Revolutionary legality and the Burkinabè insurrection

ABSTRACTCoup leaders often purport to restore constitutional order. During Burkina Faso's 2014 ‘insurrection', however, Blaise Compaoré's opponents advanced detailed (international) legal arguments that significantly constrained their subsequent conduct. Theirs was to be a legal revolution. This article situates this stance within Burkina Faso's distinctive history of urban protest, whilst emphasising under-analysed international sources for the insurrection. ‘Insurgent’ lawyers, it argues, used international instruments to reinvigorate longstanding activist attempts to reconcile constitutional rights with a language of popular justice promoted by the revolutionary regime of Thomas Sankara (1983–7). After the insurrection, however, their emphasis on legality was used by Compaoré's supporters to expose the transitional authorities’ double-standards. Meanwhile, insurgent lawyers working for the transition had to work hard to reconcile (international) legal justifications for the insurrection with the expedient politics needed to defend the new dispensation.

Le langage des murs qui enferment dans L'Étranger de Camus et Hiroshima mon amour de Duras

Meursault from L’Étranger, and “Elle” from Hiroshima mon amour are tragic characters who, as if driven by an ancient fatum, have committed a crime, blood crime or crime of love, for which they must pay. While the first is accused of insensitivity and sentenced to death because justice sees him as a “moral monster”, the second is found guilty of “horizontal collaboration” and punished by “popular justice”. From then on, locked up in a cell for Meursault, or alternately in a room and a cellar for “Elle”, these two characters seek the faces and voices of past loves. The quest for these faces and voices from a bygone world which make the protagonists suffer by their absence will give way for Meursault and “Elle” to a state of peace that will allow them to come to terms with their past. While the first character, who has changed in prison, is going to rediscover his mother and finally understand her desire to reembrace life in the home for the elderly, the second character, “healed” by the Japanese, will finally find a sentimental balance.

Kokoro: Hints and Echoes of Japanese Inner Life

The works of Lafcadio Hearn (Koizumi Yakumo) played a critical role in introducing his adopted Japan to a worldwide audience. In Kokoro: Hints and Echoes of Japanese Inner Life, he writes, “The papers composing this volume treat of the inner rather than of the outer life of Japan, — for which reason they have been grouped under the title Kokoro (heart). This word signifies also mind, in the emotional sense; spirit; courage; resolve; sentiment; affection; and inner meaning, — just as we say in English, ‘the heart of things.’” After centuries of isolation Meiji-era Japan was forced to adjust its customs and beliefs to Western influences, and Hearn reflects on the value of these traditions of the “heart” as seen in Japanese popular justice, arts, economy, patriotism, and religion. Chapters include: At a Railway Station • The Genius of Japanese Civilization • A Street Singer • From a Traveling Diary • The Nun of the Temple of Amida • After the War • Haru • A Glimpse of Tendencies • By Force of Karma • A Conservative • In the Twilight of the Gods • The Idea of Preëxistence • In Cholera-Time • Some Thoughts About Ancestor-Worship • Kimiko • Three Popular Ballads: The Ballad of Shūntoku-maru • The Ballad of Oguri-Hangwan • The Ballad of O-Shichi, the Daughter of the Yaoya.

The Autocrat’s Moral-Legal Dilemma: Popular Morality and Legal Institutions in China

Authoritarian regimes sometimes professionalize their legal systems to govern more effectively. Yet when quasi-autonomous courts rule in contradiction to popular conceptions of right and wrong—popular morality—it might threaten citizens’ trust in the regime. We use the case of contemporary China to investigate this “moral-legal dilemma”—the competing needs of legal development and the satisfaction of popular justice concerns. Four case studies demonstrate that when court rulings conflict with popular morality, the party-state selectively alters decisions, so long as intervention does not significantly jeopardize the integrity of the legal system. Two online survey experiments then assess citizens’ reactions to moral-legal conflict in court rulings. We find that people are more likely to experience “moral dissonance” when legal decisions conflict with popular morality. We do not find that moral-legal conflict in court rulings significantly undermines individuals’ trust in the regime. Our analysis underscores the need for more attention to the moral foundations of authoritarian rule.