Between the spaces: Experts on Islam in Russia

Ethnicities ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 20 (4) ◽  
pp. 752-768
Author(s):  
Kristina Kovalskaya

This paper discusses the question of knowledge construction on Islam in contemporary Russia through the lens of the category of space. Many everyday categories used by Muslims to characterize their identity are linked to spatial references. Starting from the idea of locality and ending in the search of traditional forms of Islam, these categories are highly politicized in the contemporary context. The aim of this paper is to explore the intermediary space between the political and the religious fields, the space of circulation between these fields in which experts on Islam are situated. Indeed, numerous academic specialists engage in expertise on Islam by creating or recycling categories, which circulate between the secular and the religious spaces. These experts have different backgrounds, different profiles and different strategies. Their impact on religious and political processes varies too. In addition, the experts of Islam have different characteristics according to the space they act in. We will compare these experts’ discourses in various regions (Moscow, Tatarstan and Dagestan) to analyse their strategies and the way in which they relate to their environment. Besides blurring the border between the secular and the religious by ensuring a permanent circulation of categories, the experts on Islam activate political and religious notions in a different manner according to their spatial affiliation. This concerns the reference to the local or international Muslim space as well as their normative discourse on acceptable forms of Islam.

2019 ◽  
Vol 66 ◽  
pp. 27-36
Author(s):  
Boris V. Mezhuev

In the article the author tries to analyze the fate of Alexander Solzhenitsyn as active political figure. The writer viewed himself as the person whose mission was not only to reveal to the Russian readers the truth about Bolshevism, its origin and tragic consequences but also to show Russia the way a better future. However, in 1983, on the eve of «perestroika», Solzhenitsyn resigned from any political comments and for seven year went into seclusion. The author of the article examines Solzhenitsyn’s social and political publications with the aim to figure out the reasons for his self-isolation that prevented him from influencing strongly the political processes in Russia.


Slovene ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 7-28
Author(s):  
Stoyko Stoykov

This article deals with the terms ‘Sclavinia’ and ‘Sclavoarchontia’, which are used in historiography in different and even contradictory ways, and aims to clarify a highly complicated topic, investigating the ways these terms were used by contemporaries, trying to define differences between them and connecting their use with the political changes of the time. Topics discussed include the chronology of the terms’ usage, different ways in which they were being used, relations of ‘Sclavinia’ and ‘Sclavoarchontia’ with the Empire, their appearance and disappearance and the political processes connected with it, as well as the analysis of the existing interpretations. The first part mostly discusses chronology and some existing hypotheses. The second (and the main) part analyses the way these terms were used and tries to define them. The hypothesis presented connects these terms with the re-establishing of imperial authority in the Balkans, marked in the sources by replacing the term ‘Slavic nations’, which had been used until the late 8 century to denote the independent Balkan Slavic societies and their lands. The Empire lacked the capacity for direct subjugation of the independent Slavic communities and was forced to rely on complicated measures including colonization and ensuring Slav cooperation in the process. In the themes where the Empire had enough power, Slavic communities were organized as ‘Sclavoarchontias’, who received archons from the strategos, paid collective tribute and served as symahoi, but kept some inner autonomy. The Empire also tended to ensure the cooperation of Slavic communities around themes by granting titles and subsidies to some powerful Slavic leaders, which led to the creation of client states known as ‘Sclavinias’. They were not part of the thematic system, they had their native and hereditary leaders recognized and affirmed by the emperor by titles and seals and act as imperial allies. A prototype of both had appeared at the end of the 7th c., but only when relations of such types had multiplied after Stauracius’ expedition in 783, corresponding generic terms appeared and became regular.


Author(s):  
T. A. Alekseeva ◽  
A. P. Mineev ◽  
A. V. Fenenko ◽  
I. D. Loshkariov ◽  
B. I. Ananyev

The article deals with the evolution of constructivist paradigm of international relations. The issue is of utmost importance in terms of the search for theoretical alternatives in the IR thinking. First, we are giving basic introduction of constructivism on the basis of historical and hermeneutical approaches. There is no doubt that the paradigm has faced different theoretical challenges and a lot of critics which has to be addressed. The authors reconsider some constructivist theories and notions in Alexander Wendt's works and the way Wendt tried to reinforce and reassure the constructivist paradigm. This allows us to claim that quantum turn in recent Wendt's work was almost inevitable. Second, the article attempts to answer a question whether the fundamentals of quantum physics are relevant when speaking about social and political processes. At first glance, quantum physics approach has nothing in common with the theory of politics and the theory of international relations. However, there are some grounds to believe that certain problem issues of the political science and IR theory are not deadlocks. In the second part of the article we use the unleashed and underestimated potential of analytical philosophy. To conclude, we believe that today there are more questions than answers but the quantum paradigm is expected to be the important part of the political studies and IR theory as well.


Slovene ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 7-38
Author(s):  
Stoyko Stoykov

This article deals with the terms ‘Sclavinia’ and ‘Sclavoarchontia’, which are used in historiography in different and even contradictory ways, and aims to clarify a highly complicated topic, investigating the ways these terms were used by contemporaries, trying to define differences between them and connecting their use with the political changes of the time. Topics discussed include the chronology of the terms’ usage, different ways in which they were being used, relations of ‘Sclavinia’ and ‘Sclavoarchontia’ with the Empire, their appearance and disappearance and the political processes connected with it, as well as the analysis of the existing interpretations. The first part mostly discusses chronology and some existing hypotheses. The second (and the main) part analyses the way these terms were used and tries to define them. The hypothesis presented connects these terms with the re-establishing of imperial authority in the Balkans, marked in the sources by replacing the term ‘Slavic nations’, which had been used until the late 8th century to denote the independent Balkan Slavic societies and their lands. The Empire lacked the capacity for direct subjugation of the independent Slavic communities and was forced to rely on complicated measures including colonization and ensuring Slav cooperation in the process. In the themes where the Empire had enough power, Slavic communities were organized as ‘Sclavoarchontias’, who received archons from the strategos, paid collective tribute and served as symahoi, but kept some inner autonomy. The Empire also tended to ensure the cooperation of Slavic communities around themes by granting titles and subsidies to some powerful Slavic leaders, which led to the creation of client states known as ‘Sclavinias’. They were not part of the thematic system, they had their native and hereditary leaders recognized and affirmed by the emperor by titles and seals and act as imperial allies. A prototype of both had appeared at the end of the 7th century, but only when relations of such types had multiplied after Stauracius’ expedition in 783, corresponding generic terms appeared and became regular.


2009 ◽  
Vol 29 (2) ◽  
pp. 5-19
Author(s):  
Donald Beecher

This is a study of a Renaissance artist and his patrons, but with an added complication, insofar as Leone de' Sommi, the gifted academician and playwright in the employ of the dukes of Mantua in the second half of the sixteenth century, was Jewish and a lifelong promoter and protector of his community. The article deals with the complex relationship between the court and the Jewish "università" concerning the drama and the way in which dramatic performances also became part of the political, judicial and social negotiations between the two parties, as well as a study of Leone's role as playwright and negotiator during a period that was arguably one of the best of times for the Jews of Mantua.


2017 ◽  
Vol 24 (1) ◽  
pp. 22-45
Author(s):  
Akihiko Shimizu

This essay explores the discourse of law that constitutes the controversial apprehension of Cicero's issuing of the ultimate decree of the Senate (senatus consultum ultimum) in Catiline. The play juxtaposes the struggle of Cicero, whose moral character and legitimacy are at stake in regards to the extra-legal uses of espionage, with the supposedly mischievous Catilinarians who appear to observe legal procedures more carefully throughout their plot. To mitigate this ambivalence, the play defends Cicero's actions by depicting the way in which Cicero establishes the rhetoric of public counsel to convince the citizens of his legitimacy in his unprecedented dealing with Catiline. To understand the contemporaneousness of Catiline, I will explore the way the play integrates the early modern discourses of counsel and the legal maxim of ‘better to suffer an inconvenience than mischief,’ suggesting Jonson's subtle sensibility towards King James's legal reformation which aimed to establish and deploy monarchical authority in the state of emergency (such as the Gunpowder Plot of 1605). The play's climactic trial scene highlights the display of the collected evidence, such as hand-written letters and the testimonies obtained through Cicero's spies, the Allbroges, as proof of Catiline's mischievous character. I argue that the tactical negotiating skills of the virtuous and vicious characters rely heavily on the effective use of rhetoric exemplified by both the political discourse of classical Rome and the legal discourse of Tudor and Jacobean England.


Author(s):  
Saitya Brata Das

This book rigorously examines the theologico-political works of Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph von Schelling, setting his thought against Hegel's and showing how he prepared the way for the post-metaphysical philosophy of Martin Heidegger, Franz Rosenzweig and Jacques Derrida.


2013 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 161-183
Author(s):  
Mary L. Mullen

This article considers the politics and aesthetics of the colonial Bildungsroman by reading George Moore's often-overlooked novel A Drama in Muslin (1886). It argues that the colonial Bildungsroman does not simply register difference from the metropolitan novel of development or express tension between the core and periphery, as Jed Esty suggests, but rather can imagine a heterogeneous historical time that does not find its end in the nation-state. A Drama in Muslin combines naturalist and realist modes, and moves between Ireland and England to construct a form of untimely development that emphasises political processes (dissent, negotiation) rather than political forms (the state, the nation). Ultimately, the messy, discordant history represented in the novel shows the political potential of anachronism as it celebrates the untimeliness of everyday life.


2020 ◽  
Vol 11 (3) ◽  
pp. 47-54
Author(s):  
Laylo Begimkulova ◽  

In this article, the author, on the basis of historical primary sources, highlights the role and influence of the great emirs Shaikh Nuriddin and Shokhmalik on the political processes that took place after the death of Amir Temur and the subsequent development of events.


1991 ◽  
Vol 30 (1) ◽  
pp. 95-99
Author(s):  
Ziaul Haque

After thirteen long years of military dictatorship, national elections on the basis of adult franchise were held in Pakistan in December 1970. The Awami League, led by Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, and the Pakistan Peoples Party, under Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, emerged as the two majority political parties in East Pakistan and West Pakistan respectively. The political party commanding a majority in one wing of the country had almost no following in the other. This ended in a political and constitutional deadlock, since this split mandate and political exclusiveness gradually led to the parting of ways and political polarization. Power was not transferred to the majority party (that is, the Awami League) within the legally prescribed time; instead, in the wake of the political/ constitutional crisis, a civil war broke out in East Pakistan which soon led to an open war between India and Pakistan in December 1971. This ultimately resulted in the dismemberment of Pakistan, and in the creation of Bangladesh as a sovereign country. The book under review is a political study of the causes and consequences of this crisis and the war, based on a reconstruction of the real facts, historical events, political processes and developments. It candidly recapitulates the respective roles of the political elites (both of India and Pakistan), their leaders and governments, and assesses their perceptions of the real situation. It is an absorbing narrative of almost thirteen months, from 7 December, 1970, when elections were held in Pakistan, to 17 December, 1971 when the war ended after the Pakistani army's surrender to the Indian army in Dhaka (on December 16, 1971). The authors, who are trained political scientists, give fresh interpretations of these historical events and processes and relate them to the broader regional and global issues, thus assessing the crisis in a broader perspective. This change of perspective enhances our understanding of the problems the authors discuss. Their focus on the problems under discussion is sharp, cogent, enlightening, and circumspect, whether or not the reader agrees with their conclusions. The grasp of the source material is masterly; their narration of fast-moving political events is superbly anchored in their scientific methodology and political philosophy.


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