Hirohito Redux-- Hirohito and the Making of Modern Japan by Herbert P. Bix

ABSTRACT

The American Anthropological Association's Code of Ethics does not sufficiently acknowledge the challenges posed for anthropologists who “study up” and “across” rather than “down” the partly imagined power hierarchy within which the researcher and her host members position themselves. The Code proves inadequate for the ethical dilemmas that emerged from the four projects presented in this volume on the worlds of urban feminists and right-wing conservatives, activists and policy-makers of a local community revitalization project, an indigenous minority in the process of reclaiming its present, and corporate soccer functionaries. Several features distinguish these articles from previous work on the subject of ethics in anthropology: It is no longer necessarily nor exclusively the ethnographer who does the writing. The contested claims to ethnographic authority, access, and representation are closely related to the importance of the production and circulation of texts. The will to be loyal to one's consultants does not in all projects appear as the most ethical manner to pursue fieldwork. The power relations that anthropologists engage mirror the fluidity and flexibility of power relations among their research subjects that appear exacerbated in study-up projects. As anthropology's focus has become increasingly urban, cosmopolitan, and Western, conventional understandings of ethnographic authority, access, and power relations are contested and problematized in new, more complex ways.     

The Effects of the Value-Added Tax on Revenue and Inequality

This paper examines the impact of the introduction of the value-added tax on inequality and government revenues using newly released macro data. We present both conventional country fixed effect regressions and instrumental variable analyses, where VAT adoption is instrumented using the previous values of neighbouring countries’ VAT systems as an instrument. The results reveal – in contrast to earlier work – that the revenue consequences of the VAT have not been positive. The results indicate that income-based inequality has increased due to the VAT adoption, whereas consumption inequality has remained unaffected.     

The colony of the colonized: the Duchy of Courland's Tobago colony and contemporary Latvian national identity

This paper examines the legacy of the Duchy of Courland's overseas colony of Tobago as it relates to present-day Latvian national identity using the ethno-symbolist approach of Anthony D. Smith and comparative cases. As Latvia is a small nation that has been an independent nation-state for only two short periods, national legitimacy and pride pose particular problems for Latvians. To this end, Latvian historians have worked to reinterpret the Baltic German-dominated Duchy of Courland as a positive period of Latvian national history and have sought to emphasize ethnic Latvian involvement in the Duchy's colonial endeavors, especially on the island of Tobago. Their efforts have then filtered into the general Latvian consciousness through books, film, plays, and place names. Since Latvia's independence from the USSR, the former colony of Tobago has gained renewed importance for Latvians who are experiencing a widely perceived notion of postcolonialism. This paper concludes that the appropriated colony of Tobago will continue to rise in importance as a component of Latvian national identity.     

Behind China's World Trade Organization agreement with the USA

The ‘war on terror’ is widely regarded as instigating a major regression within the development of the international system. Processes of globalisation are being challenged, it is argued, by a reassertion of the sovereign power of nation-states, most especially the USA. In more overt terms this regression is represented as a ‘return’ of a traditional form of imperialism. This ‘return of imperialism’ thesis challenges the claims of theories developed during the 1990s which concentrate on the roles of deterritorialisation and the development of biopolitics in accounting for the constitution of the contemporary international order. In contrast this paper seeks to detail the important respects in which biopolitical forces of deterritorialisation continue to play an integral role within the strategies of power that make the war on terror possible. Rather than understanding the war on terror as a form of ‘regression’ it is necessary to pay heed to the complex intertwinings that continue to bind sovereign and biopolitical forms of power in the 21st century. Such an understanding is urgent in that it provides for different grounds from which to reflect on the processes by which international order is currently being reconstituted and to help think about how to engage in reshaping them.     

Assessing civil society impact for democracy programmes: Using an advocacy scale in Indonesia and the Philippines

Democracy assistance programmes have always been notoriously difficult to measure in terms of outcome, but the need to show their impact (or lack of it) remains critical. This article represents part of a continuing endeavour to develop a tool for measuring civil society programme impact in the form of an advocacy scale encompassing democracy's critical components of participation, accountability and contestation. The scale is tested in the context of USAID-assisted initiatives in the Philippines and Indonesia, where it demonstrates a capacity both to monitor donor assistance outcomes and to suggest future programme initiatives.     

“It Happens All the Time”: Women’s Experiences and Normalization of Sexual Harassment in Public Space

This study explored the prevalence of sexual harassment, consequences of harassment, and reasons for not reporting these experiences through a survey among Swedish female university students (N?=?1941). One fourth reported one or more incidents of sexual harassment during the 12 months period prior to the survey. Victims were more often younger and with Swedish-born parents compared with nonvictims. Victimization most frequently occurred at clubs or restaurants and the most frequently reported consequences were anger and worry about being victimized again. Few reported the incidents to the police making this, in part, an invisible problem.     

Treatment as punishment: Forensic psychiatry in The Netherlands (1870–2005)

This article provides an overview of the development of forensic psychiatry in the Netherlands from the late nineteenth to the early twenty-first century. The first part addresses the ways forensic psychiatry established itself in the period 1870–1925 and focuses on its interrelatedness with forensic practice, psychiatry's professionalization, the role of the government, the influence of the so-called New Direction in legal thinking and (Italian and French) anthropology of crime, and the debates among physicians as well as between psychiatrists and legal experts on the proper approach of mentally disturbed offenders. From the mid-1920s on the so-called ‘psychopaths laws’ anchored forensic psychiatry in the Dutch legal system. The second part zooms in on the enactment of these laws, which formalized special measures for mentally disturbed delinquents. These implied a combination of sentencing and forced admission to and treatment in a mental institution or some other form of psychiatric surveillance. The article deals with the meaning, reach and consequences of this legislation, its debate by psychiatrists and legal experts, the number of delinquents affected, the offenses for which they were sentenced and the (therapeutic) regime in forensic institutions. The goal of the Dutch legislation on psychopaths was ambiguous: if it was designed to protect society against assumed dangerous criminals, at the same time they were supposed to receive psychiatric treatment to enable their return to regular social life again. These legal and medical objectives were at odds with each other and as a result discussions about collective versus individual interests as well as about the usefulness and the effects of this legislation kept flaring up. To this day the history of this legislation is characterized by the intrinsic tension between punishment and security on the one hand and treatment and re-socialization on the other. Whether at some point one or the other prevailed was largely tied to the social climate with respect to law, order and authority.     

Interpreting the Politics of the Judiciary: The British Senior Judicial Tradition and the Pre‐emptive Turn in Criminal Justice

This article presents an interpretive politics of the judiciary, arguing for the value of interpretive political analysis in understanding developments in case law and judicial activity. It sketches out a senior judicial tradition, which is argued to guide but not predetermine the actions of the British senior judiciary. A case study, the senior judiciary's response to the Imprisonment for Public Protection (IPP) sentence, is presented, drawing on case law, extra‐judicial speeches, and interviews with five serving or retired senior judges. It is argued that this demonstrates the senior judiciary to be politically attuned actors, often highly sensitive to the broader context, while equally determined to act with fidelity to the law and the responsibilities inherent in an independent, impartial judiciary. The IPP case law suggests that the senior judicial tradition, and its inherent tensions, limits the extent to which the senior judiciary feel equipped to oppose the ‘pre‐emptive turn’ in criminal justice.