Montesquieu's Shadow: Debating reform in the Austrian Netherlands

Under the pressure of governmental reform, beginning in 1740 and intensifying from the 1770s, opponents of reform in the Austrian Netherlands employed arguments derived from The Spirit of the Laws to contest the need for reform. However, reform had also been advocated by local powers using truisms publicised by The Spirit of the Laws, and during the political upheaval of 1789–1790, democrats and traditionalists clashed bitterly over the form of the new Belgian state, both citing Montesquieu to suit their purposes. This article seeks to trace and account for the influence and use of Montesquieu's thought in the Belgian context.     

Montesquieu's gentle prince: the law of majesty and the moderation of despotism in The Spirit of the Laws

Apart from its introductory chapters, Book 12 of The Spirit of the Laws has generally been disregarded by scholars of Montesquieu as a series of historical digressions with few significant implications. As a result, some important dimensions of Montesquieu's political thought have gone unacknowledged. Book 12 is particularly concerned with the punishment of crimes against God and of actions that wound sovereign majesty. Montesquieu presents his view on these subjects through an extended commentary on some aspects of Roman law and, more briefly, on the law of the Pentateuch. This article shows that Montesquieu attributes the criminalization of both kinds of offences to the vengefulness of certain rulers and to the eagerness of their ministers to avenge them. By his assessment, the desire to punish such crimes leads to excesses that undermine political liberty and give rise to despotism. Through this emphasis on the psychological factors that drive the corruption of moderate regimes, Montesquieu reveals a greater concern with the personal qualities of rulers than is often acknowledged. As he identifies certain rulers with absolute power who have nonetheless disavowed vengeance, Montesquieu points to the possibility of reforming despotism through a change in the character of the prince.     

中日两国近代化殊途探因

日本和中国一样,都是被动地接受了西方文化。不同的是,日本的戊辰革命扫除了腐朽势力,以全新的面貌励精图治,奋发求强,迅速崛起;中国的太平天国战争虽然冲击了腐朽统治,但没能建立新的革命政权,只是促使清统治集团改组,旧势力仍很强大,对洋务运动投入有限,社会经济发展缓慢。可以说,明治日本发展速度快于晚清中国最根本的原因在于革命。     

Institutional Arrangements and the Morphology of Residential Development in the Netherlands,Flanders and North Rhine-Westphalia

Abstract

This article aims to highlight the mechanisms through which institutional arrangements influence the morphology of residential development. By comparing the Netherlands, Flanders and North Rhine-Westphalia, which have quite similar socio-economic and landscape characteristics, it investigates how differences in national institutional environments have contributed to differences in the urban morphology of residential areas. This article fits within a broader institutional “turn” in planning research. While most of these studies focus on how institutions affect the behaviour of actors in the process of planning and development, this article focuses on the physical outcomes of these processes. The institutional analysis of physical outcomes suggests that urban morphology is not only linked to planning systems—the subject of this special issue—but also to housing cultures and property regimes.     

The struggle for reform: contested conceptualizations of iṣlāḥ in the Maghreb*

This contribution draws an historical and conceptual analysis of the concept of i?lā?, which is traditionally understood as “reform” in general terms, and tries to stress the origins and the main conceptual paradigms of the two main ideological and political lines in which this concept has been developed and is still used in the Arab Maghreb by main political actors and thinkers.     

Metternich and the Ottoman reform movement

The goal of the paper is to illuminate Metternich's attitude towards possibilities of reform in the Ottoman Empire and the reasons for his interest and practical steps taken in this matter. The paper attempts to provide an accurate account of an important, but until now, entirely ignored, aspect of Metternich's diplomacy and offer further proof that Metternich was not the benighted reactionary depicted in the nineteenth-century historiography, but a conservative keenly aware that the conservative order could survive only if reformed so as to adapt it to the realities of a post-revolutionary age.     

Talking the talk: Debating debate in northern Afghanistan

The ethnographic focus of this article is on the ways in which Afghan families who lived in northern Pakistan as refugees are currently reflecting upon to their complex experiences of return to their country through a rich and complex culture of debate, as well as the deployment of other verbal and peformative skills, especially imitation. More broadly, it argues that the comparative study of situated practices of debate offers unique insights for the anthropological analysis of Islam, which an expanding body of work on the ways in which piety minded Muslims embody and cultivate ethical and moral values has thus far overlooked.     

改革开放以来中国共产党改进执政方式的历史轨迹

十一届三中全会以来,党的执政理念伴随着改革开放的伟大历史进程得到不断升华,并最终形成了科学执政、民主执政和依法执政的新理念。在全面考察我们党改革开放以来执政方式历史演进的基础上,认真总结党的执政方式实现转变的历史经验,对于进一步提高党的执政能力具有重要的现实意义。     

Italian neopatriotism: Debating national identity in the 1990s

This article discusses some of the distinguishing features of the debate over national identity that took place in Italy in the 1990s. Reacting against the threats of the Lega Nord and in response to the new ideological and political landscape of the post-Cold War order, a number of Italian intellectuals rediscovered the value of patriotism. Searching for the origins of the Italians' allegedly weak sense of national identity, some questioned the Resistance and the party system that originated from it. While this historical revisionism has been the object of well-deserved criticism, there is another type of thematization of identity which has received less attention: it deploys the old notion of an 'Italian character', which appears frequently in the press and the media. The article shows that this discourse, too, is a way of articulating patriotism, and then reflects on the meaning that this reconfiguration of ideologies and identities acquires in the new context, both domestic and international.     

Debating Belarus: An Economy in Comparative Perspective

A U.S.-based geographer and Belarusian political scientist assess the current economic crisis in Belarus. Although the country's financial situation is serious in the short term, they argue that analysis of basic social and economic indicators provides some evidence of underlying strength and stability, recently bolstered by a number of trade agreements concluded with Russia in late 2011. The authors argue that the most natural and meaningful basis for ascertaining the health of the country's economy is to compare it with those of its two Slavic neighbors, Russia and Ukraine. That comparison reveals that although Belarus ranks lower on most indices of economic reform, it has outperformed them during the post-Soviet period in several important categories (GDP growth, income equality, agricultural productivity, expenditures on education and health care, life expectancy, and per capita agricultural output) and occupied an intermediate position (below Russia but above Ukraine) in others (e.g., GDP per capita, wages and pensions, and labor productivity). The paper's final section discusses the nature of the relationship between Belarus and Russia (dependence vs. complementarity) and that between the Lukashenka regime and the Belarusian people.     

论改革开放以来法价值取向的历史流变与发展趋势

法价值是法学的基本命题,也是社会关注的焦点。中国自改革开放以来法价值取向随着时代的变化而有所侧重。我们可以认为：自党的十一届三中全会以来,中国法价值取向经历了从秩序到效率、法治与人权的历史流变,但其发展趋势必然朝着公平正义的方向发展。     

Science in Dispute: Debating the Authority of Knowledge in an Environmental Contestation

This paper is an examination of science, as it is understood and contested between conservationists and developers in an application to construct a salt mine in Western Australia. If the salt mine were to go ahead, it would have become the largest salt mine in the world, adjacent to a World Heritage Area. Thus, the application triggered significant local interest in the potential environmental impacts on surrounding ecological systems. As the only means for the public to have an impact on decision‐making is through the environmental approvals process, much of the debate revolved around the validity and legitimacy of knowledge gained through ecological science. This paper focuses on the ways in which the conservationists and developers moulded and shaped scientific knowledge to fit their opposing beliefs, values, and aims. However, rather than focus on the overtly political manipulation of science, I examine why particular interpretations of science are considered legitimate by some participants in the dispute, while others are not. In particular, I ask, what does it take for particular scientific ‘facts' to be considered legitimate? To do so, I examine how the conservationists and developers came to conceptualise and frame science within the dispute. I argue that for members of either group to consider any scientific knowledge legitimate, it is first judged on its ability to resonate with their own worldviews, experiences, and aim.     

Politicized moral geographies: Debating biodiversity conservation and ancestral domain in the Philippines

Research in political ecology has paid inadequate attention to the multifaceted cultural politics surrounding discourses of environmental conservation in the developing world. Specifically, it has tended to neglect the rich politicized moral geographies integral to conservation debates. This paper, then, makes the case for thinking about conservation as an envisioning process sensitive to these politicized moral geographies as well as their linkages to political and economic processes. After a brief critique of political ecology, the paper sketches a theoretical approach in which environmental conservation is understood as a process of envisioning social relations, moral discourse and socionatural place. The approach is used to explain two contrasting visions of conservation based on the notions of integrated protected areas management and ancestral domain which are prominent today in the Philippines. The conclusion reiterates the call for a discursive political ecology alive to the politicized moral geographies that condition conservation trajectories.     

A geopolitics of drinking: Debating the place of alcohol in early republican Turkey

Following contemporary shifts in geopolitical scholarship that interrogate perspectives on identity, culture, and everyday life, this article confronts contestations over the place of alcohol in early republican Turkey. Debated today in terms that mirror the headscarf question, our study establishes a basis for scrutinizing this topic by focusing on the nation-state's first deliberations over prohibition, transpiring in the first session of the Grand National Assembly. Like the current push to intensify regulation of alcohol, 1920s prohibitionism brought together an array of narratives that included but also exceeded Islamism. In particular, progressive public health advocates provided crucial support for the narrow passage of a prohibition law that lasted until Kemalists consolidated their rule. Amid this discourse, competing players interpreted differently the ongoing American prohibition experience and deployed conflicting narratives to bolster their positions. Relying upon proceedings from the early parliament and other primary sources, this article about the place of alcohol contributes both to analyses of ongoing affairs within Turkey and to progressive geopolitical engagements with matters of governance and public space, regulation and prohibition, public health, and secular-religious rivalries.     

Debating heritage authenticity: kastom and development at the Vanuatu Cultural Centre

In October 2003, 28 cultural expressions from around the world were proclaimed Masterpieces of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity, complementing the adoption of the Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage by UNESCO. This proclamation has been part of the broader remit of the international organisation to protect the world’s cultural diversity from modernity and globalisation. Inherent in this is an underlying notion of cultural authenticity, implying that certain expressions, which are considered to be endangered and therefore in need of institutional protection, constitute ‘original’ and ‘pure’ manifestations of cultural identity. Taking forward debates on the safeguarding of intangible heritage, this paper examines cultural authenticity in the context of the Vanuatu Cultural Centre, the principal cultural organisation, museum and research institution of the Melanesian archipelago. The proclamation of the practice of sandroing (sand drawing) as a masterpiece of intangible heritage, and other heritage interventions taking place in Vanuatu and recorded during fieldwork in 2007, provide an interesting perspective for examining how global cultural initiatives are negotiated by local constituencies. Here, heritage preservation is coupled with calls for development, which invites new ways for thinking about authenticity not according to predefined criteria, but with respect to local understandings.     

Denied ethnicism: on the Walloon movement in Belgium

The Walloon movement is the lesser‐known counterpart to the Flemish movement in Belgium. In contemporary political debate it presents itself, and is usually perceived, as a civic and voluntaristic movement predicated on the values of democracy, freedom, openness and anti‐nationalism. As such it is contrasted against its Flemish counterpart, which accordingly is characterised as tending towards an ethnic exclusivist form of nationalism hinging on descent, culture and language. However, the historical record behind these representations shows that the Walloon movement is rooted in ethno‐cultural as much as social politics, and that it has always contained both civic and ethnic elements to varying degrees. This article highlights the Walloon movement in order to analyse the language and national stereotypes in which national movements are characterised both in political rhetoric and in scholarly analysis. The case is particularly relevant for the problematic usage of the ‘civic–ethnic’ opposition, slipping between the discourses of antagonism and analysis; one type of such slippage is here identified as ‘denied ethnicism’.     

Continuity and change in regional disparities in Belgium during the twentieth century

This paper presents estimates of regional GDP per capita for certain benchmark years during the first half of the twentieth century using the method proposed by Geary and Stark. After testing the robustness of the Geary and Stark methodology for the Belgian situation, these estimates are linked to the official regional GDP figures, available since 1955, so that we can cover the whole of the twentieth century. Next we test the suggestion put forward by many historians of a contrast between a ‘poor Flanders’ and a relatively ‘prosperous Wallonia’ around 1900. For the remainder of the analysis Belgium’s nine provinces are used as a geographical unit to take a broader view than just the Flanders/Wallonia controversy. The analysis shows a dramatic reversal of fortune between the northern and southern provinces. We explain the main causes of this process and assess the effect of state policies on regional development. Finally, the paper considers whether the twentieth century witnessed a process of convergence.     

Reproducing the Plot: Making Life in the Shadow of Premature Death

A protracted process of policy development has been underway in Jamaica to curtail the widespread incidence of informal settlements. Against the logic of emerging policy, this article aims to reconnect present-time unauthorised use of space to ancestral refusals of plantation land monopoly. Through ethnographic research and a reconsideration of historical texts, the article situates insecure tenure in a long history of conflict over land and livelihood—conflict that produces a boundary around the authorised use of space. That boundary is porous and mobile, the outcome of a palimpsest of colonial violence and its negation. This argument interrogates the gap between “landless” and “ownershipless”, revealing both the role of incomplete dispossession in racialised social reproduction and the spatial practices through which Jamaicans “make life” even in the shadow of premature death.     

A New Model of Executive Power: A Montesquieuan Explanation of the Obama Presidency

Abstract

The perennial concern over executive overreach continues well into Obama's presidency, leading many to wonder if the “unitary executive” is here to stay. Discussions of executive war powers focus on three models. The Hamiltonian perspective gives presidents the lead position in foreign affairs; the second model, following Madison, presents Congress as the leader when initiating hostilities. Finally, Jeffersonians present emergency powers as extra-legal, giving presidents a sphere of actions that cannot be contained within constitutional discussions. Problematically, current scholarship implicitly or explicitly grounds these explanations in Locke's political philosophy. This occurs despite a dearth of references to Locke during the Constitutional Convention and infrequent references to his thought during early debates over executive-congressional divisions of war powers. Comparatively, all of these seminal American figures frequently mention Montesquieu, often fighting over the specifics of his theory. While scholars widely acknowledge this influence, they rarely mention him during discussions of war powers or the nature of executive power in general. This article examines the Montesquieuan understanding of executive power and shows how this model represents a viable alternative to the Lockean one. Most importantly, examining the executive from a Montesquieuan perspective provides solutions to current problems that the Lockean perspective does not.