‘our children have only known war’: children's experiences and the uses of childhood in northern uganda

This article describes the situation of children forcibly abducted by the rebel Lord's Resistance Army in northern Uganda. The involvement of children complicates efforts to end rebellion, and particular notions of childhood circulate through government and aid agencies to affect children's ‘rehabilitation’. This paper examines national, ethnic, and generational causes of the conflict, discussing the ways in which normative and ideal concepts of childhood are employed by different players. Through a situated analysis of children's circumstances, I suggest the need for interlocutors to re-evaluate their goals and methods of assisting war-affected children.     

Identity of non‐self‐evident nation: Czech national identity after the break‐up of Czechoslovakia and before accession to the European Union*

ABSTRACT. In this study the authors analyse Czech national identity after the break‐up of Czechoslovakia and before accession to the European Union. National identity is understood here as a construct consisting of several elements, four of which the authors analyse: territorial identity (localism, regionalism, patriotism, and Europeanism), the image of the nation – the cultural nation (ethno‐nation) and the political nation (state‐nation), national pride (in general, and in cultural performance and in the performance of the state), and love for the nation – nationalism (or more precisely, chauvinism) and patriotism. To create a more complex picture of Czech national identity the authors compare it with national identities in eleven other European countries. To conclude, the authors analyse the attitudes of Czechs toward the European Union, and national identity is used as an important explanatory element of the support for EU governance.     

Invisible Children fades away: What it means for the future of youth activism

The global reach of Invisible Children's viral video KONY 2012 supposedly established the efficacy of ‘spectacular humanitarianism’: sympathetic spectatorship of suffering others through the mediatization, commodification, and depoliticization of Western humanitarian action. However, their ‘brand’ of activism ultimately proved unsustainable, as Invisible Children announced in late 2014 that it was phasing out operations. Here I consider how Invisible Children, as a quintessential spectacular humanitarian movement, has shaped youth activists' subjectivities in the global North. Drawing on activism, media, and humanitarian studies critiques, as well as interviews with recent Invisible Children interns, I argue that though Invisible Children's approach can attract and launch young people into social activism, it can also hinder growth beyond the problematic confines of a spectacular humanitarian approach which reproduces, rather than transforms, global power relations. However, young activists can and do go on to cultivate a more critical and self‐reflexive approach to global social activism.