Indian Debates on the International Left: Selected Writings of Lajpat Rai

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shirin Rai ◽  
Anand Prakash
Keyword(s):  
Identity Politics ◽  
The Other ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Progressive Change ◽  
Political Debates ◽  
Right Wing Populism ◽  
1960S And 1970S ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
The One

This book traces the Indian Left’s engagement with the international communist debates of the 1960s and 1970s, shedding new light on the fault lines within the Left as well as on its international solidarities. Lajpat Rai argued for rethinking established leftist positions, seeking inspiration in experiment and developing creative approaches for the sustainability of socialist ideas and ideals. The contemporary relevance of these debates is significant as the Left remains without a sharp response to the rise of neoliberalism and right-wing populism in India, and a failure of the Left to recognize the challenges emanating from a strongly integrated and organized finance capital on the one hand and the increasingly self-aware identity politics on the other. Democratic opposition rather than a bureaucratic thinking needs to be the backbone of any meaningful Left struggle. Lajpat Rai’s passionate writing gives expression to the spirit and intensity of political debates at the time and the role of the Left intelligentsia in comprehending, from a committed socialist angle, the shifting paradigms of an unstable world to help bring about progressive change.

Right-Wing Populism and Noncoercive Injustice

John Rawls ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 354-370
Author(s):  
Michael Blake
Keyword(s):  
Democratic Governance ◽  
The Other ◽  
Related Phenomenon ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Law Of Peoples ◽  
Conceptual Distinction ◽  
Right Wing Populism ◽  
Political Communities ◽  
The One ◽  
Coercive Intervention

John Rawls’s The Law of Peoples makes several assumptions that, in the years since that book’s writing, have been shown to be potentially flawed. The first is that democratic societies can be predicted to inculcate citizens with democratic values, such that democratic peoples have no realistic worry about backsliding into tyranny. The second is that there is a sharp conceptual distinction between coercive intervention, on the one hand, and mere conversation and speech on the other. The emergence of right-wing populism—and the related phenomenon of troll farms, intended to inflame disagreement and anger within democratic political communities abroad—have raised the issue of antidemocratic societies using speech to undermine support for democratic self-government abroad. Rawls’s Law of Peoples, I argue, is poorly suited for the task of responding to these circumstances. Rawls’s Law of Peoples might have been better situated for this task, the chapter concludes, had Rawls included robust respect for democratic governance within that law. This Democratic Law of Peoples might have been the basis of a global society in which democracies held each other to account for their deviations from democratic self-government—while still expressing tolerance and modesty about the extent to which we might coercively intervene in favor of democracy.

Democracy’s Autonomy Dilemma: Whistleblowing and the Politics of Disclosure

2021 ◽  
pp. 073527512110548
Author(s):  
Thomas Olesen
Keyword(s):  
Pronounced Effect ◽  
The Other ◽  
Democratic Politics ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
1960S And 1970S ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
The One ◽  
Gray Areas

Democracy has been characterized from its outset by an autonomy dilemma. On the one hand, we think it vital that organizations work according to their own codes and logics. On the other hand, we insist that autonomy must never be complete, that citizens have a right to transgress boundaries to expose wrongdoing. With their insider position in the organizations where wrongdoing occurs, whistleblowers hold a unique place within this democratic politics of disclosure, which has so far not been sociologically theorized. This article takes four steps to address this lacuna: First, I situate whistleblowing within the democratic landslides that took place during the 1960s and 1970s; second, I disentangle it from practices such as journalism and activism; third, I argue that whistleblowers are particularly well positioned to detect normalized wrongdoing within organizations; and fourth, I discuss how whistleblowers’ most pronounced effect is the disclosure of gray areas that have gone under the democratic radar.

scholarly journals James Bond’s Biopolitics

Humanities ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 62
Author(s):  
Wieland Schwanebeck
Keyword(s):  
Population Control ◽  
The Body ◽  
The Other ◽  
Biological Processes ◽  
James Bond ◽  
Secret Service ◽  
1960S And 1970S ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
The One

This chapter traces Foucauldian technologies of power in the James Bond universe and characterises the Bond franchise’s biopolitics in the cultural environment of the 1960s and 1970s, when 007 became a mass phenomenon. The majority of the chapter is dedicated to a case study of On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, Ian Fleming’s tenth Bond novel (1963) and the sixth film in the EON series (1969). The chapter highlights the intersection between reproduction and fertility on the one hand and the infliction of death and mass genocide on the other, and it examines how James Bond juxtaposes the disciplinary means that are directed against the body (as an organism) on the one hand, and the state-powered regulation of biological processes that control the population on the other. The two versions of On Her Majesty’s Secret Service amount to the franchise’s most straightforward foray into the realm of biopolitics and would pave the way for the franchise’s subsequent biopolitical and eugenic moments, like when the figure of the genocidal villain gets to articulate the franchise’s own subliminal agenda regarding population control and the future of the (British) species.

What Is Urgent Publishing?

APRIA Journal ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 3 (3) ◽  
pp. 33-43
Author(s):  
Florian Cramer
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
The Other ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Left Wing ◽  
Political Debate ◽  
New Form ◽  
The One ◽  
The Right

Publishing is increasingly being challenged through instantaneous social media publish- ing, even in the fields of scholarship and cultural, philosophical and political debate. Memetic self-publishers, such as the right-wing 'YouTube intellectual' Jordan Peterson and his left-wing counterpart Natalie Wynn, seem to tap into urgent needs that traditional publishing fails to identify and address. Does their practice amount to a new form of urgent publishing? How is it different from non-urgent publishing on the one hand and from propaganda on the other? Which urgencies can be addressed by urgent publishing? What is the role of artists and designers in it?

Dislocating Heidegger: Nietzsche’s Presence in Derrida’s Geschlecht III

2021 ◽  
Vol 51 (1) ◽  
pp. 37-60
Author(s):  
Philipp Schwab
Keyword(s):  
The Other ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
1960S And 1970S ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
The One

Abstract The paper discusses the question as to whether, and in which way, Nietzsche is present in Derrida’s readings of Heidegger in the Geschlecht texts, and in the newly edited Geschlecht III specifically. In order to unfold the background of this question, the first part turns to earlier texts from the 1960s and 1970s and shows that Nietzsche is a key figure in Derrida’s takes on Heidegger, especially as regards the issue of Heidegger’s “belonging” to metaphysics. The second part then addresses the Geschlecht texts and makes the case that, despite their brevity and seeming marginality, the remarks on Nietzsche, most of all in Geschlecht III, are indeed illuminating, in mainly two regards: on the one hand, they shed some light on how Derrida reads and “dislocates” Heidegger in these texts overall, and on the other hand, they contribute to the question of a “continuity” in Derrida’s relations to Heidegger.

Exclusionary Egalitarianism and the New Cold War

Slavic Review ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 76 (S1) ◽  
pp. S81-S97
Author(s):  
Brian Porter-Szűcs
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
The Other ◽  
Radical Right ◽  
The Media ◽  
Left And Right ◽  
1960S And 1970S ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
The One

It seems clear that there is a common ideological foundation linking Putin, Le Pen, Orbán, Erdoğan, Trump, Kaczyński, and others, but labeling that ideology has been difficult. Many in the media have called them “populists,” but this term can be misleading and imprecise. This essay focuses on Poland in order to propose a genealogy that transcends conventional divisions between left and right. The phrase “exclusionary egalitarianism” helps us recognize the intertwined commitments to both racism and nationalism on the one hand, and an opposition to inequalities of wealth and status on the other. While the analogy to the radical right of the 1930s is helpful, there is an even closer link to the “national communists” of the 1960s and 1970s.

scholarly journals Neither demarcation nor confrontation

2020 ◽  
Vol 43 (3) ◽  
pp. 357-376
Author(s):  
Christoph Haker ◽  
Lukas Otterspeer
Keyword(s):  
Boundary Work ◽  
Theoretical Framework ◽  
Critical Distance ◽  
The Other ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Critical Position ◽  
Science And Education ◽  
Right Wing Populism ◽  
The One ◽  
Epistemic Dimension

AbstractRight-wing populism has strongly polarizing effects in politics, education and science—a problem which this article aims to adress. Instead of claiming a demarcation between science and education on the one hand and right-wing populist ideology on the other, we initially focus on continuities. At the same time, we are concerned with finding a critical distance towards right-wing populism. Using the theoretical framework of boundary-work we therefore analyse a case of right-wing populist educational and scientific efforts. Boundary-work can occur in an institutional, content-related and epistemic dimension. While we identify strong continuities in the institutional and content-related dimensions, we see the main difference in the epistemic dimension. In conclusion, we use the results of our analysis to develop a critical position as scientists and educationists towards right-wing populism, drawing consequences for the epistemic, content-related and institutional dimensions.

Introduction

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-18
Author(s):  
Laura Carter
Keyword(s):  
Everyday Life ◽  
Social History ◽  
Methodological Approach ◽  
The Other ◽  
Origin Stories ◽  
The Everyday ◽  
History Of ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
The One

The introduction proposes the key argument that the twentieth century was Britain’s educational century. It discusses how the democratization of historical knowledge in Britain between 1918 and 1979 occurred as a process of negotiation between policymakers, elites, and educationists on the one hand, and ordinary people on the other. The concept of the ‘history of everyday life’ is introduced and defined. The introduction then discusses the important role of women in the making of popular social history, and its relationship to classed, gendered, racial, imperial, and national categories. The ‘history of everyday life’ is briefly discussed in relation to other ‘origin stories’ of British social history, especially the new academic social history of the 1960s and the importance of the ‘everyday’ in mid-century social science. Finally, the introduction discusses the book’s methodological approach and provides an overview of each of the chapters.

scholarly journals La traición a la democracia. Ensayo sobre las relaciones entre universidad, democracia y ciudadanía desde la idea de traición

2019 ◽  
Vol 37 (1 Mar-Jun) ◽  
pp. 21-40
Author(s):  
David Luque
Keyword(s):  
Critical Thinking ◽  
The Other ◽  
University Education ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
New Challenges ◽  
Way Of Thinking ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
The One ◽  
The Way

A partir de los sesenta, los alumnos que comenzaron a acudir a las universidades creció exponencialmente. Esto modificó la forma de pensar esta institución en su relación con la democracia. Su razón de ser ya no se encontraba únicamente en el conocimiento, sino que se deducía del papel que debía jugar en la construcción de la ciudadanía. Esta modificación dio lugar a una serie de discusiones sobre el papel de la universidad en relación a los nuevosretos que les planteaba la ciudadanía. Y esas discusiones giraban casi siempre en torno a una misma idea: que cualquier tesis sobre la universidad suponía una traición. Y es justamente eso lo que estudia este artículo. Se concluye que, en la construcción de una ciudadanía democrática, han de combinarse dos consideraciones. La necesidad irrenunciable de la extensión de la formación universitaria como elemento sustancial de una ciudadanía y la necesidad de que esta formación esté presidida por un pensamiento crítico y una vocación de servicio político. From the 1960s, the number of students who began to attend universities grew exponentially. This changed the way of thinking about this institution in terms of its relationship with democracy. Its reason for being did not only lie in the articulation of knowledge but also in the role it should play in the construction of citizenship. This modification led to a series of discussions about the role of universities regarding the new challenges posed by citizens. And these discussions almost always revolved around the same idea: any argument about universities was a betrayal. And that is precisely what this article studies. It is concluded that, in the construction of democratic citizenships, two  considerations must be combined. On the one hand, the unrenounceable need for the extension of university education as a substantial element of citizenship and, on the other hand, the need for this type of education to bepresided over by critical thinking and a vocation for political service.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document