1989: THE CHRONOPOLITICS OF REVOLUTION

A failed effort at “reform from above” or a dramatic reassertion of “people power”? Almost thirty-five years on, studies of the Revolutions of 1989 continue to be framed by these two polarities. However, this historiographical focus has meant that scholars have often overlooked the actual content and character of protest itself. This article argues that one way of reinjecting agency and ideas back into our historical understanding of 1989 is through examining the chronopolitics of revolution: that is to say, by addressing how the control and interpretation of time became a political battlefield, a site of contention and negotiation, between Communist regimes, on the one hand, and political activists and society, on the other. Investigating events in the German Democratic Republic and Czechoslovakia, the article contains two central claims: first, that an interrogation of the concept of “chronopolitics” can provide a new angle by which to grasp the revolutionary character of “1989” and the democratic transformations that resulted and, second, by way of inversion, that a study of the temporal experiences across 1989 and the early 1990s can in turn shed light on the analytical value of “chronopolitics” more generally.     

War in the feudal zone: state failure and the abandonment of anthropological research in Mexico and Central America

We analysed the extent to which violent, organised crime has disrupted anthropological research in Mexico and Central America by conducting a survey of anthropologists who work in the region. We found that although anthropologists will continue research in regions they perceive to have the socio-economic characteristics of a failed state they are far less inclined to work in areas that they perceive as excessively violent. We continue with examination of the state failure and feudalisation that are affecting the region. We conclude that in the feudal zones, the state has lost its comparative advantage in the use of force and that state intrusion into these areas increases armed collective violence in a manner similar to that described in the literature on warfare in tribal zones.     

From The Iron Curtain to Franco’s Spain: Right-Wing Central Europeans in Exile

After the Second World War, anti-communists of different backgrounds from Central and Eastern European countries decided to settle in Franco’s Spain, where they sought safety and a place to live during the Cold War. This article will provide an overview of their political profiles and assess the reasons these exiles chose Spain, a country excluded from the United Nations until 1955 and led by Francisco Franco. The article also shows how they settled in the dictatorship linked to the Nazis and Italian Fascists, and the ways in which they continued their struggles against Communism with public and private resources.     

Peace negotiations in the political marketplace: the implications of women's exclusion in the Sudan-South Sudan peace process

This article investigates the implications of women’s exclusion for the nature and durability of peace processes, and whether factors that undermine peace consolidation post-settlement might be prevented through more inclusive peacemaking. It examines the Sudan-South Sudan peace process that produced the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement, the roles women played in peacemaking and their exclusion from official negotiations, and the sources of insecurity post-CPA. South Sudan’s peace process shows that the exclusion of women can be understood as a canary in a coal mine: a highly visible marker of the broader exclusivity of such processes, and the complex dynamics of elite capture in war and peace processes. Women’s exclusion was the product of the region’s political marketplace, in which power and authority is secured by elites through violence and bargaining, to the exclusion of other groups. By understanding exclusion as a deliberate strategic tactic that extends from war into peacetime, I argue that the exclusion of women is not the reason why peace processes fail in and of itself, but rather the product of elite ownership of peace processes and the structure of many peace processes that facilitates and rewards such ownership, with serious consequences for the sustainability of peace post-settlement.     

DEMOGRAPHIC CHANGE AS A FUTURE CHALLENGE FOR CITIES IN EAST CENTRAL EUROPE

Contemporary cities in East Central Europe (ECE) represent a hybrid type of urban development which is still generally considered to be a special case and is only exceptionally referred to in the recently intensified debate over the European city. Our paper argues that such exclusion is short‐sighted because ECE cities face structural problems similar to those of their Western pendants. Therefore, the contextual frame of urban research needs to be widened and can no longer be restricted to post‐socialist transition. In this regard, one of the main challenges for future urban development will be the consequences of demographic change. Ageing, new patterns of fertility behaviour and more diversified household structures in line with the Second Demographic Transition (SDT) will have significant implications for urban structures and housing markets, as already known for Western Europe. The purpose of this paper is to work out new questions and hypotheses for future urban research with special respect to Polish and Czech cities. Besides West European experience, recent developments in eastern Germany are taken as a frame of reference, assuming that this specific transition case may, in many respects, be regarded as a forerunner for similar developments in its neighbouring countries.     

Archaeozoological research on vertebrates in Central Europe with special reference to the medieval period

This paper is the outcome of a lecture held at the Institute of Archaeology, University College London. It provides a summary in English of the archaeozoological research work which has been carried out in Central Europe during the last 30 years, with special reference to material from medieval times. It is shown that a thorough zoological analysis of bones from excavations provides much information for historical interpretation. Not only was the ratio of wild and domestic animals or of the different species of interest, but also the age and sex structure of the population by taking the function of the site into consideration. Some observations on animal teeth gave indications of distinctive handicrafts. Cut marks on cervical vertebrae of horse skeletons found as grave goods from early medieval times were considered in connection with beliefs and juridical conceptions of that time.     

Dietary Variability During Bronze Age in Central Italy: First Results

This research aims at delineating the dietary practices in Central Italy during the Bronze Age. The study of food choices is a mean for investigating palaeoenvironmental agricultural and economic activities and social relationships, which have been little explored until now in Italy from this specific perspective. Recent researches have showed that the Middle Bronze Age is a crucial period of dietary changes in Italy. Following these first observations, we studied three Bronze Age sites in Tuscany and Latium: Grotta dello Scoglietto, Grotta Misa and Felcetone. Analyses of stable carbon, nitrogen and sulphur isotopes on 38 human and 22 animal collagen samples were performed. The results show three different dietary patterns. Data from Grotta dello Scoglietto (Early Bronze Age) indicate a high‐protein intake, with a probable consumption of fish. Additionally, sulphur results let us infer the presence of some non‐local people. Individuals from Felcetone (Initial phase of the Middle Bronze Age) show a terrestrial diet dominated by plant proteins, which suggests a low δ¹⁵N food intake, namely legumes, as well as C₄ plant, such as millet. Finally, values from Grotta Misa (Middle Bronze Age) highlight a mixed terrestrial diet and the consumption of millet. Given the variety of the obtained results, we are able to conclude that the transition from the Early to the Middle Bronze Age represents a moment of change, which is reflected by the presence of different dietary patterns. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

中国俄国史研究百年检视与思考

中俄交往始于蒙古西征和金帐汗国时代(1238-1480年),中国学人撰写俄国史自1878年刊印的鹭江奇迹人的《俄国志略》,到今天已经有整整140年的历史。中国的俄国史学科伴随民族命运、国家危机以及世界形势的变化而生,自诞生之日起即负有学人情怀、民族重任和学术职责三重使命。因此,俄国史学科在中国一直发挥着“知夷”和“盗火”的两大作用。中华人民共和国成立后,俄国史(包括苏联时期和俄罗斯联邦时期)研究获得了70年的巨大发展,主要成就有:1985年中国苏联东欧史研究会成立(1992年英文更名为中国俄罗斯东欧中亚史研究会),高等院校、社会科学院、党校、国家有关部委及党政机构纷纷设立俄国史或俄罗斯问题研究机构,建立了从历史学学士、俄国史硕士到俄国史博士的三级专业人才培养体系,俄国史和俄罗斯问题研究的专业期刊创立并连续出版,大量的俄国通史、中俄(中苏)关系史、专题著作、各类教科书、翻译著作(来自俄文、英法、法文、德文、波兰文等)出版,中国俄国史学者积极参与国际学术会议和国际合作研究,具有中国特色的中国“俄罗斯学”新学科正在建立过程中。     

河南焦作聂村商代晚期墓地人骨研究

通过对河南焦作聂村商代晚期遗址出土的人骨进行观察、测量和数据统计分析,结果表明,聂村商代晚期墓地所出人骨的死亡年龄主要集中在中年期,颅骨种族特征与古中原类型的殷墟中小墓(2)组最近似,成年男性居民平均身高为165.41厘米。在聂村商代晚期人骨上还发现筛状眶与多孔性骨肥厚、骨性关节炎等骨骼病理,两性在龋病患齿率上存在显著差异,女性明显高于男性。     

Towards a countertopography of intimate war: contouring violence and resistance in a South Sudanese diaspora

Recent feminist geographic scholarship insists we rethink domestic violence as ‘intimate war’. Using this concept I analyze narratives of violence and resistance articulated by U.S.-resettled South Sudanese women and collected in the wake of a fatal incidence of domestic violence in 2005. One of a spate of intimate partner murders that shook the community at this time, this tragic event spurred debates about shifting gender norms, the stresses and opportunities of life in the diaspora, and the irradicable legacies of war. Bringing Pain and Staeheli's ‘intimacy-geopolitics’ to bear on this particularly violent, momentary and publicized aggression, I situate it within a more complex, quotidian, and dynamic terrain of power. In line with feminist political geography, this analysis complicates scalar distinctions of body, home and nation-state, demonstrating the common foundations of ‘private’, domestic and ‘public’, state-sanctioned violences. Inspired by Katz’s countertopographical approach, I extend our understanding of intimate war by contouring moments of violence and resistance in a diasporic context, over the lifecourse of refugee women, and across their sites of flight, displacement and resettlement. Tracing the mobilities of intimate war in this way productively reveals the spatial and temporal, as well as scalar, folds that may form part of its foundation.