International Human Rights Conventions and Australian Political Debates: Issues Raised by the 'Toonen Case'

In April 1994, the United Nations Human Rights Committee communicated its view to the Australian Government that Tasmanian anti-gay laws were inconsistent with Australia's international human rights obligations. Issues of Australia's human rights protection, treaty accession and Commonwealth-State relations, each of which have traditionally been characterised by major partisan differences, were brought to the fore of political debate. While the HRC decision at first appeared to give the coalition much scope to advance its arguments, subsequent developments highlighted considerable weaknesses in the rhetorical strategies of conservatives, and the difficulty of using the Tasmanian laws as a federalist cause ce le bre. In the long term, ironically, the coalition may well have weakened the efficacy of sovereignty-based arguments in Australian political debate.     

The Shareholders' Revolt at the Compagnie des Indes: Commerce and Political Culture in Old Regime France

During the 1760s a fierce political struggle developed betweenthe shareholders and the royal ministry over the administrationand continued operations of the Compagnie des Indes. Portrayingthemselves as members of a self-governing commercial republic,the shareholders insisted that ultimate authority rested withtheir assembly and accused the ministry of despotic interferencein company affairs. The ministry, concerned with the financialstability of the company, employed the abbé Morelletto shift the debate from the rights of the shareholders to theadvantages of commercial liberty over the company’s privilegedtrading monopoly. Although the ministry succeeded in endingthe commercial operations of the Compagnie des Indes, the affairhad taken place in the public sphere where the publicist Pidansatde Mairobert and the financier Jacques Necker, among others,extolled the patriotism of the shareholders, condemned the despotismof the ministry, and insisted upon the importance of the companyto France’s international presence. By including an accountof the shareholders’ meetings in his anti-Maupeou publicationsof the 1770s, Mairobert linked the affair to the infamous Maupeoureforms, thereby broadening the patriot attack on ministerialgovernment.     

Challenges in ‘Translating’ Human Rights: Perceptions and Practices of Civil Society Actors in Western India

Rights‐based approaches have become prevalent in development rhetoric and programmes in countries such as India, yet little is known about their impact on development practice on the ground. There is limited understanding of how rights work is carried out in India, a country that has a long history of indigenous rights discourse and a strong tradition of civil society activism on rights issues. In this article, we examine the multiple ways in which members of civil society organizations (CSOs) working on rights issues in the state of Rajasthan understand and operationalize rights in their development programmes. As a result of diverse ‘translations’ of rights, local development actors are required to bridge the gaps between the rhetoric of policy and the reality of access to healthcare on the ground. This article illustrates that drawing on community‐near traditions of activism and mobilization, such ‘translation work’ is most effective when it responds to local exigencies and needs in ways that the universal language of human rights and state development discourse leave unmet and unacknowledged. In the process, civil society actors use rights‐based development frameworks instrumentally as well as normatively to deepen community awareness and participation on the one hand, and to fix the state in its role as duty bearer of health rights, on the other hand. In their engagement with rights, CSO members work to reinforce but also challenge neoliberal modes of health governance.     

Jimmy Carter and the Foreign Policy of Human Rights:

I would hope that the nations of the world might say that we had built a lasting peace, based not on weapons of war but on international policies which reflect our own most precious values. These are not just my goals, and they will not be my accomplishments, but the affirmation of our nation's continuing moral strength and our belief in an undiminished, ever-expanding American dream. ¹
President Jimmy Carter, Inaugural Address, 20 January 20, 1977     

Perceptions and Misperceptions of Regime Stability and Iran's Convoluted Rise to Regional Influence

This article seeks to explain revolutionary Iran's convoluted rise to regional prominence over the last three decades. We hold that perceptions and misperceptions of regime stability (both of one's self and of others) by the relevant actors have played a major role in Iran's recent. The main logic is that the success of many strategies employed by relevant regional actors to augment their regional influence (both Iran seeking more influence and others seeking to stem that influence) have crucially hinged on making correct assessments of regime stability. This study has both theoretical and empirical findings. Theoretically, we find that failures to accurately estimate regime stability stem from three main sources: (1) objective uncertainties regarding the target state's level of regime stability, given the high strength of societal forces shaping state‐society relations in the Middle East and given the distinct variation between autocrats in terms of their ability to develop effective counterrevolutionary/repressive tools; (2) ideological blinders, from which both the United States and regional actors frequently suffer, which have often led them to be falsely optimistic regarding the existence of either subversive opportunities or opportunities to stabilize regimes facing domestic pressures; and (3) incorrect theories regarding sources of regime stability which lead experts and policymakers to overlook factors which may destabilize a regime. This article has two major empirical findings. First, Iran's rise may be at least partly attributed to Iran demonstrating a slightly better learning curve at the tactical level (i.e., learning subversive skills from its Lebanese experience in the 1980s–1990s and applying them to Iraq in the 2000s–2010s) as well as at the strategic level (i.e., understanding the limits of its subversive capacities and correctly assessing when it can engage in successful stabilizing operations). Second, two errors committed by the United States have been far more consequential than those committed by Iran for the regional balance of power: First, the George W. Bush Administration myopically opened up subversive opportunities for Iran when it invaded Iraq in 2003 by thinking that it could stabilize a democratic regime and insulate it from outside influence; second, on two occasions Washington overestimated the transformative effect that its concessions to Iran would have in terms of sufficiently empowering reformists so as to bring about complete regime transformation from within.     

法国宗教战争与欧洲近代政治思想的产生

在欧洲宗教改革的研究中,有一种矛盾的现象：一方面大力肯定宗教改革运动,称之为第一次资产阶级革命,特别推崇加尔主义的资本主义性质;另一方面,忽视或贬低法国宗教改革和法国宗教战争(胡格诺战争),还往往强调其贵族性或反动性。加尔是法国人,他一生中最关心的是法国的宗教改革,他的学说也产自法国的特定环境,这些明显的事实被惊人地忽视