The Left(s) and Nationalism(s) in contemporary Western Europe

This article introduces our themed section on The Left(s) and Nationalism(s), which provides a comparative analysis of the relationship between nationalism and different left-wing parties in Western Europe. It highlights the innovative comparative perspectives offered by this themed section, which not only concerns a series of different geographical cases studies but also involves the ideological plurality of the Left. The larger research question that our contributors address is how different left-wing parties have dealt with the inherent ideological tension between the universality claimed by the Left and the particularism inherent in nationalism, as a doctrine and a principle of political legitimacy. The article stresses three main contributions of our themed section: (1) Western European left-wing parties do engage with the themes of nationalism and nationhood, but they often rely on convenient silence to solve some of the contradictions with their progressive ideology. (2) None of these parties have formulated thick versions of the respective national identities. (3) State-wide left-wing parties have used instrumental conceptions of nationhood to address the challenge of separatist parties, but only with mixed results.     

乡村振兴导向下乡村发展能力的多维测度及时空交互特征

乡村振兴要求走乡村内生性发展道路,客观认知乡村发展能力的时空分异格局和交互关系对乡村振兴战略实施具有重要意义。本文从农业产业发展、农村基础建设和农民社会生活三个维度构建测度指标体系,并引入面板向量自回归模型识别影响乡村发展能力的敏感因素,以此测度乡村发展能力指数,进而采用探索性时空数据分析方法揭示乡村发展能力的时空交互特征。结果表明：(1)我国中部地区多维乡村发展能力提升,但呈明显的空间异质性,不同维度间差异化显著;(2)中部地区多维乡村发展能力局域空间格局呈现较强的动态性并整体表现出较强的空间依赖关系;(3)邻接地级市多维乡村发展能力的时空交互网络以正向关联为主,局部空间呈差异化的竞合态势。     

“A plantation can be a commons”: Re‐Earthing Sapelo Island through Abolition Ecology

This paper is based on the 2018 Neil Smith Lecture presented at the University of St Andrews. It considers the plantation past/futures of Sapelo Island, Georgia, one of the Sea Islands forming an archipelago along the US Southeastern coast. I work through the abolitionist efforts of the Saltwater Geechee’s who have resided there since at least 1803 to better understand how we can mobilise an emancipatory politics of land and property and to produce commons that work to repair and heal the violence done through enslavement and ongoing displacement. I weave together a series of historical threads to better situate linked ideas of abolition democracy and abolition geography, and to extend the notion of abolition ecology as a strategic notion to connect Eurocentric based political ecologies with the emancipatory tradition of Black geographies.     

胡人发型:中古“剪头胡雏”艺术形象试解

古人发型是文化界长期关注的一个重要现象。发型不仅是时代的特征与时尚的符号,也是各个族群的辨识标志。从北朝到隋唐的中古社会,"剪头胡雏"的文物图像屡屡出现,一般来说,此类胡人形象是剪发而不是束发,在当时以"高髻为尚"的社会习俗中,"剪头胡雏"发型是有着"阶级感"的存在,是有关底层胡人的直观艺术产物。也说明当时入华胡人还没有彻底"汉化",仍然保留着本族群的发型特征。该发式是胡人与汉人的区别,也是其身份归属的象征。     

Frontiers’ violence: The interplay of state of exception,frontier habitus,and organized violence

As global capitalism is expanding to the most remote areas of the world, the notion of “frontier”, where competing social orders are contesting each other, is gaining traction in academic analyses. Contemporary frontiers are associated with resource exploitation in marginalized spaces and processes of socioecological transformation, which are characterized as particularly violent. This article offers a conceptual contribution to the frontier debate by putting violence in the center of a frontier concept. Building on a sociology of violence, this approach assumes that every social order comes with some form of organized violence. We argue that the frontier is characterized by a tidal passage: Existing orders and their institutions, which socially embed and constrain a particular use of violence, are challenged by an expansive order which comes along with new formations of violence, leading to a reorganization of violence. Thus the frontier describes a momentum in which the interplay of social order and organized violence becomes highly disputed. Representatives of the expansive order refuse to recognize existing orders and favour a state of exception, in which law is set aside to impose the new order.     

The many shades of grey in urban governance: How illegality shapes urban planning,policy and development

Most research on urban planning, policy and development only considers legal practices and actors, and treats illegal ones as insignificant anomalies, unable to structurally affect the governance of urban space. However, this approach is inadequate for explaining urban governance in contexts (e.g. several countries in the Global South, the former Soviet bloc and Southern Europe) where illegal practices such as corruption and organized crime infiltration are widespread in many public and economic sectors. This paper addresses the role of illegal actors and practices in urban governance in the Italian context, using urban regime theory as the theoretical frame of reference. The research centres on the analysis of two case studies in the city of Rome (the In-between world investigation of a criminal network that had infiltrated the local administration and shaped several urban policies, and the investigation of episodes of corruption related to the project for the new A.S. Roma soccer stadium). It shows the existence of two shades of ‘grey urban governance’: firstly, the presence of a dark urban regime, centred on a criminal organisation and parallel to the ‘regular’ one; secondly, the use of corruption as a customary practice with which real estate entrepreneurs influence municipal decisions. Overall, this research contributes to moving away from a rhetoric of ‘gentlemanly’ urban capitalism and politics, and suggests the need to revise several aspects of urban regime theory – as well as other approaches to urban governance dynamics in general – in order to incorporate the role of illegal actors and practices.     

Cattle Slaughter Industry in Qing China: State Ban,Muslim Dominance,and the Western Diet

Cattle slaughter and beef consumption are barely mentioned in the literature on Chinese economic, food, or animal history. This is possibly due to the widely held popular and scholarly assumption that beef was avoided and even considered taboo in the daily diet of Chinese people in premodern times. This article investigates the tangible regulation and practice of cattle slaughter in Qing China—the period when the beef taboo was argued to be formally subsumed into Chinese morality. I ask the following questions: To what extent did the Qing state ban cattle slaughter? How was the ban enforced in the localities? Did Chinese people slaughter cattle for consumption? Were there lawful beef markets in Qing China proper? How did increasing beef-eating Western sojourners since the mid-19th century impact this sector? Accordingly, I demonstrate that with the leeway provided by the state, the cattle slaughter industry developed in many regions of China proper, especially large cities. In this sector, Chinese Muslim merchants played a dominant role, even though the Han merchants could outnumber them. Their efforts have prepared the state and Chinese merchants to better cope with new circumstances since the mid-19th century. Broadly, this paper sheds light on how different religious, ethnic, and national groups affected the economy and the practice of law in the Qing dynasty.     

Bringing Chinese Law in Line with Western Standards? Problematizing “Chinese” and “Western” in the Late Qing Debate over the New Criminal Code of Great Qing

This article examines the intense debates over the New Criminal Code of Great Qing (Da-Qing xin xinglü) in the National Assembly (Zizheng yuan) during the Qing empire’s New Policy Reform (1901–11). The focus is on the conflict between those who drafted and supported the new code and those who expressed reservations, especially over reform of the laws on filial piety and fornication. The issue of reconfiguring the family and social order through law was closely related to the overarching agenda of twentieth century legal reform in China—making an empire that “ruled through the principle of filial piety” into a modern nation-state that had direct relationships with its citizens. More importantly, an analysis of the late Qing debate over family law enables this article to problematize such concepts as “Chinese” and “Western” during this crucial moment of China’s empire-to-nation transformation. It showcases the paradox of China’s modern-era reforms—a contradiction between imposing Western-inspired order with a largely indigenous logic and maintaining existing sociopolitical order in the name of preserving national identity.     

近代中国邮政空间的“国进民退”

近代中国邮政空间主要是以民信局、国营邮政、侨批等多种企业实体构成。清朝邮政成立后即开始蚕食小额民间资本支持下的民信局经营空间,而基于对1936年《中华民国邮政舆图》的数字化工作发现,历经40余年经营,国营邮政基本整合了全国范围内的邮政空间,也基本完成了本领域的“国进民退”。在此过程中,国营邮政审慎模仿民信局的经营方式,使用多种创新经营策略,除了在大中城市内部和城市之间构建了便捷快速的邮政网络空间,更借助邮政代办的方式以极低的成本将营业网络“下沉”到铁路和公路无法覆盖的农村地区,较好地与传统农村“定期市”网络完成耦合,基本达到了通商处必通邮的效果。国营邮政点和邮路集聚所形成的“邮政聚集区”也成为一种显著的近代化外在空间表征,同时成为界定所谓“核心—边缘”结构的系统可信、定量可验证的空间指标。     

明清丝绸之路哈密—吐鲁番段“沙尔湖路”研究

明清丝绸之路哈密—吐鲁番段存在一条自哈密西南沙尔湖转西北至鄯善进而抵达吐鲁番的“沙尔湖路”,它与“黑风川道”“小南路”等传统路线均不同。利用《蒙古山水地图》等文献,可对沙尔湖路具体行经进行考证复原。该路沿线地形平坦,有泉水与植被,在明廷与吐鲁番、清廷与准噶尔在哈密的政治和军事对峙阶段曾广泛使用,后因泉湖干涸、气候炎热而中断。