scholarly journals Rituals between religion and politics: the case of VHP’s 2001-2002 Ayodhya-campaign

2003 ◽  
Vol 18 ◽  
pp. 162-175
Author(s):  
Erik Reenberg Sand
Keyword(s):  
Political Discourse ◽  
Religion And Politics ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Nationalist Movement ◽  
The North ◽  
Bharatiya Janata Party ◽  
The Right ◽  
Sangh Parivar

The present paper deals with rituals in a political discourse, namely the rituals employed by the right wing, Hindu nationalist movement, Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), in its campaign for a Rama temple in the north Indian town of Ayodhya. As is probably well-known, VHP is part of a group of organizations known as the Sangh Parivar, or sangh family, which also includes the presently ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), and the ultranationalistic organization Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, or RSS. The rituals of VHP are instruments of the construction of an ideal Hindu society and part of an encounter between Hindu-nationalist tenets and the secular, political establishment. However, the rituals employed by VHP can not be said to represent a separate ritual genre, since they are not different from similar, traditional Hindu rituals. What makes them different is their context and their motives, the fact that they do not serve ordinary material, eschatological, or soteriological aims, but rather political aims, as well as the fact that the ritual agents in this case do not seem to have a satisfactory juridical legitimacy to perform the rituals.

The BJP and an Ideological Consolidation of the Right?

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pradeep K. Chhibber ◽  
Rahul Verma
Keyword(s):  
Right Wing ◽  
National Elections ◽  
Economic Changes ◽  
Electoral Success ◽  
The Social ◽  
Bharatiya Janata Party ◽  
The Right ◽  
Potential Challenge

To the surprise of many, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) singlehandedly won a majority in the national elections of 2014. Since then the party which, once had two seats in parliament, has come to govern 21 states in India. How did the BJP become so successful? The BJP is now the principal carrier of conservatism in India. This was not the case at independence. The ideological roots of the BJP lie in the idea of Hindu majoritarianism. Over the years the BJP succeeded in accommodating conservative elements not only from the Congress but also from other right-wing parties. Its electoral success has been aided by the social and economic changes in India since the 1990s. These changes, however, have also generated contradictions within the ideological coalitions that brought about the rise of the BJP and pose a potential challenge to the party as it moves to consolidate its position.

Congress Radicals and Hindu Militancy: Sampurnanand and Purushottam Das Tandon in the Politics of the United Provinces, 1930–1947

2002 ◽  
Vol 36 (3) ◽  
pp. 619-655 ◽  
Author(s):  
William Gould
Keyword(s):  
Political Parties ◽  
North India ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Hindu Nationalism ◽  
Indian Nationalism ◽  
Indian State ◽  
National Congress ◽  
The Right ◽  
Sangh Parivar ◽  
The Relationship

A recent trend in the historiography of north India has involved analyses of ‘Hindu nationalist’ motifs and ideologies within both mainstream nationalist discourses and subaltern politics. A dense corpus of work has attempted to provide historical explanations for the rise of Hindutva in the subcontinent, and a great deal of debate has surrounded the implications of this development for the fate of secularism in India. Some of this research has examined the wider implications of Hindutva for the Indian state, democracy and civil society and in the process has highlighted, to some degree, the relationship between Hindu nationalism and ‘mainstream’ Indian nationalism. Necessarily, this has involved discussion of the ways in which the Congress, as the predominant vehicle of ‘secular nationalism’ in India, has attempted to contest or accommodate the forces of Hindu nationalist revival and Hindutva. By far the most interesting and illuminating aspect of this research has been the suggestion that Hindu nationalism, operating as an ideology, has manifested itself not only in the institutions of the right-wing Sangh Parivar but has been accommodated, often paradoxically, within political parties and civil institutions hitherto associated with the forces of secularism. An investigation of this phenomenon opens up new possibilities for research into the nature of Hindu nationalism itself, and presents new questions about the ambivalent place of religious politics in institutions such as the Indian National Congress.

scholarly journals The ‘new’ League success in the red belt and its post-fascist inheritance: evidence from 2018 National Elections

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Moreno Mancosu ◽  
Riccardo Ladini
Keyword(s):  
Unemployment Rate ◽  
Political Discourse ◽  
The Political ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
National Elections ◽  
Electoral Outcomes ◽  
Lega Nord ◽  
First Republic ◽  
The Right ◽  
The Relationship

In 2018 national elections, the Lega, an Italian xenophobic right-wing party, has dramatically increased its consensus in the ‘red belt’, the central part of the country traditionally ruled by center-left parties. Pundits have argued that this performance can be attributed to the effect of the new leadership of Matteo Salvini, who shifted the ideological location of the party (that now aims at being a national right-wing party), combined with the drop in preferences of Forza Italia, the ally/competitor in the right-wing ideological spectrum. This paper aims at providing new insights in the explanation of these electoral outcomes, by hypothesizing that geographical trajectories of diffusion of the party are correlated with the presence of geographically clustered post-fascist minorities present in the region since the First Republic age. By employing official figures at the municipality level, the paper analyses the relationship between the percentages of votes for the MSI (the most relevant post-fascist force during the First Republic) in 1976 and the Lega Nord in the 2006-2018 period. Consistent with our hypothesis, the post-fascist inheritance is significantly correlated with the local prevalence for the Lega Nord in 2018, after the change in the political discourse and leadership of the party. Empirical analyses provide evidence of our expectations, even when controlling for unemployment rate and percentage of immigrants.

The Seriousness of Play: Johan Huizinga and Carl Schmitt on Play and the Political

2020 ◽  
pp. 155541202097561
Author(s):  
Alexander Lambrow
Keyword(s):  
Political Discourse ◽  
Carl Schmitt ◽  
Nazi Germany ◽  
The Political ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Seminal Work ◽  
Political Dimensions ◽  
Johan Huizinga ◽  
The Right

This article addresses the political dimensions of Johan Huizinga’s seminal work Homo Ludens: A study of the play element in culture (1938). More than just a foundational text in academic ludology, this text positioned itself as a polemic against the right-wing political discourse going on in contemporaneous Nazi Germany, represented chiefly by Carl Schmitt. Through his concept of play, Huizinga hoped to resolve what he perceived to be the confusion of play and seriousness among a group of reactionary theorists narrowly focused on the Schmittian Ernstfall, the “serious case” of inimical violence. This article analyzes the usage of the concepts of “play” and “seriousness” in Huizinga’s and Schmitt’s respective corpuses and, finally, places their work in dialogue in order to understand the difficulties involved in defining play as unserious and unpolitical.

Introduction

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-16
Author(s):  
Luis Cabrera
Keyword(s):  
European Union ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Indian Government ◽  
Caste Discrimination ◽  
Bharatiya Janata Party ◽  
Turkish Case ◽  
The Right ◽  
First Offers

This chapter first offers narratives introducing actors in the book’s major case studies. In India, these include members of the National Campaign on Dalit Human Rights, which has sought to enlist global allies to press the Indian government for stronger action against caste discrimination, and its critics in the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party. The right-wing populist UK Independence Party’s aims for British secession from the European Union are highlighted, as are its claims that the prospect of European Union accession for predominantly Muslim Turkey is a chief reason why Britain should leave. The Turkish case is introduced via street scenes of activists confronting police amid the country’s rising authoritarianism. Then the chapter outlines the book’s major claims for how a robust institutional cosmopolitanism can be shown to orient to political humility rather than arrogance. Variants of cosmopolitanism are discussed, and the book’s argument is previewed by chapter.

scholarly journals CONCEPTUAL METAPHOR IN THE GERMAN POLITICAL DISCOURSE AS A REFLECTION OF MIGRATION PROCESSES (BASED ON OFFICIAL STATEMENTS OF THE PARTY “ALTERNATIVE FOR GERMANY”)

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 ◽  
pp. 8-18
Author(s):  
T. S. Medvedeva ◽  
V. E. Kazakova
Keyword(s):  
Federal Government ◽  
Political Discourse ◽  
Conceptual Metaphor ◽  
Public Awareness ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Migration Policies ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Right ◽  
Alternative For Germany

The paper considers the metaphorical models as a way of conceptual-metaphorical representation of migration policies pursued by the German federal government in the texts of official statements of the right-wing opposition party “Alternative for Germany” (AfD). The study aims at analyzing the functioning of conceptual metaphors in the German political discourse focused on migration processes. The study is based on the texts of AfD’s official statements within the 2016th and the 2019th years posted on the website https://www.afd.de/ The overall number of the analyzed texts is 70. The theory of political metaphor is currently one of the most urgent and dynamic fields of linguistics. In our opinion, the metaphorization of migration processes is understudied and needs addressing the topic. As a result of the research, the conclusion is made that the metaphor serves as one of the most important and effective ways of manipulation aimed at controlling the public awareness and contributing to shaping political viewpoints that benefit the addresser. Throughout the study we analyzed the basic metaphorical models used to describe migration processes in Germany; a classification of predominant metaphors based on the sources of metaphorical expansion was worked out. Besides, we tried to trace the dynamics of using the metaphorical models within the four-year period. In 2016 as well as in 2019 nature-morphic, anthropomorphic, sociomorphic models were widely used in the official statements of the AfD party. However, the number of the metaphors in the texts dated 2016 is half as much as in 2019 (184 versus 120). In both periods of time the sociomorphic model proved to be the most popular but it is much more frequent in 2019. However, in the texts dated 2016 it comprises additional concepts of religion and hospitality. The nature-morphic metaphor is twice more frequent in 2016. The percent of anthropomorphic and cognitive metaphors in both periods of time remains unaltered.

scholarly journals "Normalisierung nach rechts": Politischer Diskurs im Spannungsfeld von Neoliberalismus, Populismus und kritischer Öffentlichkeit

2015 ◽  
Vol 73 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ruth Wodak
Keyword(s):  
Qualitative Analysis ◽  
School Children ◽  
Political Discourse ◽  
Basic Assumption ◽  
Terrorist Attacks ◽  
The Political ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Complete Sample ◽  
Political Spectrum ◽  
The Right

In recent years, we can observe a shift towards the right, in politics and the related political discourse. This paper analyses this development for debates on migration in Austria, while drawing on the concept of "normalisation". The basic assumption is illustrated with an example of Austrian debates following the terrorist attacks in Paris, 7.–9.01.2015. In the quantitative and qualitative analysis of a complete sample of 72 newspaper articles in the period of two weeks in January/February 2015, it becomes obvious that the notion of "unwillingness to integrate" ("Integrationsunwilligkeit"), a completely vague notion (a "floating signifier") which remains undefined and was used only by the right-wing populist party FPÖ in the 1990s, has since moved to the middle of the political spectrum and was suddenly employed by the political mainstream in 2014 and 2015. Moreover, the analysis provides some evidence for the merging of two completely unrelated arguments: an argument about how to deal with non-compliance of adolescent migrant school children with an argument about the prevention of radicalisation in society.

scholarly journals Drift simulation of MH370 debris using superensemble techniques

2016 ◽  
Vol 16 (7) ◽  
pp. 1623-1628 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eric Jansen ◽  
Giovanni Coppini ◽  
Nadia Pinardi
Keyword(s):  
East Coast ◽  
Meteorological Data ◽  
Marine Debris ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Multiple Model ◽  
Search Area ◽  
The North ◽  
Extensive Search ◽  
Tangible Evidence ◽  
The Right

Abstract. On 7 March 2014 (UTC), Malaysia Airlines flight 370 vanished without a trace. The aircraft is believed to have crashed in the southern Indian Ocean, but despite extensive search operations the location of the wreckage is still unknown. The first tangible evidence of the accident was discovered almost 17 months after the disappearance. On 29 July 2015, a small piece of the right wing of the aircraft was found washed up on the island of Réunion, approximately 4000 km from the assumed crash site. Since then a number of other parts have been found in Mozambique, South Africa and on Rodrigues Island. This paper presents a numerical simulation using high-resolution oceanographic and meteorological data to predict the movement of floating debris from the accident. Multiple model realisations are used with different starting locations and wind drag parameters. The model realisations are combined into a superensemble, adjusting the model weights to best represent the discovered debris. The superensemble is then used to predict the distribution of marine debris at various moments in time. This approach can be easily generalised to other drift simulations where observations are available to constrain unknown input parameters. The distribution at the time of the accident shows that the discovered debris most likely originated from the wide search area between 28 and 35° S. This partially overlaps with the current underwater search area, but extends further towards the north. Results at later times show that the most probable locations to discover washed-up debris are along the African east coast, especially in the area around Madagascar. The debris remaining at sea in 2016 is spread out over a wide area and its distribution changes only slowly.

BJP’s Electoral Victory in Assam, 2016: Co-opting the Khilonjiyas

Social Change ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 47 (1) ◽  
pp. 108-124
Author(s):  
Akhil Ranjan Dutta
Keyword(s):  
Indigenous People ◽  
State Government ◽  
Identity Politics ◽  
The State ◽  
Oil Fields ◽  
Indigenous Groups ◽  
Bharatiya Janata Party ◽  
Collective Resistance ◽  
The Right ◽  
Sangh Parivar

The landslide victory of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in Assam’s assembly election in April 2016 provokes diametrically opposite interpretations. While for the rank and file of the Sangh Parivar, the victory reveals a consolidation of Hindutva forces in the state, at the other end of the spectrum, some portions of the intelligentsia, who want to project the BJP as a changed and secular entity, assert that the electoral results do not reflect the rise of Hindutva in the state but rather the advance of indigenous and identity politics. For the latter, the key to BJP’s electoral triumph was its alliance with regional-ethnic forces against the backdrop of the growing insecurity among Assam’s indigenous people caused by a steady influx from Bangladesh. While Hindu consolidation, through different agencies and institutions, gained momentum in the state, in the present elections, it was the highly emotive campaign for the protection of the rights of the Khilonjiyas (the indigenous) that assured victory for the BJP-led alliance. But it is important to understand the way ‘indigenous’ was constructed as an exclusionary category to bring in communal divisions in the electoral battle. The theory of ‘indigenous’ propagated during the elections had nothing do with substantive rights like the ‘right to self-determination’ or ‘rights over resources’, emphasised by the International Declarations on Rights of the Indigenous People. The international bidding for the auction of 12 oil fields in Assam by the BJP-led union government immediately after the new state government had assumed power and the collective resistance by nationalist and indigenous groups against this decision exposed the hollowness of the ‘indigenous agenda’ of the BJP in Assam.

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