Radical Islam: The Death of an Ideology?

Dr. Takeyh is a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations. Dr. Gvosdev is a senior fellow at the Nixon Center. The following is adapted from the conclusion of their recent book, The Receding Shadow of the Prophet: The Rise and Fall of Radical Political Islam (Praeger, 2004), reproduced with permission of Greenwood Publishing Group, Inc., Westport, CT.     

地神信仰与泰国的国王崇拜--泰国国王崇拜的民俗学解读

泰国人民对国王的崇拜源自于泰国的原始地神崇拜,而外来婆罗门教与佛教思想的渗透及其最终与本土原始信仰的融合,则进一步巩固了人民对国王的崇拜。     

Incidents on Mount Scopus: UNTSO effectiveness and the 1958 death of Lieutenant Colonel George Flint

The Europeanization reforms in Turkey are partly designed to bring about the demilitarization of Turkish politics. However, up to now reforms have not been free from the military's impact. The democracy game is still played in a field whose borders have been delimited by the Turkish armed forces (TAF) and its interpretation of Kemalism. Even when the boundaries of these borders were extended, it was more due to the TAF's self-restraint, motivated by the prospect of membership in the EU, rather than the restrictive impact of institutional reforms. Under these circumstances, the future of Europeanization and thus the demilitarization of Turkish politics is likely to be shaped by whether reforms will reach the issues and prerogatives that the military has carefully guarded and whether the EU will offer the state a credible prospect for membership.     

Letter-writing and Transnational Activism on Behalf of Indonesian Political Prisoners: Gatot Lestario and his Legacy

Amnesty International estimated in 1977 that between 600,000 and 750,000 Indonesians had been or were still imprisoned as a result of the Army-led anti-communist violence in Indonesia in the mid-1960s. This article charts the relationship between members of Amnesty International and the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) with a political prisoner on death row in East Java, Gatot Lestario, a former leader of the Indonesian Communist Party. This article draws on the letters he wrote over a period of three years before his execution in 1985 and interviews with his pen pals. It traces the ways in which he encouraged his pen pals to advocate for human rights in Indonesia and their responses, as well as his own involvement in political prisoner advocacy. This case study illustrates the disappearance of Indonesia's previously close and solidary relationship with the socialist world and its replacement at the people-to-people level with human rights activism involving Western activists. This is particularly evident in the increasingly important role played by members of Amnesty International, the Quakers and other overseas organizations concerned with Indonesia. Finally, the article assesses Gatot Lestario's impact, after his execution, on the development of a long-term advocacy network for Indonesia's political prisoners.