Russia: “Late-Take Off Society” in the Whirlwind of World Politics

2020 ◽  
Vol 64 (11) ◽  
pp. 42-52
Author(s):  
A. Volodin
Keyword(s):  
Industrial Revolution ◽  
World Politics ◽  
The State ◽  
October Revolution ◽  
Industrial Society ◽  
Russian Society ◽  
World War ◽  
Major Power ◽  
The West ◽  
The World

Russia is regarded as a “late take-off” society (other participants in this “cohort” – Germany, Japan, Italy), the modernization of which was guided from above, by the state and its agencies, indirectly reflecting the lack of alternative, spontaneous modernization option. The author, while exploring the phenomenon of modern Russian society in the unity of historical, economic, sociocultural and political forms of existence, tries to identify the similarities as well as differences between the domestic society, on the one hand, and the “classical” West, that is Northwest Europe, on the other. The comparison demonstrates: Russia is the most complex organism among the “late take-off” societies, in the modernization of which the state has played and continues to play a pivotal role in its various historical and political forms and manifestations. The paper outlines the main stages of the “guided” transformation of Russian society. Fundamental to the modernization of Russia were: Peter and Catherine’s societal transformations, the first industrial revolution in the country (1850–1890s), emergence of the “organized capitalism” system in Germany, Japan, and later in the USA, the October Revolution, World War II, Soviet-American bipolarity. The accelerated transition of Russia from rural to industrial society was accompanied by deformations (deviations from the West European “standard”), return movements (“counter-reforms”), and impediments to reception of representative institutions and practices by the masses. External pressure reinforced the tendency of state domination over society, which subsequently transformed into paternalistic behavior patterns. Migration flows were not accompanied by social and professional diversification of Russian society. From now on, the logic of the accelerated development of Russia was shaped by competition with the West that was undergoing the industrial revolution. This competition endangered the homeostatic equilibrium of traditional society. The World War I revealed the peripheral, subordinate position of Russia in the international system. The most radical approach to regaining a major power status in world politics was proposed by the Bolshevik Party, who led the October Revolution of 1917. The Communist model has become instrumental of advancing transformation of traditional/rural society into a modern, urban one. Subsequently, the exhaustion of the communist model’s internal resources gave rise to a painful search for a new modernization and development paradigm. Currently, Russia’s existential task is to accelerate the pace of economic growth, help society enter the trajectory of sustainable development and, consequentially, participate in the world system on the basis of “strategic autonomy” that is unconditional sovereignty.

Squatting: The Fight for Decent Shelter, 1970s–1980s

2018 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 27-50
Author(s):  
John Marsland
Keyword(s):  
Welfare State ◽  
Public Services ◽  
Second World War ◽  
World War ◽  
Housing Policies ◽  
The West ◽  
The World ◽  
Housing Needs ◽  
Post War ◽  
Second World

During the twenty years after the Second World War, housing began to be seen as a basic right among many in the west, and the British welfare state included many policies and provisions to provide decent shelter for its citizens. This article focuses on the period circa 1968–85, because this was a time in England when the lack of affordable, secure-tenured housing reached a crisis level at the same time that central and local governmental housing policies received wider scrutiny for their ineffectiveness. My argument is that despite post-war laws and rhetoric, many Britons lived through a housing disaster and for many the most rational way they could solve their housing needs was to exploit loopholes in the law (as well as to break them out right). While the main focus of the article is on young British squatters, there is scope for transnational comparison. Squatters in other parts of the world looked to their example to address the housing needs in their own countries, especially as privatization of public services spread globally in the 1980s and 1990s. Dutch, Spanish, German and American squatters were involved in a symbiotic exchange of ideas and sometimes people with the British squatters and each other, and practices and rhetoric from one place were quickly adopted or rejected based on the success or failure in each place.

Enemies within, Enemies without: the Ideology of a Conservative West-Russianist Newspaper During World War I (1914–1915)

2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 74-103
Author(s):  
Aliaksandr Bystryk
Keyword(s):  
World War I ◽  
Nation Building ◽  
Russian Empire ◽  
Russian Society ◽  
World War ◽  
The West ◽  
The North ◽  
National Solidarity ◽  
North Western

Abstract This paper deals with the topic of conservative West-Russianist ideology and propaganda during World War I. The author analyzes the most prominent newspaper of the movement at the time – Severo-Zapadnaia Zhizn (The North-Western Life). The discourse of the newspaper is analyzed from the perspective of Belarusian nation-building, as well as from the perspective of Russian nationalism in the borderlands. The author explores the ways in which the creators of the periodical tried to use the rise of the Russian patriotic feelings to their advantage. Appealing to the heightened sense of national solidarity which took over parts of Russian society, the periodical tried to attack, delegitimize and discredit its ideological and political opponents. Besides the obvious external enemy – Germans, Severo-Zapadnaia Zhizn condemned socialists, pacifists, Jews, borderland Poles, Belarusian and Ukrainian national activists, Russian progressives and others, accusing them of disloyalty, lack of patriotism and sometimes even treason. Using nationalist loyalist rhetoric, the West-Russianist newspaper urged the imperial government to act more decisively in its campaign to end ‘alien domination’ in Russian Empire, and specifically to create conditions for domination of ‘native Russian element’ – meaning Belarusian peasantry, in the Belarusian provinces of the empire.

The Sino–Russian Strategic Partnership

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul J. Bolt ◽  
Sharyl N. Cross
Keyword(s):  
The United States ◽  
Strategic Partnership ◽  
Relative Power ◽  
Mutual Respect ◽  
Major Power ◽  
The West ◽  
The World ◽  
Key Players ◽  
Common Interests ◽  
The Relationship

The Conclusion reviews the volume’s major themes. Russia and China have common interests that cement their partnership, and are key players in shaping the international order. Both seek better relations with the West, but on the basis of “mutual respect” and “equality.” While the relationship has grown deeper, particularly since 2014, China and Russia are partners but not allies. Thus, their relationship is marked by burgeoning cooperation, but still areas of potential competition and friction. Russia in particular must deal with China’s growing relative power at the same time that it is isolated from the West. While the Russian–Chinese relationship creates challenges for the United States and Europe and a return of major power rivalry, there is also room for cooperation in the strategic triangle comprising China, Russia, and the West. Looking ahead, the world is in a period of dramatic transition.

Islamic International Relations Towards a Theoretical Framework

2015 ◽  
Vol 1 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gubara Hassan
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
International Relations ◽  
Modern Society ◽  
Theoretical Framework ◽  
World Politics ◽  
Muslim World ◽  
The West ◽  
The Past ◽  
Alternative Approach ◽  
The World

The Western originators of the multi-disciplinary social sciences and their successors, including most major Western social intellectuals, excluded religion as an explanation for the world and its affairs. They held that religion had no role to play in modern society or in rational elucidations for the way world politics or/and relations work. Expectedly, they also focused most of their studies on the West, where religion’s effect was least apparent and argued that its influence in the non-West was a primitive residue that would vanish with its modernization, the Muslim world in particular. Paradoxically, modernity has caused a resurgence or a revival of religion, including Islam. As an alternative approach to this Western-centric stance and while focusing on Islam, the paper argues that religion is not a thing of the past and that Islam has its visions of international relations between Muslim and non-Muslim states or abodes: peace, war, truce or treaty, and preaching (da’wah).

scholarly journals ECONIMIC ASPECTS OF BREAKUP OF YUGOSLAVIA

2016 ◽  
Vol 1 (11) ◽  
pp. 83
Author(s):  
Dražen Marjanac
Keyword(s):  
World Market ◽  
World Politics ◽  
The State ◽  
The World ◽  
High Inflation ◽  
Workforce Productivity ◽  
And Function ◽  
Internal And External Factors ◽  
Effective Use ◽  
Productivity And Competitiveness

Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia represented a community of six republics with socio-cultural, social and economical differences that increased over the decades, leading to disintegration of the state. Factors that led to the collapse of the state are numerous, such as cultural and religious differences, nationalism, structure and function of the state system, internal and external factors of disintegration, change in the world politics, different levels of economic development of the republics.The economic system of Yugoslavia was based on self-managing model, a hybrid of both capitalism and socialism, which was considered to be the most effective use of capital goods, increasing workforce productivity, distributing the income and creating a product competitive for the domestic and foreign markets. However, this system had tremendous disadvantages which in addition to the changes in the world market led to the state of recession, very high inflation, decrease in workforce productivity and competitiveness of the final products in the markets, eventually resulting in the collapse of the entire system and disintegration of Yugoslavia.

Beyond Soft Power

China Report ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 53 (2) ◽  
pp. 172-187 ◽  
Author(s):  
L.H.M. Ling
Keyword(s):  
Soft Power ◽  
World Politics ◽  
The State ◽  
State History ◽  
The World ◽  
Historical Culture ◽  
Cultural Power ◽  
India And China

The concept of ‘soft power’ impoverishes our understanding of politics. It assumes (i) the world has never encountered instances of ‘soft power’ before or knows no better when encountering it; (ii) culture cannot have any interests, agency or impact of its own; and (iii) it cannot capture the state. History—especially from India and China—debunks these assumptions. I propose a contrasting concept, cultural power. It turns ‘soft power’ on its head by (i) articulating the state as ontology, not instrument; accordingly, (ii) culture can generate its own centre (or centres) of gravitas that (iii) invariably outstrips the state in purpose and identity. To demonstrate, I draw on recent filmic representations from India and China. These replay the power of historical culture, like Hindu reincarnation and/or Confucian love, through a contemporary venue. I conclude with some implications of cultural power for politics, in general, and world politics, in particular.

War Art in Japan

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Asato Ikeda
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Interior Design ◽  
Subject Matter ◽  
The State ◽  
Japanese Culture ◽  
World War ◽  
The West ◽  
Woodblock Prints ◽  
War Effort ◽  
Totalitarian State

Under Japan’s totalitarian state during World War II, most Japanese artists participated in the war effort. Their activities included producing works commissioned by the state, displaying works in state-sponsored exhibitions, donating the proceeds of art to the state, and dedicating works, as symbolic gestures, to religious sites, important battles, seminal state officials, or to those who gave their lives in the war. War artists produced works in diverse media, styles, and subject matter, ranging from painting, photography, woodblock prints, and sculpture to architecture and interior design. However, their works invariably glorified Japan’s military occupation in Asia and war against the West, or they resonated with the wartime state ideology that sought to recreate a traditional Japanese culture uncontaminated by modernity.

14. War and world politics

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tarak Barkawi
Keyword(s):  
The United States ◽  
Second World War ◽  
World Politics ◽  
The Other ◽  
Modern State ◽  
World War ◽  
The West ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Second World

This chapter examines how war fits into the study of international relations and the ways it affects world politics. It begins with an analysis of the work of the leading philosopher of war, Carl von Clausewitz, to highlight the essential nature of war, the main types of war, and the idea of strategy. It then considers some important developments in the history of warfare, both in the West and elsewhere, with particular emphasis on interrelationships between the modern state, armed force, and war in the West and in the global South. Two case studies are presented, one focusing on war and Eurocentrism during the Second World War, and the other on the impact of war on society by looking at France, Vietnam, and the United States. There is also an Opposing Opinions box that asks whether democracy creates peace among states.

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