The strange imputation of violence to liberation theology

Liberation theology identifies the existing distribution of power as a form of oppressive domination rooted in violence. The existing system justifies itself through a tightly woven fabric of economic, political, religious and social rationalizations. The most basic rationaliztion is the ‘paradigm of the inverted sacrifice’, wherein aggressive groups perceive harmless outsiders as ‘different’, as a threat, and ultimately sacrifices them, either through direct extermination or through oppression. In the modern era, this oppression is reflected in a ‘structure of dominance’ which guarantees the enrichment of a few and the disenfranchise‐ment of the masses. Liberation theology challenges the rationalization of the status quo on several key points: (1) the inappropriateness of using God to justify the ‘sacrifice’ of the poor and downtrodden to a system based on their exploitation; (2) the need for a fundamental redefinition of God to expunge the need for victims as the basis of the socioeconomic system; (3) the need to understand that history is a process of conflict; (4) the necessity to ‘desacralize’ all violence.

The critics of liberation theology reject these propositions either because they misunderstand them, or because they currently enjoy advantages that would be lost if these ideas were actualized. Noting the reference to violence in the literature of liberation theology, biased critics falsely assert that it preaches revolutionary violence and that liberation theologians are enemies of the poor. Over the past few years, these arguments have become less persuasive: the Vatican has recognized the need to correct structurally‐determined inequalities, and political candidates linked to liberation theology have made better showings in polls. Unfair criticism continues, but liberation theology shows promising glimmers of success in Latin America.     

解放神学在菲律宾：处境化与回应

解放神学是20世纪60年代诞生于拉丁美洲的一种基督教社会主义思潮,自诞生以来,对亚洲、非洲等第三世界国家天主教会的神学思想转变与社会实践带来巨大影响。一方面,解放神学直接推动第三世界国家的天主教会关注穷人的困境与国家的政治经济问题,探索穷人获得解放的途径;另一方面,解放神学不可避免地面临处境化与本土化的适应与挑战。菲律宾作为亚洲重要的天主教国家,菲律宾的天主教会在解放神学的影响下,积极探索解放神学对菲律宾社会的适应,对解放神学理论做出了新的阐释与发展,不仅极大地丰富了解放神学的理论,而且积极地推动了解放神学在亚洲社会的实践,对当代菲律宾的社会政治运动产生了深远影响。     

The context of American millenarian revolutionary theology: The case of the ‘identity Christian’ church of Israel

It is popularly believed that the millenarian Christian Identity theology movement in the United States is inextricably associated with revolutionary violence. This article examines the Church of Israel, an important center of Identity theology, to determine whether or not that popular impression is consistent with the facts in this case and with the Identity movement as a whole. It differentiates among the competing appeals of the far right wing offering taxonomies of organization types and ideological appeals. The conclusion is that while Christian Identity theology represents a revolution within the religious tradition, its adherents have rarely resorted to revolutionary violence, following a pattern familiar to earlier millenial movements in which the dominant motif was partial withdrawal from society punctuated by unusual and exceedingly short outbursts of violence.     

How Martin Luther King,Jr’s Pacifist Liberation Theology Makes Reinhold Niebuhr’s Political Realism Possible

Reinhold Niebuhr crafted a compelling theologically based theory of political realism, which became the basis for a withering critique of pacifism. Martin Luther King, Jr was influenced by Niebuhr’s Augustinian realism in his own political theology and practice. However, King lived and thought from a different perspective, had more apocalyptic expectations of divine intervention in history, and embraced pacifism. I argue that Niebuhr fell short of his own realist vision through his idealistic faith in US democracy, and that King’s political theology better enacts Niebuhrian realism. I suggest King achieves this largely because his theology is a liberation theology grounded in pacifist praxis in solidarity with the oppressed. By rejecting Niebuhr’s acceptance of American violence and basing his theology on lived confrontation with American violence, King makes Niebuhr’s political realism possible. This reading of King and Niebuhr illustrates the value of pacifism and theology for political theory and practice.     

Gender relations,authoritarianism and democratization in Chile

This article takes Chile as a case study to examine how the women's movement, the non‐governmental sector and the state have worked together to design policies for the prevention of domestic violence, and to transform the culture of authoritarianism which remains an integral part of gender relations within the state and in society. It conceptualizes the linkages between gender relations, authoritarianism and violence, examines how violence against women became a prominent issue during the transition to democracy, and shows that women's organizations have made significant advances in Chile as elsewhere in Latin America, by framing legislation on violence against women within the context of women's human rights. The study indicates that collaboration between the state, women's organizations and the police force can provide a window of opportunity to promote a democratic culture within the state and society.     

Latin American terrorism and the Soviet connection revisited

In the late 1970s and early 1980s, a number of scholars and journalists argued that the USSR was sponsoring terrorism as a means of low‐intensity conflict against the non‐communist world. This view was endorsed by the Reagan administration. This article assesses what substance there is behind such charges as they relate to Latin America. Its main argument is that sponsorship of terrorists has usually occurred as a byproduct of Soviet support of armed revolution as a tactic rather than for terrorism as such. Soviet willingness to assist armed struggle has varied over the last three decades. The article concludes that, given the current priorities of Soviet Latin American policy, Moscow's sponsorship of armed struggle, including terrorism, is decreasing and will almost certainly continue do so.     

Critique,Use and World in Giorgio Agamben's Genealogy of Government

This article explores the implications of Giorgio Agamben's genealogy of government for our understanding of critique. Agamben argues that the providential government of the world of Christian theology has bequeathed to the West an ontology of will and command. Replacing the pantheistic world of Stoic late Antiquity, the Christian world must be other than it is. The lack that this introduces is central to Agamben's account of nihilism, as it was also for Nietzsche. But what does this mean for critique? Does critique belong to the nihilistic tradition of the West; occupying the still-warm seat of God inasmuch as it finds the world wanting as if from the outside? Does this mean we are left only with affirmation—passively acceding to the world as we find it? Or is this alternative of world-rejection/world-affirmation a false one? Agamben's concept of use seeks a way out of it.     

Palestinian women,violence, and the peace process

Much has been written about the contribution of Palestinian women to their nation's liberation struggle. They have not only survived in an atmosphere of remorseless violence, but have also made remarkable strides in terms of their rights and development as women. A question that has been less explored is the long-term impact of violence against women, whether in terms of their physical and psychological well-being or of their ability to participate in a meaningful way either in the conflict itself or in the post-conflict situation. This paper argues that, although Palestinian women are not simply victims but also agents of violence, such violence--whether random or institutionalised, perpetrated by the enemy or by their own people--places significant constraints on their ability to participate in the national liberation struggle. Consequently, they are inadequately prepared to contribute towards the peace process and, therefore, are prevented from realising their full potential in the new state.     

中国与拉美国家关系中的美国因素

近年来,中国与拉美国家的关系持续快速发展引起美国特朗普政府的警惕,美国采取多重手段公开阻扰中拉合作,包括在拉美事务上频频发表反华言论、加大打击拉美左翼政权、拉拢右翼政权组建"反华阵营",并警告与中国新建交的拉美国家。特朗普政府施压手段取得了一定成效,部分拉美国家对华态度有所调整,但从长远看,基于中美关系、美拉关系及中拉关系的本质特点,未来中拉合作仍将保持良好势头。不可忽视的是,美国将继续阻扰中拉关系发展。中国应妥善应对中拉关系中的美国因素,保证中美拉三边关系良性互动。     

An ‘Aladdin's lamp’ for free enterprise: Eisenhower,fiscal conservatism,and Latin American nationalism, 1953–61

This study explores the Eisenhower administration's efforts to promote free trade and investment policies in Latin America. US officials believed that private capital investment, rather than US foreign aid, would best promote Latin American economic development and improve its abiliry to purchase American products. By eliminating the need for foreign aid, Latin American economic autarky complemented Eisenhower's zeal for fiscal conservatism. Although most scholars have focused on the primacy of anti-communism in Eisenhower's inter-American policies, this study contends that economic nationalism posed the greatest threat to Eisenhower's policies. US officials eventually responded by expanding aid to Latin America, but the additional economic aid was always intended to complement private capital, rather than replace it. This article, based upon the papers of influential administration officials and State Department records, sheds considerable light as to why the United States promoted free trade and investment policies in the developing world, as it still does today.     

特朗普执政以来美国对拉美政策的调整及其影响

在美国的全球战略中,拉美地区历来占据着重要而特殊的位置。长期以来,美国视拉美为自己的“后院”,在拉美拥有独一无二的主导权和影响力。特朗普政府执政后,公开祭出“门罗主义”的旗帜,大幅度调整对拉美的政策,展现出更公开的干涉行径、更浓厚的利己色彩、更明显的分化企图和更强烈的排外取向,意在将拉美打造成一个政治上亲近美国、经贸上依赖美国、安全上不威胁美国的“后院”。短期看,特朗普政府对拉美的政策调整取得了一定的成效,对拉美的掌控有所强化。但长期看,美国和拉美地区之间的深层次矛盾和冲突并未完全纾解,在特定的时空背景下甚至存在进一步被激化的可能性;与此同时,特朗普政府对拉政策的调整还加剧了大国在拉美展开战略博弈的风险。特朗普政府的拉美政策如何进一步演变和发展,美拉关系如何变化,这些课题值得中国学界高度关注并深入研究。     

Mano Dura: El Salvador responds to gangs

Although it is increasingly recognised that violence, crime, and associated fear are challenging democratic governance in Latin America, less attention has been paid to the ways in which state responses to crime contribute to the problem. By analysing El Salvador as a case study, this article addresses three key interconnected issues in the debate. First, it explores the dynamic of violence. It then locates youth gangs as violent actors within this context. Finally, it addresses the state response to the growing phenomenon of youth gangs. It is argued that current strategies, dubbed Mano Dura – Iron Fist, employed by the Salvadoran government serve to reveal the fragility of the democratic project, exposing the underside of authoritarianism that remains key to Salvadoran political life in the transitional process from civil war to peace.     

Richard Nixon and Economic Nationalism in Latin America: The Problem of Expropriations, 1969–1974

During the late 1960s and early 1970s, the Nixon administration confronted the problem of how best to protect US economic interests in Latin America during a period of rising economic nationalism. After extensive debate, the president approved a policy designed to deter expropriations and rein in nationalist economic sentiment by threatening to terminate US and international financial assistance to countries that expropriated American holdings without prompt and adequate compensation. As it turned out, however, this policy was little short of a disaster. Nixon's stance heightened American unpopularity during a period when US credibility in Latin America was already on the wane, and failed to have any restraining effect on either the number of expropriations by Latin American countries or the strength of economic nationalism in the area. Informed by domestic and bureaucratic pressures and the same ideological proclivities that have long characterized American relations with the underdeveloped world, Nixon's policy on the expropriations issue ultimately proved ineffective and even pernicious to US interests in Latin America.     

History Catching Up with the Present? State-Society Relations and the Argentine Crisis

This article complements the view that socio-political elements underpin the causes of the current crisis by focusing on the 'Latin Americanisation' of Argentina through the acuteness of social tensions. This is attributed to economic and political change since the 1930s, through an increasingly 'politicised state', captured by self-interested actors and alienated from civil society. Based on a brief theoretical overview of state-society relations in Latin America, the essay examines how Argentina's political economy set it apart from the rest of the region until only recently. The article argues that due to dramatic changes beginning with the last military regime (1976-83), Argentina is becoming more like the rest of Latin America in its pattern of state-society relations, and the current crisis is only the most dramatic reflection of this. It concludes that the challenge facing all Argentines is to take advantage of this 'good opportunity' to set the historical record straight, so to speak, and use the space these democratic institutions provide to resolve longstanding problems before the crisis turns into a tragedy.     

A transformation from political to criminal violence? Politics,organised crime and the shifting functions of Haiti's urban armed groups

In 2004, an unlikely combination of rural insurgent groups and urban gangs fought over the fate of President Aristide and brought Haiti to the brink of civil war. Ten years on, the country is still plagued by instances of armed violence. While most policy experts and practitioners seem to agree that over the last decade, violence transformed from a political into a criminal phenomenon, scholars remain divided over the question of whether Haiti's urban armed groups should be framed as a political movement or as hardened criminals. Drawing on semi-structured interviews and overt observation conducted during six months of fieldwork in Haiti in 2013, this article argues that it is crucial to refocus the analysis on the functions gangs fulfil on behalf of their politico-criminal sponsors. In contrast to the proclaimed internal shift from political to criminal motivation, this approach suggests that the constantly changing priorities of political entrepreneurs and organised crime groups shape the nature of the violent service offered by urban armed groups. The findings of this article mirror comparable dynamics in other countries in Latin America or sub-Saharan Africa and have crucial implications for international agencies working in the urban environment and dealing with urban armed groups.     

中国共产党与拉美共产党关系的曲折发展

1949年中华人民共和国成立,拉美各国人民特别是这些国家的进步力量和共产党受到极大鼓舞。20世纪50年代和60年代初,中共与拉美各国共产党的关系比较密切。到1960年,拉美22个共产党和工人党中,有18个党与中共建立和发展了友好关系。60年代初期,拉美共产党虽然与中共有分歧和争论,但仍与中共维持着正常往来。1965年至70年代后期,由于拉美大多数共产党在国际共运大论战中支持苏共立场,中共与拉美多数共产党的关系恶化和中断。与此同时,从拉美老共产党分裂出来的新党陆续与中共建立起党际关系。中国“文化大革命”结束和改革开放开始之后,大多数拉美共产党与中共恢复和发展关系,中共也调整了与拉美新党的关系。无论是与拉美老党还是与拉美新党的关系,中共都遵循中共十二大确立的“独立自主,完全平等,相互尊重,互不干涉内部事务”党际关系四项原则。此后,中共在党际关系方面,又突破了主要与共产党交往的传统,开始尝试与拉美民族民主等各类政党开展交往并取得重大突破,党际交往逐步由外延向内涵转变。     

美国“新门罗主义”拉美政策及面临的挑战

自特朗普政府上任以来,美国对拉美政策奉行“新门罗主义”,加大了对拉美国家的干预,反映在经济、政治和安全等领域,如鼓噪“美国优先”,大打“贸易牌”“移民牌”,使前任奥巴马政府与古巴关系正常化的努力出现全面倒退,甚至拒绝承认委内瑞拉民选总统马杜罗而另行“任命”一个代理总统瓜伊多等。当今世界处于百年未有之大变局,拉美政治、经济格局也经历着深刻变化。中国、俄罗斯等在拉美的影响力不断增强。“一带一路”倡议在拉美落地生根,深化了中拉政治、经济互信;俄罗斯强硬支持委内瑞拉加剧了美俄博弈,导致美国“后院失火”的可能性增大,迫使特朗普深度调整美国对拉美政策。这一政策调整对美国究竟意味着全球战略扩张还是战略收缩,值得探讨。特朗普的拉美政策不仅会影响美拉关系及美拉双方的发展,也将影响中拉关系的发展。本文尝试对美国“新门罗主义”拉美政策的现状、原因和影响进行分析,并考察其面临的挑战。     

土生白人与拉美独立运动

在拉美国家历史上,土生白人上层是一个重要而独特的阶级,既是殖民地社会统治阶级的组成部分,又是拉美独立运动的"领导阶级",更是独立后拉美各共和国的统治阶级。本文通过对土生白人与拉美独立运动之间互动关系的考察,主要提出了以下几个观点:拉美"土生白人独立派"是独立运动的领导者,因为土生白人中既有独立派,也有观望派和保王派,而独立派中也有激进与保守之分;拉美独立运动是"一场没有社会革命的政治革命",独立运动的领导者当时不仅提出了一系列关于社会革命的政策主张,而且也采取了一些落实措施,只不过因遭到保守势力的抵制与反对而最终成效甚微;拉美独立运动的胜利并未完成社会革命的任务,而在更大程度上,土生白人统治阶级把新生的共和国政权继续作为阶级与种族压迫的工具,把维护本阶级的利益与实现民族解放对立起来,使殖民地时期的许多前资本主义制度长期延续下来,从而既无助于民族国家的建设,也阻碍了资本主义的发展。     

The European Union and Latin America: ‘Transformative power Europe’ versus the realities of economic interests

Relations between the European Union (EU) and regional subgroups in Latin America (Mercosur, the Andean Community and Central America) are clear examples of ‘pure interregionalism’ and provide evidence of the EU's active promotion of regional integration. Within the context of these cases, this article explores what type of international power the EU wields, how interregionalism is embedded in that power, and how it is deployed. Combining strands of literature on EU–Latin American relations, interregionalism, EU external policy and power provides a framework within which interregionalism can be understood as an important normative and practical tool for the EU's external power projection. Drawing on official documentation and interviews with key individuals, the paper highlights the EU's articulation of power in interregional relations and reflects upon its mixed success. It concludes that, while imperial qualities and aspirations can be observed in the EU's penchant for interregionalism, the transformative power of the EU remains limited.     

2010年拉美地区安全形势

2010年,拉美地区安全形势整体上比较稳定,但因缉毒斗争、领土争端、政权交接和国际势力干预引发的暴力冲突和军事危机时有发生,如墨西哥贩毒集团的恐怖暴力活动严重影响了地区安全,阿根廷与英国关于马岛问题的主权归属问题再起冲突,洪都拉斯政权交接之后恐怖暴力活动仍然频繁,委内瑞拉与哥伦比亚两国边境纠纷错综复杂,厄瓜多尔警察骚乱事件使得该国局势存在变数。此外,美国、欧盟和俄罗斯加强了在拉美地区的军事存在,以巩固各自的传统势力并争夺新的势力范围。与此同时,南美洲国家联盟和里约集团等拉美区域性组织在维护地区安全中的作用日益明显。