SPLM–NCP asymmetrical power relations jeopardise the implementation of the CPA and the future of the Sudan

ABSTRACT

The political instability that has characterised Sudanese politics since independence is attributable to political exclusion, economic neglect and marginalisation. Discrimination based on religion, language and culture has constituted the main contradictions between the masses of the Sudanese people (periphery) and the politically dominant Arabised Nubians (centre) in all the different politico-ideological hues experienced by the nation. Attempts to resolve this contradiction have left the structural imbalances inherited from the colonial administration of the Sudan intact. This explains the resurgence of war, particularly in Southern Sudan. The recent peace agreements between the National Congress Party (NCP), namely the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) with the Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A); the Darfur Peace Agreement with the Sudanese Liberation Movement (SLM) (Minawi); the Cairo Agreement with the National Democratic Alliance and the Eastern Sudan Peace Agreement with the Eastern Sudan Front, have left the NCP still in firm control of the oppressive state machinery. The CPA power-sharing protocol awarded the NCP a majority which institutionalises a power asymmetry that the NCP utilises to obstruct implementation of the CPA and delay the process of democratic transformation.

This article analyses the asymmetry in the NCP–SPLM partnership and power relationship. It assumes that the tragic death of Dr. John Garang de Mabior is a major cause of the political weakness demonstrated by the SPLM since 2005. This power imbalance jeopardises the CPA implementation and the future of the Sudan as a state.     

Ahmed İhsan and the ‘Wealth of the Sciences’

In the past, weekly journals often served as the primary vehicle for the publication and dissemination of high-quality literature. Novels and plays were often serialized in such periodicals, which also featured items of poetry, essays and even political analysis. The Turkish weekly Servet-i Fünun [Wealth of the Sciences] which began publishing in 1891 and closed down in 1944 attracted contributions from the best Turkish writers of its time, and its very name became a banner for new currents in Turkish literature, whether poetry or prose. Part of its success was due to the single-minded labours of its founder and editor, Ahmed ?hsan, a journalist and novelist of distinction. The article attempts to assign to the journal and its editor their proper place within the history of Turkish literary journalism.     

Responding to Western Critiques of the Muslim World: Deconstructing the Cliché of Islamophobia and the Genealogies of Islamic Extremism

This paper is premised on the questions of whether Islam as a religion, spiritual domain, cultural practice and philosophy should be held responsible for whatever activities the Muslims choose to do in their personal capacity. Does the ascribed status of individuals being Muslims and their choice of declaring themselves as terrorists in the name of Islam entail that they are true followers of the religion and have been theologically and spiritually inspired by it? These questions have sprung up because Islam as a religion has constituted the fundamental component of western interpretation of the reasons for the rise of violent extremism involving Muslim radicals. In this context, the objective of this paper is to examine how the contemporary western interpretations, linking the actions of Muslim extremist groups with those of the ontology and epistemology of Islam, are predicated on a faulty cognition of the nature and the guiding principles of that religion itself. To accomplish this, the paper critiques Samuel Huntington's ‘clash of civilizations’ thesis and Bernard Lewis's version of the roots of Muslim extremism.     

Understanding the War in Syria and the Roles of External Players: Way Out of the Quagmire?

With Western commentators, media and think tanks still being the predominant determinant of the global international relations discourse and therefore also of the discourse relating to Syria, discerning actual realities coherently from the fog of a very biased narrative presents great challenges. Deciphering the complexities of West Asia has never been easy and the situation in Syria is particularly complicated. This article argues inter alia that the Commonwealth as an entity needs to add its efforts, voice and prestige to the global effort to prioritize the restoration of peace in West Asia in general and Syria in particular.     

The Terminal Crisis of the “Participatory Government” and the Election of Lee Myung Bak

This paper examines the election of Lee Myung Bak through the terminal crisis of the Roh Moo Hyun government that preceded it. I start with an analysis of the election of Lee Myung Bak and the electoral strategies of the liberal-progressive bloc in the December 2007 election and then move on to detail how these strategies shed light on tensions within Korean progressive politics since the transition to democracy in 1987. These tensions inform what I shall call the “terminal crisis” of Roh's “participatory government.” I argue that this crisis involves a problem of articulation within progressive politics between a politics of reunification and one grounded in egalitarian economic reform, including the lack of an alternative to the different forms of neo-liberalism embraced by both the Roh government and the conservative government of Lee Myung Bak. My hope is that thorough examination of these tensions that have informed the liberal-progressive bloc during the long decade since 1987 can spur reflection on the role of social movements in Korean democratisation and the dilemmas they face in crafting strategies for political and economic reform.     

Technology and Empire: A Colonial Narrative of the Construction of the Tonkin–Yunnan Railway

ABSTRACT

The Tonkin–Yunnan railway constituted a significant piece of transport infrastructure of the French colonial empire in Asia. The 848-kilometer railroad was a technical achievement that took ten years to complete (1900–1910) at the cost of thousands of lives. Albert Marie, a young French engineer, worked on the construction of the Chinese section of the railway over a three-year period, from August 1904 to May 1907. Through the letters he sent to his family and the photographs he took during his assignment, vignettes of everyday life in the expatriate community and the local population, as well as of the daunting work on the construction sites in a hostile physical environment, are narrated in a very candid manner. The hardworking, ambitious, and (at times) bewildered engineer, like many of his contemporary fellow countrymen, was hopeful about French rule in parts of mainland Southeast Asia and southwestern China in the early twentieth century. Technology, in particular, was believed to be the instrument of civilization and modernity that would drive France's imperial expansion in the region and elsewhere; in 1907, Albert Marie left Yunnan to work on another daunting colonial railroad project, the Constantinople–Baghdad line.     

Imperialism and incorporation—the case of Chinese Silk

Abstract

In the last decade, studies of the silk industry and trade have been at the center of the continuing debate over China's development in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Although silk, like the other case studies, has limitations for unveiling the overall picture of China's “underdevelopment,” the silk industry, as Lillian Li and other writers point out, provides a particularly valuable vantage point for exploring the debate because: (1) silk was China's most important export, accounting for one-third of total export value in the mid—nineteenth century and one-fifth in the early twentieth century; (2) China's silk industry was centered in the two regions around Canton and Shanghai that were the most important centers of imperialist penetration; (3) silk exports provide a case for comparison with Japan, since Japan and China were the two leading exporters of raw silk in the world market in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The most critical point, I sense, is the fact that Japan's silk industry was the major, indeed the only, competitor for China's silk industry. And Japan also happened to be the most important imperialist power that Chinese scholars have pointed to in explaining the failure of China's silk industry. Therefore I would stress their relations as well as comparisons of their performance.     

Sheikh Qaradawi and the Internal Palestinian Struggle Issues Preventing Reconciliation Between Fatah and Hamas and the Influence of the Qaradāwi Era over the Struggle Between the Organizations

Sheikh Dr Yusuf al-Qaradawi is one of the most influential Muslim thinkers in the world. Western observers consider him a moderate, a bridge between Muslim conservatives and Islamic activists. This article, through direct translation of Sheikh al-Qaradawi's verbal and written expressions, shows the view of him as a moderate to be wishful thinking when it deals with the Palestinian problem. This article deals with issues preventing reconciliation between Fatah and Hamas and the influence of the Qaradawi era over the struggle between the organizations.     

Antithesis – the reconstruction of the African Union for a viable and sustainable solution for the unity of Africans

ABSTRACT

Franz Fanon, the Algerian revolutionary of African descent, once declared: ‘Each generation must, out of relative obscurity, discover its mission, fulfil it or betray it.’ The challenge confronting African researchers on matters related to the Afro-Arab borderlands – regions spanning Tchad, Niger, Mali, Mauritania and the Sudan where the African and Arab worlds meet – centre on resolving, reversing and undoing historical denials and inaccuracies. This article critically reviews the falsification of history in this part of Africa, in the Sudan in particular, and the role of the Arab League, the Organisation of the Islamic Conference, the Organisation of African Unity and its successor the African Union, in addressing the plight of its inhabitants. The article concludes with the recommendation of the creation of a new, culturally based Pan-African organisation able to fill a void and offer redress.     

‘Sowing the Seeds of Love’? Determinants of Local Coalition Formation and Termination between the CDU and the Greens, 1994–2016

Drawing on empirical evidence from 11 CDU–Green coalitions in large German municipalities, this article investigates the determinants of formation and termination of black–green minimal winning coalitions. Such coalitions are likely to be formed if the mayor is a party member of either the CDU or the Greens, if one of the two parties dominates the local party system, and if the SPD suffers from severe vote losses. Furthermore, the results indicate that CDU–Green coalitions are primarily formed if neither the CDU nor the Greens have gained a parliamentary majority with their ‘usual’ coalition partners. Ideological connectivity, however, does not play a major role. Regarding coalition stability, Christian Democrats and Greens are able to govern successfully for an entire legislative term in most of the cases. If a coalition is terminated early, however, this is due to a party breaking the coalition agreement by voting on specific policies together with the SPD in the local council.     

The Jewish–Arab Conflict and the Disintegration of the Ancient Jewish Community in the Village of Peqi‘in

The fate of the last community of Arabized Jews in Palestine, in the Galilee village of Peqi’in is surveyed. Peqi’in (al-Baqi’a in Arabic) is still known as the “Village of the Four Religions,” because of its unique mix of Jews, Christians, Muslims, and Druze, who lived together for centuries in good neighborly relations. Although the Arab-Jewish conflict might not have seemed relevant to the Peqi’in Jews, who had lived there for centuries, they were ultimately pushed out of the village. This pioneering study describes how the Peqi’in Jews, who had became a symbol for the Zionist enterprise, were forced from their home, although senior Zionist leaders strove to protect them and even made them a test of the alliance between the Zionists and the Druze. The sequence of events is recounted, from the start of the Mandate through the stillborn attempt to return the Peqi’in Jews to the village after the establishment of Israel.     

‘On the outskirts of the Empire’: Joseph Brodsky and Lithuania

This article explores the role of Lithuania in Joseph Brodsky’s life and works before and after his exile from Russia in 1972. As a former Soviet republic, Lithuania represented an intermediary space for Brodsky both culturally and geographically, contributing to his realization that it was a ‘rehearsal’ for his actual emigration. However, Brodsky’s notion of Lithuania changes when, after 1972, instead of representing a simulacrum of the ‘abroad,’ the poet sees Lithuania as a ‘home’ from afar. Emigration, in Brodsky’s case, thus became a realization of the myth of exile implicit in his earlier texts about Lithuania.     

Soviet musicology and the ‘nationalities question’: the case of latvia

Nation branding, as a phenomenon, is attracting increasing scholarly attention. However, much of the existing literature has been written by those involved in the public relations industry themselves. There have been some studies which have been written from a critical viewpoint; however, the tensions of branding a nation have often been neglected. This paper aims to explore the inherent tensions between nation branding and nation building. To what extent is nation branding a tool or a practice? What images of the nation do branders seek to promote, and who is this image for? Is nation branding merely a more palatable version of nationalism? In particular this paper focuses on the debates surrounding the launch of Brand Estonia in 2001/2. Brand Estonia, with the slogan Welcome to Estonia: Positively Transforming, was launched to coincide with Estonia staging the Eurovision Song Contest in 2002. It is a unique and interesting case study given the level of controversy that the initiative generated amongst the Estonian public. Estonia was the first Former Soviet Republic to launch a nation branding project and, perhaps more controversially, it was managed by a British-based company, Interbrand. However, little scholarly attention has been paid to public-level discourses concerning Brand Estonia. The empirical findings discussed in this article highlight some of the more salient narratives on national identity that Brand Estonia engendered and therefore aims to fill this gap.     

The biopolitics of China’s “war on terror” and the exclusion of the Uyghurs

This article provides an overview of People’s Republic of China (PRC) counter-terrorism policies targeting Uyghurs since 2001 when the state first asserted that it faced a terrorist threat from this population. In reviewing these policies and their impact, it suggests that the state has gradually isolated and excluded Uyghurs from PRC society. Drawing on the writings of Michael Foucault, it articulates this gradual exclusion of Uyghurs as an expression of biopolitics where the Uyghur people as a whole have come to symbolize an almost biological threat to society that must be quarantined through surveillance, punishment, and detention. Rather than suggesting that these impacts of China’s “war on terror” coincide with the intent of state policy, the article argues that they are inevitable outcomes of labeling a given ethnic population as a terrorist threat in the age of the Global War on Terror.     

Guarding the honor of the nation and the prosperity of the state: National Defense of Lithuania ‘Iron Wolf’ (1928-1930)

The radical right, semi-clandestine, and paramilitary organization called the National Defense of Lithuania ‘Iron Wolf’ (1928–1930) is, perhaps, the best known and the only example of an attempt to introduce a fascist form of governance in interwar Lithuania. Established and controlled by the Lithuanian Nationalist Union (Lietuvi? tautinink? s?junga) authorities, its first and foremost task was to protect the new nationalist regime from its political opponents, spread propaganda, as well as report any acts of societal disloyalty and disobedience. The short-lived organization was shut down due to conflict between the highest authorities and the threat that ‘Iron Wolf’ was beginning to pose to President Smetona’s rule.     

Ruling the Desert: Ottoman and British Policies towards the Bedouin of the Naqab and Transjordan Region, 1900–1948

The various policies developed by the Ottomans and British for governing the indigenous Bedouin tribes of the Negev/Naqab and Beersheba (southern Palestine) region between 1900 and 1948 are examined using primary sources. Whereas Ottoman attempts to pacify the tribes in southern Palestine and Transjordan were somewhat ineffective, the British Mandate achieved a degree of control and stability by incorporating tribesmen into the Palestine Police, strengthening the frontier areas and enhancing inter-territorial tribunal arrangements between Beersheba, Sinai and Transjordan.     

Negotiating power and authority in the desert: the Arab Bedouin and the limits of the Ottoman state in Hijaz, 1840–1908

This article explores the techniques and strategies used by Ottoman authorities to control the Bedouin with a specific focus on the province of Hijaz between 1840 and 1908. Using primary sources from the Ottoman and British archives, it argues that the Ottoman Empire developed a ‘politics of negotiation’ towards the tribes in its attempt to secure cities and major pilgrimage and trade routes against tribal attack. The principal agents of the empire who made this negotiated governance possible were the amir of Mecca and the governor of Hijaz. As a result of this policy, imperial authorities had to give significant concessions to the tribes, and they thus incorporated them into the province's imperial order. When the Ottoman economy went through a crisis, as in the 1900s, negotiated governance and order faced great problems.     

Uzbekistan's ‘spirit’ of self-reliance and the logic of appropriateness: TAPOich and interaction with Russia

The article looks at Uzbekistan's political economy from the perspective of a logic of appropriateness, an approach that takes rules to be the underlying principle of action. The rules are mostly in line with a ‘spirit’ of self-reliance (mustaqillik), which has shaped Tashkent's international engagement since independence. From the perspective of those rules, the article reveals some important features of Russian–Uzbek relations, particularly the difficult and often tense negotiations over the future of the Tashkent Aviation Production Association (TAPOich). Self-reliance and the rules by which it was comprised were not, in the end, conducive to long-term cooperation with Russia in the aviation sector, where collaboration was first and foremost necessary.     

The sword,the pen,and the uterus: multidirectional feminist culture and the Argentine dictatorship of 1976–1983

During the period 1982–1999, a cohort of feminist cultural activists highlighted parallels between the political, gendered, racial, and linguistic frameworks used to justify state violence in Argentina of 1976–1983 and in Germany of 1933–1945. Their cultural works indicate the transnational aspects of Argentina’s failures of modernity, and the parallel responsibilities to trauma memory assumed by women and Jews as marginalized members of society, who consequently emerge as both local and transnational agents of democratization. A number of scholars have noted Argentine writers’ and playwrights’ adoption of Holocaust cultural constructs to represent the 1976–1983 dictatorship, yet these cultural contributions have not yet been studied from the combined perspectives of post-Holocaust and post-dictatorship feminist scholarship. By providing a gendered analysis of “Holocaust multidirectionality” within a global arena of “postmemory,” this article shows the convergence of the two terms in the cultural production of women who remember, represent, and transmit the experience and meaning of the Argentine military dictatorship.