The microfinance phenomenon

In the 1990s, microfinance has captured the imagination of opinion leaders, governments, and donor agencies. Suppor ters have argued that microfinance institutions (MFIs) can not only have a major impact in the fight against poverty, but can do so on a sustainable basis. At the same time, a number of critics have emerged. In this paper, Paul McGuire, consultant, and John Conroy, Executive Director of the Foundation for Development Cooperation, Brisbane, Australia, consider the achievements of microfinance to date. They find that most, but not all, of the evidence suggests that microfinance can play a role in reducing poverty. On the other hand, while it has become generally accepted that MFIs can and should become financially self-sufficient, few have actually done so. It may be appropriate for well-managed programs to receive some ongoing level of subsidization if they can be shown to be effective in reducing poverty. There is a continuing role for donors in the development of microfinance, but it is important that donors focus on quality rather than quantity.     

Parliamentary oversight and corruption in the Caribbean: comparing Trinidad & Tobago and Grenada

Parliamentary oversight is a key determinant of corruption levels. This article presents research findings on parliamentary oversight in two Caribbean countries: Trinidad & Tobago and Grenada. Our results cast doubt on the results of previous research and also indicate that certain facets of ‘the Westminster’ system need to be relaxed, to reflect contextual reality in smaller island economies. Political will to adopt our recommended reforms is critical, but, as in other countries, inertia often dominates the political environment. Until citizens demand that their elected representatives establish various oversight and anti-corruption mechanisms and ensure these mechanisms are free of political influence, the institutions will be ‘window dressing’ and corrupt actions will go undeterred and unpunished.     

Writing Islamic Constitutions: Lessons from Pakistan

Muslim-majority countries often face the question of how to reconcile the place and role of religion within the framework of the nation state and a modern westernised system of constitutional ordering. And few states have wrangled with the politics of constitutionalising religion as profoundly and persistently as the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. This paper argues that insights drawn from Pakistan are pertinent as much for contemporary debates on Islam within many Muslim-majority countries as they are for wider debates on religion and politics in the modern period. It argues that when contemplating the constitutionalisation of Islam and Islamic provisions: the design and jurisdiction of the courts matter; it may be better to achieve a workable political compromise between competing parties on religious matters than to stall or strive for the realisation of some ideal; the constitution should be free of any sectarian bias; and constitution-makers must take more structural matters such as the separation of powers seriously when considering discussions on religion and politics.     

Crafting a business Umma? transnational networks of ‘Islamic businessmen’ after the Arab Spring

This article focuses on the transnational project, led by Turkish Independent Industrialists and Businessmen Association (Müsiad), of crafting a community of Islamic businessmen. The Arab Springs opened new opportunities to further this project, especially in Tunisia and Egypt where Islamist groups rose to power after 2011. In both countries, Müsiad supported the creation of two Islamic business associations, exporting its own organizational model. Examining this circulation process, we question the classical dichotomy between economic and advocacy transnational networks. We also show how this transnational activism is constrained by divergent domestic patterns of relationships between Islamists, business and states in each country.     

Problems in Contemporary Applications of Islamic Criminal Sanctions: The Penalty for Adultery in Relation to Women

Taking the penalty for adultery (hadd al-zina¯ ) as a case study, this essay attempts to address some of the practical problems associated with contemporary applications of Islamic penalties known as hudud. In empirical terms the study will investigate some court cases of zina¯ taken from Sudan, a country in which the Islamic criminal penalties were introduced for the first time in 1983, then in 1991. My aim in the investigation of these cases, all of which involve women, is to address the question of whether the penalty of zina¯ as currently imposed in some Muslim countries is discriminatory against women. In conclusion this essay argues that women accused of zina¯ (adultery or fornication) have suffered injustices ranging from discriminatory treatment on grounds of their biological makeup to penalization of potential victims of rape. The presumption of zina¯ on grounds of pregnancy puts a woman defendant in a disadvantageous position compared to a man accused of the same offence. Furthermore, the categorization of rape as a form of zina¯ does not just result in the virtual impossibility of convicting a rapist, but may even lead to incrimination of the woman victim of rape instead.     

嬗变中的东南亚伊斯兰教育

伊斯兰教育是东南亚国家教育体制的一个重要组成部分.长期以来,伊斯兰学校在传承伊斯兰宗教文化、维系东南亚伊斯兰社会方面发挥着重要的作用.20世纪以来,随着东南亚国家向现代化与世俗化的转变,东南亚伊斯兰教育也从传统的宗教教育逐渐向以宗教教育与世俗教育并重的教育体制转变.近年来,随着伊斯兰极端主义势力在东南亚地区的复兴,以瓦哈比派教义为中心的原教旨主义思想也逐渐蔓延渗透到东南亚的伊斯兰学校,有的伊斯兰学校甚至成为传播伊斯兰原教旨主义意识形态的基地与中心,严重威胁该地区的稳定与安全.当代东南亚伊斯兰教育的发展及其政治走向,已经引起学术界与国际社会的普遍关注.     

Islamic Militias and Capitalist Development in Post-Authoritarian Indonesia

This article examines the emergence of Islamic militias that are often involved in political gangsterism in post-authoritarian Indonesia. It is argued that these groups are an outcome of the complex structural changes accompanying state formation in the context of capitalist development, instead of the product of a weak state or because of decentralisation of power and authority in the democratic context. Their existence is intricately related to the way the state organises institutions of coercion according to specific exigencies. In addition, these militias are an element of the rise of Islamic identity politics following the fall of Soeharto. The approach advanced here contrasts with two dominant approaches: an institutionalist approach that emphasises a lack of state capacity and the anthropology of the state approach that draws on Migdal’s state-in-society approach, which underlines the fragmentation of authority as the condition for the emergence of militias. It is shown that such groups could exist in a “weak” state and in a “strong” state, and in decentralised and centralised settings.     

Main-streaming the climate change and green growth agenda into development visions: A narrative from selected sub-Sahara African countries

Abstract

Primary commodities continue to play a critical role in the economic development of many economies in Africa. However, the climate change phenomenon is threatening the role of these commodities through two routes. First, through its demand for a development trajectory that mitigates and adapts to climate change by following a less primary commodities-intensive development agenda, and second, climate change induced extreme weather events such as floods and drought that threaten the production of some of these commodities, Through a case study of four primary commodities-intense African economies: South Africa, Kenya, Nigeria and Cameroon, this article examines the degree and intensity of the articulation of the climate change and green growth agenda in the policy documents that shape the development agendas of these countries. The findings indicate a paucity of discussions on the green growth agenda in the development visions of all the countries except South Africa. In contrast, there is a general discussion of the challenges that climate change poses to the development efforts and articulation of the need to mitigate and adapt to these challenges. The need for mitigation and adaptation is proactively articulated in the post-2007 development visions of South Africa, Nigeria and Cameroon and retrospectively discussed through complementary policy documents supporting the pre-2007 development vision of Kenya. What remains to be determined, is how these visions will be translated into specific policies and implemented in order to enable these economies to adapt to and mitigate climate change in a manner that allows them to sustainably exploit some of their primary commodities and to compete in a world that in the future will increasingly demand green products and services.     

US Covert Operations toward Iran,February–November 1979: Was the CIA Trying to Overthrow the Islamic Regime?

This article examines US covert operations toward Iran from February until November 1979. It focuses especially on whether the CIA was trying to undermine or overthrow Iran's nascent Islamic regime, as many Iranians believed. The article details the extensive covert contacts the CIA and other US personnel established in this period with Iranian officials and various Iranian opposition factions. Its main conclusion is that US officials established these contacts for the purpose of gathering intelligence about the rapidly changing situation in Iran, rather than to undermine the Islamic regime. Indeed, US personnel never encouraged these Iranian contacts to plot against the regime and often explicitly discouraged them from doing so.     

Religion,Secularization and Democracy in the Mediterranean Region: Problems and Prospects

Political debates in many Mediterranean countries today are increasingly framed in dichotomous terms, highlighting divisions between religious and secular worldviews. In some countries, for example Israel, the issue is so contentious that it is described as a ‘culture war’. While Israel struggles to balance its commitment to a Jewish state and a democracy, it does not seem to matter if the countries in question are democracies or non-democracies, or what their majority religious faith is. Instead, the role of religion in public life or, put another way, the ‘public return of religion’, is a pertinent and controversial political question everywhere in the Mediterranean region. How do we explain this phenomenon? On the one hand, we can point to both economic and demographic changes, while, on the other, we can trace the impact of continuing secularisation. Together these two sets of developments produce new challenges to existing political arrangements.     

Perceptions of Political Corruption in Latin American Democracies

Political corruption poses a serious threat to the stability of developing democracies by eroding the links between citizens and governments. Using data on national levels of corruption (Transparency International 1997 CPI index) and individual opinion (1995-97 World Values Survey), this study finds that Latin Americans are quite aware of the seriousness of corruption in their countries. The ensuing question is whether citizens can connect their views about corruption to appraisals of their authorities and institutions and of democracy more generally. Collectively, the findings suggest that they can, and that the necessary ingredients for accountability are present in Latin America. The possible dark side of mass opinion on corruption is that pervasive misconduct may poison public sentiment toward democratic politics. On this score, the analysis found that this attitude affected only support for specific administrations and institutions.     

Social Safety Net in Islam: The Case of Persian Gulf Oil Exporters

The Persian Gulf oil-exporting countries have had a poor record of managing their oil wealth to meet the basic needs of their citizenry and have failed in insuring an equitable distribution of income and opportunities. Government expenditures in the social sector can be characterized as wasteful and subsidies as regressive and for the more-heavily populated countries simply unsustainable. Set within the paradigm of Islamic economics, providing both normative and ethical guidance on the development of a just economic order, the issue of reforms to the social safety net is analyzed and how these oil exporters can better address the needs of the disadvantaged in an Islamic context is suggested.     

Islamic Campus Preaching Organizations in Indonesia: Promoters of Moderation or Radicalism?

ABSTRACT

This article asks whether campus preaching organizations such as the Indonesian Muslim Students Islamic Union (KAMMI) and Hizb ut-Tahrir Indonesia (HTI) serve as potential breeding grounds for radicalism or, alternatively, do they serve as institutions that promote political moderation and prevent radical action among young university-age Muslims. Utilizing insights from inclusion-moderation thesis, it concludes the answer to these questions depends on whether these groups are willing to accept Indonesia’s democratic political system. These determine the tactics the groups chose to promote their agenda to potential recruits. While KAMMI is willing to moderate its strategies, HTI is unwilling to do so and continues to promote its agenda through secretive means, although it formally rejects radicalism and extremism.     

Reorganization of Working Time and Modalities of Employment under the New Turkish Labour Act

Islamism and nationalism are usually regarded as opposites. The main purpose of this article is to question that notion. Instead of conceptualizing these two clusters of ideologies as standing in contradiction to each other, it may be worthwhile to look for affinities between them. That argument is based on an analysis of the doctrine of sovereignty as it underlies modern nationalism (congruence between the state and nation) and how this idiom shows signs of similarities to the theory of the classical caliphate (congruence between the ruler and ummah). When modern nationalism enters the political scene of the Muslim Middle East, Islamic heritage will constitute an important element of the way the nation, in relation to the state, will come to be articulated. The article starts by discussing developments in three countries where the relationship between Islamism and nationalism has been sufficiently evident (Egypt, Iran, and Turkey), and concludes with a discussion of the need for a theory of modernity, especially when tracing the historical roots of modern ideologies such as nationalism and Islamism.     

Imagine All the People? Mobilising Islamic Populism for Right-Wing Politics in Indonesia

ABSTRACT

Right-wing politics in Indonesia is frequently associated with Islamic populist ideas. In part this is because Islamic organisations played a major role in the army-led destruction of the Indonesian Communist Party in the 1960s. Since then Islamic populism has evolved greatly and in post-authoritarian Indonesia it includes manifestations that see no fundamental contradiction between Islam and neo-liberal market economies as well as those that do. Significantly, like their counterparts in other countries, Indonesian Islamic populists maintain vigilance against the purveyors of class-based politics who may exert a divisive influence on the ummah. Thus, Indonesian Islamic populism shares with many of its counterparts a disdain for Leftist challenges to private property and capital accumulation besides political liberalism’s affinity to the secular national state. Yet strands of Islamic populism have relegated the project of establishing a state based on sharia to the background and embraced the democratic process. But this has not translated necessarily into social pluralist positions on a range of issues because the reinforcement of cultural idioms associated with Islam is required for the mobilisation of public support in contests over power and resources based on an ummah-based political identity.     

跨太平洋伙伴关系协议(TPP):研究前沿与架构

"跨太平洋伙伴关系协议"(TPP)在美国的积极推动下发展迅速,似乎将成为亚太地区新的竞争性区域合作机制。TPP以成员国全面零关税、知识产权保护、劳工和环保等议题为特点,提出建立高质量和高标准的自由贸易区,已吸引了包括美国在内的亚太九国参加协议谈判。在TPP建立过程中,美国企图重获亚太经济主导权的意图明显;日本虽积极参与,但自身困难重重;东盟在巩固现有基础上,并不排斥新机制出现。当前,美国主导TPP势头正盛,但其发展态势并不明朗,TPP谈判仍将面临美国国内政治因素和技术问题的双重障碍以及日本能否顺利加入等问题;当前的国际政治与经济局势,使中国面临新的挑战与机遇,宜通过调整经济结构,扩大内需,完善和巩固现有区域合作战略以积极应对TPP的发展。未来,中国与美日韩以及东盟等双边和多边经贸关系受TPP的实质影响将成为新一轮研究重点。     

China and the International Human Rights Covenants

ABSTRACT

In 1966 the UN passed two International Human Rights Covenants that are among the great achievements of humankind. The covenants were adopted in five equally binding languages, one of which was Chinese. The People's Republic of China (PRC) is generally assumed to have ratified one and signed (but not ratified) the other. In 1973, however, soon after the PRC began representing China in the UN, new Chinese-language versions of each mysteriously came into existence. These are the versions one is likely to find on the UN website, and they are what the Chinese government treats as the “covenants.” The authors of this article show that these contain substantial revisions from the covenants that had been passed by the UN 1966 and subsequently ratified by at least 164 countries. The revised versions are so different, in fact, that one could well question whether the PRC actually embraced either covenant. The covenants granted rights that the revisions would later withdraw, and in at least one case the revisions recognize a right that is absent in the covenants. Based on their comparative analysis of the various versions, the question arises as to whether China is a responsible actor in the international legal order and a reliable partner when it comes to entering into agreements with other countries or acceding to international treaties. Given that China comprises over one-fifth of humanity, it also brings into question whether the principles in the covenants can claim absolute validity and anything like universal acceptance.     

East sees east: the image of Jews from Islamic countries in the Jewish discourse of interwar Poland

This article explores travel pieces on Jews in Islamic countries published in the Jewish press (in Yiddish and Polish) in interwar Poland. It argues that many of the strategies of representation that Polish–Jewish journalists employed to describe the Jews of Islamic countries during this time borrow from the way the Jews of Eastern Europe were perceived. Turning the Western gaze on the Orient served Eastern European Jewish intellectuals as an act of multiple redemption. Finding themselves in between modern and traditional identification, Polish–Jewish journalists decided to ensure their belonging to the world which they saw as civilised by transposing concepts they knew from home.     

Demand- and supply-based policy transfer in Estonian public administration

Abstract

The aim of this study is to analyze the role of foreign influence in the development of Estonian central government since the beginning of the 1990s. A distinction is made between two types of policy transfer, which have been characteristic of Estonia and can be applied to transitional countries more generally. The first is demand-based policy learning based on the initiative and acknowledged need of recipient countries. The second is supply-based policy transfer, which is to a large extent based on foreign aid and the initiative of donor countries. Supply-based policy transfer was predominant at the start of transition, but in the late 1990s Estonian government institutions became more proactive in selecting different country models and engaging in lesson-drawing based on demand. Consequently, the focus on policy transfer has lost its significance and policy learning has become more important.     

Prospects for Islam in post‐Soeharto Indonesia∗

The Islamic parties combined may win a majority of the popular vote in the general elections in Indonesia in June, says Professor Mitsuo Nakamura of the Department of Cultural Anthropology, Chiba University, but there is virtually no possibility that so‐called “Islamic fundamentalism” will gain influence, and little likelihood that a solid Islamic bloc dominating both legislative and executive bodies of the government would initiate a comprehensive program of Islamization. In this article, Nakamura discusses the implications of the growing number of Islamic political parties for the future of Indonesian politics, and whether the emergence of these parties is likely to be detrimental or conducive to the reconstruction of Indonesia's national life on a more democratic footing.