War and Political Violence in Twentieth-Century Europe

2005 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
pp. 107-123 ◽  
Author(s):  
IAN KERSHAW
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Political Culture ◽  
Political Violence ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Popular Sovereignty ◽  
Mass Killing ◽  
State Legitimacy ◽  
Modern Warfare ◽  
Twentieth Century Europe

This article takes the obvious link between war and political violence in twentieth-century Europe to ask three questions. Did the cause of such a massive upsurge in violence have roots extending beyond the technologies of modern warfare? What shapes the relative propensity of states and societies towards violence? And what is specifically ‘modern’ (other than the technology of destruction) about mass killing in the twentieth century? It finds answers in the use of popular sovereignty to justify unprecedented ethnic conflict, in a mix of ingredients linked to political culture and contested state legitimacy, and in the role of bureaucracy and technology in the orchestration of large-scale and state-sponsored violence.

The People

2012 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yuri Pines
Keyword(s):  
Political Culture ◽  
Social Factors ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
The Political ◽  
Imperial History ◽  
Political Role ◽  
The People ◽  
Chinese Political Culture

This chapter explores the reasons for the recurrence of large-scale popular uprisings throughout imperial history. It considers how the idea of rebellion correlates with fundamental principles of Chinese political culture, such as monarchism and intellectual elitism. Moreover, the chapter looks at why the rebellions serve to support rather than disrupt the empire's longevity. These issues are then related to the broader issue of the political role of the “people,” here referring primarily, although not exclusively, to the lower strata, in the Chinese imperial enterprise. In answering these questions, this chapter focuses on ideological and social factors that both legitimated rebellions and also enabled their accommodation within the imperial enterprise.

Planning or Improvisation

2020 ◽  
pp. 116-120
Author(s):  
Alasdair Roberts
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
The United States ◽  
Unintended Consequences ◽  
Governance Strategies ◽  
The Face ◽  
Imperfect Knowledge

This chapter assesses the role of planning in the design of governance strategies. Enthusiasm for large-scale planning—also known as overall, comprehensive, long-term, economic, or social planning—boomed and collapsed in twentieth century. At the start of that century, progressive reformers seized on planning as the remedy for the United States' social and economic woes. By the end of the twentieth century, enthusiasm for large-scale planning had collapsed. Plans could be made, but they were unlikely to be obeyed, and even if they were obeyed, they were unlikely to work as predicted. The chapter then explains that leaders should make plans while being realistic about the limits of planning. It is necessary to exercise foresight, set priorities, and design policies that seem likely to accomplish those priorities. Simply by doing this, leaders encourage coordination among individuals and businesses, through conversation about goals and tactics. Neither is imperfect knowledge a total barrier to planning. There is no “law” of unintended consequences: it is not inevitable that government actions will produce entirely unexpected results. The more appropriate stance is modesty about what is known and what can be achieved. Plans that launch big schemes on brittle assumptions are more likely to fail. Plans that proceed more tentatively, that allow room for testing, learning, and adjustment, are less likely to collapse in the face of unexpected results.

The trajectory of geomorphology

2010 ◽  
Vol 34 (3) ◽  
pp. 265-286 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Church
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Earth Science ◽  
Dominant Role ◽  
Historical Interpretation ◽  
Spatial And Temporal Scales ◽  
Absolute Dating ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Living Organisms

Modern geomorphology was founded in the nineteenth century as an exercise of historical interpretation of landscapes. After the mid-twentieth century it dominantly became a quest to understand the processes by which landscapes are modified. This focused attention on the measurement of sediment fluxes on synoptic timescales and on a reductionist, Newtonian programme of construction of low-order theories about those fluxes, largely imported from engineering science. The period also saw the emergence of an applied geomorphology. Toward the end of the twentieth century the subject was dramatically transformed by improved technologies for remote sensing and surveying of Earth’s surface, the advent of personal computation and of large-scale computation, and important developments of absolute dating techniques. These technical innovations in turn promoted recognition of geomorphology as a ‘system science’ and facilitated the reintegration of tectonics into geomorphology, opening the way for a renewed consideration of the history of the landscape. Finally, increasing recognition of the dominance of human agency in contemporary modification of Earth’s terrestrial surface has become a significant theme. Important influences on the continuing development of the subject will include the search for physically sound laws for material fluxes; reconciling geomorphological information and process representations across spatial and temporal scales, in both observation and theory; comprehending complexity in geomorphological processes and landform histories; incorporating the geomorphological role of living organisms, particularly micro-organisms; understanding the role of climate in geomorphology, both in the contemporary changing climate and in the long term; and fully admitting the now dominant role of humans as geomorphic agents. Geomorphology is simultaneously developing in diverse directions: on one hand, it is becoming a more rigorous geophysical science — a significant part of a larger earth science discipline; on another, it is becoming more concerned with human social and economic values, with environmental change, conservation ethics, with the human impact on environment, and with issues of social justice and equity.

A Neighbourhood under Storm Zhabei and Shanghai Wars

2010 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 291-319 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christian Henriot
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Urban Landscape ◽  
Urban Setting ◽  
Success Story ◽  
Military Conflict ◽  
Major Aspect ◽  
Modern Warfare ◽  
Forms Of Violence ◽  
The City

AbstractWar was a major aspect of Shanghai history in the first half of the twentieth century. Yet, because of the particular political and territorial divisions that segmented the city, war struck only in Chinese-administered areas. In this paper, I examine the fate of the Zhabei district, a booming industrious area that came under fire on three successive occasions. Whereas Zhabei could be construed as a success story—a rag-to-riches, swamp-to-urbanity trajectory—the three instances of military conflict had an increasingly devastating impact, from shaking, to stifling, to finally erase Zhabei from the urban landscape. This area of Shanghai experienced the first large-scale modern warfare in an urban setting. The 1927 skirmish established the pattern in which the civilian population came to be exposed to extreme forms of violence, was turned overnight into a refugee population, and lost all its goods and properties to bombing and fires.

scholarly journals El rol de las comunidades campesinas de El Pato (Caquetá) en la implementación del punto dos del Acuerdo Final de Paz de La Habana, en momentos de incertidumbre nacional

2021 ◽  
pp. 301-339
Author(s):  
Juano Zuluaga García
Keyword(s):  
Political Culture ◽  
Social Organization ◽  
Political Violence ◽  
Critical Reflection ◽  
National Government ◽  
Peace Agreement ◽  
Peasant Communities ◽  
The One ◽  
The Way

Resumen: La implementación del Acuerdo Final de Paz ha tenido sus avances y retrocesos. Por un lado, el panorama nacional es alarmante: se evidencian altos picos de violencia política; re- configuración de actores armados; asesinato sistemático de líderes sociales,   reincorporados, etc.; la implementación real de lo acordado es mínima; y hace falta mayor voluntad y efectividad del Estado colombiano y del Gobierno nacional. En contraste, no se pueden desconocer las dinámicas de apropiación y organización social ni el rol transformador de las comunidades desde los territo- rios. El presente trabajo tiene como propósito poner en diálogo una reflexión crítica de la situación nacional del punto dos del Acuerdo con los procesos impulsados por las comunidades de El Pato (Caquetá), y la forma en que estas vienen tejiendo una cultura política participativa y pluralista, aportando así a la implementación del punto dos en, con, desde y para el territorio. The Role of the Peasant Communities of El Pato (Caquetá) in the Implementation of Point Two of the Final Peace Agreement of Havana, in Times of National Uncertainty Abstract: The implementation of the Final Peace Agreement has had progress and setbacks. On the one hand, the national panorama is alarming: high peaks of political violence are evident. Re- configuration of armed actors; systematic murder of social leaders, reincorporated, etc. The actual implementation of the agreement is minimal; and greater will and effectiveness of the Colombian State and the national government are needed. In contrast, the dynamics of appropriation and social organization and the transforming role of the communities from the territories cannot be ignored. The purpose of this paper is to put into dialogue a critical reflection of the national situ- ation of point two of the Agreement with the processes promoted by the communities of El Pato (Caquetá). Also, the way in which they have been weaving a participatory political culture and pluralist. Thus, contributing to the implementation of point two in, with, from and for the territory. Keywords: Final Peace Agreement, democracy, democratization, pluralism, peasant communities, unity, organization, mobilization,  transformation,  social  leaders,  political  culture,  radicalization of democracy.

Women, economy, war

2010 ◽  
Vol 92 (877) ◽  
pp. 161-176 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carolyn Nordstrom
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Political Violence ◽  
Informal Economy ◽  
First Century ◽  
Vanishing Points ◽  
Trade Networks ◽  
The Public ◽  
Informal Economies ◽  
Victims Of Violence

AbstractPolitical violence amplifies contemporary trends occurring worldwide in the twenty-first century: globalization, an increasing reliance on the informal economy, a shift from twentieth-century manufacturing to resource and labour wildcatting, and the growth of complex international extra-legal trade networks. Women are central to all of these, though their roles both as leaders of development and victims of violence are often overlooked in mainstream analyses. To explain these invisibilities, this article introduces the concept of vanishing points – places where formal analyses and policy effectively cease, such as the dividing lines between formal and informal economies, and the violence associated with controlling extra-legal profits that is effectively invisible to the public at large. The realities of women's work amid political violence and postwar development, and across the spectrum of in/formality are explored. The conclusions serve to challenge established notions of power, profit, and economy, and the role of gender within these.

scholarly journals Ward Heelers and Honest Men: Urban Québécois Political Culture and the Montreal Reform of 1909

2013 ◽  
Vol 23 (2) ◽  
pp. 20-32 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alan Gordon
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Political Culture ◽  
Municipal Government ◽  
Popular Sovereignty ◽  
Progressive Movement ◽  
City Life ◽  
French Speaking ◽  
Party Support ◽  
Mass Circulation ◽  
The City

While scholars often emphasize traditionalism, ruralism and anti-statism as the "dominants" of Quebec's political culture prior to the Quiet Revolution, some Québécois embraced progressivism early in the twentieth century. Municipal government reform, one of the hallmarks of the progressive movement, cropped up in Canada's largest city, Montreal. Far from being confined to anglophones and remnants of Quebec's rouge party, support for reform came from a wide section of Montreal's French-speaking population. This article analyzes the rhetoric employed by Montreal's mass circulation newspapers during the referendum campaign of 1909 in order to demonstrate the popularity of reform in Montreal and to uncover the main doctrines of French-Canadian progressivism. Urban Quebec's political culture, then, accommodated the position of the city in Québécois culture and envisioned an expanding and active state role in city life. Overriding these beliefs were the basic assumptions of early-twentieth-century liberalism and, curiously for a referendum campaign, a distrust of popular sovereignty characteristic of North American reformism in general.

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