A “Proactive Contribution to Peace” and the Right of Collective Self-Defense: The Development of Security Policy in the Abe Administration

Since the inauguration of the second Abe cabinet in December 2012, there have been many important developments in the area of security policy. This article examines each new policy and how it fits in to the National Security Strategy principles of a “proactive contribution to peace” and international cooperation. It concludes with a comparison of the new policies with those of other major world powers and a discussion of the main source of opposition to Japan's security policy.     

Mega-Regional Trade Deals in the Asia-Pacific: Choosing Between the TPP and RCEP?

The emergence of “mega-regional” trade agreements has recently become the most significant trade policy issue in the Asia-Pacific. Since 2010, governments in the region have launched negotiations for two new trade agreements: the United States-led Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and the ASEAN-led Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP). Differentiated by their membership, scope and level of ambition, the TPP and RCEP embody competing visions for how the Asia-Pacific trade system should evolve, and regional governments must now make choices over which initiative better serves their economic and political interests. This article explores the trade policy choice posed by these mega-regional trade negotiations, reviewing the evolution of the Asia-Pacific trade system, the recent emergence of the TPP and RCEP, and the competitive dynamics inherent in the development of the two proposals. It argues that four key considerations (trade policy ambition, the role of ASEAN, US-China geopolitical rivalry and defensive concerns) will be of key importance in informing regional governments’ decisions as the TPP and RCEP move towards completion in 2015.     

Driving Development? The Problems and Promises of the Car in Vietnam

The private car comes with promises of modernity and comfortable mobility for the growing middle class in Vietnam. Vietnam’s government has also targeted the domestic automobile industry as a “spearhead industry” in an attempt to achieve industrial upgrading. Paradoxically, the government is simultaneously restraining the market for this industry through imposing high taxes and fees on cars, making them available only to a limited number of people. This article discusses the promises and problems of the automobile in Vietnam. It analyses policies related to the development of the automobile industry, and discusses the reasons for the relative failure of the project. The article argues that the failure is linked to weaknesses in Vietnamese development strategies, but also to the potential problems an expansion in car ownership in Vietnam would lead to. The article contends that the car represents a development dilemma between industrialisation and urban mobility, and that environmental, energy and social concerns add to the rationale for limiting car ownership. Furthermore, although forces promoting car-driven industrialisation appear to be gaining ground, the requirements for regional economic integration may challenge the future of the infant automobile industry.     

Jihad in the Bastion of “Moderation”: Understanding the Threat of ISIS in Malaysia

ABSTRACT

Malaysia has long been hailed as a beacon of moderate Islam. Yet, at present, there is considerable support for ISIS amongst Malaysians, and it represents a unique articulation of contemporary violent Islamist extremism. Malaysians who joined ISIS in Syria and its supporters at home are characterized by a sense of Islamic righteousness. Also, they share distinctive features that differentiate them from the old jihadi generation: a diverse occupational background, the lack of either formal or informal religious training, and the growing nexus of criminality-radicalization. Malaysian support for ISIS can be historically and politically contextualized in relation to the Islamization race between the main political parties, the presence of Salafi-jihadi discourse and ISIS’s discursive construction of authentic Islam.     

“Disorder Yields to Order Fair the Place”: The emergence of political parties in Western and Central Europe

SUMMARY

In this article Professor Best writes as a social scientist interested in how historical data can be used statistically to test hypotheses about conflict structures. The study uses the voting data from the two Constituent Assemblies of 1848 in Paris and Frankfurt to test alternative theories about the development of conflict in democratic assemblies elected on universal male suffrage. One predicts that free elections would naturally generate complex conflict structures, the other that they would generate polarity around opposite extremes. The statistical model employed suggests that in these assemblies, where the basic issue was between the status quo and change, the pattern that emerged was one of polarisation.     

The role of peace journalism in the deconstruction of elections and the “national question” in Nigeria

Nigeria, a very fragile country, is constantly teetering towards dissolution. For several decades post-independence, the country has been plagued by protracted disputations among the diverse ethnic nationalities, which have been attributed to the inadvertent merger of the Northern and Southern protectorates in 1914 by the British colonialists. Since the merger, there has been intense unrest among the various ethnic groups with tensions for greater resource control and self-determination. The country has also witnessed the intense politicisation of religion in ways that have continued to aggravate the deepening antagonism between Christians and Muslims, further broadening already existing fault lines. The longdrawn-out bickering has led to calls for a renegotiation of the terms of cohabitation among the various ethnic nationalities; and this has given rise to the “national question”, a term used to describe the quest to review the dilemmas associated with accommodating multipleidentity communities within the framework of a single, integrated, national political system. This article argues that traditional media reportage of the “national question” in Nigeria has been more divisive than uniting. The article proposes the adoption of a peace journalism approach to reporting the “national question” to ensure that members of the various ethnic nationalities consider and value non-violent responses to conflict.     

‘Gender,Neoliberalism, and the Venezuelan Migrant Crisis’: Female Migrants' Informal Labour and Access to Services in Urban Colombia

Neoliberalism, informality, and migration are all inextricably linked and the Venezuelan migration crisis has certain implications for women. While extensive post-neoliberal spending programmes under Chávez served to reverse the feminisation of poverty, millions of Venezuelans have migrated in recent years due to a severe economic crisis. Oral history testimonies highlight how female Venezuelan migrants in neoliberal Colombia often have no choice but to engage in precarious informal earning strategies and also experience reduced access to public services, which can substantially increase their domestic labour and outgoings. In many ways they are better off in Venezuela, thus highlighting how neoliberalism exacerbates gender poverty in both Latin America and the Global South.     

“Restorying” the Maternal Myth of Origin in Zami and Makeba: My Story

Myths are particularly important sources of alternative history for groups denied a place in mainstream culture.1 ¹ Humm, Practising Feminist Criticism.

I have, throughout my private war, been a she, a you, a Donna, a me, and finally, an I.2 ² See “Author's Note” in Williams, Nobody Nowhere. This observation (from 1992) suggests the model of transformation and “journey motif” that I examine with respect to Audre Lorde's and Miriam Makeba's autobiographies. See Lorde, Zami.      

From the rebellion of the Prussian league to the autonomy of Royal Prussia: The estates of Prussia and Poland in the years 1454–1526

Summary

This article examines the successive stages in the conflict between Prussian particularism and royal centralism after the separation of the Prussian League from the Teutonic Order and incorporation into the Polish Crown in 1454. The Incorporation Privilege, though interpreted on the one side as a purely personal union and on the other as a real incorporation, remained a point of reference regulating the public and legal relationship between Royal Prussia and Crown Poland for three centuries. It is argued that the years up to 1526 can be considered as a period of consolidation of Prussian particularism and autonomy, although from the 1510s a new policy of participation was beginning to emerge in the Estates, reflecting the interests of the Prussian nobility and their increasing expression in the political arena.     

“Hybrid Governance” and the Politics of Legitimacy in the Myanmar Peace Process

This article examines competing claims to political legitimacy and sovereignty in Myanmar’s conflict-affected areas of “limited statehood.” In the context of ceasefires and an emerging peace process since 2012, non-state-controlled “liberated zones” and areas of mixed insurgent and government authority constitute new political spaces, where multiple state and para-state actors demonstrate governance authority, extract resources and provide services to local communities. This article explores the dynamics and implications of these developments with reference to the emerging literatures on “rebel rulers” and “hybrid governance,” and examines the practices of donors and aid agencies operating in these areas. I argue that external actors seeking to “think and work politically” should move beyond standard peace-building and development packages based on strengthening the state, and adopt more conflict and context-sensitive approaches. Effective state building should take account of governance structures and service delivery functions established by ethnic armed organisations, which although under-resourced enjoy significant political legitimacy.     

ASIO and the Monitoring of Irish Republicans in Australia during the “Troubles”

After the “Troubles” broke out in Northern Ireland in 1969, the Australian government became increasingly concerned that these international tensions would manifest themselves within the Irish diaspora. Sympathy for Irish Republicanism was identified in a number of nationalist and socialist groups in Australia which were monitored by the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO). Although chiefly focused on the Communist Party of Australia, ASIO monitored Irish Republicans alongside other left-wing groups and social movements. Based on recently released ASIO files, this article explores the extent to which they were surveilled. The article argues that the monitoring of the Irish Republicans can fit into two periods. The first period, from the outbreak of the “Troubles” in 1969 to 1972, was when Irish Republicanism was seen as an extension of the Communist and Trotskyist groups in Australia. The second period, from 1972 through to the late 1970s, saw security services much more concerned about Irish Republicanism as terrorism, as international terrorism and the expansion of the IRA's bombing campaigns outside of Northern Ireland became an increasing concern. This shift in perceptions of Irish Republicanism demonstrates a wider shift in focus for ASIO and the Australian authorities from Cold War counter-subversion to counter-terrorism.     

“Bribery with Chinese characteristics” and the use of guanxi to obtain admission to prestigious secondary schools in urban China

Some scholars have attempted to find ways to distinguish guanxi from bribery, which can be difficult due to the role played by four traditional Chinese concepts and practices. First, people value the renqing ethic more than law, making it hard to judge whether a relation has “improper inducements.” Second, some interaction rituals used in bribery guanxi are a type of moral performance, undertaken to justify immoral practice – this mixes together guanxi practice with bribery. Third, some of the “ganqing” (affection) and esteem expressed in bribery guanxi results from this moral performance, rather than from genuine affection and esteem. Fourth, some people try to embody their relationship as an enduring guanxi, rather than one-off bribery, which exacerbates the difficulty in distinguishing guanxi from bribery. Because of the moralizing culture and the custom of mixing together renqinq and bribery, it can be difficult to distinguish bribery from guanxi by attempting to judge whether an action is purely based on esteem or coercion, on an enduring relationship or a one-off exchange, on improper inducement or proper conduct, or other such formal distinctions.     

Visions of Tsafendas: Literary Biography and the Limits of “Research”

Abstract

Research seminar, research cluster, research output. The word is almost a fetish within the contemporary academy—but what does “research” actually mean in a discipline like literature? And what happens when a research project overspills its bounds, or pushes up against disciplinary limits and protocols? In this piece, I explore such questions via the figure of Demetrios Tsafendas, the "mad Greek" who assassinated apartheid Prime Minister Hendrik Verwoerd in 1966, supposedly acting on instructions from a tapeworm inside him. It is one of the strangest facts in South African history; it is also, of course, a kind of fiction, and one that has been refracted into a range of literary and artistic works. Reading across both official and “creative” archives, I address a range of methodological problems that I encountered in attempting an academic treatment of Tsafendas and his (as the presiding apartheid judge put it) “useless life”.     

From the Subject of Evil to the Evil Subject: “Cultural Difference” in Postapartheid South African Crime Fiction

This article takes up the question of “crime writing” and rejoins the debate around whether such literature stands in for the “political novel” in postapartheid South Africa. What social function might crime writing be serving? Research by political economists and cultural anthropologists suggests that acts of writing in “social detection” mode (rather than “crime writing”) serve as an allegory for occulted sociopolitical conditions. Cultural difference is seen, once again, to play a pivotal role in the legitimation of power, and writers in the detection mode are correspondingly seen to be probing the possibility of a resurgence of “bad” difference. This notion, it is argued, is a key differentiator in an otherwise murky scene in which the borderline between licit and illicit, and right and wrong, has become obscure. While many South African writers are brought into the discussion, including but not restricted to crime authors, a key novel by leading crime writer Deon Meyer is read as a case study to illustrate the more general points made in the article.     

From the Achaemenids to Somoni: national identity and iconicity in the landscape of Dushanbe’s capitol complex

This article focuses on the iconicity of contemporary Dushanbe’s capitol complex, with its state-sponsored architecture and memorial culture, part of the government of Tajikistan’s national identity construction. Dushanbe’s architecture post-independence is actant, a mnemonic and iconographical bridge between the present and favoured historical periods in a quest for national origins. A bricolage of historical symbols, including those of Achaemenid Iran and the early Islamic Samanids, is displayed here in a city with Soviet foundations. Together with pan-Iranian iconography is a desire by the government of Tajikistan for monumentality for its own sake. The capitol complex evokes the natural world, connected to a Central Asian conception of sacred space, suggesting an interlacing of power and religious authority. These monumental building projects are taking place against the backdrop of the destruction of Dushanbe’s ‘authentic’ Soviet architecture and built heritage in the capitol complex, itself a container for collective memory.