Western moral and political theory in the last two centuries has widely held that morality and politics are independent of a divine reality. Claiming that this consensus is flawed, prominent theologian Franklin I. Gamwell argues that there is a necessary relation between moral worth and belief in God. Without appealing to the beliefs of any specific religion, Gamwell defends a return to the view that moral and political principles depend on a divine purpose. To separate politics from the divine misrepresents the distinctive character of human freedom, Gamwell maintains, and thus prevents a full understanding of the nature of justice. Principles of justice define "democracy on purpose" as the political form in which we pursue the divine good. Engaging in a dialogue with such major representatives of the dominant consensus as Kant, Habermas, and Rawls, and informed by the philosophical writings of Alfred North Whitehead, this book makes the case for a neoclassical metaphysics that restores a religious sensibility to our political life.

Autonomy, Refusal, and The Black Bloc reinterprets the positioning of critical and radical theory by focusing squarely on the role of class analysis. It also argues that the survivance of The Frankfurt School style of critique is wholly dependent upon the traditions of radical theory that find their same departure point from out of "the great refusals" of the 1960s and 1970s. By linking together the traditions of critical and radical theory through the work of Marcuse and Negri and by demonstrating their conjunctural and historiographical connections, Carley argues that the inventive strategic and organizational contexts that give rise to the black bloc tactic constitute a new political expression of class and, more forcefully, constitute the meaning of class politics for the late 20th and 21st century.

Democracy and Brazil: Collapse and Regression discusses the de-democratization process underway in contemporary Brazil. The relative political stability that characterized domestic politics in the 2000s ended with the sudden emergence of a series of massive protests in 2013, followed by the controversial impeachment of Dilma Rousseff in 2016 and the election of Jair Bolsonaro in 2018. In this new, more conservative period in Brazilian politics, a series of institutional reforms deepened the distance between citizens and representatives. Brazil's current political crisis cannot be understood without reference to the continual growth of right-wing and ultra-right discourse, on the one hand, and to the neoliberal ideology that pervades the minds of large parts of the Brazilian elite, on the other. Twenty experts on Brazil across different fields discuss the ongoing political turmoil in the light of distinct problems: geopolitics, gender, religion, media, indigenous populations, right-wing strategies, and new forms of coup, among others. Updated analyses enriched with historical perspective help to illuminate the intricate issues that will determine the country's fate in years to come. Democracy and Brazil: Collapse and Regression will interest students and scholars of Brazilian Politics and History, Latin America, and the broader field of democracy studies.

This book develops the concept of the corporatist catch-all party to explain how the German Christian Democratic Union (CDU) has responded to changing demands from women over the past forty years. Otto Kirchheimer's classic study argues that when catch-all parties reach out to new constituencies, they are forced to decrease the involvement of membership to facilitate doctrinal flexibility. In a corporatist catch-all party, however, societal interests are represented within the party organization and policy making is the result of internal party negotiation. Through an investigation of CDU policy making in the issue areas of abortion policy, work-family policy, and participation policy, this book demonstrates that sometimes the CDU mobilizes rather than disempowers membership. An important lesson of this study is that a political party need not sacrifice internal democracy and ignore its members in order to succeed at the polls.

While the Chinese urban movement has successfully transferred surplus labor from the countryside to urban industries that urgently require free and cheap labor, numerous problems have arisen as a result of the unprecedented huge-scale process. Such conditions such as overcrowding, substandard housing, lack of social services, corruption, and abuse of power have often reached crisis stage. American college students often ask: How does the government control the largest urban population in the world? Why do newly developed, highly commercialized cities continue to support the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) rather than challenging the old regime? What happens when urban residents have problems with a party-controlled government? This book, collects essays from the best scholars in their fields and examines urban issues, including identifying residents' concerns, analyzing policy problems, and providing some answers to these pivotal questions. They address this important topic from a Chinese-American perspective through a cooperative interdisciplinary research effort among Chinese-American scholars interested in the subject. Their scholarship makes a significant contribution through multi-faceted components from different fields such as economics, political science, criminal justice, law, anthropology, sociology, and education. The authors introduce and explore the theory and practice of policy patterns, political systems, and social institutions by identifying key issues in Chinese government and society contained within the larger framework of the international sphere. Originally from Beijing, Shanghai, Xi'an, Tianjin, and other cities in China, these authors have received training and advanced degrees from American universities and colleges, thus bringing uncommon perspective and conclusions by focusing on urban studies specific to China. Their endeavors move beyond the existing scholarship and seek to spark new debates and proposed solutions while reflecting on established schools of history, religion, linguistics, and gender studies. Crucial to this volume is the assessment of historical and empirical data found in these essays that place major events in the context of Chinese tradition, its culture, and national security. Using comprehensive coverage to create a broad and solid foundation of knowledge, this collection presents a better understanding of the current Chinese metropolitan climate and includes legitimate issues with city policy implementation.

The Mobilization of Political Islam in Turkey explains why political Islam, which has been part of Turkish politics since the 1970s but on the rise only since the 1990s, has now achieved governing power. Drawing on social movement theory, the book focuses on the dominant form of Islamist activism in Turkey by analyzing the increasing electoral strength of four successive Islamist political parties: the Welfare Party; its successor, the Virtue Party; and the successors of the Virtue Party: the Felicity Party and the Justice and Development Party. This book, which is based on extensive primary and secondary sources as well as in-depth interviews, provides the most comprehensive analysis currently available of the Islamist political mobilization in Turkey.

This book focuses on the Boko Haram insurgence in Nigeria, and provides information on the origin and growth of the sect, antecedent and historical factors behind the insurgence, assessing a variety of socio-political drivers. The structure, organization and ideology of the sect are analysed, paying attention to internal splits within the group, as well as external relations with the Nigerian state, and global jihadism. The diverse and wide ranging issues covered in the book makes it valuable for academic researchers, students and policy practitioners both within Africa and beyond.

Poststructuralism and After provides a comprehensive, innovative and lucid account of contemporary poststructuralist theory, which probes its limits, explores rival theoretical approaches, and elaborates new concepts and logics. The book distils and articulates the basic philosophical assumptions and theoretical concepts of poststructuralism, but by building upon the work of Derrida, Foucault, Heidegger, Lacan, Laclau, Levi-Strauss, Marx, Saussure and Zižek it also provides a distinctive version of the poststructuralist project.The philosophy and theory of poststructuralism is presented through a critical engagement with the central problems of social and political theory. Such problems include the structure/agency dilemma; the problem of social order; the ongoing debates between positivists, interpretivists and realists about the role and character of social science; the relationship between the economy, the state and society; the complexities of identity/difference; and the role of power, domination and ideology. Empirical illustrations and case studies of selected social phenomena further illuminate the theoretical arguments displayed in this book.

This book addresses itself to the relationship between the ideological and material which has long occupied a primary place in Marxist scholarship and is seen to be of central importance to feminist analysis. This book looks at some aspects of the debate in the context of Asia.;In particular, it examines the role that ideology can play both as a disabling and an enabling factor in the lives of women seeking to earn a livliehood for themselves and their families under conditions of poverty.;The case studies relate to a mixed set of Asian countries, with an associated diversity of cultural and economic conditions.;Haleh Afshar is also editor of "Iran: A Revolution in Turmoil", "Women and Ideology" and "Women, State and Ideology". Bina Agarwal is editor of "Structures of Patriarchy: State, Community and Household in Modernising Asia" and author of "Mechanisation in Indian Agriculture" and "Cold Hearths and Barren Slopes: The Woodfuel Crisis in the Third World".

In recent years, political theorists have increasingly focused on the question of legitimacy rather than on justice. The question of legitimacy asks: even if legal coercion falls short of being perfectly just, what nonetheless makes it morally legitimate? Yet legitimacy remains poorly understood. According to the regnant theory of justificatory liberalism, legitimate legal coercion is based on reasons all reasonable persons can accept and is conceived in terms of a hypothetical procedure. Philip Shadd argues that this view would effectively de-legitimize all laws given its requirement of unanimity; it wrongly suggests that basic rights are outcomes of political procedures rather than checks on such procedures; and it is paternalistic as it substitutes hypothetical persons for actual persons. Where should theorists turn? Shadd's perhaps surprising proposal is that they turn to neo-Calvinism. Founded by the Dutch politician, theologian, and social theorist, Abraham Kuyper (1837-1920), neo-Calvinism is a specific variant of Reformed social thought unique for its emphasis on institutional pluralism. It has long theorized themes such as church-state separation, religious diversity, and both individual and institutional liberty. Out of this tradition Shadd reconstructs an alternative framework for legitimacy. The central neo-Calvinist insight is this: legitimacy is a function of preventing basic wrongs. The book develops this insight in terms of three ideas. First, the wrongs that legitimate regimes must prevent are violations of objective natural rights. Second, these rights and wrongs presuppose some or another view of basic human flourishing. Third, Shadd suggests we understand these rights and wrongs as being exogenous. That is, they are not social constructions, but arise outside of human societies even while applying to them. While based in a religious tradition of thought, religious intolerance is no part of this neo-Calvinist theory of legitimacy and, in fact, runs contrary to neo-Calvinism's distinctive institutional pluralism. But only by theorizing legitimacy along the lines Shadd suggests can we make sense of convictions such as that some legal coercion is legitimate even amidst disagreement and that paternalistic coercion is illegitimate. Neo-Calvinism offers a better framework for understanding legitimacy. This book will be of particular interest to secular theorists focusing on themes of political legitimacy, public reason, justificatory (or political) liberalism, or the work of John Rawls, and to religious theorists focused on theories of church-state separation, institutional pluralism, and religious diversity.

A prospective future of ecological and economic crises poses a challenge to the utopian imaginary, to conceive a better world, and alternative future. Utopia as Method does not construe utopia as a goal or blueprint, but as a holistic, reflexive method for developing what those possible futures might be. It begins by treating utopia as the quest for grace, through a hermeneutics that recovers the utopian meaning in our culture, explored through colour and music. Moving from the existential to the social, it draws on H. G. Wells's claim that the creation of utopias is the distinctive and proper method of sociology, and on the tentative reappearance of utopia in contemporary social theory. It proposes a constructive method, the Imaginary Reconstitution of Society. This fusion of explicitly normative social theory and analytic critique rehabilitates utopia as an integral part of sociology, and offers a means of collective engagement in shaping a better tomorrow.

This book offers the first transnational history of white nationalism in Britain, the US and the formerly British colonies of Rhodesia, South Africa and Australia from the post-World War II period to the present. It situates contemporary white nationalism in the 'Anglosphere' within the context of major global events since 1945. White nationalism, it argues, became more global in reaction to the forces of decolonisation, civil rights, mass migration and the rise of international institutions. In this period, assumptions of white supremacy that had been widely held by whites throughout the world were challenged and reformulated, as western elites professed a commitment to colour-blind ideals. The decline in legitimacy of overtly racist political expression produced international alliances among white supremacists and new claims of populist legitimation. -- .

Autocracies not only resist the global spread of democracy but are sources of autocratic influence and pressure. This book presents a conceptual model to understand, assess, and explain the promotion and diffusion of authoritarian elements. Employing a cross-regional approach, leading experts empirically test the concept of authoritarian gravity centers (AGCs), defined as "regimes that constitute a force of attraction and contagion for countries in geopolitical proximity." With an analysis extending across Latin America, the Middle East, Eastern Europe, Central Asia, and Asia, these AGCs are shown to be effective as active promoters (push) or as neutral sources of attraction (pull). The authors contend that the influence of exogenous factors, along with international and regional contexts for the transformation of regime types, is vital to understanding and analyzing the transmission of autocratic institutional settings, ideas, norms, procedures, and practices, thus explaining the regional clustering of autocracies. It is the regional context in which external actors can influence authoritarian processes most effectively. Authoritarian Gravity Centers is a vibrant and comprehensive contribution to the growing field of autocratization, which will be of great interest to undergraduate and postgraduate students of comparative area studies, illiberalism, international politics, and studies of democracy.

This is the first concise study to give full credit to the collaboration of works between French nobleman, writer and politician Alexis de Tocqueville (1805-59) and his travel companion and friend Gustave de Beaumont (1802-66), and puts this collaboration into its social, historical and theoretical context. It accompanies the two friends to the US and analyses the fruitful encounter between the New and the Old World that was the result of that journey, particularly in relation to emerging Atlantic democracies and revolutions. This includes the hopes but also the problems and contradictions that they have come to represent. The book also follows Tocqueville and Beaumont to England, Ireland, and Algeria. It discusses their political careers and their engagement in the abolitionist movement, their fight for liberal social and political reform, as well as their futile attempt to rationalize French colonization in Algeria.

This book addresses a central theme in social and political theory: what is the motivation behind the theory of ideology, and can such a theory be defended?

They make an odd gang: football thugs, gay activists, French celebrities, Jewish academics, uneasy alliances of feminists and conservatives, politicians hungry for power. The only thing they have in common is a belief that Islam will overrun the West. The movement was born with 9/11. As coalition troops invaded Afghanistan and Iraq, iconoclastic journalists like Oriana Fallaci and Melanie Phillips warned that Muslims in the West were a potential enemy within. They got their ideological ammunition from a mysterious woman called Bat Ye'or, a Jewish-Egyptian ideologue with a career on the fringes of academia. An online underground community spread the message. Soon sites like Jihadwatch and Little Green Footballs were warning the world that Islam posed a threat to democracy. In 2007 the Counter-Jihad Conference in Brussels brought activists face-to-face with mentors like Bat Ye'or for the first time. Then British conference attendees hooked up with football hooligans and an Evangelical Christian millionaire to form the English Defence League. Similar anti-Islamic groups blossomed across Europe - until a massacre by Norwegian Anders Breivik disillusioned many. The Arab Spring, a series of Islamist terrorist attacks and the European migrant crisis reinvigorated the movement. By this time prominent American counter-jihad bloggers had jobs writing for Breitbart News, a right-wing news outlet with the ear of a New York billionaire considering a run in the 2016 Presidential election. Donald J. Trump would get elected on a platform of populist nationalism and counter-jihad policies. Far-right movements across Europe took note. Christopher Othen weaves together current events and history into a compelling account of the counter-jihad movement.

This book analyzes the relationship between art and politics in two contrasting modern dictatorships. Through a detailed look at the Chilean and Romanian dictatorships, it compares the different ways in which political regimes convey their view of the world through artistic means. It examines how artists help \ convey a new understanding of politics and political action during repressive regimes that are inspired by either communism or anti-communism (neoliberalism, traditionalist, conservative). This book demonstrates how artistic renderings of life during dictatorships are similar in more than one respect, and how art can help better grasp the similarities of these regimes. It reveals how dictatorships use art to symbolically construct their power, which artists can consolidate by lending their support, or deconstruct through different forms of artistic resistance.

This collection rejects excessive idealism in considering contemporary ethical dilemmas and returns to more classical styles of ethical reasoning, including pragmatism, legal realism and the virtuous life. Valuing pluralism and the ethical dilemmas that ensue from the multiplicity of values in contemporary international society, this book does not seek to solve by raising one value over others, but rather by seeking reconciliations.Arguing for a middle ground between idealism and realism, this book offers a fruitful starting point for studying international ethics, of war most obviously, but also of justice, human rights, intervention, succession and development ethics where universal ideals encounter real world obstacles to the accomplishment of principles of the good. The collection considers real-life situations and how to resolve them in ways that do not demand a total overthrow of the contemporary international order but that point to ways to ameliorate it.Bringing together renowned international scholars in the field, this book will appeal to scholars of international relations and international ethics, as well as diplomats.

England has had a predominantly conservative political culture for some centuries. Yet there is a persistent, minority strand of radicalism that has challenged the practices, beliefs and structures of power of the established order. This book explores this 'radical tradition' as articulated in the twentieth century. The main currents of English radicalism range from liberal reformers, through socialist parliamentarians, to social movement activists in the peace, women's and labour movements. Despite their differing agendas, all have held their moral and political commitments to achieving a free, democratic, equal and just society in common. Moreover, all have believed, whatever their other differences, in the importance of extra-parliamentary social movements. What is it that has constituted this 'radical tradition'? Is it a coherent, distinctive and important political force in the twentieth century? And how do these ideas and practices relate to radical politics in England in the early twenty-first century? This book offers an analysis of the historical and ideological development of English radicalism from the English Civil War onwards. Richard Taylor examines how the problems of achieving radical change in England in the twentieth century were approached by the ten key figures from a range of ideological positions within the tradition: Bertrand Russell, Sylvia Pankhurst, Ellen Wilkinson, George Orwell, E.P. Thompson, Michael Foot, Joan Maynard, Stuart Hall, Tony Benn and Nicolas Walter. -- .

This book analyzes how the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement, one of the most well-known actors within the humanitarian sector, has responded to the expanding humanitarian needs. The Movement of today not only cares for the wounded and the sick on the battlefields, but also responds to disasters triggered by natural and man-made hazard, engaging in a wide health and social program, as well as in rehabilitation and recovery efforts. Recent debate has forced the Movement to reflect on the scope of its current response. The analysis of the issues currently shaping the provision of humanitarian assistance is followed by a discussion of how they affect the Movement, its operational work in armed conflict, emergencies linked to natural hazards, as well as in times of peace.

International Discourses of Authoritarian Populism provides 15 cutting-edge chapters probing into the diversity of present-day populist discourse from across the world. Not adhering to any particular school, the volume explores populism from a variety of disciplines and perspectives, with contributions characterized by heuristic openness as called for by the manifold manifestations of populism. The chapters balance theoretical and empirical studies, as well as quantitative and qualitative surveys and case studies, to offer readings on historical and new types of populism, and the politicians associated with these variates. Authors draw on a variety of print, digital, textual, and visual source materials to provide a close examination of the phenomena interconnected with populism including separatism (Catalexit), human rights and legal issues, debate rhetoric, and journalism, with many authors writing as insiders about the situation within their own country. Through its multi-disciplinarity, International Discourses of Authoritarian Populism provides fresh insights into the existing and potential dangers of populism, and a basis for further critical assessment and discussion. It will be a key resource for scholars and students across a range of disciplines, including sociology, political science, linguistics, media and communication studies, literary studies, and history. Moreover, it will be of special interest to professionals who deal with both national and international issues of populism.

International Discourses of Authoritarian Populism provides 15 cutting-edge chapters probing into the diversity of present-day populist discourse from across the world. Not adhering to any particular school, the volume explores populism from a variety of disciplines and perspectives, with contributions characterized by heuristic openness as called for by the manifold manifestations of populism. The chapters balance theoretical and empirical studies, as well as quantitative and qualitative surveys and case studies, to offer readings on historical and new types of populism, and the politicians associated with these variates. Authors draw on a variety of print, digital, textual, and visual source materials to provide a close examination of the phenomena interconnected with populism including separatism (Catalexit), human rights and legal issues, debate rhetoric, and journalism, with many authors writing as insiders about the situation within their own country. Through its multi-disciplinarity, International Discourses of Authoritarian Populism provides fresh insights into the existing and potential dangers of populism, and a basis for further critical assessment and discussion. It will be a key resource for scholars and students across a range of disciplines, including sociology, political science, linguistics, media and communication studies, literary studies, and history. Moreover, it will be of special interest to professionals who deal with both national and international issues of populism.

A collection of Robert Sobukwe’s political writings, speeches and court testimonies supplemented by an account of his years in Kimberley following his release from Robben Island.

There are several accounts of Robert Sobukwe’s courageous role in contesting South Africa’s system of apartheid and of his incarceration on Robben Island after the Anti-Pass Campaign that led to the tragic events of Sharpeville in March 1960. Far less attention has been paid to the years the leader of the Pan-Africanist Congress spent in Kimberley, between 1969 and 1978, after his release from the Island.

Darkest Before Dawn, the follow-up to Lie on Your Wounds: The Prison Correspondence of Robert Mangaliso Sobukwe, captures the story of the post-prison years of Sobukwe’s life. This latest compilation complete with a biographical narrative by the editors and enriched with images from Sobukwe’s life in this period of his life demonstrates the many challenges Sobukwe faced as well as his continued political resolve to fight for an end to apartheid. This is captured in the many meetings he had in spite of banning orders and letters he exchanged with friends and admirers, including the celebrated novelist Bessie Head whose letters to Sobukwe are published here for the first time. Sobukwe continued to meet political allies, such as Black Consciousness leader Steve Biko, he pursued a legal career and played host to international visitors. The portrait of Sobukwe that emerges is that of a highly ethical man, a figure of dignity and fortitude, and a wise elder whose commitment to the people of Africa and to the vision of Pan-Africanism who remained undeterred, despite his being forced to live, in his final years, under near impossible conditions. To do justice to Sobukwe’s legacy, his intellectual contribution and his unfailing desire to pursue liberation for the African people, we need to view his biography against the backdrop of his words.

Darkest Before Dawn includes a definitive collection of his political writings, speeches, unpublished court testimonies, interviews with Gail Gerhart and Joe Thloloe, and expansive annotations by the compilers. The book ends with a reflective essay which highlights the ongoing pertinence of Sobukwe’s legacy.