The Cult of the Martyr: The Symbol of Stanisław Wacławski and Rituals of Violence in the Warsaw Student Milieu of the 1930s

The Cult of the Martyr: The Symbol of Stanisław Wacławski and Rituals of Violence in the Warsaw Student Milieu of the 1930sViolence was a key element of the interwar radical habitus and was particularly affirmed in far-right movements, which found fertile ground for their ideas among students. However, the influence of the systems of ideas advocated by ideologues on student masses seems limited and indirect. Student support for antisemitism and extremism cannot be explained only by cultural conditions, ideology or political engineering. What is needed here are intermediate stages, linking radical ideology with the actions of social actors. I argue that the intermediary function was performed by the symbol of Stanisław Wacławski, a student and member of the Camp of Great Poland (Obóz Wielkiej Polski) who was killed during the antisemitic riots in Vilnius in 1931. The figure of Wacławski was a key element of antisemitic discourse in far-right press and was used by academic societies to construct the annual ritual of violence in the 1930s. I employ the micro-sociological approach and draw on Randall Collins’ theory of “interaction ritual chains” to show that the factors behind the mobilization of ordinary students for collective violence and a chauvinistic agenda included also emotions and personal relations, and not only political identification and advertising. Kult męczennika. Symbol Stanisława Wacławskiego i rytuały przemocy w warszawskim środowisku studenckim lat trzydziestych XX wiekuW habitusie międzywojennych radykałów przemoc grała kluczową rolę i była szczególnie afirmowana w ruchach skrajnie prawicowych, które znajdowały podatny grunt dla swoich idei w środowiskach studenckich. Jednak wpływ systemów idei głoszonych przez ideologów na masy studenckie wydaje się ograniczony i pośredni. Poparcia studentów dla antysemityzmu i ekstremizmu nie można tłumaczyć jedynie uwarunkowaniami kulturowymi, ideologią czy inżynierią polityczną. Potrzebne są tu etapy pośrednie, łączące radykalną ideologię z działaniami aktorów społecznych. W niniejszym tekście dowodzę, że funkcję taką pełnił w środowisku akademickim symbol w postaci Stanisława Wacławskiego, studenta i członka Obozu Wielkiej Polski, który zginął podczas antysemickich zamieszek w Wilnie w 1931 roku. Jego postać stanowiła kluczowy element antysemickiego dyskursu prasy skrajnej prawicy i była wykorzystywana przez stowarzyszenia akademickie do konstruowania corocznego rytuału przemocy w latach 30. Aby pokazać, że czynnikami, które wyjaśniają, w jaki sposób zwykli studenci byli mobilizowani do zbiorowej przemocy i pozyskiwani dla szowinistycznego programu, były również emocje i osobiste relacje, a nie tylko identyfikacja polityczna i agitacja, stosuję podejście mikrosocjologiczne i czerpię z teorii „łańcuchów rytuałów interakcji” Randalla Collinsa.

Political and Civic Identity of Libertarians in Contemporary Russia: Problems and Perspectives

Libertarianism is a new ideological trend, popular among young people. We try to find out whether libertarianism rises as independent political movement or it is the reaction on the fall of popularity of traditional political parties. For that purpose, the author made the comparative analysis of the program documents of the Libertarian Party of Russia with the classical works of the American libertarians and analyzed the published interview both of the party leaders/activists and of the experts. The author used the interview which he took from some activists in order to clarify the political identification of the Russian libertarians. The political identity of libertarians is characterized by the broadest possible interpretation of personal and economic freedom. Libertarians believe that such freedom is compatible with law and legality and is opposite to anarchy. At the same time, they avoid definitions and norms that could constrain freedom by both the state and the adherents of certain, including liberal, values and slogans. This broad approach makes it difficult to politically identify libertarians, but contributes to their attractiveness among young people.

Sociopolitical Participation Among Marginalized Youth: Do Political Identification and Ideology Matter?

Engaging youth in the political system has promise for creating social change and ensuring the future of our democracy. Sociopolitical participation—individual and/or collective action to facilitate change—may be biased towards more liberal or Democratic views, which emphasize reform to create social equity. The aim of this study is to test if youth who vary in political ideology (i.e., conservative, liberal) and political identification (i.e., Republican, Democrat) participate at different levels and whether this measurement of sociopolitical participation is in fact biased. These issues were examined among 237 youth attending a large Midwestern high school who generally identified with historically marginalized groups. Results suggest that youth identifying as Republican exhibited slightly higher levels of participation, and that items were not biased by political ideology or identification. Further, political ideology and identification explained less than 5% of the variance in sociopolitical action, suggesting it is largely independent of political leaning.

Reproductive Work, Territorial Commons and Political Precarity in Peripheral Extractive Sites in Ecuador and Bolivia

This article examines the labour and political dimensions of non-salaried women workers in the extractive peripheries of Bolivia and Ecuador, to show how the appropriation of racialised and gendered work is a foundational aspect of the extractive logic of capital. We consider extraction in its broadest sense as the dispossession not only of resources but also of informal and reproductive work, and examine the ways in which the territorialised commons produced by, and necessary for, the interdependent activities to sustain life also form the basis of political identification and organisation. Territories as the making of places are fundamental for the constitution of marginalised collective identities. In peripheral sites where extractive logics have been socio-culturally and institutionally established, the literal and figurative common grounds for women’s social reproduction are reduced, individualising livelihoods and increasing physical, economic and subjective vulnerability. As such, the extraction of resources and of territorialised networks intersects with the historical appropriation of reproductive work to configure both material and political precarity. KEYWORDS: informal work; reproductive labour; extractivism; territory; commons

Political Identity and Perceived Threat Predict Negative Perceptions of Outgroup Facial Expressions

Social group identity plays a central role in political polarization and inter-party conflict. Here, we use ambiguously valenced faces to measure affective biases in the processing of political in and outgroup faces and explore predictors of negativity toward political outgroups. Participants identifying as Democrats and Republicans categorized happy, angry, and surprised faces as positive or negative. Whereas happy and angry faces convey positive and negative valence respectively, surprised faces are ambiguous in that they readily convey positive and negative valence. Thus, surprise is a useful tool for characterizing bias. Face stimuli were assigned to the participants’ political in or outgroup, or a third group with an unspecified affiliation (baseline). Participants also completed measures of strength of political identification and perceived outgroup threat. We found a significant interaction of facial expression and group membership, such that outgroup faces were categorized more negatively than ingroup and baseline, but only for surprise. Strength of identification moderated the relationship between threat and the magnitude of outgroup negativity, such that increased outgroup threat predicted greater negativity towards the outgroup (relative to the ingroup), and this effect was exacerbated by stronger ingroup identification. There was also an interaction of facial expression and political affiliation, with Republicans categorizing surprise more negatively than Democrats across all group conditions. Our findings reinforce the importance of political identity on inter-party affective biases and are consistent with ideological differences in bias. Further, strength of political identification and perceived outgroup threat are established as potential mechanisms underlying political polarization and inter-party conflict.

Red shape, blue shape: political ideology influences the social perception of body shape

Political elections have a profound impact on individuals and societies. Optimal voting is thought to be based on informed and deliberate decisions yet, it has been demonstrated that the outcomes of political elections are biased by the perception of candidates’ facial features and the stereotypical traits voters attribute to these. Interestingly, political identification changes the attribution of stereotypical traits from facial features. This study explores whether the perception of body shape elicits similar effects on political trait attribution and whether these associations can be visualized. In Experiment 1, ratings of 3D body shapes were used to model the relationship between perception of 3D body shape and the attribution of political traits such as ‘Republican’, ‘Democrat’, or ‘Leader’. This allowed analyzing and visualizing the mental representations of stereotypical 3D body shapes associated with each political trait. Experiment 2 was designed to test whether political identification of the raters affected the attribution of political traits to different types of body shapes. The results show that humans attribute political traits to the same body shapes differently depending on their own political preference. These findings show that our judgments of others are influenced by their body shape and our own political views. Such judgments have potential political and societal implications.

Gender Differential Effect of College on Socio-Political Orientation Over the Last 40 Years—a Propensity Score Weighting approach

It is well-known that the more educated people are, the more liberal views they tend to express. However, it is unclear whether this is due to college attendance itself or because those who go to college differ from those who do not in ways (directly or indirectly) related to their later political identification. In this paper, we therefore attempt to estimate the effect of college on political identification net of people’s tendencies to select into college using an inverse probability of treatment weighting approach. Based on data from the General Social Survey, we analyze how this effect has changed over time and whether college affects the political identification of women in the same ways as that of men. We find evidence consistent with the argument that college attendance politicizes both men and women. Moreover, we show that not only the general, but also the gender specific effects change markedly across the decades. This raises questions about the different mechanisms at play in how college mobilizes men and women politically.

IS TRADING WITH CHINA DIFFERENT? SELF-INTEREST, NATIONAL PRIDE, AND TRADE PREFERENCES

Despite increasing economic integrations with China, worries exist in China's neighboring countries about China's implicit political intention. Do people view trading with China differently? In this article, we incorporate the political context of trade agreements by showing that trade with partners who come with political costs is less likely to be supported. Using a nationally representative survey experiment from Taiwan, we find that trading with China garners less support than trading with Japan or Malaysia, and nationalism suppresses self-interest when the proposed trading partner is China. We show that national attachment, which is neither a proxy for political identification nor a proxy for national chauvinism, becomes a stronger predictor of trade preferences toward China. While the political tension between China and Taiwan is unique, many countries see at least one other country posing a negative externality. Our finding suggests strongly identified nationalists would oppose engaging with a hostile outsider regardless of their self-interest.