The Ambivalent Potential of Cultural Identity

1996 ◽  
Vol 29 (1) ◽  
pp. 3-22 ◽  
Author(s):  
Katherine Fierlbeck
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Identity ◽  
Cultural Context ◽  
Political Community ◽  
Political Rights ◽  
Normative Force ◽  
Liberal Democratic ◽  
Political Relations ◽  
Universal Human Rights ◽  
Democratic Norms ◽  
Recent Claim

AbstractDespite the overwhelming prevalence of democratic ideals in contemporary political relations throughout the world, a potent ideological challenge to liberal democratic norms is the recent claim that “differential” rights are essential to foster and protect the identity of individual rights within culturally distinct groups. This article examines the claim that cultural identity confers sufficient normative force upon which to base distinct political rights for specific groups. In what, precisely, does the normative force of “cultural identity” lie? The article challenges the claims that individuals' sense of personal identity can only arise through a “secure cultural context”; that a passive sense of group identity is a “primary good” that equals or even precedes the importance of universal human rights; and that this “politics of inclusion” based upon differential rights for different groups will lead to greater equality and tolerance within the larger political community.

scholarly journals A Postmodern Defence of Universal Liberal Legal Norms

2010 ◽  
Vol 23 (1) ◽  
pp. 5-31 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lisa M. Austin
Keyword(s):  
The Self ◽  
Legal Responsibility ◽  
Ethical Responsibility ◽  
Community Practice ◽  
Legal Norms ◽  
Liberal Democratic ◽  
The Social ◽  
Universal Human Rights ◽  
Strong Resemblance ◽  
Democratic Norms

The idea of universal liberal legal norms has long been under attack from a variety of sources. One of the most sustained and sophisticated philosophical versions of such an attack is found in the work of Martin Heidegger. His argument from the social embeddedness of the self to the ultimate contingency and groundlessness of any claims of normativity has been highly influential across a number of fields. This paper argues that legal theorists who wish to contest such a view should look to the work of philosopher Emmanuel Levinas. In his critique of Heidegger, Levinas affirms the significance of the human beyond the particular context in which we find ourselves embedded. Levinas wrote very little about law; his main focus was on ethical responsibility and the claim that an “other” makes on me. I argue that legal responsibility is fundamentally different, concerned instead with the claims that a self can make on others. Drawing upon Levinas’ understanding of the self as constituted through ethical responsibility, I argue that a Levinasian account of justice can support liberal-democratic norms such as freedom, equality and dignity. Indeed, Levinas himself endorsed universal human rights and even indicated a strong affinity with Kant’s idea of justice. What he denied, however, was that justice is a fully rational and coherent concept. I argue that this does not render justice incoherent or call into question the basic status of the norms of justice. Rather, a Levinasian account of justice shifts the emphasis to the community practice of reasoning about universal norms, a practice that is never complete. I further suggest that such a practice of reasoning should be familiar to lawyers as it bears a strong resemblance to common law reasoning.

Influence of the ICCPR in the Middle East

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Başak Çali
Keyword(s):  
Middle East ◽  
Legal Status ◽  
Political Rights ◽  
Reporting Practices ◽  
Rights Protection ◽  
Liberal Democratic ◽  
East Region ◽  
Civil And Political Rights ◽  
State Responses

This chapter surveys the legal influence of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) on the domestic laws of States in the Middle East region. It analyses ratification, reservation, and reporting practices, the domestic legal status of the ICCPR, and State responses to the Human Rights Committee’s concluding observations. The chapter argues that the ICCPR’s legal influence in the region is structurally hampered due to its lack of authoritative legal status and the dominance of defensive domestic legalism. A significant gap remains between the HRC’s vision of civil and political rights protection grounded in the entrenchment of liberal, democratic, and multicultural laws and the region’s authoritarian or majoritarian political structures that foreground security and treat non-majority identities as threats. The influence of the ICCPR on domestic laws in the Middle East remains a long-term battle, whereby small gains under limited legal opportunity structures remain the overarching norm.

scholarly journals Killing a Constitution with a Thousand Cuts: Executive Aggrandizement and Party-state Fusion in India

2020 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
pp. 49-95 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tarunabh Khaitan
Keyword(s):  
Good Governance ◽  
Democratic Governance ◽  
The Political ◽  
State Institutions ◽  
Liberal Democratic ◽  
The People ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
General Elections ◽  
The Media ◽  
Democratic Norms

AbstractMany concerned citizens, including judges, bureaucrats, politicians, activists, journalists, and academics, have been claiming that Indian democracy has been imperilled under the premiership of Narendra Modi, which began in 2014. To examine this claim, the Article sets up an analytic framework for accountability mechanisms liberal democratic constitutions put in place to provide a check on the political executive. The assumption is that only if this framework is dismantled in a systemic manner can we claim that democracy itself is in peril. This framework helps distinguish between actions that one may disagree with ideologically but are nonetheless permitted by an elected government, from actions that strike at the heart of liberal democratic constitutionalism. Liberal democratic constitutions typically adopt three ways of making accountability demands on the political executive: vertically, by demanding electoral accountability to the people; horizontally, by subjecting it to accountability demands of other state institutions like the judiciary and fourth branch institutions; and diagonally, by requiring discursive accountability by the media, the academy, and civil society. This framework assures democracy over time – i.e. it guarantees democratic governance not only to the people today, but to all future peoples of India. Each elected government has the mandate to implement its policies over a wide range of matters. However, seeking to entrench the ruling party’s stranglehold on power in ways that are inimical to the continued operation of democracy cannot be one of them. The Article finds that the first Modi government in power between 2014 and 2019 did indeed seek to undermine each of these three strands of executive accountability. Unlike the assault on democratic norms during India Gandhi’s Emergency in the 1970s, there is little evidence of a direct or full-frontal attack during this period. The Bharatiya Janata Party government’s mode of operation was subtle, indirect, and incremental, but also systemic. Hence, the Article characterizes the phenomenon as “killing a constitution by a thousand cuts.” The incremental assaults on democratic governance were typically justified by a combination of a managerial rhetoric of efficiency and good governance (made plausible by the undeniable imperfection of our institutions) and a divisive rhetoric of hyper-nationalism (which brands political opponents of the party as traitors of the state). Since its resounding victory in the 2019 general elections, the Modi government appears to have moved into consolidation mode. No longer constrained by the demands of coalition partners, early signs suggest that it may abandon the incrementalist approach for a more direct assault on democratic constitutionalism.

War without Citizens

2018 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 18-38
Author(s):  
Stephen J. Rosow
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Consumer Culture ◽  
The United States ◽  
The State ◽  
Political Community ◽  
Democratic Citizenship ◽  
The Political ◽  
The Public ◽  
Liberal Democratic ◽  
Advanced Technologies

Contestation over war memorialization can help democratic theory respond to the current attenuation of citizenship in war in liberal democratic states, especially the United States. As war involves more advanced technologies and fewer soldiers, the relation of citizenship to war changes. In this context war memorialization plays a particular role in refiguring the relation. Current practices of remembering and memorializing war in contemporary neoliberal states respond to a dilemma: the state needs to justify and garner support for continual wars while distancing citizenship from participation. The result is a consumer culture of memorialization that seeks to effect a unity of the political community while it fights wars with few citizens and devalues the public. Neoliberal wars fought with few soldiers and an economic logic reveals the vulnerability to otherness that leads to more active and critical democratic citizenship.

scholarly journals Human Rights and Cultural Identity

2015 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 112-135 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gordon John-Stewart
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Cultural Identity ◽  
Culturally Sensitive ◽  
Cultural Identities ◽  
Ethical Relativism ◽  
Small Core ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
Universal Human Rights

Abstract Universal human rights and particular cultural identities, which are relativistic by nature, seem to stand in conflict with each other. It is commonly suggested that the relativistic natures of cultural identities undermine universal human rights and that human rights might compromise particular cultural identities in a globalised world. This article examines this supposed clash and suggests that it is possible to frame a human rights approach in such a way that it becomes the starting point and constraining framework for all non-deficient cultural identities. In other words, it is possible to depict human rights in a culturally sensitive way so that universal human rights can meet the demands of a moderate version of meta-ethical relativism which acknowledges a small universal core of objectively true or false moral statements and avers that, beyond that small core, all other moral statements are neither objectively true nor false.

scholarly journals What do we do now? Examining civilian masculinity/ies in contemporary liberal civil-military relations

2018 ◽  
Vol 45 (2) ◽  
pp. 239-259
Author(s):  
Katharine M. Millar
Keyword(s):  
Military Service ◽  
Complex Dynamics ◽  
Research Programme ◽  
Political Community ◽  
Civil Military Relations ◽  
Liberal Democratic ◽  
Contemporary Politics ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Military Relations ◽  
The Military

AbstractIn contemporary Western, liberal democratic societies, the soldier is frequently regarded as ‘the best of us’, taking on the unlimited liability for the protection and betterment of the whole. In the context of volunteer militaries and distant conflicts, the construction of men (and the universalised masculine citizen) as ‘always-already’ soldiers (or potential soldiers) poses a substantial obstacle to the identification or performance of ‘good’ civilian masculinity – particularly during wartime. The theorisation and articulation of a positive, substantive civilian masculinity, or masculinities, rather than one defined simply by an absence of military service and implication in the collective use of violence, is a central challenge of contemporary politics. As a means of illuminating the complex dynamics of this challenge, this article examines charitable practices of civilian support for the military, and corresponding constructions of masculinity, in the UK during the ‘war on terror’. In doing so, the article demonstrates the ways in which gendered ‘civilian anxiety’, through its connection to citizenship, comes to condition the political possibilities and subjectivities of all those who seek belonging in the liberal political community. The article concludes by arguing for the essentiality of a research programme oriented around ‘civilianness’, and civilian masculinity/ies.

scholarly journals Indigenous people’s self-determination in the context of COVID-19 in northern Mexico

2021 ◽  
pp. 117718012110585
Author(s):  
Juan Jaime Loera Gonzaléz
Keyword(s):  
Self Determination ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Rights ◽  
Community Responses ◽  
Northern Mexico ◽  
Current Health ◽  
Indigenous Groups ◽  
Political Relations ◽  
Indigenous Territories ◽  
Care Guidelines

This article presents various transformations registered in the political sphere and community participation due to the COVID-19 pandemic on Indigenous territories in northern Mexico. It explores the challenges of the Rarámuri and Ódami Indigenous people’s experience in guaranteeing their political rights and self-determination in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, specifically when organising festivities and ceremonies that were unable to celebrate to comply with official health care guidelines. The article gives firsthand accounts of the political relations between Indigenous groups’ community responses and the Mexican government’s actions to mitigate the effects of the new coronavirus. The article draws on the argument that the current health emergency context is inserted into a complex network of pre-existing and structured power relations that largely define the scope of the actions taken because of the pandemic. Critically, the community responses emanating from Indigenous groups show crucial cultural differences in ways to deal with the disease.

scholarly journals Cultural Identity in the Case-Law of the Human Rights Committee

2017 ◽  
Vol 7 ◽  
pp. 119-139
Author(s):  
Sylwia Stryjkowska
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Cultural Identity ◽  
Case Law ◽  
Political Rights ◽  
Linguistic Minorities ◽  
Civil And Political Rights ◽  
Insight Into

The aim of the article is to present the jurisprudence of the Human Rights Committee on Article 27 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights concerning the rights of persons belonging to ethnic, religious and linguistic minorities. Therefore, the study examines the underprivileged position of minorities within States and focuses on their will to survive as a distinct culture. Examination of the aforementioned caselaw provides an insight into the Committee’s understanding of the concept of cultural identity.

scholarly journals Antropologiczna orientacja słowa 'prawo' w twórczości Adama Mickiewicza

2015 ◽  
Vol 37 ◽  
pp. 121-139
Author(s):  
Maria Teresa Lizisowa
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Identity ◽  
Legal Culture ◽  
Political Life ◽  
Law And Order ◽  
Bad Faith ◽  
Political Relations ◽  
The World ◽  
Symbolic Meanings ◽  
Grand Duchy Of Lithuania ◽  
Grand Duchy

The anthropological orientation of the word law in Adam Mickiewicz’s writingsThis article discusses the anthropological orientation of the word law in Adam Mickiewicz’s writings. The author claims that this word is essential for the interpretation of the poet’s historiosophical thought, in the context of legal culture of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. The citizens of Lithuanian territories recognized the 16th century Statutes as a distinctive feature of the state’s cultural identity, because they were still effective in the judicature under the Russian Partition, and in social awareness they remained a semblance of the independence from the foreign rule. The Romantic understanding of law, state and morality resulted in perceiving these values as “the spirit of the world” of which the image of virtue was born. In the dimension of legal discourse, law as an idea takes a real shape in its definition, in poetic tropes, and in scholarly discussions, but most of all in the actions of literary characters. The metaphorical and symbolic meanings of law manifest themselves in the topos of the court of law, judging what is right and what is wrong; good and bad faith; in family, social and political relations. The analysis of the texts has shown that the poet, by depicting the way of perceiving and understanding the organisation of political life in analogy to family life, enclosed his own personal vision of law and order in the structures of language. Антропологическая ориентация слова право в творчестве Адама МицкевичаСтатья посвящена антропологической ориентации слова право в текстах Адама Мицкевича. Автор утверждает, что слово является ключом к интерпрета ции главной историософической мысли поэта в контексте юридической культуры Великого княжества Литовского. Культурообразующим знаком государства для жителей литовских земель были статуты XVI века, которые были обязательны еще на территории аннексированной Россией, а в общественном сознании oни были символом зависимости от чужой власти. Понимание права, государства и моральности в Романтизме отражают ценности, олицетворяющие «дух мира», который рождает представление о добродетели. В юридическом дискурсе право как идея добра принимает реальную форму в определении, в поэтических тропах и в ученых выводах, а прежде всего в действиях литературных героев. Метафорическое и символическое значение права выражается в теме суда, устанавливающего правых и виноватых, выносящего решение о добрых и злых намерениях в семейных, общественных и политических отношениях. Анализ текстов показывает, что поэт, проводя аналогию между политической и семейной жизнью, в структурах языка реализует собственное представление о законности.

Democracy Through Darkness

2021 ◽  
pp. 199-214
Author(s):  
Emily Van Duyn
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Survey Data ◽  
The United States ◽  
Political Expression ◽  
The Public ◽  
Liberal Democratic ◽  
Public Expression ◽  
The Face ◽  
Democratic Norms ◽  
Sizeable Number

Chapter 8 reviews the focus of this book—how and why people keep their politics a secret—based on observations of CWG and the survey data. This chapter argues that the existence of political secrecy says that the democracy in the United States is dark. That the fear laid bare in the women’s experiences and the sizeable number of people who engage in secret political expression are evidence that liberal democratic norms are being threatened. But it also considers how political secrecy might tell us that democracy is alive. That people continue in the face of opposition and that secrecy can be a tool to help people engage in politics when they feel it is risky. Finally, this chapter addresses the implications for practitioners, asking them to consider the ways in which they privilege public expression, and encouraging them to consider this an inaccurate picture of the public itself.

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