Kathryn Hochstetler
- Published in print:
- 1997
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780198781837
- eISBN:
- 9780191598968
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0198781830.003.0008
- Subject:
- Political Science, Democratization
Perceptions of the political importance of social movements and popular organizations often err by seeing only one of their many possible roles. An analysis of the evolution of the Brazilian ...
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Perceptions of the political importance of social movements and popular organizations often err by seeing only one of their many possible roles. An analysis of the evolution of the Brazilian environmental movement in the 1980s, as they themselves perceive it and through its impact on Brazilian politics, shows how the myriad groups went through different combinations of four important political roles. Although with less impact on the first of these—state transformation (the usual focus of analysis)—the environmental groups showed significant activity in other roles: representation of popular interests, cultural politics, and action in the informal polity.Less
Perceptions of the political importance of social movements and popular organizations often err by seeing only one of their many possible roles. An analysis of the evolution of the Brazilian environmental movement in the 1980s, as they themselves perceive it and through its impact on Brazilian politics, shows how the myriad groups went through different combinations of four important political roles. Although with less impact on the first of these—state transformation (the usual focus of analysis)—the environmental groups showed significant activity in other roles: representation of popular interests, cultural politics, and action in the informal polity.
Jozef Keulartz
- Published in print:
- 1999
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780198295099
- eISBN:
- 9780191599262
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/019829509X.003.0005
- Subject:
- Political Science, Environmental Politics
Environmental policy in the Netherlands has reached a remarkable evolutionary stage, in which policy‐makers have moved beyond merely defensive considerations of preserving and protecting the ...
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Environmental policy in the Netherlands has reached a remarkable evolutionary stage, in which policy‐makers have moved beyond merely defensive considerations of preserving and protecting the environment to encompass proactive measures for ‘nature development’ by recovering wasteland and ‘returning’ it to nature. However, this new phase of environmental engineering is not without its own risks, notably with respect to its cultural assumptions. The principles of Dutch nature development involve a dubious form of cultural politics, in which the science is used to impose a particular cultural view of nature upon local communities, thereby excluding other views. Upon analysis, it becomes clear that science provides no adequate basis for this, and that a more consultative and democratic process is needed to clarify the range of solutions and scenarios that is available. Environmental politics should aim to address the question of what sort of relationship to nature people really want.Less
Environmental policy in the Netherlands has reached a remarkable evolutionary stage, in which policy‐makers have moved beyond merely defensive considerations of preserving and protecting the environment to encompass proactive measures for ‘nature development’ by recovering wasteland and ‘returning’ it to nature. However, this new phase of environmental engineering is not without its own risks, notably with respect to its cultural assumptions. The principles of Dutch nature development involve a dubious form of cultural politics, in which the science is used to impose a particular cultural view of nature upon local communities, thereby excluding other views. Upon analysis, it becomes clear that science provides no adequate basis for this, and that a more consultative and democratic process is needed to clarify the range of solutions and scenarios that is available. Environmental politics should aim to address the question of what sort of relationship to nature people really want.
Frank Fischer
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- May 2009
- ISBN:
- 9780199282838
- eISBN:
- 9780191712487
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199282838.003.0010
- Subject:
- Political Science, Comparative Politics
This chapter takes up the design of deliberative fora. It begins by introducing the influential theory of ‘empowered participatory governance’ put forward by Fung and Wright, which is seen to focus ...
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This chapter takes up the design of deliberative fora. It begins by introducing the influential theory of ‘empowered participatory governance’ put forward by Fung and Wright, which is seen to focus mainly on procedural and material factors. It argues that enabling participation requires more attention to the underlying social conditions necessary for participatory deliberation to work. Drawing on contributions from postmodern cultural politics, as well as experiences from participatory research, democratic structures and procedures are seen to offer an opening for participatory empowerment, but cannot in and of themselves ensure authentic deliberation. Deeper political and social-psychological factors related to the intersubjective aspects of participation are involved as well. The argument is illustrated through a several theoretical and practical contributions, including a more detailed analysis of the ‘People's Planning Campaign’ in Kerala, India.Less
This chapter takes up the design of deliberative fora. It begins by introducing the influential theory of ‘empowered participatory governance’ put forward by Fung and Wright, which is seen to focus mainly on procedural and material factors. It argues that enabling participation requires more attention to the underlying social conditions necessary for participatory deliberation to work. Drawing on contributions from postmodern cultural politics, as well as experiences from participatory research, democratic structures and procedures are seen to offer an opening for participatory empowerment, but cannot in and of themselves ensure authentic deliberation. Deeper political and social-psychological factors related to the intersubjective aspects of participation are involved as well. The argument is illustrated through a several theoretical and practical contributions, including a more detailed analysis of the ‘People's Planning Campaign’ in Kerala, India.
Barbara Goff and Michael Simpson
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- January 2008
- ISBN:
- 9780199217182
- eISBN:
- 9780191712388
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199217182.001.0001
- Subject:
- Classical Studies, Literary Studies: Classical, Early, and Medieval
This book seeks to explain the prominence of Sophocles' Theban plays among those Greek tragedies adapted by dramatists across the African diaspora. It argues that the Theban plays reflect on three ...
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This book seeks to explain the prominence of Sophocles' Theban plays among those Greek tragedies adapted by dramatists across the African diaspora. It argues that the Theban plays reflect on three themes which have become crucial in the postcolonial context: identity, the grounding of civilization on barbarism, and transmission of culture over time and space. To adapt the Theban dramas is thus a massively theoretical as well as an audaciously practical act, because they have been installed as the script that both legislates and explains how they, and indeed all other cultural artefacts, are conveyed. African, Afro-Caribbean and African-American adaptations engage with the cultural politics of the so-called Western canon, and use their self-consciously literary status variously to assert, ironize, and challenge their own place, and the place of the Greek ‘originals’, in relation to that tradition. Beyond these oedipal reflexes, the adaptations offer alternative African models of cultural transmission. The book is informed by and contributes to postcolonial theory and theories of classical reception. In particular, it develops a new analytic concept, the ‘Black Aegean’, with which to theorize the ways in which colonialist and postcolonialist discourses have staged various encounters between ancient Greece and contemporary Africa. This construct mediates through the plays the later debates about the Black Atlantic and Black Athena.Less
This book seeks to explain the prominence of Sophocles' Theban plays among those Greek tragedies adapted by dramatists across the African diaspora. It argues that the Theban plays reflect on three themes which have become crucial in the postcolonial context: identity, the grounding of civilization on barbarism, and transmission of culture over time and space. To adapt the Theban dramas is thus a massively theoretical as well as an audaciously practical act, because they have been installed as the script that both legislates and explains how they, and indeed all other cultural artefacts, are conveyed. African, Afro-Caribbean and African-American adaptations engage with the cultural politics of the so-called Western canon, and use their self-consciously literary status variously to assert, ironize, and challenge their own place, and the place of the Greek ‘originals’, in relation to that tradition. Beyond these oedipal reflexes, the adaptations offer alternative African models of cultural transmission. The book is informed by and contributes to postcolonial theory and theories of classical reception. In particular, it develops a new analytic concept, the ‘Black Aegean’, with which to theorize the ways in which colonialist and postcolonialist discourses have staged various encounters between ancient Greece and contemporary Africa. This construct mediates through the plays the later debates about the Black Atlantic and Black Athena.
Juliet John
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- January 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780199257928
- eISBN:
- 9780191594854
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199257928.003.0002
- Subject:
- Literature, 19th-century and Victorian Literature, Film, Media, and Cultural Studies
This chapter explores Dickens's cultural vision and practice, both characterized by what could be called a dramatic impulse to shape‐shift or to transform boundaries (of self, politics, language, and ...
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This chapter explores Dickens's cultural vision and practice, both characterized by what could be called a dramatic impulse to shape‐shift or to transform boundaries (of self, politics, language, and cultural mode) into dialogic thresholds. The second section analyses the partial alignment between Dickens's politics and his cultural politics and surveys the vexed history of attempts to label Dickens's politics. It argues that Dickens's privileging of cultural politics over politics as a means of influencing public affairs make it inevitable that his cultural politics seem contradictory or paradoxical when framed by the logic and language of ‘politics per se’. The oxymoronic idea of paternalistic populism thus comes closest to capturing Dickens's complex attitudes to popular culture. The final section looks in detail at Dickens's notoriously imprecise political discourse to argue that it is conscious and strategic rather than, as so often is assumed, naive or disciplinary: in particular, it maintains that Dickens's vagueness when writing about class arose from a sophisticated sense of the constitutive function of language, an idealistic desire to offset the experiential power of the idea of class and an instinct to maximize his commercial appeal.Less
This chapter explores Dickens's cultural vision and practice, both characterized by what could be called a dramatic impulse to shape‐shift or to transform boundaries (of self, politics, language, and cultural mode) into dialogic thresholds. The second section analyses the partial alignment between Dickens's politics and his cultural politics and surveys the vexed history of attempts to label Dickens's politics. It argues that Dickens's privileging of cultural politics over politics as a means of influencing public affairs make it inevitable that his cultural politics seem contradictory or paradoxical when framed by the logic and language of ‘politics per se’. The oxymoronic idea of paternalistic populism thus comes closest to capturing Dickens's complex attitudes to popular culture. The final section looks in detail at Dickens's notoriously imprecise political discourse to argue that it is conscious and strategic rather than, as so often is assumed, naive or disciplinary: in particular, it maintains that Dickens's vagueness when writing about class arose from a sophisticated sense of the constitutive function of language, an idealistic desire to offset the experiential power of the idea of class and an instinct to maximize his commercial appeal.
Asef Bayat and Linda Herrera
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- September 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780195369212
- eISBN:
- 9780199871179
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195369212.003.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, Religion and Society, Islam
Muslim youth have assumed a central, if complex, place in the politics and cultures and politics of the global South and North. Their cultural behavior can be understood as representing a new arena ...
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Muslim youth have assumed a central, if complex, place in the politics and cultures and politics of the global South and North. Their cultural behavior can be understood as representing a new arena of contestation for power in a global era. In conventional wisdom, a combination of youth bulge, unemployment, marginality, and a general sentiment of deprivation has given Muslim youth an exceptional status. This chapter shows that although the majority of young Muslims share many common social, political, and economic misfortunes, they respond to their situations and express their youthfulness through remarkably diverse ways. Although groups of them have been drawn into radical Islam, others have embraced their religion more as an identity marker or lifestyle choice, whereas still others opt for secularism. Far from being “exceptional,” young Muslims in reality have as much in common with their non-Muslim global generational counterparts as they share among themselves. They are simultaneously objects, agents and victims on a world stage and are engaged in constant negotiation between being Muslim, modern, and young.Less
Muslim youth have assumed a central, if complex, place in the politics and cultures and politics of the global South and North. Their cultural behavior can be understood as representing a new arena of contestation for power in a global era. In conventional wisdom, a combination of youth bulge, unemployment, marginality, and a general sentiment of deprivation has given Muslim youth an exceptional status. This chapter shows that although the majority of young Muslims share many common social, political, and economic misfortunes, they respond to their situations and express their youthfulness through remarkably diverse ways. Although groups of them have been drawn into radical Islam, others have embraced their religion more as an identity marker or lifestyle choice, whereas still others opt for secularism. Far from being “exceptional,” young Muslims in reality have as much in common with their non-Muslim global generational counterparts as they share among themselves. They are simultaneously objects, agents and victims on a world stage and are engaged in constant negotiation between being Muslim, modern, and young.
Frank Fischer
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- May 2009
- ISBN:
- 9780199282838
- eISBN:
- 9780191712487
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199282838.001.0001
- Subject:
- Political Science, Comparative Politics
This book examines the role of policy expertise in a democratic society. From the perspectives of both political theory and policy studies, the chapters explore the implications of deliberative ...
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This book examines the role of policy expertise in a democratic society. From the perspectives of both political theory and policy studies, the chapters explore the implications of deliberative democratic governance for professional expertise and extend them to specific policy practices. The discussion focuses in particular on the ways professional practices might be reoriented to assist citizens in understanding and discussing the complex policy issues of an advanced technological society. In doing so, it also explores how public deliberation can be improved through more cooperative forms of policy inquiry. Adopting a deliberative-analytic approach, policy inquiry is grounded in a postempiricist, constructivist understanding of inquiry and knowledge and the participatory practices that support it. Toward this end, the chapters draw on thriving theoretical and practical work dedicated to revitalizing the citizen's role in both civil society and newer practices of democratic governance, in particular deliberative democracy in political theory, practical work with deliberative experiments, the theory and practices of democratic governance, and participatory research. Deliberative practices are promoted here as a new component part of policy-related disciplines required for participatory governance. Calling for a specialization of ‘policy epistemics’ to advance such practices, the second half of the book takes up issues related to deliberative empowerment, including the relation of technical and social knowledge, the interpretive dimensions of social meaning and multiple realities, the role of narrative knowledge and storylines policy inquiry, social learning, tacit knowledge, the design of discursive spaces, and the place of emotional expression in public deliberation.Less
This book examines the role of policy expertise in a democratic society. From the perspectives of both political theory and policy studies, the chapters explore the implications of deliberative democratic governance for professional expertise and extend them to specific policy practices. The discussion focuses in particular on the ways professional practices might be reoriented to assist citizens in understanding and discussing the complex policy issues of an advanced technological society. In doing so, it also explores how public deliberation can be improved through more cooperative forms of policy inquiry. Adopting a deliberative-analytic approach, policy inquiry is grounded in a postempiricist, constructivist understanding of inquiry and knowledge and the participatory practices that support it. Toward this end, the chapters draw on thriving theoretical and practical work dedicated to revitalizing the citizen's role in both civil society and newer practices of democratic governance, in particular deliberative democracy in political theory, practical work with deliberative experiments, the theory and practices of democratic governance, and participatory research. Deliberative practices are promoted here as a new component part of policy-related disciplines required for participatory governance. Calling for a specialization of ‘policy epistemics’ to advance such practices, the second half of the book takes up issues related to deliberative empowerment, including the relation of technical and social knowledge, the interpretive dimensions of social meaning and multiple realities, the role of narrative knowledge and storylines policy inquiry, social learning, tacit knowledge, the design of discursive spaces, and the place of emotional expression in public deliberation.
Asef Bayat and Linda Herrera
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- September 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780195369212
- eISBN:
- 9780199871179
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195369212.001.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, Religion and Society, Islam
There has been a proliferation of interest in youth issues in recent years, and Muslim youth in particular. Young Muslims have been thrust into the global spotlight in relation to questions about ...
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There has been a proliferation of interest in youth issues in recent years, and Muslim youth in particular. Young Muslims have been thrust into the global spotlight in relation to questions about security, employment, migration, multiculturalism, conflict, human rights, and citizenship. This book interrogates the cultures and politics of Muslim youth in the global South and North to understand their trajectories, conditions, and choices. It shows that although the majority of young Muslims share many common social, political, and economic misfortunes, they exhibit remarkably diverse responses to their situations. Although groups of them are drawn into radical Islam, others embrace their religion more as an identity marker. Although some take Islam as a normative frame and subvert it to express and reclaim their youthfulness, their counterparts may exert themselves through a music of rage or via collective action using the tools of new media and communications technologies. Far from being “exceptional,” young Muslims in reality have as much in common with their non-Muslim global generational counterparts as they share among themselves. They permeate the spaces of culture and politics to navigate between being Muslim, modern, and young.Less
There has been a proliferation of interest in youth issues in recent years, and Muslim youth in particular. Young Muslims have been thrust into the global spotlight in relation to questions about security, employment, migration, multiculturalism, conflict, human rights, and citizenship. This book interrogates the cultures and politics of Muslim youth in the global South and North to understand their trajectories, conditions, and choices. It shows that although the majority of young Muslims share many common social, political, and economic misfortunes, they exhibit remarkably diverse responses to their situations. Although groups of them are drawn into radical Islam, others embrace their religion more as an identity marker. Although some take Islam as a normative frame and subvert it to express and reclaim their youthfulness, their counterparts may exert themselves through a music of rage or via collective action using the tools of new media and communications technologies. Far from being “exceptional,” young Muslims in reality have as much in common with their non-Muslim global generational counterparts as they share among themselves. They permeate the spaces of culture and politics to navigate between being Muslim, modern, and young.
Juliet John
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- January 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780199257928
- eISBN:
- 9780191594854
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199257928.003.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, 19th-century and Victorian Literature, Film, Media, and Cultural Studies
The Introduction argues that Dickens's consciousness of the emerging mass culture of his day was fundamental to his popular art and to his unique place in literary and cultural history. It ...
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The Introduction argues that Dickens's consciousness of the emerging mass culture of his day was fundamental to his popular art and to his unique place in literary and cultural history. It establishes that Dickens's popularity in his lifetime was so striking that it was seen as a cultural phenomenon in itself, transcending barriers of class, gender, age, and nation. It argues that numbers of readers were important to Dickens in a way that has not been fully appreciated, but that the statistical and sociological basis of Dickens's popularity is contested. It surveys Dickens's extra‐literary lives and suggests that the translatability of Dickens's works and image across multiple media has arguably been more crucial to his ability to establish a long‐term mass cultural presence than have sales of the novels themselves. It considers Dickens's mixed fortunes with literary critics and discusses theoretical approaches to the terms ‘mass culture’ and ‘popular culture’, and argues that ‘fancy’ or fantasy and a certain doubleness are integral to Dickens's cultural politics — in particular to his vision of an intimate public or imagined community existing between himself and a mass readership.Less
The Introduction argues that Dickens's consciousness of the emerging mass culture of his day was fundamental to his popular art and to his unique place in literary and cultural history. It establishes that Dickens's popularity in his lifetime was so striking that it was seen as a cultural phenomenon in itself, transcending barriers of class, gender, age, and nation. It argues that numbers of readers were important to Dickens in a way that has not been fully appreciated, but that the statistical and sociological basis of Dickens's popularity is contested. It surveys Dickens's extra‐literary lives and suggests that the translatability of Dickens's works and image across multiple media has arguably been more crucial to his ability to establish a long‐term mass cultural presence than have sales of the novels themselves. It considers Dickens's mixed fortunes with literary critics and discusses theoretical approaches to the terms ‘mass culture’ and ‘popular culture’, and argues that ‘fancy’ or fantasy and a certain doubleness are integral to Dickens's cultural politics — in particular to his vision of an intimate public or imagined community existing between himself and a mass readership.
Linda Herrera and Asef Bayat
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- September 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780195369212
- eISBN:
- 9780199871179
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195369212.003.0022
- Subject:
- Religion, Religion and Society, Islam
The current prevailing youth research articulates the “question of youth,” and Muslim youth in particular, as both a problem and an opportunity—problems associated with youth radicalism, disruption, ...
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The current prevailing youth research articulates the “question of youth,” and Muslim youth in particular, as both a problem and an opportunity—problems associated with youth radicalism, disruption, deviance, and instability; and opportunity for the young to act as agents of political and economic change as the builders of the future. Although this chapter underlines the value of such approaches, it argues for more innovative methodologies that include ethnography, life histories, and comparative global (North and South), interdisciplinary, and intergenerational collaborations. It stresses the need to look at the young on their own terms, as a particular social group that is increasingly becoming the “new proletariat” of our times in an ongoing struggle for citizenship. Research in the area of youth necessitates not only research about the young, but collaborations and initiatives with the young. Combining cultural politics with political economy approaches, and viewing the young at the intersection of both local/national and global processes can provide invaluable ways to “know Muslim youth.”Less
The current prevailing youth research articulates the “question of youth,” and Muslim youth in particular, as both a problem and an opportunity—problems associated with youth radicalism, disruption, deviance, and instability; and opportunity for the young to act as agents of political and economic change as the builders of the future. Although this chapter underlines the value of such approaches, it argues for more innovative methodologies that include ethnography, life histories, and comparative global (North and South), interdisciplinary, and intergenerational collaborations. It stresses the need to look at the young on their own terms, as a particular social group that is increasingly becoming the “new proletariat” of our times in an ongoing struggle for citizenship. Research in the area of youth necessitates not only research about the young, but collaborations and initiatives with the young. Combining cultural politics with political economy approaches, and viewing the young at the intersection of both local/national and global processes can provide invaluable ways to “know Muslim youth.”
