‘Communication’ in the era of ‘Empire’ and ‘multitude’

SUMMARY

Politics has been described as “an aggregate of persons in a power perspective of elaborated demands and expectations”. From this the collective nature of politics can be clearly seen. Without communication, however, no collective action is possible and consequently no political action. Based on this politics can be seen as the continuous defining of collective action in the context of mutual power relations in which there are differences (inter alia of objectives and methods) and consequently conflict over the allocation of scarce resources. Even though there has been an early interest in the relationship between politics and communication, e.g. Aristoteles and Julius Caesar with his Acta Diurna, systematic study of the relationship between communication and politics and the generation and regulation of conflict is of recent nature. A review of the literature on the theory and research in the field of political communication indicates it to be of original interest to researchers from fields such as journalism, mass communication, political science and speech communication. Recently, however, political communication emerged as a field on its own worthy of its recognition as a subdiscipline of communication science: it is recognized by professional bodies like the International Communication Association it is a separate area for research, teaching and for publication of journals devoted to it.     

Evaluating authorial ‘objectivity’ and ‘stancetaking’ in reporting the making of a new constitution in Zimbabwean newspapers

ABSTRACT

Zimbabwe held ‘fresh’ elections on July 31, 2013 under a new constitution. This was in line with the provisions of the Global Political Agreement (GPA), a political power-sharing compromise signed between Zimbabwe's three main political parties, following the heavily disputed 2008 harmonised presidential and parliamentary elections. The GPA established in Zimbabwe a Government of National Unity (GNU). On the road to making a new constitution, political differences and party politicking always seemed to take precedence over national interest. This political polarity in Zimbabwe resulted in the heavy polarity of the media, especially along political ideological grounds. The new constitution-making process and all its problems received heavy coverage in almost all national newspapers. This article analyses the discourse-linguistic notion of ‘objectivity’ in ‘hard’ news reports on the new constitution-making process by comparing the textuality of ‘hard’ news reports from two Zimbabwean national daily newspapers: the government-owned and controlled Herald and the privately owned Newsday. Focusing on how language and linguistic resources are used evaluatively in ways that betray authorial attitudes and bias in news reporting, the article examines how the news reports uphold or flout the ‘objectivity’ ideal as explicated through the ‘reporter voice’ configuration, and within Appraisal Theory.     

Developing a critical pedagogy of ‘research-based’ teaching in Islamic studies

Studying Islam and Middle Eastern politics has become highly popular, particularly in American and British universities after the 9/11 and 7/7 terrorist events. Unfortunately, the increasing interest in Islam and Muslims in the West is often based on (mis)recognition of images of Muslims in the media. This has created a new set of problems of ignorance and misunderstandings about terrorism and the Islamic world. The intent of this article is to outline a ‘critical pedagogy’ of research-based teaching for Islamic studies and illustrate how this kind of pedagogical engagement better equips students to ‘problematise the natural, cultural and historical reality’ and dominant Orientalist assumptions about the relationship between Islam and terrorism. This article shows how research-based teaching can help students to become critical thinkers to connect knowledge and power while studying Islam and Middle Eastern politics.     

Transdisciplinary innovation research in Uzbekistan – one year of ‘Follow-the-Innovation’

In 2008, a German-funded interdisciplinary research project in Khorezm province, Uzbekistan, initiated a participatory approach to innovation development and diffusion with local stakeholders. Selected agricultural innovations, developed by the project and identified as ‘plausible promises’, have since then been tested and modified accordingly by teams of researchers, local farmers and water users. This paper discusses the challenges faced in this process of joint experimentation and learning between researchers and local stakeholders whose behaviours, attitudes and actions are heavily shaped by the local context, academic discipline and hierarchical culture of knowledge governance.     

Bringing politics back in: the introduction of the ‘performative power’ of counterterrorism

While it is sensible that governments and academics endeavour to assess the effectiveness of counterterrorism policies, this article argues that it is almost impossible to measure arithmetically the outcome of counterterrorism efforts for a variety of reasons. However, this does not mean that the effect of governmental policy cannot and should not be assessed. This article argues that it is not necessarily the policy measures and their intended results as such, but much more the way in which they are presented and perceived, that determine the overall effect of the policy in question. The article introduces the concept of ‘performativity’, which involves the extent to which a national government, by means of its official counterterrorism policy and corresponding discourse, is successful in selling its representation of events, its set of solutions to the terrorist problem, as well as being able to set the tone for the overall discourse on terrorism and counterterrorism. Due to the distinct relation between the performative power of counterterrorism efforts and the arc of violence carried out by terrorist movements, analysing the level of performativity will provide an indication to the effectiveness of counterterrorism policies. It is argued that a low level of performative power generally has a more rapidly neutralising effect on radicalisation and political violence than large-scale, public counterterrorism efforts.     

Garden of Eden? The impact of resettlement on squatters' ‘agri-hoods’ in Fiji

Since the mid 1990s, squatter settlements in Fiji have been expanding at a phenomenal rate, largely due to the non-renewal of agricultural land leases and inadequate urban governance. In response to squatter growth, the government of Fiji has implemented a squatter-resettlement scheme. This scheme threatens the livelihoods of squatters engaged in urban agriculture, or ‘farming squatters’. In this article, interviews with key informants and squatter residents will reveal contrasting attitudes and approaches to the issue of ‘farming squatters’. The article suggests a more participatory process to address the needs of ‘farming squatters’.     

Mining codes in Africa: emergence of a ‘fourth’ generation?

A burgeoning interest among academics, policy-makers and civil society groups has developed concerning Africa's extractive sector and particularly its mining codes, which are now at the centre of a wider policy debate over natural resource governance and economic development on the continent. This article reviews the evolution of Africa's regulatory codes in the mining sector, which has undergone what Bonnie Campbell describes as ‘three generations’ of liberalization since the 1980s. We also highlight new voluntary, regional and transnational initiatives, driven by a host of heterogeneous actors from Africa and abroad, which constitute a ‘fourth’ generation of mining codes and natural resource governance practices that place primary emphasis on transparency and accountability by both mining companies and host governments. This new generation of natural resource governance initiatives presents new opportunities as well as unique challenges, particularly with the growing role of emerging economies such as the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa). We conclude by assessing future trends and policy challenges in Africa's extractive sector governance.     

The symbiosis between Palestinian ‘Fayyadism’ and Israeli ‘economic peace’: the political economy of capitalist peace in the context of colonisation

Abstract

Recent years have seen both the Palestinian Authority and Israeli government conveying the supremacy of economic approaches over politics to achieve peace and stability. More specifically, the encounter and symbiosis between Palestinian 'Fayyadism' as a professional application of neo-liberal approaches to state-building and economic development, and the Israeli strategy of 'economic peace' towards the Palestinians have shaped much of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict dynamic, with a particularly discernible materialisation in the West Bank. This article critically analyses this dynamic in light of the recently revived theory of 'capitalist peace', which, despite valid criticism, entails considerable similarities with the basic assumptions of 'Fayyadism' and 'economic peace'. While two key dimensions express this symbiosis—security co-ordination and economic normalisation—the article focuses mainly on the economic part, particularly the case of joint industrial zones, which exemplify the most extreme example of this symbiosis.     

The concept of ‘respect’ in African culture in the context of journalism practice: An Afrocentric intervention

Abstract

For decades, since the debate about the role of the media in post-colonial Africa emerged, a distorted interpretation of the meaning of ‘respect’ in the African cultural context has persisted in academic discourse to the present day. The distorted view suggests that according to traditional African beliefs it is disrespectful to criticise authoritative figures. On this basis, in some African countries journalism students have opposed criticism of heads of states, arguing that it is un-African to do so. On the other hand, journalism academics and practitioners have condemned and dismissed the concept of ‘respect’ in African culture as undemocratic and inimical to the role of journalism as a tool for democracy. This article argues that a critical examination of the concept of ‘respect’ in the African cultural context reveals that historically, in traditional Africa, ‘respect’ was not equated to obsequiousness by the citizens in their encounter with power. Sycophancy and submission in the face of power were invoked in the name of a falsified version of African culture by postcolonial power-hungry dictators, who sought to entrench themselves by distorting African culture for self-serving purposes.     

‘The camp’ and ‘the lesser evil’: humanitarianism in Sri Lanka

This article examines the 2009 humanitarian disaster in Sri Lanka through fieldwork conducted at the time and through theoretical lenses supplied by Arendt, Foucault and Agamben. The article suggests that this catastrophe represents a salutary example of the consequences of promoting a ‘lesser evil’ in the context of a government-fuelled human rights disaster. In line with Arendt's critique of the ‘lesser evil’, the case illustrates the limits to prioritising compromise, quietude and ‘access’. At the same time, while ‘democracy’ and ‘terror’ have frequently been posed as opposites, this tragedy shows how democratic forces, nationally and even internationally, can embrace something that approximates to Agamben's ‘camp’, a state of emergency in which entire groups of people lose their rights and can, at the extreme, be killed with impunity. Meanwhile, a pervasive official language of ‘care’ and ‘humanitarianism’ (corresponding to Foucault's politics of ‘life’) not only proved entirely consistent with ethnic cleansing and the large-scale killing of civilians; it also actively assisted in this endeavour by creating a smokescreen behind which massacres could be carried out.     

The perils of ‘going local’: liberal peace-building agendas in Nepal

Responding to recent critiques, foreign aid organisations are increasingly ‘going local’ in their operations in order to integrate local actors into their peace-building and aid projects. This is done under the belief that entering into partnerships directly with grassroots actors will increase local autonomy in joint ventures, thus empowering locals as agents of change both during and after the project period. But despite its normative and conceptual appeal, we argue that this model is not workable in practice and cannot be under the current structural conditions of the international aid environment. This is due to a fundamental disconnect between the conceptualisation and rationale of ‘going local’ and the structural and institutional frameworks within which ‘local ownership’ is supposed to be operationalised and implemented. This paper uses the example of Nepal to illustrate that this disconnect not only prevents foreign aid organisations from reaching their stated goals, but exacerbates the very problems that ‘going local’ is supposed to address.     

Russia and the role of the OSCE in European security: a ‘Forum’ for dialog or a ‘Battlefield’ of interests?

Abstract

This essay explores Russia's Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) policy, by focusing on two questions. First of all, analysts have noted Russia's disinterest and obstructive policies towards the Organization. Thus, the question is what – if anything – does the Russian Federation still want from the OSCE? Secondly, does the OSCE still serve as a forum for dialog? These two issues are studied on the basis of rational institutionalism and realism. The essay demonstrates that Russia is still interested in the OSCE, but its policy has become more pragmatic, selective and instrumentalist. It includes obstructive and constructive strategies. At the same time, today the Russian Federation ascribes less significance to the Organization in European security. This is predetermined not only by its inability to push its interests through the OSCE, but also by the declining interest of other participating States in the Organization. The differences between OSCE participants have turned it into a battlefield of interests in many areas.     

Internal borderlands: architectures of force and state expansion in India’s central ‘frontier’

India’s Maoist insurgency, a conflict in the geographic heartland of the country, is often portrayed as symptomatic of the underdevelopment and weak governance of the region. Rhetorically, the state has pursued a counter-insurgency strategy premised on a tandem of ‘security’ and development, while emphasising the conflict zone’s rootedness in the nation. This discourse ignores that historically the state has treated the region as a hostile ‘borderland’. This paper argues that the Indian state’s counter-insurgency is structured around a set of strategies of absorption. Drawing on James C. Scott’s examination of Zomia, as well as Henri Lefebvre’s theories of the state and space, this paper examines processes of militarised state expansion. Focusing on the construction of roads, government-controlled resettlement camps, forward operating bases and militarised schools, this paper conceptualises these particular state spaces as ‘architectures of force’: material manifestations of a larger project of highly militarised and acutely violent state-building.     

Millenarian aspects of ‘white supremacist’ movements

Since the mid‐1980s, press accounts have widely reported the activities of a new variety of radical right‐wing groups often characterized as ‘white supremacist’. Among groups to which the label has been attached are Aryan Nations, The Order, Posse Comitatus, and The Covenant, Sword and Arm of the Lord. These groups share a belief system made up of five elements: (1) ‘Identity’ theology, which asserts that whites of Western European extraction are direct descendants of the Biblical tribes of Israel; (2) a doctrine of racial superiority, which places ‘Aryans’ at the summit of a four‐race hierarchy; (3) belief in a world Jewish conspiracy; (4) admiration for Nazism, together with acceptance of ‘Holocaust revisionism'; and (5) a millenarian view of history, emphasizing the imminence of the ‘last days’. Such organizations typically draw from this belief system implications directly relevant to the study of violence: (1) the desirability of withdrawing into self‐sufficient, often paramilitary, communal groups maintaining minimal contact with outsiders; and/or (2) seeking direct confrontation with political authority in the form of terrorism and guerrilla warfare (for example, The Order's crime wave in 1983–84).     

‘Peace-building as state-building’? Rethinking liberal interventionism in contexts of emerging states

Contemporary policy-making guided by the ‘liberal peace’ holds that peace is necessary for states to emerge, and that peace-building and state-building do not only go in tandem, but are mutually reinforcing. Yet, in view of both the historical record of state-making and empirical evidence provided by liberal interventionism, this proposition appears questionable. While scholars have shown that state-making has, historically, been as much associated with war than with peace, cases from Afghanistan to Somalia suggest that state-making is inherently conflictive, frequently upsetting nascent peace. In order to shed light on the reasons underpinning the relationship between prevailing peace-building practices and the fundamental exigencies of state-making, this article pursues a theoretical argument. It proposes that while peace-building is principally about creating a situation of non-violent co-existence despite prevailing differences and, thus, essentially geared at accepting and enshrining institutional and identity pluralism, state-making is vitally aimed at replacing institutional and identity multiplicity with greater degrees of rule hegemony and standardisation. Applying the prism of ‘rule standardisation’ to the nexus of peace-building and state-making, this paper seeks to advance existing debates on this delicate relationship.     

‘We're not like that’: Denial of racism in the Afrikaans press in South Africa

Abstract

While the South African media on the whole underwent significant shifts after the demise of apartheid, repositioning was especially acute on the part of the Afrikaans-language press, which during the apartheid years largely served as legitimising institutions for apartheid and now had to adapt to the changing democratic political and social environment. This repositioning coincided with a liberal consensus in the news media in general, in terms of which individual rights, independence of the media and freedom of speech were emphasised. What complicated matters for the Afrikaans media was the need to retain the loyalty of primarily white Afrikaans readers, who remained attractive to advertisers, while having to orientate itself in relation to the new centres of political power in the country. The precarious balance between the liberal consensus of individual rights and freedom of expression on the one hand, and the imperative to carry a torch for Afrikaans cultural identity in the new dispensation, comes to light in news coverage of a recent racist incident at a historically white, Afrikaans university. This article will seek to explore editorial comment on the incident in selected Afrikaans media, to indicate how the event was interpreted and presented as an individual transgression, rather than a systemic and historically determined problem.     

‘Communities of practice’: prospects for theory and action in participatory development

‘The myth of community’ permeates both the understanding and the practice of participatory development. Yet the idea that communities exist as coherent units of people who inhabit bounded geographic spaces and are ready to be mobilised for development restricts the very agency that participation promises. This article offers an alternative model of community: one that is more compatible with the ideal of people-centred, participatory development. Using Etienne Wenger's concept of ‘communities of practice’, and drawing on narrative theory and cognitive approaches to policy analysis, the article argues that community should be created and sustained around shared meanings.     

Comments (1) on ‘cultural differences in the behavior of terrorists’

By examining the historically progressive role of cultural property in terrorism and political violence, this paper reveals the evolving significance of art to international security. Over the past two centuries, abuse of antiquities and fine art has evolved from the spoils-of-war into a medium for conducting terrorism that strives to erase the cultural heritage of “the other.” In contrast to wartime destruction and plunder which date back millennia, the growth of the art market over the past fifty years has created opportunities for novel abuses of cultural property. Since World War II, maturing international awareness has recognized the threat which armed conflict and looting pose to cultural property, but in parallel, art trafficking and the politics of cultural property have become tools for transnational organized crime and terrorist groups. The resulting unique intersection of issues in art, politics, and counterterrorism forms the basis for a new field—cultural security. After an assessment of topical security threats which suggest the need for such a field, the paper concludes by speculating on international-security risks precipitating from antiquities trafficking and collecting.     

Access to information law and the stalled ‘winds of change’ in Zambia

Zambia, like a few other African countries, has been grappling with the adoption of the Access to Information (ATI) law over the past 25 years. This article argues that the Zambian approach towards easing access to public information has been faulty, because it is narrowly focused and this has resulted in the process stalling. The argument is made here, that the ATI law is part of a global social movement towards greater transparency. Furthermore, the article focuses on Zambia's approach to the law (whose push is dominated by executive control) and how that approach has impacted on good governance. The article also discusses how some countries have dealt with similar laws, before concluding that unless Zambia's move towards this law is broadened, whatever may be enacted in the future could be faulty.