Power, Hegemony and Politics: Leadership Struggle in Congress in the 1930s

2006 ◽  
Vol 40 (2) ◽  
pp. 333-370
Author(s):  
JAYABRATA SARKAR
Keyword(s):  
Political Power ◽  
Political Leadership ◽  
The Political ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
National Politics ◽  
Left Behind ◽  
Historical Role ◽  
National Congress ◽  
The Right ◽  
Indian National Congress

The decade of the 1930s provided a near perfect backdrop for a leftist surge in Indian national politics whose trajectory so far had been mapped under the political leadership of Gandhi. It had its moments of excitement, glory and disappointments. Although ample opportunities presented themselves to the Left to decisively influence the nationalist struggle during this period, it failed in its endeavour to play a historical role, beaten by a smarter, tactful, opportunist ‘Old guard’, the ‘right-wing’ leadership of the Indian National Congress, who, as events indicated in the later years, left behind all scruples to cling to political power.

The Radical Right in Post-Soviet Ukraine

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Melanie Mierzejewski-Voznyak
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Context ◽  
Social Role ◽  
Political Life ◽  
Radical Right ◽  
The Political ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
National Politics ◽  
Far Right ◽  
The Right ◽  
Electoral Performance

During much of Ukraine’s post-Soviet history, the radical right has remained on the political periphery, wielding little influence over national politics. However, from 2009 to 2014, Ukraine saw a radical right-wing party, Svoboda, enter parliament, and from 2014 to 2016 there was an increased social role played by the right-wing radical groups Pravyi Sektor and Azov. Thus, the political impact of the far right in Ukraine extends beyond electoral performance and to the activities of extra-parliamentary groups that are beginning to penetrate political life and state institutions. The radical right in Ukraine is intertwined, but not identical, with ethnic Ukrainian nationalism. The direction and development of the Ukrainian far right have thus been a result of both the historical legacy and cultural context of a nation that was ruled over by others for centuries and is home to competing ethnic nationalisms and geopolitical orientations.

Counting Caste: Censuses, Politics, and Castelessness in India

2018 ◽  
Vol 46 (4) ◽  
pp. 455-484 ◽  
Author(s):  
Trina Vithayathil
Keyword(s):  
Affirmative Action ◽  
Political Leadership ◽  
The Political ◽  
The Public ◽  
Congress Party ◽  
The Face ◽  
National Congress ◽  
Indian National Congress

This article addresses the important question of how “upper”-caste power is reproduced in contemporary India, in the face of organized challenges from below. It argues that this process turns on the reproduction of castelessness. A long-standing site for the cultivation of castelessness has been the postcolonial census, which has limited the enumeration of caste to certain nonelites for the purposes of affirmative action reservations. However, in the aftermath of an intensive campaign to include a full castewise enumeration in Census 2011, the political leadership of the Indian National Congress Party conceded and reversed seventy years of census policy on caste. This article examines the institutional pushback within the executive bureaucracy in the year following the public concession to change census policy on caste. In doing so, it shows how bureaucratic actions and inactions reproduce both castelessness and upper-caste power in contemporary India.

The Withering Away of Politically Salient Territorial Cleavages in South Africa and the Emergence of Watermark Ethnic Federalism

2019 ◽  
pp. 219-236
Author(s):  
Nico Steytler
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
South African ◽  
African National Congress ◽  
The Political ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
National Party ◽  
Ethnic Federalism ◽  
Territorial Politics ◽  
National Congress ◽  
The Right

This chapter examines how a stable, legitimate, and highly regarded constitutional dispensation has successfully withered away the political salience of territorial cleavages in South Africa and paved the way for a stronger form of ethnic federalism. It first explains the context that led to South Africa’s transition from apartheid to democracy before discussing the period of constitutional engagement in 1990–96, focusing on the deal between the National Party (NP) and the African National Congress (ANC) that resulted in the adoption of an interim Constitution in December 1993. It also explores the constitutional provisions that sought to address the demands of the right-wing Afrikaners and the Zulu nationalists, along with the ratification of the final Constitution in 1996. The chapter concludes with an analysis of the outcome of the South African constitutional settlement and the important lessons that can be drawn from the unmaking of territorial politics in the country.

Nazistowski mord na Żydach w prasie polskich komunistów (1942–1944).

2006 ◽  
pp. 54-75
Author(s):  
Klaus Peter Friedrich
Keyword(s):  
Shared Responsibility ◽  
The Political ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Social Democrats ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Government ◽  
Post War ◽  
Polish Government ◽  
The Right ◽  
Political Right

Facing the decisive struggle between Nazism and Soviet communism for dominance in Europe, in 1942/43 Polish communists sojourning in the USSR espoused anti-German concepts of the political right. Their aim was an ethnic Polish ‘national communism’. Meanwhile, the Polish Workers’ Party in the occupied country advocated a maximum intensification of civilian resistance and partisan struggle. In this context, commentaries on the Nazi judeocide were an important element in their endeavors to influence the prevailing mood in the country: The underground communist press often pointed to the fate of the murdered Jews as a warning in order to make it clear to the Polish population where a deficient lack of resistance could lead. However, an agreed, unconditional Polish and Jewish armed resistance did not come about. At the same time, the communist press constantly expanded its demagogic confrontation with Polish “reactionaries” and accused them of shared responsibility for the Nazi murder of the Jews, while the Polish government (in London) was attacked for its failure. This antagonism was intensified in the fierce dispute between the Polish and Soviet governments after the rift which followed revelations about the Katyn massacre. Now the communist propaganda image of the enemy came to the fore in respect to the government and its representatives in occupied Poland. It viewed the government-in-exile as being allied with the “reactionaries,” indifferent to the murder of the Jews, and thus acting ultimately on behalf of Nazi German policy. The communists denounced the real and supposed antisemitism of their adversaries more and more bluntly. In view of their political isolation, they coupled them together, in an undifferentiated manner, extending from the right-wing radical ONR to the social democrats and the other parties represented in the underground parliament loyal to the London based Polish government. Thereby communist propaganda tried to discredit their opponents and to justify the need for a new start in a post-war Poland whose fate should be shaped by the revolutionary left. They were thus paving the way for the ultimate communist takeover

The Spanish Church and The Revolutionary Republican Movement, 1930–1931

1962 ◽  
Vol 31 (4) ◽  
pp. 430-439
Author(s):  
José M. Sánchez
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
The Political ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Nineteen Thirties ◽  
Republican Movement ◽  
Revolutionary Movements ◽  
The Right ◽  
Political Realities ◽  
The Church

Few subjects in recent history have lent themselves to such heated polemical writing and debate as that concerning the Spanish Church and its relationship to the abortive Spanish revolution of 1931–1939. Throughout this tragic era and especially during the Civil War, it was commonplace to find the Church labelled as reactionary, completely and unalterably opposed to progress, and out of touch with the political realities of the twentieth century.1 In the minds of many whose views were colored by the highly partisan reports of events in Spain during the nineteen thirties, the Church has been pictured as an integral member of the Unholy Triumvirate— Bishops, Landlords, and enerals—which has always conspired to impede Spanish progress. Recent historical scholarship has begun to dispel some of the notions about the right-wing groups,2 but there has been little research on the role of the clergy. Even more important, there has been little understanding of the Church's response to the radical revolutionary movements in Spain.

scholarly journals Images of A.F. Kerensky and the Political Struggle in 1917 (based on the newspapers of A.A. Suvorin)

2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (3) ◽  
pp. 834-883
Author(s):  
Boris I. Kolonitskii
Keyword(s):  
Visual Images ◽  
The Political ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Left Wing ◽  
Political Struggle ◽  
Personal Authority ◽  
Left And Right ◽  
Cultural Forms ◽  
The Right

The article examines the cultural forms of legitimation / delegitimation of authority of the Provisional Government. Particular attention is paid to the personal authority of Alexander Kerensky, including rhetorical (persuasive) devices and visual images which underlay the tactics of praising or condemning him. As the main source, the article uses the newspapers of A.A. Suvorin, namely Malen'kaya gazeta [Little newspaper], Narodnaya gazeta [People’s newspaper], Rus' [Rus], Novaya Rus' [New Rus]. These newspapers are compared with resolutions, letters and diaries, and with publications in other periodicals. The study clarifies some aspects of political isolation of the Provisional Government in the fall of 1917. By this time, the propaganda attack on Kerensky was conducted not only by the Bolsheviks and other left-wing groups but also by the right-wing and conservative publications. The propaganda of the left- and right-wing opponents was significantly different but they had a point of contact: both of them created the image of the “traitor” who was unworthy to remain in power.

Black Politics in South Africa Today

1990 ◽  
Vol 18 (2) ◽  
pp. 11-13
Author(s):  
Joe Latakgomo
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Black Politics ◽  
Modern World ◽  
The Political ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Minority Government ◽  
The One ◽  
The Right ◽  
Political Scene ◽  
White Minority

The political scene in South Africa today is perhaps one of the most complex in the modern world. The easiest analysis would be to have the white minority government on the one hand, and the back resistance and liberation organizations ranged against it on the other. Unfortunately, it is not that easy. The white minority itself is torn by divisions and differences in ideology, with essentially two divisions into the right-wing and the centrists. Both camps, however, are themselves divided into various notches on the scale to the right, but never beyond to the left of centrist. That position has been reserved for black politics, which is also positioned at various points on the scale to the left.

Leaving

Jimmy Reid ◽  
2019 ◽  
pp. 159-192
Author(s):  
W.W.J. Knox ◽  
A. McKinlay
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
The Political ◽  
Full Time ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
The Road ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Power Base ◽  
Revolutionary Party ◽  
The Media ◽  
The Right

The chapter explores his vain attempts to be elected as a full-time national official of the AEU defeated by the right-wing of the union’s leadership. It also exposes the organisational deficiencies of Reid; a man capable of motivating and inspiring workers but unable to build a mass power base within the political or industrial arenas. It also discusses critically Reid’s narrative concerning the road to leaving the CPGB as well as the reception to his decision both within the media and among the party membership. We contend that international events such as the Prague invasion were secondary influences, rather we argue it was events nearer to home that were more influential. Thus, we discuss how the rejection of the concept of the revolutionary party by the CPGB in favour of broad-based parliamentary alliances narrowed the ideological chasm between communists and the Labour left. Indeed, the only issue dividing them was the continued support by the former for the Soviet Union; something that Reid had begun to reject. The other factor was his dissatisfaction with party democracy. Reid left in 1976 and joined the Labour Party two years later. Fast tracked by the left he stood as Labour candidate in 1979 in Dundee where he suffered the same fate as in 1974.

Romania

2019 ◽  
pp. 388-434
Author(s):  
Laurențiu Ștefan
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Party System ◽  
Prime Minister ◽  
Political Regime ◽  
The Political ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Left Wing ◽  
Coalition Governments ◽  
Political Spectrum ◽  
The Right

In Romania, a highly segmented and extremely volatile party system has contributed to a predominance of coalition governments. Alternation in power by coalitions led by either left-wing or right-wing parties used to be a major feature of Romanian governments. Thus, until a short-lived grand coalition in 2009, ideologically homogeneous coalitions were the general practice. Since then, parties from the right and left of the political spectrum have learned to work together in government. Given the semi-presidential nature of the political regime and the exclusive power to nominate the prime minister, the Romanian president plays an important role in coalition formation. The president also plays a pivotal role by shadowing the prime minister and therefore influencing the governance of coalitions. She has the power to veto ministerial appointments and therefore she can also shape the cabinet line-up. Pre-election coalitions are a common feature, more than two-thirds of Romanian coalition governments have been predicated on such agreements. Coalition agreements dealt with both policy issues and coalition decision-making bodies and the governance mechanisms that have been in most cases enforced and complied with—until the break-up of the coalition and the downfall of the respective government. One very common decision-making body is the Coalition Committee, which has been backed on the operational level by an inner cabinet made up of the prime minister and the deputy prime ministers, which usually are the heads of the junior coalition parties.

Muslim Origins and Destinations

2019 ◽  
pp. 29-44
Author(s):  
Tahir Abbas
Keyword(s):  
Social Mobility ◽  
White Supremacy ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Left Behind ◽  
Global North ◽  
Race Ethnicity ◽  
The Uk ◽  
The Right ◽  
Over Time ◽  
Downward Social Mobility

Patterns of racism in the Global North are correlated with the changing nature of globalization and its impact on individual economies, especially over the last four decades. The ‘left behind’ are groups in society who have faced considerable downward social mobility, with some becoming targeted by the mainstream and fringe right-wing groups who do this to release their pent up frustration towards the center of political and economic power. How this form of racism has evolved over time to focus on race, ethnicity, culture and now religion is explored in relation to the UK case, discussing the rise of Trump and the issue of Brexit as symptoms of a wider malaise affecting societies of the Global North. These forms of tribalism act to galvanize the right, combining racism with white supremacy, xenophobia and isolationism.

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