Reaching the other side

Abstract

To talk about Vietnam now is to get caught in a flurry of accusations and counter accusations, from the Chinese and Kampucheans, the Western press, and the Vietnamese themselves. At a time when Vietnam is entangled in military disputes and deepening party disputes with its socialist neighbors, it may seem anachronistic to go back and relive the spring days of 1975 when, after decades of war, Vietnam was euphorically reunited and freed from foreign invaders. One is tempted to read into those momentous days a foreshadowing of the conflicts to come. There is another reason to review Vietnam's spring liberation, however, and the reason goes beyond the fact that a good book has been written about the subject. Central to current disputes about Vietnam is an assessment of the meaning and practice of socialist transformation. Reaching the Other Side, by Earl S. Martin, is an eyewitness account of the earliest days of socialist Vietnam's postwar transition. In the pages of Martin's book, concrete form is given to the dreams and difficulties facing the newly reunited Vietnam. Martin offers a quiet, detailed account of the socialist government's early answers to those challenges.     

An open letter/review

Abstract

I first read about you and your book, The Woman Warrior, in the book review sections of several magazines and Sunday newspapers. I read Susan Brownmiller's interview with you in “Mademoiselle” magazine, Jane Kramer's review of your book in the New York Times, and Nan Robertson's interview with you, also in the Times. In addition, several white feminist friends were telling me I should read your book “because it is a powerful, feminist story by a Chinese American woman.” So I read your book.     

A Kingdom in Crisis – What’s All the Fuss About?

This article reviews Andrew MacGregor Marshall’s A Kingdom in Crisis: Thailand’s Struggle for Democracy in the Twenty-First Century, a book on how Thailand’s political challenges relate to the Thai monarchy. The review draws comparisons between the excitement surrounding the publication of the acclaimed book The King Never Smiles in 2006 and the recent reaction to the publication of A Kingdom in Crisis. It argues that the book is an important contribution because it informs a wide audience about the damaging political role of the monarchy, but it repeatedly ignores an already existing corpus of literature that deals critically with Thailand’s monarchy. Moreover, its focus on the succession as the key factor in the ongoing political crisis is unnecessarily narrow and should have been complemented by an analysis of structural forces as drivers of change.     

Causes of the Slowdown in Soviet Defense

This paper discusses the recent official U.S. intelligence estimates indicating a slowdown in the growth rates of Soviet defense spending and military procurement since 1976. The Central Intelligence Agency's explanation for the slowdown is examined. Questions are raised about two of the factors, economic constraints and technical difficulties, and the implications of the CIA's explanation for theories about the relationship of the defense sector to the rest of the economy are considered. The author offers as a possible alternative explanation of the slowdown a change in Soviet military investment priorities de-emphasizing strategic offensive weapons. Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: 052, 114, 124.     

The Gender Ethics and Politics of Affection: The ‘Feminine’Melodramatic Mode in Walter Salles' Central do Brasil (1998)

This article reads Walter Salles's Central do Brasil (1998) through a reappraisal of the film's relationship to melodrama in order to emphasise the significance of the association of affect with ethical judgment in thinking about the complex and contradictory gender politics of the film, thereby challenging the conventional tension between pathos and logos. Using a number of filmic and psychoanalytic theories, this article argues that Central do Brasil's melodramatic search for a ‘space of innocence’ in the Sertão could offer less a nostalgic return to anachronistic forms of living than a survival strategy for living in late modernity. Finally, this article argues that Central do Brasil, while lamenting the state's withdrawal from the public sphere, calls for an ethical imperative that is associated with a ‘feminine’ responsible and generous capacity to embrace the other as a necessary form of social and political action for the redefining of citizenship in Brazilian neoliberal society.     

Saving Private Hegel — Australian Liberalism and the 1914–1918 War

In this essay I explore the pamphlet literature and related sources, in order to assess the effects of the 1914–1918 War on liberal political ideas in Australia. The main focus of the study is the WEA intellectuals in Sydney and Brisbane, and the core group of Deakinite liberals in Melbourne as represented by the overlapping membership of the Boobooks Club and the Round Table. Themes of compulsion, Progressivism, industrial relations, citizenship, and internationalism are examined. In particular the tension which wartime experiences produced within the high idealism of Kantian and Hegelian new liberal political philosophy is investigated. The bitterness caused by the war and the doubts raised about German philosophy help us to understand the decline of statist and idealist elements within liberal thought in Australia. It seems impossible, during the present war, to write any book or to deliver a sermon or an address which does not in some way refer to the war. H.B. Higgins, Socrates, the State and War, p.7     

McAlister's Vietnam

Abstract

John McAlister's book is an ambitious attempt to apply current American social scientific theories of social mobilization and revolution to Vietnam. It is likely to be considered an important source since his analysis of the anti-French revolution is based on still secret and inaccessible French army files, used in conjunction with other French language sources available only in a few libraries in the U.S. It might well become popular as a college text, offering a theoretical model of revolution for those wishing to venture comparisons with other nations. It is, to my mind, a subtly and intelligently written book but an extremely biased one, and therefore worthy of careful analysis.     

Fantasy as ‘Recovery,Escape and Consolation’ in the Short Stories of Isaac Bar Moshe

Isaac Bar Moshe (1927-2004) was born in Baghdad and immigrated to Israel in 1950. This article deals with his literary world, which is split between realism on the one hand and fantasy, mysticism and dreams on the other, with both these planes reflecting his perspective on various existential questions. The article focuses on the short stories in his book Behind the Wall (1973), which, like many of his other works, are largely anchored in his private life and depict a bleak reality, with dreams and fantasy offering the only hope of escape into a better, more spiritual world. The article concludes with an analysis of Bar Moshe's stories in terms of the three functions of fantasy – ‘recovery, escape and consolation’ – as formulated by writer and philologist J.R.R. Tolkien in his book Tree and Leaf.     

The rise of the Jama'at al Tabligh in Kyrgyzstan: the revival of Islamic ties between the Indian subcontinent and Central Asia?

After two centuries of close relationships, especially under the Mughals, Islamic ties between India and Central Asia have been considerably weakened, first after the Tsarist colonization and then by Soviet religious repression and ideological isolation. However, when Central Asian post-Soviet republics became independent in 1991, they renewed all kinds of links with the Indian subcontinent. Moreover, the revival of Central Asian Islam benefited from inspirational international Islamic sources from Turkey, the Arab countries and India. The latter drew less attention from analysts than other sources of influence, although it has gained ground all over the region in past years, particularly in Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, where the India-based Jama'at al Tabligh has achieved significant success. This Islamic organization, established in British India in the 1920s, defines itself as a non-radical and non-political movement, promoting ‘basic’ Islamic faith and practice. So far, the Jama'at al Tabligh has been tolerated by local authorities who would rather use them as a shield against the more radical Islamic groups that are openly opposing the regime.     

War on error and the Southern fire: How terrorism analysts get it wrong

Abstract

This extended, five-part critique of Conflict and Terrorism in Southern Thailand interrogates how terrorism experts have interpreted the recent escalation of violence in the Thai southern border provinces. It does so by questioning the authors' use of sources, and draws on a range of alternative Thai-and English-language sources to suggest that the authors have reached poorly founded conclusions. The first part considers the contemporary context of terrorism studies and argues that it is important to understand Conflict and Terrorism as a knowledge product influenced by that discipline. The second presents an overview of competing theories concerning events in Thailand, as background to the conclusions presented in Conflict and Terrorism. The third evaluates the book's conclusion that Thailand faces a renewed insurgency, largely driven by domestic factors and carried out by definable actors. The fourth part examines the authors' claim concerning the importance of a booklet titled Berjihad di Patani, which is said to have motivated insurgents involved in the 28 April 2004 “uprising.” The fifth will attend to some significant factual and interpretative errors that severely undermine the credibility of the book. Overall, the critique demonstrates that various interpretations of what is happening in the South of Thailand remain plausible, and the article concludes that the authors of Conflict and Terrorism were too poorly equipped to deal with these competing interpretations to offer any insights into the conflict.     

New Soviet books: a verdict on twentieth century Persia

A detailed discussion of this book appeared in Central Asian Review. Vol. IV, N°. 3, 1956.     

From sultanism to neopatrimonialism? Regionalism within Turkmenistan

This paper proposes that under President Berdimuhamedov, the government of Turkmenistan has begun to move away from the ‘sultanism’ of the Niyazov era. Instead, the new government exhibits characteristics and has pursued policy changes that prepare conditions for the further development and entrenchment of localized networks of elites based on kinship. Such changes suggest that the government of Turkmenistan may develop into a more classic neopatrimonial system of authoritarian governance similar to the other post-Soviet republics in Central Asia. This argument is advanced by examining changes between the governments of former President Niyazov and Berdimuhamedov with regard to three areas of the Turkmen state's relationship with its constituent regions: regional composition of the national cabinet; hakim (governor) policy; and regional development. This examination relies largely on a comprehensive survey of online Turkmen state-media sources, as well as numerous supportive secondary sources.     

What was different about the German Democratic Republic?

For the last few years, I have been planning to write a book called Unwrapped Past and Empty Present: GDR Culture in Retrospect . The post-unification process has not been easy, and the other day I even came across a statement in the press that "other postcommunist countries did not seem to have faced the same difficulties as the former GDR". Although this is a highly questionable comment, ignoring the plight of large sections of the population under "successful" postcommunist governments and the far higher living standards of the GDR population, despite de-industrialisation and massive unemployment, it contains a grain of truth. The more I read about and discuss the East German situation before and after 1989, the more I become convinced that there were vital differences, not only in Soviet policy towards the GDR and other Warsaw Pact states, but perhaps more importantly, in the attitudes of the East German party, the intellectuals and the population at large to the idea of "nation", to the Soviet Union and even to "socialism as it existed in reality". After a stint in Potsdam cramming post-1989 memoirs, I should like to address these issues in a first try at a possible introduction to my planned book.     

A tribute to Phyllis Andors, 1942–1992

Abstract

Phyllis Andors died at the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York City on 10 February 1992. In the late sixties Phyllis was one of the founding members of the Committee of Concerned Asian Scholars that gave rise to the Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars (BCAS), and in 1975 she edited as well as contributed an article and a book review to two BCAS special issues on women in Asia. Most recently, BCAS published her article “Women and Work in Shenzhen” in volume 20, number 3 (July–September 1988). Phyllis was a very active and much appreciated member of the BCAS editorial board since 1987, not only refereeing articles and contributing money but also taking on special projects such as investigating how BCAS might get grants and being the main editor of a proposed BCAS book about women in Asia. We at BCAS are grateful to Phyllis's husband, Steve, for providing us with much of this tribute to Phyllis so that our readers can join us in appreciating who she was and her unique contribution to those around her and the world.     

The centrality of Central Asia

Abstract

This paper poses some questions about how Central Asia fits into world history. The questions arise from my attempt to study world history as a world system. From this perspective, as one nonspecialist addressing other nonspecialists, Central Asia appears as a sort of black hole in the middle of the world. Little is known or said about it by those who focus on the geographically outlying civilizations of China, India, Persia, Islam, and Europe—including Russia. Even world historians see only some migrants or invaders who periodically emerge from Central Asia to impinge on these civilizations and the world history they make. Historians of art and religion view Central Asia as a sort of dark space through which cultural achievements moved from one civilization to another. At best, they see Central Asia itself as a dark tabula rasa on which itinerant monks, mullahs, and artists from these allegedly civilized areas left their marks. Now their remains can be admired in a thousand Buddha caves and mosques spread through Central Asia. Or they have been deposited in museums spread through the cultural capitals of the West and Japan after their “discoverers” unearthed them, crated them up, and carted them away.     

Stephen H. Roberts' The House That Hitler Built as a Source on Nazi Germany

This article is a critical evaluation of Stephen H. Roberts' The House that Hitler Built (1937) as a source on Nazi Germany. Roberts' book was one of the most successful contemporary accounts of Nazi Germany by an English-speaking visitor, at least as far as the number of printings and translations was concerned. The work is also of interest on account of Roberts' important position in the history of the historical profession in Australia. The present article proceeds by examining the evidence about Roberts' visits to Germany in 1936, and the context of the book's composition, relating it to other contemporary sources, in order to arrive at an assessment of the book's merits as a primary source and as a scholar's assessment of the "Third Reich". The article finds that while Roberts' work contains some shrewd insights and is persuasively written, the scholarship is sometimes flawed, with Roberts ultimately arriving at correct conclusions for the wrong reasons.     

The Quest to Understand Global Jihad: The Terrorism Industry and its Discontents

In the 1840s Sarantis Archigenes, an Ottoman Greek citizen, wrote a book on political economy called Tasarrufat-? Mülkiye. The book contained both political-economic knowledge and developmentalist policy recommendations for the Ottoman Empire. The emphasis given to human capital, trade and transportation, industrialization and property relations is noteworthy. Since it did not reach large numbers of people, the importance of Tasarrufat-? Mülkiye has not been appreciated. The goal of this article is to provide an account of Archigenes' views on political economy as presented in his long-neglected book. Had the policy makers in the Empire in the second half of the nineteenth century taken Archigenes' views seriously, a sound development strategy could have been formed.     

Comments on ‘vietnamese anticolonialism’

Abstract

The review by Nguyen Cong Binh of Vietnamese Anticolonialism deals with the larger historical perspective of the anti-colonial movement from 1885 to 1925, questions of methodology, and theoretical concepts about Vietnamese history. Some aspects of the book are particularly interesting and germane to American readers, even if they have only a casual familiarity with contemporary Vietnamese history.