More than Old Friends? Narrative in Australia's Relationship with Korea

Attempts to come to terms with Australia's relationship with South Korea routinely emphasise material dynamics, such as volume and value of trade, military exchange and security cooperation, or formal diplomatic engagement. This study focuses instead on the nuances of persuasive appeal in “stories”, which comprise a key component of the broader narrative of Australia's relationship with South Korea. I undertake a rhetorical analysis of three key stories conveyed at all levels of official foreign policy communication. I find the Australian narrative seeks to endow the bilateral relationship with authority, establish a sense of similarity and commitment, and invokes indebtedness and reciprocity. While such representations are significant to the broader bilateral relationship, a key challenge here concerns the extent to which these representations are genuinely shared and resonant depictions of Australia‐South Korea relations.     

Now: prefigurative politics through a north Indian lens

This paper focuses on ‘prefigurative politics’ – embodying in the present one's vision of the future – among young people in north India. In so doing it contributes to wider debates on oppositional politics, temporality, India and youth. Building on recent fieldwork in Uttarakhand and Uttar Pradesh, we highlight the ubiquity of civic-minded everyday forms of prefigurative politics among a subset of young men and young women. We examine the temporality of this politics, which, like other recent prefigurative action across the world, emphasizes acting in the present. Young people in north India tend to view the future not as a point on the horizon but as the precipitate of their daily activities. By identifying the energetic attempts of young people within and beyond India to engage in social action, we also provide a counterpoint to negative stereotypes of youth circulating in the media and some scholarly circles.