Abolishing ‘Cruel Punishments’: A Reappraisal of the Chinese Roots and Long-term Efficiency of the Xinzheng Legal Reforms

2003 ◽  
Vol 37 (4) ◽  
pp. 851-862 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jérôme Bourgon
Keyword(s):  
The State ◽  
Penal Code ◽  
Contemporary China ◽  
Legal Reforms ◽  
The Past ◽  
Epochal Change

The 24th of April 1905 is a date of no particular significance in the current historiography of China. However, the memorial submitted this day by the Imperial Commissioners in charge of legal reforms, Wu Tingfang and Shen Jiaben, entailed the immediate suppression of so-called ‘cruel punishments’ (kuxing), such as dismemberment (lingchi), exposure of the head (xiaoshou) and desecration of the corpse (lushi). Judicial torture and bamboo flogging were suppressed straight after. From then on, cruelties of the past were illegal, and prohibited in practice, even though a penal code conforming to modern standards was not completed before 1928. China thus entered into the age of uneven and uncertain eradication of illegal but recurrent practices of torture. Though spectacular outbursts of violence occurred in contemporary China, with the complicity or under instigation of the highest authorities, those were not openly authorized by law, and they were eventually denounced, and some of their authors prosecuted. The shift from cruelty openly legitimized and practiced by the state to its official prohibition and ashamed toleration is an epochal change, which stems from the April 24th 1905 memorials.

scholarly journals The Resilient Bond With Zhujiajiao: (Re)making Community in a Chinese Tourism Town

2019 ◽  
Vol 25 (1) ◽  
pp. 119-135
Author(s):  
Siyang Cao ◽  
Wenzhi Wu
Keyword(s):  
Social Interactions ◽  
Cultural Values ◽  
Urban Governance ◽  
Contemporary China ◽  
The Past ◽  
Chinese Perspective ◽  
Local Residents ◽  
Analytical Importance ◽  
Depth Interviews

This article examines how community has been reinterpreted and remade among local residents in relation to the development of tourism in Zhujiajiao, China. Focusing on the narratives and practices of long-term residents, it was found that people generally maintain a resilient bond with their community in Zhujiajiao despite profound local changes. Drawing on in-depth interviews, the article brings to light the complicated and contextual meanings of community that are constantly under negotiation. We argue that the notion of community is reconstructed through narratives of the past, everyday social interactions, and material connections between people and places. Meanwhile, the process of remaking Zhujiajiao community is shaped by cultural values and situated within wider structural conditions. In this way, the article contributes to debates on the analytical importance of relationality and sociality in the recent rethinking of community from a Chinese perspective. It also argues for the need to develop more nuanced understandings of community in contemporary China beyond viewing it as a form of urban governance by focusing on residents’ narratives and practices.

scholarly journals Butterflies of Amazon and Cerrado remnants of Maranhão, Northeast Brazil

2017 ◽  
Vol 17 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Lucas Pereira Martins ◽  
Elias da Costa Araujo Junior ◽  
Ananda Regina Pereira Martins ◽  
Mairla Santos Colins ◽  
Gabriela Cristina Fonseca Almeida ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Species Composition ◽  
Sampling Methods ◽  
Biological Indicator ◽  
The State ◽  
Small Subset ◽  
Northeast Brazil ◽  
The Past ◽  
Local Diversity ◽  
Baited Traps

Abstract Species inventories are important tools to evaluate biodiversity losses and contribute to the conservation of endangered areas. The Amazon and Cerrado are the largest Brazilian biomes and represent some of the most threatened regions of the country. Due to its location between these biomes, the state of Maranhão, Northeast Brazil, possesses a great variety of habitats and a high local diversity. Nonetheless, few faunistic inventories of diversified groups have been performed in the state. In the specific case of butterflies, a well-known biological indicator, no inventories have been published in the past years. This study aimed to expand the knowledge on the composition of butterflies in Amazon and Cerrado remnants of Maranhão. Butterflies were sampled between 2011 and 2015 across eight municipalities of the state. Captures were made through entomological nets and baited traps. In total, 189 species were sampled, of which 165 were captured in the Amazon, 65 in the Cerrado and 41 in both biomes. We sampled 167 species through entomological nets and 43 through baited traps, representing 12% of similarity in species composition between sampling methods. We estimate that the recorded species represent a small subset of the butterflies from Maranhão. Therefore, long-term researches in poorly studied areas of the state are recommended to identify novel and/or endemic taxa.

Our Obsolete Marketing Mentality: George Fisk, Meet Karl Polanyi

2020 ◽  
pp. 027614672097372
Author(s):  
Raymond Benton
Keyword(s):  
Institutional Economics ◽  
The State ◽  
Karl Polanyi ◽  
The Past ◽  
Alternative Economies ◽  
The Future ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
New Framework

Marketing in general can have greater influence if a new, yet old, perspective on marketing is adopted—something akin to the original orientation of marketing. Adopting George Fisk’s definition of marketing and marrying it with notions derived from the institutional economist Karl Polanyi is proposed. The histories of marketing thought and of institutional economics are reviewed to demonstrate their affinity and similar origins. Fisk’s conceptualization of marketing as societies’ provisioning systems is shown to correspond with Polanyi’s conceptualization of economies as instituted processes, admitting more than the market and the state as ways economies have historically and cross-culturally integrated with society. The obsolete marketing mentality is that marketers, including macromarketers, are overly fixated on the market and ignore or overlook alternatives. The Fisk/Polanyi orientation will attract macromarketers interested in marketing and development, critical marketing, sustainability, alternative economies, and those interested in the long-term prospects of macromarketing. Adopting this old, but new, framework will connect the past with the future, permit macromarketers make a mark on a larger intellectual landscape and serve to invite scholars in this larger landscape to engage with macromarketing.

Consuming a difficult past unapproved: Chairman Mao as commodity

2020 ◽  
pp. 175069802092774
Author(s):  
Licheng Qian
Keyword(s):  
Autobiographical Memory ◽  
Memory Studies ◽  
The State ◽  
Contemporary China ◽  
The Past ◽  
Displacement Theory

What role does consumption play in remembering a difficult past unacknowledged by the state? By analyzing the consumption of Chairman Mao symbols in contemporary China, this article explores the memory of a difficult past under censorship with ambiguous rules, that is, imposed discursive ambiguity, and puts forward a theory of mnemonic displacement centering on two generational mechanisms: denial and diversion. The “attendant generation” has experienced the past, reads the discursive ambiguity conservatively and consumes the Mao symbol as denial of the difficult past. The “posterior generation” has no autobiographical memory of the past, reads the discursive ambiguity more openly and consumes the Mao symbol as diversion of mnemonic themes. As a result, the difficult past is displaced and forgotten. This article contributes to memory studies not only by theorizing a type of difficult past under discursive ambiguity but also by developing a displacement theory of remembering and forgetting.

Solving the Shortage of Mathematics and Science Teachers

1985 ◽  
Vol 7 (4) ◽  
pp. 371-382 ◽  
Author(s):  
Henry M. Levin
Keyword(s):  
Teacher Training ◽  
Science Teachers ◽  
The State ◽  
Qualified Teachers ◽  
The Past ◽  
Systematic Planning ◽  
Mathematics And Science Teachers ◽  
Single Salary Schedule ◽  
Mathematics And Science

Present shortages of mathematics and science teachers in secondary schools are not a new phenomenon. Such shortages have been present for at least 40 years, with only the magnitude of the shortages fluctuating. Nor is the cause of the shortages a new phenomenon. Just as school salary policy, with its reliance on the single salary schedule, has not provided competitive salaries for mathematics and science specialists in the past, it continues to create a shortfall in the number of qualified mathematics and science personnel willing to take teacher training and offer their services to schools. It is only by providing special increments to attract mathematics and science specialists that a long-term solution can be effected. Schools can accommodate such a change in policy through careful and systematic planning. Both the state and federal governments have roles to play in assisting schools to formulate salary policies that will attract adequate numbers of qualified teachers for all openings.

Experimenting in Somalia: The new security empire

2017 ◽  
Vol 17 (3) ◽  
pp. 404-420 ◽  
Author(s):  
Catherine Besteman
Keyword(s):  
State Government ◽  
The State ◽  
Territorial State ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Us ◽  
A Site ◽  
Us Intervention ◽  
Security Regimes

The past several decades of US intervention in Somalia produced violent destabilization, dysfunction, and uncertainty, creating refugee outflows and terrorist networks against which the US is currently tightening its security cordons. This paper argues that Somalia’s recent history as a stateless region offers a cautionary and tragic case study of the long-term damages that ensue when wealthy states that intervene in poorer states in the name of their own security instead cause insecurity and inequities that enable violence, and then in response to that violence enact further securitization to protect themselves against the consequences of that damage. But rather than focusing on the state as a site of securitization, I focus on those whose lives are made insecure by the retreat of their state government and the imposition in its place of security regimes that are not created by their own state government. Such security regimes overlap and compete, are instituted by different state and nonstate actors for different purposes, and by their incoherence and multiplicity raise questions about the definition, location, and relevance of the state in such regions. The paper explores the emergence of new, interlinked security regimes that are partially or wholly constituted through the logics of a new security empire designed to respond to US security concerns. By turning attention to the situations faced by those who live within the insecurities of stateless regions, the paper asks, what happens to the concept of securitization when the national-territorial state is not the entity that operates as a ‘state’ in the lives of people, even though their lives are overlain with multiple and overlapping regimes of securitization?

‘This pasture is ours since ancient times’: An ethnographic analysis of the reduction in conflicts along the post-1991 Afar-Tigray regional boundary

2014 ◽  
Vol 52 (1) ◽  
pp. 25-44 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lutgart Lenaerts ◽  
Mark Breusers ◽  
Stefaan Dondeyne ◽  
Hans Bauer ◽  
Mitiku Haile ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
The State ◽  
Border Zone ◽  
The Past ◽  
Ancient Times ◽  
Ethnographic Analysis ◽  
Regional Boundary ◽  
Key Questions

ABSTRACTThe role of post-1991 ethnic-based federalism on conflicts along regional boundaries has been a topic of great dispute in Ethiopianist literature. This article sheds new light on the on-going debate based on original ethnographic material from the Afar-Tigray regional border zone. Contrary to other studies, conflicts appear to have reduced in that area. Two key questions are addressed: how do different groups lay future claims to land; and which role does the post-1991 government play in those claims to land and in reducing conflicts? The case study reveals that people materialise religion to lay future claims to land and that conflicts have reduced with increased involvement of the state over the past two decades, but that this reduction has come at a high cost and may therefore not be sustainable in the long term.

scholarly journals Hardiness and personal resources of red zone staff: psychological analysis

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
BA Yasko ◽  
BV Kazarin ◽  
VN Gorodin ◽  
NA Chugunova ◽  
LV Pokul ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
The State ◽  
Proactive Coping ◽  
Healthcare Personnel ◽  
The Past ◽  
Psychological Analysis ◽  
History Of ◽  
Resistance To Stress ◽  
Group 2 ◽  
Group 1

In light of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, it is becoming increasingly important to address the problem of resourcefulness in the healthcare personnel of COVID-19 red zones. The aim of this study was to assess hardiness and the state of vital resources in physicians continuously working in red zones and to test a hypothesis that that long-term work in a COVID-19 red zone adversely affects the resourcefulness, reducing resistance to stress. Group 1 (n = 94) consisted of physicians with a history of employment in a COVID-19 red zone between May 2020 and June 2021; group 2 (n = 77) comprised physicians who were not involved in managing COVID-19 patients. The tests showed that hardiness and its components (commitment, control and challenge) were at high levels in group 2 (59.7%; 67.5%; 61.0%; 20.9%, respectively). The index of resourcefulness (RI; 1.24) reflected the prevalence of personal gains over losses in group 1 over the past year. In this group, there were no sex differences in the results. By contrast, hardiness was significantly reduced in 31.9% of the respondents in group 1 (red zone). Working in the red zone had a devastating effect on all hardiness components: the ratio of the percentages of high to low values was 8.5/27.7 for commitment, 9/6/34.0 for control and 10.6/35.1 for challenge. RI was reduced (0.77). The most pronounced loss of resources was observed in female physicians. The study found a significant mutual impact between challenge and the state of personality resources in red zone staff, which may indicate activation of proactive coping strategies and the acceptance of new professional experience.

Conclusion

Unruly People ◽  
2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert J. Antony
Keyword(s):  
The State ◽  
Contemporary China ◽  
Secret Societies ◽  
Late Imperial ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Future

The conclusion summarizes the main findings of this book with discussions of the underside of Guangdong society and the connections between banditry, community, and the state in late imperial Guangdong. Lastly, the author briefly discusses the pressing problems of criminal gangs and secret societies in contemporary China in terms of the relevance of the past in understanding the present. As sociologist Ho-Fung Hung reminds us, “The past is always a constitutive part of the present, and it will continue to be part of the future.” With this in mind let us engage the past.

Anthropology in Norway: Directions, Locations, Relations

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Edvard Hviding
Keyword(s):  
International Development ◽  
Public Engagement ◽  
Critical Reflection ◽  
The State ◽  
The Past ◽  
Egalitarian Society ◽  
Diverse Discipline ◽  
Per Capita ◽  
Socially Relevant

Norway, it is claimed, has the most social anthropologists per capita of any country. Well connected and resourced, the discipline – standing apart from the British and American centres of anthropology – is well placed to offer critical reflection. In this book, an inclusive cast, from PhDs to professors, debate the complexities of anthropology as practised in Norway today and in the past. Norwegian anthropologists have long made public engagement a priority – whether Carl Lumholz collecting for museums from 1880; activists protesting with the Sámi in 1980; or in numerous recent contributions to international development. Contributors explore the challenges of remaining socially relevant, of working in an egalitarian society that de-emphasizes difference, and of changing relations to the state, in the context of a turn against multi-culturalism. It is perhaps above all a commitment to time-consuming, long-term fieldwork that provides a shared sense of identity for this admirably diverse discipline.

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