scholarly journals First Footprints

2020 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Erin Buechele
Keyword(s):  
Political Leaders ◽  
White People ◽  
White Administrators ◽  
The Past ◽  
Australian History

History should be written to inform the present and honour the past. In order to successfully meet this criteria history needs to be retold, above all else, truthfully. This truthfulness requires a brazen acknowledgement of past actions and events no matter how they reflect on the nation. In the case of Australian history, and any other colonizing nation, that truth contains harmful realities of oppression. Because of this, history is often reconstructed in a form that is easier to swallow or in a way that benefits those leading the nation. Because records are largely made by white people, they have far too often become subjective retellings of history used to justify actions made by white administrators and political leaders of the past and present.

Democratic Legitimacy

2011 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pierre Rosanvallon
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
The United States ◽  
Democratic Legitimacy ◽  
Political Leaders ◽  
Constitutional Courts ◽  
International Debate ◽  
The Past ◽  
Democratic Authority ◽  
Original Contribution ◽  
Western Democracies

It's a commonplace occurrence that citizens in Western democracies are disaffected with their political leaders and traditional democratic institutions. But this book argues that this crisis of confidence is partly a crisis of understanding. The book makes the case that the sources of democratic legitimacy have shifted and multiplied over the past thirty years and that we need to comprehend and make better use of these new sources of legitimacy in order to strengthen our political self-belief and commitment to democracy. Drawing on examples from France and the United States, the book notes that there has been a major expansion of independent commissions, NGOs, regulatory authorities, and watchdogs in recent decades. At the same time, constitutional courts have become more willing and able to challenge legislatures. These institutional developments, which serve the democratic values of impartiality and reflexivity, have been accompanied by a new attentiveness to what the book calls the value of proximity, as governing structures have sought to find new spaces for minorities, the particular, and the local. To improve our democracies, we need to use these new sources of legitimacy more effectively and we need to incorporate them into our accounts of democratic government. This book is an original contribution to the vigorous international debate about democratic authority and legitimacy.

Free but fragile: Human relations amidst poverty and HIV in democratic South Africa

2015 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 85-94
Author(s):  
Christina Landman
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Predominantly White ◽  
Black People ◽  
Hiv Treatment ◽  
Human Relations ◽  
White People ◽  
Black And White ◽  
The Past ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Black Township

Dullstroom-Emnotweni is the highest town in South Africa. Cold and misty, it is situated in the eastern Highveld, halfway between the capital Pretoria/Tswane and the Mozambique border. Alongside the main road of the white town, 27 restaurants provide entertainment to tourists on their way to Mozambique or the Kruger National Park. The inhabitants of the black township, Sakhelwe, are remnants of the Southern Ndebele who have lost their land a century ago in wars against the whites. They are mainly dependent on employment as cleaners and waitresses in the still predominantly white town. Three white people from the white town and three black people from the township have been interviewed on their views whether democracy has brought changes to this society during the past 20 years. Answers cover a wide range of views. Gratitude is expressed that women are now safer and HIV treatment available. However, unemployment and poverty persist in a community that nevertheless shows resilience and feeds on hope. While the first part of this article relates the interviews, the final part identifies from them the discourses that keep the black and white communities from forming a group identity that is based on equality and human dignity as the values of democracy.

Diplomatic Affairs and International Law, 1913

1914 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 25-49
Author(s):  
Alfred L. P. Dennis
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
International Law ◽  
International Cooperation ◽  
Economic Loss ◽  
Panama Canal ◽  
Military Operations ◽  
Political Leaders ◽  
The Past ◽  
True Value

War has marked the year 1913; and charges and countercharges as to alleged atrocities by belligerents have been rife. Treaties were drawn to be promptly torn up; and solemn declarations of intention and policy often proved futile. The existence of internal disorder and the outbreak of domestic revolutions in several countries have also exerted disturbing influences on international relations. The result was economic loss and diplomatic tension even well beyond the field of military operations. And these conditions have led to renewed activity in the struggle for concessions and investment in renascent communities. Racial and religious sentiments have also aroused bitter feeling; while political leaders in several countries compel renewed consideration of the weight of individuals in the determination of the world's affairs.In large part the problems of 1913 were historic; but in part they were affected by apparently impending changes which we cannot as yet define. Thus the influence of socialism and of various forms of radical thought on international relations is a factor. The adoption of oil as a naval fuel, the opening of the Panama Canal, the plans for administrative reorganization of Turkey, and its capitalistic development, the renewed debate as to the Monroe doctrine, and the problem of China are all matters whose future significance scarcely concern us here; but their influence in the past year has been unquestionably great. We cannot estimate as yet the true value of many recommendations touching various fields of international coöperation; and the value of delay in international action still remains in dispute. So on the whole the year 1913 has apparently been the year of the cynic.

Bangladesh in 2002: Imperiled Democracy

Asian Survey ◽  
2003 ◽  
Vol 43 (1) ◽  
pp. 222-229 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rounaq Jahan
Keyword(s):  
Law And Order ◽  
Political Leaders ◽  
Nationalist Party ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Government ◽  
Dynastic Succession ◽  
The Way

The year did not bring any improvement in the way government and politics function in Bangladesh. Murder, intimidation, suppression, and harassment of political opponents worsened the atmosphere of vendetta and violence that has marked the country's politics in the past few decades. To tackle the deteriorating law and order situation, the government called in the army in October. The administration appeared to be adrift, caught in factional feuds within the ruling coalition. There were also signs of dynastic succession within the ruling Bangladesh Nationalist Party. The economy did not register any significant improvements. Relations with Pakistan improved but Indo-Bangladesh relations hit their lowest point in decades. Citizen disenchantment with political leaders continued to grow.

FOREWORD

Geophysics ◽  
1964 ◽  
Vol 29 (2) ◽  
pp. 151-153 ◽  
Author(s):  
Charles C. Bates
Keyword(s):  
Prime Minister ◽  
State Of The Art ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Political ◽  
Bad Faith ◽  
Political Leaders ◽  
The Past ◽  
Current State ◽  
Nuclear Tests ◽  
Test Ban

A decade ago, it would have been the rare geophysicist indeed who would have predicted that his specialty was destined to become a major topic of discussion between such world political leaders as Presidents Eisenhower and Kennedy, Prime Minister Macmillan of Great Britain, and Chairman Khrushchev of the USSR. Yet this has come to pass during the past six years, for in 1958 there started the continuing round of international negotiations directed towards the creation of an effective underground test-ban treaty. During the conduct of these negotiations, it has been repeatedly necessary to assess the current state-of-the-art in seismology and its sister geophysical sciences, for the only detectable signals known to propagate for several hundreds to thousands of miles from underground nuclear tests are seismic in nature. With the United States policy being only to seek an underground-test-ban agreement incorporating strong safeguards against acts of bad faith, it is important that the political safe-guards be backed up by those of a geophysical nature.

Introduction: state structures, political processes, and collective choice in CMEA states

1986 ◽  
Vol 40 (2) ◽  
pp. 195-238 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ellen Comisso
Keyword(s):  
International Economic ◽  
Economic Assistance ◽  
Political Leaders ◽  
East European ◽  
Political Processes ◽  
The Past ◽  
Political Resources ◽  
Mutual Economic Assistance ◽  
Economic Strategies

The similarity of state structures throughout Eastern Europe helps to explain why the reactions of states in that area to the international economic disturbances of the past decade resemble each other and why they differ from those of states outside the socialist bloc. Similar state structures, however, do not explain why the economic strategies of the East European states themselves in response to international economic shocks in the 1970s and 1980s diverged so noticeably. The role of state structure is to define “kto/kovo” (who can do what to whom) relationships in the state and economy. In this way state structures define problems that political leaders must solve, possibilities among which they may choose, and political resources and allies upon which they may draw in the course of their decision making. In contrast, strategy choices–“what is to be done”–are the outcomes of political processes in which leaders mobilize resources and allies to capture positions of power from which they can pursue the purposes they advocate. Thus differences in foreign economic strategies among member states in the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance reflected differences in the dynamic interaction of the form and content of political processes that occurred within common state structures.

Sense and Nonsense in Politics

1969 ◽  
Vol 2 (04) ◽  
pp. 573-581 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marvin Surkin
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Political Action ◽  
Political Leaders ◽  
The Past ◽  
Political Experience ◽  
The Social ◽  
Historical Relationship ◽  
The Third World ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
New Generation

I take my cue for the title of this paper from Merleau-Ponty, the French phenomenologist, who wrote in 1948 that “the political experience of the past thirty years oblige us to evoke the background of non-sense against which every universal undertaking is silhouetted and by which it is threatened with failure.” Merleau-Ponty refers to the experience of that generation of intellectuals for whom Marxism was a “mistaken hope” because it lost “confidence in its own daring when it was successful in only one country.” But this criticism is equally relevant for a new generation of intellectuals in America for whom the ideals of liberalism have been emptied of reality and have become little more than a super-rational mystique for the Cold War, a counter-revolutionary reflex in the third world, and a narrow perspective of social welfare at home. Merleau-Ponty argues that Marxism “abandoned its own proletarian methods and resumed the classical ones of history: hierarchy, obedience, myth, inequality, diplomacy, and police. Today intellectuals in America are making the same critique with equal fervor about their own lost illusions.As we search for new ways to comprehend the social realities of American life and new modes of social thought and political action to reconstruct “the American dream,” Merleau-Ponty's notion of sense and nonsense guides us to see the historical relationship between ideologies and practice, between thought and action, between man and the world he creates. It symbolizes that recurrent fact in history whereby reason parades as unreason, where even “the highest form of reason borders on unreason.” We must learn from recent history that “the experience of unreason cannot simply be forgotten;” that the most noble claims to universal truth, the most rational modes of philosophical or social inquiry, the most convincing declarations of political leaders are all contingent, and should be subject to revision and open to criticism and change.

scholarly journals A comparative analysis between liberal democracy and the China and Vietnam model’s voting system

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tung Manh Ho
Keyword(s):  
Economic Growth ◽  
Comparative Analysis ◽  
Liberal Democracy ◽  
Political Leaders ◽  
Viable Option ◽  
The Past ◽  
System P ◽  
The World ◽  
Voting System ◽  
The One

The current rise of populism in many democracies all over the world has raised questions about the ability of the “one person, one vote” system to produce the most competent leaders. Though the rise of populism is a recent phenomenon, many philosophers and political scientists in the past have questioned the wisdom of “one person, one vote” and proposed the alternative. In this paper, some of the arguments against liberal democracy’s voting system will be explored, followed by the model of China and Vietnam for choosing political leaders. These two countries, known for the ability to maintain an impressive level of economic growth consistently, can be argued to present an alternative to the liberal democracy's way. Whether the China (Vietnam) model is a viable option is an issue worthwhile of ethical consideration.

Schooling and Literacy

2010 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul Grendler
Keyword(s):  
Northern Europe ◽  
Institutional Research ◽  
Religious Orders ◽  
Political Leaders ◽  
Late 19Th Century ◽  
Educational Levels ◽  
The Past ◽  
Moral Wisdom ◽  
Questions And Answers ◽  
Select Bibliography

The study of schooling, defined as preuniversity education, in the Renaissance and Reformation era is old and new. Historians have long been aware of the high value that Renaissance pedagogical theorists, political leaders, and clergymen placed on educating the young properly. From the late 19th century onward, local historians have produced valuable monographs on the schools in their own cities, towns, and villages, often without connecting their research to a larger context. Historians also analyzed humanistic pedagogical treatises and assumed that students acquired rhetorical skills and moral wisdom by reading the classics. Protestant theologians and Catholic religious orders believed that students learned Christian truth in the schools that they organized, and historians generally took them at their word. Only in the past few decades have historians made a determined effort to find out what really happened. They have asked practical questions as, what kinds of schools existed? How many boys and girls attended them? What did they learn? Such questions and answers have animated, broadened, and renewed the study of schooling. At present most historiography focuses on two areas. The first is institutional research: that is, studying the organization of schooling. What kinds of schools did state, town, religious order, family, or private teacher establish, and who attended them? When enrollment figures and census information is available, scholars can make estimates about the literacy of the population and formulate hypotheses about the educational levels of society. The other focus of research is the content of schooling: What did teachers teach and students learn? This involves analysis of the textbooks and much else. Of course, institutional and intellectual investigations are two halves of a whole and should not be separated. What follows is a select bibliography, most of it recent, on schooling and literacy in the Renaissance and Reformation era, defined as beginning in Italy about 1350, and in northern Europe about 1450, and lasting to about 1648.

What Adaptations and Adaptation Studies Tell Us (and Sometimes Don't Tell Us) about Politics, Culture, and Social Change

Adaptation ◽  
2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Julie Grossman
Keyword(s):  
Social Change ◽  
Supreme Court ◽  
Real World ◽  
Social Roles ◽  
Film Noir ◽  
Contemporary Society ◽  
Political Leaders ◽  
Adaptation Studies ◽  
The Past ◽  
Public Figures

Abstract This essay explores the implications of a Supreme Court dissent written by US Chief Justice John Roberts in the style of film noir. The article analyses Roberts’s adaptation, discussing more broadly the use of classic literary types such as the hardboiled detective and the western cowboy in social and political discourse. The article argues for the significance of adaptation studies in our polarized contemporary society because its valuing of change counters formulaic appropriations of the past and fixed ideas and models of experience. The essay suggests not only that political leaders mired in the past cannot adapt to changing society and social roles, but also that adaptation studies hones readers’ discernment, especially called for when public figures use fictional patterns to address real-world circumstances.

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