Civil and civic death in the new authoritarianisms: punishment of dissidents through juridical destruction,ethical ruin,and necropolitics in Turkey

ABSTRACT

Since the Turkish government’s recent turn to authoritarianism, tens of thousands of public dissidents and government critics have been subjected to dismissals and revocation of civic rights via emergency decrees. The victims call this process ‘civil death’. We aim to understand the logic behind this form of punishment in Turkey by examining the differential genealogy of civil death in the work of Hannah Arendt, Bertrand Ogilvie, Giorgio Agamben, and Achille Mbembe. We demonstrate that a later form of civil death was used by totalitarian regimes in a process leading to the reduction of targeted individuals as ‘superfluous’ and as ‘living corpses’ in concentration camps. In these contexts, death became an instrument of biopolitical and necropolitical powers. We propose that although contemporary punishment of public dissidents in Turkey shares some similarities with these forms of civil death, it may more fittingly be identified as civic death. We argue that while civil death is based on the classical political right of the sovereign to ‘make die’ after first reducing targeted individuals to little more than living corpses, civic death is linked to the power of the sovereign to ‘let die’ through the exclusion of public dissidents from economic, social, and political life.     

Explaining Sexual Harassment Judgments: Looking Beyond Gender of the Rater

Law and Human Behavior - In two decades of research on sexual harassment, one finding that appears repeatedly is that gender of the rater influences judgments about sexual harassment such that...     

Pellagra: a rare disease observed in a victim of mental and physical abuse

Lesions of the brain stem and cerebellum due to nutritional deficiencies are mostly seen in chronic alcohol abuse and more rarely in severe malnutrition. We report the case of a 27-year-old woman, found dead in the family flat. She presented cachexia (167 cm, 25 kg) and multiple hematomas of the limbs. Postmortem examination revealed lesions due to peritonitis. Neuropathological examination showed severe atrophy of the corpus callosum and central neuronal chromatolysis, which are observed in pellagra. Inflammatory colitis or celiac disease was not found. Toxicological analysis was negative, in particular no alcohol absorption. Pellagra, which is due to nicotinamide deficiency, is a disease rarely seen in this country. In this case, nutritional deficiency was the consequence of failure to eat in a context of abuse. The woman was born of an incestuous relationship and presented intellectual retardation due to poor affective relations with her mother.     

A New Conceptual Framework for Analysing a Case Study on ICT and the Sanctity of the Home

The case study shows the complex reality with respect to processes of meaning construction. Ruiters framework provides a more sophisticated instrument to analyse these complex processes. Unlike the classic models of legal communication, based upon a linear causality between norm and action, and unlike the dual model of interplay between legal institutions and institutional legal facts developed by MacCormick and Weinbergers Institutional Legal Theory (ILT), the tripartite model of interplay between rule, application, and social practices, stemming from Ruiters analysis of ILT, can contribute to a more refined model of legal communication.     

开展农民工艾滋病防治工作的策略思考

农民工是伴随着农村改革开放,农民在比较利益的驱动下,采取自发外出的方式到城市寻找生存和劳作机会而形成的。农民工自发的频繁流动性和自身所处社会弱势地位的特点等决定了他们有可能成为艾滋病传播中的脆弱人群。需要在政策层面上,提高对农民工艾滋病易感性和现实威胁性的认识,动员全社会的力量,并根据农民工的特点,将社会性别意识纳入决策主流,探索以农民工城市社区为单位的艾滋病防治工作,以有效预防和控制艾滋病在我国的传播和蔓延。     

以法制权：从权力反腐走向制度反腐

反对腐败必须以法制权,从权力反腐走向制度反腐。首先,制度反腐是提高党的执政能力的内在要求,是贯彻落实“三个代表”重要思想的本质要求,是建设现代政治文化的客观要求,从权力反腐走向制度反腐具有必然性。其次,制度反腐具有普适性、稳定性、科学性,从权力反腐走向制度反腐具有必要性。再次,公民社会的兴起是制度反腐的社会基础,多层监督网络的形成是制度反腐的技术基础,日趋完备的法律制度是制度反腐的法律基础。从权力反腐走向制度反腐具有可行性。     

国民幸福总值应成为衡量社会发展的新指标

本文分析了建国以来衡量我国发展水平指标体系的变化历程,阐明了G D P指标体系在新的历史时期的缺陷,认为提高国民的幸福感应该成为国家发展的终极目的,这也同“以人为本”的科学发展观相一致。     

From the Morality of Living to the Morality of Dying: Hunger Strikes in Turkish Prisons

Political hunger strikes have been part of the debates on human rights in many countries around the world. This paper explores the preconditions for and motives behind hunger strikes in Turkey by conceiving the hunger strikers as a part of citizenship politics through which strikers not only express their views against certain common issues, but also declare total opposition to an unjust condition within their political community. The paper focuses on the question of why some such “citizens” choose to participate in hunger strikes, which appears as an individual commitment to achieve a certain common objective. In doing so, the meaning of the experiences of hunger strikers and their universal right to live are elaborated in relation to their political and moral views. Hunger strikes are suggested to be seen as voluntary fasting, undertaken as a means of civil disobedience against an injustice within the context of citizenship. As examples of non-violent political acts, hunger strikes are not only part of citizenship politics but also expressions of commitment to achieving one's goals through non-aggressive means for the common good of all citizens. Moreover, they can also be considered examples of martyrdom/heroism because hunger strikers altruistically risk their life for a public cause. As a particular altruistic act, hunger strikes can also be viewed as an effective form of communication directed toward fellow citizens. Moreover, they are expressions of self-determination for having control over and for one's own life conditions. Finally, hunger strikes can be conceptualized as a struggle for transforming the configuration of structures and practices of citizenship about which one is passionately concerned. In this context, hunger strikes seem to be struggles for recognition in a relationship between two subjects, in which one subordinates the other.     

结合论的理论意义及实践价值

中国化的马克思主义必然在和照搬马克思主义、照搬西方文明的斗争中产生毛泽东思想、邓小平理论、“三个代表”重要思想以及科学发展观的指导思想。探讨结合论将对马克思主义的中国化有着重要的理论意义和现实意义。     

Fatalities due to methyl alcohol intoxication in Turkey: an 8-year study

The aim of this study is to examine methyl alcohol poisoning cases from the medico-legal point of view. The records of the Morgue Department of Council of the Forensic Medicine were reviewed retrospectively for all methyl alcohol poisonings for the period of 27.10.1992 and 30.05.2001. The victim's age, sex, death year, death place, methyl alcohol blood levels, the source of methyl alcohol, accompanying laboratory results and histopathologic tissue changes were recorded. The number of deaths due to the methyl alcohol poisoning was 271 during that period of time. Two hundred and forty-two of the (89.3%) total 271 methyl alcohol fatalities were men and 29 (10.7%) of were women. The largest age group was 36-40 years old, followed by 41-45. The methyl alcohol blood concentrations ranged widely from 50 to 755 mg for per 100 ml. There were 222 cases (81.9%) with the methyl alcohol blood concentrations over 100 mg/dl. Twenty-nine (10.7%) victims were poisoned through the consumption of cologne and three of them with alcoholic beverage named "Raki". Consumed products were not known in all other cases because of insufficient patient history and data. As a conclusion, regarding the distribution according to years, mortality due to methyl alcohol intoxication in our country have been proceeding on a certain level. In order to decrease the mortality due to methyl alcohol intoxication, some precautions should be developed that could prevent the production and consumption of alcoholic beverages illegally produced.