Bridewealth1 and the Autonomy of Women in Melanesia

Considering bridewealth in Melanesia from the angle of women's autonomy, in this introduction we review and analyse the various elements of this marriage practice that reveal its place in the symbolic, social and economic worlds of women. With an accent on social transformation, we discuss women's autonomy and agency in relation to the constraints that bridewealth puts on their lives, and on how they engage with it. Knowing what bridewealth is, and how the rules of reciprocity that it indexes obligate married women, the focus is on women's ability to act within these constraints or to redefine their contours, particularly with regards to economic and reproductive agency. The article, which serves also as the introduction for the special issue on bridewealth in the journal Oceania, discusses themes analysed in the collection, such as the moral prospects of bridewealth today, its relation to ‘capital’ in twenty-first century Oceania, the triad value/valuables/valuers, and the empowerment of women. It concludes with thoughts on gender inequality.     

Mendicants as victims: scale,scope and the idiom of violence

This article establishes the scale of violence perpetrated against mendicant friars in thirteenth- and fourteenth-century Europe, and provides a list of these events in an on-line appendix. It underscores and analyses the wide variety of contexts in which such incidents took place and examines the ramifications for the history of the mendicant orders and medieval urban society generally. Violence was a subtler form of communicative action than is sometimes recognised, and the paper points to the inverse relationship between power and violence in medieval urban conflicts.     

Mendicants as victims: scale,scope and the idiom of violence

This article establishes the scale of violence perpetrated against mendicant friars in thirteenth- and fourteenth-century Europe, and provides a list of these events in an on-line appendix. It underscores and analyses the wide variety of contexts in which such incidents took place and examines the ramifications for the history of the mendicant orders and medieval urban society generally. Violence was a subtler form of communicative action than is sometimes recognised, and the paper points to the inverse relationship between power and violence in medieval urban conflicts.     

Keeping the Network out of view: Mining,Distinctions and Exclusion in Melanesia

ABSTRACT This paper examines the ‘property effects’ surrounding competition over access to mining benefits in Papua New Guinea. Under conditions of rapid social change engendered by large scale resource extraction, Lihirian islanders have increasingly recalibrated their social networks, manifest through shifting notions of sociality and obligation, and ownership strategies that seek to limit other people's claims to wealth. These local changes are paralleled by larger and more paradoxical processes: although the state uses the mining project to consolidate itself, Lihirians have consistently challenged the state through their attempts to appropriate the mine for their own ends. By keeping the multiple layers of their social networks out of view, Lihirians deny the connections that can provide others with access to benefits. In considering the strategic responses to the inequalities, discontents and inconsistencies of life in modern Papua New Guinea, it becomes apparent that questions of property are simultaneously questions about identity and belonging.     

Scale frames and counter-scale frames: constructing the problem of environmental injustice

The concept of environmental injustice raises difficult questions about on how best to measure and address environmental inequities across space, and environmental justice politics are permeated by considerable debate over the nature and spatial extent of both problem and possible solutions. This paper theorizes the politics of environmental justice as a politics of scale in order to explore how environmental justice activists respond to the scalar ambiguity inherent in the political concept of environmental justice. With a case study of a controversy over a proposed polyvinylchloride production facility in rural Convent, Louisiana, I develop the concept of scale frames and counter-scale frames as strategic discursive representations of a social grievance that do the work of naming, blaming, and claiming, with meaningful reference to particular geographic scales. The significance of scale is expressed alternatively within these frames as an analytical spatial category, as scales of regulation, as territorial framework(s) for cultural legitimacy, and as a means of inclusion, exclusion and legitimation.     

Carl Schmitt, Reinhart Koselleck and the foundations of history and politics

This article explores the intellectual relations between Carl Schmitt and the German historian Reinhart Koselleck with a focus on the inspiration that Koselleck found in Schmitt's work in the early 1950s. The article goes beyond earlier contributions in the field by illuminating how the most important discursive features that Koselleck drew from Schmitt were utilized toward a very independent intellectual project. This project concerned an attempt to revise modern political thought by means of outlining a new concept of history. Koselleck's concept of history was to depart from all utopian notions of history as a singular, unified and goal-directed process. Instead, it aimed to outline certain fundamental existential structures of the human condition and to take account of the social relations existing among human beings in order to understand (historically) and contain (politically) the potential conflict in human societies. Hence Koselleck believed that his new concept of history would lead to a more responsible foundation of political order and decision making. Following an analysis of how Koselleck developed his project in a dialogue with the work of Schmitt and a number of other scholars, first of all Friedrich Meinecke and Martin Heidegger, the article presents a brief perspective on how his new concept of history was received in the 1950s and on how it came to provide his work with a certain analytical, thematic and argumentative unity.     

Radicalization revisited: violence,politics and the skills of the body

For more than a decade, ‘radicalization’ has been a keyword in our understanding of terrorism. From the outset, radicalization was conceived of as an intellectual process through which an individual would increasingly come under a spell of extremist ideas. This ideological understanding of radicalization still prevails. In a 2015 speech on extremism, British Prime Minister David Cameron, for instance, claimed that the ‘root cause of the threat we face is the extremist ideology itself’. But the way we understand radicalization has specific consequences for the way we manage and fight the scourge of terrorism. Considering recent events, including the November 2015 Paris attacks, the present article sets out to reassess the above‐mentioned intellectualist understanding of radicalization and come up with new suggestions as to how radicalization may be understood today. Initially, the article suggests that ideology is not necessarily a precondition for violence, but that a prior experience with violence is more often a precondition for engaging an extremist ideology. Such experience with violence can be both domestic and international, obtained in Europe or Syria and other conflict zones. In the second part of the article it is argued that although radicalization is often conceived of as an individual process, pathways towards terrorism are inherently social and political. Finally, the article argues that by stressing the importance of ideology and ideological processes, concepts of radicalization have abstracted away from another factor that is pivotal for understanding pathways towards terrorist violence: the skills and capacities of the body.     

Authenticity in tourism and Native Title: Place,time and spatial politics in the East Kimberley

This study examines the concepts of authenticity involved in the production and consumption of tourist experiences in the East Kimberley region of northern Australia. It contrasts the notions of authenticity produced in this domain with those produced in the legal context of indigenous land claims made through the Native Title process (Native Title Act 1993) in Australia. Our aim in making this comparison is to develop a deeper understanding of how the place-images of tourism relate to the politics of land use and land tenure in the East Kimberley. Environment and Aboriginal culture are the two unique aspects of northern Australia most commonly commodified by the tourism industry. We concentrate on relationships between the tourism industry and Aboriginal culture in the East Kimberley using the term 'Aboriginal cultural tourism' to denote the packaging of Aboriginal culture for tourist consumption. We describe experiences and expectations of tourists, tourism operators and Aboriginal people from the Miriuwung and Gajerrong groups regarding Aboriginal cultural tourism. Drawing on a multi-method approach that includes interviews, field observations and survey techniques we examine how ideas of authenticity are formed and promoted and their potential for change. We then compare and contrast ideas of authentic Aboriginal culture produced within the tourism industry with those produced within a Native Title claim. Interrogated in this way, the concept of authenticity is interpreted as a socially constructed value that provides a means to understanding how Aboriginal cultural tourism and tourism more generally connects with broader spatial politics. Cette étude examine les concepts d'authenticité impliqués dans la production et consommation d'expériences touristiques dans la région de Kimberley Est, située dans le Nord de l'Australie. Elle compare les notions d'authenticité issues de ce domaine avec celle produites dans le contexte légal de revendications territoriales aborigènes, menées selon le processus de Status Aborigène (Native Title Act 1993) en Australie. Par cette comparaison, notre but dans est de développer une meilleure compréhension de la façon dont les images touristiques locales sont reliées aux débats politiques concernant la propriété et l'utilisation du sol dans la région de Kimberley Est. L'environnement et la culture aborigène sont les deux aspects uniques du Nord de l'Australie les plus couramment appropriés par l'industrie touristique. Nous nous concentrons sur les relations entre l'industrie touristique et la culture aborigène en utilisant le terme 'tourisme culturel aborigène' afin de dénoter comment la culture aborigène est présentée pour fins de consommation touristique. Nous décrivons les expériences et attentes des touristes, des guides et des aborigènes appartenant aux groupes Miriuwung et Gajerrong envers ce tourisme culturel aborigène. A partir d'une approche multiple incluant entrevues, observations de terrain et différentes techniques d'enquête, nous examinons comment s'effectue la formation et promotion du concept d'authenticité et nous analysons son potentiel de changement. Nous comparons et contrastons ensuite l'idée d'une authenticité culturelle aborigène émergeant de l'industrie touristique avec celle produite par le biais de revendication du Statut Aborigène. Dans cette approche, le concept d'authenticité est envisagé comme étant le résultat d'un processus social capable d'ouvrir des voies d'analyse sur les façons dont le tourisme culturel aborigène, et le tourisme en général, est relié à une politique de l'espace beaucoup plus large. Esta investigación examina los conceptos de autenticidad que corresponden a la producción y el consumo de experiencias turísticas en la región de East Kimberley en el norte de Australia. Compara las nociones de autenticidad producidas en este campo con aquellas producidas en el contexto legal de las reclamaciones de tierra indígena realizadas por el proceso de Título Nativo (Native Title Act 1993) en Australia. Con esta comparación pretendemos llegar a una comprensión más amplia de cómo las imágenes turísticas del lugar encajan con las políticas de uso de tierra y de tenencia de tierra en el East Kimberley. El medio ambiente y la cultura aborígena son los dos aspectos únicos del norte de Australia más frecuentemente mercanceados para el turismo. Enfocamos en la relación entre la industria turística y la cultura aborígena en el East Kimberley, utilizando el término 'turismo cultural aborígena' para indicar el empacamiento de la cultura aborígena para consumo turístico. Describimos las experiencias y las expectativas de turistas, operadores de viajes y gente aborígena de los grupos Miriuwung y Gajerrong con respecto al turismo cultural aborígena. Haciendo uso de entrevistas, observaciones del campo y encuestas analizamos cómo las ideas de autenticidad son formadas y fomentadas y su potencia para efectuar cambios. Después comparamos las ideas de lo que es la auténtica cultura aborígena generadas en la indústria turística con las ideas producidas en una reclamación de Título Nativo. Así interrogado, el concepto de autenticidad es interpretado como un valor de construcción social que nos ayuda a entender como el turismo cultural aborígena, y el turismo en general, enlaza con una política de espacio más amplia.     

The Threefold Logic of Papua‐Melanesia: Constitution‐writing in the Margins of the Indonesian Nation‐State

Clashes over the status of West Papua and the political future of the territory proliferated markedly following the end of Indonesia's New Order regime in 1998. Amid a wide variety of demands for justice and independence, and a series of demonstrations, mass gatherings and prayers, only a few Papuans mused on how Papua could become a state and what would constitute its nature as being distinctly Papuan and/or Melanesian. One exception is the work put into the Constitution for West Papua entitled Basic Guidelines, State of West Papua, a document edited by Don A.L. Flassy, a bureaucrat, writer and thinker, with a preface by late Theys H. Eluay, then chairman of the Papuan Council. In this article I analyse this Constitution to show how a combination of Christianity and local customs, and a mimicry of elements of Indonesian nation building and symbols of the Indonesian nation‐state are reshaped to oppose Indonesian nation‐building agendas. The Constitution shows that when Papuans imagine an independent state, forms of vernacular legality play a central role. ‘The state’ has journeyed to Papua and encouraged faith in ‘the law,’ and Basic Guidelines is partly the effect of this growing vernacular legality. My analysis shows that it is essential to see how legal mobilisations and imaginations of the state articulate with other normative systems and practices – in particular Christianity and custom (adat) – and how they mutually allow for and invite strategies.     

Pacific view: the meaning of governance and politics in the Solomon Islands

Based on the turmoil of the ‘crisis years’ (1998–2003) and the Regional Assistance Mission to Solomon Island (RAMSI) years (2003–2007), this paper explores epistemological issues that deeply divide the way that Solomon Islanders look at prosperity and good government and the way that foreign aid donors, RAMSI and Australia see the future for Solomon Islands. State-building or re-building is not the same as nation-building based on local concepts of the good life. The stakes are high, and as the Sogavare Government (2006–2007) indicated, substantial changes are needed to RAMSI, with a clear exit strategy or amalgamation of its central features into the central government structure. Unless RAMSI can come to terms with Solomon Islands’ epistemological and related political issues, there is no future for the Mission. The paper looks first at the post-RAMSI period, before concentrating on epistemological and political differences, and uses Malaita Province as an example of local circumstances that apply in all areas of the troubled nation. The argument on the epistemology of development is drawn from the writings of David Gegeo and Karen Watson Gegeo, and my personal experience.     

'Nothing Can Ever Be the Case of 'Us' and 'Them' Again': Exploring the politics of difference through border pedagogy and student journal writing

Linda McDowell (1994) has called for styles of teaching which put into practice arguments about the 'politics of difference', which has become an increasingly central part of human geographical research. This paper draws on a number of years' experience of teaching an undergraduate course on multicultural historical geography, in which this was attempted. Here students were encouraged to get more involved in these debates, to take them more personally, and to develop 'situated knowledges' about the UK as a multicultural society. The approach to teaching, learning and assessment which made this possible was based on the principles of 'border pedagogy' and on students writing journals throughout the course which charted the development of their understandings of the materials they encountered.     

The Theory of Enchantment and the Enchantment of Theory: the Art of Alfred Gell

ABSTRACT Gell's Art and Agency that aimed to articulate the first anthropological theory of art has achieved a near‐cult status among the academic community. Departing from previous semiological and aesthetic approaches, this theory takes it that art is a form of instrumental action, the canonical efficacy of which lies in its power to function as a cognitive trap and to captivate the spectator's mind. In this article it is argued that Gell's theory is not as novel as it is claimed; that it fails to define the specific field of art; and that by excluding the aesthetic properties of art objects, it discards ethnographical data nonetheless necessary for understanding the agency of art in Melanesian local cultures. At a meta‐level, Gell assigned to his theory the same captivating purpose as he did to art, and this probably explains the seductive fascination that his work continues to exert.     

The theatre of social change: nobility,opera industry and the politics of culture in Bologna between papal privileges and liberal principles

In Bologna, after Rome the second biggest city of the Papal States, the Teatro Comunale played a major role in the city's cultural self-representation from the eighteenth century. After the Unification of Italy local politicians and the rising middle class used the theatre - together with the famous university, the Liceo musicale and the Pinacoteca - to present Bologna as one of the young nation-state's cultural capitals. A study of Bologna's opera house as a social institution highlights social, cultural and political processes and conflicts which marked the transition from the papal regime to the liberal nation-state. Bologna's nobility, which owned the theatre's prestigious private boxes, opposed the idea of democratically elected politicians and professional experts determining the fate of their theatre, the theatre which for centuries had provided the preferred backdrop for staging their social status.     

Labour in 'lean' times: geography, scale and the national trajectories of workplace change

In this paper we argue that far from being surpassed by globalization, the nation-state remains a key space for organized labour. However, labour geographers' focus on patterns of union organization and strategies of 'internationalism' underplays the enduring role of national institutions. Moreover, while labour geographers have recognized the significance of new forms of work organization, such as just in time and lean production, with some exceptions they have not examined how unions both formally and informally determine the trajectory of workplace change. Based on case studies of unions in the Canadian and German auto industries, we stress that the linkage between national and workplace scales remains critical to understanding how unions are responding to the challenges being presented by lean and just in time production. Finally, while there is a re-scaling of bargaining in the automobile industry to the firm or enterprise scale, the outcomes of decentralization depend largely on the national regulatory context.     

Part and Whole Numbers: an ‘Enumerative’ Reinterpretation of the Cambridge Anthropological Expedition to Torres Straits and its Subjects.

ABSTRACT From the starting point that concepts of number can contain within them a representation of a society's overall cosmology, reinforcing and strengthening its reality in logical terms through practice (a process I call enumeration), this paper charts the meeting of two systems of enumeration. As such systems are constantly changing, we concentrate on a particular point in time and space: the Cambridge Anthropological Expedition to Torres Straits (CAETS) in 1898. Here a nineteenth century anthropology obsessed with reinforcing its position as science through the mathematicalisation of its methods met a Melanesian enumerative system bound to materiality and pattern. The conflict between intentionally abstractive and intensely material enumerative systems generated perplexing results which throw their underlying cosmologies into greater relief.     

Brands of youth citizenship and the politics of scale: National Citizen Service in the United Kingdom

This paper explores the politics of scale in the context of youth citizenship. We propose the concept of ‘brands of youth citizenship’ to understand recent shifts in the state promotion of citizenship formations for young people, and demonstrate how scale is crucial to that agenda. As such, we push forward debates on the scaling of citizenship more broadly through an examination of the imaginative and institutional geographies of learning to be a citizen. The paper's empirical focus is a state-funded youth programme in the UK – National Citizen Service – launched in 2011 and now reaching tens of thousands of 15–17 year olds. We demonstrate the ‘branding’ of youth citizenship, cast here in terms of social action and designed to create a particular type of citizen-subject. Original research with key architects, delivery providers and young people demonstrates two key points of interest. First, that the scales of youth citizenship embedded in NCS promote engagement at the local scale, as part of a national collective, whilst the global scale is curiously absent. Second, that discourses of youth citizenship are increasingly mobilised alongside ideas of Britishness yet fractured by the geographies of devolution. Overall, the paper explores the scalar politics and performance of youth citizenship, the tensions therein, and the wider implications of this study for both political geographers and society more broadly at a time of heated debate about youthful politics in the United Kingdom and beyond.     

Nonmetric dental characteristics of the early modern population of Okinawa Island in Nansei Islands,Japan

Dental morphological characteristics of the early modern population (c. 17–19th century AD) of Okinawa Island, Nansei Islands, were investigated to clarify their genealogical characteristics. We observed and classified 25 nonmetric traits of tooth crowns and roots from human remains (106 individuals) excavated from tombs of the early modern period in Okuma, Ginowan City, Okinawa. The incidences of these traits were compared with the incidences in the populations of the other Nansei Islands, of Japan, and of Asia overall. Univariate analysis of each trait and multivariate biological distance analysis based on the frequencies of the traits showed that the Okinawa population in the early modern period more closely resembled the migrant Yayoi populations than it did the native Jomon populations. It is difficult to support the “Ainu‐Ryukyu common origin theory” with regard to the early modern population in Okinawa without some modification of the theory, as well as the modern populations in Tanegashima and Okinawa Island. The geographical cline in the modern period from the northern Kyushu to the Okinawa Island via Tanegashima was confirmed in this analysis. Considering the major temporal changes in northern Kyushu and Tanegashima in addition to the geographical cline, the southward gene flow of the migrant Yayoi elements from northern Kyushu to the central Nansei Islands via the northeast end of the Nansei Islands is suggested. In addition, this study detected some temporal changes from the early modern to the modern period in Okinawa Island. Although the minor temporal change may be attributed to some genetic drift, gene flow from the Japanese main islands or China might be considered one of the causes of the change. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Close-up on renewable resources and armed conflict: The spatial logic of pastoralist violence in northern Kenya

Methods of spatially disaggregated conflict analysis are becoming increasingly popular and open avenues for systematic micro-level research. Especially within the field of environmental security research they bear the promise of a better assessment of environment–conflict linkages at the sub-national level. Yet, this branch of research lacks a thorough theoretical involvement with the spatial logic of armed contests over renewable resources and this hampers the use of highly disaggregated data. To address this shortcoming, the present contribution proposes an actor-centred approach, which allows determining the precise locations of violent events in armed contests over renewable resources. It is developed by analysing the spatial logic of pastoralist violence in northern Kenya, a frequently cited example of scarcity-related struggle over renewable resources. The analysis demonstrates that pastoralist violence in northern Kenya has frequently occurred close to well sites and in locations of higher rainfall, which offer favourable conditions for livestock raiding. These results lend support to narratives of pastoralist violence, which emphasise the strategic use of violence with regard to the ecological opportunities and constraints of African rangelands. They also highlight more generally that conflict locations reveal more about the strategic choices made by armed groups in a given conflict situation than about the ultimate causes of their struggle. This calls for a more conscious use of disaggregated data in environmental security research.     

On exposure,vulnerability and violence: Spatial distribution of risk factors for climate change and violent conflict across Kenya and Uganda

Recent studies discuss the link between climate change and violent conflict, especially for East Africa. While there is extensive literature on the question whether climate change increases the risk of violent conflict onset, not much is known about where a climate-conflict link is most likely to be found. We address this question by analyzing the spatial distribution of the factors commonly associated with a high exposure and vulnerability to climate change, and a high risk of violent conflict onset in Kenya and Uganda. Drawing on recent literature and quantitative data for the period 1998–2008, we develop various specifications of a composite risk index (CRI) with a spatial resolution of half a degree for Kenya and Uganda in the year 2008. A quantitative comparison with conflict data for the year 2008 provides support for the composite risk index. Finally, the composite risk index is contrasted with the findings of three qualitative case studies, which provide mixed support for the index and help to identify its strengths and weaknesses as well as conceptual needs for further quantitative studies on climate change and violent conflict.     

Renzi: the government,the party,the future of Italian politics

On 22 February 2014 President Napolitano appointed Matteo Renzi to the office of President of the Council of Ministers (the correct title according to the Italian constitution). Since then the 39-year-old secretary of the Democratic Party has launched a series of institutional, economic, and social reforms. Claiming that it was of the utmost importance to scrap the old political class and to put Italy back to work, Renzi has already produced significant but, to say the least, controversial changes, as well as many clashes within his party and in the relationship between Italy and the European Union. This article will explore where the changes in his style of governing and in his party will lead the politics of Italy.