scholarly journals Dialogic Struggle in the Becoming of the Cultural Revolution: Between Elite Conflict and Mass Mobilization

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Xiaohong Xu
Keyword(s):  
Rational Choice ◽  
Cultural Revolution ◽  
Status Quo ◽  
Mass Mobilization ◽  
Teleological Explanation ◽  
Political Events ◽  
Chinese Cultural Revolution ◽  
The Status ◽  
Cultural Repertoires ◽  
Politics Of Interpretation

This article addresses the becoming of contentious political events through the case of the Chinese Cultural Revolution (1966). The conditional theory of structural causa- tion and the rational choice conception of agency that have complemented each other in current scholarship have left missing links between elite conflict and mass mobilization. Examining the dialogic struggle among various actors involved in the process helps to overcome the teleological explanation of the rise of the Cultural Rev- olution and brings to light the politics of interpretation in constructing its meaning. The perspective shows ideological contradictions in the status quo ante to be important sources for change in an uncertain and destabilizing situation. The event thus did not result from the realization of actors’ fixed goals but was an emergent process of the disarticulation of structural contradictions, in which actors’ active appropriation and changing deployment of cultural repertoires were critical.

The Staying Power of the Legislative Status Quo: Collective Choice in Canada's Parliament after Morgentaler

1997 ◽  
Vol 30 (1) ◽  
pp. 31-53 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas Flanagan
Keyword(s):  
Rational Choice ◽  
Rational Choice Theory ◽  
Choice Theory ◽  
Status Quo ◽  
Potential Cycling ◽  
Agenda Control ◽  
Institutional Rules ◽  
The Status ◽  
The Government ◽  
Amendment Procedure

AbstractRational choice theory has drawn attention to the phenomenon of structure-induced equilibrium in situations of potential cycling. When there is no majority, first preference or Condorcet winner, the outcome is determined by agenda control and institutional rules of decision making. Within that context, the status quo has a special advantage because of the parliamentary amendment procedure, in which the status quo, as the default option to the bill in formal form, is not voted upon until the last stage. The unsuccessful attempts of the Canadian government of Prime Minister Brian Mulroney to respond legislatively to the Supreme Court's Morgentaler decision illustrate these general principles of rational choice. The government was unable to get legislation passed because, with cyclical configurations of opinion in both the House of Commons and the Senate, institutional rules, especially the order of voting required by the parliamentary amendment procedure, favoured the status quo.

scholarly journals Dancehall music and urban identities in Zimbabwe – A constructive postmodern perspective

2016 ◽  
Vol 72 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Zorodzai Dube
Keyword(s):  
Status Quo ◽  
Economic Uncertainty ◽  
State Institutions ◽  
Political Events ◽  
The Status ◽  
Dancehall Music

Dancehall music may be seen as a commentary over the socio-political events that are unfolding in Zimbabwe since 2008, a period characterised by political and economic uncertainty. The study focuses on how this genre of music reflects identities that emerge from the context characterised by the disintegrating state institutions and fragile households. With such a context, dancehall music may be interpreted as offering hope and courage. Notably, the music carries a unique theological injunction where God is called upon to witness and offer strength, not to punish or change the status quo. I call this genre of music wilderness music to explain that the music provides spaces of hope and courage to fragile and less certain identities.

scholarly journals Non-deteriorating Choice Without Full Transitivity

2007 ◽  
Vol 29 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Walter Bossert ◽  
Kotaro Suzumura
Keyword(s):  
Game Theory ◽  
Social Choice ◽  
Rational Choice ◽  
Status Quo ◽  
Individual Rationality ◽  
Alternative Form ◽  
Alternative Definition ◽  
The Status ◽  
Full Transitivity ◽  
Definition Of

AbstractAlthough the theory of greatest-element rationalizability and maximalelement rationalizability on general domains and without full transitivity of rationalizing relations is well-developed in the literature, these standard notions of rational choice are often considered to be too demanding. An alternative definition of rationality of choice is that of non-deteriorating choice, which requires that the chosen alternatives must be judged at least as good as a reference alternative. In game theory, this definition is well-known under the name of individual rationality when the reference alternative is construed to be the status quo. This alternative form of rationality of individual and social choice is characterized in this paper on general domains and without full transitivity of rationalizing relations.

Nanjing's Failed “January Revolution” of 1967: The Inner Politics of a Provincial Power Seizure

2010 ◽  
Vol 203 ◽  
pp. 675-692 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dong Guoqiang ◽  
Andrew G. Walder
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Revolution ◽  
Turning Point ◽  
Political Conflict ◽  
Status Quo ◽  
The Political ◽  
Local Authorities ◽  
Central Tenet ◽  
The Status ◽  
The Cultural Revolution

AbstractScholarship on factional warfare during the first two years of the Cultural Revolution has long portrayed a struggle between “conservative” factions that sought to preserve the status quo and “radical” factions that sought to transform it. Recent accounts, however, claim that the axis of political conflict was fundamentally transformed after the fall of civilian governments in early 1967, violating the central tenet of this interpretation. A close examination of Nanjing's abortive power seizure of January 1967 addresses this issue in some depth. The power seizure in fact was a crucial turning point: it removed the defenders of local authorities from the political stage and generated a split between two wings of the rebel movement that overthrew them. The political divisions among former rebel allies intensified and hardened in the course of tortuous negotiations in Beijing that were buffeted by confusing political shifts in the capital. This created a contest that was not between “conservatives” and “radicals” over the restoration of the status quo, but about the respective places of the rival radical factions in restored structures of authority.

Stable and unstable choices

2019 ◽  
Vol 36 (1) ◽  
pp. 113-125
Author(s):  
Anders Herlitz
Keyword(s):  
Rational Choice ◽  
Status Quo ◽  
Decision Methods ◽  
The Status

AbstractThis paper introduces a condition for rational choice that states that accepting decision methods and normative theories that sometimes entail that the act of choosing a maximal alternative renders this alternative non-maximal is irrational. The paper illustrates how certain distributive theories that ascribe importance to what the status quo is violate this condition and argues that they thereby should be rejected.

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