Spirit Confronts the Four-Headed Monster: Jean-Bertrand Aristide’s Mistik–Infused Flood-Rise in Duvalierist Haiti

To explore Jean-Bertrand Aristide’s rise from obscure rural Haiti to become the nation’s first democratically elected president—by a landslide—is to enter into a world and a swirl of events that reads like surreal fiction or magical realism. As a Catholic priest (Salesian order), Aristide was fueled by the religio-socialist principles of liberation theology, which emerged as a significant force in Latin America primarily in the 1970s and 1980s, forcefully and vocally advocating for the masses of Haitian poor mired in deeply-entrenched disenfranchisement and exploitation. As a charismatic spokesperson for the popular democratic movement in Haiti during an era of entrenched dictatorship and repressive violence, Aristide boldly confronted the “four-headed monster” of the Haitian power structure—the army, the church hierarchy, the tontons macoutes, and the wealthy elite. His seemingly impossible escape from multiple assassination attempts, together with the power of his colorful rhetoric and his close association with urban slum dwellers and rural peasants, led to a rising “flood” (or lavalas) that invested him with an aura of Spirit, or mistik, that in either/both the Haitian-embraced tradition of Christianity or vodoun (voodoo) served to energize and greatly reassure an intense mass movement arrayed against seemingly impossible odds. This article focuses on the rise of Aristide as the embodiment and voice of Spirit among the people and does not extend into his tumultuous secular years in and out of the presidency, having been twice the victim of coups (1991 and 2004); instead it focuses primarily on the years 1985–1990 and does not enter into an assessment of Aristide as president. Aristide’s own vivid narratives of this time, segments of his sermons, and later, passages of his poetry serve to bolster the literary quality or interpretation of this brief but vividly colorful historic epoch in the Haitian experience.

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A.S. Khomyakov and “people’s thought” in the epic novel by Leo Tolstoy “War and Peace”

Philological Sciences Scientific Essays of Higher Education ◽

10.20339/phs.6-21.091 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 1 (6) ◽

pp. 91-97

Author(s):

Yury V. Lebedev ◽

Keyword(s):

War And Peace ◽

Russian Art ◽

The People ◽

Church Hierarchy ◽

Single Organism ◽

Papal Infallibility ◽

Cult Of Personality ◽

Christian Love ◽

The Individual ◽

The Masses

The article reveals the deep connections of the “people’s thought” and Tolstoy’s philosophy of history in “War and Peace” with the theological and literary-critical works of A.S. Khomyakova. The author of the work analyzes the dispute between Tolstoy and the cult of an outstanding personality, with the Hegelian understanding of his role in the historical process. Tolstoy is alien to the Hegelian rise of “great personalities” over the masses, the Hegelian liberation of the “genius” from moral control and evaluation. Tolstoy believes that it is not an exceptional personality, but the life of the people that turns out to be the most sensitive organism, catching the will of Providence, intuitively sensing the hidden meaning of the historical movement. Anticipating Tolstoy, Khomyakov sharply criticizes the cult of personality in the church hierarchy, the Catholic dogma of papal infallibility, of the unconditional authority of an individual in matters of conscience and faith. Khomyakov reveals deep religious roots that feed the centuries-old Western enmity towards Russia. The article proves that Tolstoy is close to Khomyakov’s idea that Divine Providence overshadows with its grace only the believing people, united into a single organism by Christian love, that the epic basis of “War and Peace” is anticipated in Khomyakov’s literary-critical works “Glinka’s Opera ‘Life for Tsar’”, “On the Possibility of the Russian Art School”, “Ivanov’s Painting. Letter to the editor of ‘Russian Beseda’”. The article proves that “War and Peace” overcomes the conflict between the individual and society, the hero and the people, and reveals the epic horizons lost in the Western European novel.

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The Cause of the People: Sartre's Encounter with Lacan in Badiou's Theory of the Subject

Paragraph ◽

10.3366/para.2019.0298 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 42 (2) ◽

pp. 188-204

Author(s):

Andrey Gordienko

Keyword(s):

Mass Movement ◽

Philosophical Work ◽

Political Status ◽

Present Essay ◽

Jean Paul ◽

The People ◽

Dialectical Reason ◽

The Subject ◽

Group Functions ◽

The Masses

In one of his late interviews, Alain Badiou acknowledges that his concept of the event can be traced back to Jean-Paul Sartre's notion of the group-in-fusion, presented in the Critique of Dialectical Reason as a momentous historical irruption that dissolves the serial existence of the masses. Given the lack of engagement with Sartre in Being and Event, the present essay attempts to account for this unexpected admission by arguing that Sartre figures as Badiou's silent partner in Theory of the Subject. The centrality of Sartre to Badiou's first major philosophical work is evident in the mobilization of the category of destruction to supplement the structural dialectic developed by Badiou's other master, Jacques Lacan. In so far as the mass movement is said to effectively destroy the space of placement by forcing the evental presentation of the real, Theory of the Subject pre-emptively contradicts Badiou's subsequent attempts to deny political status to the group-in-fusion. The present article thus concludes that the Sartrean group functions as a veritable cause that commences the subject-process constitutive of politics itself.

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Ambiguous Subject: the “Masses” (qunzhong) Discourse in Modern China

Cultura ◽

10.3726/cul.2018.02.08 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 15 (2) ◽

pp. 135-156

Author(s):

Lifeng LI

Keyword(s):

Mass Movement ◽

Historical Materialism ◽

Political Mobilization ◽

Modern China ◽

Mass Psychology ◽

The People ◽

Social Elites ◽

Intellectual Traditions ◽

Dynamic Forces ◽

The Masses

Abstract The “masses”(qunzhong ) discourse in modern China was influenced by two western intellectual traditions, i.e., mass psychology and historical materialism. The former regards the masses as a blind, impulsive, and irrational crowd, while the latter thinks that only the people are the real dynamic forces of historical development. As a result, the “masses” discourse in modern China bifurcated into a negative one of “mass psychology” and a positive one of “mass movement”, both of which were employed as effective tools of political mobilization by different political parties and social elites. The concept of the “masses” was either the crystallization of the abstract “people”(renmin ) or the actualization of the ideal “citizenry”(guomin ). What is embodied in the concepts of the people, the citizenry, and the masses in modern China was actually an ambiguous image of a political subject.

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Democratic Practice and Good Governance In Nepal

Journal of Political Science ◽

10.3126/jps.v17i0.20511 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 17 ◽

pp. 18-35

Author(s):

Girdhari Dahal

Keyword(s):

Democratic Republic ◽

Good Governance ◽

Mass Movement ◽

Essential Elements ◽

Fundamental Rights ◽

Democratic Movement ◽

Independent Judiciary ◽

The People ◽

History Of

Nepal was declared Federal Democratic Republic after the mass movement of 2006, which was institutionalized by the Constitution of Nepal promulgated through Constitutional Assembly (CA) in 2015. The Constitution of Nepal is the people’s constitution. It was a dream of people to draft their constitution from CA since 1951. Nepal has a long history of democratic movements. Democratic movements in Nepal started from the period of autocratic Rana regime back in 1940s. Nepal Praja Parisad (the first political party of Nepal) had started organized democratic movement in Nepal. Thereafter many democratic movements and revolutions took place for the establishment of federal democratic republic Nepal. Democracy and good governance are closely interrelated to one another. Democracy is called the rule of law. Legitimate government, transparent rule, accountability to the people, free and fair election, independent judiciary, and fundamental rights and duties of the people are the essential elements of good governance as well as democracy. The main objective of this paper is to explore democratic movements and the concept of good governance in Nepal. The paper also tries to analyze the role of democratic movements for democracy and the relation between democracy and good governance in Nepal.Journal of Political Science. Vol. 17, 2017, Page: 18-35

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Knowledge and Perception on Rti and Aids Among Urban Slum Dwellers: A Study in Ap

Indian Journal Of Applied Research ◽

10.15373/2249555x/nov2013/156 ◽

2011 ◽

Vol 3 (11) ◽

pp. 490-492

Author(s):

Prof. Ravindra kumar. V. K Prof. Ravindra kumar. V. K ◽

Keyword(s):

Urban Slum ◽

Slum Dwellers

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Serge Moscovici's "Réflexions sur la popularité des conspiracy mentalities"

10.31234/osf.io/c47x6 ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Olivier Klein

Keyword(s):

Middle Ages ◽

French Revolution ◽

Social Representations ◽

Social Representation ◽

Future Research ◽

Conspiracy Theories ◽

The Enlightenment ◽

The People ◽

Social Representation Theory ◽

The Masses

This is a pdf of the original typed manuscript of a lecture made in 2006. An annotated English translation will be published by the International Review of Social Psychology. I this text, Moscovici seeks to update his earlier work on the “conspiracy mentality” (1987) by considering the relationships between social representations and conspiracy mentality. Innovation in this field, Moscovici argues, will require a much thorough description and understanding of what conspiracy theories are, what rhetoric they use and what functions they fulfill. Specifically, Moscovici considers conspiracies as a form of counterfactual history implying a more desirable world (in which the conspiracy did not take place) and suggests that social representation theory should tackle this phenomenon. He explicitly links conspiracy theories to works of fiction and suggests that common principles might explain their popularity. Historically, he argues, conspiracism was born twice: First, in the middle ages, when their primary function was to exclude and destroy what was considered as heresy; and second, after the French revolution, to delegitimize the Enlightenment, which was attributed to a small coterie of reactionaries rather than to the will of the people. Moscovici then considers four aspects (“thematas”) of conspiracy mentality: 1/ the prohibition of knowledge; 2/ the duality between the majority (the masses, prohibited to know) and “enlightened” minorities; 3/ the search for a common origin, a “ur phenomenon” that connects historical events and provides a continuity to History (he notes that such a tendency is also present in social psychological theorizing); and 4/ the valorization of tradition as a bulwark against modernity. Some of Moscovici’s insights in this talk have since been borne out by contemporary research on the psychology of conspiracy theories, but many others still remain fascinating potential avenues for future research.

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Ayurveda and Communicable Diseases

Journal of Ayurveda and Integrated Medical Sciences (JAIMS) ◽

10.21760/jaims.v2i05.10260 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 2 (05) ◽

Author(s):

Ashok G. Naikar ◽

Ganapathi Rao ◽

Panchal Vinayak J.

Keyword(s):

Oral Tradition ◽

World View ◽

Close Association ◽

Practical Aspect ◽

Oral Traditions ◽

Local Health ◽

The People ◽

The World ◽

Pertinent Question ◽

Cultural Domination

Indian medical heritage flows in two distinctive but mutually complimenting streams. The oral tradition being followed by millions of housewives and thousands of local health practitioners is the practical aspect of codified streams such as Ayurveda, Siddha, Unani. These oral traditions are head based and take care of the basic health needs of the people using immediately available local resources. Majority of these are plant based remedies, supplemented by animal and mineral products. Many of the practices followed by these local streams can be understood and evaluated by the codified stream such as Ayurveda. These streams are not static, historical scrutiny of their evolution shows the enriching phenomena at all times. Thus we have more than 7000 species of higher and lower plants and hundreds of minerals and animal product used in local health tradition to manage hundreds of disease conditions. A pertinent question that arises here is that in which basis these systems got enriched. Is it just trial error method over a point of time which gave rise to this rich tradition, is it an intuitive knowledge born out of close association with nature. One of the reasons for this attitude can be, that one is always made to believe that the science means that which can be explained by western models of logic and epistemology. The world view being developed and adopted by the dominant western scientific paradigm never fits in to the world view being followed and practiced by the indigenous traditions. This is well accepted by us due to the last 200 yrs of political and cultural domination by western and other alien forces.

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Eco-Environmental Aspects of COVID-19 Pandemic and Potential Control Strategies

International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health ◽

10.3390/ijerph18073488 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 18 (7) ◽

pp. 3488

Author(s):

Rashid Nazir ◽

Jawad Ali ◽

Ijaz Rasul ◽

Emilie Widemann ◽

Sarfraz Shafiq

Keyword(s):

Control Strategies ◽

Public Awareness ◽

Noise Pollution ◽

Environmental Aspects ◽

Potential Control ◽

Health Infrastructure ◽

The People ◽

Slum Dwellers ◽

Hospital Wastes ◽

Future Outbreak

A new coronavirus-strain from a zoonotic reservoir (probably bat)—termed as severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2)—has recently claimed more than two million deaths worldwide. Consequently, a burst of scientific reports on epidemiology, symptoms, and diagnosis came out. However, a comprehensive understanding of eco-environmental aspects that may contribute to coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) spread is still missing, and we therefore aim to focus here on these aspects. In addition to human–human direct SARS-CoV-2 transmission, eco-environmental sources, such as air aerosols, different public use objects, hospital wastes, livestock/pet animals, municipal wastes, ventilation facilities, soil and groundwater potentially contribute to SARS-CoV-2 transmission. Further, high temperature and humidity were found to limit the spread of COVID-19. Although the COVID-19 pandemic led to decrease air and noise pollution during the period of lockdown, increased use of masks and gloves is threatening the environment by water and soil pollutions. COVID-19 badly impacted all the socio-economic groups in different capacities, where women, slum dwellers, and the people lacking social protections are the most vulnerable. Finally, sustainable strategies, waste management, biodiversity reclaim, eco-friendly lifestyle, improved health infrastructure and public awareness, were proposed to minimize the COVID-19 impact on our society and environment. These strategies will seemingly be equally effective against any future outbreak.

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