Cultural identity and political responsibility

Abstract

The Cultural Industries Quarter (CIQ) in Sheffield was set up in 1981 as a local government initiative. At the time this was regarded as an extraordinary, either brave or foolish, use of public money. This paper argues that the development of the CIQ over 20 years has been adversely affected by early decisions made before cultural quarters were commonplace. Left-wing politics focusing on job creation and a climate of reliance of public funding encouraged the CIQ to develop according to a particularly narrow model of cultural regeneration. Later, a lack of leadership among the public funders discouraged diversification from this model, while elsewhere cultural quarters embraced a broader mix of social and economic activity, leaving the Sheffield experiment as something of a dinosaur. The paper seeks to analyse what mistakes were made, their effects, and what now can be done to update and enliven the Sheffield Quarter.     

To whom,and for whom,must I respond? Negotiating responsibility during the last years of East German state socialism

This paper reconsiders the practice of responsibility during the last years of East German state socialism. It treats the matter of responsibility as a kind of dialogue, attending to the various ways in which people were called upon to respond to and account for their actions and those of others across a range of circumstances and predicaments. It addresses several basic questions, among them: What did the ordinary practice of responsibility look like in the East? How did this requirement to respond to and for others affect the arrangements of ordinary living? More specifically, how did the practice of responsibility work out geographically? The approach taken here is both practical and analytic. It attends to the practical and constitutive aspects of dilemmas of responsibility across a range of situations. It is also historical and ethnographic, based on the city and district of Rostock, and drawing upon a range of primary source materials, from security reports to interviews to sermons delivered during the 1980s. The paper shows some of the ways in which the practice of responsibility played itself out in relation to place. For example, residents themselves invoked a rhetoric of responsibility, criticizing local officials for being unresponsive or indifferent to their concerns. Others found ways to generate ambiguity about how the rules of the state were to be applied in particular circumstances. Finally, some residents simply refused to socialize and otherwise assume responsibility for certain others both at work and at home.     

Environmental responsibility and the possibilities of pragmatist-orientated research

Human geographers have explored at some length the discourses and subject positions implicated in the recent rise of ‘environmental responsibility’. Assigning it either as an individual disposition enacted in various spaces, a performative ‘othering’ tool, and/or a form of ecological governmentality, these debates have said little about the role of research and researchers in encouraging environmental responsibility. Utilising arguments from William James’ ‘radical empiricism’, I argue that exploring practices through a pragmatist lens enables a tentative re-envisioning of environmental responsibility. Re-visiting my doctoral research into the household-level adoption of sustainable consumption practices, I claim environmental responsibility as an ethical experience felt at the moments when practices are reconsidered. Here, my presence played a vital role in this social experimentation, which, as pragmatists argue, is the fundamental basis of positive social change.     

Moral economies of food and geographies of responsibility

This paper uses the concept of 'moral economy' to challenge the conventional view that defines morality and the market as oppositional terms. Drawing on evidence from life history interviews with key actors in the British food industry, the paper outlines how moral and ethical questions are articulated through notions of space and time. Using case study material from the chicken and sugar industries, the paper examines the way that ethical and moral issues are expressed through the dimensions of time (via notions of remembering and forgetting) and space (via notions of connecting and disconnecting) and via notions of visibility and invisibility. The paper concludes by examining how our understanding of the moral economies of food can be advanced through the adoption of a relational view of geographical scale and temporal connection, contrasting the attribution of individual blame with a politics of collective responsibility.     

The responsibility to protect and Australian foreign policy

It is widely recognised that the Responsibility to Protect (RtoP), adopted by heads of state and government in 2005, is an important new international principle. Australia has been one of the principle's most significant contributors, with prominent Australians and governments from both sides of politics contributing to its development, emergence, and implementation. This article traces and explains Australia's contribution to RtoP and asks what more it might do to assist in its implementation. It argues that Australia's commitment to RtoP is informed by a synergy of values and interests and has been strengthened by the Rudd government's reengagement with multilateralism. It concludes by calling for the development of a whole-of-government strategy for implementation and by suggesting some policy avenues that might be considered.     

沁州有水沁州心

去年仲夏,首涉以水为心的山西水上之城——长治市沁县,我们就爱上了那里。那里是出皇家大臣的风水宝地,也是窖藏民间佛塔、佛龛石刻的神秘圣地,更是由8条水系托举的清凉王国。好得无从下手去写,就循着那里的浊漳河源头,写了《一泓清可沁诗脾》发表在本刊2007年第8期上。今年1月,再去沁县,正有一个《北方水城?中国沁州——山西沁县河湖水系概念规划》论证会议召开。应沁县县委书记田志明、县长裴少飞之邀,我们客座了论证现场,为之鼓舞。情之所至,忽有一句让人美不胜收的古诗澎湃而出:"千江有水千江月"!并迅速迸发出比这句古诗更有人文精神的诗意题目:沁州有水沁州心。值世界水日,我们把感怀与领略先粗浅地书写于此,算作《旅游纵览》将见证一个水城再造的笔录题记。     

Darfur and the failure of the responsibility to protect

When official representatives of more than 170 countries adopted the principle of the ‘responsibility to protect’ (R₂P) at the September 2005 World Summit, Darfur was quickly identified as the test case for this new doctrine. The general verdict is that the international community has failed the test due to lack of political will. This article argues that the failure is real but that it is more fundamentally located within the doctrine of R₂P itself. Fulfilling the aspiration of R₂P demands an international protection capability that does not exist now and cannot be realistically expected. The critical weakness in R₂P is that the ‘responsibility to react’ has been framed as coercive protection, which attempts to be a middle way between classic peacekeeping and outright military intervention that can be undertaken without the consent of the host government. Thus far, theoretical and practical attempts to create this intermediate space for coercive protection have failed to resolve basic strategic and operational issues. In addition, the very act of raising the prospect of external military intervention for human protection purposes changes and distorts the political process and can in fact make a resolution more difficult. Following an introductory section that provides background to the war in Darfur and international engagement, this article examines the debates over the R₂P that swirled around the Darfur crisis and operational concepts developed for the African Union Mission in Sudan (AMIS) and its hybrid successor, the UN–African Union Mission in Darfur (UNAMID), especially during the Abuja peace negotiations. Three operational concepts are examined: ceasefire, disarmament and civilian protection. Unfortunately, the international policy priority o bringing UN troops to Darfur had an adverse impact on the Darfur peace talks without grappling with the central question of what international forces would do to resolve the crisis. Advocacy for the R₂P set an unrealistic ideal which became the enemy of achievable goals.     

Keeping cool: practicing domestic refrigeration and environmental responsibility

Domestic refrigerators have become symbols of climate change in energy efficiency campaigns; they are equipment that both permits and prohibits the performance of environmental citizenship. However, little is known about how subjectivities and practices interact, particularly with regard to questions about refrigeration and domestic energy. What might those of us interested in household sustainability learn from the relationships among refrigerators, energy, subjectivities, and practices, and from what these may reveal about environmental responsibility? We draw on data from mixed‐method qualitative research conducted with 28 households in Wollongong, Australia, and frame the analysis in terms of social practice theory, with additional attention to subjectivity. This framing helps us develop thinking about how refrigeration is done and consider whether and how things become waste by paying closer attention to the spatial imperatives underpinning these practices. It also assists us in considering how the ongoing relationships of social and material aspects of refrigeration co‐constitute a range of subjectivities. Further, our analysis advances discussions on how household practices and identities relate to public campaigns about environmental responsibility, particularly as the latter is constructed in terms of ‘energy efficiency’.     

绿色镌刻在土乡的那份责任——互助土族自治县林业生态扫描

在土乡,最美丽的身影是站立的树; 在土乡,最动人的色彩是流动的绿. --摘自采访手记 地处青海东北的互助土族自治县,素以"彩虹的故乡"而为世人所熟知. 其实,互助不仅为多彩多姿的世界孕育了独特的土族文化,它也向美丽和谐的世界贡献了它绿色的情怀.     

论制度问责与提升政府执行力

行政问责制在我国正从权力问责向制度问责转变。进一步革除权力问责的诸多弊端,努力完善现代政府的行政问责制度,则是破解我国政府执行力低效的重要举措。