Showing papers on "Expansionism published in 2008"

The Linguistic Imperialism of Neoliberal Empire

Abstract: The article explores the transition from the linguistic imperialism of the colonial and postcolonial ages to the increasingly dominant role of English as a neoimperial language. It analyzes ‘global’ English as a key dimension of the U.S. empire. U.S. expansionism is a fundamental principle of the foreign policy of the United States that can be traced back over two centuries. Linguistic imperialism and neoimperialism are exemplified at the micro and macro levels, and some key defining traits explored, as are cultural and institutional links between the United Kingdom and the United States, and the role of foundations in promoting ‘world’ English. Whereas many parts of the world have experienced a longstanding engagement with English, the use of English in continental Europe has expanded markedly in recent years, as a result of many strands of globalization and European integration. Some ongoing tensions in language policy in Europe, and symptoms of complicity in accepting linguistic hegemony, are explored....

Dislocating Race and Nation: Episodes in Nineteenth-Century American Literary Nationalism

Abstract: This title presents literary responses to questions of U.S. racial nationalism and imperialism.American literary nationalism is traditionally understood as a cohesive literary tradition developed in the newly independent United States that emphasized the unique features of America and consciously differentiated American literature from British literature. Robert Levine challenges this assessment by exploring the conflicted, multi-racial, and contingent dimensions present in the works of late eighteenth- and nineteenth-century American and African American writers. Conflict and uncertainty, not consensus, Levine argues, helped define American literary nationalism during this period.Levine emphasizes the centrality of both inter- and intra-American conflict in his analysis of four illuminating "episodes" of literary responses to questions of U.S. racial nationalism and imperialism. He examines Charles Brockden Brown and the Louisiana Purchase; David Walker and the debates on the Missouri Compromise; Nathaniel Hawthorne, Herman Melville, and Hannah Crafts and the blood-based literary nationalism and expansionism of the mid-nineteenth century; and, Frederick Douglass and his interest in Haiti. Levine offers critiques of recent developments in whiteness and imperialism studies, arguing that a renewed attention to the place of contingency in American literary history helps us to better understand and learn from writers trying to make sense of their own historical moments.

Converting colonialism : visions and realities in mission history, 1706-1914

Abstract: In this volume, leading historians of Christianity in the non-Western world examine the relationship between missionaries and nineteenth-century European colonialism, and between indigenous converts and the colonial contexts in which they lived. Forced to operate within a political framework of European expansionism that lay outside their power to control, missionaries and early converts variously attempted to co-opt certain aspects of colonialism and to change what seemed prejudicial to gospel values. These contributors are the leading historians in their fields, and the concrete historical situations that they explore show the real complexity of missionary efforts to "convert" colonialism.

Suffragists in an Imperial Age: U.S. Expansion and the Woman Question, 1870-1929

Abstract: In 1899, Carrie Chapman Catt, who succeeded Susan B. Anthony as head of the National American Women Suffrage Association, argued that it was the "duty" of U.S. women to help lift the inhabitants of its new island possessions up from "barbarism" to "civilization," a project that would presumably demonstrate the capacity of U.S. women for full citizenship and political rights. Catt, like many suffragists in her day, was well-versed in the language of empire, and infused the cause of suffrage with imperialist zeal in public debate. Unlike their predecessors, who were working for votes for women within the context of slavery and abolition, the next generation of suffragists argued their case against the backdrop of the U.S. expansionism into Indian and Mormon territory at home as well as overseas in the Philippines, Puerto Rico, and Hawaii. In this book, Allison L. Sneider carefully examines these simultaneous political movements-woman suffrage and American imperialism-as inextricably intertwined phenomena, instructively complicating the histories of both.

Liberal Imperialism in Germany: Expansionism and Nationalism, 1848-1884

Abstract: List of Abbreviations Preface Introduction PART I: A LIBERAL EMPIRE FOR A LIBERAL NATION Chapter 1. National Unification and Overseas Expansion at the Frankfurt National Assembly, 1848 - 1849 Chapter 2. Mythopoesis -Imperialism as Nationalism PART II: RECONFIGURING EMPIRE IN THE 'POST-LIBERAL' ERA Chapter 3. Informal Empire and Private Sector Imperialism, 1849-1884 Chapter 4. Burgerlich Agency and the World of the Verein Chapter 5. Bismarck and the Socio-Political Context of the Colonial Umschwung PART III: THE TEXTS OF IMPERIALISM Chapter 6. Expansionist Agitation after 1849 Chapter 7. Geography and Anthropology in the Service of Imperialism Chapter 8. Popular Culture and the Transmission of Imperialist Values Conclusion Bibliography Index

A People's History of American Empire: A Graphic Adaptation

Abstract: Since its landmark publication in 1980, "A People's History Of The United States" has had six new editions, sold more than 17 million copies, become required classroom reading throughout the USA, and been turned into an acclaimed play More than a successful book, "A People's History" triggered a revolution in the way history is told, displacing the official versions with their emphasis on great men in high places to chronicle events as they were lived, from the bottom upNow Howard Zinn, historian Paul Buhle, and cartoonist Mike Konopacki have collaborated to retell, in vibrant comics form, a most immediate and relevant chapter of "A People's History": the centuries-long story of America's actions in the world Narrated by Zinn, this version opens with the events of 9/11 and then jumps back to explore the cycles of US expansionism from Wounded Knee to Iraq, stopping along the way at World War I, Central America, Vietnam, and the Iranian revolution The book also follows the story of Zinn, the son of poor Jewish immigrants, from his childhood in the Brooklyn slums to his role as one of America's leading historiansShifting from world-shattering events to one family's small revolutions, "A People's History of American Empire" presents the classic ground-level history of America in a dazzling new form

Crossing Empire's Edge: Foreign Ministry Police and Japanese Expansionism in Northeast Asia

Abstract: For more than half a century, the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Gaimusho) possessed an independent police force that operated within the space of Japan’s informal empire on the Asian continent. Charged with "protecting and controlling" local Japanese communities first in Korea and later in China, these consular police played a critical role in facilitating Japanese imperial expansion during the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Remarkably, however, this police force remains largely unknown. Crossing Empire’s Edge is the first book in English to reveal its complex history. Based on extensive analysis of both archival and recently published Japanese sources, Erik Esselstrom describes how the Gaimusho police became deeply involved in the surveillance and suppression of the Korean independence movement in exile throughout Chinese treaty ports and the Manchurian frontier during the 1920s and 1930s. It had in fact evolved over the years from a relatively benign public security organization into a full-fledged political intelligence apparatus devoted to apprehending purveyors of "dangerous thought" throughout the empire. Furthermore, the history of consular police operations indicates that ideological crime was a borderless security problem; Gaimusho police worked closely with colonial and metropolitan Japanese police forces to target Chinese, Korean, and Japanese suspects alike from Shanghai to Seoul to Tokyo. Esselstrom thus offers a nuanced interpretation of Japanese expansionism by highlighting the transnational links between consular, colonial, and metropolitan policing of subversive political movements during the prewar and wartime eras. In addition, by illuminating the fervor with which consular police often pressed for unilateral solutions to Japan’s political security crises on the continent, he challenges orthodox understandings of the relationship between civil and military institutions within the imperial Japanese state. While historians often still depict the Gaimusho as an inhibitor of unilateral military expansionism during the first half of the twentieth century, Esselstrom’s expose on the activities and ideology of the consular police dramatically challenges this narrative. Revealing a far greater complexity of motivation behind the Japanese colonial mission, Crossing Empire’s Edge boldly illustrates how the imperial Japanese state viewed political security at home as inextricably connected to political security abroad from as early as 1919—nearly a decade before overt military aggression began—and approaches northeast Asia as a region of intricate and dynamic social, economic, and political forces. In doing so, Crossing Empire’s Edge inspires new ways of thinking about both modern Japanese history and the modern history of Japan in East Asia.

"What Are the Advantages of the Acquisition?": Inventing Expansion in the Early American Republic

Abstract: In 1803, the Louisiana Purchase transformed the boundaries of the United States. In the process, it forced Americans to rethink how they conceived of expansion, landscape, and nation. This article examines the cultural production that followed, focusing primarily on the ways that Americans represented the West in pamphlets, travel narratives, and maps. This article also seeks to challenge some familiar assumptions about westward expansion while seeking to provide models for interdisciplinary inquiry that connect policymaking to print and visual culture. This article argues that rather than the unrestrained expansionism so often associated with the early American republic, the print and visual culture that accompanied the Louisiana Purchase expressed profound ambivalences toward the West and toward expansion. Equally important, this outlook was never entirely the result of fears about expansion itself. Instead, a combination of factors—political philosophy, publishing technology, and policymaking necessity—combined to shape the ways Americans went about describing the West. Meanwhile, the narrative personae of western explorers who aimed for public careers in the civil and military branches of the federal government further informed the notion that the West presented profound dangers to the union. All of these factors combined to question the tangible benefits of expansion into the Far West beyond the Mississippi, even as those forms of express drew on the celebration of expansion into the Near West during the decades before 1803. This article begins by examining the conventions of western landscape description that preceded the Louisiana Purchase. It then examines the political pamphlets that came in the immediate aftermath of the Purchase, and then the travel narratives and books produced by the first federal expeditions into the Purchase territories. This article concludes by explaining how Americans later reconfigured the images of the Louisiana Purchase to fuel a pro-expansionist outlook in the antebellum era. This change was partly the result of shifts in public sentiment and political culture, but it was also the result of shifts in the American cartographic industry and the rising power of new generic forms, specifically the novel and landscape painting. This article seeks to engage a broad range of writing for scholarly and general audiences alike. For generations, it has been standard practice to situate the Louisiana Purchase as a touchstone in the broader story of Anglo-American expansionism. This article argues instead that American settlers may have eagerly sought additional lands in the West, but American policymakers, pamphleteers, explorers, and cartographers were more circumspect. While hardly opposed to American dominance, they described challenges of a more practical nature in the West that might exceed the capacities of the federal government. This article situates the discussion of the Purchase and its aftermath within a broader context of expansionism, print, and visual culture in the early republic. Indeed, a crucial claim of this article is that historians of federal policymaking and scholars on cultural production—fields that often function in isolation—stand to reap enormous benefits from a close conversation that considers the way cultural production shaped the way policymaking decision appeared to the general public as well as the policymaking priorities that shaped how Americans represented their nation and themselves.

Toward a Definition of Caribbean American Regionalism: Contesting Anglo-America's Caribbean Designs in Mary Seacole and Sui Sin Far

Abstract: This essay brings into dialogue discrete conversations in Caribbean studies, international political economy (IPE), and hemispheric American studies. Contextualizing these fields through the trope of hospitality, a figure of particular significance in Caribbean-U.S. relations, the author charts a field of writing he terms Caribbean American Regionalism, which is not bound necessarily to the geographic or ideological commitments of U.S. regionalist traditions even as it acknowledges and extends from innovative scholarship about them. The essay focuses on the role of women's voices in such a regionalist, Caribbean American imaginary, specifically Jamaican Creole healer and boarding-house operator Mary Seacole and the Eurasian writer Sui Sin Far. Although from distinct epochs and locations, Seacole and Sui Sin Far-as migrant laboring women of color in the Caribbean American region-are affected by, and their texts keenly respond to, developments in Caribbean-U.S. relations during the last half of the nineteenth century. This is particularly so in light of the dependence of corporations like the Panama Railroad Company and United Fruit Company on commodities produced by, and on the commodifying the bodies of, laboring West Indian women in hospitality industries. Seacole and Sui Sin Far, by marking (in)hospitable relations in the Caribbean American region in sites of hospitality where they reside and work-the Jamaican creole boarding-house and tourist hotel, respectively-expose the (in)hospitality of industry and the industry of (in)hospitality sponsoring nineteenth-century U. S. expansionism.

Frontiers of Femininity: A New Historical Geography of the Nineteenth-Century American West

Abstract: British explorer and professional travel writer Isabella Bird is, to the modern eye, a study in contradictions. One of the premier mountaineers and world explorers of her generation, she was, in 1892, the first woman elected to London's Royal Geographic Society. And yet Bird's books on her travels are filled with depictions of herself and other women that reinforce the 'properly feminine' domestic and behavioral codes of her day.In this fascinating and highly original collection of essays, Karen Morin explores the self-expression of travel writers like Bird by giving geographic context to their work. With a rare degree of clarity the author examines relationships among nineteenth-century American expansionism, discourses about gender, and writings of women who traveled and lived in the American West in the late nineteenth century - British travelers, American journalists, a Native American tribal leader, and female naturalists.Drawing from a rich diversity of primary sources, from published travelogues and unpublished archival sources such as letters and diaries to newspaper reportage, Morin considers ways in which women's writing was influenced by the material circumstances of travel in addition to the various social norms that circumscribed female roles. Ranging in scale from the interior of train cars and the homes of these women to the colonial projects of conquering the American West, the author illustrates how geography was fundamental to the formation of women's identity and greatly influenced the gendered and colonialist language found in their writing.

Reacting to Hitler: Polish, Hungarian, Lithuanian, and Romanian foreign policy, 1933-1939

Abstract: The nations of East Central Europe have traditionally been portrayed as “victims” of Nazi German expansionism. In this work the foreign policies of Poland, Lithuania, Hungary, and Romania from 1933 to 1939 were examined through the paradigm of Hitler's major foreign policy achievements to explore this prevalent notion and to discern why the foreign policies of these governments failed. These included his rise to power in 1933, the remilitarization of the Rhineland, the Anschluss with Austria, the dismemberment of Czechoslovakia, and the invasion of Poland. Specifically, the reactions of these four nations to German action and their relationships with each other were examined. It was found that their foreign policies ended in failure due to their inability to substitute shortsighted national objectives that focused on regional revision at the expense of their neighbors for regional security directed against German expansionism.

The Greek—Ottoman Boundary as Institution, Locality, and Process, 1832-1882:

Abstract: Borders are often described as lines of conflict between states. The Greek—Ottoman boundary of the 19th century is no exception; history condemned it as a dangerous front of Greek state expansionism at the expense of a declining Ottoman Empire. This article uses Ottoman and Greek archival documents and British consular records to show that the Greek—Ottoman boundary was, in many ways, a well-managed institution. The central states that governed it and the two sides' border guards often cooperated and colluded to provide security and forestall conflict. Although the border eventually collapsed and moved northward at the expense of the Ottomans, this article demonstrates that the early decades of the boundary contain tremendous insight for historians and social scientists interested in contentious politics and institutions.

Mayday, Mayday! Newspaper framing anti-globalizers! A critical analysis of the Irish Independent's anticipatory coverage of the `Day of the Welcomes' demonstrations

Abstract: This article provides a critical analysis of the discourses employed in the Irish Independent's anticipatory coverage of the `Day of the Welcomes' demonstrations that occurred in Dublin during 2004. These demonstrations were organized by a broad church of `anti-globalization' activists who sought to use the coincidence of EU enlargement and the May Day holiday as an opportunity to highlight alternative visions of the European project. As Ireland's biggest selling `quality' newspaper, the Irish Independent has had a significant role in framing public debates about key social and political questions in this state. I show how, in the run up to the `Day of the Welcomes', the Irish Independent's coverage discredited both the political aspirations and the potential conduct of protesters. The overwhelming thrust of this coverage was to sanction dominant ideologies in relation to neo-liberalism, EU expansionism and the place of dissent in Irish society.

The Benin Kingdom in British Imperial Historiography

Abstract: The body of knowledge that constituted British imperial writing, and the expression that interacted with it were attempts to engage European readership on the imperial adventure in Africa in the age of the new imperialism. This study is an attempt to address the complex issues involved in the production of historical knowledge about precolonial Benin to justify British colonial rule. The argument advanced in this paper is that, since imperial discourse set out to deal with history in terms of civilization, British imperial writing was a struggle to articulate certain ideas about Benin into a position of dominance before the British public. As Mary Louise Pratt explains, “depicting the civilizing mission as an aesthetic project is a strategy the west has often used for defining others as available for and in need of its benign and beautifying intervention.” British imperial discourse will form the basis of the discussion in this paper.Imperial discourse and its subjectivity raises questions about issues of power and privilege of those writers who were determined to sustain their voices in the debate on European imperialism in Africa. Their approach to the constitution of knowledge about Benin was one of many ways that opened the frontiers of knowledge about African states and societies to redefine civilization, albeit for the purposes of understanding various meanings and implications in this intellectual assault. This provides a vital entry point for examining the European colonial approach to the construction of the image of Africa. The aim is to demonstrate how this process suggests a connection from imperial expansionism to forms of knowledge and expression that reaffirmed metropolitan authority in the context of colonial subjugation.

Discourse on the Admission of Slovenia to the European Union: Internal Colonialism

Abstract: The admission of former communist countries to the EU raised the question regarding their position in this supranational structure. This paper presents the results of a discourse analysis of the press and political and business leaders in the southern Austrian province Carinthia, where public discourse of difference between Others/Slovenians/non-Europeans and Us/Carinthians/Austrians/Europeans has been prevalent for decades. Macropropositional and lexical analysis display three key discourses regarding the admission of Slovenia to the EU: integrational discourse; differential discourse based on the level of Europeanity between Carinthia/Austria as ‘Western European’ and Slovenia as ‘Eastern European’ and thus not a sufficiently ‘European’ member of the EU; and discourse of economic expansionism. The analysis also uncovers the strategies of Carinthian public discourse, which display the occurrence of a new form of exploitation, so-called internal colonialism.

Nation-Building in the Philippines: Rooseveltian Statecraft for Imperial Modernization in an Emergent Transatlantic World Order

Abstract: The acquisition of the Philippines in the wake of the Spanish–American War gave Theodore Roosevelt's presidency an unprecedented mandate for conflict resolution, post-war reconstruction and development through modernization and democratization. A network of bilateral inter-colonial relations contributed to the extension of triangular transatlantic reciprocal influence. The lessons of America's continental empire-building, assessment of competing colonial experiments, and modern attempts at public diplomacy fed into a strategy of preventive containment of Japanese expansionism through popular consent. The intention was to institute an enduring “special relationship” to build up America's power in the Pacific, and to transform the Philippines into a model that would then “naturally” expand into a transcontinental informal empire by proxy.

The minaret and the palace: obedience at home and rebellion abroad

Abstract: From Tangier to Jakarta, and from Western capitals to those of the Arab world, Saudi Arabia has confirmed its status as a kingdom without borders. Its political influence, religious expansion and media empires are now applauded, debated or contested and both local recipients of Saudi largesse and governments enmeshed in Saudi agendas debate a phenomenon that so far has attracted more sensational reporting than serious scholarly analysis. Kingdom Without Borders is the first volume to shed light on this growing regional and international power and its ambitions to project its influence beyond its frontiers in three interrelated spheres of activity. This volume brings together established scholars from Europe, the US, the Middle East and Asia to map the historical roots and contemporary manifestations of Saudi expansionism. Combining both top-down and grass roots analysis, contributors interrogate the reality and impact of Saudi transnational connections on local politics, religious affiliation and media genres. This exploration leads to a reassessment of the changing nature of state and society in Saudi Arabia in an age of globalisation. It highlights contradictions within Saudi Arabia with the emergence of multiple actors in the state and the consolidation of new non-state actors who, thanks to a second oil boom, may either consolidate or subvert the state. Contributors also trace the impact of Saudi religious, financial and political influence on receiving societies, — including Yemen, the USA and Lebanon — their objective being to move the discussion away from accusations and counter accusations about support for terrorism to offer a nuanced approach to how local contexts are shaped by external actors in a globalised world.

Holocauste et colonialisme. Contribution à une archéologie de la pensée génocidaire

Abstract: The invasion of Poland and the Soviet Union by the German Reich was without doubt a significant war of colonial expansionism. The Nazi officials with Hitler at their head justified this policy of expansionism with clear references to colonial history. However, not all researchers consider the Third Reich’s policy of expansionism in terms of colonial history. In fact, historical research deliberately ignores the structural similarities between National-Socialism and Colonialism. One can get the false impression that Hitler was not really interested in building a colonial empire if one does not pay enough attention to the fact of how this “colonial empire” would have modified the world map.Fifty years ago, Hannah Arendt highlighted the link between imperialism and the totalitarian phenomena and posited the thesis that imperialism played a role of a precursor to the National-Socialist ideology. In those days her analysis was hardly accepted. Yet a comparative study of these two phenomena leads us to see in the Nazi expansionist policy a transformation of the colonial phenomenon. Still the understanding of the relationship between Colonialism and Nazism is a highly political issue, hampered by arguments on the uniqueness of the Holocaust which also belongs to the philosophy of history and issues of identity.

‘Brighter Britain’: Images of Empire in the International Child Rescue Movement, 1850–1915

Abstract: The literature produced by the child rescue movement, disseminated from England in the second half of the nineteenth century, was replete with images of Empire. Organizations such as Dr Barnardo’s, the Church of England Waifs and Strays Society, the National Children’s Homes and the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children all produced magazines for both adult and child supporters from the earliest years of their operation. Although the circulation of such magazines is unknown, the publication of correspondence and subscription lists show that they were read widely throughout Britain and the colonies, positioning the work of child rescue organizations, and their charismatic male founders, within the larger context of the ‘civilizing mission’. The term, the ‘civilizing mission’, was used primarily to describe the attempts by Evangelical Christians to inscribe a benevolent purpose within British imperial expansionism, providing the justification for much of the missionary activity described elsewhere in this volume.1 However, in this chapter, the focus is on the civilizing mission at home, a process by which insights gained from missionary endeavour abroad were used to evangelize the great unchurched in the slums and rookeries of England’s cities.

Levantines and Marseille: The Politics of Naturalization and Neutralization in Early Modern France, 1660–1720

Abstract: This study examines the connections between fluctuations in French policies directed at Levantine migrations into the kingdom, and depictions of Ottoman Levantine peoples in French travel literature during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries French characterizations of the Levantine and Turkish other were not consistently negative On the contrary, during the height of Colbertiste mercantilist expansion, from 1660 to 1683, the French favourably assessed Levantine lands and peoples in travel literature, and initiated an open-door policy in the French Mediterranean port of Marseille that encouraged Levantine Armenian and Jewish migrations into France French and Levantine peoples, the argument went, shared common characteristics, histories and mores By the end of Colbert's tenure, however, such inclusive ideas became increasingly incompatible with the Crown's shifting commercial interests and religious ideologies and its ambivalence towards Turkish expansionism Writers therefore opted for ne

Greek-Bulgarian Relations in the Post–Cold War Era: Contributing to Stability and Development in Southeastern Europe

Abstract: The Balkan Peninsula has been an unstable regional security subsystem because of a number of defining and qualitative parameters, namely, overt or covert challenges to the territorial status, interethnic conflicts, the “great idea” syndrome, out-of-system interference, and minority expansionism. In the post–Cold War era, European Union enlargement in the area assisted the establishment of a core of systemic stabilizers that could, under certain conditions, absorb inherent instability. Greece and Bulgaria constitute an axis providing eufunctional input to the regional stability and security equation. Their partnership has been an example of inter-Balkan cooperation and an effort to establish an equilibrium mechanism to enhance the cohesion of the region.

Historical Contexts and Logics of American Expansionism

Abstract: The period of 1978-80 is regarded as a revolutionary turning point in the world’s social and economic history (Harvey 2005: 1). A force called globalization" has been felt around the world. Globalization debates have been prevalent in the social sciences from the 1990s onward, taking the place of debates on postmodernism. In retrospect, in the latter half of the 20th century, we were confronted with debates ranging from the Miliband-Poulantzas debate" (1960s-70s), state-deviation debates" in what was then West Germany, to the bringing the state back in" movement in the American political science, and now globalization debates have gained prominence. After the demise of the Soviet bloc, the US gained an ability to act unilaterally, paving the way for the Bush (Jr.) administration’s declaration of a preemptive military attack" and a preventive use of force" in the aftermath of September 11". The 2003 invasion of Iraq by the US and the Coalition of the willing" was conducted without the support of the UN Security Council and was justi ed as a preemptive strategy because of the assumed presence of weapons of mass destruction. In order to understand the American policies exempli ed by the invasion of Iraq, the NATO intervention in Kosovo, and the 1990 Persian Gulf War, one must examine the development of American hegemony and place the current state of affairs in historical context. In 1885 John W. Burgess, one of the founders of American political science, expressed his vision of America from a historical perspective;

China's Africa expansionism: Competitive questions

Abstract: Introduction Since the beginning the 2000s, China's foreign policy thinking on Africa became a priority. Africa has not received attention from China to this extent since the 1970s (Davies, Endinger, Tay and Naidu 2008.) This strategic shift in international relations between China and Africa is attracting a great deal of interest and commentary. China's investment push in the continent has been facilitated by generous aid and loan packages. China has cancelled US$1,4 billion of African debt and announced additional debt relief of more than US$1,3 billion. At a summit of African leaders in Beijing in 2007, China said it would also double its level of assistance to Africa by 2009 (Davies et al. 2008.)

Veiled Intentions: The Cultural Mythology Of Veils, Harems, And Belly Dancers In The Service Of Empire, Security, And Globalization

Abstract: In the contemporary context, mythologized figures of Arab womanhood, such as the seemingly ubiquitous image of the veiled woman and the persistent icon of the belly dancer, continue to operate as the visual vocabulary through which collective anxieties about new forms of power and progress manifest. If images of belly dancers and harem girls in twentieth-century tobacco advertisements reflect the disorientations of consumerism and expansionism in the United States at the turn of the twentieth century, contemporary images of Arab womanhood continue to be engaged with consumerism and expansionism in the context of contemporary U.S. neoliberalism and imperialism. In this chapter, I am interested in applying the trajectory of my argument thus far to representations of Arab and Muslim womanhood in what might be called the era of globalization, from the 1970s to the present. Like my analysis of the metanarrative of modernity, I will be investigating mainstream discourses of globalization in terms of their disavowal of the neocolonial and imperialist projects in which they are embedded.

The Potential for a Democratic Islam

Abstract: The Potential for a Democratic Islam Political Islam, World Politics and Europe, by Bassam Tibi, Routledge, Taylor and Francis Books, 2008, 311 pp Reviewed by Daphne Burdman Bassam Tibi examines Islamist expansionism both in Muslim and Western societies, a phenomenon that appears in violent and deceptively peaceful guises He presents a penetrating and analytical study of the West's inability to comprehend the underlying ideologies of Islamism, which is crucial if it hopes to effectively confront this increasingly dire situation By demonstrating its essential structure, Tibi also examines the potential for democracy in societies where classical Islam prevails Tibi defines his book as a "social-scientific study" and not a theological analysis He views "religious activism" as a social fact However, he accepts the self-image of jihadists as "true believers in [their] new world order of 'hakimiyyat Allah/God's rule" He argues that "religion has become politicized" and "politics has become religionized" Quoting Sayyid Qutb (1906-1996), the ideologist of the Muslim Brotherhood, who stated "Islam is meant for the entire globe," he traces worldwide jihadist terrorism to this expansionist ideology and dismisses as "deceit" excuses that these actions are manifestations of outrage over Western policies in Palestine, Iraq, Afghanistan and Lebanon From the overall tone of the book it is clear that Professor Tibi is also a strong advocate of the Muslim world He criticizes violent hegemonic expansionism which he sees as destructive not only to non-Muslims but also to Muslims themselves by deflecting the latter from a constructive course to build a better society Professor Tibi is particularly qualified both professionally and personally to write this detailed and thoughtful study because of his unique understanding of both Islamic and Western cultures Tibi was born in Damascus, Syria, to a family of notable Islamic scholars As a boy he studied and memorized the Qur'an in the traditional way, yet at that early age questioned his teachers regarding the Muslim assumption of superiority After receiving his Baccalaureate from a Damascene French lycee, he went to Frankfurt University, Germany, earning degrees in social science, philosophy and history At the "Frankfurt School" with teachers such as Horkheimer, Adorno and Habermas, he embraced the "rationalism" of Max Weber He correlates this rationalism with the tradition of medieval Islamic rationalism found in al-Farabi, Avicenna, Averroes, and Ibn Khaldun (ninth to fourteenth centuries CE), the pinnacle of which is considered the "Golden Age of Islam" Tibi defines himself as both a reformist and a practicing Muslim Tibi, who heads the Department of International Relations at the University of Goettingen, Germany, is AD White Professor at Large at Cornell University, USA, and was previously visiting professor at Harvard University and other US universities He has authored 27 books in German which have been translated into 16 languages, and seven books in English Expansionism Tibi disagrees with Huntington's Clash of Civilizations concept He maintains that the "clash" is within Islamic societies, and not between Islamic and external societies Previously, he disagreed with Fukuyama, who postulated the "End of History" at the conclusion of the Cold War, but is now conditionally in agreement with him since Fukuyama has acknowledged Europe as a new battleground of Western values versus values of the European Islamic diaspora1 Tibi views today's jihadist/militant radical Islamists and Islamism (deriving from the thought of Hasan al-Banna (1928) and Sayyid Qutb, with additional contributions from Ayatollah Khomeini) as a new creation He sees its politicization as an invented tradition and a manipulation of the basic Islamic theological concepts of jihad according to the Qur'an This has led to the establishment of a "transnational totalitarian organization" aimed at destabilizing the political hegemony and cultural values of Western and democratic nations, while also targeting so-called moderate Islamic nations …

La regionalización de la seguridad en América del Norte

Abstract: The following work suggests that 6 years after the 9-11 attacks, security policies in North America present two distinct features: on one hand, the US government has imposed the region’s security standards, what has produced, on the other hand, several reactions in Canada and Mexico for and against US initiatives. Both trends have contributed to the regionalization of security. It seems clear to the author that this process is double-folded: first, borders have been maintained as the response towards external threats, namely terrorism (USA) or expansionism (Canada, Mexico); second, the US government seems to be in need of a safety perimeter, objective that has led to several bi- and tri-lateral agreements. This process has allowed the emergence of a “selective Customs Union”, in which cooperation in security issues are in the top of the agenda.