Living Parallel Lives: Italy and Greece in an Age of Austerity

The economic crisis has triggered a process of political convergence between Italy and Greece. The simultaneous downfall of the Italian and Greek governments, following the public withdrawal of European confidence in their ability to handle the crisis, was followed by the establishment of technocrat-led governments based on parliamentary ‘super-majorities’ and then by ‘protest elections’, marked by unprecedented levels of electoral volatility. By apparently ending bipolarism, the crisis has completely changed patterns of national government formation and resulted in experiments with unusual government types. Both political systems have entered a transitional phase whose outcome is anything but certain, especially in the continuing context of economic crisis.     

Yet Another Case of Electoral and Government Epidemic? The Turkish Cypriot Legislative Election of January 2018

Following Bosco and Verney’s analyses of ‘electoral’ and ‘government epidemics’, the 2018 Turkish Cypriot legislative election is examined in the context of the impact of the economic crisis on elections and government formation in southern Europe. Despite its obvious idiosyncrasies as a self-declared state with 335,000 inhabitants, in the last decade of economic crisis and austerity policies, the Turkish Cypriot case has followed a largely similar pattern to other southern European countries: declining turnout; emergence of start-up parties; three consecutive early elections; a more fragmented parliament; sidelining of the biggest party in government formation; the first ever grand coalition; and, finally, an unprecedented four-party coalition bringing together parties from left, right, and centre.     

German expellee organisations in the enlarged EU

This article examines German expellees (Vertriebene) as an interest group in domestic and enlarged European Union contexts. While their background and motivations may be unique, they have similarities to other non-party actors aiming to influence political and/or legal processes. German governments have made rhetorical and financial expressions of support but privileged foreign policy considerations over core expellee demands and sought to contain them as an internal issue. EU enlargement and accession by CEE states to its legal bases has been interpreted as opening new possibilities. A ‘Europeanising’ of ‘justice’ may have unintended implications for relations among European states and peoples.     

Towards conflict or cooperation? The Ukraine crisis and EU-Russia relations

The Ukraine crisis and Russia’s contribution to it have raised numerous concerns regarding the possible emergence of a new ‘Cold War’ in Europe. At the same time, Ukraine’s popular choice and enthusiasm for European integration expressed clearly on the streets of Kyiv seem to have caused Russia to adopt a (neo)revisionist attitude. In this context, relations between Russia and the EU (and the West for that matter) have been limited, frozen and directed on path towards conflict. This article analyses how the traditional dichotomy between conflict and cooperation in EU–Russia relations was replaced by conflict in the context of the Ukraine crisis. The article contends that the breakdown of the symbolic and peaceful cohabitation between the EU and Russia has been influenced by the fact that both actors have chosen to ignore key tensions that characterized their post-Cold War interactions. The article identifies three such tensions: the first emphasizes divisions between EU member states and their impact on coagulating a common EU approach towards Russia; the second (geopolitical) tension highlights the almost mutually exclusive way in which the EU and Russia’s security interests have developed in the post-Soviet space; finally, the third contends that a clash of values and worldviews between the EU and Russia makes conflict virtually unavoidable.     

Protest in Italy in Times of Crisis: A Cross-Government Comparison

Abstract

Using protest event analysis methodology and conceptual and theoretical toolkits developed in social movement studies, this article analyses protest mobilisation during the period of the height of the economic crisis in Italy (2009–2014) by comparing the protest trends in diachronic and comparative perspectives over a period of four different governments. Data show that the Italian anti-austerity protest arena was dominated by ‘old actors’ (the traditional trade unions) and was not able to produce the strong social and political coalitions that emerged in other South European countries. This was due to the specific relationship that developed between civil society and political parties that shaped the forms of anti-austerity mobilisation in this period.     

Crisis,Routine, Consolidation: The Politics of the Mediterranean Migration Crisis

The current ‘migration crisis’ is framed as a moment of reckoning in the EU’s dealings with its Mediterranean neighbourhood. Yet to what extent is crisis the most useful tool to account for migration and European border control practices in the current context? An exclusive focus on crisis, we argue, is misleading. To a large extent, the current crisis management builds on pre-existing practices and enables their consolidation. For us this is an invitation to discuss the relation between crisis, routine and consolidation in Euro-Mediterranean migration policies and practices. This intervention shows how ‘crises’ are spatio-temporally limited and used to further pre-existing migration control practices and techniques of governing. As such we interrogate what it means to talk of crisis versus routine in the field of Mediterranean security practices.     

Can the Welfare State as We Know It Survive? A View from the Crisis-Ridden South European Periphery

South European countries have been hit hardest and longest by the post-2008 economic crisis. This has brought their welfare states under acute strain. Unmet need has sharply increased while significant welfare reforms and (more or less) deep cuts and changes in social spending have been prominent in the repertoire of the crisis management solutions implemented by the governments (under European Union constraints and the strict rescue-deal requirements for Greece and Portugal). This introduction briefly reviews reform trends prior to and during the crisis in order to highlight convergent and divergent paths among the four countries and outline the major questions addressed by the contributions to this volume.     

Indigenous Peoples in Southern Africa

Abstract

This article considers the complex cases of indigenous peoples in three Commonwealth countries in southern Africa: Botswana, Namibia and South Africa. In terms of national-level policy, the governments of these countries do not differentiate indigenous peoples from the rest of their populations. They do, however, have programmes aimed at assisting ‘marginalised’ or ‘disadvantaged’ communities. In this article, three main dimensions related to indigenous peoples’ rights in southern Africa are discussed: national policies, indigenous peoples’ rights, and rights to representation; land and resource rights, including rights to water; and language and gender rights. The paper concludes with an assessment of where indigenous peoples stand today in southern Africa.     

Breaking the ‘Silence’ of the Military Regime: New Politics of Memory in Brazil

This article elucidates the latest developments in the ‘politics of memory’ regarding the military regime in Brazil. Only recently, I argue, has the Brazilian state abandoned its ‘politics of silence’ and started to actively champion the memory of the left‐wing ‘resistance’. This new strategy climaxed in a governmental crisis over a historic plan to establish a National Truth Commission to investigate human rights violations during the military regime. The article analyses key incidents and debates prior to the crisis, and contrasts the post‐dictatorial collective memory of Brazil with that of other Latin American countries.     

Finanzplatz deutschland: National or European response to internationalisation?

Germany's has long been held up as a competitive, bank‐based financial system, providing long‐term and secure finance for industrial and service companies. The emphasis here is on the international market and regulatory conditions which have helped to transform the the financial system. In the 1980s, the government remained averse to any ‘Big Bang’ experiment, adapting national securities markets to policy initiatives in the US, and in London and Paris. This aversion was rooted in Bundesbank opposition to the development of money markets, and to the practice of corporate‐bank‐insurance cross‐shareholding among Germany's big publicly listed corporations. The politics of ‘Finanzplatz Deutschland’ achieved a balance between maintaining national institutions and adapting them carefully to international markets and regulation. Implementing monetary union and the European financial area in the 1990s and beyond amounts in effect to a ‘Big Bang ‘ policy which is already under way. The prospect of a liquid ‘Euro'‐market for securities, and increasingly competitive banking and insurance markets, spells a shift in German corporate policies towards Anglo‐American practices. National cross‐shareholding corporate structures will not long survive a single currency.     

Constructing the ‘Immigrant’: Germany’s Radical Left in the Refugee Crisis

The article scrutinises how Germany’s non-political party radical left has discussed immigration and ‘cultural’ or ‘national’ identity in the context of past and current immigration into Germany, with a focus on the refugee crisis of 2015. Three types of radical left discourse are identified. First, some in the radical left have come to regard immigrants, in particular refugees, as an ‘ersatz proletariat’ and therefore as potential revolutionary instruments for their own project. Second, some agree that revolutionary change is necessary but subordinate their principles to practical support for immigrants and refugees in the here and now. Third, given the improbability of communist revolution and the crisis of ‘Western modernity’, some on the radical left have called for the defence of ‘the West’ and to help immigrants assimilate into Western civilisation. The article makes a timely contribution to the knowledge about contemporary radical left politics in Germany and shows the fractured nature of Germany’s non-political party radical left in the context of the refugee crisis. It also investigates the impact of ‘crisis’ as an ‘open moment’ and ‘catalyst’ on the radical left’s discourse-as-practice.     

Endeavours to export a migration crisis: Policy making and Europeanisation in the German migration dilemma

This article examines the potential for ‘Europeanising’ the policy process within Germany ‐ examining the constraints and facilitators that have played a defining role in ‘Europeanising’ asylum and immigration issues. It demonstrates that despite the magnitude of the asylum crisis within Germany, blockages evident within the domestic policy process initially prevented a domestic policy solution. In response the federal government instituted a concerted attempt to resolve the issue outside the domestic arena, exporting the issue to the European decisional level. The processes that governed policy making on the European level within this policy sector proved incapable, however, of adequately addressing the issue. Thus, although agreement on the need to harmonise asylum and immigration policies was forthcoming, consensus on the means to achieve and implement substantive policy harmonisation proved elusive. The ‘Europeanisation’ of asylum and immigration policies within Germany has therefore been inherently limited. In response the German government felt compelled to supplement measures agreed at the European level both with a renewed effort within the domestic arena to resolve the constitutional deadlock and through bilateral agreements with their eastern neighbours.     

Interrogating the Mediterranean ‘Migration Crisis’

This Forum aims to uncover the socio-politics of the ‘migration crisis’ in the Mediterranean. The contributions explore the idea of the ‘migration crisis’ or ‘refugee crisis’ in the Mediterranean from the starting point that as scholars of the Mediterranean we can do two things: one, we can look at the way crisis introduces processes of bordering to our analysis, limiting our gaze and analytical curiosity to a specific space and a specific time; or two, we can take these limits as an opportunity to explore the wider socio-politics, geographies and economies that contribute to producing this so-called ‘crisis’ and in turn what socio-politics, geographies and economies are produced and their implications.     

From Indifference to Obsession: The Role of National State Celebrations in Iraq, 1921–2003

Rulers and elites have invented rituals and commemorations in order to serve their interests—to legitimize their hegemony as well as to maintain the existing social and political order. This process is most salient in the new modern states, whose national identity and collective memory are at an early stage of construction. This article analyses Iraq's state celebrations in the context of its state formation and nation-building processes. Before the US occupation in April 2003, Iraq had been governed by four regimes: the monarchy (1921–1958), ‘Abd al-Karim Qassem (1958–1963), the ‘Arif Brothers (1963–1968), and the Ba‘th (1968–2003). This article shows how successive Iraqi regimes moved from indifference to obsession with regard to celebrating national holidays. It advances three major arguments. First, each regime attempted to de-legitimize its predecessor by erasing or significantly changing its national calendar of holidays. These changes adversely affected the ability of the Iraqi polity to establish a shared historical memory serving as a basis for its national identity. Second, though a modern invention of British colonialism, Iraq's cultural artefacts of celebrations were taken from a mixed reservoir: foreign—both Western European and Eastern European—and local or ‘traditional’, either Islamic or pre-Islamic. The end result of the use of this wide symbolic market was a calendar reflecting a hybrid political culture. Third, the Iraqi case study shows that an inverse correlation exists between the calendar's density and the regime's perceived legitimacy. It seems that a ‘thick’ calendar reflects a shortage of legitimacy while a ‘thin’ calendar reflects a more secure and legitimized regime.     

Chile's (Inter)National Identities: Framing the Relations with Bolivia and Peru

National identities play a significant role in Latin American international relations. They affect the ways in which policy‐makers view themselves and others, as well as influencing the ways in which their policies are ‘received’ abroad. In this way, identities create opportunities and constraints for foreign policy‐making, framing the relations between Latin American countries. The author argues that, since 1990, three main patterns of Chilean identity recently affected the country's relations with its northern neighbours Bolivia and Peru: a ‘neoliberal identity’, a ‘legalistic identity’ and a ‘progressive identity’. These three patterns of identity have created opportunities for cooperation as well as causes for conflict.     

Adapting to Lisbon: Reforming the Role of German Landesparlamente in EU Affairs

In Europeanisation studies subnational parliaments are so far treated as a quantité négligeable – despite the fact that their key functions are strongly affected by European integration and they are perceived as losers of European integration. Given the provisions of the Lisbon Treaty, which acknowledges a role for subnational parliaments on subsidiarity issues, and given the concept of parliamentary ‘responsibility for integration’ introduced by the German Bundesverfassungsgericht, this represents a substantial gap. These recent changes in the institutional environment have led to a wave of reforms in the German Landesparlamente concerning their EU-related functions. The key strategy is strengthening the control function vis-à-vis the Länder governments. The high degree of convergence in terms of control strategies and instruments is explained by the fact that these reforms follow by and large the path adopted in the aftermath of the Maastricht Treaty, but with some interesting modifications.     

The Commonwealth of Nations and the EU after the ‘Global’ Crisis: Rethinking Post-2015 ‘Global’ Development?

Abstract

The continuing ‘global’ crisis has accelerated divergences between regions, especially between the ‘rising’ global South, the European Union (EU) of the PIIGS (Portugal, Ireland, Italy, Greece and Spain) and Cyprus, which belongs to both the Commonwealth and the EU. This article studies the emerging ‘vertical’ divergences between the EU and the global South, especially around the so-called Economic Partnership Agreements, and the parallel ‘horizontal’ divergences among Anglophone, Francophone (the Organisation Internationale de la Francophonie) and Lusophone (the Comunidade dos Países de Língua Portuguesa) Commonwealths, with their inheritance of emulation and competition. It focuses on the possibilities of enhanced human/citizen security to propose an analysis that challenges established perspectives and points towards prospects for Commonwealth ‘schools’ of international relations/development.     

Citizenship controversies in Germany: The twin legacy of Völkisch nationalism and the Alleinvertretungsanspruch

For many Germans, citizenship is a problematic and emotive issue, as is demonstrated by the controversies generated around current attempts to modernise and ‘normalise’ German citizenship law. This article looks to German history to account for the failure of successive governments to effect such change. It asserts that two key historical developments have been decisive in stalling a ‘normal’ western European pattern of policy development in this field. First, the concept and law of citizenship in Germany were originally formulated in the context of nation‐state development based on cultural or ‘völkisch’ nationalism. Second, West German governments subordinated the development of citizenship policy to the aim of upholding the West German claim to be the sole legitimate representative of the Germans, thereby denying the legitimacy of the GDR. The unification of Germany in 1990 removed the specific constraints which had brought about the stalled citizenship policy. The article contrasts a Kulturnation (ethno‐cultural) stance on citizenship issues with a Verfassungsnation (civic‐territorial) understanding, and identifies contemporary partisan positions within this conceptual framework.     

Southern Europe and the Eurozone Crisis Negotiations: Preference Formation and Contested Issues

South European countries were severely hit by the eurozone crisis. Adopting the theoretical framework of prospect theory, this article conducts an empirical analysis of the interpretation of the situation by the South European political leaders in terms of gains and losses. After discussing the stances of South European countries vis-à-vis a number of contested issues which emerged during the 2010–2013 negotiations, the article goes on to provide a comparative account of the determinants of national preference formation with respect to the eurozone crisis reforms in Cyprus, Greece, Italy, Malta, Portugal and Spain, paying special attention to the relationship between governments and parliaments.     

Contemporary art on the current refugee crisis: the problematic of aesthetics versus ethics

ABSTRACT

This article focuses on contemporary artworks outlining the current refugee flow from the Middle East to the West, namely to European countries together with the US and Canada. Drawing primarily on Jacques Rancière’s conceptualization of ethical art versus aesthetics, I explore how various journeys of refugees in its many forms have been represented in the contemporary art scene. My aim is to concretize the theoretical debate surrounding the ‘political’ engagement of critical art on the issue of refugee representation through various prominent artworks and art practices starting with the well-known image of Alan Kurdi’s and Ai Weiwei’s replication of this image in his artwork. I will analyse when and in which configurations aesthetics and ethics can be found in contemporary art on the issue of the ‘refugee crisis’. I argue that art on refugees can be grouped into two primary categories that I define as ‘human condition assessment’ and ‘agency empowerment’. As such, I demonstrate in practice how contemporary art on the current refugee crisis both employs and moves beyond the ethical subject matters by challenging abject victimhood as well as the ideal of egalitarian art for the underrepresented and thus assumingly voiceless, depoliticized refugees.