Caught in the headlights of history: Eritrea, the EPLF and the post-war nation-state

2005 ◽  
Vol 43 (3) ◽  
pp. 467-488 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Reid

A little over a decade after the achievement of independence, Eritrea is confronted by a range of social and political problems, problems which are rooted both in the nation's past and in the ruling movement's interpretation of that past. This paper is concerned with the widening gulf between the nation-state, as envisaged by the Eritrean People's Liberation Front (EPLF) during the liberation struggle and as currently ‘imagined’ by the government, and the socio-political reality. Eritrean society is now marked by widening divisions between the ‘struggle generation’ and the membership of the former EPLF on the one hand, and large sections of the remainder of the population, notably youth. The 1998–2000 war with Ethiopia, the root causes of which are as yet unresolved, has proved more destructive than was apparent even at the time, and has been used by the state as a vindication of the EPLF's particular interpretation of the past. Political and social repression, rooted in a militaristic tradition and a profound fear of disunity, has intensified since the war. In this paper the current situation is examined in terms of the deep frustration felt by younger Eritreans, the urban–rural divide, the state-level determination to cling to the values and the aims of the liberation struggle, and the position of Eritrea in international politics.

2019 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-14
Author(s):  
Muhamad Ali

Indonesia and Malaysia offer comparative perspectives concerning the relationship between loyalties to the Muslim umma, local ethnicity, and the modern nation-state, and how interpretations of the sharia and modern constitution, laws, politics, and policies intersect in multiple and changing ways. This article seeks to compare and contrast some of the contemporary discourses on sharia and citizenship as demonstrated by Indonesian and Malaysian scholars, politicians, and activists. Both Indonesian and Malaysian constitutions were born out of the modern notion of citizenship that recognizes religious diversity. On the one hand, the Constitution of Indonesia does not specify Islam as the state religion, but the government promotes official religions. On the other hand, the Constitution of Malaysia makes it explicit that Islam is the state religion while recognizing religious diversity. The Indonesian government does not conflate particular ethnicity with Islam, whereas Malaysia integrates Islam and Malay ethnicity amidst Malaysian religious and ethnic plurality. Both cases prevent us from categorizing each case as either an Islamic legal conservatism or a modern legal liberalism. These two cases resist the binary opposition between sharia conservatism deemed against citizenship and modern legal liberalism deemed against religious laws. There are ambiguities, contradictions, as well as compromises and integration between conflicting ideas and systems concerning Islam and citizenship.


2007 ◽  
Vol 66 (4) ◽  
pp. 303-321
Author(s):  
Lode Wils

In het tweede deel van zijn bijdrage 1830: van de Belgische protonatie naar de natiestaat, over de gebeurtenissen van 1830-1831 als slotfase van een passage van de Belgische protonatie doorheen de grote politiek-maatschappelijke en culturele mutaties na de Franse Revolutie, ontwikkelt Lode Wils de stelling dat de periode 1829-1830 de "terminale crisis" vormde van het Koninkrijk der Verenigde Nederlanden. Terwijl koning Willem I definitief had laten verstaan dat hij de ministeriële verantwoordelijkheid definitief afwees en elke kritiek op het regime beschouwde als kritiek op de dynastie, groeide in het Zuiden de synergie in het verzet tussen klerikalen, liberalen en radicale anti-autoritaire groepen. In de vervreemding tussen het Noorden en het Zuiden en de uiteindelijke revolutionaire nationaal-liberale oppositie vanuit het Zuiden, speelde de taalproblematiek een minder belangrijke rol dan het klerikale element en de liberale aversie tegen het vorstelijk absolutisme van Willem I en de aangevoelde uitsluiting van de Belgen uit het openbaar ambt en vooral uit de leiding van de staat.________1830: from the Belgian pre-nation to the nation stateIn the second part of his contribution 1830: from the Belgian pre-nation to the nation state, dealing with the events from 1830-1831 as the concluding phase of a transition of the Belgian pre-nation through the major socio-political and cultural mutations after the French Revolution, Lode Wils develops the thesis that the period of 1829-1830 constituted the "terminal crisis" of the Kingdom of the United Netherlands. Whilst King William I had clearly given to understand that he definitively rejected ministerial responsibility and that he considered any criticism of the regime as a criticism of the dynasty, the synergy of resistance increased between the clericalists, liberals and radical anti-authoritarian groups in the South. In the alienation between the North and the South and the ultimate revolutionary national-liberal opposition from the South the language issue played a less important role than the clericalist element and the liberal aversion against the royal absolutism of William I and the sense of exclusion of the Belgians from public office and particularly from the government of the state.


2010 ◽  
Vol 24 (3) ◽  
pp. 233-250 ◽  
Author(s):  
Francine Lafontaine ◽  
Fiona Scott Morton

In fall 2008, General Motors and Chrysler were both on the brink of bankruptcy, and Ford was not far behind. As the government stepped in and restructuring began, GM and Chrysler announced their plan to terminate about 2,200 dealerships. In this paper, we first provide an overview of franchising in car distribution, how it came about, and the legal framework within which it functions. States earn about 20 percent of all state sales taxes from auto dealers. As a result, new car dealerships, and especially local or state car dealership associations, have been able to exert influence over local legislatures. This has led to a set of state laws that almost guarantee dealership profitability and survival—albeit at the expense of manufacturer profits. Available evidence and theory suggests that as a result of these laws, distribution costs and retail prices are higher than they otherwise would be; and this is particularly true for Detroit's Big Three car manufacturers—which is likely a factor contributing to their losses in market share vis-à-vis other manufacturers. After discussing the evidence on the effects of the car franchise laws on dealer profit and car prices, we turn to the interaction of the franchise laws and manufacturers' response to the auto crisis. Last, we consider what car distribution might be like if there were no constraints on organization. We conclude that although the state-level franchise laws came about for a reason, the current crisis perhaps provides an opportunity to reconsider the kind of regulatory framework that would best serve consumers, rather than carmakers or car dealers.


Popular Music ◽  
1999 ◽  
Vol 18 (2) ◽  
pp. 193-207 ◽  
Author(s):  
Martin Cloonan

Recent years have seen two noticeable trends in Popular Music Studies. These have been on the one hand a series of works which have tried to document the ‘local’ music scene and, on the other, accounts of processes of globalisation. While not uninterested in the intermediate Nation-State level, both trends have tended to regard it as an area of increasingly less importance. To state the matter more boldly, both trends have underplayed the continually important role of the Nation-State.


2017 ◽  
pp. 263-276
Author(s):  
Maciej Walkowiak

The paper is mainly concerned with Gottfried Benn’s complex attitude to the state and history. By means of introductory prefigurations, such as existential tensions related to the conflict between Protestant ethics and modern aesthetics, there emerges Benn’s difficult and complex relation to the state as such, seen as a product of history, and to its particular examples, starting from the Second Reich until the initial phase of West Germany. Friedrich Nietzsche’s philosophy, and in particular the philosophy of art, is of great importance in this context. This issue is discussed using Benn’s key works such as Roman des Phänotyp or Doppelleben. Benn’s literary and life self-creations played a vital role in his relations with the political reality and the state, which is discussed at the end of this analysis. His ambivalent relation to early West Germany has a strong biographical basis, i.e. his involvement with the history of the Nazi Germany on the one hand, and on the other – the period of his literary fame at the end of his life.


Author(s):  
Asma A. Rahim ◽  
Sujina C. Muthukutty ◽  
Sabitha R. Jacob ◽  
Rini Ravindran ◽  
Jayakrishnan Thayyil ◽  
...  

Kozhikode district of North Kerala, India witnessed an outbreak of Nipah virus (NiV) in the month of May 2018. Two adjacent districts were affected leaving 17 patients dead out of the 19 confirmed. United Nations and WHO lauded the expeditious response of the state’s health system in the diagnosis and containment of the outbreak which was unprecedented. The authors being in the contact tracing and surveillance operation district team, had kept a record of timeline of events and actions at the state level, compiled the news clippings and tracked events. In the absence of an end‑of‑epidemic report for reference, these records served as a valuable tool for the present review. We used the Management science for health frame work tool (MSH framework) to evaluate the district and state coordinated actions which helped in curbing the outbreak. Though NiV outbreak in South India (2018) had similar epidemiological features to previous disease outbreaks, it stands out as the one to be detected and contained in a short span of time. As health personnel working in the government medical college of an affected district and directly involved in contact tracing operations and containment measures, exploring and sharing, what worked and how, in the context of multidisciplinary response and recovery attempts of the outbreak in the state may be beneficial to public health personnel and policy makers. This management framework may be replicated in the national and international context, particularly in South East Asian region under threat of emerging viral infections like COVID-19, lacking specific epidemic management frameworks for outbreak response and containment.


2016 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 61 ◽  
Author(s):  
Muhamad Rizal ◽  
Yanyan Yani

The purpose of state defense is to protect and to save the integrity of the Unitary State of the Republic of Indonesia, the sovereignty of the state, as well as its security from all kinds of threats, whether they are military or non-military ones. One of the non-military threats that potentially threatens the sovereignty and security of the nation-state is the misuse of technology and information in cyberspace. The threat of irresponsible cyber attacks can be initiated by both state and non-state actors. The actors may be an individual, a group of people, a faction, an organization, or even a country. Therefore, the government needs to anticipate cyber threats by formulating cyber security strategies and determining comprehensive steps to defend against cyber attacks; its types and the scale of counter-measures, as well as devising the rules of law. 


2020 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 121-141
Author(s):  
Osama Sami AL-Nsour

The concept of citizenship is one of the pillars upon which the modern civil state was built. The concept of citizenship can be considered as the basic guarantee for both the government and individuals to clarify the relationship between them, since under this right individuals can acquire and apply their rights freely and also based on this right the state can regulate how society members perform the duties imposed on them, which will contributes to the development of the state and society .The term citizenship has been used in a wider perspective, itimplies the nationality of the State where the citizen obtains his civil, political, economic, social, cultural and religious rights and is free to exercise these rights in accordance with the Constitution of the State and the laws governing thereof and without prejudice to the interest. In return, he has an obligation to perform duties vis-à-vis the state so that the state can give him his rights that have been agreed and contracted.This paper seeks to explore firstly, the modern connotation of citizenship where it is based on the idea of rights and duties. Thus the modern ideal of citizenship is based on the relationship between the individual and the state. The Islamic civilization was spanned over fourteen centuries and there were certain laws and regulations governing the relationship between the citizens and the state, this research will try to discover the main differences between the classical concept of citizenship and the modern one, also this research will show us the results of this change in this concept . The research concludes that the new concept of citizenship is correct one and the one that can fit to our contemporary life and the past concept was appropriate for their time but the changes in the world force us to apply and to rethink again about this concept.


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.


1973 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-28 ◽  
Author(s):  
L. J. Sharpe

In his celebrated study of American democracy written in 1888, Lord Bryce reserved his most condemnatory reflections for city government and in a muchquoted passage asserted: ‘There is no denying that the government of cities is the one conspicuous failure of the United States. The deficiencies of the National government tell but little for evil on the welfare of the people. The faults of the State governments are insignificant compared with the extravagance, corruption and mismanagement which mark the administration of most of the great cities'sangeetha.


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