scholarly journals John A. Macdonald, “the Chinese” and Racist State Formation in Canada

2017 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Timothy Stanley
Keyword(s):  
Indigenous People ◽  
Private Property ◽  
Biological Difference ◽  
Colonial Expansion ◽  
Collective Control ◽  
Property Owners ◽  
Initial Support ◽  
To Come ◽  
European Colonialism ◽  
The Right

In 1885, John Alexander Macdonald took the right to vote away from men racialized as Chinese on the grounds that they were biologically different from “Canadians” and that their presence threatened “the Aryan character” of Canadian society.  Through the 1885 Electoral Franchise Act, Macdonald was seeking to consolidate colonial expansion into the west by constituting the federal polity around the owners of private property, i.e., of land that had been converted from the collective control of Indigenous people. As elsewhere in the world, European colonialism in Canada involved taking control of Indigenous people’s territories and converting it to the private ownership of European colonizers.  Making ownership of property the key to membership in the federal polity explains Macdonald’s initial support for giving the vote to women. It also explains why his legislation gave the vote to Indigenous people who met the property qualification. For Macdonald, ownership of private property was the final proof of an individual’s acculturation to colonial dominance. Property-owners from China, by contrast, threatened European dominance in British Columbia. Basing exclusion on alleged biological difference made it inescapable and permanent. The 1885 Act was thus a key moment in forming the racist state in Canada. Indeed, the strong opposition to Macdonald’s introduction of biological racism, including in the Canadian Senate on the part of his own appointees, underscores the significance of this change, one that would have consequences for racialized and excluded groups for many years to come

Tipaimukh Multipurpose Hydroelectric Project

2017 ◽  
pp. 227-251 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ali Reja Osmani
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Economic Growth ◽  
Indigenous People ◽  
Water Shortage ◽  
Hydroelectric Project ◽  
Significant Harm ◽  
Farakka Barrage ◽  
To Come ◽  
Freshwater Reservoir ◽  
The Right

Moving ahead from the freshwater reservoir versus climate change debate, the Indo-Bangla controversy over the Tipaimukh Project exists over the right of riparian states. India needs more energy to propel its economic growth, whereas Bangladesh is worried about downstream impact. The concerns of Bangladesh are based on the experience of severe water shortage and other impacts of Farakka Barrage and Teesta Barrage and also Himalayan Component of the Interlinking of River Project. Over the years some progress was made at bilateral level. But the major problem remains unaddressed i.e. without reconciling the issues of indigenous people a big dam cannot be constructed. This paper highlighted the existing scenario of Bangladesh and the indigenous people of Manipur in India in one hand and ecological, socio-economic concern in other hand i.e. obligation not to cause significant harm. There is no straight way answers available to be choose between a ‘Yes' or ‘No'; neither depends on the issues of ‘might' over ‘right' or ‘development' over ‘destruction', but on the circumstances to come.

Subject 01: exemplary Indigenous masculinity in Cold War genetics

2020 ◽  
Vol 53 (3) ◽  
pp. 311-332
Author(s):  
ROSANNA DENT
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Indigenous People ◽  
Research Programme ◽  
Epidemic Disease ◽  
Mato Grosso ◽  
Central Brazil ◽  
Colonial Expansion ◽  
To Come ◽  
Set Up ◽  
Political Realities

AbstractIn 1962 a team of scientists conducted their first joint fieldwork in a Xavante village in Central Brazil. Recycling long-standing notions that living Indigenous people represented human prehistory, the scientists saw Indigenous people as useful subjects of study not only due to their closeness to nature, but also due to their sociocultural and political realities. The geneticists’ vision crystalized around one subject – the famous chief Apöwẽ. Through Apöwẽ, the geneticists fixated on what they perceived as the political prowess, impressive physique, and masculine reproductive aptitude of Xavante men. These constructions of charismatic masculinity came at the expense of recognizing how profoundly colonial expansion into Mato Grosso had destabilized Xavante communities, stripping them of their land and introducing epidemic disease. The geneticists’ theorizing prefigured debates to come in sociobiology, and set up an enduring research programme that Apöwẽ continues to animate even four decades after his death.

Taking Community Seriously: Lessons from the Israeli Disengagement Plan

2014 ◽  
Vol 47 (1) ◽  
pp. 149-171
Author(s):  
Shai Stern
Keyword(s):  
Private Property ◽  
Market Value ◽  
Eminent Domain ◽  
Similar Formula ◽  
Property Owner ◽  
Residential Communities ◽  
Property Owners ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Right

Eminent domain, or the expropriation of private property, is among the most controversial of legal arrangements. The challenges and threats that it poses to private property make it the subject of debate and dispute. Surprisingly, however, most Western jurisdictions embrace a similar formula to address expropriation, both in terms of the purposes that justify such action and the compensation that should be awarded to property owners.This article challenges the prevailing eminent domain formula, according to which, regardless of the circumstances of the expropriation, compensation to the property owner is determined by reference to the market value of the property. By exploring the case of Israel's 2005 disengagement plan, as a result of which 21 residential communities were uprooted by expropriation, this article argues that loss of communality should be taken into account in expropriations that uproot entire communities. However, in order for the legal arrangement to be efficient, fair and, of no less importance, to reflect the values embodied in the right to property, it should be constituted within a normative infrastructure that takes into account the values that the society wishes to endorse, and the inner meaning of these values.

INSTITUTIONAL CONDITIONALITY OF THE ENDOGENIZATION OF ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT

2018 ◽  
pp. 145-156 ◽  
Author(s):  
Valeriy Heyets
Keyword(s):  
Social Space ◽  
Private Property ◽  
Social Institutions ◽  
The State ◽  
The Political ◽  
Social Mechanisms ◽  
Centralized Management ◽  
The Social ◽  
To Come ◽  
The Right

At the end of the XXth century, in the countries of the former socialist camp, the capitalist reforms of the fundamental content of the principles of ensuring the right to liberty were carried out, including the economic one, that was realized in accordance with the existence and protection of the rights for a private property. This choice was made because there was a fundamental desire to overcome the dependence on the leadership of the political sovereign, which, in fact, ensured the receipt of «rents» through the implementation of a centralized management system on a planning and distribution basis, restraining the desire to gain freedom by providing opportunities for self-realization. In place of the ideology of the political «sovereign», the new ways of human activity coordination had to come, based on the principles of the ideology of liberalism. At the initial stages of reforms, the problems of institutionalization of activity of both the state and business, remained out of attention, since freedom was «above all».Capitalism, that develops without control and restrictions, is guided by a single criterion - by the private interest of the strongest and remains hostile to any form of public interest of the majority. At the same time, the development of the social institutions requires the formation of an institutional space for the implementation of the civic initiatives and the protection of freedoms from the manifestations of power and the weakly controlled monopoly organized business in the limitation of the civic activity. For this reason, in the process of development of society, the state should establish the long-term social mechanisms not only to consolidate the new spirit of capitalization and further economic growth, but also development through the social mechanisms of the social space that will not break, but will stabilize the society on the basis of the social values.

Tipaimukh Multipurpose Hydroelectric Project

2020 ◽  
pp. 735-759
Author(s):  
Ali Reja Osmani
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Economic Growth ◽  
Indigenous People ◽  
Water Shortage ◽  
Hydroelectric Project ◽  
Significant Harm ◽  
Farakka Barrage ◽  
To Come ◽  
Freshwater Reservoir ◽  
The Right

Moving ahead from the freshwater reservoir versus climate change debate, the Indo-Bangla controversy over the Tipaimukh Project exists over the right of riparian states. India needs more energy to propel its economic growth, whereas Bangladesh is worried about downstream impact. The concerns of Bangladesh are based on the experience of severe water shortage and other impacts of Farakka Barrage and Teesta Barrage and also Himalayan Component of the Interlinking of River Project. Over the years some progress was made at bilateral level. But the major problem remains unaddressed i.e. without reconciling the issues of indigenous people a big dam cannot be constructed. This paper highlighted the existing scenario of Bangladesh and the indigenous people of Manipur in India in one hand and ecological, socio-economic concern in other hand i.e. obligation not to cause significant harm. There is no straight way answers available to be choose between a ‘Yes' or ‘No'; neither depends on the issues of ‘might' over ‘right' or ‘development' over ‘destruction', but on the circumstances to come.

Investor-State Dispute Settlement under NAFTA Chapter 11: The Shape of Things to Come?

1998 ◽  
Vol 35 ◽  
pp. 263-290
Author(s):  
J. Anthony VanDuzer
Keyword(s):  
Free Trade Agreement ◽  
Dispute Settlement ◽  
Trade Agreement ◽  
Minimum Standards ◽  
The North ◽  
State Behaviour ◽  
Nafta Chapter 11 ◽  
To Come ◽  
The Right

SummaryRecently, there has been a proliferation of international agreements imposing minimum standards on states in respect of their treatment of foreign investors and allowing investors to initiate dispute settlement proceedings where a state violates these standards. Of greatest significance to Canada is Chapter 11 of the North American Free Trade Agreement, which provides both standards for state behaviour and the right to initiate binding arbitration. Since 1996, four cases have been brought under Chapter 11. This note describes the Chapter 11 process and suggests some of the issues that may arise as it is increasingly resorted to by investors.

Our Bodies, Whose Property?

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anne Phillips
Keyword(s):  
Labor Markets ◽  
Personal Autonomy ◽  
The Body ◽  
Body Parts ◽  
Complex Issue ◽  
Human Organs ◽  
Property Owners ◽  
The Common ◽  
The Difference ◽  
The Right

No one wants to be treated like an object, regarded as an item of property, or put up for sale. Yet many people frame personal autonomy in terms of self-ownership, representing themselves as property owners with the right to do as they wish with their bodies. Others do not use the language of property, but are similarly insistent on the rights of free individuals to decide for themselves whether to engage in commercial transactions for sex, reproduction, or organ sales. Drawing on analyses of rape, surrogacy, and markets in human organs, this book challenges notions of freedom based on ownership of our bodies and argues against the normalization of markets in bodily services and parts. The book explores the risks associated with metaphors of property and the reasons why the commodification of the body remains problematic. The book asks what is wrong with thinking of oneself as the owner of one's body? What is wrong with making our bodies available for rent or sale? What, if anything, is the difference between markets in sex, reproduction, or human body parts, and the other markets we commonly applaud? The book contends that body markets occupy the outer edges of a continuum that is, in some way, a feature of all labor markets. But it also emphasizes that we all have bodies, and considers the implications of this otherwise banal fact for equality. Bodies remind us of shared vulnerability, alerting us to the common experience of living as embodied beings in the same world. Examining the complex issue of body exceptionalism, the book demonstrates that treating the body as property makes human equality harder to comprehend.

Der Spielraum bei der Vermarktung von Waldleistungen ist eingeschränkt (Essay) | The scope for the commercialization of forest services is limited (essay)

2009 ◽  
Vol 160 (8) ◽  
pp. 228-231
Author(s):  
Hansruedi Walther
Keyword(s):  
Private Property ◽  
Legal Framework ◽  
Third Parties ◽  
Wood Products ◽  
Forest Owner ◽  
Free Access ◽  
School Class ◽  
Market Niche ◽  
The Right ◽  
Exclusive Right

A forest owner can only commercialize non-wood products and services within a tightly restricted market niche. On account of free access being permitted to the forest it is impossible to deny to third parties the consumption of many non-wood products and services: everybody has the right to be in the forest for recreation. As a result many non-wood services cannot be commercialized by the forest owner, or not exclusively. What would seem unthinkable elsewhere on private property seems to be taken for granted in the forest: third parties may take products from the forest and even sell them without being the forest owners. For certain nonwood services or products, such as the installation of rope parks or for burial in the forest, the organizer must conclude an agreement with the forest owner or draw up a contract for servitude or benefit. In addition, for these activities a permit from the Forestry Department is necessary. On the other hand, for an itinerant school class or for the production of forest honey neither a binding regulation with the forest owner nor a permit from the Forestry service is necessary, provided that no constructions are erected in the forest. The only exclusive right which remains to the forest owner, besides the sale of his property, is the exploitation of his trees within the legal framework.

De zaak van Rechter Grootaert en de strijd om het Nederlands in Belgisch-Congo. Een symbooldossier uit de jaren vijftig

2008 ◽  
Vol 67 (1) ◽  
pp. 7-46
Author(s):  
Bert Govaerts
Keyword(s):  
Private Property ◽  
Local Level ◽  
Free State ◽  
Court Cases ◽  
In De Praktijk ◽  
French Speaking ◽  
Congo Free State ◽  
The Right ◽  
Belgian Congo

In 1908 verwierf België de souvereiniteit over de voormalige Congo Vrijstaat, die particulier bezit van koning Leopold II was geweest. De nieuwe kolonie kreeg een soort grondwet, het Koloniale Charter. Artikel 3 daarvan bepaalde dat er in Belgisch-Congo taalvrijheid heerste, maar ook dat de Belgen er dezelfde taalrechten en -bescherming zouden genieten als in het moederland. Uiterlijk tegen 1913 moesten speciale decreten de taalregeling in rechtszaken en in de administratie vastleggen. Die afspraak werd niet gehonoreerd. De decreten kwamen er niet en de kolonie werd in de praktijk exclusief Franstalig. Een klein aantal Vlaamse koloniale ambtenaren verzette zich daar tegen en boekte ook beperkte successen, op plaatselijk niveau. Een doorbraak kwam er pas in de nadagen van de kolonie, toen een Vlaams magistraat, Jozef Grootaert, het recht opeiste om in het Nederlands te vonnissen. Pas na een lang en bitter gevecht, uitgevochten tot op regeringsniveau en mee gekleurd door allerlei persoonlijke motieven, werd uiteindelijk in 1956, meer dan veertig jaar later dan afgesproken, een decreet over het gebruik van de talen bij het koloniale gerecht goedgekeurd. Over een decreet i.v.m. bestuurzaken raakte men het niet meer eens voor de onafhankelijkheid van de kolonie in 1960. In het onafhankelijke Congo was er voor het Nederlands geen (officiële) plaats.________The Case of Judge Grootaert and the struggle for Dutch in the Belgian CongoIn 1908 Belgium acquired the sovereignty over the former Congo Free State, which had been the private property of king Leopold II. The new colony was granted a kind of constitution, the Colonial Charter. Article 3 of this charter provided not only that there would be freedom of language in the Belgian Congo, but also that the Belgians in that country would enjoy the same rights and protection of their language as they had in their motherland. The language regulation for court cases and the administration was to be laid down in special decrees by 1913 at the latest. That agreement was not honoured. The decrees failed to be drawn up and in practice the colony became exclusively French speaking. A small number of Flemish colonial officials resisted against this situation and in fact obtained some limited successes on a local level. A breakthrough finally occurred in the latter years of the colony, when a Flemish magistrate, Jozef Grootaert claimed the right to pronounce judgement in Dutch. Only after a long and bitter struggle that was fought out until the bitter end on a governmental level and that was also characterized by all kinds of personal motives, a decree about the use of languages at the colonial court was finally approved in 1956, more than forty years after it had been agreed. It proved to be no longer possible to reach agreement about a decree concerning administrative matters before the independence of the colony in 1960. In the independent Congo Republic no (official) role was reserved for Dutch.

Anti-System Politics

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jonathan Hopkin
Keyword(s):  
Comparative Approach ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Political Systems ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
The Us ◽  
Long Term Result ◽  
The Rich ◽  
Dramatic Shift ◽  
To Come ◽  
The Right

Recent elections in the advanced Western democracies have undermined the basic foundations of political systems that had previously beaten back all challenges—from both the Left and the Right. The election of Donald Trump to the US presidency, only months after the United Kingdom voted to leave the European Union, signaled a dramatic shift in the politics of the rich democracies. This book traces the evolution of this shift and argues that it is a long-term result of abandoning the postwar model of egalitarian capitalism in the 1970s. That shift entailed weakening the democratic process in favor of an opaque, technocratic form of governance that allows voters little opportunity to influence policy. With the financial crisis of the late 2000s, these arrangements became unsustainable, as incumbent politicians were unable to provide solutions to economic hardship. Electorates demanded change, and it had to come from outside the system. Using a comparative approach, the text explains why different kinds of anti-system politics emerge in different countries and how political and economic factors impact the degree of electoral instability that emerges. Finally, it discusses the implications of these changes, arguing that the only way for mainstream political forces to survive is for them to embrace a more activist role for government in protecting societies from economic turbulence.

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