Framing Capital Punishment in Japan: Avoidance,Ambivalence, and Atonement

This article examines how two of Japan’s largest newspapers frame death penalty issues. Through a content analysis of 7,153 Asahi and Nikkei articles in the 66-month period from January 1, 2007 to June 30, 2012, 11 death penalty frames are identified: inevitability, atonement by dying, atonement by living, victims’ rights and emotions, human rights, miscarriage of justice, calls for discussion, life without parole, deterrence, public support, and retribution. In addition to frames, we examined who the main voices are in each article on capital punishment. We found that avoidance and ambivalence are the two main approaches taken by Asahi and Nikkei to cover death penalty issues, and the most surprising finding is the high salience of atonement as a frame for thinking about capital punishment. In Japan, atonement is used to justify (atone by dying) and oppose (atone by living) the death penalty. Although atonement by living in prison and atonement by dying at the gallows imply radically different outcomes, the flexibility of the atonement frame may suggest new possibilities for Japan’s anti-death penalty movement.     

Thirty Years of Scholarly Influence in International Journals and Its Relation to the Most-Cited Scholars in Asian Criminology

Citation analysis provides a quantitative means of tracking the most influential scholars and works within a field. Despite this advantage, there is a dearth of research that provides more than a snapshot of influence over a relatively short time period. One exception is the citation analysis body of research conducted by Cohn and Farrington (1990, 2012), which has recently been expanded to include European (Cohn and Iratzoqui 2016) and Asian (Farrington et al. 2019) criminologies. The current paper presents a thirty-year analysis (1986–2015) of scholarly influence within four international journals (Australian and New Zealand Journal of Criminology, British Journal of Criminology, Canadian Journal of Criminology and Criminal Justice, and Criminology), as well as an analysis of the Asian Journal of Criminology (AJC) over its first 10-year period (2006–2015). The main conclusions are that, while rankings over time are not generally consistent within journals, the most-cited scholars tend to remain highly ranked over time across the four main international journals. Furthermore, the most highly cited scholars in the four international journals were also highly cited in AJC. The most-cited works of the top scholars across all of the international journals, including AJC, covered four major areas, including developmental and life-course criminology, theoretical issues, statistics, and policy issues.

     

Is Spain Different? The Tamed Memory of the Spanish Civil War and the Limits of Spain's National Self-Image (2008–10)

This article focusses on ongoing discussions about the place of the Spanish Civil War (1936–39) and the Franco dictatorship (1939–75) in Spain's democracy. Following the suspension of Judge Baltasar Garzón by the Spanish Supreme Court in 2010, who had indicted General Francisco Franco (1892–1975) and thirty-four accomplices under international law for committing crimes against humanity, a debate arose between leading intellectuals in Spain about the growing international influence on Spain's war past. This debate revealed that a group of influential left-wing intellectuals attempted to curb the social and political influence of the citizens' memory movements. The author observes how this happened by applying three strategies: the foreign strategy, the nationalistic-ethical strategy, and the saturation strategy. He concludes that the growing international pressure on Spain's handling of the Civil War and dictatorship led to a “Spanification” of the “culture of the transición” as a national memory, causing the memory movements to lose momentum and curbing the international influence on Spain's handling of its dictatorial past.     

Evolving Dynamics of Societal Security and the Potential for Conflict in Eastern Ukraine

Abstract

In this essay we argue that changes in political structures in post-Soviet Ukraine have affected the potential for conflict during transition. Relying on organisational theory to determine the potential for conflict in Ukraine, we argue that this potential is structurally determined by the changing character of societal relations within and beyond Ukraine. The potential for conflict was always present in post-Soviet Ukraine, but this essay examines the facts of when, how and why conflict happened, and how it was related to weak state institutions, centre–periphery relations and an unsettled relationship with Russia. Relying on our analytical framework, we conclude that the conditions for further conflict greatly outweigh the conditions for peace.     

Introduction: Meritocracy in Perspective. The Rise of the Meritocracy 60 Years On

Sixty years after its publication, Michael Young’s The Rise of the Meritocracy remains one of the most important texts for understanding the changing intellectual politics of postwar Britain. Young’s fictional vision of a meritocratic society explores the consequences of a society where each citizen is judged according to the formula ‘I.Q. + Effort = Merit’. The successful meritocrats hoard ever-greater rewards for themselves, crystallising into a rigid and repressive elite who rule over an increasingly powerless and depressed underclass. While the concept has evolved and adapted, the language of meritocracy is one of the great survivors of postwar British politics. In an age characterised by the rise of populist leaders and movements, as well as a backlash against educated ‘liberal elites’, revisiting, reinterpreting and re-evaluating Young’s influential satire and the central place the concept of meritocracy occupies in the history of postwar Britain has never been more important.     

The communitarian revolutionary subject: new forms of social transformation

Abstract

The hope for a unique revolutionary actor in the twentieth century evaporated as a result of the weaknesses of social organisations. This paper examines the potential of an almost-forgotten group of revolutionary actors – collectively organised and deliberately involved in processes of social and productive transformation with a legitimate claim to territory – whose present-day activities involve them in concerted processes to consolidate a different constellation of societies on the margins of the global capitalist system. Indigenous and peasant communities throughout the Americas are self-consciously restructuring their organisations and governance structures, taking control of territories they claimed for generations. They are also reorganising production to generate surplus, assembling their members to take advantage of underutilised resources and peoples’ energies for improving their ability to raise living standards and assure environmental conservation and restoration. These communities are not operating in isolation. They coordinate activities, share information and build alliances. Hundreds of millions of people are participating in this growing movement; they occupy much more than one-quarter of the world’s land area. There is great potential for others to join them, expanding from the substantial areas where they are already operational. Global social networks are ensuring that this dynamic accelerates.