The Great Game and the evolving nature of political talk shows on Russian television

ABSTRACT

Much has been written about the specific way in which the Russian government under President Vladimir V. Putin uses television to propagate pro-government views on domestic and international politics by influencing what is aired. This paper examines the first season of The Great Game (Bol’shaya Igra in Russian), a television talk show that appears on Russia’s national television network Channel One, as an example of the government’s effort to shape public opinion. A content analysis suggests The Great Game differs from the typical Russian talk show genre in that it delivers political messages without much entertainment, providing cerebral discussions of issues that nonetheless back up all nine of the core “neoconservative” concepts underlying recent Russian political strategy. This suggests that the Russian government and television executives innovate to determine how best to use television to win over skeptical citizens to the Kremlin’s point of view.     

Terrorist Skin,Peace-Party Mask: The Political Communication Strategy of Sinn Féin and the PIRA

The article analyses the political communication strategy adopted by Sinn Féin in order to legitimize the Provisional Irish Republican Army's (PIRA) terrorist campaign during their transition from violence into mainstream politics. Their endeavours to portray a triumphant republican movement in spite of the huge gap between strategic aims and achievements are examined. The political and social rehabilitation of violent Republicanism, and how their leaders have evolved from pariahs to celebrities, is also assessed. The role of the media and political elites, as well as the political discourse of the PIRA and Sinn Féin, is analysed in order to examine how the republican movement has tried to rewrite its past in an attempt to gain political and social legitimacy. Consequently, the myths reproduced by republicans to disguise their failures as historical compromises, reproducing a more benign interpretation of history which distorts the causes and consequences of terrorism, are critically assessed. The article will focus on the struggle for the legitimacy of the terrorist campaign and the propaganda system which, in the words of Garret FitzGerald (Irish Prime Minister between 1981 and 1987), has managed to turn the republican movement into the “peace party” despite murdering thousands of human beings.     

我国面临的国际恐怖犯罪现状与应对策略

国际恐怖主义犯罪是威胁当今国际社会安全的非传统安全因素,近年来,国际恐怖组织、个人,以及境内外“东突”恐怖势力、“藏独”恐怖势力、邪教恐怖势力,尤其是境内外“东突”及“藏独”势力的恐怖主义犯罪已经对我国构成了现实威胁。针对威胁,公安机关应积极推动我国反恐立法,完善反恐工作机制,参与国际反恐合作,重视情报、舆论引导和群众工作,加强安全防范和预案演练,以有效遏制和消除国际恐怖主义犯罪。     

国家安全治理的内外整合:以打击"东突"恐怖主义为例

国家安全是一个动态演进的概念。现代意义上的国家安全概念产生于工业社会的民族国家,并体现出以民族国家为中心、强调外部安全的特征。目前,中国正在从工业社会向后工业社会转型。在经济全球化的影响下,国家安全风险出现了高度的复杂性和高度不确定性等特征,内外界限被模糊。总体国家安全观是契合中国向后工业社会迈进时代特征的系统性、整体性的国家安全观。它具有多元性、层次性、结构性和整体性等特征,强调对内部安全与外部安全、国土安全与国民安全、传统安全与非传统安全、发展问题与安全问题、自身安全与共同安全的整合。作为一个重要的国家安全问题,中国打击“东突”恐怖主义可以在总体国家安全框架下呈现新的图景。由于“东突”恐怖主义日益被打上后工业化时代的烙印,中国反恐怖的模式必须实现从“统治”向“治理”的演变,这是因为“东突”恐怖主义日益显现出组织的松散性、风险的流动性和行为的不确定性以及思想的激进化、活动的虚拟化和联系的全球化,对既有的反恐模式提出了挑战。中国应在统筹国家治理与全球治理的基础上,构建内外整合型的治理模式,实现对恐怖主义的国家治理与全球治理良性互动。     

“Peace propaganda”? the application of Chomsky’s propaganda model to the Daily Nation’s coverage of the 2013 Kenyan elections

This article uses the third and fourth filters of Herman and Chomsky's Propaganda Model, namely, official sources and flak, to examine how the Daily Nation, which is the largest circulating newspaper in Kenya, covered the 2013 Kenyan elections. In the run up to the elections, several institutions, among them the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) of Kenya and the Media Council of Kenya (MCK), organised several workshops with media owners and journalists in the name of “peace journalism” to avoid a repeat of the 2007/2008 post-election violence. Although such efforts paid off because there was no physical post-election violence, questions have been raised as to whether this extensive peace training translated to “peace propaganda” making journalists and the media in general engage in excessive self-censorship in the name of peaceful elections thereby neglecting their watchdog role. Using the findings from a qualitative content analysis of the Daily Nation as a case study and semi-structured interviews with civil society organisations as media monitors, it can be arguably observed that the Daily Nation avoided any “contentious electoral issues” for fear of flak and relied overly on the IEBC and other government agencies as official sources of critical electoral information.     

Hezbollah’s Global Tentacles: A Relational Approach to Convergence with Transnational Organized Crime

That terrorists, criminals, and their facilitators exploit the global marketplace is well known. While the global movement of illicit goods is well documented, robust empirical evidence linking terrorism and organized crime remains elusive. This article posits Network Science as a means of making these links more apparent. As a critical case study, Hezbollah is quite possibly the most mature globalized terrorist organization, although it thinks of itself as the “Party of God.” However, the means seem to justify the ends: this article shows that Hezbollah’s holy men have no qualms about resorting to pornography, contraband cigarettes, immigration fraud, and credit card fraud to raise funds. Beyond establishing links, Social Network Analysis reveals other important characteristics, such as the relative autonomy from Hezbollah headquarters that local fundraising networks enjoy. That finding implies a paradigm shift: Hezbollah is no less a terrorist organization than an organized crime syndicate. This is apparent in a network’s structure. Transnational Organized Crime is typically about nodes being connected to many others in the network. Yet, Hezbollah fundraising networks allow such connectivity because of the group’s typically high levels of mutual trust and familial relationships. This creates a vulnerability that can be exploited by law enforcement and intelligence organizations.     

Norman Lindsay and the ‘Asianisation’ of the German Soldier in Australia during the First World War

Abstract

From the beginning of the First World War, atrocity stories about German depredations against Belgian civilians circulated throughout the Allied world. Caricatures of German soldiers rapidly degenerated into depictions of monstrous ‘Huns’ who were subhuman beasts, prone to acts of rapine and banditry. The most prominent producer of ‘Hun’ cartoons in Australia was artist Norman Lindsay, who published extensively throughout the war. Through an analysis of the antecedents of Lindsay’s monstrous ‘Hun’, this article will demonstrate that the rapid creation of the ‘Hun’ in Australia was made possible by the pre-existing racial caricatures of non-European people that were popular during this period. Chinese and Japanese people who were excluded from Australia by the White Australia policy were the previous targets of Norman Lindsay’s racial caricatures; as stories of German atrocities filtered into Australia, Lindsay transferred traits of Asians on to the German ‘Hun’, thus transforming him into the enemy ‘Other’. These traits were products of British imperial propaganda, and part of an ideology that asserted it was the job of the white man to civilise the barbaric coloured man. By ‘Asianising’ the German, Lindsay used a well understood language of racial caricature to reduce the German to the status of a barbarian. Race was therefore one of the central paradigms through which Australian propaganda operated.     

我国刑法应增设“恐怖活动罪”——基于新疆“7·5”事件的思考

新疆7·5事件引发了对我国刑法规定的反思。我国刑法缺乏专门的反恐罪名,应将暴力破坏的犯罪类型从刑法分则各章节中分列出来,结合恐怖主义目的,合并设置为专门罪名恐怖活动罪,为反恐怖斗争提供有力的法律依据。     

浅析国际恐怖主义犯罪对我国国家安全的危害

国际恐怖主义犯罪是威胁当今国际社会安全重要的非传统安全因素。近年来,国际恐怖组织、个人以及境内外“东突”恐怖势力、“藏独”恐怖势力、邪教恐怖势力,尤其是境内外“东突”及“藏独”势力的恐怖主义犯罪,已经对我国的国家安全构成了现实威胁,其恐怖犯罪活动不仅冲击局部地区的主流价值观、宗教观,破坏我国法制,侵蚀当地民族的国家认同信念,而且直接挑战我国的国家主权。     

公安宣传教育工作与时俱进的几点思考

当前公安宣传工作存在着舆论引导不够。宣传资源开发不力,对警察公共关系认识不足等问题。在新的形势和任务面前,公安宣传工作要强化"四个职能"。教育训练工作存在着四个"三不够",首要的问题是解决好教育训练的机制,即健全"龙头"机制,完善保障机制,明确主体机制。