Restitution or compensation: The open property question

German unification brought in train the principle of restitution, that property in the east should be restored to its former owners where that property had changed hands after 1945, or between 1933 and 1945, other than through ordinary commercial transaction or gift. This essentially backwards‐looking measure was bound to come into conflict with the need to promote investment in east Germany in the present and future, as well as to overcome the profound gulf which the years of division brought. The article examines property restitution in the general context of unification, and draws comparisons with revaluation legislation in the 1920s and the equalisation of burdens in the 1950s.     

Bhopal revisited: The view from below

Abstract

The night of 2–3 December 1994 will mark the tenth anniversary of the world's largest industrial disaster. Over the years the attention Bhopal has attracted has centered on the extended legal negotiations between the Union Carbide Corporation (UCC) and the Indian government. What is less known is that despite a settlement in 1989 and a review in 1991, the gas survivors continue to suffer untold misery. Indeed their lives are more insecure today than they were in 1984.     

GCC‐EU political cooperation: myth or reality?

Arab hopes of an emerging multipolar international system after the Cold War were immediately dashed by the second Gulf War. The US proved to be the indispensable guarantor of security, especially for the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). Nevertheless, the EU and the GCC had engaged in a successful relationship since their formal cooperation agreement in 1988. The following article gives an insight into the priorities of both. Furthermore, it asks whether the numerous political declarations of the EU‐GCC Joint Council are more compensation for stalemate in the free trade negotiations than the expression of real political ambition, with the GCC mainly interested in using the EU as an element of counterbalance and the EU primarily concerned with safe energy supplies. Finally, the article examines the probability of continuing European junior partnership with the US or a more equal role in the Gulf area—either through European initiative or an increasing American reluctance to make sacrifices in order to secure the oil flow to European economic competitors.     

Continuity in Islamic political philosophy: the role of myth

There is an essential continuity between Islamic political philosophy in the Middle Ages and today. Political philosophers in the Middle Ages explained and justified the use of mythical stories by rulers to motivate the whole of the community to behave in appropriate ways. They argued, basing themselves to a degree on their understanding of Plato, that not everyone is capable of really comprehending the reasons for certain aspects of political necessity, and so they should be led to obedience of civil law by being told stories which represent in more vivid and imaginative form the rewards and penalties which exist with respect to the law. It has often been argued that these philosophers, ranging from al‐Farabi to Ibn Rushd, were dissimulating their genuine heterodox views on the relationship between Islam and the state by arguing for the use of stories and allegories to persuade the masses that they ought to act in particular ways, while the intellectual élite can be provided with rational explanations for political action. It will be argued that contemporary and recent political writers in the Islamic world of the Middle East speak and write in a manner very similar to that of their medieval predecessors, especially when it is a matter of distinguishing between an élite and the common people, and some resemblances between political and social conditions today and in the medieval world of Islam will be drawn to try to account for this similarity and continuity.     

The church and landed property: The greek orthodox patriarchate of Jerusalem

This article analyses the creation of the accelerated Arabic language studies programme in the Israeli-Jewish school system, ‘The Oriental Classes’, over the years 1950–67. The article investigates the networks that enabled and controlled the ‘Oriental Classes’, the main actors involved in its operation, the aims of this programme as well as the ways to achieve them. It argues that this flagship programme serves as an example of the dominant orientation with which Arabic studies have been associated in Israeli-Jewish society, that of political and military intelligence needs, and that this can add a new angle to our understanding of the way Israel perceives the Arab world, vis-à-vis its relations with the Arab ‘other’ and the Palestinian citizens of Israel.     

The land question,land grabbing and agriculture in Africa

Abstract

Land grabbing has emerged as a form of production and export of food and biofuels in the Third World by enterprises owned by foreign governments and business entities. Large tracts of land are either leased or sold to these enterprises cheaply by the state, usually with the argument that such land is empty and needs to be put to good use. But land grabbing dates back to colonial times, thus substantially shaping the political economy of such countries as South Africa, Kenya and Zimbabwe. It is therefore fitting at this conjuncture to discuss land grabbing in its holistic and historical context, noting that smallholding agriculture juxtaposed against large scale commercial farming will for a long time define agrarian class struggles, the character of the state and the project of nation building.

Over the last decade or so land distribution in Zimbabwe by the Mugabe government was assumed to be heading for disaster. Recent information, however, reveals that productivity has improved, tobacco exports are improving and smallholders accessing affordable farm input and markets while getting a fair reward for their labour behave no differently from large scale commercial farmers. In the final analysis the issue of equity and poverty elimination needs to be central in addressing the land and agriculture question in Africa.     

The frontier revisited: displacement,land and identity among farm labourers in the Sundays River Valley

This paper aims to unpack the dynamics of displacement and the relationship of physical movement to elements of space (i.e. land) and place (or identity), in the Sundays River Valley, near the town of Kirkwood, in the Eastern Cape, South Africa. It primarily uses the motif of frontiers to cast light on displacement as an ongoing phenomenon and explore the different eras of occupation of land in the Sundays River Valley, from the early nineteenth century until 1970. It relates different layers of belonging and identity to the unfolding of capitalism and apartheid in South Africa. The article argues that ties to land are multiple, contested and based upon dispossession and physical movement rather than upon stability. While such a high degree of contestation of oral evidence in the Sundays River Valley might not give current claimants a detailed legal basis for restitution, it is an academically valuable idea to explore the origins of the inhabitants in the Sundays River Valley – because it can indicate the degree to which local identities are influenced by experiences of disruption and displacement. The paper argues that frontier relationships in the SRV are central in the formation of larger systems of relationships of race and class, and that this casts new light on displacement (both as a historical event and a contemporary experience), in the formation of identity and place in southern Africa.     

“Informal pluralism” and Japanese politics: Sino-Japanese rapprochement revisited

This study attempts to take the 1972 Sino-Japanese rapprochement as a case study testing the hypotheses that emerged from recent research on the pluralistic nature of Japanese politics. It concentrates on “informal pluralism,” an important characteristic of Japanese political life. Internal maneuvers of Japanese politics during the normalization process have been closely examined. These internal elements include: the Liberal Democratic Party—informal organizations in action, the ruling party/bureaucracy apparatus—informal channels, opposition parties diplomacy—informal styles, and intellectuals—informal advisory groups.