Ethnicity and the politics of heritage in Uzbekistan

The UNESCO office in Uzbekistan has been relatively successful in nominating cultural practices to The Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. Selection for the List conveys prestige and draws international attention to local culture that is deemed of universal value. What is striking about the first successful nominations from Uzbekistan is that they point to the inseparability of Tajik and Uzbek culture, a touchy subject for both Uzbekistan and Tajikistan. In this article the author looks at how the politics of ethnic cultural heritage play out through these projects, highlighting the tensions between a rhetoric of diversity promoted both by UNESCO and by the official national ideology, and practices that demonstrate a more mundane, ethnically exclusive sense of national culture. Although ostensibly celebrating the rich diversity of Uzbekistan's national culture and eschewing the strict delineation of Tajik culture from Uzbek culture, the effect of UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage programmes is to perpetuate the occlusion of Tajik culture in Uzbekistan.     

The Nexus between National Party Preferences and State Elections – A Long-Term Perspective

State elections are one of the most prominent features of Germany's multi-level political system. The prevailing view is that the standing of the national governing parties has a major influence on the results of state elections. Still, two perspectives on the nexus between national party preferences and state election results have so far received less scholarly attention: First, it remains unclear if short-term changes in the national government's popularity also have an effect on state election results. Second, do results of state elections also influence the standing of the national government? A reason for this might be that short-term factors are becoming more important for government evaluation and vote choices. This paper responds to these two questions by examining the nexus between state elections and the standing of the national government in a long-term perspective from 1977 to 2005 and by means of cross-sectional and time-series analyses.     

National unity and reconciliation in Rwanda: A flawed approach?

This article examines the Rwandan government's national unity and reconciliation policy and one of its key elements, the National Unity and Reconciliation Commission (NURC). It contends that while the NURC potentially represents an innovative model that other post-conflict societies could adapt and use, the central premise on which both the commission and the government's broader national unity and reconciliation policy are based is critically flawed. The unity that they are endeavouring to achieve, as a vehicle for reconciliation, relies upon a negation of ethnicity – a core component of the 1994 genocide – and hence does not allow for an open and honest engagement with the past. The problem is further compounded by the government's attitude towards the prosecution of crimes committed by the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF), which not only demonstrates that ethnicity remains highly significant but also underscores the incomplete and partial way in which the past is being addressed.     

Identity and Foreign Policy: Canada as a Nation of the Americas

Using Canada's relations with the Americas as a case study, this article seeks to better understand the link between identity and foreign policy. It argues that there is a gap between the Canadian government's recent efforts to construct a state identity increasingly turned toward the Americas and Canadians' national identity as it is expressed through public opinion. It concludes that the most plausible explanation for this gap probably has to do with Canada's European cultural heritage. The analysis shows that the projection of national identity into foreign policy is a much more complex process than the projection of state identity.     

Conceiving of Telecom: The Politics of Australian Telecommunications Reform 1967–1972

This article explores the politics of telecommunications reform between 1967 and 1972, during which time Labor developed a new policy approach that included committing to reconstitute the Postmaster‐General's Department as a relatively independent statutory authority. This represented the first serious attempt to reconcile the conflicting objectives of Australian policy: to provide affordable universal services by a government department expected to operate as a “business‐like” enterprise, and ended the political consensus about how national telecommunications should be delivered. The paper contrasts Labor's policy with the Liberal‐Country government's more incremental approach; and highlights a significant public policy shift that has received insufficient attention.     

Poetry of witness: Uzbek identity and the response to Andijon

This article focuses on poetry written about the 13 May 2005 events in Andijon, Uzbekistan to examine how Uzbek identity is expressed in relation to the narrow nationalism of post-Soviet Uzbek state culture. While the Uzbek government insists the 13 May events were a justified retaliation against armed insurgents, the authors of the Andijon poems portray the episode as a brutal attack on innocent civilians by government forces. In so doing, they not only contradict the official state narrative, but challenge the legitimacy of the government's construction of Uzbek identity and nationhood. This article examines the content, language and distribution of the poems as well as the persecution and arrests of their authors. The cases of these dissident poets touch on a number of theoretical issues—among them nationalism, identity, authoritarianism and literary politics—which have risen to the fore as a result of the Andijon events.     

UZBEKISTAN AND THE UNITED STATES: INTERESTS AND AVENUES FOR COOPERATION

Uzbekistan has recently initiated a series of reforms in the wake of (former) President Islam Karimov's death in 2016. To what extent and why does Tashkent seek to liberalize? Concurrently, the United States - which curtailed ties with the Uzbekistani government in the aftermath of the 2005 Andijan massacre - has expressed renewed interest. What do Washington and Tashkent seek to gain by improving relations? This article posits that while the United States aspires to bolster regional support for the War in Afghanistan, Uzbekistan is mainly interested in consolidating a new regime and balancing against nearby Great Powers. As such, President Shavkat Mirziyoyev's reformist drive should not be construed as a categorical embrace of good governance but a means to reestablish Uzbekistan's geopolitical footing after more than a decade of isolation. Based upon this assessment, both sides can work to foster avenues for cooperation, while the United States encourages Uzbekistan to liberalize at its own pace.     

Becoming Hebrew. The Creation of a Jewish National Culture in Ottoman Palestine

This paper discusses the factors that resulted in the formation of the short-lived Socialist Republican Party (SRP0 in December 1951, with emphasis on the Sudan government's role in its formation. Rivalry between the Khatmiyya and the Ansar was a strong factor in the formation of the party. The Sudan government hoped that the party would develop into a centre party representing the people of the Sudan and that would enlist the support of the Khatmiyya. The paper argues that this movement was too late as the political map of the Sudan had by then been drawn and there was no chance of success for the SRP in the circumstances. The formation of the SRP indicates a crisis of government; the Sudan government's frustration and despair led to the formation of the party. This is evident in the British documents and the private papers of the civil servants of the Sudan government which, in addition to the papers of the SRP, are the main source of this paper.     

The Salience of Ideology: Fifteen Years of Presidential Elections in El Salvador

The victory of the FMLN in El Salvador's presidential elections of March 2009 has been considered remarkable, given the dominance of ARENA in four consecutive presidential races from 1989 to 2004. Using individual‐level data, this article examines the determinants of electoral support for both parties over the past 15 years. Several statistical models illuminate some of the factors that led to ARENA's dominance and ultimate defeat. A combination of variables associated with different theoretical models of voting helps explain the choices made by Salvadoran voters over the years. The most consistent predictors of vote have been voters' self‐reported ideology and their evaluation of the incumbent government's performance. The 2009 turnaround relates to fundamental changes in the national and international context, and also to the selection of candidates.     

Explaining Strike Outcomes in Chile: Associational Power,Structural Power,and Spatial Strategies

Research on strikes has traditionally focused on how economic, institutional, and political variables shape strike patterns. Recent work examines how workers' structural, associational, and symbolic power facilitate strikes. Building on this research, this article asks, what factors determine strike outcomes? It analyzes four strikes at MADECO, Chile's largest copper manufacturer, across democratic, authoritarian, and postauthoritarian regimes. Using qualitative and documentary evidence, it argues that strike outcomes reflect workers' capacity to halt or disrupt production and to access government allies who can pressure management to settle strikes in workers' favor. Outcomes vary based on the political composition of government, workers' capacity to halt production, and industry's and government's dependence on foreign investment. MADECO workers' location in Santiago, near national officials, allowed them to mobilize at the local, national, and international scales to pressure management. Comparisons with other strikes in Chile, Argentina, and Peru identify similar mobilization patterns.     

Parties over: The demise of Egypt's opposition parties

Heeding Eberhard Kienle's deliberalisation argument and Maye Kassem's work on legislative elections in Egypt, the article explores the government's tactics in causing fragmentation in Egypt's legalised political parties. In this vein, it extends both arguments applying them to opposition parties in Egypt. Since 1998, the Political Parties Committee (PPC) has closed seven of the sixteen legal opposition parties. The government is not only stifling group development, but also preventing prominent independent members of parliament (MPs) from using already existing parties to challenge the ruling National Democratic Party (NDP). By examining the government's tactics towards opposition parties, this article shows that a re-entrenchment of authoritarianism has emerged, and argues that Egypt's democratisation process has ended.     

What price access to the open seas? The geopolitics of oil and gas transmission from the Trans-Caspian republics

In the late 1980s, the Soviet Union was the world's largest hydrocarbon producer. The landmass over which these resources are distributed is vast and the reserves mostly landlocked. To convey these hydrocarbons to refineries and to market, the Soviets constructed the largest integrated pipeline networks in the world. After the dissolution of the Soviet Union, new competing national interests have produced tensions over these energy resources and transmission corridors, with economically detrimental and often irrational consequences. In Central Asia, the post-Soviet Republics of Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan produce significant amounts of hydrocarbons and export their oil and gas to or through Russian Federation territory. Russian government policy aims to continue exercising political control over these resources and to maximize Moscow's share of profits from their export. This paper examines oil and gas transmission issues in Central Asia, against a backdrop of emerging new relationships between the Russian Federation and the three post-Soviet republics, the resurgent strategic competition between Russia and the United States, China's developing power base in the region and Iran's potentially key geographic position for channelling Caspian energy supplies towards the Persian Gulf.     

Gorton and the Re‐Making of Political Tradition in Foreign Investment Policy

This article examines the Gorton government's tentative, but significant role in reshaping Australia's approach to overseas investment, focusing on the role of the Prime Minister himself. Prime Minister Gorton and his Cabinet ultimately accepted the need to pursue a more overt form of economic nationalism for political gain. This provided a basis for subsequent governments to offer more direct, national government intervention in foreign investment decision‐making to the Australian polity. Historical accounts and more recent assessments are drawn on to make this case and point to the legacy of Gorton and his government in the political management of foreign investment in Australia. The approach to foreign investment that emerged during Gorton's government demonstrated to subsequent governments the worth of developing a calibrated response that appeared to address populist concerns while still enabling substantive and increasing investment inflows.     

Land policy in post-independence Eritrea: A critical reflection

After a brief review of the traditional land tenure systems in a historical perspective, the article attempts to identify and discuss the main tenets of the post-independence government's land policy and explains the reasons underlying the government's decision to opt for state ownership, in spite of the bleak track record of such a property rights regime, instead of building on the wealth of the historically transmitted, culturally embedded, and socially sanctioned tenurial regimes in the country. On the surface, there appear to be well-thought-out arguments underlying the government's land policy as underpinned by the land law. This article questions the main assumptions and the reasons that support this policy.     

Dynamics of water reallocation and cost implications in the transboundary setting of Ferghana Province

While in the international literature water sharing in the Syr Darya Basin per past agreements is widely portrayed as most benefiting Uzbekistan, here the dynamics of water allocation within small transboundary tributaries in Ferghana Province show Uzbekistan as benefiting least. The case study highlights that water allocation for Uzbekistan within the tributaries has decreased over the years. Uzbekistan's approach to compensate for the reduced allocations by means of other water sources has had large long-term cost implications for irrigated agriculture as well as the irrigation bureaucracy. This article contributes to the international debate on benefit sharing in transboundary rivers. The article highlights that costs should be incorporated into the benefit-sharing approach, and therefore the focus on benefit sharing alone is misguiding riparian states. Furthermore, the article raises the need to reevaluate benefits, since perceptions of potential benefits change over time.     

Wildlife policy matters: inclusion and exclusion by means of organisational and discursive boundaries

As a result of shifting wildlife policy, approximately one-sixth of South Africa's total land has been ‘game-fenced’ and converted for wildlife-based production during the last three decades. The wildlife industry has thereby become a multibillion rand industry with an increasingly vocal political arena. Seeing nature and its production as an organised political project, this article sets out to give insight into the shifting power relations between wildlife utilisers, government officials and civil society in South Africa. It does so by examining the production of dominant narratives on wildlife in the emerging organisational field of wildlife policy. This article studies the Wildlife Forum, an important national discursive space in which government engages with non-governmental parties about wildlife policy. The article argues that by means of organisational and discursive restructuring, government and industry actors have promoted a discourse alliance that endorses both government's conservation interests and industry's development interests, while excluding dissenting voices.     

Singapore's National Day Rally speech: A site of ideological negotiation

This article analyses the inaugural National Day Rally speeches of three Singapore prime ministers. It locates these speeches in the continuous ideological work that the People's Action Party (PAP) government has to do in order to maintain consensus and forge new alliances among classes and social forces that are being transformed by globalisation. Increasingly, these speeches have had to deal with the contradictions between nation-building and the tensions between the liberal and reactionary tendencies of the global city. It is argued that such a situation has made it futile for the government to attempt a straightforward ideological mobilisation of the people into a relatively homogeneous national community. The PAP government's ideological struggle to forge consensus has been balanced by a strategy of divide-and-rule. Ironically, the rally speeches have been as much about dividing as they have been about uniting.     

Engaging with Asia: the Chifley Government and the New Delhi Conferences of 1947 and 1949

This article is a study of the Chifley government's foreign policy towards Asia, in particular India and Indonesia, as evidenced by Australia's attendance at the 1947 Asian Relations Conference and the 1949 New Delhi Conference on the Indonesian‐Dutch conflict. Australia's presence at these two conferences provides an ideal opportunity to examine the Chifley government's response to the momentous changes that occurred in post‐war Asia as a result of the dismantling of the European colonial world order. Through detailed examination of the archival material and contemporary accounts generated from Australia's involvement in the New Delhi conferences, this article will argue that despite significant political constraints, the Chifley government did adopt a distinctive and innovative policy towards the emergent nations of Asia in the immediate post‐war years.     

The Effect of Ministerial Instability on Government's Mandate Fulfilment: Evidence from the Portuguese Case

Research on the fulfilment of electoral promises has been particularly fruitful over the past decades. Most of it focused on examining pledge fulfilment at the cabinet level, and little emphasis was placed on the reasons underlying the level of compliance. As a consequence, core factors in explaining pledge fulfilment have not yet been explored. One such factor might be instability in a government's internal functioning. We argue that ministerial instability is relevant for explaining a government's broken promises, and that its importance increases at the junior minister level and among the most salient ministries. Relying on data on the fulfilment of electoral promises and ministerial instability in Portugal between 1995 and 2019, backed by interviews with former ministers and junior ministers, we provide evidence that the fulfilment of electoral promises is significantly influenced by portfolio volatility, particularly at the junior ministerial level and in the most important ministries.     

Integrating domestic politics and foreign policy making: the cases of Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan

Matters of domestic political consideration exerted a major influence on the processes of foreign policy making established and developed by the authoritarian leaderships of post-Soviet Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. The preservation of internal authoritarian stability and the political survival of the national regimes have therefore constituted the key foreign policy ends set by decision makers in Ashgabat and Tashkent. This article unveils and discusses the interconnection between domestic politics and foreign policy making in post-Soviet Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan by looking comparatively at the dynamics through which the regimes manipulated foreign policy to consolidate their internal power. In particular, this article will analyse the crucial role played by foreign policy in the regimes' responses to perceived threats to their political stability.