A Dialectical Approach to Understanding the Critical Content of Alternative Media

2020 ◽  
pp. 57-77
Author(s):  
Defne Ozonur
Keyword(s):  
Organizational Structures ◽  
Alternative Media ◽  
Social Phenomena ◽  
Dialectical Method ◽  
Political Role ◽  
Dialectical Approach ◽  
Critical Content ◽  
The Social ◽  
Radical Approach

Various definitions of alternative media have been put forward and a number of approaches to determining “alternative” suggested. Many theorists emphasize the administrative/organizational aspects of alternative media. Critics of this approach point out that such organizational structures can also be used in media advancing repressive ideas and argue instead for a focus on content. A more radical approach argues that to be determined as alternative, the content of any media must be critical. However, little attention has been given to what constitutes “critical content.” This study stands in the tradition of Marxist criticism and applies dialectical method to analyzing and understanding the social phenomena of critical content, arguing that only such an approach can reveal the social and political role of media for it to be considered alternative. From this perspective, alternative media can be seen as a theoretical weapon in the struggle for self-emancipation, as is dialectical materialist philosophy.

«Имперский синдром»: концепция османского халифата на Ближнем Востоке и в Южной Азии (первая четверть XX в.)

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
S.A. Kirillina ◽  
A.L. Safronova ◽  
V.V. Orlov
Keyword(s):  
Middle East ◽  
South Asia ◽  
South Asian ◽  
Political Role ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Aspect Interaction ◽  
Muhammad Rashid Rida ◽  
Political Actions

Аннотация В статье изучены общие и специфические черты идейных воззрений, пропагандистской риторики и политических действий представителей халифатистского движения на Ближнем Востоке и в Южной Азии. В ретроспективном ключе прослеживается эволюция представлений о сущности и необходимости возрождения института халифата в трудах исламских идеологов, реформаторов и политиков Джамал ад-Дина ал-Афгани, Абд ар-Рахмана ал-Кавакиби, Мухаммада Рашида Риды, Абул Калама Азада. Внимание авторов сосредоточено на общественно-политических дискуссиях 2030-х годов XX столетия, а также на повестке дня халифатистских конгрессов и конференций этого периода. На них вырабатывались первые представления современников о пост-османском формате мусульманского единства и идейно-политической роли будущего халифата. Авторы демонстрируют различие между моделями реакции мусульман Ближнего Востока и Южной Азии на упразднение османского халифата республиканским руководством Турции. Установлена многоаспектная взаимосвязь между халифатистскими ценностями, проосманскими настроениями и формами самоотождествления, которые сложились в арабских и южноазиатских обществах. Отдельно намечено соотношение между подъемом халифатистских настроений и радикализацией антиколониальных действий мусульман Индостана.Abstract The article deals with analysis of common and specific features of ideas, propaganda, rhetoric and political actions taken by representatives of the movement for defense of the Caliphate in the Middle East and South Asia. The retrospection showing the transformation of conception of the Caliphate and the necessity of its revival in the works of eminent ideologists and politicians of the Muslim world Jamal al-Din al-Afghani, Abd al-Rahman al-Kawakibi, Muhammad Rashid Rida and Abul Kalam Azad, is also given in the article. The authors also focus on the social and political discussions of the 1920s 1930s, as well as on the agenda of Caliphatist congresses and conferences of this period. They helped to elaborate the early representations of post-Ottoman pattern of the Muslim unity and the ideological and political role of the future Caliphate. The authors demonstrate the difference between the forms of reaction of Muslims in the Middle East and South Asia to the repudiation of the Caliphate by the Republican leaders of Turkey. The article establishes a multi-aspect interaction between the Caliphatist values and forms of self-identification, emerged in Arab and South Asian societies. The correlation between the rise of Caliphatist attitudes and radicalization of anti-colonial actions of South Asian Muslims is also outlined.

scholarly journals Society as Cause and Cure: The Norms of Transgender Social Medicine

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ketil Slagstad
Keyword(s):  
Social Medicine ◽  
Social Aspects ◽  
Political Role ◽  
Therapeutic Regime ◽  
Trans People ◽  
The Social ◽  
In Trans ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Oral History Interviews

AbstractThis article analyzes how trans health was negotiated on the margins of psychiatry from the late 1970s and early 1980s. In this period, a new model of medical transition was established for trans people in Norway. Psychiatrists and other medical doctors as well as psychologists and social workers with a special interest and training in social medicine created a new diagnostic and therapeutic regime in which the social aspects of transitioning took center stage. The article situates this regime in a long Norwegian tradition of social medicine, including the important political role of social medicine in the creation of the postwar welfare state and its scope of addressing and changing the societal structures involved in disease. By using archival material, medical records and oral history interviews with former patients and health professionals, I demonstrate how social aspects not only underpinned diagnostic evaluations but were an integral component of the entire therapeutic regime. Sex reassignment became an integrative way of imagining and practicing psychiatry as social medicine. The article specifically unpacks the social element of these diagnostic and therapeutic approaches in trans medicine. Because the locus of intervention and treatment remained the individual, an approach with subversive potential ended up reproducing the norms that caused illness in the first place: “the social” became a conformist tool to help the patient integrate, adjust to and transform the pathology-producing forces of society.

scholarly journals Appearance and Development of Short-Term Higher Education Vocational Training in Hungary

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 63-76
Author(s):  
Barbara Máté-Szabó ◽  
Dorina Anna Tóth
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Political Orientation ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Short Cycle ◽  
Higher Education System ◽  
Political Role ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Government ◽  
International Comparative

Abstract Introduction: This article examines the first level of the European higher education system, namely the short-cycle higher education trainings related to the ISCED 5 whose Hungarian characteristics, and its historical changes were described. Methods: We examined participation rates among OECD countries. As there are large differences in the short-cycle higher education trainings in Europe, we have relied on data that makes the different systems comparable. Results and discussion: The interpretation, definition and practical orientation of the trainings varies from country to country, we presented the Hungarian form in connection with the results of international comparative studies and data. To understand the role of trainings, it is essential to get to know their history, especially because short-term higher educational trainings were transformed in several European countries. Conclusions: Prioritising or effacing the social-political role of short-cycle higher education trainings depending on the political orientation of the government and as a part of this, prioritising the disadvantaged regions instead of the disadvantaged students.

Reading inquiry through the prism of unemployement

2020 ◽  
pp. 201-216
Author(s):  
Guillaume Heuguet
Keyword(s):  
Public Space ◽  
Doctoral Students ◽  
Science Inquiry ◽  
The Political ◽  
Social Rights ◽  
The Public ◽  
Political Role ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Relationship

This exploratory text starts from a doctoral-unemployed experience and was triggered by the discussions within a collective of doctoral students on this particularly ambiguous status since it is situated between student, unemployed, worker, self-entrepreneur, citizen-subject of social rights or user-commuter in offices and forms. These discussions motivated the reading and commentary of a heterogeneous set of texts on unemployment, precariousness and the functioning of the institutions of the social state. This article thus focuses on the relationship between knowledge and unemployment, as embodied in the public space, in the relationship with Pôle Emploi, and in the academic literature. It articulates a threefold problematic : what is known and said publicly about unemployment? What can we learn from the very experience of the relationship with an institution like Pôle Emploi? How can these observations contribute to an understanding of social science inquiry and the political role of knowledge fromm precariousness?

Verfassung und Verwaltung. Landesfürst und Stände, Politiker und Beamte

2021 ◽  
pp. 139-174
Author(s):  
Peter Urbanitsch
Keyword(s):  
Public Administration ◽  
State Government ◽  
Organizational Structures ◽  
Political Life ◽  
Substantial Part ◽  
Central State ◽  
The Public ◽  
Political Role ◽  
Revolution Of 1848

Constitution and Administration. The Territorial Prince and Estates, Politicians and Officials. This chapter focuses on the bipolar political life in Lower Austria in the course of the long 19th century. Beginning with the constitutional realities before the revolution of 1848, it examines the constitutional developments after 1848 and 1861, and also offers a brief description of the various administrative organizational structures and their efforts and achievements. Prior to 1848, the aulic offices sought to minimize the political role of the estates and thus the participation of sections of the populace. Yet according to the constitutional settlement of 1861, some elements of the population hitherto not involved in politics were given the opportunity for self-determined activities. The “autonomous” administration of the land became a substantial part of public administration, being quite successful in supplying all kinds of services. Owing to a blurred assignment of remits between the “autonomous” administration of the land and that run by the central state government, this “dual-track” public administration diminished the effectiveness of its activities and became a nuisance for the public at large

The Social and Political Role of the Orthodox Church in Post-Communist Russia

1992 ◽  
Vol 20 (01) ◽  
pp. 1-16
Author(s):  
Paul Valliere
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Orthodox Church ◽  
Internal Security ◽  
Political Role ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
The Social ◽  
Security Network ◽  
Cultural Roles ◽  
The Church

The political role of the Orthodox Church in post-communist Russia is more difficult to assess than its social and cultural roles for several reasons. First, to offer any systematic observations on the matter one must attempt to construe the nature of the church-state relationship in Russia, a notoriously controversial subject. Second, one must make an educated guess concerning the part played by the huge internal security apparatus which only yesterday dominated the internal affairs of the Soviet Union, including religious affairs. The security establishment has been dislodged from its hegemonic role in the Soviet state as a result of the Gorbachev reforms, but there is little question that it continues to exist as a political force in the country. Reading the aims of this network is no easy matter, however, because by definition it operates in relative secrecy and by means of diversionary tactics. One also has to reckon with the possibility that the security network has been disrupted by the changes of recent years, and operates with less coordination than in the past.

The Social and Political Dimensions of Co-operative Enterprises

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Victor A. Pestoff
Keyword(s):  
Social Services ◽  
Social Dimensions ◽  
For Profit ◽  
Political Role ◽  
Goods And Services ◽  
Industrial Age ◽  
The Social ◽  
Political Dimensions ◽  
Post Industrial

The role of co-operatives as providers of goods and services, as in the industrial age, more recently became overshadowed by their potential as providers of social services. In the post-industrial or service society, co-operatives are found in a growing number of countries. Co-operative enterprises have a unique capacity to mobilize social capital and provide relational goods that neither public nor private for-profit providers demonstrate. This brings co-operative enterprises full-circle in terms of their historical political role as democratic pioneers, since they can now also contribute to reducing the growing democratic deficit. This chapter explores the political and social dimensions of co-operative enterprises that pursue multiple goals. It also introduces a dynamic model of co-operative development that can be fruitfully employed for analysing the social and political dilemmas faced by co-operative enterprises.

scholarly journals The Socio-Political Role of Zombie Categories. A Case Study of the Referendum Amending Article 48 of The Romanian Constitution (6-7 October 2018)

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-7
Author(s):  
Georgeta Ghebrea
Keyword(s):  
Risk Society ◽  
Political Actors ◽  
The Public ◽  
Traditional Family ◽  
Political Role ◽  
Public Agenda ◽  
The Social ◽  
Definition Of

Our scope was to explain the failure of the Referendum on the revision of Article 48 of the Romanian Constitution, regarding the definition of family (held in 2018 and known as the "traditional family referendum"). We hypothesized that in Romania the traditional family has become a "zombie" category, unable to produce an authentic mobilization of the social-political actors. Still, the traditional family represents an anchor that counteracts insecurity and anxiety caused by the "risk society" in which we live. This function is capitalized by social-political actors as a source of their legitimation. Our understanding was based on the processual analysis of this issue on the public agenda, from inflammation to extinction. This analysis clearly showed the process of gradual demobilization of the actors involved.

scholarly journals The Humble Reason. On Education in Kant and Fichte

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 26-45
Author(s):  
Lara Scaglia
Keyword(s):  
Human History ◽  
Human Reason ◽  
Political Role ◽  
The Core ◽  
Ethical Education ◽  
Core Function ◽  
The Social ◽  
Historical Phenomenon ◽  
Critical Writings

In this paper I will focus on education as the core function of reason in Kant and Fichte. The notion of reason carries an intrinsic tendency to universality, which is difficult to be reconciled with its local (cultural, historical, anthropological) background and actualisation. I believe that the stress on the importance of learning, which can be seen in the works of both Kant and Fichte, might provide useful clues to approaching the relation between universality and particularity. I will start by focusing on Kant’s narration on the genealogy of human reason in the Conjectural Beginning of Human History, and then move on to the critical writings and selected lectures in order to focus on the role of human dignity and ethical education for the moral appraisal and the practice of virtue. Later, I will consider Fichte’s lectures on the Vocation of the Scholar, the Vocation of Man and The Characteristics of the Present Age, which are crucial to understanding the social, ethical and political role of the scholar. For Fichte, education is the best instrument to eradicate selfishness, regarded as a historical phenomenon which can lead a nation to ruin. I will then provide some conclusions concerning the two accounts and their implications.

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