scholarly journals Pandemics as Crisis Performance: How Populists Tried to Take Ownership of the Covid-19 Pandemic

2021 ◽  
Vol 56 (4) ◽  
pp. 147-157
Author(s):  
Erica Simone Almeida Resende
Keyword(s):  
The Political ◽  
Common Denominator ◽  
The People ◽  
The World ◽  
Political Spectrum ◽  
A Performance

With the Covid-19 pandemic dominating the agenda, it seems almost natural that it be associated with another buzzword: populism. As the pandemic advances, it seems that the prediction of populism surviving the pandemic due to its own diversity has been proved right, given the variation in responses by populists around the world. One common denominator stands out though: populists across the political spectrum understood the benefits of performing the Covid-19 crisis as a tool to strengthen their political positions. They tried to politicize the pandemic to increase the antagonism between the people and the elites. In this article, I introduce the notion of crisis as both a construct and a performance, and as a useful concept to analyze populist reactions to the pandemic. I argue that notwithstanding the attempts to politicize the pandemic, the Covid-19 crisis ended up imposing its own reality. In other words: the crisis could not be owned by politics.

The Role of Religious Force in the Wukan Incident

2013 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 155-175 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hou Yuxin
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Religious Beliefs ◽  
The Political ◽  
The People ◽  
The World ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Media ◽  
Social Management ◽  
The Village

Abstract The Wukan Incident attracted extensive attention both in China and around the world, and has been interpreted from many different perspectives. In both the media and academia, the focus has very much been on the temporal level of the Incident. The political and legal dimensions, as well as the implications of the Incident in terms of human rights have all been pored over. However, what all of these discussions have overlooked is the role played by religious force during the Incident. The village of Wukan has a history of over four hundred years, and is deeply influenced by the religious beliefs of its people. Within both the system of religious beliefs and in everyday life in the village, the divine immortal Zhenxiu Xianweng and the religious rite of casting shengbei have a powerful influence. In times of peace, Xianweng and casting shengbei work to bestow good fortune, wealth and longevity on both the village itself, and the individuals who live there. During the Wukan Incident, they had a harmonizing influence, and helped to unify and protect the people. Looking at the specific roles played by religion throughout the Wukan Incident will not only enable us to develop a more meaningful understanding of the cultural nature and the complexity of the Incident itself, it will also enrich our understanding, on a divine level, of innovations in social management.

scholarly journals Engaging for Puerto Rico: #RickyRenuncia (and #RickySeQueda) during El Verano del 19 and digital identities

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Danilo T Perez-Rivera ◽  
Christopher Torres Lugo ◽  
Alexis R Santos-Lozada
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Puerto Rico ◽  
Social Activism ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Political ◽  
Digital Revolution ◽  
The People ◽  
The Social ◽  
The World ◽  
Puerto Rican Diaspora

Between July 13-24, 2019 the people of Puerto Rico took the streets after a series of corruption scandals shocked the political establishment. The social uprising resulted in the ousting of the Governor of Puerto Rico (Dr. Ricardo Rosselló, Ricky), the resignation of the majority of his staff something unprecedented in the history of Puerto Rico; this period has been called El Verano del 19 (Summer of 19). Social media played a crucial role in both the organization and dissemination of the protests, marches, and other activities that occurred within this period. Puerto Ricans in the island and around the world engaged in this social movement through the digital revolution mainly under the hashtag #RickyRenuncia (Ricky Resign), with a small counter movement under the hashtag #RickySeQueda (Ricky will stay). The purpose of this study is to illustrate the magnitude and grass roots nature of the political movement’s social media presence, as well as their characteristics of the population of both movements and their structures. We found that #RickyRenuncia was used approximately one million times in the period of analysis while #RickySeQueda barely reached 6,000 tweets. Particularly, the pervasiveness of cliques in the #RickySeQueda show concentrations of authority dedicated to its propagation, whilst the #RickyRenuncia propagation was much more distributed and decentralized with little to no interaction between significant nodes of authority. Noteworthy was the role of the Puerto Rican diaspora in the United States of America and around the world, contributing close to 40% of all geo-located tweets. Finally, we found that the Twitter followers of the former governor had indicators of being composed of two distinct populations: 1) those active in social media and 2) those who follow the account but who are not active participants of the social network. We discuss the implications of these findings on the interpretation of emergence, structure and dissemination of social activism and countermovement to these activities in the context of Puerto Rico.

The German Elections of 1928

1928 ◽  
Vol 22 (3) ◽  
pp. 698-705
Author(s):  
James K. Pollock
Keyword(s):  
Political Parties ◽  
The Political ◽  
City Councils ◽  
The People ◽  
The World ◽  
Modern Methods ◽  
Political Consolidation ◽  
National Socialists ◽  
The Right ◽  
Intensive Work

The elections which were held throughout Germany on May 20, 1928, are of considerable interest and importance not only to Germany but also to the rest of the world. These elections, to be sure, did not have the dramatic interest which attended the Reichstag elections of December, 1924. But they deserve attention for a number of reasons: first, because they are the first elections to be held in the Reich under what may be called normal conditions; second, because elections for five Landtags and several city councils were held at the same time; and third, because the elections gave a further test, and supplied additional evidence of the operation, of the German system of proportional representation.Despite the intensive work of the political parties, the people were not aroused to much enthusiasm during the campaign. The old Reichstag was dissolved before Easter, but not until the last week of the campaign could one detect any excitement. Never before had the electors been bombarded with so much printed matter, posters, and, last but not least, loud-speakers and films. All the modern methods of appealing to the voters were tried by the numerous political parties. There were lacking, however, the overpowering issues and the battlecries which were so effective in 1924. Parades, demonstrations, meetings, and all the rest were carried through successfully on the whole, but they were quite dull and uninteresting. Only the two extreme parties, the National Socialists or Hitlerites on the right, and the Communists on the left, could appear enthusiastic. Nevertheless, the lack of what the Germans call a “grosse Parole” and the lack of excitement are not to be deplored; their absence probably indicates progress toward social and political consolidation.

Conclusion

2020 ◽  
pp. 201-206
Author(s):  
Lucy Atkinson ◽  
Andrew Blick ◽  
Matt Qvortrup
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Natural Extension ◽  
The Political ◽  
The Public ◽  
The People ◽  
Popular Government ◽  
Political Spectrum ◽  
Device Use ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Working Device

The referendum came onto the agenda in the UK in the final quarter of the nineteenth century, and it has never entirely disappeared from it, either as a proposition or a working device. Use of the referendum in the UK was conceived of and presented both as a natural extension of the principle of democracy that was then taking hold, and as a means of offsetting perceived defects with the representative variant of popular government that had developed. In particular, it was seen as a safeguard against the manipulative impact of parties that might lead the parliamentary system to serve the ends of factions within the elite above the people. It might enable the public to vote for a particular party with which they were broadly sympathetic without needing to endorse their entire programme; and would mean that a government could not implement measures of major significance to which a majority objected. It was largely envisaged as likely to have a conservative impact, creating a new and final means by which change might be blocked. Yet its appeal spread across the political spectrum; as did opposition to it....

scholarly journals The Relationship Between Authority and Authenticity in the Laozi: Employing Wu無 as a Philosophical Framework

Religions ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 79
Author(s):  
Sharon Y. Small
Keyword(s):  
The Political ◽  
Political Aspect ◽  
The People ◽  
The World ◽  
Philosophical Framework ◽  
Generative Processes ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
The Way

Wu 無 is one of the most prominent terms in Ancient Daoist philosophy, and perhaps the only term to appear more than Dao in both the Laozi and the Zhuangzi. However, unlike Dao, wu is generally used as an adjective modifying or describing nouns such as “names”, “desires”, “knowledge”, “action”, and so forth. Whereas Dao serves as the utmost principle in both generation and practice, wu becomes one of the central methods to achieve or emulate this ideal. As a term of negation, wu usually indicates the absence of something, as seen in its relation to the term you 有—”to have” or “presence”. From the perspective of generative processes, wu functions as an undefined and undifferentiated cosmic situation from which no beginning can begin but everything can emerge. In the political aspect, wu defines, or rather un-defines the actions (non-coercive action, wuwei 無為) that the utmost authority exerts to allow the utmost simplicity and “authenticity” (the zi 自 constructions) of the people. In this paper, I suggest an understanding of wu as a philosophical framework that places Pre-Qin Daoist thought as a system that both promotes our understanding of the way the world works and offers solutions to particular problems. Wu then is simultaneously metaphysical and concrete, general, and particular. It is what allows the world, the society, and the person to flourish on their own terms.

The Empire Strikes Back: How Right-Wing Nationalists Tried to Recapture Russian Literature

1996 ◽  
Vol 24 (4) ◽  
pp. 601-624 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kathleen Parthe
Keyword(s):  
Russian Literature ◽  
The Political ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Thought Process ◽  
The World ◽  
Political Spectrum ◽  
The Way

This article attempts to reconstruct the khod myshleniia (thought process) of the ultra-nationalist, ultra-conservative camp, not just because it is interesting in and of itself but also because of the way that some of their ideas, concerns, and ways of seeing Russia and the world are shared by a growing number of people in the middle of the political spectrum. The extremists' ideas about russifikatsiia may not spread very far, but russkost' is a powerful and attractive concept.

“The Holocaust” or “The Salvation of Democracy”

2015 ◽  
Vol 42 (3) ◽  
pp. 140-161
Author(s):  
Sigifredo Leal-Guerrero
Keyword(s):  
Collective Memory ◽  
The Political ◽  
Public Concern ◽  
Social Agents ◽  
Anti Semitism ◽  
Derechos Humanos ◽  
The People ◽  
The Holocaust ◽  
Important Object ◽  
Political Spectrum

The massacre known as the Palace of Justice Holocaust is an important object of public concern in Colombia. After 29 years, social agents struggle in fields such as public activism, legal claims, and artistic creation to construct and legitimate accounts of what happened and inscribe them in collective memory as “the truth.” An analysis of these struggles, developed from inside and outside the state and from diverse points of the political spectrum, makes it possible to identify the meaning frames in which the people taking part in these struggles construct narratives of the massacre, such as the Jewish-Christian tradition, discourses on human rights and the memory of the Shoah, national security doctrines, and Nazi anticommunist anti-Semitism. La masacre conocida como el Holocausto del Palacio de Justicia es un importante objeto de interés público en Colombia. Después de 29 años de acontecida, diversos actores sociales continúan luchando en campos como el activismo político, los reclamos legales y la creación artística para construir y legitimar versiones sobre lo sucedido, e inscribirlas en la memoria colectiva como “la verdad”. Un análisis de esas luchas, desarrolladas desde dentro y fuera del Estado y desde diversos puntos del espectro político, permite identificar los marcos de sentido dentro de los cuales dichos actores construyen narrativas sobre la masacre. Algunos de esos marcos son la tradición judeo-cristiana, los discursos sobre los derechos humanos y la memoria de la Shoá, las doctrinas de seguridad nacional y el antisemitismo anticomunista nazi.

scholarly journals Educational Lessons from Further Analysis of Ho Chi Minh and V.I Lenin Ideologies on Values of Socialism Economy and Building State Government

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
pp. 670-676
Author(s):  
Nguyen Thi Hang ◽  
Dinh Thi Hien ◽  
Dinh Tran Ngoc Huy ◽  
Leng Thi Lan ◽  
Ly Thi Hue
Keyword(s):  
Qualitative Analysis ◽  
State Government ◽  
Political System ◽  
Historical Materialism ◽  
The Political ◽  
Important Criterion ◽  
The People ◽  
The World ◽  
Inductive Methods ◽  
Research Findings

This paper aims to present practical values of a socialism economy from ideologies of V.I Lenin and Ho Chi Minh, two talented leaders of the world. Authors mainly use qualitative analysis, consisting of synthesis and inductive methods and historical materialism methods. Research findings show us that from Ho Chi Minh views, People is the most important criterion to evaluate the effectiveness of the political system’s operating capacity. This is also a very humanistic goal of the Vietnamese political system. If the operation of the political system is ineffective, the bureaucracy, the contingent of cadres and civil servants, especially key cadres, are degenerated and degenerated, the political system will slip out of the orbit of the people. The owner of the people, to become a force opposed to the people.

Pranks, Tropes and Raspberries: The Dialogic Demeanour of Satire’s Creative Horizon

2019 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 46-60
Author(s):  
John Baldacchino
Keyword(s):  
Holy Spirit ◽  
Nobel Laureate ◽  
Moral Values ◽  
The Political ◽  
The People ◽  
Dario Fo ◽  
The World ◽  
The Holy Spirit ◽  
The Ideal

Abstract This essay starts off with a modern-day court jester (Nobel laureate Dario Fo) praising a Pope (Albino Luciani, who became John Paul I). Fo presents us with an historic moment: Luciani scandalises his Church by calling God “Mother.” With utmost seriousness, Fo appreciates the Pope’s kindness and warmth by which the artist perceives a way of scandalising the world out of complacency. In their idealised and situated presentations of the world, the sacred and the profane return the necessary to the contingent (and vice-versa) as moments of equal attention and distraction. Likewise, irony and satire mark our situated sense of the ideal by an inability to unlearn the certainties by which we are urged to construct our world. This is done by first presenting a situated pedagogical context that refuses to provide solutions presumed on measurement, certainty or finality. Secondly this begins to lay claim to the political, aesthetic and moral values that are gained through art’s ironic disposition. Thirdly, through our contingent states of being we begin to understand how education is culturally conditioned and why we need to shift it to another gear – that of unlearning through a weak pedagogy. An atheist, Fo suggests that thanks to Pope Luciani, we now could endear to the Holy Spirit as a spirito ridens, a spirit that laughs. Here one finds a kenotic sense that gives us a glimpse in how an ironic disposition owes its strength and effectiveness to a weak pedagogy. By dint of such weakness, the jester’s pedagogical disposition becomes a form of resistance, exiting the Court in order to be with the people and consequently transformed by the people.

Social Nutrition at the League of Nations

2020 ◽  
pp. 75-89
Author(s):  
Tom Scott-Smith
Keyword(s):  
Economic Growth ◽  
Social Change ◽  
Golden Age ◽  
League Of Nations ◽  
The Political ◽  
New Work ◽  
The World ◽  
Political Spectrum ◽  
A Chain ◽  
Vast Network

This chapter explains the golden age of humanitarian nutrition as undertaken by the League of Nations. It was golden not so much in results as in its ambition and scope, bringing nutrition to the center of international policy. The aspirations of this golden age of social nutrition became extensive, and its findings rose up the international agenda. A chain of positive reactions, its adherents claimed, would follow from better nutrition for all: improvements in health, which would lead to greater productivity, which would generate higher wages and stimulate demand for goods. This, in turn, would lead to economic growth and more trade across the globe. It was a vision that appealed to politicians from all parts of the political spectrum, who promoted new work on the management of malnutrition as well as examining the possibilities of social change. By the late 1930s, nutrients stood at the center of a vast network, with expanding connections around the world, but the imperatives of the coming war soon restricted these visions.

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