scholarly journals Political Culture in Post-Communist Countries: Albanian Case

Author(s):  
Orinda Malltezı

The goal of this article is to establish the degree of interrelation between state and society as well as the implications that come from this interrelation by focusing on the Albanian case. If the state is perceived in relation with the society, then what comes as a result of this relationship will be seen as Plexus. On the other hand, Nexus is the way the Albanian society perceives the relation between state and society mostly represented by the functioning of state, where the state is the central axis and the society has no influence on it. This derives mostly from the political culture which has been shaped during communism. Countries that experienced totalitarian regimes tend to have similar behavior and perception towards politics which is the product of political culture. In this regard, the political culture in post-totalitarian regimes shares similar elements such as: lacks of civic participation, lack of public on governments or politics, etc.

Istoriya ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (8 (106)) ◽  
pp. 0
Author(s):  
Pavel Bychkov

The article deals with the strategies used by French medieval authors of the 14th — 15th centuries to comprehend the state and society with the help of cognitive tools like metaphor and allegory. Writers and poets of that period, such as Nicolas Oresme, Eustache Deschamps, Jean Gerson, Christina de Pisan and others, use the same expressive means in their works, but the means themselves can be expressions of different, even opposite ideas. The article considers the metaphor of the political body and the allegorical figure of France, which French thinkers most frequently resorted to. The metaphor of the body expresses the idea of the integrity of the state, the harmonious combination and functionality of all parts of society, thus helping to form a political and philosophical doctrine of the state structure. Allegory, on the other hand, as a certain personification of this body, outlines the state as a female figure, becoming the archetypal “damsel in distress” in order to form an identity and loyal feelings in the reader. Thus, this or that trope dictated the model for describing the state, and vice versa-the choice of this or that trope signified the desire to convey certain ideas to potential recipients.


Author(s):  
Emilio Castillejo Cambra

This article analyzes and compares the 1943 and 1948 editions of the Camp Manual, which provides instructions for the camp commanders of the Youth Front, the Francoist equivalent of Mussolini’s Balilla and the Nazi Hitler-Jugend. In these manuals, the camp appears as a microcosm that reflects the organic structure and government practice of the Francoist State, including its biopolitical aspects: health, food storage, calorie consumption... The political culture that they transmit and its variants maintain an affinity with the normalization of the bodies of the campers: while the Phalangist subculture imposes strength, martiality and rectitude upon the bodies, the Catholic subculture imposes meekness and sinuous forms. The two editions of the manual also reflect the evolution of Franco’s regime. In the 1943 edition, the leaflet of the camp leader reflects the Fascistization of the State. The 1948 edition, on the other hand, stresses the legitimization of the encyclical Divini Illius Magistri or the imposition of a Christian pedagogy (principle of self-direction), and it speaks of the establishment of a Catholic State. This includes the concept of the culture of the participative subject, linked in turn to a new normalization of the bodies (greater distention, oblique lines), without this implying the disappearance of the traditional forms of control or the automatic movements (parades, formations), characteristic of the culture of the subject that gives unity to Francoism.


Author(s):  
Anatolii Petrovich Mykolaiets

It is noted that from the standpoint of sociology, “management — a function of organized systems of various nature — (technical, biological, social), which ensures the preservation of their structure, maintaining a certain state or transfer to another state, in accordance with the objective laws of the existence of this system, which implemented by a program or deliberately set aside”. Management is carried out through the influence of one subsystem-controlling, on the other-controlled, on the processes taking place in it with the help of information signals or administrative actions. It is proved that self-government allows all members of society or a separate association to fully express their will and interests, overcome alienation, effectively combat bureaucracy, and promote public self-realization of the individual. At the same time, wide direct participation in the management of insufficiently competent participants who are not responsible for their decisions, contradicts the social division of labor, reduces the effectiveness of management, complicates the rationalization of production. This can lead to the dominance of short-term interests over promising interests. Therefore, it is always important for society to find the optimal measure of a combination of self-management and professional management. It is determined that social representation acts, on the one hand, as the most important intermediary between the state and the population, the protection of social interests in a politically heterogeneous environment. On the other hand, it ensures the operation of a mechanism for correcting the political system, which makes it possible to correct previously adopted decisions in a legitimate way, without resorting to violence. It is proved that the system of social representation influences the most important political relations, promotes social integration, that is, the inclusion of various social groups and public associations in the political system. It is proposed to use the term “self-government” in relation to several levels of people’s association: the whole community — public self-government or self-government of the people, to individual regions or communities — local, to production management — production self-government. Traditionally, self-government is seen as an alternative to public administration. Ideology and practice of selfgovernment originate from the primitive, communal-tribal democracy. It is established that, in practice, centralization has become a “natural form of government”. In its pure form, centralization does not recognize the autonomy of places and even local life. It is characteristic of authoritarian regimes, but it is also widely used by democratic regimes, where they believe that political freedoms should be fixed only at the national level. It is determined that since the state has achieved certain sizes, it is impossible to abandon the admission of the existence of local authorities. Thus, deconcentration appears as one of the forms of centralization and as a cure for the excesses of the latter. Deconcentration assumes the presence of local bodies, which depend on the government functionally and in the order of subordination of their officials. The dependency of officials means that the leadership of local authorities is appointed by the central government and may be displaced.


1995 ◽  
Vol 29 (2) ◽  
pp. 159-184
Author(s):  
Mark Voss-Hubbard

Historians have long recognized the unprecedented expansion of federal power during the Civil War. Moreover most scholars agree that the expansion of federal power manifested itself most immediately and profoundly in the abolition of slavery. In a sense, through the Emancipation Proclamation, the Republican administration injected the national government into the domain of civil rights, and by doing so imbued federal power with a distinct moral purpose. The passage of the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments codified this expression of federal authority, rejecting the bedrock tenet in American republican thought that centralized power constituted the primary threat to individual liberty.


2018 ◽  
pp. 226-262
Author(s):  
Muhammad Qasim Zaman

This chapter focuses on religio-political violence, whose widespread incidence—after Pakistan's realignment in the US-led War on Terror in the aftermath of September 11, 2001, and the subsequent rise of a new, Pakistani Taliban—has threatened the very fabric of state and society. It examines the violence in question from two broad and intertwined perspectives, one relating to the state, and the other to Islam and those speaking in its terms. Part of the concern in this chapter is to contribute to an understanding of how the governing elite and the military have often fostered the conditions in which the resort to religiously inflected violence has been justified. It also suggests that the nonstate actors—ideologues and militants—have had an agency of their own, which is not reducible to the machinations of the state. Their resort to relevant facets of the Islamic tradition also needs to be taken seriously in order to properly understand their view of the world and such appeal as they have had in particular circles.


Author(s):  
M. Safa Saraçoglu

This chapter focuses on the official correspondence between Vidin’s administrative council and the provincial capital, Ruse. These reports pertaining to events in Vidin County were a part of the political procedures of the local judicio-administrative sphere. As such, politics of local administration influenced the official correspondence and our understanding of the events in Vidin County. The writing of reports and petitions and other provincial administrative/judicial practices (such as interrogations) constituted a significant part of Ottoman governmentality. Those who could shape how the official correspondence was constructed gained advantage in local political economy. Such correspondence was an essential component of how provincial Ottoman government functioned; therefore, reports, petitions, false accusations, and interrogations became important tools for agents and groups who were engaged in hegemonic negotiations. Both elite and non-elite agents were able to utilize Ottoman governance to pursue their own strategies against other local agents or imperial government. People who refused to use these bureaucratic tools in making claims and negotiating were presented in this correspondence as defiant stubborn and violent. This perspective is critical of the state–society divide, as the case studies reveal a more complex singular government of state and society.


2013 ◽  
Vol 34 (2) ◽  
pp. 223-244
Author(s):  
Espen Hammer

Hegel's philosophy of religion is characterized by what seems to be a deep tension. On the one hand, Hegel claims to be a Christian thinker, viewing religion, and in particular Christianity, as a manifestation of the absolute. On the other hand, however, he seems to view modernity as largely secular, devoid of authoritative claims to transcendence. Modernity is secular in the political sense of requiring the state to be neutral when it comes to matters of religion. However, it is also secular in the sense of there being no recourse to authoritative representations of a transcendent God. Drawing on Charles Taylor's view of secularization, the article focuses on the second strand of his religious thinking, exploring how Hegel can be thought of as a theorist of secularization. It is claimed that his dialectic of religious development describes a process of secularization. Ultimately, Hegel's system offers a view of the absolute as immanent, suggesting that an adequate account of religion will necessarily have to accept secularization as the end-point of spirit's development. This is how the tension between religion and secularization can be resolved.


2003 ◽  
Vol 36 (3) ◽  
pp. 291-309 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lars Johannsen

Using secondary data from 21 post-communist countries, a map of urban–rural cleavages is produced. The findings are that while persistent cleavages exist with respect to attitudes toward the state, the market and traditional institutions, these cleavages have yet to be institutionalized within the political system. Deviations from the generalized pattern can typically be explained by the intrusion of the state-building process into the urban–rural cleavage structure. Furthermore, it is argued that the lack of institutionalization has led to a situation in which state and political elites have gained increased autonomy.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document