scholarly journals THE TRIUMPH OF THE STATE: SINGAPORE'S DOCKWORKERS AND THE LIMITS OF GLOBAL HISTORY, c. 1920–1965

2017 ◽  
Vol 60 (4) ◽  
pp. 1097-1123
Author(s):  
GARETH CURLESS

AbstractLabour history has been revitalized by the global turn. It has encouraged historians to look beyond national frameworks to explore issues relating to mobility and inter-territorial connection. This article, while accepting the benefits of a global approach, argues that historians should not lose sight of the factors that constrain mobility or lead to the collapse of cross-border exchanges. Singapore's dockworkers were at the forefront of the island's anti-colonial campaigns of the 1940s and 1950s. Inspired by anti-colonial movements elsewhere in the world, dockworkers drew on international discourses relating to self-determination to place their local struggles in a global context. This activism, however, coincided with the emergence of countervailing forces, including the universalization of the nation-state and the rise of state-led developmentalism. In this context, dockworkers’ internationalism came to be regarded as a threat to state sovereignty and development. As a result, once Singapore achieved independence the ruling People's Action Party encouraged dockworkers to abandon their globalized outlook in the name of modernization and nation building. Global history, then, should be as much about the rise of the national as the transnational, and the loss of connection as the forging of inter-territorial networks.

2016 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
pp. 126-130
Author(s):  
Daniel Solescu

Abstract Globalization has raised the issue of the place and role of the nation state in the world market. The effects of globalization have resulted in the joint effort of some State’s sovereign powers, quite exclusive until recently, which leads to reconsider the concept of state sovereignty, tasks, functions and objectives of the state. Globalization involves reducing the state intervention in the economic matters, but it does not imply the disappearance of the state concept. The integration in the transnational economy necessarily implies the weakening of the nation-state authority, since it must make room for the independent actors.


2020 ◽  
Vol 11 ◽  
pp. 21-23
Author(s):  
Aleksey L. Bredikhin ◽  
◽  
Evgeniy D. Protsenko ◽  

In this article, the authors analyze the amendments to the Constitution of the Russian Federation, adopted in 2020, with a view to their influence on the state of Russian sovereignty and note that the topic of sovereignty is central to these amendments. Researchers conclude that the amendments constitute, first and foremost, the strengthening of the sovereignty of the Russian Federation, the autonomy of state jurisdiction, and the increasing status and role of Russia in the world political system.


Author(s):  
Andrés Baeza Ruz

This is a study on the relations between Britain and Chile during the Spanish American independence era (1806–1831). These relations were characterised by a dynamic, unpredictable and changing nature, being imperialism only one and not the exclusive way to define them. The book explores how Britons and Chileans perceived each other from the perspective of cultural history, considering the consequences of these ‘cultural encounters’ for the subsequent nation–state building process in Chile. From 1806 to 1831 both British and Chilean ‘state’ and ‘non–state’ actors interacted across several different ‘contact zones’, and thereby configured this relationship in multiple ways. Although the extensive presence of ‘non–state’ actors (missionaries, seamen, educators and merchants) was a manifestation of the ‘expansion’ of British interests to Chile, they were not necessarily an expression of any British imperial policy. There were multiple attitudes, perceptions, representations and discourses by Chileans on the role played by Britain in the world, which changed depending on the circumstances. Likewise, for Britons, Chile was represented in multiple ways, being the image of Chile as a pathway to other markets and destinations the most remarkable. All these had repercussions in the early nation–building process in Chile.


Author(s):  
Or Rosenboim

This chapter examines perceptions of the state in a global context, arguing that the emergence of globalism encouraged mid-century thinkers to reimagine—but not abandon—the nation-state. In particular, it considers Raymond Aron’s proposals to reinterpret the political space of the nation-state in the post-war era and how the war experience formed his conceptualization of international relations. While the state remained for Aron the main bastion of individual liberty, he acknowledged its conceptual and structural insufficiency in the age of globalism. Aron’s interpretation of political ideologies in conversation with the sociologist Karl Mannheim and the philosopher Jacques Maritain led to the development of his loose and pluralistic vision of European unity held together by “political myth.” The chapter also compares Aron’s vision of world order with that of David Mitrany.


Author(s):  
John Breuilly

This chapter examines the role of nationalism and national self-determination (NSD) in shaping the major institution of modern international relations: the nation-state. It considers different types of nationalism and how they vary from one another, whether the commonly accepted sequence of nation > nationalism > nation-state is actually the reverse of the normal historical sequence, and whether the principle of NSD is compatible with that of state sovereignty. The chapter also explores the contribution of nationalism to the globalization of world politics and the changing meanings of NSD since 1918. Four case studies of nationalism are presented: Kurdistan, Germany, India, and Yugoslavia. There is also an Opposing Opinions box that asks whether the principle of NSD threatens stable international relations.


Author(s):  
John Breuilly

This chapter examines the role of nationalism and national self-determination (NSD) in shaping the major institution of modern international relations: the nation-state. It considers different types of nationalism and how they vary from one another, whether the commonly accepted sequence of nation > nationalism > nation-state is actually the reverse of the normal historical sequence, and whether the principle of NSD is incompatible with that of state sovereignty. The chapter also explores the contribution of nationalism to the globalization of world politics and the changing meanings of NSD since 1918. Four case studies of nationalism are presented, in Kurdistan, Germany, India, and Yugoslavia. There is also an Opposing Opinions box that asks whether the principle of NSD threatens stable international relations.


2015 ◽  
Vol 30 (2) ◽  
pp. 320-334
Author(s):  
Silas W. Allard

In her essay “The Decline of the Nation-State and the End of the Rights of Man,” Hannah Arendt famously wrote, “Nobody had been aware that mankind, for so long a time considered under the image of a family of nations, had reached the state where whoever was thrown out of one of these tightly organized closed communities found himself thrown out of the family of nations altogether.” Surveying the aftermath of the world wars, the same aftermath that eventually led to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Arendt found that a person had to be emplaced—the subject of a political space—in the state-oriented order of geopolitics to be cognizable as a subject of human rights. The stateless, being displaced, were excluded from such a regime of rights and from the global political community. Bare humanity, Arendt argued, was an insufficiently binding political identity. As she wrote in her arresting language, “The world found nothing sacred in the abstract nakedness of being human.”


2019 ◽  
Vol 26 (6) ◽  
pp. 1709-1713
Author(s):  
Jovica Palashevski

The most commonly asked question is whether states are competing with one another. It is correct to think that nations compete with each other just as the firms do. Paul Krugman points out that the idea of state competition is a dangerous obsession. However, the generally accepted viewpoint between policymakers and the academic world is very different. The transformation of the nation-state into a corporate market-state lies at the heart of political globalization. Inclusion in economic competition is another manifestation of practicing the so-called. "Soft power" by the states. Books, government reports, daily newspapers, television programs, virtually all over the world, announce the language and imagination of the battle of competition between countries for a larger piece of the global economic pie.


2016 ◽  
pp. 877-888
Author(s):  
Miodrag Cujic

The cultural heritage and historical monuments are silent witnesses of social development and they deserve a special place in the world?s annals, both in material and in spiritual sense. In this regard, UNESCO has undertaken a number of measures which recognize such values. However, the current international events directly usurp cultural and historical features using international politics which in the process of globalization puts in an uncertain position the characteristics of certain national identities. The jurisdiction of this international organization is compromised by pressures of leading international subjects. By defining its strategic objectives, the position of the state sovereignty of its member states is determined. Consequently, it is necessary to induce the criteria and proposals to prevent such tendencies in order to preserve not only the cultural heritage of a nation, territory, religious population, but also its identity and its statehood.


Author(s):  
Hanns W. Maull

This chapter sets out the guiding questions for this volume and develops a comprehensive, integrated framework for analyzing political order across its three major levels. It proposes a concept of order that allows a comparison and evaluation of the characteristics and evolution of political order at their three major spatial levels: the nation-state, partial regional and functional orders at intermediate levels between the state and the world as a whole, and the global level. Key aspects of political order are effectiveness, legitimacy, and authority; principles, norms, and rules; compliance and collective sanctions and the incidence of violence; actors with the capabilities and the intentions to shape respective orders; their major structural characteristics; and their evolution over time and their resilience.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document