scholarly journals Origins of State and Legal Ideas of Russian Freemasons in the Late 18th – First Half of the 19th Century

2019 ◽  
pp. 207-215
Author(s):  
Alexey Dmitriyev

The research was triggered by the opinions spreading in the contemporary academic literature, according to which the ideology of Russian freemasonry was associated with constitutionalism and Order of Illuminati, and the theory of public welfare was a formal rationale for the monarch’s unlimited power. The main goal of this research is analyzing the public welfare concepts in the teachings of Russian and foreign thinkers, as well as in provisions of acts and writings of Russian freemasons. The author uses methods of the history of notions and the intellectual history to analyze the links between F. Prokopovich’s, S. Pufendorf’s, V. N. Tatishchev’s, Y. F. Bilfeld’s and I. G. Justi’s ideas and provisions of freemasons’ charters and writings by Russian freemasons – A. P. Sumarokov, I. V. Lopukhin, I. A. Pozdeyev. The author’s core findings were as follows: public welfare is mostly understood as a merging of wills achievable on condition of realizing everyone’s welfare. The concept of public welfare includes the principle of a limited union between the authorities and the society, as well as the principle of fulfilling mutual obligations by the monarch and citizens (subjects), failing which the morals decline and the state falls. The study’s main conclusions illustrate that Russian freemasons adopted theoretical constructs of public welfare, mutual obligations of the monarch and the subjects (citizens), and the moral nature of will. Russian freemasons developed these ideas in their own works, interpreting them mainly in the conservative and protective vein. The political ideal of the Russian freemasonry is a single and indelible limited monarchy headed by an enlightened monarch whose authority of governing the civil society is limited by the natural law and the law of God.

2022 ◽  
pp. 154-178
Author(s):  
Barry W. Bussey

In recalling the Newfoundland school debate during the late 20th century, this chapter considers the use of a direct democracy initiative that purportedly sought public input on a matter of communal religious rights. It raises the question as to whether a referendum is an appropriate tool to abandon minority rights which form part of a country's constitution. First, there is a brief discussion on the importance of free and democratic societies to foster civil society, including religious communities engaging in the public square. Second, the history of the Newfoundland education system will lay the foundation for a review of the perceived problems with churches running government-funded schools. Third, a short synopsis of the political machinations that led to two referendums and how the referendums were used as a legitimization tool by a government apparently unwilling to work out a viable solution that allowed some residual accommodation of the church schools. Finally, a reflection on what lessons may be learned from the Newfoundland experience.


Author(s):  
Ivars Orehovs

On May 4, 2020, the 30th anniversary of the restoration of Latvia’s national independence was celebrated, and the 160th anniversary since the birth of the first President of Latvia, Jānis Čakste (1859–1927), was remembered on September 14, 2019. In 1917, even before the establishment of the Latvian state, Čakste published a longer essay in German, entitled „The Latvians and Their Latvia” (Die Letten und ihre Latwija), in which both the ethnic and geopolitical history of the Baltics was presented to communicate the public opinion and strivings of that time internationally. The essay also reflected economic relations in the predominantly Latvian-inhabited territory, demonstrating the political convictions and the culture-historical background of the era. The article aims to characterise the history of writing and publishing the essay in German, and its translation into Latvian (1989/90), and the translation’s editions (1999, 2009, 2014, 2019). Part of the article is devoted to analysing the culture-historical aspects, which in the authorial narrative have been expressed in the interethnic environment of the territory and the era.


2018 ◽  
Vol 72 (3) ◽  
pp. 693-716
Author(s):  
Zeynep Direk

Abstract This essay explores the late nineteenth and early twentieth Century gender debates in the late Ottoman Empire, and the early Republic of Turkey with a focus on Fatma Aliye’s presence in the public space, as the first Ottoman woman philosopher, novelist, and public intellectual. I choose to concentrate on her because of the important stakes of the gender debates of that period, and the ways in which they are echoed in the present can be effectively discussed by reflecting on the ways in which Fatma Aliye is read, presented, and received. In the first part of this paper, I talk about Fatma Aliye’s life and experience of her gender as a woman, and point to her key interests as a writer and philosopher. In the second part, I situate her in the political history of feminism during the Rearrangement Period (Tanzimat), the Second Constitutional Era (II. Meşrutiyet), and the institution of the modern Republic of Turkey. Lastly, in the third part, I discuss the diverse ways in which she is interpreted in contemporary Turkey. I explore the political impact of the reception of Fatma Aliye as an intellectual figure on the current gender debates in Turkey.


Author(s):  
Jane Rowling

The Lincolnshire lowlands owe their existence to a long-term programme of formal and informal drainage, by which the landscape has been managed since the Roman period. The public bodies that have held responsibility for this drainage, namely the Commissions of Sewers followed by the Internal Drainage Boards (IDBs) from 1930, are often perceived as solely aiming to remove water from the land as quickly as possible. Recent water management planning in Lincolnshire has begun to explore the idea of water retention, but, as this article will show, this is not a new idea. Far from keeping water out at all costs, Lincolnshire’s drained, farmed landscape is a porous one, which has benefited from a long history of deliberate, managed flooding and small-scale sacrifice of valuable agricultural land to water. This is a lacuna which exists in both the academic literature, and in the stories people involved in the drainage boards tell about themselves.


2021 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
pp. 97-127
Author(s):  
Leah Bornstein-Makovetsky

This article discusses the biographies and economic and public activities of the Ḥatim family in Istanbul in the late 18th century and throughout the 19th century. Most of the attention is focused on R. Shlomo Ḥatim and his son Yitsḥak, who were members of the Jewish elite in Istanbul and settled in Jerusalem at the ends of their lives. R. Shlomo, who is said to have served the Ottoman authorities in Istanbul, settled in Jerusalem more than ten years before the leaders of the Jewish economic elite in Istanbul were executed in the 1820s. His son, surviving this purge, followed much later, immigrating to Israel in 1846, but died immediately thereafter. This article provides insights into the business activities of the Ḥatim family, as well as the activities of Yitsḥak Ḥatim as an Ottoman official in Istanbul. I also discuss two more generations of this family, considered an elite, privileged one, and that was highly esteemed among well-known rabbis in the Ottoman Empire. I also discuss the ties that developed between the communities of Istanbul and Jerusalem in the first half of the 19th century as a result of initiatives of officials in Istanbul and of immigration from Istanbul to Jerusalem.


2021 ◽  

The political scientist and former Bavarian Minister of Culture Hans Maier has created a historically profound, theologically educated, literarily and musically highly sensitive, politically mature body of work, with which he has inscribed himself in the (intellectual) history of the Federal Republic. This book is the first to contain contributions by renowned scholars and politicians on the rich work and impact of the Catholic scholar and politician Hans Maier. It thematises and appreciates in detail his view of German history and the traditions of political thought, his critique of political language, political theology, totalitarianism and political religions, but also his contributions on Catholicism and modernity, his writings on literature and music, and finally his influence as an academic teacher, public intellectual and politician.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Josh Shepperd

Abstract Through detailed archival analysis of personal letters, this article examines how the “public interest” mandate of the Communications Act of 1934 inspired the formation of the Princeton Radio Research Project (PRRP), and influenced Paul Lazarsfeld’s development of two-step flows and media effects research. Buried in federal records, a post-Act Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Pursuant that mandated analysis of educational broadcasting additionally turns out to be the causative reason that Theodor Adorno was brought to America by the Rockefeller Foundation. Crucial to the intellectual history of media and communication theory, Lazarsfeld invited Adorno not only to develop techniques to inform educational music study, but to strategically formulate advocacy language for the media reform movement to help noncommercial media obtain frequency licenses. The limits and pressures exerted by the FCC Pursuant influenced the trajectory of the PRRP research, and consequently, the methodological investments of Communication Studies.


2019 ◽  
pp. 67-80
Author(s):  
Rachel Hammersley

Chapter 4 focuses on the nature of Harrington’s republicanism and the key features of his ‘equal commonwealth’. It begins by examining the complex publishing history of Oceana and the political and intellectual context in which that work was written. It then traces Harrington’s commitment to key features of commonwealth government: his use of republican models ancient and modern, his adoption of the neo-Roman understanding of liberty and his conflict with Thomas Hobbes on this issue, and his commitment to government in accordance with reason and the public good. Harrington’s understanding of, and emphasis on, the concepts of empire and authority are then explored. Finally, the central features of his equal commonwealth are set out: the agrarian law to ensure equality at the foundation, and then a bicameral legislature, rotation of office, and the Venetian ballot to secure equality and prevent corruption in the superstructure.


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