The consequences of nationalism: A scholarly exchange

The main thrust of the scholarship on nationalism has so far been concerned with its origins. But nationalism also has effects. Whether it underpins the nation-building efforts of states, is mobilised by counter-state forces or is used in everyday life, nationalism might implicate a wide range of substantive outcomes, including political regimes, public goods provision, citizenship and immigration laws, and different patterns of conflict. Yet—with a few notable exceptions—the consequences of nationalism have received significantly less scholarly attention. In response, the aim of this Exchange is to create a new dialogue between different strands of scholarship around what we know and do not know about the consequences of nationalism. We organise this Exchange around the following questions: (1) What is nationalism? (2) How can we measure nationalism? (3) What are the consequences of nationalism? (4) What are new research frontiers?     

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.     

The Making of Speculative Biodiesel Commodities on the Agroenergy Frontier of the Brazilian Northeast

In this paper, I examine the speculative dimensions of biodiesel production in Northeast Brazil under the National Program for the Production and Use of Biodiesel (PNPB), by focusing on the case of castor oil plant (Ricinus communis) in semi-arid Bahia, a promising flex crop that was said to generate social, environmental and economic benefits, especially for the historically marginalised Northeast peasantry. I argue that speculative practices over castor have relied on state policies and discourses as well as biophysical and biotechnological (im)materialities that are transforming agrarian relations in ways that compromise peasants’ control over their (re)productive systems while promoting the expansion of the agroindustrial frontier. By examining the everyday, performative and place-based character of speculative biodiesel practices and their uneven and contested socioenvironmental implications, this paper contributes to current political ecology debates on the nexus between agroenergy development, nature’s capitalist valuation and rural dispossession.     

Evidence for “Celtic migrations”? Strontium isotope analysis at the early La Tène (LT B) cemeteries of Nebringen (Germany) and Monte Bibele (Italy)

Strontium isotope analysis on human remains from the Iron Age (4th/3rd century BC) cemeteries of Nebringen, Germany and Monte Bibele, Italy were carried out to investigate the role of residential changes during the period of the historic “Celtic migrations”. From an archaeological perspective, the location of the cemeteries in the Celtic core (Nebringen) and expansion area (Monte Bibele), and the distinctive development of their material culture, suggest that the buried populations had differing mobility rates. On the contrary, the strontium results indicate that only few individuals were mobile or non-local. There is, however, a difference in variation of strontium isotope ratios between the two studied cemeteries, presumably caused by differing geological conditions. In Nebringen changing use of cultivated land in a geologically heterogeneous environment most likely caused varying strontium isotope ratios even within the same jaw, while individual mobility over longer distances can also not be excluded. In Monte Bibele the range of strontium isotope ratios is narrow, and this may be explained by a community living in the same village and using the same agricultural resources. For various prehistoric time periods it has been suggested that some population groups were more mobile than others, for example because they had special social roles. In the two cemeteries studied here, males have slightly more often a non-local birthplace or moved during childhood. In contrast, females had isotope signatures which are more consistent with the local geological environment. Male mobility is, however, not correlated with burial as a warrior, and patrilocal residential patterns were not observed among females. Foreign and local items are found with isotopically local and non-local individuals and objects per se do not indicate descent. The motives for residential changes were, therefore, varied and not constrained to a specific area or population group. The presented dataset provides details on the way of life and land-use in the Celtic communities, for which information is otherwise absent.     

Review of Books

MICHAEL BENTLEY, ed. Companion to Historiography. London and New York: Roudedge, 1997. Pp. xvii,997. $150.00 (us). Reviewed by Simon Hornblower

JEREMY BLACK. Maps and History: Constructing Images of the Past. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1997. Pp. 267. $35.00 (us). Reviewed by John A. Agnew

GANG DENG. Chinese Maritime Activities and Socioeconomic Development, c. 2100 BC–1900AD. Westport: Greenwood Press, 1997. Pp. xxvi, 218. $65.00 (us). Reviewed by Thomas T. Allsen

RICHARD G. HOVANNISIAN, ed. The Armenian People from Ancient to Modern Times: Volume I: The Dynastic Periods: From Antiquity to the Fourteenth Century. New York: St Martin's Press, 1997. Pp. xii, 372. $49.95 (us); Volume II: Foreign Dominion to Statehood: The Fifteenth Century to the Twentieth Century. New York: St Martin's Press, 1997. Pp. xii, 493. $49.95 (us). Reviewed by Dennis R. Papazian

ANTONIO SANTOSUOSSO. Soldiers, Citizens, and the Symbols of War: From Classical Greece to Republican Rome, 500-167 BC. Boulder: Westview Press, 1997. Pp. x, 277. $22.00 (us), paper. Reviewed by Michael Hodgkinson

THOMAS T. ALLSEN. Commodity and Exchange in the Mongol Empire: A Cultural History of Islamic Textiles. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1997. Pp. xv, 137. $49.95 (us). Reviewed by Ruth I. Meserve

HUGH KENNEDY. Muslim Spain and Portugal: A Political History of al-Andalus. London and New York: Longman, 1996. Pp. xvi, 342. £15.99. Reviewed by Maya Shatzmiller

MICHAEL COSTEN. The Cathars and the Albigensian Crusade. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1997; dist. New York; St Martin's Press. Pp. x, 229. $19.95 (us), paper. Reviewed by James A. Brundage

JAMES L. GILLESPIE, ed. The Age of Richard II. New York: St Martin's Press, 1997. Pp. viii, 256. $55.00 (us). Reviewed by Anthony Tuck

S. A. M. ADSHEAD. Material Culture in Europe and China, 1400–1800: The Rise of Consumerism. New York: St Martin's Press, 1997. Pp. ix, 279. $59.95 (us). Reviewed by Craig Cluna

J. J. CLARKE. Oriental Enlightenment: The Encounter between Asian and Western Thought. London and New York: Routledge, 1997. Pp. 273. $19.95 (us), paper. Reviewed by Michael Tsin

P. E. H. HAIR. Africa Encountered: European Contacts and Evidence, 1450–1700. Aldershot: Variorum, 1997; dist. Brookfield: Ashgate. Pp. xx, 324. $94.95 (us). Reviewed byNorman R. Bennett

GODFREY GOODWIN. The Janissaries. London: Saqi Books, 1997; dist. Portland, Oreg.: ISBS. Pp. 288. $24.95 (us), paper. Reviewed by Virginia H. Aksan

JOHN M. HEADLEY. Church, Empire, and World: The Quest for Universal Order, 1520–1640. Aldershot: Variorum, 1997; dist. Brookfield: Ashgate. Pp. x, 322. $89.98 (us); JOHN M. HEADLEY. Tommaso Campanella and the Transformation of the World. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997. Pp. xxv, 399. $55.00 (us). Reviewed by William Mccuaig

DAVID MCDOWALL. A Modern History of the Kurds. London and New York: I. B. Tauris, 1997; dist. New York: St Martin's Press. Pp. xii, 480. $17.95 (us) paper. Reviewed by Kemal H. Karpat

GLYNDWR WILLIAMS. The Great South Sea: English Voyages and Encounters, 1570– 1750. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1997. Pp. xv, 300. $37.50 (us). Reviewed by G. V. Scammell

RONALD G. ASCH. The Thirty Years War: The Holy Roman Empire and Europe, 1618–48. New York: St Martin's Press, 1997. Pp. xiv, 247. $19.95 (us), paper. Reviewed by Heinz Duchhardt

DONALD HARMAN AKENSON. If the Irish Ran the World: Montserrat, 1630–1730. Montreal and Kingston: McGill-Queen's University Press, 1997. Pp. x, 273. $22.95 (CDN), paper. Reviewed by Andrew J. O'Shaughnessy

GRETE KLINGENSTEIN and FRANZ A. J. SZABO, eds. Staatskanzler Wenzel Anton von Kaunitz-Rietberg, 1711–1704: Neue Perspektiven zu Politik und Kultur der europäischen Aufklärung. Graz: Andreas Schnider Verlagsatelier, 1996. Pp. iv, 499. $46.00 (us). Reviewed by P. G. M. Dickson

THOMAS R. TRAUTMANN. Aryans And British India. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997. Pp. xiv, 260. $35.00 (us). Reviewed by Eugene F. Irschick

MATTHEW H. EDNEY. Mapping an Empire: The Geographical Construction of British India, 1765–1843. Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 1997. Pp. xv, 458. $35.00 (us). Reviewed by Douglas M. Peers

ORVILLE T. MURPHY. The Diplomatic Retreat of France and Public Opinion on the Eve of the French Revolution, 1783–1789. Washington: Cadiolic University of America Press, 1998. Pp. viii, 193. $59.95 (us). Reviewed by Marsha Frey

J. E. COOKSON. The British Armed Nation, 1793–1815. Oxford and New York: Clarendon Press, Oxford University Press, 1997. Pp. vi, 286. $121.50 (CDN). Reviewed by H. T. Dickinson

ANTHONY S. BENNELL. The Making of Arthur Wellesley. London: Sangam Books, 1997. Pp. viii, 235. £17.95. Reviewed by Enid M. Fuhr

DAVID CURTIS SKAGGS and GERARD T. ALTOFF. A Signal Victory: The Lake Erie Campaign, 1812–1813. Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 1997. Pp. x, 244. $34.95 (us). Reviewed by E. Jane Errington

ZEYNEP ÇELIK. Urban Forms and Colonial Confrontations: Algiers under French Rule. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997. Pp. xiv, 236. $40.00 (us). Reviewed by John Ruedy

PETER YOUNG and PETER JESSER. The Media and the Military: From the Crimea to Desert Strike. New York: St Martin's Press, 1997. Pp. viii, 391. $59.95 (us), cloth; $19.95 (us), paper. Reviewed by Philip M. Taylor

JOST DÜLFFER, MARTIN KRÖGER, and ROLF-HARALD WIPPICH. Vermiedene Kriege. Deeskalation von Konflikten der Großmächte zwischen Krimkrieg uni Erstem Weltkrieg, 1856–1914. Munich: R. Oldenbourg Verlag, 1997. Pp. vi, 716. DM 98, paper. Reviewed by Ivo N. Lambi

PAUL A. C. KOISTINEN. Mobilizing for Modern War: The Political Economy of American Warfare, 1865–1919. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1997. Pp. xiii, 391. $45.00 (us). Reviewed by Robert D. Cuff

THOMAS FISCHER. Die verlorenen Dekaden: ←Entwicklung nach außen→ und ausländische Geschäfte in Kolumbien, 1870–1914. New York: Peter Lang, 1997. Pp. 472. $76.95 (us), paper. Reviewed by JÜRgen Buchenau

FREDERICK F. ANSCOMBE. The Ottoman Gulf: The Creation of Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar. New York: Columbia University Press, 1997. Pp. xiv, 270. $17.50 (us), paper. Reviewed by Caesar E. Farah

LEILA J. RUPP. Worlds of Women: The Making of an International Women's Movement. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997. Pp. xiii, 325. $19.95 (us)> paper. Reviewed by Harriet Hyman Alonso

IAN ROBERT DOWBIGGIN. Keeping America Sane: Psychiatry and Eugenics in the United States and Canada, 1880–1940. Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 1997. Pp. xvi, 245. $37.50 (us). Reviewed by Angus Mclaren

MYUNG-KEUN CHOI. Changes in Korean Society between 1884–1910 as a Result of the Introduction of Christianity. New York: Peter Lang, 1997. Pp. xx, 321. $54.95 (us). Reviewed by James H. Grayson

ALEX MCKAY. Tibet and the British Raj: The Frontier Cadre, 1904–1947. Surrey, UK: Curzon Press, 1997. Pp. xxvi, 293. £65.00. Reviewed by Ian Copland

WILLIAM N. TILCHIN. Theodore Roosevelt and the British Empire: A Study in Presidential Statecraft. New York: St Martin's Press, 1997. Pp. xvii, 302. $45.00 (us). Reviewed by Richard H. Collin

SAMUEL HYNES. The Soldiers' Tale: Bearing Witness to Modern War. New York and London: Allen Lane and Penguin, 1997. Pp. xvi, 318. $24.95 (us). Reviewed by Jacek Wi?niewski

STEPHEN GARTON. The Cost of War: Australians Return. New York: Oxford University Press, 1996. Pp. xii, 298. $53.95 (CDN). Reviewed by Christina Twomey

WILLIAM ALLISON. American Diplomats in Russia: Case Studies in Orphan Diplomacy, 1916–1919. Westport: Praeger, 1997. Pp. xi, 190. $59.95 (us). Reviewed by Betty M. Unterberger

T. HUNT TOOLEY. National Identity and Weimar Germany: Upper Silesia and the Eastern Border, 1918–1922. Lincoln and London: University of Nebraska Press, 1997. Pp. xii, 320. $56.00 (us). Reviewed by Peter Krüger

DAVID CHUTER. Humanity's Soldier: France and International Security, 1919– 2001. Providence: Berghahn Books, 1996. Pp. xi, 356. $59.95 (us). Reviewed by Anthony Adamthwaite

G. F. KRIVOSHEEV, ed. Soviet Casualties and Combat Losses in the Twentieth Century, trans. Christine Barnard. London and Mechanicsburg: Greenhill Books and Stackpole Books, 1997. Pp. xiv, 290. £21.95. Reviewed by Steven Rosefielde

RAYMOND PEARSON. The Rise and Fall of the Soviet Empire. New York: St Martin's Press, 1998. Pp. xix, 194. $19.95 (us), paper. Reviewed by Graeme Gill

WARREN F. KUEHL and LYNNE K. DUNN. Keeping the Covenant: American Internationalists and the League of Mations, 1920–1939. Kent: Kent State University Press, 1997. Pp. xvii, 306. $49.00 (us). Reviewed by George Egerton

ALEKSANDR M. NEKRICH. Pariahs, Partners, Predators: German-Soviet Relations, 1922–1941, ed. and trans. Gregory L. Freeze. New York: Columbia University Press, 1997. Pp. xiv, 308. $35.00 (us); DIANE P. KOENKER and RONALD D. BACHMAN, eds. Revelations from the Russian Archives: Documents in English Translation. Washington: Library of Congress, 1997. Pp. xxv, 808. $59.00 (us). Reviewed by Jonathan Haslam

D. A. Low. Britain and Indian Nationalism: The Imprint of Ambiguity, 1929– 1942. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1997. Pp. xv, 358. $74.95 (us). Reviewed by Anita Inder Singh

CHARLES REARICK. The French in Love and War: Popular Culture in the Era of the World Wars. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1997. Pp. x, 321. $35.00 (us). Reviewed by Judith Devlin

DEREK H. ALDCROFT. Studies in the Interwar European Economy. Aldershot and Brookfield: Ashgate, 1997. Pp. ix, 229. $72.95 (us). Reviewed by Sidney Pollard

PATRICIA CLAVIN. The Failure of Economic Diplomacy: Britain, Germany, France, and the United States, 1931–36. New York: St Martin's Press, 1996. Pp. x, 279. $59.95 (us). Reviewed by Kenneth Mouré

BENJAMIN WELLES. Sumner Welles: FDR's Global Strategist. New York: St Martin's Press, 1997. Pp. xii, 437. $35.00 (us). Reviewed by Warren F. Kimball

TOM BUCHANAN. Britain and the Spanish Civil War. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1997. Pp. xii, 241. $64.95 (us), cloth; $24.95 (us), paper. Reviewed by Michael Richards

DENNIS J. DUNN. Caught between Roosevelt and Stalin: America's Ambassadors to Moscow. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1998. Pp. xii, 349. $29.95 (us). Reviewed by David Mayers

BARBARA REARDEN FARNHAM. Roosevelt and the Munich Crisis: A Study of Political Decision-Making. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997. Pp. xi, 313. $39.50 (us). Reviewed by Randall Schweller

DAVID DAY, ed. Brave New World: Dr H. V. Evatt and Australian Foreign Policy, 1941–1949. St Lucia: University of Queensland Press, 1996; dist. Portland, Oreg.: ISBS. Pp. x, 182. $22.95 (us), paper. Reviewed by Roger Dingman

HORSTJ. P. BERGMEIER and RAINER E. LOTZ. Hitler's Airwaves: The Inside Story of Nazi Radio Broadcasting and Propaganda Swing. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1997. Pp. xiv, 368. $40.00 (us). Reviewed by Edwin Herzstein

CHARLES L. ROBERTSON. International Politics since World War II: A Short History. Armonk: M. E. Sharpe, 1997. Pp. xiv, 383. $62.95 (us), cloth; $24.95 (us), paper. Reviewed by Keith L. Nelson

YEZID SAYIGH and Avi SHLAIM, eds. The Cold War and the Middle East. New York: Clarendon Press, Oxford University Press, 1997. Pp. xiv, 303. $108.00 (CDN). Reviewed by Michael Graham Fry

PETER LOWE. Containing the Cold War in East Asia: British Policies towards Japan, China, and Korea, 1948–1953. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1997. Pp. xii, 288. £45.00. Reviewed by Roger Buckley

NEIL CAPLAN. Futile Diplomacy: Volume III: The United Nations, the Great Powers, and Middle East Peacemaking, 1948–1954. London: Frank Cass, 1997; dist. Portland, Oreg.: ISBS. Pp. xxvi, 390. $59.50 (us); Volume IV: Operation Alpha and the Failure of Anglo-American Coercive Diplomacy in the Arab-Israeli Conflict, 1954–1956. London: Frank Cass, 1997; dist. Portland, Oreg.: ISBS. Pp. xxi,414. $59.50 (us). Reviewed by Benny Morris

ONN WINCKLER. Population Growth and Migration in Jordan, 1950–1994. Brighton: Sussex Academic Press, 1997. Pp. xii, 138. $75.00 (us). Reviewed by Allan Findlay

MICHAEL D. GAMBONE. Eisenhower, Somoza, and the Cold War in Nicaragua, 1953–1961. Westport: Praeger, 1997. Pp. xiv, 247. $65.00 (us). Reviewed by Richard H. Immerman

N. PIERS LUDLOW. Dealing with Britain: The Six and the First UK Application to the EEC. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1997. Pp. xiii, 282. $64.95 (us), cloth; $24.95 (us), paper. Reviewed by Coral Bell

KENDRICK OLIVER. Kennedy, Macmillan, and the Nuclear Test-Ban Debate, 1961–63. New York: St Martin's Press, 1998. Pp. x, 252. $65.00 (us). Reviewed by Jeffrey W. Knopf

TIMOTHY P. MAGA. Hands across the Sea? US-Japan Relations, 1961–1981. Athens: Ohio University Press, 1997. Pp. x, 183. $29.95 (us). Reviewed by Michael A. Barnhart

HOUMAN A. SADRI. Revolutionary States, Leaders, and Foreign Relations: A Comparative Study of China, Cuba, and Iran. Westport: Praeger, 1997. Pp. xv, 147. $55.00 (us). Reviewed by Odd Arne Westad

DUNCAN L. CLARKE, DANIEL B. O'CONNOR, and JASON D. ELLIS. Send Guns and Money: Security Assistance and US Foreign Policy. Westport: Praeger, 1997. Pp. xiv, 211. $19.95 (us), paper. Reviewed by Ted Galen Carpenter

CHARLES S. MAIER. Dissolution: The Crisis of Communism and the End of East Germany. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997. Pp. xx, 440. $29.95 (us). Reviewed by Geoff Eley

FERGUS CARR, ed. Europe: The Cold Divide. New York: St Martin's Press, 1998. Pp. xii, 208. $65.00 (us). Reviewed by Richard Falk

KARL VON VORYS. American Foreign Policy: Consensus at Home, Leadership Abroad. Westport: Praeger, 1997. Pp. viii, 379. $59.95 (us). Reviewed by Wesley T. Wooley

ALAN COLLINS. The Security Dilemma and the End of the Cold War. New York: St Martin's Press, 1997. Pp. 243. $59.95 (us). Reviewed by William C. Wohlforth

MICHAEL LIBAL. Limits of Persuasion: Germany and the Yugoslav Crisis, 1991– 1992. Westport: Praeger, 1997. Pp. xi, 206. $59.95 (us). Reviewed by Hanns W. Maull

JOHN W. GARVER. Face Off: China, the United States, and Taiwan's Democratization. Seatde: University of Washington Press, 1997. Pp. xii, 193. $18.95 (us), paper. Reviewed by Peter Van Ness

ROBERT JERVIS. System Effects: Complexity in Political and Social Life. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997. Pp. ix, 309. $29.95 (us). Reviewed by Harlan Wilson

MICHAEL W. DOYLE. Ways of War and Peace: Realism, Liberalism, and Socialism. New York: W. W. Norton &; Company, 1997. Pp. 557. $30.00 (us). Reviewed by Fred H. Lawson