Elite–mass agreement in British foreign policy

Thirty years ago, William Wallace likened British foreign policy to a musical tug-of-war between the ‘Anglo-Saxons’ and ‘Europeans’, attributing ‘all the best tunes’ to the former. This article revisits Wallace's thesis and its main concept: national identity. It finds that Wallace was right to draw attention to the power of the ruling elite to shape Englishness and Britishness. However, the article also finds that ‘global’ foreign policy ideas were never the exclusive province of a segment of the British elite. Rather, they circulated in English and more broadly British society writ large, reflecting and reinforcing deep-seated, even unselfconscious, agreements between both ‘Anglo-Saxon’ and ‘European’ elites on the one hand, and much of the mass consumer public on the other. It follows that the constraints posed on possibilities of foreign policy change were always greater than Wallace had suggested; that a ‘lesser’ British foreign policy that was, and still is, so hard to imagine for the British is significant for analysis of dynamics of ‘western’ knowledge production that come under critique in this special issue. But rather than focusing exclusively on elites, critical analyses of knowledge exchange should be attuned to popular common sense, too.

LAND DISPUTE SETTLEMENT POST LAW NO. 2 OF 2012; GLAGAH VILLAGE CASE STUDY RELATED TO NYIA AIRPORT

The location for the New Yogyakarta International Airport (NYIA) construction involved in land disputes during the land acquisition process. The land acquisition will always lead to disputes or conflicts with the affected people. It is even more complicated if, in the development process, the ruling elite intervenes, external forces outside the local community that are not directly related to the development. This article deals with the question of the government's public perceptions of the legal polemic of land dispute settlement based on Law No.2 of 2012, and concentrates to examine a new model of land dispute resolution from the perspective of affected communities against NYIA. This research is normative-empirical based on primary and secondary data, namely a literature study, field study, using purposive sampling with interviews, FGD, observation, and qualitative descriptive analysis. The result showed the failure of formal litigation and non-litigation approaches offered by Law No.2 of 2012 to resolve the disputes fairly. Village discussions based on local wisdom as a new model for equitable land dispute resolution needs a political review of Law No. 2 of 2012. The new paradigm of agrarian reform must be based on customary law and local wisdom values in the 1945 Constitution and the Agrarian Law. Given recent controversies concerning land disputes, a law on reform and structuring the national agrarian structure, Agrarian conflict resolution law, and law of natural resources management for the community are urgently needed.

The Relation of Elite, Sub-Elite, and Village Community in Maintaining the Masra Family Dynasty in Gapurana Village, Sumenep Regency: Study on the H. Andiwarto Regime in 2013-2019

This research focuses on the relation of elite H. Andiwarto with sub-elite and village community in maintaining Masra family dynasty for village head position. Masra family dynasty has run for a long time. For 150 years, Masra family descendants occupy the village head position. The survival of Masra family dynasty in the Gapurana Village Government is studied in the relation of H. Andiwarto, who is Masra descendant with sub-elite and village community to maintain Masra family descendant dynasty as a village head. This research used a qualitative method with descriptive research type. The elite theory proposed by Suzanne Keller was used to analyze the relation of elite, sub-elite, and the community. This theory has 4 (four) indicators: the governing elite, the ruling elite, the not ruling elite, and the community. Based on these indicators and the results of this research, the relation built by H. Andiwarto in maintaining Masra family dynasti consists of three relations: relation with the political elite, relation with economic elite, and relation with the social elite. The political elite’s relationship is vital in maintaining the Masra family descendant dynasty. In contrast, the relation between the economic elite and the social elite supports relations for keeping the legitimacy of the village community towards Masra descendants.

«The Klutkoism». Saransk Case of 1934.

The article is devoted to the events of the first part of 1930-ies in the Mordovian Autonomous Region. The politics struggle between different groups of the soviet and party ruling elite, which accompanied the process of the formation of Mordovian statehood and the korenization of the State machinery are considering as well. On the example of Mordovian oblast committee and Saransk town committee of VKP(b) some features inherent in the regional Soviet nomenclature of the 1930s are shown. The article acknowledges that in Mordovia, the struggle between various groups of the Soviet and Party elite was significantly influenced by the national factor and the process of indigenization of the administrative apparatus. At the same time, there was tension between the First secretary of the regional Party Committee sent from the outside, who tried to rely on his own proteges, and the regional nomenclature clans formed from local national cadres. Meanwhile, in the existing system of close-knit corporate groups and bureaucratic clans based on personal ties and mutual responsibility, there was a rapid degeneration of Party and Soviet executives. This led to the spread of such negative phenomena as leaderism, embezzlements, abuse of official position, etc. In preparing the article, the method of analyzing historical documents, historical and systemic, historical and comparative methods were used. Archival documents (from the Central State Archives of the Republic of Mordovia), as well as materials of the Soviet periodicals from the newspapers Volzhskaya Kommuna and Krasnaya Mordovia served as the basis for the source base of the article.

Features of Perception of the Belt and Road Initiative in the Slovak Republic

The article is part of the research related to the perception of the Belt and Road Initiative of the PRC in the Visegrad Group countries. It presents results of discourse analysis on perception of the Belt and Road Initiative in the Slovak Republic in government and expert circles and data from a sociological survey on the attitude of Slovaks to the Chinese initiative. The results show that the Slovak perception of the Belt and Road Initiative is pragmatic and focuses on possible economic benefits from participation in the initiative. The experts are not oblivious to the political and economic risks associated with China’s expanding influence in the region, which makes the Slovak discourse rather balanced and utilitarian. The Slovak expert discourse has been found to have a significant influence on the pragmatic sentiments in the Visegrad Group countries regarding the Belt and Road Initiative. The independent think tank of the Central European Institute for Asian Studies (CEIAS) plays a major role in the transmission of these ideas, producing a number of analytical reports and actively engaging researchers from the Visegrad Four countries in its work. As for the governmental discourse, the Chinese theme is present in it to a limited extent; in recent years there have been several cases that have divided the views of the ruling elite regarding Sino-Slovak relations. In general, these have concerned human rights issues and interaction with the Dalai Lama and the resulting problem of whether it is worth raising sensitive issues and criticising the PRC at the state level to the detriment of economic ties. In conclusion, the author describes the main trends and forecasts of the development of the Slovak discourse about the Chinese initiative.

Pomiędzy relacyjnością a ambiwalentnością. Rozwój idei własności i wolności w warunkach politycznych samodzierżawia rosyjskiego w XIX wieku jako lejtmotyw w twórczości naukowej Richarda Pipesa

The article illustrates that property rights, including in particular property and the relationship between property rights and the category of freedom in the nineteenth-century Russian Empire, was one of the most important areas of scientific activity of Richard Pipes. For centuries, both the institution of freedom and property were highly politicised. Based on Richard Pipes’ findings, it can be concluded that the relationship between ownership and freedom manifested itself in the feature of relativity or ambivalence, depending on the time and individual parts of the Russian Empire. In the 19th century, the former mainly influenced the development of the monetary economy, while the latter strengthened the idea of samoderzhavyie in the political system. Richard Pipes noticed the sources of the antinomy between the idea of freedom and property in nineteenth-century Russia in the dynamically developing economic life and the “stillness” of the autocratic political power system. Following this concept, the article presents the doubts appearing among the St Petersburg ruling elite as well as provincial officials related to establishing the personal freedom of peasants in Russia, which finally took place in 1861. The system of tsarist autocracy in Russia, which was developing throughout history, noticed significant links between property and freedom. A good example of this process was the confiscation of land property. In this regard, the article mentions political premises, the impact of the phenomenon of “paradox and tragedy,ˮ as well as the socio-economic calculations carried out in the field of confiscating private property in the western governorates of the Russian Empire, after the January Uprising of 1863.

From Family Crisis to State Crisis

Former Yan (285/337–370) was a state in Northeast China established by the Murong branch of the Xianbei, a partly nomadic people who had settled on the Chinese frontier in the 220s. The Murong gradually accommodated themselves to Chinese ways and, having defeated their rivals along the frontier by the 340s, became a major power in North China. A decade later they destroyed the states which had been strongest north of the Yellow River (Later Zhao 319–351) and their ruler assumed imperial dignity. By this time they were close to becoming the masters of North China. Schreiber explains one of the secrets of their success by arguing that the creation and the conduct of the Yan government was “a family affair”. He claimed that the Yan was a stable state, relatively free of internal turmoil and civil war. However, deteriorating family relations within the ruling elite, which did not lead to serious armed conflict but dragged on for about two decades, played a major role in the demise of their state. In the present paper I examine the causes of this deterioration and attempt to shed light on the connections between the crisis it caused and earlier attempts to forestall such a crisis.

The Influence of the Ruling Elite on Political Activity in the Conditions of Destructuring the Essence of the Philosophy of Law

Different policy actors have different influences on the process. Most do not directly participate in political life: a particular layer of people called the political elite is more likely to get involved in it. From a philosophical point of view, the political elite is mainly defined as a minority of society, a somewhat independent, relatively privileged group (or a set of groups) that has the appropriate psychological, social and political qualities and is directly involved in the formation and implementation of political decisions related to the use of state power or influence on it. The main goal of the article is to characterise the negative influence of the ruling elite on the formation of political activity in the context of revealing its possibilities of destructuring the essence of the philosophy of law itself. The methodology was based on the main historical and theoretical research methods that made it possible to achieve the set goal. As a result of the study, the main elements of the negative influence of the ruling elite were characterised, its place in the philosophy of law was determined and which destructuring consequences it has.

Grave developments

The burial site at Borre is a common example of centralization that took place in Scandinavia during the transition between the early and late Iron Age in the sixth century. The major activities of the site are dated to the Late Iron Age, ca. 550-1050 AD. The site, which is specifically known for its uncommonly large collection of monumental mounds, has often been referred to as a burial place for kings, and the mounds have been interpreted as symbols of power meant to solidify the control of the ruling elite. This article examines changes that take place during the sites use and discusses four possible phases based on a reworked chronology. The article argues that the phases are results of different societal needs and place the mounds in a larger setting than simply elitist constructions. The reworked chronology is based on a thorough Bayesian analysis and suggests some alterations to the current understanding of the chronology at Borre.

"Give 'Em a Few Bars of the Hymn of Hate": The German and English-Language Reception of Ernst Lissauer's "Haßgesang gegen England"

<p>Ernst Lissauer’s “Haßgesang gegen England” is an Anglophobic German poem, written in the early weeks of the First World War. This thesis examines the poem’s reception in the German and English-speaking worlds, the imitations it inspired, the opposition it provoked, and the enduring discourse it instigated. The study begins by outlining Lissauer’s biography, and places his “Haßgesang” within the context of contemporary German poetry of hate. It discusses the changing reception of the poem in the German-speaking world over time, and the many and varied German works it inspired. The “Haßgesang” is shown to have captured the Zeitgeist of Germany at the beginning of the First World War, but to have been later rejected by the German public and renounced by its author, while the war still raged. The poem also established a discourse on hatred and hatefulness as motivating factors in war, sparking debate on both sides. In the English-speaking world, the “Haßgesang” was viewed by some as a useful insight into the national psyche of the Germans, while for others it merely confirmed existing stereotypes of Germans as a hateful people. As an example of propaganda in reverse the poem can hardly be bettered, inspiring parodies, cartoons, soldiers’ slang and music hall numbers, almost all engineered to subvert the poem’s hateful message. The New Zealand reception provides a useful case study of the reception of the poem in the English-speaking world, linking reportage of overseas responses with new, locally produced ones. New Zealand emerges as a geographically distant but remarkably well-informed corner of the British Empire. Regardless of the poem’s literary quality, its role as a vehicle for propaganda, satire and irony singles it out as a powerful document of its time: one which cut across all strata of society from the ruling elite to the men in the trenches, and which became an easily recognised symbol around the globe.</p>