Becoming a true Javanese: A Javanese view of attempts at Javanisation

The active bearers of Javanese culture have two main aims in life: to make themselves true Javanese, and to try to make ‘others’ Javanese; others include other races or ethnicities. This article explores the relationship between Javaneseness and politics, and the attitude of Indonesian presidents from Sukarno to Megawati Sukarnoputri on this subject. The promotion of Javaneseness is most characteristically embodied in various kinds of Currents of Belief, united in two umbrella organisations: namely the Himpunan Penghayat Kepercayaan Terhadap Tuhan Yang Maha Esa or HPK (The Association of those who have Faith in the One Supreme God), and the Badan Koordinasi Organisasi-Organisasi Kepercayaan Terhadap Tuhan Yang Maha Esa or BKOK (The Coordinating Authority for Organisations of those who have Belief in the One Supreme God).     

The dynamics of tradition in Panajachel and Zinacantan

George A. Collier. Fields of the Tzotzil: The Ecological Bases of Tradition in Highland Chiapas. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1975. xv + 255 pp. Appendix, bibliography and index. $9.75.

Robert E. Hinshaw. Panajachel: A Guatemalan Town in Thirty‐Year Perspective. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1975. xxvii + 203 pp. Forward, epilogue, appendix, notes, glossary, bibliography and index. $16.95.     

The democracy tradition in US foreign policy and the Obama presidency

This article proposes a three‐level analysis of the democracy tradition in American foreign policy that identifies its ideational, strategic and policy dimensions and situates Barack Obama's presidency to date within it at each level. At the heart of this approach is the understanding that the motivations and practice of the United States' democracy promotion are shaped by its ideas about national identity, political order, national interest and international relations. This is the ideational source of the democracy tradition, which, as US power has grown, has led increasingly to decision‐makers setting strategic goals that include democratization abroad as a facilitator of other US goals. Only slowly has this led to the development of specific policies to that end, though, and democracy promotion as a discrete policy field mostly developed from the 1980s onwards. Democracy promotion went through a ‘boom’ after the end of the Cold War as the United States enjoyed unparalleled power on the international stage. It is clear that Barack Obama and his administration belong firmly in the democracy tradition at the ideational, strategic and policy level, and they have given no cause to expect any major change in his second term as far as democracy promotion is concerned. It is in any case a mistake to think that changes in the democracy tradition come from particular leaders; rather, it is the changing international environment confronting US foreign policy that is more likely, in the longer term, to lead to a shift away from democracy promotion.     

The principles of demonstration and tekmeriodic proofs in the late-antique commentary tradition

I argue that Aristotle’s late-antique commentators read into his theory of demonstration the notion of tekmeriodic proofs in attempt to integrate into the theory of demonstration the assumption that the principles of demonstration should be evident. In so doing, I trace the late antique commentators’ view to Alexander of Aphrodisias’ discussion of the principles of demonstration, showing how his assumption that the principles of demonstration should be evident underlies their notions of tekmeriodic proofs.