Barack Obama and the South: demography as electoral opportunity

ABSTRACT

Barack Obama was more successful in the South in the 2008 election than many previous Democratic presidential nominees had been. While John McCain continued Republican dominance in the conservative region, it was a major breakthrough for a northern liberal Democrat, especially an African American from Illinois, to win three southern states and secure 55 electoral votes. Florida, North Carolina and Virginia were good opportunities for Obama because, demographically, they had come to resemble other large states outside the South. In these ‘converging’ southern states, the Latino and Asian communities had grown substantially. The percentage of college-educated Whites had increased and there had been large-scale migration from other regions of the country. The states that Obama won in the South were not as ‘southern’ as they once were. In some southern states, those called the ‘neo-Confederate South’ in this article, white support for Obama was less than John Kerry had received in 2004. This decline in white voting for the Democratic presidential nominee occurred despite the difficult economic times that enveloped the country in the months preceding the election, and the general unpopularity of the incumbent Republican administration headed by George W. Bush. Some of these states, like Alabama, Arkansas, Louisiana and Mississippi, had been among the most intransigent states in resisting the claims of the civil rights movement for social and political equality for African Americans in the 1950s and 1960s. In the future it may be more accurate to speak of more than one South, rather than refer to the region as an undifferentiated whole.     

Specialised domestic violence courts in Canada and the United States: Key factors in prioritising safety for women and children

ABSTRACT

This paper reviews the response of specialised domestic violence courts in Canada and the United States to contact disputes where there are allegations of domestic violence. It begins with a discussion of legal reforms responding to domestic violence in Canada and the United States, including the different types of DV courts and their rationales, key features, merits and drawbacks. Evaluations of Integrated DV courts in the United States and Canada are then reviewed. The research shows that although IDV courts hold more promise to deal with contact disputes given their inclusion of family law matters, there are few studies analysing the impact of IDV courts on these disputes, and some suggest these courts may actually increase contact and hence the potential for safety issues to arise. The final section discusses the strengths and weaknesses of IDV courts in relation to contact disputes, identifying the factors that make these specialised courts more or less successful in prioritising safety and minimising harm for women and children.     

Institutional and symbolic aspects of illiberal politics: the case of North Macedonia (2006–2017)

ABSTRACT

The paper discusses the underlying characteristics of Macedonian illiberal politics during the 11-year rule of the centre-right party VMRO-DPMNE (2006–2017) focusing on two aspects: institutional and symbolic. We argue that the unfair political competition was enabled by the weakness of pre-existing institutions and the population’s clientelist preferences, which were systematically exploited and expanded by VMRO-DPMNE. We also argue that the multi-ethnic character of the country, the disputed Macedonian national identity and the lack of viable international prospects allowed VMRO-DPMNE to construct a strong nationalist narrative that appealed to voters and further isolated the opposition.     

论“两廊一圈”的性质、法制条件和进程

中越“两廊一圈”经贸合作议题的提出,既是对多年来蓬勃发展的两国经贸关系的肯定,同时也显示两国经贸交往还潜在着巨大的可开发空间。“两廊一圈”性质上是中国—东盟自由贸易区之下的中越自由贸易区,它在内容和实施步骤上将以中国—东盟自由贸易区的相关协议为蓝本和框架,其建设进程不会快于中国—东盟自由贸易区时间表。     

中共中央北方局各抗日根据地的民主政权建设

抗日战争是全民族的事业,必须给广大人民群众以充分的抗日民主自由权利。中共中央北方局在抗日战争初期即遵照中央指示,改造旧政权,建立抗日政府。抗日战争进入战略相持阶段前后,又致力于抗日民主政权的建设,创立了“三三制”的民主政权形式,开展了广泛的精兵简政运动,巩固了抗日根据地,推进了中国人民的抗战事业。     

Framing and dominant metaphors in the coverage of North Korea in the Australian media

Through the selective allocation of attention, framing and metaphors in covering foreign affairs and countries, media narratives often act to delegitimise, marginalise and demonise international actors. Focusing on Australian reportage of North Korea in The Australian, The Sydney Morning Herald and from the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) between 1 January 2010 and 31 December 2012, this paper explicates how the framing mechanisms utilised in media point to media complicity in reinforcing a negative, adversarial orientation towards North Korea. It also discusses implications for how Australians view the North Korean people, Australian–North Korean relations, and policy pertaining to Northeast Asia more broadly.     

Why invest in North Korea? Chinese foreign direct investment in North Korea and its implications

North Korea has been regarded as the least likely place to attract foreign investors due to its poor infrastructure, policy reversals, and totalitarian regime. However, the recent growth of Chinese direct investment in North Korea has drawn much attention due to its implications for the North Korean economy and regional stability. This research provides an analytical framework by considering two fundamental issues that any foreign investor takes into account when making an investment decision: property rights protection and profitability. It examines how recent changes have influenced these two issues, which, in turn, shaped the incentive structure of Chinese private investors.     

Teaching “Narratives of Slavery” in Charleston,SC – Slavery Central

This essay describes a graduate course entitled “Narratives of Slavery” taught in Charleston, SC in spring 2014, in which I sought to recenter the dominant (national) discourse on slavery by stressing the local and insisting on our (the class’s) implication with the structures of things past, both the physical structures of the city of Charleston, and all of the legal, financial, historiographical, and ideological structures of the Atlantic World that continue to shape our contemporary reality. The course attempted to critically analyze the process and the consequence of narrativizing slavery – how we write slavery into (and out of) being; how we use narratives of slavery for the purpose of abolition and emancipation; what happens when we write particular narratives of slavery; what gets written out of the history of slavery when particular narratives become dominant; how contemporary narratives of slavery feed into and compare with historical accounts; how historical accounts feed into historical fiction, and how all these things play out in the postcolonial here and now of the American South in the age of Obama (and anti-Obama). In addition to offering a set of critical readings of texts, notably Zakes Mda’s neo-slave narrative Cion, the essay also presents some of the students’ thoughtful and moving responses to the texts and to Charleston’s evolving memorial landscape. The essay’s claim that we must read and discuss slavery and race in ways that do not reify or ossify either of those two terms was given even more urgency by the horrific mass shooting of 17 June 2015.     

Deconstructing Mediation: A Case Study of the Cod Wars

In this study, I explore the mediation techniques used by an international organization (IO) to settle an international crisis. Specifically, I have focused on the use of formal and informal techniques with a case study of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization's (NATO) mediation during the Cod Wars between Iceland and the United Kingdom. My analysis indicates that a combination of both formal and informal mediation techniques was instrumental in resolving the Cod Wars conflict. Further research would clarify whether this finding can be generalized to other cases of NATO mediation and interventions of third parties in addition to NATO.