Swampwalls: dark matter and the lumpen army of art

Dominant notions of contemporary art are being overturned not by some radical avant-garde theory or movement, but instead by an “uprising” from within the confines of the “art factory,” as well as by newly embodied instances of informal everyday creativity that high culture has long overlooked. Theorists Negt and Kluge might have described this insurrection as the partial unblocking of a counter-public or proletarian sphere: a realm of fragmented identities and working class fantasy generated in response to the alienating conditions of capitalism. A more specific cultural interpretation suggests this mutiny from within and assault from below is the irrepressible brightening of “creative dark matter:” that marginalized and systematically underdeveloped aggregate of creative productivity, which nonetheless reproduces the material and symbolic economy of high culture. The results are explosive, or at least potentially so as this long, pent-up shadow archive spills out into the once forbidden dwelling place of mainstream law and order and high cultural privilege. Meanwhile, a new wave of socially engaged art is thriving on the margins of the art world. Like an enormous production warehouse this “post-public” creativity is developing sustainable farming, reenacting historical labor demonstrations, providing public services lost to decades of deregulatory economic policy, and initiating local bartering systems and environmental cleanups. Its vitality is something Joseph Beuys could have only dream about. And not surprisingly even this “autonomous” and “Interventionist” art is selectively becoming part of the mainstream culture industry through what Gilles Deleuze describes as an “apparatus of capture.” Nevertheless, one result of this new confrontation reveals this vibrant imaginary “from below” is pushing artistic production, pushing also discourse, pedagogy and cultural institutions into radically re-thinking definitions and possibilities not only involving the possibilities of contemporary avant-garde art practices, but also about the very nature of creativity, democracy, and political agency more broadly.     

Shifting linkages in ethnic mobilization: the case of RMDSZ and the Hungarians in Transylvania

The Democratic Alliance of Hungarians in Romania (RMDSZ) has been the most stable actor in the Romanian party system over the past two decades. However, in this article, we argue that beyond this apparent stability, the linkages between RMDSZ and its voters have undergone a gradual, yet significant shift. The ethnic block voting of Transylvanian Hungarians was closely connected to the concept of a self-standing and parallel “Minority Society,” and to the practices of institution building that the minority elites engaged in in the early 1990s. However, since its first participation in the Romanian government in 1996, RMDSZ has gradually departed from this strategy, a phenomenon that was also closely connected to a process of elite change within the organization. The present RMDSZ leadership puts less and less emphasis on policy programs that could reinforce the institutional system of the minority; consequently, it is unable (and unwilling) to organizationally integrate the community activists of the minority society who previously had played a key role in the process of (electoral) mobilization. At the rhetorical level, RMDSZ did not abandon the goal of building a parallel Hungarian minority society, but in its linkages to the Hungarian electorate, clientelistic exchanges have become predominant.     

China’s ‘New Silk Roads’: sub-national regions and networks of global political economy

This paper argues that the Chinese government’s ‘belt and road’ initiative – the Silk Roads vision of land and maritime logistics and communications networks connecting Asia, Europe and Africa – has its roots in sub-national ideas and practices, and that it reflects their elevation to the national level more than the creation of substantially new policy content. Further, the spatial paradigms inherent in the Silk Roads vision reveal the reproduction of capitalist developmental ideas expressed particularly in the form of networks, which themselves have become a feature of contemporary global political economy. In other words, the Silk Roads vision is more of a ‘spatial fix’ than a geopolitical manoeuvre.     

Humanism in the autobiographies of Edward Said and Nelson Mandela: memory as action

This paper discusses the concept of memory as a form of humanist activism in the autobiographies of Nelson Mandela and Edward Said. Mandela and Said were chosen because they dedicated their lives to the cause of freedom in South Africa and Palestine. Their engagement with the political causes of their countries turned into a concern with worldwide struggles for human rights and racial equality. While Mandela emerged as a vital force against apartheid in South Africa, Said was a well-known and influential Palestinian critic and intellectual whose writings tackle the Palestinian struggle for justice within the worldwide experience of imperialism and its binary oppositions of white/black, male/female, superior/inferior. I argue that these autobiographies bear witness to the plight of Black South Africans and Palestinians as both a shared memory resistant to erasure and a call for justice. Mandela and Said used their personal memories and life stories to construct a public reading of the meanings of the events that shaped them. Here I focus on the concept of humanist and political activity in the two autobiographies.     

周礼是怎样形成的

周礼是在继承殷礼的基础上,在周初政治、经济以及文化条件制约之下,在平衡各种政治势力的权力和利益的基础上诞生.采用韦伯的立场、观点和方法进行相关分析.     

实体经济发展中产业工人思想政治引领的实践路径探索——基于全国12家企业、6所职业院校的调查

目前我国经济已经进入高质量发展阶段,需要建设现代化经济体系、振兴实体经济,而产业工人队伍是振兴实体经济,支撑中国制造、中国创造的重要基础.本研究基于12家企业以及6所职业院校的调研情况,发现当前产业工人在思想上存在职业自豪感不强、主人翁意识淡薄、学技能动力不足、建功新时代着力点不清等问题.这些问题产生的原因主要是产业工...     

成汉政权及其族属

成汉政权是由南方的少数民族贝宗人所建,李氏宗族是成汉政权历代统治者的主体为期共45年,其势力范围除西南地区外还达到了西北的甘肃境内。与两晋之际出现的众多地方政权相比较,成汉政权和它们都同属于割据性质的地方政权,但却有着自己的诸多的特点:建立政权的时间最早;南部唯一的地方政权;实行武装割据,但并未断绝与中央王朝的关系;关注社会稳定;大规模移民。     

我国人民陪审员制度兴衰的原因和改革设想

我国人民陪审员制度自确立后,经历了曲折的历程。除了在个别时期由于党和国家的高度重视和民主高涨,使陪审制度得到较好实施以外,在绝大部分时间里由于"极左"路线、政治和司法集权以及制度设计上的原因,陪审制度或者被弃之不用,或者其实施仅流于形式。2005年新的人民陪审员制度本身仍存在很多问题,原因在于该制度对陪审员的职责定位不准,仍把陪审员定位于法官的参谋和助手,没有将陪审员的职责定位于对职业法官的监督制约,根本原因就是没有将保护民众的权利作为立法目的。在民众权利日益受到公权力和个别职业法官侵犯和威胁的今天,陪审制度应把保护民众的权利作为其立法目的,以民主和权力制约作为制度设计的理念,这符合时代要求和民众的愿望,这样才能使该制度免于重蹈覆辙。     

论大学生思想政治教育网络创建

随着人类进入信息社会,网络以其独特的方式影响着社会各个领域.大学生作为一种特殊的群体,网络给他们的思想带来了诸多影响,文中就如何借助网络做好大学生思想政治教育工作进行了探讨.     

The Worst Is Not over Yet: The Lives and Deaths of the ‘Self’ and ‘Others’ in Brazil's Response to the COVID-19 Pandemic

This paper focuses on the politics of life and death in Bolsonaro's Brazil during the COVID-19 pandemic. It is argued that while this administration, and the president himself, have long supported violence against individuals and social groups they did not see as fully human, their response to the pandemic marked a public transition from valuing certain kinds of lives as opposed to others, to a general contempt for human lives. The paper explores this transition by discussing the reification of the economy to the detriment of the people who produce and consume.