Elite Community Research Articles

Post Harmony and the Role of the Elites in Reconciliation Based On Restorative Justice in Sigi District (Social Conflict in the Perspective of Islamic Education)

This study examines the role of community elites in reconciliation of social conflicts based on restorative justice to achieve mutual understanding of how to get out of "pseudo-harmony" as an alternative to social conflict resolution in Sigi Regency. Research is a type of descriptive qualitative research using a case study approach. Data collection was carried out through in situ observation, in-depth interviews, and documentation. The analysis technique uses univariate and bivariate analysis techniques, while checking the validity of the data uses triangaulation theory. The results showed that social conflict reconciliation based on restorative justice, is very effective in changing people's mindsets about conflict transformation from pseudo-harmony to eternal harmony as a form of transformation of the ethos of peace. In the perspective of Islamic education, social integration strengthens if the reality of the social life of society is far from the low-trust society, so that a collective life process attitude is born to live in peace and work together. In that way, the pseudo-harmony resulting from the peace agreement changed to eternal harmony as a result of peace awareness, ushering in the people in Sigi district to play a strategic role of individual participation and social obligations in one moment of peace.

Illuminating History: A Retrospective of Seven Decades

Illuminating History: A Retrospective of Seven Decades

Elite Communities and Polarization in Neoliberal Society: Consecration in Australia’s and Sweden’s Wealthy Neighbourhoods

‘Elite communities’ are the areas where the wealthy, and even ‘superrich’, live, socialize and raise their children as future economic and financial elites; they are the places where a few lead socially and economically privileged lives. Earlier studies have concentrated on the inner dynamics of these settings, focusing on the way residents are constructed and socialized as elites through their social, communicative and aesthetic abilities that are perceived as exemplary in contemporary neoliberal society. In this paper, we broaden the perspective, by exploring how these areas contribute to polarization, that is, how they generate distinctions based on money, morals and manners that are peculiar to neoliberalism’s idealization of ‘entrepreneurship’, ‘self-management’, ‘leadership’ and the pursuit of an ‘active lifestyle’. Our data come from two major ethnographic studies: one conducted between 2010 and 2015 of Sweden’s wealthiest community, Djursholm, that is populated by the country’s business and financial elites; the other conducted between 2016 and 2019 of three of Australia’s most prestigious and economically privileged suburbs, Toorak (Melbourne), Mosman (Sydney) and Cottesloe (Perth).

Reterritorialization of Community Forestry: Scientific Forest Management in the Terai and Chure Region of Nepal.

Nepal's community forestry is an example of a decentralized, participatory and autonomous development model. However, recent community forestry practices informed by the concept of scientific forestry in resource-rich and commercially lucrative Terai regions of Nepal have reversed community forestry gains. Scientific forestry, enforced through the Department of Forest has reproduced frontier power dynamics creating reterritorialization of community forestry through commercialization. Discouraging subsistence utilization and increasing commodification of high-value timber resources have been crucial in reconfiguring forest authority and territorial control. Moreover, the Scientific Forestry Programs have informally institutionalized rent-seeking practices at the local level. A local level, power nexus has developed among forest officials, contractors and community elites that systematically undermine local participation, allocation of resources for subsistence livelihoods and local autonomy. In effect, scientific forestry is recentralizing forest authority by legitimizing territorial control and the elite accumulation of benefits.

Futurizing luxury: an activity-centric model of phygital luxury experiences

PurposeThe purpose of this study is to examine how phygital luxury experiences can be generated from mobile-mediated service activities while enabling luxury apparel shoppers to attain status goals and hedonic goals. Phygital luxury experiences are defined in this context as shopping experiences that blend the participative and immersive components of mobile and ubiquitous media with physical luxury servicescapes.Design/methodology/approachThis conceptual research draws on activity theory from the field of human-computer interaction to produce an activity-centric model of phygital luxury experiences. By drawing on activity theory, the authors develop research propositions and build a conceptual model. The conceptual model probes how phygital luxury experiences can be generated from mobile-mediated service activities that enable luxury apparel shoppers to attain status goals and hedonic goals. In turn, service activities are proposed to meld with luxury shopping goals when mobile devices allow luxury apparel shoppers to participate in community-, rules-, and labor-based service activities.FindingsFirst, the conceptual model demonstrates that social validation and personalization are status and hedonic drivers for community-based service activities (e.g. content-sharing and multiplatform storytelling). Second, special privileges and new comforts are status and hedonic drivers for rules-based service activities (e.g. engaging in pseudo-webrooming, pseudo-showrooming, and seamless and on-demand resources). Third, know-how and domination are status and hedonic drivers for labor-based service activities (e.g. adopting self-service technologies and smart or intelligent displays).Originality/valueThis conceptual model contributes to the well-documented need for research on interactive luxury strategies and luxury retail innovation. Overall, these service activities provide luxury brands and shoppers new opportunities for building elite communities, bending store rules, and altering the division of labor within physical stores. At the same time, this model shows that exclusivity and allure of luxury consumption can be reproduced through luxury apparel shoppers' embodied interactions with salespeople and relevant audiences in connected store environments.

Moving ‘out’ to be ‘in’: the suburbanization of London Jewry, 1900–1939

AbstractBetween 1900 and 1939, Jewish Londoners departed the East End for the suburbs. Relocation, however, was not always the result of individual agency. Many Jews became the object of institutional strategies to coerce and persuade them to disperse away from inner-city areas. Simultaneous to this was the emergence of a dominant pro-suburban rhetoric within and beyond Jewish cultural circles, which aimed to raise aspirations towards middle-class lifestyles. This striking suburban ‘urge’ amongst London Jewry, managed by the community's elite institutions and leaders, was far more than a phenomenon running parallel to wider British society. As this article argues, it was a decisive response to an insidious culture of intolerance and antisemitism.

How violence shapes contentious traditional leadership in Nigeria’s Niger Delta

This article analyses the role of violence in the emergence of political leadership in village-communities of Nigeria’s Niger Delta. The article makes three overarching arguments. First, that individuals involved in violent militancy and youth cultism (gangs) use violence to attain political power within communities in the Niger Delta. When they succeed, these individuals become the new elites in their communities. This power is often focused on appropriating traditional authority. Second, the use of violence to take control of traditional governance structures reduces the moral authority that legitimizes traditional leadership. Third, the struggle by everyday people and factions within villages to reclaim traditional authority from violent actors creates contentious leadership in communities. These arguments highlight the crisis being experienced by traditional forms of governance in Nigeria’s Niger Delta as a result of the proliferation of violence in the region. Based on empirical data obtained from ethnic communities heavily impacted by militancy and youth cultism in Rivers State, the article found that competitive struggles amongst the local elites in communities over the control of cult groups, and economic and political spaces of traditional authority shape the dynamics of cult wars, political violence and contentious leadership in the Niger Delta.

Redefining status through burqa: Religious transformation and body politics of Indonesia’s woman migrant workers

Apart from being commonly understood as a symbol of religious identity, full-face veils (burqa) are also a process through which women redefine their bodies and social status. This article investigates Indonesian women’s commitment to wearing burqa after their work migration in Taiwan and Hong Kong. It focuses on the signification and the redefinition of the body through hijrah (transformation). In-depth interviews conducted with nine Indonesian women migrant workers (WMWs) revealed that this hijrah process characterised by the wearing of the burqa is not always motivated by a religiously radical mindset but more likely by practical considerations aiming to create a sense of security and comfort while working overseas. The burqa is perceived as a symbolic shift in body definition: from being a source of harm, to piety and privilege, paving the way for women to join an emerging elite community, rendering them a new noble and influential social status through socio-religious activities. This study recommends that further research on WMWs in the Middle East needs to acquire a more comprehensive picture taking into account its complexity.Contribution: Beyond the symbolic religious identity, burqa wearing is also a form of political participation. It illustrates women’s agency and transformation in redefining their bodies, public space, authority and public recognition.

Anthropogenic Drives of Emerging Infectious Diseases and Possible Mitigation Approaches

The last decade has seen a surge of emergence of zoonotic diseases leading to disastrous consequences. The out break of these zoonoses are due to immense human pressure leading to biodiversity loss, change of human dietary pattern and illegal wildlife trade to name a few. Globally scientists, politicians and economists are trying to tackle the problem, but more unified efforts are required. Keeping these efforts confined to the elite community will be of no use unless the common people, who account for the greater part of the population, are made aware of the global scenario.

Dietary and cultural differences between neighbouring communities: A case study on the early medieval Carpathian Basin (Avar and post-Avar period, 7th–9th/10th centuries AD)

Stable isotope (δ15N, δ13C) and 14C results from two early medieval cemeteries are presented and evaluated in this study in order to draw conclusions about diet, social differentiation and chronology in the Carpathian Basin during the Avar period (7th–9th century CE). At Tiszafüred and Hortobágy, two contemporaneous but distinct groups buried their deceased. The results reflect basic diet deviations between the two communities, which originated in alternative subsistence strategies and-or social differences. The Tiszafüred samples fit well into the general dietary picture of the period. The members of the rustic population consumed mainly cereals and millet, while the proportion of animal protein was significant also. Because of the exceptionally high δ15N levels of the Hortobágy-Árkus elite community, their diet was primarily based on animal protein, most probably of fresh-water origin.Concerning the low number of our samples that were selected for radiocarbon dating, the present information is insufficient for an exhaustive reconstruction. For now, we intend to grant some new additions to the sporadic data available for dietary reconstruction from this region and period. Our dataset is thought-provoking not only for the two distinct clusters of the plot but also for the rarity of stable isotope results from Avar and post-Avar sites. The 14C measurements published in the paper provide some new information on the chronology of the early medieval Carpathian Basin as well.

Cacicas: The Indigenous Women Leaders of Spanish America, 1492–1825

From the time of Christopher Columbus, Spaniards developed the notion of Indians as a sweeping cultural category, and their empire soon evolved a system of law and governance based on the theory of parallel Indian and Spanish republics. This system incorporated Native leaders whom Spaniards termed caciques. The word itself was borrowed from Caribbean Tainos, but Spaniards applied it liberally to Native leaders throughout the empire. Cacicas (female caciques) are surprisingly common in the documentary record, though they have not always received adequate attention from historians. This excellent edited volume addresses the omission. In nine chapters by leading historians in the field, several general findings emerge: Cacicas exerted considerable influence in colonial systems through their control of property, their feudal privileges, and their occasional appointment to political offices more typically held by men. Many invoked their status to great advantage in legal conflicts and local politics.The position of cacicas was most stable and enduring in the core areas of Spanish viceroyalties where colonial institutions were built on a foundation of preconquest empires. Bradley Benton's chapter on cacicas from central Mexico describes the formation and preservation of complex alliances among the elite families of Texcoco and Teotihuacan. The descendants operated as both local leaders and imperial clients who survived as a permanent elite under Spanish rule. Despite diminishing political power, male and female members of these families retained considerable influence and social standing even in the late eighteenth century. Sara Vicuña Guengerich gives us a portrait of Teresa Choquehuanca, a Peruvian cacica in the era of late colonial Andean rebellions. Choquehuanca was a descendant of Inca lords, a governor, and an influential loyalist. She struggled to simultaneously advance her own interests and those of the colonial regime in her capacities as a landowner, businesswoman, and regional official charged with the extraction of tribute and labor from the peasantry. A chapter by Liliana Pérez Miguel and Renzo Honores and another by Karen Graubart describe the persistence of powerful cacicas in lowland Peru, where capullanas (female chiefs) had existed at the time of first contact. In both cases, litigation records reveal an era in which Native titles and privileges were hotly contested. At the same time, this legal and political climate offered a path to power for elite Native women who operated as clients of the viceroyalty.The book is also attentive to women's leadership in frontier spaces where the position of cacicas was more loosely defined. Peter Villella's chapter on the Tapias of Querétaro describes a family of Indigenous soldiers on a mining frontier who transformed themselves into a new regional nobility. In this case women's leadership was rooted not in a preconquest hereditary nobility but in the mechanisms of alliance, conquest, and cocolonization that permitted rising families to become civic founders and long-term elites. A chapter by Florencia Roulet also addresses hybrid elites in frontier spaces—in this case, the pampas region on the southern Río de la Plata frontier. The area's inhabitants were considered barbarians by the Spanish, but barbarians led by a recognizable group of caciques. Cacicas rose to prominence at this moment not so much through their ties to an ancestral aristocracy but through their roles as diplomats and translators, which gave them influence among Spaniards and Native peoples alike.The women studied by this book occupied a wide range of positions on the continuum of status in colonial society. Some were wealthy and powerful descendants of incas and tlatoque, and several were significant regional rulers in their own right. Others were more humble community elites. A chapter by Margarita Ochoa on Mexico City and one by Catherine Komisaruk on cases from the Kingdom of Guatemala provide intimate portraits of women who, though they invoked the language and history of nobility, were people of middling means, fighting to hold on to property and status among their neighbors.Cacicas leaves a few loose ends. Chantal Caillavet's chapter on the northern Andes is something of a prospectus for future research, but one that offers emerging researchers a helpful blueprint for the use of testaments in the reconstruction of social history. An appendix by the late Patrick Werner, though not a chapter in the strictest sense, is a valuable resource. He has left future researchers of cacicazgos in Nicaragua a guide to the Colección Somoza, a database of underutilized colonial sources from the Archivo General de Indias.Unlike most edited volumes, this one is suitable for use in the classroom. Though the book is based on new research from experts in the field, the prologue (by Ida Altman), the introduction (by the editors), and the conclusion (by Mónica Díaz) offer student-readers an excellent introduction to the subject of cacicas, to the relevant historiography, and to the broader field of Native elites under Spanish rule.

Elite Groups of the Republic of Kazakhstan and Peculiarities of Making Strategic Political and Economic Decisions During the Transit Period

Central Asia is a strategically important region for Russia due to its territorial proximity, logistic potential, and the activation of major foreign policy players. At the same time, relations between Russia and Kazakhstan, as a regional power, are very important for the entire region. In the post-Soviet period, Kazakhstan has become a key partner of Russia in Central Asia due to its consistent political position (gradual development of relations within the framework of integration associations and relations at the level of heads of state). Although today the nature of relations between the countries remains the same, the transit period in which Kazakhstan is located carries certain risks and prospects for revising these relations, which is especially important given the activation of other external players, including China, Turkey, and other countries of the West. Accordingly, Russia needs to have a clear understanding of the elite community composition of the Republic of Kazakhstan and its changes during the transit period. And it is necessary to understand what role specific elite groups play in making strategic political and economic decisions.

Epidemiological and radiological patterns of paediatric fractures in an elite community in South West Nigeria

Background: Fracture remains a common cause of morbidity, mortality, and disability in childhood. The etiology of fractures varies between and within countries and depends on the socioeconomic and environmental conditions. Etiology of fractures from the elite and high socioeconomic class community has not been documented and this study aimed to document such, including the radiographic features. Methods: A prospective, descriptive, cross-sectional study conducted on 38 children below 17 years that presented with injured limb between July 1, 2018, and June 30, 2020, to a private facility located within a highbrow location in Lagos, Nigeria. Ethical approval was obtained from the Health Research and Ethics Committee, Lagos University Teaching Hospital, Idi-Araba. Data were collected with pro forma. Data analysis was done using the Microsoft excel and Statistical Package for the Social Sciences software (SPSS) for Windows version 21. Results: Thirty-eight children were recruited. The mean age was 8.78 ± 4.35 years. The male-to-female ratio was 3.2–1. Fall was the most common cause of the fracture. Injury occurred most within the school environment followed by the home environment. All the injured presented with pain and swelling of the affected parts. The upper limbs were more injured. Transverse fractures were the most common radiographic findings. Moderate-to-severe displacement of fracture edges was seen in 55.3%, with severe angulations of fracture edges in 23.4%. Majority of the fractures were managed conservatively. Conclusion: Majority of the fractures were due to falls. Most are complete and transverse fractures. A higher percentage was displaced. The management was mostly conservative.

The Dialectic and Coupling of Three Paradigms in the Process of Art Rural Construction: Environment, Culture, and Industry.

The development and construction of cities and villages are a complex process jointly promoted by multiple subjects such as government, residents, enterprises, planners, and community elites. Through the summary and analysis of the practice of art rural construction at home and abroad, it is found that its events show three main paradigms in the development process. The environmental creation paradigm reconstructs the environmental semantics of the countryside through the creation of environmental art works, showing the remarkable characteristics of “the presence of works.” The cultural revival paradigm maintains the local culture through cooperation with residents in art and has the characteristics of “de-artization ” and “de-heritage.” The industrial development paradigm adjusts the industrial structure through the production of commodity art to achieve the improvement of the rural economic foundation. Under the new development trend, the three paradigms are gradually converging.

CAPTATIO BENEVOLENTIAE IN LATE ANTIQUE EPISTOLOGAPHY AS A MEANS OF PRESERVING COMMUNICATION OF THE INTELLECTUAL ELITE

The article analyzes the epistolary collections of Late Antique authors of the IV−VI centuries: Ausonius, Sidonius Apollinaris, Ruricius of Limoges and others. These representatives of the Late Antique intellectual elite got a brilliant education, and were engaged in literary activities. The epistolary genre was popular among the highest aristocracy not only as a means of communication at a distance, but also as a field for manifesting its education and literary talent. Epistolary contacts connected various regions of the Mediterranean world into a unified network, the members of which supported their Roman identity (“Romanitas”) using a set of rhetorical rules and techniques. The purpose of this study is to reveal the literary trope “captatio benevolentiae” expressing the writers’ desire to belittle their merits. This rhetorical technique was used to win favor with the audience due to the authors’ modesty and to motivate the addressee to continue the epistolary dialogue. Lowering the level of their talent and education, as well as the quality of the texts, the authors of the letters forced the interlocutors to refute unfair self-assessment, thereby, maintaining epistolary communication and social ties, as well as forming a closed, elite community of like-minded people distinguished by a refined culture and high level of education and, thus, differentiating themselves from the masses of common people and barbarians.

Writing Regional Identities in Medieval England: From the "Gesta Herwardi" to "Richard Coer de Lyon by Emily Dolmans

Reviewed by: Writing Regional Identities in Medieval England: From the "Gesta Herwardi" to "Richard Coer de Lyon by Emily Dolmans Robert Rouse Emily Dolmans. Writing Regional Identities in Medieval England: From the "Gesta Herwardi" to "Richard Coer de Lyon". Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 2020. Pp. xiv, 235. $95.00 cloth; $29.95 e-book. Scholarship on the articulation of English identity during the medieval period has been somewhat of a boom industry over the past twenty-five years. To a large extent initiated by the publication of Thorlac Turville-Petre's England the Nation in 1996, the subfield has borne forth a rich variety of monographs, articles, and conferences examining the development of Englishness, in its manifold theorized forms, from the arrival of the Early English through to the end of the Middle Ages. Many of these studies have sought to understand these nascent forms of English group identity (the concept of nation is problematic in a medieval context) by examining the way in which identity coalesces around the center, most often in the form of the elite community of the realm, the communitas regni. Emily Dolmans's much-needed 2020 study, Writing Regional Identities in Medieval England: From the "Gesta Herwardi" to "Richard Coer de Lyon," provides a timely nuancing of such a centralized model of identity, arguing convincingly that much medieval Englishness is determinedly local and regional in nature. Judiciously ranging across a wide span of multilingual literature set within, and on the borders of, medieval England, Dolmans's book makes a convincing case for a renewed examination of the myriad ways in which Englishness is imagined across a variety of locales during this period. The book comprises a framing introduction and five chapters, each of which forms a case study of a particular regional form or mode of English identity. The introduction, "These Englands: Regional Identities and Cultural Contacts," highlights two key aspects central to Dolmans's argument. First is the plural nature of the identity formations to be examined. Each construction of English identity performed in these texts is different, sometimes in nature, sometimes in degree, reminding us of the communal [End Page 395] fiction that lies at the heart of any sense of group identity. The many different Englands examined in Dolmans's book stand testament to the enduring value and importance of such an idea, while simultaneously reminding us of the inherent plurality of an idea repeatedly reimagined and redeployed in different geographical and political contexts. Second, the reader is reminded of the importance of the not-English in any formulation of English identity. As theorists of identity have reminded us for many decades, much of the heavy lifting of identity politics is performed by imagined and real cultural others. Here we find the Welsh, the French (in the guise of the Norman/Angevin kings), and the non-Christian others of the romance East examined for their role in the identity politics of the medieval English. Dolmans begins with the post-Conquest English identity crisis as articulated in the twelfth-century Gesta Herwardi. In this reading, the island cathedral city of Ely looms large, read here as an identity locus for the regional poetics of the text. A gesturing here toward a fractal kaleidoscope of local responses to the social and political upheaval of the Conquest reminds us of the fragile nature of the late pre-Conquest English state, a realm where regional identities were still palpable, as evident in the spatial politics of poems such as The Battle of Maldon. A retreat to long-held identity politics of the local is a natural strategy in the face of regnal displacement. After discussing Hereward, Dolmans moves us east to Lincolnshire, into the world of Gaimar's regional history, the Estoire des Engleis. Gaimar, writing in the deeply multicultural legacy of the east of England, weaves together narratives from Danish, English, and continental histories to create a sense of regional cultural identity that is simultaneously safely nostalgic and progressively integrative. The March of Wales has a history of complex and ever-changing landscapes of identity, as work in recent years by scholars such as Lindy Brady and Daniel Helbert has reminded us. Dolmans...

Social Exclusion and Ethnic Mobilisation in Northeast India: Understanding the role of Elites

The Northeast India has been passing through a serious ethnic conflict and turmoil ever since the independence of the country. The ethnic assertion of different groups are the manifestation of the urges and aspirations of these ethnic communities against exclusion and for their all round development. These assertions may be understood as a form of elite conflict. In fact, ethnic assertion is not something which is irrational and impulsive but it is a cover through which the elites compete and struggle for power. This paper is an attempt to deal with the questions such as how the elites of different communities mobilise the people of their respective communities? What strategies do they adopt to push through their objectives? What kind of exclusion motivates the elites of the ethnic communities to organise their respective communities? It is found in the study that the existing exclusion and conflict among the diverse communities of northeast India may be removed to some extent by mobilisation of the masses of all sections of people far beyond the interest of dominant Assamese elite and the elite of the ethnic communities as well as to end exploitation of the Indian State.

Princezny z Hájku. K problematice elity ve střední době bronzové

The topic of this study is the possibilities of archaeological identification of the local elite in the Bronze Age. We‘re targeting the female elite, who are characterized by a particular form of costume. In a case study of the barrow cemetery of Šťáhlavy – Hájek, we are trying to show that the elite status of women in the Bronze Age was not based on their personal qualities, but rather on their affinity with an elite family. Their social status may therefore have been hereditary. On the other hand, it turns out that certain particularities of the costume (different types of necklaces, etc.) may point to different origins of women and thus the exchange of female partners within the wider elite community.

Who are Our National Heroes beyond National Borders?

The focus of this article is on monuments to national heroes built at the initiative of the Bulgarian nation state, political party or migrant community beyond the national borders. Three analytical perspectives are presented: geographical, cultural and social, given that monuments are both physical objects and represent non-physical relations. The place of a monument is essential in the interpretation of its function, reflecting intercommunity negotiations and the views of community elites regarding the place of the in the host society. Another basic issue is who Bulgarian national heroes are abroad, who has selected them, and what means and procedures brought them there. Our hypothesis connects the core of the national celebrations (both pantheon and calendar) within the national territory with its periphery in what is a dynamic system. These reflections are illustrated with three case studies: Botev’s monument in Beijing, Vazov’s bust in Moscow and Levski’s memorial plate in Yeniköy (Romania). An inventory and a map of all the monuments dedicated to these three figures are attached.

Consecrating and Desecrating Elite Communities: Fearing and Dealing with Social Deviance in Sweden’s Wealthiest Neighborhood

In this article I report observations from an ethnographic study of a Swedish economic elite community, including interviews with residents and service staff, and participant observations in various social contexts stretching over a period of five years that can contribute to an understanding of how elite communities respond to potential social deviance among its members, such as feelings of insufficiency and stress, thus trying to avoid any ‘desecration’ of their social and cultural capital. Specifically, I examine how the practices through which desecration is avoided, for example the exclusion of unwanted members, interplay in the further consecration of the communities, thus maintaining and strengthening elites’ status and standing, Studying the problems and difficulties experienced by elites in their neighborhood settings, and how they try to manage them, is potentially an important step forward to better analyze and understand the way powerful groups in contemporary society maintain and strengthen their privileges and power.