Political Feelings Research Articles

To Share or not to Share? Institutional Exchange of Cadaver Kidneys in Denmark

To Share or not to Share? Institutional Exchange of Cadaver Kidneys in Denmark

David Ost, The Defeat of Solidarity: Anger and Politics in Postcommunist Europe

Anger, bitterness, and frustration are inseparable from politics. In many ways, they are political feelings par excellence. They may lurk behind social and cultural criticism serving as a necessary impetus for the entire critical enterprise. At the same time, anger is capable of shaping or reshaping social and political reality. Ultimately, it makes social reality, as far as various subversive or revolutionary activities are concerned. A successful mobilization of anger may come as a promise of hope for the future, and even may result in radical sociopolitical and sociocultural change. Yet the long process of transformation that follows anger and enthusiasm unavoidably reveals another face of anger, one that exposes itself in total disappointment and political apathy or, worse, in self-contempt and hatred. Anger anticipates and signifies the arrival of the new epoch and even of the new world order manifesting itself as a politics of universal human fellowship, openness, and sympathetic understanding. At the same time, anger can mark the end of expectations and put forward a politics of disenchantment. This ambivalence of anger especially applies to East European politics and postcommunist Europe in general where the organization and mobilization of anger was instrumental in orchestrating fundamental sociopolitical change and also in providing a new social and moral order. The Solidarity movement in Poland, which on 31 August 2005 celebrated its 25th anniversary, may exemplify this better than anything else. It was with sound reason that Zbigniew Brzezinski, commemorating Solidarity in Warsaw and Gdansk on 29-31 August 2005, compared the Solidarity movement with such great events in the political history of humankind as the American Revolution and Mahatma Gandhi's nonviolent struggle against British colonial rule. At the same time, Brzezinski called upon his fellow Poles to renovate the political life of the country, to lift it to the higher level in terms of ideas and

The Risky Gamble

The Deadly Bet is the kind of book many of us would like to write and few of us do. It is a short history book that attempts to tell a big, exciting story to undergraduates (and, given Walter LaFeber's track record, the reading public). LaFeber kind of has a thesis: “During the 1960s U.S. presidents made a life-or-death bet that Americans could fight a long war against a determined foe, and, at the same time, maintain order and protect constitutional rights in their own society…. The presidents, especially Lyndon Johnson, lost their bet” (p. 1). I say “kind of” because LaFeber never really tries to prove any of those claims. After all, none of the presidents actually conceived of such a bet, and LaFeber never connects the main disorders of the 1960s to the Vietnam War, nor does he spend any time discussing the loss of constitutional rights during the 1960s. Really, LaFeber just wants to write about the 1968 election and the Vietnam War, looking in particular at how and why Johnson and American liberalism lost the presidency and Richard Nixon won it. He tells his story against the backdrop of the wars at home (though he is never quite sure how to integrate the election, the war, antiwar protests, and the era's racial politics; in particular, he seems conceptually stymied by the fact that racial disorder, more than polarization over the Vietnam War, motivated so many Americans’ political feelings in 1968).

“Civilization Had Given Him a Vote”: Citizenship and the Ballot in Sara Jeannette Duncan’s The Imperialist

This essay offers a reading of Sara Jeannette Duncan’s The Imperialist as a novel of citizenship. At the centre of this reading is the enfranchisement of the Moneida Indians, whose uncomprehending abuse of the ballot is contrasted by Duncan with the depth of political feeling in Lorne Murchison to produce a critique of electoral politics—and, arguably, an implicit argument for female suffrage. By critically engaging with the novel’s presentation of character and of historical events, the essay builds on existing scholarship on The Imperialist to make a case for the centrality of its political argument.

What Is Political Feeling?

As disaffection with poststructuralism increases, but new paradigms have not yet emerged, theorists have begun to reconsider the ties that current thought maintains with the tradition it critiques, in particular, its affiliations with the Enlightenment. Focus has inevitably fallen on the writings of Immanuel Kant, which in the act of codifying Enlightenment rationality simultaneously initiated its dissolution. Disputes tend to arise, however, over the precise nature and cause of the hairline fracture that prevents Kant's Critiques from attaining the unity to which they aspire. Even greater controversy centers on the advisability of possible responses: should we set the bones, break open the gap, or provide an entirely new limb? In Consequences of Enlightenment, Anthony Cascardi undertakes a detailed discussion of how various theoretical schools interpret the fissure, and the problems posed by their accounts. Not simply remaining content with this critique of critiques, Cascardi presents his own stance, advising that we embrace Kant's recourse to "feeling" in the Critique of Judgment as an inevitable entailment of the Kantian system. Whereas Horkheimer and Adorno's Dialectic of Enlightenment argues that the opposition between Kantian reason and Nietzschean irrationalism represents the undoing of the Enlightenment, Cascardi responds that Kant's own writings encompass the duality. As an essential moment of what he terms the Enlightenment's "aesthetic critique," the resistance that feeling poses to "the unity of experience"--or to the unity of the Critique of Pure Reason and the Critique of Practical Reason--should be embraced. Cascardi further maintains that this "should" entails political consequences, although his text does not itself fully elaborate a vision of what these might be.

‘Why not Lukács?’ or: on Non-Bourgeois Bourgeois Being

The Lukacs Circle in Szeged, a spontaneous, unofficial organization of young Hungarian scholars and philosophy teachers, characteristically represented Georg Lukacs' influence on young Hungarian intelligentsia in the period of late socialism. In this paper, the author recalls and critically analyses the intellectual milieu and motives that led a considerable part of young Hungarian intelligentsia of that time to make a cult of Lukacs' philosophy. The key to the analysis is the ambiguous character of the political feelings and philosophical orientation of many young people in the period of late socialism and the paradoxical ‘non-bourgeois bourgeois’ character of Lukacs' philosophy. Lukacs' young followers were dissatisfied with the political conditions of ‘real socialism’ and with official Marxism. However, they considered themselves Marxists and were convinced by the anti-capitalist, romantic idea of democratic socialism. In the eyes of his young followers, Lukacs was a genuine philosopher whose teaching was interwoven by his wide-ranging bourgeois middle-class education, promising both a real philosophical alternative to official Marxism and a high-level philosophical foundation for a non-capitalist but democratic future human history. The author argues that Lukacs' philosophy did not satisfy these expectations. In his political philosophy, the philosopher could not move away from the mythological idea concerning the leading role of the communist party and therefore could not elaborate a genuine philosophical foundation for the idea of democratic socialism. Despite the superiority of his philosophy, his methodology and approach to the history of philosophy failed to provide a real philosophical alternative to the Bolshevik tradition of Marxism.

Union and Division in Europe

Boundaries change in Europe every forty years or so. The 1815 settlement after the Napoleonic Wars lasted until the unification of Italy and Germany between 1860 and 1870. The Treaty of Versailles in 1919 transformed Europe but left so much unfinished business that a new settlement was carried out between 1938 and 1945. This more durable settlement lasted for forty years until the surprisingly peaceful changes between 1989 and 1995. Russia has shed all its conquests of recent centuries quickly and fairly amicably, Czechoslovakia has divided in two with very little trouble, and only the break-up of Yugoslavia reminds us of the brutal national changes of the past.By comparison, North and South America have been quiet and peaceful. The end of the Spanish Empire caused convulsions that had worked themselves out by 1850; since then few borders in the Americas have been changed. Panama was created, Canadians might say the shape of the Alaska panhandle was altered at the beginning of the century (the British and the Americans say that the Alaska-British Columbia border follows the line already laid down in the negotiated settlement of 1826), Bolivia has lost its access to the sea, and there have been a few changes in unsettled areas in the interior. But anyone who looks at a map of the Americas of 1850 can see how slight the changes have been. It is not in the least surprising to learn that there have been very few wars on American soil in the last 150 years. Canada and the United States have taken part in wars elsewhere that have affected them and the world profoundly, but this is unusual for states in the Americas.The present generation of Europeans has probably had enough changes for its political lifetime, and yet a new set of changes is likely to come, perhaps in twenty rather than forty years. The first and most easily visible change is simply that a great many European borders are becoming less important for military and economic purposes. The European Union (EU) offers a guarantee that there will be no more wars and that a number of other problems can be handed over to the bureaucrats of Brussels.This does not mean that the nation-state is out-of-date or, put in polysyllables, that globalization and mass communications are replacing nationalism. People who think nation-states were invented simply to fight wars more efficiently or to impose unified economic policies may be right to say they will be less important in these areas of activity, but this misses the point: nation-states were effective for military and economic purposes because their populations were united by national feeling. This did not mean that people developed national feelings in order to fight wars better. Nobody would say that countries in Latin America are non-nationalist, but fighting wars is not the way they express national feelings.While boundaries change or even fade, people are more ready than ever to see nationalism as the only real source of political feeling. Earlier in the century loyalty to imperial rulers and commitment to Marxism stood as political principles that could rival nationalism. In more recent decades nationalism has replaced loyalty to imperial rulers, and the great continental and transoceanic empires have dissolved. Nationalism has also replaced Marxism, and the Soviet Union has broken up. At any moment some people are losing their attachment to the existing nation-state they are supposed to belong to, but then at any moment some people are falling out of love and this does not show that love does not exist as an emotion. Lifelong emotional attachments are perhaps found less often than in the past; lifelong national attachment is more common than lifelong emotional attachment, but it could hardly be expected to be universal.One new expression of nationalism in Europe is simply the development of a national feeling for Europe. A few people feel about Europe in the way that people usually feel about their native country, and refer to the heritage of Charlemagne, Dante, Voltaire, and Goethe in the way that nationalists of the old-established variety might refer to Napoleon, Victor Hugo, and Pasteur or Wellington? …

Workers’ Control and Changes in Political Culture: Portugal's Alentejo 20 Years after the Revolution

This article empirically tests three well-known hypotheses about the political effects of workplace democracy on workers. Specifically, it asks whether membership in worker controlled agrarian collectives in southern Portugal has had any long-term effects on its participants’ political culture. The results, based upon a comparison of baseline data collected in 1980 and a sample survey of 240 residents from the same county collected in 1994, suggest that the relationship between workers’ control and political participation, radicalization, class awareness and feelings of political efficacy may be explicitly dependent upon local environmental conditions. More narrowly, our survey results indicate the presence of a substantially different rural political culture from the one described by other scholars of the Portuguese Revolution and its agrarian reform sector.

Political styles and political feelings: Introduction

Political styles and political feelings: Introduction

‘A light to the blind’: the voice of the dispossessed élite in the generation after the defeat at Limerick

To find authentic expressions of political feeling amongst the dispossessed élite in Ireland in the generation after the defeat of 1691 is no easy task. Between the treaty of Limerick and the early writings of John Curry and Charles O’Conor in the mid-eighteenth century Irish catholic laymen seemingly avoided committing their political views to paper, for reasons which are not difficult either to understand or to sympathise with. Only amongst the clergy do we find comment of a political nature, but even this on the whole was restricted to reaction to penal laws and persecution and was concerned with the position of the church rather than the laity. Occasionally glimpses of a broader picture emerge tantalisingly from the Continent where correspondents were beyond the range of British control, as in Ambassador da Cunha’s report on Irish conditions in 1710 or in Internuncio Spinelli’s account of 1723, both of which blamed the depressed state of the laity unequivocally on the violation of the treaty.

The Polarization of Utopian Idealism and Practical Politics in the Idyll: The Role of the First "Brautigam" in Goethe's Hermann und Dorothea

For German intellectuals the decisive turning point of the French Revolution occurred in 1793-94. This change in attitudes was marked by three events: the execution of the king in January 1793, the escalation of the wars of into wars of exploitation, and the consolidation of power in the hands of Robespierre and the Jacobins in the form of the dictatorship of the Committee of Public Safety after July 1793. Even for the intellectuals who had until that point supported the revolution, these three developments touched on a cultural and national nerve and resulted in a massive polarization of political feeling during and after 1793. The execution of the king was an act against the sovereign monarch, whose position was still central to German enlightened political theory; the war of liberation threatened to turn Germany into a looting ground, supplying food and money for the revolution; and the political tactics of the Jacobins represented an affront to the ideals of humanity and democracy implicit in enlightened thought. The German intellectuals' perception of the early stages of the revolution as an experiment in practical enlightenment was shattered by the reality of the new historical development in France, with its dictatorship, its brutality and its mass repression. The consequent polarization of political thought in Germany, and the discrediting of the process of modernization and redefinition of political and social categories in France becomes, from this period onward, a touchy subject for German writers. Hermann und Dorothea was written in the wake of this

Freud's ego ideals: a study of admired modern historical and political personages.

It is appropriate to conclude this study with a statement that characterizes Freud and his search for particular models, and this is: "A genius chooses his family from among heroes." His historical heroes were Cromwell, Napoleon, Masséna, Garibaldi, Bismarck, Adler, Lasalle, Lasker, and Wilson. Of course, toward many of these figures, Freud was also ambivalent. Yet these leaders have certain common denominators. In various degrees, they may be characterized as progressive, secular, and anti-Catholic. Moreover, they all had spectacular careers, stood up against great odds, and in many instances had serious conflicts with their fathers or men in authority. These leaders had a special significance for Freud, and their selection is representative not only of his own personal dynamics, but also of his historical milieu. His ego ideals demonstrate that Freud was ambitious and had partisan political feelings and concerns. In some cases the choice of the ego ideals stemmed from his ambivalent feelings toward his father and his particular resolution of the oedipal situation. Also very significant is the fact of Freud's Jewish heritage and the anti-Semitism he experienced as a citizen of the Hapsburg Empire. Moreover, Freud was always sensitive about the power and the influence of the Catholic church. Still another reason for his selection of widely scattered figures with whom to identify is the broadening influence of his classical education. In addition, being gifted linguistically, he was able to transcend a parochial environment. In general then, Freud's ego ideals reveal that he was informed politically and historically and that he regarded these men as promoting policies that were liberating.

La France dans "l'après-Pershing"

France in the « post-Pershing » period, by Pierre Lellouche Even though the Soviets lost the test of wills, the Euromissile issue is by no me ans over now that the first deployment has taken place. Not having made any real concessions in time, the Kremlin's bluff failed. Although the North Atlantic alliance certainly gained an important psychological success, the European democracies must endure another four years internal conflict over this issue. The two big questions which will arise over future Geneva negotiations are : which of the superpowers will give way first ? and : how will political feeling evolve in Western Europe if nothing happens in Geneva before 1985 ? France may be force during this « post-Pershing » period to make fundamental redefinition of its defence and national security policies. This could engender rupture of the « consensus » of opinion in France which has up till now been apparent in matters of defence. The problem of European security in the coming years can only lead once more to the idea of cooperative inter-European defence system. Only France could take far-reaching initiative in this respect and all depends on whether the French who have legitimate worries about the consequences of German feelings of insecurity have the energy to overcome their own inertia as well as that of their fellow Europeans.

Voter Turnout and Political Efficacy Among Mexican-Americans in Michigan

A description and explanation of the research on levels of political interest and feelings of political efficacy among Mexican-Americans is presented. The primary concerns are comparing Mexican-Americans with other Americans, determining the effect of the Mexican-American subculture, and evaluating the usefulness of standard explanations of variations in political interest and feeling of political efficacy in explaining variations among Mexican-Americans. The research sample included 465 Mexican-Americans in Michigan. Contrary to past studies, which have described Mexican-Americans as politically inactive and fatalistic, we found that Mexican-Americans did not differ significantly from other similar Americans in voting turnout and political efficacy. The Mexican-American subculture did not discourage voting or encourage a sense of powerlessness. Generally, standard theories were useful in explaining variations in voting turnout and political efficacy among Mexican-Americans. An additional factor of importance was the perception of the status of Mexican-Americans in society.

The Metamorphoses of Coriolanus

HE search for meanings in Shakespeare leads to one kind of outward manifestation, stage production; and history of these productions is a sampling, or refraction, of cultura~l history of their times.' This is obvious enough, and applies. to all of Shakespeare's plays. But Coriolanus is a special case. It is, by general consent, the most exclusively political play by Shakespeare.2 The play depicts an especially bitter class struggle, and focuses on failings of a singularly unlikeable aristocrat; it therefore stimulates, to a greater degree than any other play in canon, political feelings and attitudes of a normal audience. Nevertheless, general thrust of play has never been decisively demonstrated. Careful critics and casual audiences alike, feeling immediate impact of play, have, according to their considered opinions or momentary prejudice, variously regarded it as an impartial presentation of secular struggle between few and many, a whole-hearted indictment of democracy, or an ardent profession of faith in aristocratic principle.3 The text offers much sustenance to Left and to Right; so much is clear. The play depends, for its continued vitality and provisional meaning, very considerably upon circumstances of a given production, and it is this aspect of matter that concerns us here. I do not propose here a full stage history of Coriolanus; that goes far beyond scope of a single paper. But I shall consider some of most important stage versions of Coriolanus, and show' how their handling of political issues-and character of hero-is a touchstone to the. life of times.

Towards a theory of application in systems science

The actual utilization of systems science, especially social systems engineering, has not measured up to the plethora of theories and examples of potential applications in the literature. To begin developing a theory of application in systems science, one may consider modeling the systems scientist as a system or consider nonsystems approaches that would include the political influence, feelings, aesthetic, and religious dimensions of both the analyst and the user. The essential ideas of this process are presented in summary form.

Editors Make War: Southern Newspapers in the Secession Crisis (review)

book reviews263 Contrary to the dustjacket blurb, this book is not "ideal for the tourist [or] the student." Civil War scholars will find it a sterling example of historical commercialism diat is neither needed nor desired. James I. Robertson, Jr. Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University Editors Make War: Southern Newspapers in the Secession Crisis. By Donald E. Reynolds. (Nashville: Vanderbilt University Press, 1970. Pp. x, 304. $10.00.) The coming of the Civil War remains one of the most fascinating problems of American history, one which continues to challenge and vex historians . Focusing on the twelve months from the spring of 1860 to 1861, Professor Donald E. Reynolds provides another perspective on the political mind of Dixie from his extensive reading of the editorial pages of the soudiern press. Central to his book is an effort to trace the seemingly inexorable collapse of unionism. The fate of the South seemed to be sealed even before the presidential nominating conventions, for Reynolds indicates that the principal journalistic battles were not fought over fundamental principles but over tactical matters, namely, what constituted a just precipitant for secession. There was clearly a base line of agreement both on the need to preserve slavery as the essential bulwark of the southern society and economy, and on a shared fear of the Republican party (although the author consistently underestimates how genuine a threat to slavery a Republican victory actually was). Secession itself is pictured by Reynolds as the flowering of seeds of racial fears sown for years by radicals. (It is, however, misleading to lump Soutìi Carolina conservative James L. Orr with Rhett and Yancey as a "fire-eater." [pp. 84-85].) Lining up newspapers on a scale from radical to unionist, Reynolds' story is largely concerned with the predictable response of their editors to external events. Those familiar with this story will not be surprised at the rapid disintegration of conservatism in the soudiern press, but Reynolds provides some interesting glimpses into the experiences of courageous unionist editors in the lower South, men who struggled against vicious and often successful pressures to silence their voices. The surface of this political landscape has, nevertheless, already been charted by historians, and it is questionable that Editors Make War adds much to a deeper understanding of that critical year. Of what value is a study wholly confined to newspapers, especially as a published work? Altìiough antebellum newspapers were a leading source of information and opinion, this study offers contradictory evidence of the influence and reliability of press opinion. On the one hand, Reynolds repeatedly denies the power of these newspapers to alter political sentiment; he sees their role mainly as mirrors of local attitudes, or worse, as irresponsible panderers to sectional and racial biases, switch- 264CIVIL WAR HISTORY ing loyalties at the behest of their readership. Yet, he concludes that their influence was important in eroding the fundamental conservatism of the southern people. Nor does the author deal satisfactorily widi the inadequacy of relying almost exclusively upon editorials as indices of mass public opinion. The broadest illustration of this danger is the fact that while unionist newspapers were a small and decreasing portion of the whole, political feeling was much more narrowly divided on secession, even in the lower South. Editors Make War may ultimately prove more useful as a source of newspaper positions and quotations than as a source of insight into the southern mind in the secession crisis. Steven A. Channing The Johns Hopkins University Confederate Shipbuilding. By William N. Still, Jr. (Athens, Georgia: University of Georgia Press, 1969. Pp. xi, 110. $3.00.) Confederate Shipbuilding is a brief but good account of the construction of ships within the bounds of the Confederate States of America. On February 21, 1861, the Confederate Congress created a navy department and shortly thereafter appointed Stephen R. Mallory as Secretary of the Navy. Mallory appears to have been a man willing to permit innovation in the naval service, a necessity for the Confederacy. Early in the war the navy received little support from either Jefferson Davis or the rest of the Confederate government. There was a great shortage of rolling mills and machine shops in the...

The Politics of Sino-Japanese Trade Relations, 1963-68

IT SEEMS INDISPUTABLE that a combination of complementary economic conditions, close cultural ties, and geographic proximity between Japan and Chinese People's Republic (CPR) would normally be conducive to substantial expansion of their trade. While CPR can be both a useful market and a major source of raw materials for Japan, latter is in an excellent position to assist former's industrialization.' This promise of mutual benefits, however, has been largely undermined by a number of non-economic factors, including absence of diplomatic and political harmony. Moreover, Chinese have long used, or sometimes abused, as a primary instrument of their political operations in Japan. As increased appreciably in i96os, its political role loomed larger in Chinese foreign policies. Especially, during Cultural Revolution, China applied slogan politics in command in all dimensions of Sino-Japanese trade, even to extent of disregarding elementary requirements of economic rationalism. Hence an editorial in Japan Times (March 8, i968) bluntly complained that the Chinese Communists are so completely swayed by political feelings that they have allowed their distrust of Japan to enter into their consideration of commercial matters. Indeed, this tendency not only reflected a particular direction of China's policy toward Japan, but also stemmed from a unique system of relations which rendered Japan singularly vulnerable to CPR's shifting maneuvers. Since i963 there have been dual channels of Sino-Japanese commercial intercourse-friendship trade and memorandum trade-each representing different political backgrounds and economic problems. The relative economic importance of these two methods fluctuated at least partially in proportion to their respective usefulness for China's political interests. The Chinese often balanced one method against another in an attempt to gain a better political leverage in Japan and to mobilize Japanese circles in forcing Japanese government into some concessions in its China policy. Friendship was initiated by Premier Chou En-lai in i960, because drastic decline in Sino-Soviet economic relations, coupled with failure

IV. Expectations of the New County Councils, and their Realization

I have tried in another article to consider the preparation of the Local Government Act of 1888 as illustrative of the politics of the time. I shall here discuss the prognostications made of the new English County Councils, the extent to which these were realized at the first council elections, and the way in which the new bodies settled down, in the hope of shedding some light on the social and political feelings of, and the forces prevalent in, the countryside. My treatment of these themes will necessarily be rather selective, an attempt to illustrate the broad general currents of thought, as far as possible in the words in which they were expressed.

The tribal organization of Chios

The economic and political development of the Greek states from the eighth century onwards left few, if any, of their tribal organizations unaffected; as these became unworkable or unpopular, the traditional divisions into tribes, phratries, and gene, based in practice, if not in origin, on kinship, were sooner or later replaced or modified. But the factors which led to reform were many; it might be the problem of a subject population, a mixed population, a shifting population, or of synoecism; it might be the need for military reform; or simply a question of political feeling, an attempt to satisfy anti-aristocratic prejudice by destroying the essentially aristocratic kinship system. More than one factor could be involved in any change; each might have a different effect on the result. Consequently the process was not simple or uniform; the new order might be wholly artificial or merely a modification of the old; the old might be discarded or retained alongside the new for some special purpose; old names, proper or generic, might still be used in the new system at the same or even at a different level. In such confusion it is essential to analyse in detail the evidence for each organization on its own before looking for any general pattern or arguing by analogy from one state's system to another.In the case of Chios the relevant documents have often been interpreted in the light of what was known of the gentilicial system of Attica. Tribes, of number unknown, were thought to have been divided into phratries, each composed of several smaller units of two kinds, gene and thiasoi. The comparison is misleading. The constitution of the Attic phratries is far from clear, but, whatever it may have been, these documents from Chios, of which the text is given below, must belong to a very different order.