To reject or not to reject nationalism: debating Marx and Engels' struggles with nationalism, 1840s–1880s

The relationship between Marxism and nationalism has been tumultuous. While theoretically attempting to reject nationalism as a transient product of capitalism, Marxism has in practice oftentimes exploited its appeal and utilized its extensive institutional repertoire. To a large extent, the difficult dialogue between the two ideological constellations can be traced back to Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels who neglected to leave a definitive statement on the nationality question. The article traces the evolution of Marxism's conceptualization of the nationality question – a slow shift from an outright rejection of nationalism to an acceptance of its progressive features, complexity, varieties and influences. It re-evaluates Marx and Engels' views on the nationality question, from its outright denial to limited acceptance and application. After identifying factors that shaped their perception of the nationality question, the study offers an analysis of the evolution of these attitudes from the 1840s to the 1860s. The objective is to show how Marx and Engels' theoretical dogmatism was tainted by their desire for activism. Their views were not inflexible but rather evolved in response to changing circumstances in the mid 19th century.     

The origins and politics,campaigns and demands by the international fisher peoples’ movement: an Indigenous perspective

Abstract

This reflective contribution discusses the intersection of Indigenous and Small Scale Fisheries’ (SSF) issues, and how the international SSF movement has a critical role in the broader struggle for the convergence of social justice regarding the environment, food and lifeways. I explore some of the political tensions around Indigenous and SSF struggles against global neoliberalisation of land and water resources, some of the successes and challenges of the international SSF movement, and future considerations for academic/activist ‘decolonising’ work.     

Property,power, and the presidency: ownership policy reform and Russian executive–legislative relations, 1990–1999

This article asks how new rules of political conduct are established in a country attempting political transformation and sweeping economic change. Based on a close analysis of the conflict over property policy and its effect on Russian executive–legislative relations in the 1990s, the study argues that regardless of formal distributions of power, the real allocation of policy-making authority is shaped in struggles over substantive policy issues. Those arenas, especially during the first years after the fall of an authoritarian regime, can function as “political classrooms” in which leaders either adopt or reject such practices as compromise and negotiation.     

Railway Development and the Economic and Political Integration of the Balkans,c. 1850–2000

This article uses the evolution of the railways to examine the relationship between the level of economic integration and external political influences in the Balkans over a period of 150 years. The analysis focuses on two key themes: the long-term spatial evolution of the railway network and external influences on this infrastructure. To undertake this territorial analysis, we first established a Historical Geographical Information System (HGIS) that allowed us to interpret data on the evolution of the railway network and then related this to other data on themes such as changing international borders and the nationality of investment.     

The Evolution of the Regulation of Labour in the USSR,the CIS and the Baltic States, 1985–2009

This article is a first systematic study of employment protection legislation in the 15 successor states of the USSR over the last two and a half decades. The analysis is based on new and unique data assembled using OECD methodology. We find that the dynamics of employment protection in the region resemble an inverted U-shaped pattern with the peak of labour market rigidity occurring in the mid-1990s in CIS countries and a decade later in the Baltic states. By now, the former Soviet states as a group are similar to the EU-15 and OECD countries in terms of the overall employment protection legislation index, although they differ in terms of contributions to the overall employment protection legislation of its three major components, namely, regulation of permanent contracts, temporary contracts and collective dismissals.     

Bandits and blanket thieves,communists and terrorists: the politics of naming Sandinistas in Nicaragua, 1927 – 36 and 1979 – 90

This article examines the politics of naming Sandinistas in Nicaragua during two periods of intense political and military struggle: the era of the Sandinista Revolution and Contra War (1979?–?90) and the era of the Sandino rebellion against the US Marines and Nicaraguan National Guard (1927?–?36). Focusing principally on the rhetorical and narrative strategies used by the USA and its Nicaraguan allies, the article explores the delegitimising master narratives concocted by these dominant groups and the efforts of two generations of Sandinistas and their allies to challenge these narratives. It argues that the politics of naming was embedded within a larger politics of storytelling, and that effective challenges to dominant groups' epithets must be grounded in historically informed challenges to the larger narratives from which they spring.     

Sara Baartman and Andries Stoffels: Violence,Law and the Politics of Spectacle in London and the Eastern Cape, 1809–1836

This article contrasts the well-known display of Sara Baartman, exhibited in London and Paris under the rubric the “Hottentot Venus,” with the 1835–36 visit to Britain for political ends of Andries Stoffels, a Khoekhoe Christian convert who testified before the House of Commons Select Committee on Aborigines (British Settlements). It places both visits in the context of legal reform and violence in the Cape Colony in the early nineteenth century. Both visits can be fruitfully re-read as reflecting South African struggles over control of the Khoekhoe body, the rule of colonial law, and emerging ideas of human rights. Baartman was displayed as an iconic body in a legal context in which (mostly white) masters coerced Khoekhoe labourers and claimed the right to control their bodies. Stoffels displayed himself as a Christian convert to eager evangelical audiences, in a context in which legal reform depended on the putative erasure of difference, even as racial tension persisted in significant ways. The article suggests that the history of human rights is closely tied to the history of colonialism. It also, however, argues that members of Baartman's community responded to, and fought, the conditions that led to her display and that Baartman should not be understood in isolation from that community.