scholarly journals Silhouettes of the Revolution: Ideas of V. I. Lenin, L. D. Trotsky and A. V. Lunacharsky in Zenith (1921-1926)

2021 ◽  
pp. 68-78
Author(s):  
Jelena Lalatović
Keyword(s):  
Editorial Policy ◽  
October Revolution ◽  
The Political ◽  
Avant Garde ◽  
Historical Role ◽  
Intertextual Connections ◽  
The One ◽  
Level Of Analysis ◽  
The Revolution

The matters of the October Revolution are present on several levels in Zenit from the first issue until the closing of the magazine. The October Revolution appears as a topic in Zenit in discussions about Soviet Avant-garde art, as well as the sociopolitical consequences of the Revolution, but also as a symbol of the destruction of old civilisation, one of the fundamental programme principles of Zenitism. This paper analyses the strategies for shaping the concept and discourse on the October Revolution in Zenit. First, the intertextual connections between the texts that speak about the Soviet artistic Avant-garde and the texts about the political Avant-garde of the October Revolution are reconstructed, i.e. their ideological and aesthetic unity as a product of Ljubomir Micić's editorial policy. Then, the second level of analysis occurs through a comparative reading of the programmatic principles of Zenithism and the ideas of the representatives of the Soviet political Avant-garde - Vladimir Ilyich Lenin, Leon Davidovich Trotsky and Anatoly Vasilyevich Lunacharsky. The aim of this paper is to examine how the figures of revolutionary leaders and artists, and the reception of their works and texts in the Zenit magazine, shaped the Zenitist understanding of the historical role of Avant-garde art as new art. Furthermore, special attention is paid to the interpretation of Zenit's artistic ideology in the context of revolutionary Marxism, i.e. to the analysis of implicit ambivalences between artistic individuality, on the one hand, and the Avant-garde and Revolution, as collective events, on the other.

scholarly journals The Сelebration of the First Anniversary of the October Revolution and the Red Terror: Legitimizing of Revolutionary Violence

2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (4) ◽  
pp. 976-988
Author(s):  
K. V. Godunov ◽  
Keyword(s):  
October Revolution ◽  
The Political ◽  
Soviet History ◽  
Political Situation ◽  
Revolutionary Violence ◽  
Ruling Party ◽  
The Revolution

The author explores how attitudes toward the Red Terror and activities of the Cheka were manifested during celebrations of the first anniversary of the October Revolution. Based on a study of speeches by Bolshevik leaders, propaganda materials related to the festival, discussions at various levels, and characteristics about the holiday provided by opponents and enemies of the ruling party, the author demonstrates what arguments were used for legitimation and delegitimation of the Red Terror. The author analyzes the discussion by D. B. Ryazanov and G. E. Zinovev on the correlation of terror and the holiday; characterizes the position of V. I. Lenin and other prominent Bolsheviks who used the holiday as a resource to discuss the powers of the Cheka; and describes positions of opponents to the Bolsheviks. The significance of one of the first political amnesties in Soviet history, dedicated to the celebration of the October Revolution, is described. Prominent Bolsheviks perceived the role of terror in the revolution in different ways: if V. I. Lenin and G. E. Zinovev, in the struggle to strengthen their influence, were insistent on the need to deepen terror, D. B. Ryazanov insisted that the scope of repressive politics should be limited, and L. B. Kamenev lobbied for amnesties. All of them used the celebration of the first anniversary of October to implement their projects. Research on the linkage between the Red Terror and the holiday provide insights into the specifics of the political situation in the autumn of 1918.

Some Kantian Reflections on a World Republic

1998 ◽  
Vol 2 ◽  
pp. 51-71 ◽  
Author(s):  
Otfried Höffe
Keyword(s):  
Political Philosophy ◽  
Liberal Democracy ◽  
International Order ◽  
The Political ◽  
Avant Garde ◽  
Modern Times ◽  
Political Project ◽  
The One

Liberal democracy has long been recognized ‘in principle’ as the political project of modern times. This is not a political philosophy of which we can say that it has followed the words of Hegel and taken flight only with the falling of the dusk. Rather it is a philosophy which observes the Aristotelian maxim that ‘the end aimed at is not knowledge but action’, and therefore concerns itself with a perspective from which the thought of its own recognition is still in question. This thought is the one of international order. Here the figure of Kant steps forth in the role of philosophical and political avant-garde.

Whose knowledge for what politics?

2003 ◽  
Vol 29 (S1) ◽  
pp. 199-221 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karena Shaw
Keyword(s):  
Political Institutions ◽  
The Other ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Practice ◽  
Research Strategies ◽  
Progressive Politics ◽  
Primary Object ◽  
Contemporary Study ◽  
The One

We find ourselves amidst an explosion of literature about how our worlds are being fundamentally changed (or not) through processes that have come to be clumped under the vague title of ‘globalisation’. As we wander our way through this literature, we might find ourselves – with others – feeling perplexed and anxious about the loss of a clear sense of what politics is, where it happens, what it is about, and what we need to know to understand and engage in it. This in turn leads many of us to contribute to a slightly smaller literature, such as this Special Issue, seeking to theorise how the space and character of politics might be changing, and how we might adapt our research strategies to accommodate these changes and maintain the confidence that we, and the disciplines we contribute to, still have relevant things to say about international politics. While this is not a difficult thing to claim, and it is not difficult to find others to reassure us that it is true, I want to suggest here that it is worth lingering a little longer in our anxiety than might be comfortable. I suggest this because it seems to me that there is, or at least should be, more on the table than we're yet grappling with. In particular, I argue here that any attempt to theorise the political today needs to take into account not only that the character and space of politics are changing, but that the way we study or theorise it – not only the subjects of our study but the very kind of knowledge we produce, and for whom – may need to change as well. As many others have argued, the project of progressive politics these days is not especially clear. It no longer seems safe to assume, for example, that the capture of the state or the establishment of benign forms of global governance should be our primary object. However, just as the project of progressive politics is in question, so is the role of knowledge, and knowledge production, under contemporary circumstances. I think there are possibilities embedded in explicitly engaging these questions together that are far from realisation. There are also serious dangers in trying to separate them, or assume the one while engaging the other, however ‘obvious’ the answers to one or the other may appear to be. Simultaneous with theorising the political ‘out there’ in the international must be an engagement with the politics of theorising ‘in here,’ in academic contexts. My project here is to explore how this challenge might be taken up in the contemporary study of politics, particularly in relation to emerging forms of political practice, such as those developed by activists in a variety of contexts. My argument is for an approach to theorising the political that shifts the disciplinary assumptions about for what purpose and for whom we should we produce knowledge in contemporary times, through an emphasis on the strategic knowledges produced through political practice. Such an approach would potentially provide us with understandings of contemporary political institutions and practices that are both more incisive and more enabling than can be produced through more familiarly disciplined approaches.

scholarly journals Conflicts in the environment of Russian political emigration in Switzerland in 1870

10.33287/1195 ◽  
2019 ◽  
pp. 49-57
Author(s):  
Ю. І. Коломоєць
Keyword(s):  
The Political ◽  
Russian Government ◽  
Revolutionary Movement ◽  
Royal Power ◽  
Positive Side ◽  
The World ◽  
State Of Affairs ◽  
The One ◽  
Russian Section

Russian political emigration from the beginning of its birth in the first half of the nineteenth century was constantly in search of forms and methods of struggle with royal power in the homeland. Detachment from Russia, the feeling of isolation that was inherent in emigration to the early twentieth century, were an important factor in the ongoing conflicts that took place in its environment. We note the conflicts between the «old» and the «young» emigration in the late 1860’s, between the Marxists and the populists of the 1880’s, between the revolutionary Marxists and the «economists» at the end of the 1890’s. All of these, as a rule, were due to excessive the ambitions of some leaders, the attempt to become the «rulers of ideas» for revolutionary youth, due to significant financial problems. In the list of these and similar conflicts there are events of 1870, when in the environment of political emigration there are two serious confrontations between the leader of anarchists M. Bakunin on the one hand and S. Nechaev or «Russian section of the First International» - on the other. These conflicts significantly influenced the situation in emigration, disorganized it, weakened the ability to fight the tsarist regime. They were accompanied by sharp accusations, searches for compromising materials, attempts to get support from leaders of the world revolutionary movement. The ambitions of young revolutionaries such as S. Nechaev or M. Utin were also connected with the attempt to take the main place among the emigrants, moving to the background of former leaders M. Bakunin, M. Ogarev, P. Lavrov. All this led to split in emigrant colonies, which consisted mainly of student youth. Violent discussions, accusations, boycotts became a hallmark of emigrant life. Basically, all these events took place in Switzerland, which at that time already became the center of not only Russian, but also international political emigration. Conflicts were directed at the political annihilation of the opponents, which subsequently resulted in the arrest and extradition to the Russian government of S. Nechaev in 1872, the cessation of the activities of the Russian Section of the First International and the return of M. Utin to Russia and the cessation of revolutionary activity in general. The positive side of these conflicts was the rallying of emigrants around their leaders, better information on the state of affairs in their environment, the development of new forms and methods of interaction and the strengthening of the role of revolutionaries from Russia itself.

scholarly journals “A Boot Stamping on a Human Face – For Ever”: George Orwell, Language, Literature, and Politics

2020 ◽  
Vol 39 ◽  
pp. 172-188
Author(s):  
Roberta Ferrari
Keyword(s):  
Spanish Civil War ◽  
George Orwell ◽  
The Political ◽  
Human Face ◽  
Literature And Politics ◽  
Language And Literature ◽  
The One ◽  
Historical Moment ◽  
The Relationship

"Britain experienced the harshness of 20th-century dictatorship and censorship only obliquely, as a reflection of what was happening in several “elsewheres”. Yet, events such as the Spanish Civil War deeply affected a whole generation of young British writers who, after the period of elitist Modernism, were trying to reassert the political import of literature through a redefinition of the role of the artist as politically and socially engagé. George Orwell figures as one of the most disenchanted and lucid witnesses of this particular historical moment. In both his essays and journalistic articles, as well as in his narrative work, he continuously ponders over the relationship between political power and society on the one hand, and language and literature on the other, providing a most interesting analysis of the mechanisms that preside over this interaction."

The Origins and Dynamics of Inequality

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jon D. Wisman
Keyword(s):  
Sexual Selection ◽  
Evolutionary Psychology ◽  
The Political ◽  
Human History ◽  
Central Importance ◽  
Social Scientists ◽  
Political Dynamics ◽  
The Past ◽  
Historical Role

Whereas President Barack Obama identified inequality as “the defining challenge of our time,” this book claims more: it is the defining issue of all human history. The struggle over inequality has been the underlying force driving human history’s unfolding. Drawing on the dynamics of inequality, this book reinterprets history and society. Beyond according inequality the central role in human history, this book is novel in two other respects. First, transcending the general failure of social scientists and historians to anchor their work in explicit theories of human behavior, this book grounds the origins and dynamics of inequality in evolutionary psychology, or, more specifically, Darwin’s theory of sexual selection. Second, this book is novel in according central importance to the critical historical role of ideology in legitimating inequality, a role typically ignored or given little attention by social scientists and historians. Because of the central role of inequality in history, inequality’s explosion over the past 45 years has not been an anomaly. It is a return to the political dynamics by which elites have, since the rise of the state, taken practically everything for themselves, leaving all others with little more than the means with which to survive. Due to elites’ persuasive ideology, even after workers in advanced capitalist countries gained the franchise to become the overwhelming majority of voters, inequality continued to increase. The anomaly is that the only intentional politically driven decline in inequality occurred between the 1930s and 1970s following the Great Depression’s partial delegitimation (this should remain delegitimation globally) of elites’ ideology.

The (Mixed) Times of Revolution

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jaime Rodríguez Matos
Keyword(s):  
Political Change ◽  
The State ◽  
The Political ◽  
Jose Lezama Lima ◽  
Difficult Question ◽  
Revolutionary Politics ◽  
Political Foundations ◽  
The One ◽  
The Way

This chapter examines the role of Christianity in the work of José Lezama Lima as it relates to his engagement with Revolutionary politics. The chapter shows the multiple temporalities that the State wields, and contrasts this thinking on temporality with the Christian apocalyptic vision held by Lezama. The chapter is concerned with highlighting the manner in which Lezama unworks Christianity from within. Yet its aim is not to prove yet again that there is a Christian matrix at the heart of modern revolutionary politics. Rather, it shows the way in which the mixed temporalities of the Revolution, already a deconstruction of the idea of the One, still poses a challenge for contemporary radical thought: how to think through the idea that political change is possible precisely because no politics is absolutely grounded. That Lezama illuminates the difficult question of the lack of political foundations from within the Christian matrix indicates that the problem at hand cannot be reduced to an ever more elusive and radical purge of the theological from the political.

“The Factory Of The Revolution”

Women Rising ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 354-362
Author(s):  
Layla Saleh
Keyword(s):  
Women's Rights ◽  
Well Being ◽  
The Political ◽  
Women’S Rights ◽  
Women's Participation ◽  
Second Year ◽  
Role Of Women ◽  
Syrian Revolution ◽  
The Revolution

Giving a personal voice to the role of women in the Syrian revolution, Layla Saleh places the account of one Syrian woman, Um Ibrahim, exiled in the second year of the uprising, in the larger context of women’s participation in the revolutionary popular mobilization, after the Assad regime’s “women’s rights” proved unsatisfactory and insufficient. The narrative culminates in Um Ibrahim’s own participation in the protests in Damascus before the full-fledged war took hold. Um Ibrahim recounts how women took on a central role in the Syrian revolution, hiding protesters, cooking, delivering food and weapons, and serving in the political and armed opposition. However, they have been victimized by the war, their activist role has been diminished, and their security and physical well-being have become precarious as the country is bloodily entrenched in civil and proxy warfare.

scholarly journals Losing the One, Caring for the All: The Activism of the Peace Mothers in Turkey

2018 ◽  
Vol 7 (10) ◽  
pp. 174 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nisa Göksel
Keyword(s):  
The Political ◽  
Feminist Literature ◽  
Gendered Politics ◽  
Peace Activism ◽  
Peace Settlement ◽  
Turkish State ◽  
The One ◽  
Maternal Activism ◽  
Local Family

This article focuses on the political activism of the Peace Mothers in Turkey, a group of Kurdish mothers whose children were either Partiya Karkerên Kurdistan (PKK) guerrillas or political dissidents during the conflict between the Turkish state and the PKK. The peace activism of the Mothers is a distinctive case that speaks to the tension between the domains of the familial and the political—a tension that appears in everyday discussions as well as in feminist literature. In this article, I suggest that the Peace Mothers’ struggle to bridge national and local peace-making ideals is a subtle effort to resolve that tension and to transform the realms of family and politics. The mobilization around “motherhood” aims at peace on the national scale, but has led to an unexpected form of activism in the Kurdish community, where the Mothers now mediate local family conflicts in the wake of war. While the Mothers’ activism has not been successful in achieving its main goal of securing a national peace settlement, I argue that it transforms both the political and the familial spheres to a significant extent. The Mothers conceive of motherhood broadly: as the state of being an agent with the capacity to connect to the All via a sense of loss and care. In engaging with feminist debates on motherhood, activism, and care, this article presents a novel framework for understanding the persistent boundary between the political and the familial and calls attention to the role of gendered politics and maternal activism in understudied local settings.

The Icon and Visual Arts During the Russian Religious Renaissance

2020 ◽  
pp. 411-431
Author(s):  
Clemena Antonova
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Visual Arts ◽  
Russian Culture ◽  
Avant Garde ◽  
Simple Observation ◽  
Cultural Life ◽  
The One ◽  
Role Of Religion ◽  
Artistic Tradition

This chapter begins from a simple observation, namely, that what has been called ‘the Russian religious renaissance of the twentieth century’ coincided in time with two important movements in the sphere of the visual arts. On the one hand, there was a sweeping revival of interest in the medieval icon at the beginning of the twentieth century, which left almost no sphere of cultural life untouched. On the other, in artistic terms, the whole period was largely defined by the advent of the Russian avant-garde. I would like to consider the junction at which these three developments overlapped, informed, influenced, even opposed and clashed with one another. According to the interpretation proposed here, it is the mixture and the coexistence of a revived Orthodoxy, a reawakened focus on the medieval artistic tradition, and the rise of avant-garde modernism that gave a unique flavour to early twentieth-century Russian culture. The debates on the function and the meaning of the icon in the period between the 1910s and the early 1920s ultimately suggested different answers to the problem of the role of religion in modernity.

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