Politics

A proposal for a progressive alliance, a multi-party non-Tory electoral pact, has been bouncing around the UK political discourse for the last few years. To some it’s an appealing idea whose time might come, just as it has in the past, with the right political leadership, which at the moment is lacking. A more intriguing concept is the true progressive alliance, which relates to the existing political firmament viewed from an ecological stance. It points the way towards a transformational political re-alignment that might eventually emerge. I explain this in due course, but first a little about electoral pacts and the progressive alliance.

What are the legacies of violence on gendered patterns of political representation? We examine the long-term effects of a watershed conflict of the twentieth century: the Khmer Rouge genocide, during which 50–70% of Cambodia’s working-age men were killed. Using original data on mass killings and economic and political conditions in Cambodian communes, we find that genocide exposure is positively associated with women’s economic advancement and present-day indicators of women’s representation in local-level elected office. We conduct in-depth, ethnographic interviews with genocide survivors to explore the mechanisms by which violence spurred women into elected office. A crucial finding emerges: In areas that suffered the genocide’s worst killings, widows obtained economic autonomy, providing a template for the economic advancement of women in households maintaining conventional gender roles. The shift in norms regarding the sexual division of labor created intra-communal and intergen...

The fall of the Muslim civilization resulted from the rejection of reason. The rejection of reason was a result of the characterization of the use of reason to know revelation as kufr. The rejection of reason became explicit in the shutting of the gates to ijtihad and was reinforced by al-Ghazali’s attack on philosophers. The rejection of reason found political expression in the repression of the rationalists by Musa al-Hadi in 786. The slaughter of five-thousand philosophers was an event analogous to the Reign of Terror of the Jacobins, under Maximilien Robespierre during the French Revolution. Sixteen thousand followers of “tradition” were beheaded at the guillotine with the emergence of the Age of Reason, touted by the European Enlightenment, a millennium afterwards. In Islam, the rejection of reason made it harder to understand and follow revelation. The perception that “all knowledge is in the Quran” did not help matters. This was an example of perfunctory thought. For it automatically withheld the designation of “knowledge” from all knowledge not in the Quran. This perception was based on a problematic understanding of epistemology or what constitutes knowledge. It was a reflection of hubris. In response to the bewilderment caused the prohibition of the use of reason, exegetes alleged that revelation features “ambiguous” passages. The rejection of reason made it hard to know and follow revelation. It also made it hard to understand key terms as “mutashabihat,” “hikma,” and “hawa.” As a result, Muslims turned to tradition, which replaced reason for the purpose of explaining revelation. But to “explain” revelation, tradition had to be elevated to an “equal” of revelation and subsequently even “above” revelation.
For the expectation that it would “explain” revelation placed tradition in the position of a “judge” of revelation. The elevation of tradition above revelation reversed the relation of revelation and tradition. The word of God was subordinated to the words of persons. The reversal of the relationship between revelation and tradition facilitated the adoption of the teaching of abrogation. The abrogation of the peace verses by the ayah as-sayf transformed Islam into “political Islam.” The abrogation of revelation by tradition transformed Islam into “traditional Islam.” The application of the teaching of abrogation warped penal law. The abrogation of revelation by tradition subjugated revelation to tradition. Hence, the process that led to this requires attention. It is necessary to restore revelation to its pre-eminence in relation to tradition, to rehabilitate reason, and to ensure that all laws are in agreement with revelation rather than based on inclination. (4 pages)

L’idéologie est partout, le mot est si galvaudé que le concept s’est comme évaporé : on dit qu’une grève est idéologique pour éviter de dire qu’elle a d’autres raisons qu’une stricte revendication. On dit qu’une réforme est idéologique pour éviter de dire qu’elle s’inscrit dans la grande reprise en main autoritaire et libérale actuelle. Ce livre éclaire la notion d’idéologie, tout d’abord en précisant ce qu’elle n’est pas : ni une surface miroitante et trompeuse jetée par-dessus le réel qu’elle masquerait à des spectateurs consommateurs hypnotisés. Ni une superstructure mécaniquement déterminée par sa base économique et sociale, vision qui est celle d’un « marxisme » abâtardi. Isabelle Garo prend le contre-pied de ces interprétations convenues. Elle suit l’évolution de Marx sur la question de l’idéologie – depuis L’Idéologie allemande jusqu’au Capital – et elle en propose la poursuite contemporaine. Cette confrontation passé/présent montre que l’idéologie ne peut pas se définir une fois pour toutes, qu’elle est inséparablement liée aux affrontements et aux conflits d’idées d’un moment, au domaine des luttes et à celui des analyses théoriques. « Il s’agit d’arracher la notion d’idéologie à toute tentative de définition figée et de lui rendre sa capacité à débusquer les contradictions profondes qui reconduisent sans cesse les idées dominantes à l’ensemble d’un mode de production ».

How do leaders' idiosyncrasies are developed, and how do these, in turn, impact their political behaviour? This study traces the idiosyncratic behaviour of Presidents Andrew Jackson and Donald Trump. It details four historical traditions-Hamiltonian, Wilsonian, Jeffersonian, and Jacksonian. The study expands upon Jacksonian tradition and sees that how Trump pursued this tradition and how is his political behaviour remained similar to that of Andrew Jackson. Three specific areas in which these variables are determined are personal lives, narcissism and authoritarian behaviour, and populism and corruption. The paper also charts out the ways and means through which Donald Trump's administration is termed as Jacksonian in nature.

The de facto war on the Left The Gala Report The current "war against right-wing extremists" is in fact-and always has been-a war against the Left. Right-wing extremist J. Edgar Hoover, his successors in the F.B.I., CIA, and the national security state have waged a de facto war of terror against civil rights activists, antiwar protesters, whistleblowers, labor unions, Occupy Wall Street protestors,

The practice of taxing church property while exempting other nonprofit groups appears to violate the “no special burden” principle of the free exercise clause. The Supreme Court case of Walz v. Commission charted a course between the free exercise and establishment clause. The Court argued from neutrality, separatism, and history to state that tax exemption of church property is part of an unbroken national tradition. However, the Court’s neutrality argument does not address constitutionality, its separatism argument is contrived, and historically, only established religions have been exempt from taxation.

Past tax exemptions are rooted in two traditions: the common law adopted from England that granted exemptions to established churches, and the equity law tradition that granted exemptions to all churches. The common law tradition was restricted to certain types of church property of established churches, and the exemptions could be put on hold during times of emergency. The equity tradition gave churches another chance; ecclesiastical and charitable organizations could be tax exempt.

These traditions continued uninterrupted in the early American republic. Three provisions ultimately provided ground for a challenge to the tax exemption of church property. The disestablishment of religion undercut the authority of officials to prefer one religion over the other. The truncation of the equity tradition removed the equitable privileges given to charities. Finally, equal and uniform taxation was considered a basis of American life.

In modern theory, churches are seen as beneficial to society because they promote public morality, charity, and education. The law of equity is now based in statutory schemes or state constitutions, but the religious use of property is key to its tax exempt status. In the future, courts must find a via media between the eradication of exemptions and blanket endorsements.

To cite:
Wilkins, A. 2017. Rescaling the local: Multi-academy trusts, private monopoly and statecraft in England. Journal of Educational Administration and History, 49 (2), 171-185

For the past six years successive UK governments in England have introduced reforms intended to usher in less aggregated, top-down, bureaucratically overloaded models of service delivery as well as secure conditions for greater school autonomy.  Yet the ‘hollowing out’ of local government has not resulted in less bureaucracy on the ground or less regulation from above, nor has it diminished hierarchy as an organising principle of education governance.  In some cases, monopolies and monopolistic practices dominated by powerful bureaucracies and professional groups persist, albeit realised through the involvement of new actors and organisations from business and philanthropy.  In this paper I adopt a governmentality perspective to explore the political significance of large multi-academy trusts (MATs) – private sponsors contracted by central government to run publicly funded schools – to the generation of new scalar hierarchies and accountability infrastructures that assist in bringing the gaze of government to bear upon the actions of schools that are otherwise less visible under local government management.  On this account, it is argued, MATs are integral to statecraft and the invention and assemblage of particular apparatuses for intervening upon specific organisations, spaces and peoples.

This article studies Cypriot LGBs' identity construction processes and understandings of politics amidst the sociopolitical environment within which they are articulated. It does so by addressing a question that is central to gender and sexuality research: How are gender and sexual identities formed, and how do these formations inform gender and sexuality politics in contexts caught between tradition and modernity? Employing a qualitative research design, it thematically analyzes data from interviews with Greek-Cypriot and Turkish-Cypriot LGBs. It marks intra-ethnic and interethnic in-group exclusions. It argues that these exclusions are reinforced by local notions about modernity, expressed through the “Europe/west–versus the–rest” opposition. Nonetheless, it also finds that the successes of the Cypriot LGBTI movement have been based on opportunities created by Europeanization. Therefore, it helps develop our understanding of the implications of conceptions of nationhood, gender, and sexuality on gender and sexuality politics where the “rest” meets the “west.”

KEYWORDS: Gender, Sexuality, Identity, Politics, Modernity, Cyprus

Not-guilty verdicts, mistrials, and impunity for the Bundy family and many of their supporters in the armed confrontations over public land use in Nevada and Oregon. Expanded access for private oil, gas, mining, and logging industries and the downsizing of national monuments such as Bears Ears lead by Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke. A number of highly contentious debates and sensationalized events have again focused attention on land held in the public domain by the United States. This essay argues that federal land policy as a form of colonial administration has been constitutive for the logic of expectation as property in what is now the United States. From the state land cessions negotiated on behalf of the Articles of Confederation to the preemption acts (1830–1841) to the homestead acts (1862–1916) to present-day demands for land transfer, the acquisition and disposal of the so-called public domain have been central to westward colonization, the consolidation of the nation-state, and the promise of land ownership as the ostensible foundation of individual liberty. These dynamics are evident in contemporary conflicts over public lands and arguments for the transfer of public lands to either state or private ownership. Approaching the Bundy occupations as flashpoints that illuminate competing interpretations and claims to land within the history of westward colonization, this essay seeks to demonstrate the ways in which expectation emerges from particular economies of dispossession of indigenous peoples that have historically worked through and across the division of public and private property.

The twenty-three years (1934-1957) between the end of the US Occupation and the start of the Duvalier era were a dynamic period of introspection and change in Haitian society. The relatively high degree of freedom of expression, the proliferation of ideologies like Marxism and Noirisme, and the "Revolution of 1946" were all linked to a transformation of Haitian politics and culture unprecedented since 1804. One clear indication of the spirit of this chapter of the country's history, which I have labeled the Haitian Sixties, was the progress made by the Kreyòl movement. After the setbacks under the US Occupation, the call for a legitimation of the popular language entered a phase of renewed vigor: it was bolstered by groundbreaking philological studies, concerted attempts to create a standard orthography, experiments in the use of the Kreyòl language as a medium of instruction, and a renaissance in Kreyòl-language literature. Yet as the movement progressed, it was hampered by new internal divisions and longstanding prejudices at different levels of Haitian society.

The European Parliament (EP) adopted, between 2004 and 2009, a series of resolutions calling for recognition of Communist crimes and commemoration of their victims. This article focuses on an overlooked aspect of anti-Communist activism, the awareness-raising activities carried out by some Central European Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) to perpetuate the cause through networks that enable them to exchange institutional credibility, scientific legitimacy, and policy-oriented knowledge with Institutes of National Memory, parts of academia, and victims associations. Although they use the techniques of expertise and scandalization that are often effective in European institutions, these memory entrepreneurs have largely failed to further their claims in the European Union (EU) after 2009. In line with the turn toward “practice” in EU studies and the increased attention paid to agency in memory politics, this article contends that the conditions of production of their narrativ...

FOR LIJIANG OLD TOWN 丽江古城, 1 June 2016 was not a happy day. More than 800 hostels, guesthouses, and shops refused to open their doors. They had made a collective decision to protest against the local government’s insistence that they collect an eighty-yuan ‘conservation fee’ 维护费 from foreign and domestic tourists. The shop owners, mainly migrants from other parts of China, complained that the seemingly arbitrary nature of the request was hurting business. The three-day protest resulted in a dramatic decrease in tourist numbers —transforming this popular vacation spot into a ghost town.Places like Lijiang easily become stereotyped ‘theme parks’ in which local communities play a marginal role, entangled in the battle between local bureaucracies and business. It is in this struggle that old towns lose the very core of their cultural value.

This paper analyzes the prehistory of the War on Terror to explore how the meanings counterterrorists attributed to “terrorism” in the 1990s. A Tom Clancy novel, Rainbow Six, read in the context American cultural shifts in the 1990s surrounding capitalism, technology, globalization, and gender, reveal a counterterrorist fantast of mirroring terrorist dissociation from state institutions to engage in extralegal practices. These tactics range from breaking international law to torture, anticipating the War on Terror. The paper concludes with a consideration of the possibility that 9/11 may have slipped into a pre-existing cultural narrative rather than starting a new one.

Political movements and personalities have been given nicknames in Zimbabwe.
Through an analysis of nicknames used on social and print media as well as in
popular music, this paper argues that nicknames describe physical appearances,
character traits and also utterances they make. Through a close examination of
nicknames given to several politicians and political movements from postindependent
Zimbabwe, this paper argues that these names and naming practices
achieve a certain number of objectives. Initially, it allows citizens to discuss
political figures particularly against the background where some politicians such
as the President cannot be easily spoken about. Moreover, the fluidity of nicknames
allows for a ridiculing of politicians especially when they do not live up to the
offices they hold. Drawing on Mehrabian and Piercy’s (1993) theoretical work on
nicknames, this paper concludes that nicknames can be viewed as what James
Scott (1985) terms “weapons of the weak” given that they have a “hidden
transcript” that make it possible for simple citizens to resist, oppose and challenge
those in power.

"Baruchello’s Philosophy of Cruelty, the second collection of his essays, turns a difficult and emotionally charged topic into a surprisingly informative and enlightening read. Covering the history of Western philosophy’s treatment of cruelty as a topic, yet relating every point to present-day occasions of violence and injustice, this book is a touchstone for any discussion of cruelty as a philosophical theme. It pulls no punches, yet it leaves you standing taller." (Dr. B. Myers)

(cf. http://www.brendanmyers.net/nwpbooks/baruchello2.html - incl. table of contents; the book can be ordered from Amazon or the publisher)

Please note that all author's royalties are devolved to charity.

The early broadcast era and our current platform era bear some striking resemblances, but one parallel looms large: In the 1940s, we lost a key battle to build a potentially liberating and wondrous medium—and we are on the cusp of doing so again. Then as now, commercial operators defined the terms by which we could use our core communication and information infrastructures. While reaping tremendous profits from the public airwaves, a few corporate firms became the sole providers for much of the nation’s media.

È uscito il volume A. Pascale, Ascesa e declino dell'impero statunitense, tomo 1 – Genesi di un regime elitario (dalle origini al 1945), La Città del Sole-L'AntiDiplomatico, Napoli 2022.
Il testo consta di 620 pagine ed è acquistabile al prezzo di 28 euro nelle migliori librerie e con uno sconto dai rivenditori online. 
Di seguito un breve abstract, l'Indice, una presentazione dell'Autore e la bibliografia utilizzata.

Jakarta’s Government has development agenda for eradicating poverty with education. The government has view if education can eradicate poverty. Education has effect for increasing human capital to foster economic development (Midgley and Hall, 2004: 145; Minza, 2010: 224). The Jakarta Government for realizing it build facilities and infrastructures with 8258 schools in Jakarta (Jakarta BPS,2015). The main problem in education is expenditure cost for reaching school, especially for poor household. Jakarta Government’s gives solution for this problem with provide social protection on KJP program (Jakarta Smart Card). This essay would like to discuss the implication of KJP on education acces for poor household.

"En las siguientes páginas se analizan principalmente dos aspectos. En primer lugar, la posición de los diferentes actores políticos y sociales marroquíes con respecto a la situación de los derechos civiles y políticos. De entre estos actores me ha
interesado especialmente el movimiento de defensa de los derechos humanos. La pregunta que subyace en todo el estudio es en qué medida este movimiento contribuyó a la liberalización del régimen y en qué medida puede contribuir a su democratización.
Con esta intención he analizado su cultura política, sus características sociológicas y, sobre todo, su posición y margen de maniobra dentro del campo político (vínculos e instrumentalización por el poder, relaciones con los partidos políticos, con actores internacionales, etc.). Se trata de determinar la capacidad y los límites de un movimiento que ha experimentado una importante transformación en las últimas tres décadas. El contexto represivo de los años setenta (en el
que el movimiento únicamente podía preocuparse de su propia supervivencia y debía guardar silencio sobre gran parte del dossier represivo de los años de plomo) se suavizó a finales de los ochenta, y la liberalización se consolida en la segunda
mitad de los noventa."

In recent decades, civil society organisations (CSOs) have grown both in number and in their impact on policy-making, at European and also non-Member state level. Public institutions, motivated by the need to increase their legitimacy, have increasingly delegated functions to CSOs. Concomitantly, CSOs have expanded their access to public funding. In part because of increased access to public funding, and in part because of a stronger relationship with public powers, CSOs are under pressure to demonstrate that they use the resources they are given in an efficient, accountable and transparent manner, e.g. by adopting policies on fiscal transparency, and by maintaining financial solvency. The EU's interest in regulating CSOs is relatively recent. At present, the legal framework addressing CSOs' financial accountability includes two 'categories' of norms: those that regulate the award of public contracts and the concession of grants, and those norms that address transparency and openness. The first category includes the rules on public contracts and the rules on (co-)financing of CSO projects; whereas the second category includes the Financial Transparency Initiative (FTJ) and the Joint Transparency Register
(JTR). The FTJ gathers all information on EU funding in a single database. The JTR gathers information produced by the various organisations (including CSOs) that are interested in lobbying the EU, and who register voluntarily. Defining the boundaries of CSO fiscal accountability and effectively tackling cases of fraud or financial mismanagement remains a difficult endeavor. On the one hand, the EU still lacks a single overarching understanding (and, consequently, legal definition) of CSOs. This translates into the absence of clear legal definitions, and more generally into
the opacity of the information available on CSOs through EU databases. Moreover, as CSOs are 'private entities', they are not submitted to the same integrity mechanisms and norms that apply to public institutions, including internal and external oversight. Finally, a significant administrative burden imposed on CSOs may, in the end, counter EU efforts to tackle financial mismanagement by CSOs. In many respects, the issue of CSO financial accountability has come to resemble a dialogue of the deaf: EU institution-proposed reforms have been postponed, or have not produced the outcomes expected, or have been fiercely opposed by CSOs. At the same time, the self-regulatory tools (including policies on selecting donors, self monitoring and codes of conduct and standards) developed by CSOs to enhance their
financial accountability have not obtained official recognition from EU institutions.

Unlike the bulk of penological scholarship dealing with managerialist reforms, this article calls for greater theoretical and research attention to the often pernicious impact of managerialism on criminal justice professionals. Much in an ideal-typical fashion, light is shed on: the reasons why contemporary penal bureaucracies endeavor systematically to strip criminal justice work of its inherently affective nature; the structural forces that ensure control over officials; the processes by which those forces come into effect; and the human consequences of submission to totalitarian bureaucratic milieus. It is suggested that the heavy preoccupation of present-day penality with the predictability and calculability of outcomes entails the atomization of professionals and the dehumanization of their work. This is achieved through a kaleidoscope of direct and indirect mechanisms that naturalize and/or legitimate acquiescence.

As a German historian recently remarked, for Germany Adolf Hitler was the “off-spring,” the outstanding legacy, of World War I, and no one doubts that.1 He himself started his political career in 1919 in the wake of a lost war and the crushing peace of Versailles. That treaty reduced Germany’s territory by 14 percent and its population by 6.5 million citizens. It created for Germany large minorities outside its new borders and for the time being an unlimited reparations liability.2 Hitler’s rise to dictatorship is unthinkable without the humiliation and misery that resulted for the German people out of their defeat. And still: was he bound to become the war’s nemesis in destroying the Weimar Republic? This article thus asks the question whether Hitler’s rise to power from Germany’s defeat to the proclamation of the Third Reich was inevitable. For that purpose the ways in which Germans tried to come to terms with their defeat and the war’s legacies will be discussed. As an illustration the article focuses on two highly popular political doctrines, both legacies of the war of its own—both in different ways denying the hopelessness of Germany’s military situation at the end of the war. These were: (1) the doctrine of the so-called “stab-in-the-back” (Dolchstoss); and (2) the doctrine of the so-called “war guilt lie” (Kriegsschuldlüge). At its conclusion, this analysis will raise the question as to whether Hitler’s exploitation of these two doctrines immediately led to his dictatorship.
(1) The stab-in-the-back doctrine first was foreshadowed, when, on October 3, 1918, the German government requested an armistice with the Allies and peace negotiations on the basis of the peace program that President Woodrow Wilson had propagated. To the German public this move was an absolutely shattering surprise. Until then the German High Command had failed to admit the increasing seriousness of Germany’s military position resulting from strategic overstretch and military exhaustion.3 Instead, all the public had perceived was that the German troops fighting in France had protected them against the direct experience of war and that in the East Germany's predominance extended as far as the Caucasus Mountains. How then could Germany’s bid be explained?4 Could it be that the million-fold sacrifice of lives had been in vain? The gap that throughout the war had yawned between far-flung popular hopes and the grim military reality thus deepened even further. Other, non military reasons, it was believed, must have been behind Germany’s sudden giving up. The German military command concealed what it had confessed to the political leadership in Berlin—that it feared German troops in France were on the verge of being routed. To avoid a public loss of face, it claimed that nonmilitary reasons lay behind Germany’s critical military situation. Ludendorff, the de facto highest commander of Germany’s troops, concocted an explanation by inventing the stab-in-the-back doctrine. Germany had sued for an armistice, he asserted in a confidential talk with his officers, because it had become impossible to continue the war. This was due to the “poison” of Marxist–Socialist propaganda that had undermined the soldiers’ resolution to go on fighting and made them “unreliable,” although the chances of a successful defense, if not victory, continued to be good.5 Ludendorff’s statement initiated a lengthy process of political onus shifting between military and civil authorities, between the Right and the Left, regarding the responsibility for the military disaster that was threatening their country.6
Actually, the antecedents of this doctrine went further back—well into the fall of 1916. At that point, under the impression of a precarious military situation during the battle of the Somme, the first doubts arose in Germany regarding the prospects of a victory. A heated controversy about the war’s purpose and Germany’s war aims broke out. The military leadership and the exponents of the nationalist right kept insisting that a total victory was indispensable that would ensure sizable annexations, improve Germany’s geopolitical position, and entail a reward for the sacrifices the German people had made. Significantly, it was also held that only the perspective of a total victory would maintain morale at home and at the front.7 The forces of the German Center and Left, not least Labor, on the other hand, pressed for a peace of accommodation based on a military tie as the only realistic way out of a war that Germany apparently could not win. The real reward of the war seemed to be liberal reforms in Prussia and the Empire.8 On July 19, 1917, a majority of the German Reichstag passed a resolution demanding just that.9 To the rightist die-hards this amounted to outright treason subverting the public morale. According to the Right, internal reforms could not be a substitute for military victory.10

This essay seeks to explore the expressions of power and persuasion in Tony Blair’s victory speech in 1997. Firstly, a theoretical framework about power and persuasion in political discourse is demonstrated. Secondly, the context of sociopolitical context of the speech is analyzed and the theoretical underpinnings of Political Discourse Analysis (PDA) are presented in the framework of Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA). Thirdly, utilizing some linguistic tools based on the Halliday's and Matthiessen's (2004) functional grammatical theory, the speech is analyzed investigating the linguistic features that attribute power and persuasion.