The Politics of Disease and Disorder in Post-War Malaya

1990 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
pp. 88-113 ◽  
Author(s):  
T.N. Harper
Keyword(s):  
Political Action ◽  
Political Life ◽  
Pacific War ◽  
Nationalist Movement ◽  
The Pacific ◽  
The Social ◽  
Military Administration ◽  
Present Decade ◽  
Post War ◽  
Malaysian Politics

It has become a commonplace of Malayan historiography that the period following the end of the Pacific War witnessed the establishment of a pattern of political life which has persisted in its main features into the present decade. Existing accounts have focused around the restructuring of the British presence in Malaya under a military administration and the introduction of, and opposition to, the Malayan Union scheme in 1946 and the Federal structure which succeeded it in April 1948. These years saw the emergence of an ethnically based nationalist movement and the defeat of a radical challenge to its predominance. The communal and insurrectionary violence which was a feature of the period has been represented as a constraint to subsequent political action — as a limit to what the structure of Malaya's pluralism could tolerate — and the constitutional struggles as a lost opportunity to effect its transformation. Whilst it is hard to exaggerate the importance of these events in shaping the landscape of Malaysian politics, there is a sense in which the sophistication of these political and constitutional preoccupations suggests uneven development within the historical writing as a whole. The social context which stimulated change, and the breadth of the local response which dignified it, has been marginalized in many accounts. There has been a tendency to conceive the state system and the colonial presence in Malaya within the bounds of a paradigm governed by the constitutional settlement, and the various phases of insurrection and political change as primarily the products of the subversive or nationalist imagination.

“Because it's there …” A consideration of the decision to commit New Zealand troops to Malaysia beyond 1971

1971 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 22-31
Author(s):  
Keith Jackson
Keyword(s):  
New Zealand ◽  
Middle East ◽  
Far East ◽  
Pacific War ◽  
Royal Navy ◽  
National Trauma ◽  
Recent Innovation ◽  
The Pacific ◽  
Post War ◽  
Second World

Direct diplomatic relations between New Zealand and Malaya/Singapore are a relatively recent innovation dating back only to 1955, and, significantly, the original decision to station troops in the area in peacetime preceded the establishment of formal diplomatic links. It is true that even before the Second World War there had been a growing consciousness of the strategic significance of the area, but it was seen in terms of Singapore as a link in the chain of Imperial defence, never as a region in its own right. Regions were subsumed in the worldwide defence strategy of the British Empire. Thus New Zealand contributed financially to the construction of the base for the Royal Navy at Singapore, but her military commitments were in helping to guard the Suez ‘lifeline’. New Zealand air-force units were stationed in Singapore in 1940, but despite the national trauma associated with the fall of the base and the apprehended threat to New Zealand’s own security, the ground forces remained in the Middle East. Indeed, New Zealand's formal Commonwealth responsibilities were to remain in the Middle East until 1955 and public interest continued to focus on that area to a surprising degree. The lessons of the Pacific War for New Zealand, therefore, were less concerned with the strategic importance of any particular area than with the indispensability of a United States alliance. As one research group put it, ‘in the immediate post-war years New Zealand showed a greater sense of international awareness, but no sense of particular involvement with the Far East; still less with South-East Asia.

scholarly journals Gender, Class and Ideology: The Social Function of Virgin Sacrifice in Euripides' Children of Herakles

2007 ◽  
Vol 26 (1) ◽  
pp. 81-169 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Kawalko Roselli
Keyword(s):  
Social Status ◽  
Political Action ◽  
Social Groups ◽  
Class Struggle ◽  
Lower Class ◽  
Political Life ◽  
Representation Of Women ◽  
Marginal Groups ◽  
The Social

Abstract This paper explores how gender can operate as a disguise for class in an examination of the self-sacrifice of the Maiden in Euripides' Children of Herakles. In Part I, I discuss the role of human sacrifice in terms of its radical potential to transform society and the role of class struggle in Athens. In Part II, I argue that the representation of women was intimately connected with the social and political life of the polis. In a discussion of iconography, the theater industry and audience I argue that female characters became one of the means by which different groups promoted partisan interests based on class and social status. In Part III, I show how the Maiden solicits the competing interests of the theater audience. After discussing the centrality (as a heroine from an aristocratic family) and marginality (as a woman and associated with other marginal social groups) of the Maiden's character, I draw upon the funeral oration as a comparative model with which to understand the quite different role of self-sacrifice in tragedy. In addition to representing and mystifying the interests of elite, lower class and marginal groups, the play glorifies a subordinate character whose contradictory social status (both subordinate and elite) embodies the social position of other ““marginal”” members of Athenian society. The play stages a model for taking political action to transform the social system and for commemorating the tragic costs of such undertakings.

Fujita, Tsuguharu (藤田嗣治) (1886–1968)

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Szostak
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Landscape ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Pacific War ◽  
The West ◽  
White Pigment ◽  
The Pacific ◽  
Japanese Military ◽  
Post War ◽  
Contemporary Painting ◽  
French Citizen

Fujita Tsuguharu was a Japanese oil painter who spent most of his career in France. He is known in the West for female nudes and portraits painted in the 1920s with a distinctive pearl-white pigment, executed in a style that melds French modernism with the linear aesthetics of traditional Japanese prints. These paintings, which frequently featured cats, won him both critical and popular acclaim, earned him membership in the Salon d’Automne, and made him a mainstay of the Montparnasse artist community. He is the sole Japanese painter associated with the École de Paris. Fujita returned to Japan in 1933, where he exerted substantial influence on contemporary painting as a member of the Second Section Society (Nikakai). During the Pacific War, Fujita created many large-scale works for the Japanese military as an official war artist, activities that continue to affect his reputation in Japan today. Difficulties adjusting to the post-war cultural landscape of Japan led Fujita to return to France in 1950, where he revitalized his career. He became a French citizen in 1955, and was awarded the Legion of Honour in 1957.

The Social Construction of Transformative Political Events

2017 ◽  
Vol 51 (10) ◽  
pp. 1243-1278 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karlo Basta
Keyword(s):  
Social Construction ◽  
Conceptual Understanding ◽  
Political Action ◽  
Meaning Making ◽  
Symbolic Meaning ◽  
Nationalist Movement ◽  
Political Events ◽  
The Social ◽  
Upcoming Event

Comparative political scientists have sought to remedy their subdiscipline’s structuralist tendencies by paying greater analytical attention to transformative political events. Yet, our conceptual understanding of events remains rudimentary. The article addresses this conceptual gap in two ways. First, it foregrounds symbolic meaning-making as the constitutive attribute of events. Second, it demonstrates that events are not inherently agency-facilitating by developing the concept of prospectively framed events. These are occurrences that actors know will take place, but of whose outcome they are uncertain. Political challengers frame the upcoming event so as to discursively trap incumbents into political action they would rather not undertake. The article demonstrates this process by tracing the conflict between secessionist challengers and political incumbents within the Catalan nationalist movement between 2006 and 2010. The concluding section discusses the causal implications of the argument.

scholarly journals THE ‘GHOST’ OF THE ANGLO-JAPANESE ALLIANCE: AN EXAMINATION INTO HISTORICAL MYTH-MAKING

2006 ◽  
Vol 49 (3) ◽  
pp. 811-831 ◽  
Author(s):  
ANTONY BEST
Keyword(s):  
Political Discourse ◽  
The Political ◽  
Pacific War ◽  
The Pacific ◽  
The Subject ◽  
War Memoirs ◽  
1960S And 1970S ◽  
Post War ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
Political Right

Even though the argument runs counter to much of the detailed scholarship on the subject, Britain's decision in 1921 to terminate its alliance with Japan is sometimes held in general historical surveys to be a major blunder that helped to pave the way to the Pacific War. The lingering sympathy for the combination with Japan is largely due to an historical myth which has presented the alliance as a particularly close partnership. The roots of the myth lie in the inter-war period when, in order to attack the trend towards internationalism, the political right in Britain manipulated memory of the alliance so that it became an exemplar of ‘old diplomacy’. It was then reinforced after 1945 by post-war memoirs and the ‘declinist’ literature of the 1960s and 1970s. By analysing the origins of this benevolent interpretation of the alliance, this article reveals how quickly and pervasively political discourse can turn history into myth and how the development of myths tells us much about the time in which they were created.

Military Expediency: A Determining Factor in the Japanese Policy Regarding Burmese Independence

1978 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 248-267 ◽  
Author(s):  
Won Z. Yoon
Keyword(s):  
Adverse Effect ◽  
Pacific War ◽  
Policy Makers ◽  
The Pacific ◽  
Military Administration ◽  
Determining Factor

Military consideration had been given top priority by the Japanese policy-makers in formulating policy towards Burma immediately prior to and after the outbreak of the Pacific War. This was evident in their decision to establish military administration in Burma in March 1942, and in granting independence to the Burmese in August 1943. These decisions, however, had an adverse effect for Japan during the war years, since they were largely responsible for turning the Burmese against Japan.

scholarly journals „La bataglia per la libertà” — antyfaszystowska opozycja braci Carlo i Nello Rossellich w latach 1926–1937

2017 ◽  
Vol 39 (1) ◽  
pp. 109-122
Author(s):  
Małgorzata Kiwior-Filo
Keyword(s):  
Italian Society ◽  
Political Life ◽  
Moral Formation ◽  
Italian History ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Social ◽  
Standing Up ◽  
Deep Conviction ◽  
Post War ◽  
The Masses

LA BATTAGLIA PER LA LIBERTÀ — THE ANTI-FASCIST OPPOSITION OF THE BROTHERS CARLO AND NELLO ROSSELLI IN 1926–1937 The opposition activities of the Rosselli brothers, brutally killed on 9 June 1937 in Bagnoles­-de-l’Orne, France, by the French cagoualards, were rooted in their deep conviction concerning the necessity of fighting for freedom in fascist Italy, fighting that brought together Italian, Jewish and French anti-fascist circles. This was manifested in numerous initiatives and various kinds of oppo­sition activities undertaken by Carlo Rosselli b. 1899 — a writer, economist and politician — and his younger brother Sabatino Enrico b. 1900, known as Nello — a historian and journalist. Their collaboration with the opposition periodicals Noi giovani and Non Mollare, their work in the “L’Italia Libera” society, and, above all, in the social-liberal movement “Giustizia e Libertà”, fo­unded by the Rosellis in August 1929, the political programme of which was based on ideas included in Socialismo liberale published by Carlo, were an attempt to unite all non-communist forces that wo­uld be willing to fight together to put an end to the fascist regime. “Giustizia e Libertà” played an im­portant role in sensitising the public, especially outside Italy, to and informing it about the true fascist reality, the image of which was usually distorted by the regime’s propaganda or simply created by it. In Carlo Rosselli’s interpretation, fascism appeared as an anti-freedom and anti-liberal move­ment, “the most passive product of Italian history”, a manifestation of reaction and not revolution. In an article entitled La lotta per la libertà C. Rosselli concluded that fascism was, in a way, an “autobiography of the nation”. It took root in Italy thanks to some favourable circumstances, among which C. Rosselli listed a lack of moral formation of Italian society and conviction of the masses that they should become involved in political life, but also bias, romantic tastes, petit bourgeois idealism, nationalistic rhetoric, sentimental post-war reaction, and restless desire for “novelty” regardless of what was behind it. Carlo Rosselli saw one of the causes of the “triumph of fascism” in a degeneration of parliamentarism” and “inability to rally society around a constructive programme and create a uniform force” that would be capable of standing up to Mussolini. The contribution of the Rosselli brothers to the fight for freedom — encouragements to be­come involved, attempts to make people aware of the real problems exposed by fascism in Italian society — is unquestionable. Their intellectual legacy, political engagement and commitment, and anti-fascist opposition certainly deserve to be reflected upon by generations for whom the idea of freedom still remains invaluable.

scholarly journals Experiences of political mobilization and popular participation in Milan's working-class neighbourhoods: 1945–1967

Urban History ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 1-19
Author(s):  
Marco Soresina
Keyword(s):  
Economic Growth ◽  
Working Class ◽  
Social Integration ◽  
Public Housing ◽  
Political Mobilization ◽  
Political Life ◽  
Popular Participation ◽  
The Social ◽  
Post War

Abstract The years 1945–55 were a period of reconstruction for Italy; the following decade was one of economic growth. An aspect of this transition is analysed here, in relation to the forms of social integration created in working-class neighbourhoods. The case-study focuses on Milan, and the two organizations studied are the consulte popolari (the ‘people's councils’), created by the left in the immediate post-war period, and the ‘social centres’ created in the mid-1950s by the IACP (the Autonomous Institute of Public Housing). Both were attempts to involve the new, outlying suburbs in the city's political life, each of them trying to adapt to different political phases. Both, I would like to suggest, succeeded in achieving certain results.

A Question of Expediency: Britain, the United States and Thailand, 1941–42

1988 ◽  
Vol 19 (2) ◽  
pp. 209-244
Author(s):  
Richard Aldrich
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Southeast Asia ◽  
The United States ◽  
Pacific War ◽  
Special Operations ◽  
The Pacific ◽  
Foreign Office ◽  
Degree Of Control ◽  
Post War

This passage was written on 27 March 1945 by Major Andrew Gilchrist, a Foreign Office official serving with the Special Operations Executive in Thailand. It neatly demonstrates the manner in which the wartime debate within and between the various Allied bureaucracies responsible for Thailand's post war status appeared to be dominated by the circumstances of Thailand's rapid capitulation to Japan in December 1941. Subsequently, diametrically opposed interpretations of these unhappy events were employed both by Britain to legitimize her wartime plans to re-establish a degree of control over Thailand, and also by the United States to justify her attempts to thwart perceived British aggrandizement in Southeast Asia. Yet despite the clear importance of the events of 1941 for Thailand's relations with the Allies, her place in the outbreak of the Pacific War is not yet fully understood.

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