The great Caliban: the struggle against the rebel body – part two

“The prospects for red‐green politics in Britain can appear bleak. The fourth successive Conservative general election victory in April, 1992 has caused disarray and demoralization among the opposition parties. Nevertheless, the shock of defeat leaves a fluid situation in which there is a growing space on the left. There is at least a possibility that this could be filled by an eco‐socialist political force.     

Women's Experiences in the Gwangju Uprising: Participation and Exclusion*

Because of the prevailing patriarchal ideology in Korea, studies of the Uprising in Gwangju have not attributed an active role in the resistance or even autonomous subjectivity to women who took part in the uprising. This article raises and analyzes how the Gwangju Uprising has been genderized and represented in a way that continues this genderization. All too often, women's autonomous subjectivity has been omitted. This article further analyzes women's experiences of resistance in the Gwangju Uprising as well as their experience of being excluded from formal political organizations.     

The electoral victory of the NPD in Saxony and the prospects for future extreme-right success in German elections

ABSTRACT

Largely because of Germany's traumatic experience of National Socialism, German extreme right-wing parties have remained a marginal post-war political phenomenon. The spectacular electoral victory of the Nationaldemokratische Partei Deutschlands (NPD) in the Saxon parliamentary elections of September 2004 (9.2 per cent of the vote) nurtured the fear that a far-right party could establish itself at the national level. Backes explains the election victory by relating it to a set of Saxon and Eastern German circumstances. He demonstrates that unfavourable conditions, which have so far prevented the establishment of extreme right-wing parties at the national level, still prevail. Against this background, he shows that the NPD's capacity for taking advantage of advantageous conditions (like economic problems and xenophobia, rampant in some places) reaches its limits very quickly.     

The Gwangju People's Uprising and the Construction of Collective Identity: A Study on the Fighters' Bulletin

This paper explores the Fighters' Bulletin (Tusahoebo) , which was initially published by a student organization during the Gwangju People's Uprising and later became a kind of official newspaper of the struggle headquarters. Through an analysis of the contents of the Fighters' Bulletin , this study reconstructs the trajectory of the collective identity construction. The Fighters' Bulletin informed Gwangju citizens of the meaning and development of the Uprising and earnestly devoted itself to construct the collective identity of "we," defining the object and the subject of the resistance and guidelines for action. Concentrated on constructing the collective identity at the beginning, it tried to resist the stigmatic framing of the dominant discourses, to highlight the true meaning of the struggle. In the later stage of struggle, it devoted itself to investing in the emotional framing through the participants' willingness to sacrifice their lives for the struggle. It concludes that, even though the Gwangju Uprising was a failed 10-day long revolution, its collective identity, which was constructed and manifested through the Fighters' Bulletin, has been appropriated as a major framework for subsequent political struggles in South Korea.     

The Paradoxes of the Revolutions of 1989 in Central Europe

Abstract

The self-limiting revolutions of 1989 in Central Europe offer an alternative paradigm of revolutionary change that is reminiscent more of the American struggle for independence in 1776 than the Jacobin tendencies that grew out of the French Revolution of 1789. In order to understand the contradictory impulses of the revolutions of 1989—the desire for a radical renewal and the concern for preservation—this article takes as its point of departure the political thought of Hannah Arendt and Edmund Burke.     

A psychiatrist's view of disturbed relationships

Orwell's writings and the testimony of people who knew him confirm that the author of 1984 was touched by the antisemitic milieu in which he grew up. His struggle to come to terms with this important part of his background was not always successful.     

Fanon

Abstract

I argue that Franz Fanon can usefully be situated in the tradition of German Idealism in the sense that he takes from Kant and especially Hegel the conception of agency as something to be achieved through struggle for the ideal of humanity as self-determining. Fanon sees the suffering cased by colonial rule in Africa and elsewhere as deriving from the systematic deprivation of agency by the colonial power. Using the work of Hegel, Fanon seeks to reconstruct the emancipatory project of the black man in close analogy to Hegel’s master-slave dialectic. The violence which Fanon sees as unavoidable in such a struggle is not violence for the sake of violence but, following Hegel, the violence that constitutes the subject in the first place.     

House organ

“The disintegration of the Soviet Union and the geopolitical and ideological upheavals this has caused have altered the nature of class struggle throughout the world. Without the Soviet Communist Party, parties in the rest of the world have lost legitimacy and their claim to leadership of the working class. The basic tension between capital and labor remains, but the traditional means of addressing working class and minority grievances have necessarily changed. Without either a model or a support base — the two possibilities that the Soviets offered the working classes of other countries — those demanding economic and social justice must confront capital with new forms of organization and struggle.”     

The Peronists’ return to power in Argentina

The victory of Alberto Fernández in October’s presidential election represents a triumph for the Peronist tradition that has dominated Argentinian politics since the 1940s. It is likely, however, that his new government will struggle to rejuvenate Argentina’s struggling economy. Moreover, Fernández’s presidency may test Argentina’s relations with the United Kingdom, the United States and – potentially most dangerously – with Brazil.     

Why should we care about competition?

Abstract

Most people believe that competitive institutions are morally acceptable, but that there are limits: a friendly competition is one thing; a life or death struggle is another. How should we think about the moral limits on competition? I argue that the limits stem from the value of human sociability, and in particular from the noninstrumental value of a form of social connectedness that I call ‘mutual affirmation.’ I contrast this idea with Rawls’s account of social union and stability. Finally, I show how these ideas provide the basis for a powerful argument in favour of social provisions for public goods: for example, a strong public health care system moderates the stakes in labour market competition, preventing the competition from descending into a life or death struggle.     

Whither a Theory of Inter-organisational Relations: A Burgeon Field of Research Between Conceptual Innovation and Fragmentation

ABSTRACT

This article discusses the potential emergence of a theory on inter-organisational relations (IOR). Although no dominant set of causal statements about IOR exists, which is traditionally associated with a theory, the literature has made substantial advancements in the last decade. The main aim of this contribution is to review the respective literature, portraying its merits and shortcomings. The article shows that a rich analytical repertoire of instruments for research exists but that scholarship struggles to make use of these advancements. The article argues that an IOR theory is on the horizon but the field needs to accept and better conceptualise phenomena which lay outside the traditional understanding of theory building.     

Jean Thiriart in Cairo and Bagdad

ABSTRACT

In the ‘poor’ result achieved by Jean-Marie Le Pen in the 2007 presidential elections, many commentators saw the demise of the Front National. However, when asked by a journalist whether it was the end of her father's political career, Marine Le Pen smilingly replied: ‘I don't think so. In any case, this is the victory of his ideas!’ In this question and answer lies the whole story of the Front National and its impact on mainstream politics in the past two decades. First, Le Pen's defeat was exaggerated, the same way his victory had been in 2002. What Mondon argues in this paper is that the 2002 presidential elections did act as an ‘earthquake’ within French politics. However, this ‘earthquake’ did not trigger a tsunami of support for Jean-Marie Le Pen, but rather a tidal wave of misinformation and misunderstanding as to the real significance of the election results. By concentrating on the 2002 and 2007 presidential elections, Mondon highlights how this reaction led to the consecration of right-wing populist politics, best exemplified in the landslide election of Nicolas Sarkozy in 2007. He also provides an insight into the slippery slope Sarkozy's government took after its election, leading to an extremely rightward-leaning 2012 presidential campaign and new heights for the Front National.     

Evolution without democracy: Toward a unified framework for understanding the success and failure of Chinese Communism

This paper establishes an evolutionary framework for studying the dynamics of the power struggle within the Chinese Communist Party in relation to the wider power struggle in the nation. It posits four essential conditions for the applicability of the framework and a prediction of consequences. If a political party meets all the key conditions, then the model predicts that the ultimate winner of the internal power struggle is one who has identified the optimal strategy for the party to win the national power struggle and who has demonstrated the ability of putting it to practical use. The theoretical framework is briefly applied to several periods of the modern Chinese history. One of the evolutionary conditions is that the norm of promotion based on merits, which I argue the CCP inherited from the traditional Confucian culture, figures as the basic rule of game in deciding the intra-party power struggle. Thus, “evolution without democracy” is essentially a continuation of the traditional political culture in the new social context. My basic observation is that the CCP before 1949 met most of the evolutionary conditions, with Mao Zedong emerging as the ultimate winner of the internal power struggle at the same time as the CCP won its national victory. After 1949, however, the CCP has gradually changed from a revolutionary party to a status quo party, with Mao himself the biggest status quo winner, and some of the evolutionary assumptions began to be violated. I suggest that, in the post-Mao (and especially the post-Deng) era, these conditions might begin to be satisfied again. These preliminary observations are to be tested further by extensive case studies. The author thanks Professor Ross Terrill and an anonymous reviewer for their helpful comments on the earlier drafts of the paper.     

Hunting where the ducks are: activating support for Donald Trump in the 2016 Republican primary

ABSTRACT

Donald Trump’s victory in the 2016 Republican primary defied the predictions of many politicians, pundits, and political scientists. Yet, while Trump’s nomination was hard to predict, it is not difficult to explain. We show that Trump’s campaign message succeeded by activating longstanding, but often unappreciated, sentiments among Republican voters about immigration and economic entitlements. In particular, his support was concentrated among Republican voters with hawkish views on immigration and relatively liberal views on economic policy. Moreover, these views preceded support for Trump, rather than the other way around. Drawing on an original panel survey, we show that attitudes about immigration and economic entitlements measured in 2011 strongly predicted support for Trump in 2016. Although Trump’s coalition struck many observers as odd, it was predicated on a set of attitudes that is not unusual among Republican voters. He simply hunted where the ducks are.     

Media as Moderator of “the Sympathy Effect”

SUMMARY

How does public opinion respond when faced with the tragic death of a political candidate in the midst of an election campaign? The concept of the sympathy vote suggests that media coverage of the tragedy and the unification of public opinion carry the party of the deceased to victory on Election Day. Yet, the emotional dynamics of public opinion may not be so simple. This study argues that the relationship between emotion and candidate support hinges largely on behavioral expectations and media coverage. If messages violate expectations, media will focus on controversy leading to a dissipation of the sympathy effect in public opinion. This investigation elaborates on the mechanisms governing the relationship between campaigns and public opinion by emphasizing the significant link of media coverage in the process, and by defining boundaries of the concept of the sympathy vote for further theoretical consideration.     

The Common Root of Commitment,Resistance and Power

Abstract

This essay responds to some of the questions raised by Infinitely Demanding from the perspective of tragic conflicts. On this view, the struggle for power cannot be disentangled from the freedom at stake in liberalism and capitalism, nor from the efforts of individuals and groups to resist the powers that be. I suggest, moreover, that this entanglement threatens to divide from within not just the ethical subject, but groups and institutions as well.     

Right-wing Euroscepticism and populism: investigating the concept of ‘the people’

ABSTRACT

Right-wing Eurosceptic political groups gained ground in the elections for the European Parliament in May 2014. The electoral victory of right-wing Euroscepticism was accompanied by a concern that populism is (once again) spreading in Europe. Associating right-wing Eurosceptics with populism raises the question of whether critiques of populism can be directly extended to right-wing Euroscepticism. By reconstructing the right-wing Eurosceptic concept of ‘the people,’ this article demonstrates that the Eurosceptic concept of the people has a dual meaning that encompasses both a transnational and a national concept of the people. The article concludes that while Euroscepticism shares ideological features with populism, it is problematic, due to the internal structure of the promoted concept of the people and the European political environment, directly to extend recent critiques of populism to right-wing Euroscepticism.     

Riots,disasters and racism: impending racial cataclysm and the extreme right in the United States

ABSTRACT

Three events in late 2005—Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath in New Orleans, the Muslim riots in the suburbs of Paris, and the Cronulla ‘uprising’ in Australia—were interpreted by the American extreme right as confirmation of a long-feared impending racial cataclysm. Michael and Mulloy examine analyses of these events from various representatives of the American extreme right. While the mainstream media were often diffident about reporting frankly on the more sensitive implications of these events, this phenomenological approach may provide insight on how various controversial issues—such as immigration, race and multiculturalism—impinge on contemporary American society, culture and politics.     

The Emergence of a Global Civil Society: The Case of Anti-Apartheid

Abstract

This article argues that the transnational anti-apartheid movement which, from a global perspective, must be seen as one of the most significant social movements during the post-war era, made an important contribution to the emergence and consolidation of a global civil society during this period. The transnational anti-apartheid movement lasted for more than three decades, from the late 1950s to 1994, when the first democratic elections in South Africa were held, and it had a presence on all continents. In this sense, the interactions of the anti-apartheid movement were part of the construction of a global political culture during the Cold War. Further, I argue that the history of the anti-apartheid struggle provides an important historical case for the analysis of present-day global politics, as it is evident that the present mobilization of a global civil society in relation to economic globalization and supranational political institutions such as the World Trade Organization (WTO), the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank, has historical links to the post-war, transnational political culture of which the anti-apartheid movement formed an important part. Movement organizations, action forms and networks that were formed and developed in the anti-apartheid struggle are present in this contemporary context, making the transnational anti-apartheid movement an important historical resource for contemporary global civil society.