Towards a pedagogy of reconciliation and transformation: A peace education through art initiative in response to 26/11

The 26/11 Mumbai attacks in India severely impacted the already strained Indo–Pak political relations and fuelled prejudice against the common people of Pakistan. Since the attacks, Indian people have found various expressions of collective memory and ways to commemorate the incident. While these serve as a remembrance of the attack, it also reinforces negative attitudes towards Pakistan and its people, hindering any prospects of peace and reconciliation. This article describes a peace education through art initiative implemented in a high school in Mumbai. It draws from a synergy of theoretical concepts in peace, reconciliation and conflict transformation for its curricular framework that has three inquiry processes: Examine–Envision–Envisage. This article describes the implementation and outcomes of the initiative that support the value of an integrated peace- and reconciliation-focused art education pedagogy aimed at promoting reconciliation in relation to ongoing/intractable conflicts. Furthermore, it highlights the importance of addressing negative emotions inherent in ongoing conflicts and how empathy might contribute towards reducing prejudice towards the ‘Other’.

Nexus of Political Connections with Green Financial Development and Fiscal Performance

Green finance is an important guarantee to promote the development and structural transformation of green industries in China and is also the power source to implement the concept of green development during the "13th Five-Year Plan". The development of green finance is inseparable from the support of financial and taxation policies. Based on this background, there is a certain connection between green finance and corporate values. When companies strengthen their political relations, there will be certain positive and negative effects on the company's future development. Green development should be the goal, and the financial and tax performance of companies should be enhanced in strengthening the development of green finance. The most important thing for companies, regardless of the industry, is to interact with the government to improve their development goals and performance, maintain their rights and interests through political relations and policies, and obtain government support to achieve sustainable development of the company. Therefore, this study focuses on the political relationship between green finance development and financial performance and examines the intervention of political ties on corporate green investment and corporate performance. The results confirm that politically connected companies have more resources and protect the natural environment while improving their financial performance.

Esorcizzare lo spettro

This paper enquires into the political and juridical themes underlying Giacomo Puccini’s opera Tosca (1900). Through the comparison of Puccini’s score, the libretto by Giacosa and Illica, and the original play by Sardou, I will present a twofold reading of the intertwinement between politics, religion, and law in this musical work. On the one hand, I will show that the police power represented by the character of Scarpia can be interpreted, from a Benjaminian standpoint, as a violent power that shapes the legal and religious order. On the other hand, I will argue that the artistic couple made by Cavaradossi and Tosca is politically significant in so far as their art represents an attempt to deactivate Scarpia’s pervading and oppressive force. The conclusion will contend that the aesthetics in this opera subtends the aspiration for an “inoperative”-wise revolution in religious institutions as well as in legal and political relations.

Nepal-China Bilateral Economic Cooperation Empowering Nepalese Economy

Bilateral economic cooperation is one of means for improving economic, social and political relations between two countries. Nepal and China have been enjoying good neighborly respects and benefit since the establishment of diplomatic relations in 1955. Both countries behave a good neighborhood relations and enjoyed fruitful bilateral cooperation and mutual support and following the social and economic development activities by exchanging cooperation in the areas of trade, tourism, investment and connectivity, building human capital and infrastructure and deepening people to people relations is at the center of Nepal-China bilateral relations. Within Nepal and China, there are marvelous possibilities promoting socio-economic transformation and raising the living standard of people through the mutual cooperation in the areas of mutual interest. Cooperation under the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) is of great significance for Nepal and China. The present study is conducted with the aim of examining the economic impact of bilateral economic cooperation between Nepal and China. The impact of bilateral cooperation with China in Nepalese economy has been analyzed in terms of FDI flows, trade between Nepal, China and economic assistance from China to Nepal and tourists arrivals from China over the period of 2000-2019 by applying simple statistical tools and simple linear regression model. The results show that there have been positive influences on Nepalese economy with bilateral economic cooperation of China.

Religious Education Policy in Public Schools During the New Order

The new order government policy about religious education in state schools gradually led to an accommodative policy. If the old order government made religious education a facultative subject, then at the beginning of the new order the government strengthened the position of religious education by removing facultative provisions, even though they were not obligatory. Until finally, through Law number 2 (1989), the government required religious education to be taught in all channels, types, and levels of education. And the right of every student to get religious lessons by their religion and is taught by religious educators. This research includes historical research and policy studies, because it relies on past data, whose steps consist of four main activities, namely heuristics, verification, interpretation, and historiography. This accommodative policy is influenced by several factors, including; the government’s determination to implement Pancasila purely and consistently after it was diverted in the old order era; the weakening of the government’s power at that time so that it required the political support of muslims as the majority population; There is an intellectual transformation of muslim thinkers and political activists towards harmonious and complementary political relations between Islam and the state so that Islamic ideas are more easily accepted; and muslims experience a process of rapid social, educational, economic and political mobilization and so that more and more people are involved in government and can influence policies in a pro-muslim direction.

The Will of Eustathios Boilas in the Context of Byzantine-Georgian Political Relations in the 11th Century

ntroduction. The article considers the data of the Will of the Byzantine nobleman Eustathios Boilas about his possessions in the Byzantine theme Iberia and Great Armenia in the context of political relations between Byzantium and the Georgian Kingdom in the 1040s and 1050s. Methods. The comparison of the texts of different written traditions is carried out. The data of the Will of Eustathios Boilas is analyzed in the context of “Chronicle of Kartli” from the corpus of the Kartlis Tskhovreba and the other sources. Analysis. The comparison of information from all the texts indicates that Boilas’ possessions even reached beyond the theme of Iberia, in particular, to the Northern Tao and part of Klarjeti. From the late 30s of the 11th century this territory became the arena of a cruel Georgian civil conflict between the Georgian king Bagrat IV and the Byzantium ally, the Duke of Kldekari Liparit IV Baghuashi. The defeat of Liparit in this conflict between 1053 and 1057 forced Byzantium to abandon its new acquisitions in Northern Tao, as a result of which, among other things, Eustathios Boilas lost several of his lands, which were transferred to Bagrat IV and his allies. Results. As the study shows, the borders of the theme Iberia and Great Armenia in the period from 1047 to 1053/1057 expanded to the north, including the territory of the Northern Tao and possibly part of Klarjeti, which was ruled by the Byzantine ally Liparit. The combination of data from both Byzantine and Georgian texts assumes to revise the generally accepted point of view about the administrative boundaries of the Iberia and Great Armenia theme.

The Moral Wrong of Colonialism: A Non-Instrumentalist Approach

Whether colonialism involves an intrinsic moral wrong or not happens to be an important question in contemporary political and legal philosophy. If colonialism is understood as a system that necessitates some form of intrinsic moral wrong then the process of epistemic decolonization can freely repeat the patterns of political relations prevailing in colonial regimes. However, understanding colonialism from a non-instrumentalist approach guides us to take a different path in the process of decolonization. This approach mandates for discontinuation of the wrongful political relation that was prevalent in colonial world. This article stands for a non-instrumentalist approach towards colonialism and regards the system of colonialism as intrinsic wrong. To that end, it challenges the predominant discourses that portray the wrong of colonialism from an instrumentalist approach. Moreover, it introduces new arguments to support Lea Ypi’s non-instrumentalist approach to the wrong of colonialism.

Irregularities in transnational adoptions and child appropriations: Challenges for reparation practices

Transnational adoption is a global movement of children across borders to new permanent and irreversible legal relationships. It is a circulation that involves social, economic, cultural and political relations marked by geographies of inequalities of power on a global scale. Many of these circulations have been shrouded by illicit practices which mean the violation of child rights. This special issue of the journal Childhood examines individual, social and political narratives on illicit processes surrounding this practice. Drawing from social and political sciences research, the contributors of this collection show the contradiction between ‘silences’ around certain practices in some societies, while in others ‘truth recovery’ has been central to the transition towards democracy. The authors raise concerns about policies and practices that complicate the interests and rights of individual actors.