Anthropological realism in a scientistic age

2017 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
pp. 129-150 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Herzfeld
Keyword(s):  
Social Experience ◽  
Authoritarian Regimes ◽  
The Political ◽  
Critical Thought ◽  
Sharp Distinction ◽  
Audit Culture ◽  
Anthropological Theory ◽  
Political Implications ◽  
Realist Position ◽  
Political Advantage

Anthropology is a realist discipline. In this article, I draw a sharp distinction between realism and scientism, or objectivism, arguing that realism requires the recognition of the contexts and contingency of all knowledge, including ethnography, whereas scientism – a rhetoric that invokes science as its source of authority – paradoxically occludes recognition of its own context of production. A realist position, anchored in social experience and aware of the limitations that such an entailment involves, is thus far better situated to explore the political implications of anthropological theory, especially in a world where market consumerism, neoliberalism and audit culture, as well as certain authoritarian regimes, have, to their political advantage, substituted quantitative rhetoric for critical thought.

Economic Regionalism

2019 ◽  
pp. 179-218
Author(s):  
Anastassia V. Obydenkova ◽  
Alexander Libman
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Policy ◽  
Indirect Effect ◽  
Authoritarian Regimes ◽  
The Political ◽  
Russian Foreign Policy ◽  
Regional Organizations ◽  
Eurasian Economic Union ◽  
Political Implications ◽  
Long Line ◽  
Set Up

Unlike the CIS, the Eurasian Economic Union, which was set up in 2015, but follows a long line of regional organizations which existed since 1995, focuses exclusively on economic affairs. The chapter discusses the governance and the membership of the EAEU, as well as its economic and political implications. It analyzes possible influences of the EAEU on the political regimes of the member countries, and concludes that the EAEU itself does not seem to exercise autocracy-promoting influences. However, the chapter shows that, by studying the EAEU, it is important to take into account an indirect effect: the existence of the EAEU triggers changes in Russian foreign policy, which in turn can contribute to the stabilization of authoritarian regimes.

The Influence of Utilitarianism on Natural Rights Doctrines

Utilitas ◽  
1997 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 183-202
Author(s):  
Gregory I. Molivas
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Public Good ◽  
Moral Agency ◽  
Natural Rights ◽  
The Political ◽  
The Public ◽  
Sharp Distinction ◽  
Political Advantage ◽  
Rights Theories

This paper shows that the perceived difference between utilitarianism and natural rights theories in the eighteenth century was much less sharp than that in the twentieth century. This is demonstrated by exploring Josiah Tucker's critique of Locke and his disciples and the way in which the latter responded to it. Tucker's critique of Locke was based on a sharp distinction between a conception of natural rights as individual entitlements and the conception of the public good. The disciples of Locke did not share Tucker's views and his interpretation of Locke. In defending natural rights they appealed less to the notion of moral agency and more to utilitarian ideas. The extent to which the advocates of the rights of man employed utilitarian ideas is obscured by the fact that they never divested themselves of the political advantage of using the words ‘natural rights’ even when their arguments were closer to the principle of utility.

PENSAMENTO POLÍTICO EM GIORGIO AGAMBEN

Professare ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 109
Author(s):  
Claudemir Aparecido Lopes
Keyword(s):  
Political Freedom ◽  
State Of Exception ◽  
The Political ◽  
State Control ◽  
Giorgio Agamben ◽  
Modern Democracy ◽  
Social Fabric ◽  
Contemporary Politics ◽  
Political Implications ◽  
The Social

<p class="resumoabstract">O professor Giorgio Agamben tem elaborado críticas à engenhosa estrutura política ocidental moderna. Avalia os mecanismos de controle estatal, nos quais os denomina ‘dispositivos’, cuja força está na imbricação às normas jurídico-teológicas com seus similares ritos e liturgias. Suas ocorrências e legitimidade preponderam no tecido social cuja organização sistêmica se põe quase como elemento natural e não cultural. O texto tem por objetivo explorar a concepção política de Agamben sobre a política contemporânea, especialmente considerando seu livro: ‘Estado de Exceção’, cuja investigação apresenta a possibilidade de atenuação dos direitos de cidadania e o enfraquecimento da prática da liberdade política e o processo de relação dos indivíduos no meio social através da redução das subjetividades ‘autênticas’. Analisamos ainda a transferência do mundo sacro elaborado pelos teólogos católicos presente na modernidade à política cuja democracia moderna faz do homem (sujeito) tornar-se objeto do poder político. Faz também, reflexão dos conceitos de subjetivação e dessubjetivação relacionando-os às implicações políticas do homem moderno. A pesquisa é bibliográfica com ênfase na análise dos conceitos elaborados por Agamben, especialmente quanto ao ‘dispositivo’. Conclui que o indivíduo ocidental, de modo geral, sofre o processo de dessubjetivação e está ‘nu’, indefeso e alienado politicamente. Ele precisa voltar-se ao processo de ‘profanação’ dos dispositivos para libertar-se das vinculações orientadoras que forçosamente o descaracteriza enquanto ser ativo e livre.</p><p class="resumoabstract"><strong>Palavras-chave</strong>: Política. Liberdade. Subjetivação.</p><h3>ABSTRACT</h3><p class="resumoabstract">Professor Giorgio Agamben has been criticizing the ingenious modern Western political structure. It evaluates the mechanisms of state control, in which it calls them 'devices', whose strength lies in the overlap with legal-theological norms with their similar rites and liturgies. Its occurrences and legitimacy preponderate in the social fabric whose systemic organization is almost as a natural and not a cultural element. The text aims to explore Agamben's political conception of contemporary politics, especially considering his book 'State of Exception', whose research presents the possibility of attenuating citizenship rights and weakening the practice of political freedom and the individuals in the social environment through the reduction of 'authentic' subjectivities. We also analyze the transfer of the sacred world elaborated by the Catholic theologians present in the modernity to the politics whose modern democracy makes of the man - subject - to become object of the political power. It also reflects on the concepts of subjectivation and desubjectivation, relating them to the political implications of modern man. The research is bibliographical with emphasis in the analysis of the concepts elaborated by Agamben, especially with regard to the 'device'. He concludes that the Western individual, in general, suffers the process of desubjectivation and is 'naked', defenseless and politically alienated. He must turn to the process of 'desecration' of devices to free himself from the guiding bindings that forcibly demeanes him while being active and free.</p><p class="resumoabstract"><strong>Keywords</strong>: Politics. Freedom. Subjectivity. </p><p> </p>

Princes and Parliaments in the Arab World

2004 ◽  
Vol 58 (3) ◽  
pp. 367-384 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Herb
Keyword(s):  
Arab World ◽  
Authoritarian Regimes ◽  
Political Life ◽  
The Political ◽  
The World

Several Arab monarchies have held reasonably free elections to parliaments, though all remain authoritarian. This article compares the Arab monarchies with parliaments in other parts of the world, including both those that became democracies, and those that did not. From this I derive a set of prerequisites, potential pitfalls, and expected stages in the monarchical path toward democracy. This helps us to understand not only the democratic potential of the parliamentary experiments in the Arab monarchies, but also the role these parliaments play in the political life of these authoritarian regimes.

China's Western Horizon

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniel S. Markey
Keyword(s):  
Political Influence ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Political ◽  
Regional Politics ◽  
National Wealth ◽  
Long Run ◽  
Political Implications ◽  
Foreign Policies ◽  
Belt And Road ◽  
Infrastructure Investments

This book explains how China’s new foreign policies like the vaunted “Belt and Road” Initiative are being shaped by local and regional politics outside China and assesses the political implications of these developments for Eurasia and the United States. It depicts the ways that President Xi Jinping’s China is zealously transforming its national wealth and economic power into tools of global political influence and details these developments in South Asia, Central Asia, and the Middle East. Drawing from extensive interviews, travels, and historical research, it describes how perceptions of China vary widely within states like Pakistan, Kazakhstan, and Iran. Eurasia’s powerful and privileged groups often expect to profit from their connections to China, while others fear commercial and political losses. Similarly, statesmen across Eurasia are scrambling to harness China’s energy purchases, arms sales, and infrastructure investments as a means to outdo their strategic competitors, like India and Saudi Arabia, while negotiating relations with Russia and America. The book finds that, on balance, China’s deepening involvement will play to the advantage of regional strongmen and exacerbate the political tensions within and among Eurasian states. To make the most of America’s limited influence along China’s western horizon (and elsewhere), it argues that US policymakers should pursue a selective and localized strategy to serve America’s aims in Eurasia and to better compete with China over the long run.

Afterword

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hugh B. Urban ◽  
Greg Johnson
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Academic Discourse ◽  
Critical Study ◽  
The Political ◽  
The People ◽  
Political Implications ◽  
Education Today

The Afterword includes an interview with Bruce Lincoln, in which he is asked to reflect on the current study of religion, methods of comparison, and the political implications of academic discourse. In addition to responding to specific points in these chapters, Lincoln also fleshes out what he thinks it would mean “to do better” in the critical study of religion amid the ongoing crises of higher education today. Perhaps most importantly, he reflects upon and clarifies what he means by “irreverence” in the study of religion; an irreverent approach, he concludes, entails a rejection of the sacred status that other people attribute to various things, but not of the people themselves.

The Stakes of Decolonization, 1945–1960

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Talbot C. Imlay
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Majority Rule ◽  
Minority Rights ◽  
The Political ◽  
Nation State ◽  
Individual Rights ◽  
Political Implications ◽  
Common Position ◽  
Human Individual ◽  
Post War

In examining the efforts of European socialists to forge a common position towards the issue of post-war empires, this chapter highlights some of the political stakes involved in decolonization. As debates between European and Asian socialists suggest, the process of decolonization witnessed a struggle between competing rights: national rights, minority rights, and human (individual) rights. Each set of rights possessed far-reaching political implications, none more so than minority rights, as they were often associated with limits on national sovereignty. These limits could be internal, such as constitutional restraints on the working of majority rule; but they could also take the form of external constraints on sovereignty, including alternatives to the nation state itself. The victory of the nation state, in other words, was inextricably tied to the defeat of minority rights as well as the growing predominance of human rights.

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