The Anti-Axial Age

Karl Jaspers famously characterized the period from the beginning of the eighth to the end of the third century before Christ as an “Axial Age” in which intellectual freedom and creativity blossomed as never before. This article argues that it was followed, five hundred years later, by an “Anti-Axial Age”, which devised a novel formula for intellectual and political repression. Its essence was the state’s capture of the millenial narrative, which had first been developed as religious doctrine within Zoroastrianism and Christianity. Involving the two great classical empires of Western Eurasia, Persia and Rome, and then empowering the expansion of Islam, the Anti-Axial Age left an ideological legacy that continues to haunt the contemporary world.     

Ned Cobb's children: A new look at white supremacy in the rural southern US

Many scholars regard segregation in the US South as part of urbanization and modernization. Yet few have examined race relations in the countryside. The Rural Face of White Supremacy shows that absolute separation based on race proved poorly adapted to rural life. Inspired by the sociological studies of the rural South done in the 1930s and the 1940s, this book uses oral history to show that interracial social life in mid-twentieth century rural Georgia was ‘marked by intimacy as well as white supremacy.’ Race relations reflected the paternalism and dependence of an agrarian labour system that reduced black workers to the status of a peasantry.     

Laws without teeth: An overview of the problems associated with corruption in Ukraine

This paper presents an overview of the current problems of corruption in Ukraine. It provides an example of specific corruption practices in the country and describes the general provisions related to the fight against corruption in Ukraine. The paper presents preliminary results of a pilot study of corruption in Ukraine to examine the impact of corruption on thefinancial markets. We support the proposition of Claessens, Djankov, andKlingebiel (2000) that the development of financial institutions and the improvement of financial market services in a nation can be viewed as indicators of the effectiveness of the economic, political, and legal reforms and the dedication of the government to these reforms. The paper ends with a discussion of the role of the international community in the fight against corruption in Ukraine.