The United Nations as the ‘Parliament of Man’

Abstract

Paul Kennedy. The Parliament of Man: The Past, Present, and Future of the United Nations. Toronto, ON: HarperCollins, 2006. Pp. xvii, 361. $36.95 (CDN); Ronald St John Macdonald and Douglas M. Johnston, eds. Towards World Constitutionalism: Issues in the Legal Ordering of the World Community. Leiden: Brill, 2005. Pp. xviii, 968. €235.00; $317.00 (US); S. Neil MacFarlane and Yuen Foong Khong. Human Security and the UN: A Critical History. Bloomington and Indianapolis, IN: Indiana University Press, 2006. Pp. xix, 346. $35.00 (US), paper; David M. Malone. The International Struggle over Iraq: Politics in the UN Security Council, 1980–2005. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2006. Pp. xiv, 398. $59.95 (CDN); Michael J. Matheson. Council Unbound: The Growth of UN Decision Making on Conflict and Postconflict Issues after the Gold War. Washington, DC: United States Institute of Peace Press, 2006. Pp. xvi, 422. $19.95 (US), paper; Ramesh Thakur. The United Nations, Peace, and Security: From Collective Security to the Responsibility to Protect. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press, 2006. Pp. xvi, 388. $32.99 (US), paper.     

The ‘superman’ solution: ‘Super soldiers’ and ‘superheroes’ in the United States military

Current US military research focused on the development of pharmacological ‘super soldiers’ – soldiers enhanced through a variety of pharmaceuticals and biomedical technologies to perform far beyond what unenhanced soldiers can do – draws from and often mimics popular or pop-cultural conceptions of the superhero. These biomedical and pharmacological interventions pose profound ethical problems and possibilities that are solved – in part – by imagining the new US super soldier as a superhero. Drugging soldiers to enhance their ability to fight and survive is a frightening proposition, and one that makes people uncomfortable; the solution is to imagine them as superheroes – as positive representations of the enhanced soldier on the side of good, somehow contained and controllable and fundamentally safe and unfrightening.     

‘That mad hatters tea party on the East River’: Conservative journals of opinion and the United Nations 1964–1981

During the 1960s and 1970s the Right viewed the United Nations as an institution that had lost its way. Writers for the journals of conservative opinion believed America’s complacent position toward the UN’s anti-western attitudes were representative of a nation that was no longer confident as a leader in the world. It was a course they were determined to change. The actions of National Review, Human Events and Commentary were not singularly responsible for the success or failure of American policy at the UN, but the language they employed contributed to the tone Ronald Reagan used during his presidency.     

‘We Have Been Making History’: The League of Nations and the Leticia Dispute (1932–1934)

This article sheds a historical light on the League of Nations’ role in the settlement of the Leticia dispute between Peru and Colombia (1932–1934). It first describes how the Geneva organization conducted the negotiations with the two opposing parties and reached an agreement for the establishment of a temporary territorial administration of Leticia. Then, it examines the work of the International Commission, scrutinizing the challenges the Commissioners had to overcome to fulfil their mandate. Based on the League of Nations’ archives, this research contributes to a more comprehensive understanding of the settlement of the Leticia dispute. It also shows the innovative character of the Geneva organization's intervention to maintain international peace.     

The Origins of the Concept of ‘Palaeolithic Art’: Theoretical Roots of an Idea

This paper explores the origin and theoretical roots of the concept of ‘Palaeolithic art’ in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries (1895–1906). It identifies three main sources for this concept: the Western category of ‘art’, the idea of evolution and the notion of primitive. This article shows how the traditional conception of ‘Palaeolithic art’ is a particular case of the wider idea of ‘primitive art’, a category that was born as an attempt to harmonise the notion of ‘primitive society’ and the nineteenth-century bourgeois concept of ‘art’. Additionally, I discuss this traditional conception as the source of a number of ideas that have persisted in our way of interpreting Palaeolithic images until recently, including the understanding of prehistoric images through the lens of the modern notion of ‘art’, their interpretation in symbolic-religious terms and their formal definition based on the idea of naturalism.     

Commemoration in the United States: ‘The reason for fighting I never got straight’

The United States entered the First World War late, in April 1917, and so its centenary commemoration of the war will begin well after those of its former associated powers and enemies. Even in 2017, however, US commemoration will likely be muted by the past and present ramifications of the debate and confusion over the meanings and significance of the First World War to the United States that have raged since the end of the war itself.

美国参战是在1917年4月,是一战的后期了。因此它的一战纪念活动会晚于从前的那些友国和帝国。即便在2017年,过去和现在关于一战意义的争吵（战争结束以来就没停过）也会消弱纪念活动的音量。     

‘The races and conditions of men’: women in nineteenth-century geography school texts in the United States

Geography schoolbooks published in the United States were important opinion makers in the nineteenth century, often joining the Bible as the main source of information about the world outside North America. The texts examined here are noteworthy for their static and pejorative treatment of non-American cultures and may be seen as playing a key role in forming isolationist and chauvinist American public opinion. They also played a role in reinforcing ideas about the proper niche for women in American society, even though it may seem at first that these books could not have had much influence on ideas about American women because they barely mentioned women, almost always relegating them to illustrations and captions. The few women depicted were usually characterized as ‘poor souls’ in distant lands worthy of pity. We discuss the national political context in which these writers (many of whom were women) were producing geography school texts, the social roles they were fulfilling by reinforcing such limited images of ‘foreign’ women, and the sources they may have used in their research. Furthermore, we demonstrate that much more could have been drawn ethnographically from the illustrations of women. The images of women in these geography schoolbooks reinforced the marginalization of women, particularly non-white and non-western women.     

Underplaying the ‘Okinawa card’: how Japan negotiates its alliance with the United States

The US military bases in the Japanese prefecture of Okinawa have long been a source of domestic political opposition to the US–Japan alliance. As an alliance management issue, the ongoing troubles surrounding the bases raise questions as to when and why states adopt particular bargaining strategies when dealing with allies. Why, for instance, has the Japanese government not made greater use of this ‘Okinawa card’ when negotiating alliance issues with the USA? Even though highlighting particular domestic problems as a part of a negotiating strategy (known as tying hands) should appeal to a weaker ally such as Japan, this article argues that in the Okinawan case the reverse has been true. Japan has generally, though not always, sought to minimise or downplay domestic opposition to its alliance agreements, essentially preferring a cutting-slack to a tying-hands approach. The Japanese experience suggests that when states which are directly dependent on an alliance for their security see their security environment as unstable, they view tying-hands strategies as too likely to undermine their bargaining credibility. Maintaining credibility is important in an alliance bargaining context because it is a way for such states to signal their commitment to an alliance and so guard against abandonment.     

“They Laid Planks ‘Crost the Coffins”: The African Origin of Grave Vaulting in the United States

Grave vaulting, a vernacular burial form common in nineteenth and early twentieth century America, consists of a simple primary grave shaft at the bottom of which is dug a smaller secondary shaft or niche within which the body or coffin is placed. Typically loose boards are then placed over the secondary shaft to offer protection from the soil coming into direct contact with the body or burial container. This tradition is documented through historical accounts and hundreds of excavated graves through a survey of 86 historic cemetery investigations. Although its cultural origins have been previously unknown, this study argues that the vaulted burial form in the United States is likely of African origin. An extensive ethnological survey of historical and modern cultures throughout the continent of Africa, from 1602 to the mid twentieth century, documents both the vaulted grave form and its variations. Correlating this African cultural practice to its use in the United States demonstrates a hitherto unrecognized creolization of Euroamerican mortuary tradition with African roots, and its corollary, the retention of an African mortuary tradition by those of African descent.