Wartime Politics Research Articles

A Superhero Army, a Courageous People and an Enchanted Land: Wartime Political Myths and Ontological Security in the 2022 Russian Invasion of Ukraine

The first three months of the 2022 full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine saw the rise of mythical stories of fantastical heroes, events, and places in Ukraine’s public space. This article suggests looking at these stories through the frame of wartime political myths providing a greater sense of ontological security. By analyzing four proposed characteristics of the Ukrainian myths – transcendentalism, normativity, identity, and national context – we argue that political myths constitute strategies of resistance that contribute to ontological security. In this case, we observe that they do so in (at least) three ways: by creating myths of a superhero army; by creating myths of a courageous Ukrainian people; and by creating myths of a sacred enchanted land.

Mapping Dissent: Conscientious Objectors in Northern England during the First World War

The men who refused to fight for King and Country in the First World War have now been identified and placed in their home communities by a Register of British Conscientious Objectors. Doing that has exposed the geography of that dissent and has helped map popular attitudes to the war more closely than hitherto. With an explanatory text are tables of Conscientious Objectors (COs) in the eight counties of Northern England—Cumberland, Durham, Lancashire, Northumberland, Westmorland and the Yorkshire Ridings. Each table sets out the numbers of COs listed in the Register arranged by local government areas and calculates a CO Index to indicate the proportion of COs among those eligible to serve. Interpreting and comparing that data helps create new insights into the hugely diverse wartime politics of the Northern Counties.

Karma as a Means of Wartime Political Mobilization: A Reading of Chinese Buddhists’ Response to the Second Sino-Japanese War, 1937-1945

The concept of karma is of great significance for scholars of modern China seeking to comprehend the impact of Buddhism on the Second Sino-Japanese War. This paper explores the sociopolitical function of karma within China’s wartime society and its profound implications for Nationalist politics. It examines how karma was articulated by wartime Chinese Buddhists as a means of Nationalist mobilization for China's war effort. Moreover, this paper situates the discourse on karma within the framework of modern nationalism by comparing the sociopolitical utilization of karma by Chinese and Japanese Buddhists during the war. As such, it reveals that the divergent interpretations of karma by Buddhists in the two nation-states had enduring and far-reaching consequences on their respective societies.

Research on the Influence of War on Film Art Taking Casablanca During World War II as an Example

The monumental events of World War II deeply impacted numerous spheres of human life, including Hollywood cinema. This paper delves into the influence of WWII on Hollywoods thematic and narrative shifts, using the iconic film Casablanca (1942) as its focal point. Released amidst the wars tumult, Casablanca seamlessly blends a distinct love story with contemporary political dynamics, exemplifying Hollywoods adaptive response to wartime conditions. Through meticulous examination of Casablanca, this study gleans insights into Hollywoods filmmaking choices and content transformation against the wars backdrop, drawing from varied sources such as film archives, governmental records, and industry reports. This exploration vividly highlights the lasting impact of the war on cinema, positioning Casablanca as a paragon of the synergy between cinematic art and wartime politics.

Sir Steven Runciman at Istanbul University: How British Wartime Politics Led to the Establishment of the Byzantine Art History Chair

The historiography of Byzantine art history education in Turkiye is a widely overlooked subject, despite a number of studies that have already been carried out. The first, and for a long time the only, Byzantine art history chair in Turkiye was founded in March 1942 at Istanbul University, Faculty of Letters, and the first holder of the chair was the British Byzantinist, Sir Steven Runciman. In its background, this foundation had the turbulent politics of the Second World War and three major institutions connected to it: The British Council, The Ministry of Education Turkiye and Istanbul University. This article deals with the historical and political background surrounding the establishment of the chair and with the key figures involved therein. It also deals with the relationship between the three institutions mentioned above. Through a comprehensive survey of archive materials, memoirs, newspaper, magazine, and journal articles, the article depicts Steven Runciman as a Byzantinist, and reviews his courses, travels, and published articles during his post at Istanbul University. It also sheds light on his contribution to academia in Turkiye between 1942 and 1945. The study aims to define and offer an introduction to the earliest stage of the establishment and the objectives of the first Byzantine art history chair in Turkiye.

On Care for Our Common Home: Ecological Materiality and Sovereignty over the Lempa Transboundary Watershed

AbstractFor over a decade, Salvadorean grassroots movements and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) pursued legal innovations with the aim of protecting their water sources from potentially polluting industrial activities such as mining. They initially drafted bans on mining that would preclude the extractive-based development path embraced by neighbouring countries. Eventually, they scaled up their approach and devised a draft proposal for a transboundary waters treaty that addressed the challenges that the ecological materiality of international watercourses poses to nationalde juresovereignty. In so doing, the transboundary watershed has become a useful heuristic, a spatial trope to which Salvadoreans have turned to substantiate their claims to sovereignty over the Lempa River waters that El Salvador shares with pro-mining Guatemala and Honduras – claims imbued with an ethics of care rooted in wartime politics and Catholic morality.

Honks, Whistles, and Harp: The Transnational Sound of Harpo Marx

This article investigates the role music and sound played in Harpo Marx’s singular ability to traverse complex, controversial social and political boundaries—an ability that influenced Harpo’s selection as the first American to perform in the USSR after its formal recognition by the USA. The Marx Brothers burst into cinema during Hollywood’s transition from silent films to talkies—a transition essential to the effective translation of Harpo’s character from stage to screen. Although Harpo never spoke in his movies, he was anything but silent. His character was a creature of sound, dependent on an emotive level of communication accessible to all with little need for translation—emotions he expressed in honks, whistles and, most eloquently, in his music. This allowed Harpo to transcend class and wartime politics; a freedom not afforded his brothers, or any character explicitly tied to verbal language and, by extension, a specific cultural outlook.

“Twisted Desires,” Boy-Lovers, and Male–Male Cross-Generational Sex in the Late Ottoman Empire (1912–1918)

This article explores the condemnation of male–male cross-generational sexual practices in the Ottoman Empire during World War I (1914–1918) through a sexual harassment case that took place in an orphanage in Konya. Relying on the police registers and incorporating individual testimonies of orphan boys who were sexually abused by the headmaster, Münir Bey, I explore the wartime political and sexological discourses on cross-generational homoerotic sexual practices against the backdrop of the institutionalization of heterosexual sex. I argue that, rather than the act of sexual abuse itself, in the wartime ideological climate it was the sexual interaction between same-sex individuals that alarmed Ottoman state and society and forced them to take action against it. Male–male cross-generational sex and homoeroticism itself became bigger crimes than the act of sexually abusing underage individuals.

The Portraits of a Heroine: Huang Bamei and the Politics of Wartime History in China and Taiwan, 1930–1960

Author(s): Guo, Weiting | Abstract: This article explores the life and images of Huang Bamei (1906–1982)—a female bandit, guerrilla leader, and women’s organization coordinator. During the Second Sino-Japanese War (1937–1945), Huang was involved in smuggling and trade with pro-Japanese forces. The Nationalist authorities recruited her troops and hid her past by portraying her as a wartime heroine and model housewife. Yet, in later times she participated in guerrilla warfare and was portrayed as a pirate queen and a Han traitor, and her roles and images changed dramatically with the wars. Drawing on government archives, newspapers, memoirs, and films, this article examines how Huang developed survival strategies during turbulent times and how competing regimes used her images discursively to promote various social and political agendas and stimulate Chinese patriotism and war commemoration in different historical periods. Through a close reading of the life history of a woman made legendary by the state and the media, the article shows how Huang’s changing roles and competing representations were deeply embedded in the wartime politics of modern China and Taiwan. The author argues that Huang’s guerrilla practices, as well as her involvement in banditry, formed an integral part of not only her survival strategies but also a range of options for achieving legitimization. Keywords: Huang Bamei, pirate queen, female bandit, heroine, Second Sino-Japanese War, Chinese Civil War, Taiwan

DEEDS NOT WORDS: AMERICAN SOCIAL JUSTICE MOVEMENTS AND WORLD WAR I

This essay investigates how the repressive wartime political and social environment in World War I encouraged three key American social justice movements to devise new tactics and strategies to advance their respective causes. For the African American civil rights, female suffrage, and civil liberties movements, the First World War unintentionally provided fresh opportunities for movement building, a process that included recruiting members, refining ideological messaging, devising innovative media strategies, negotiating with the government, and participating in nonviolent street demonstrations. World War I thus represented an important moment in the histories of all three movements. The constructive, rather than destructive, impact of the war on social justice movements proved significant in the short term (for the suffragist movement) and the long term (for the civil rights and civil liberties movements). Ultimately, considering these three movements collectively offers new insights into American war culture and the history of social movements.

Homecomings From “The Hague”

Based on the analysis of media reporting on the release and return of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) defendants after the end of their trials or imprisonment, this article focuses on the homecoming celebrations organized for politically prominent defendants. While large celebratory homecomings were vastly covered and discussed by local media, most of the defendants actually returned with no public welcome. This article demonstrates that the homecomings of politically significant returnees became part of a normalized political folklore, in which the convicted individuals are welcomed in the same manner as those acquitted. Nevertheless, this article suggests that these events are not necessarily (or not only) an expression of popular support to wartime “heroes.” Instead, it argues that political actors seek to utilize the occasions of the return of those ICTY defendants who possess symbolic capital as wartime political or military leaders in order to gain political profit. As these homecomings have become an expected political and media spectacle, they are treated by media professionals as such. The local media coverage of the homecoming spectacles reveals that while they are politically potent events, they are also contested: on the one hand by the proponents of competing ethnonational historical narratives and on the other by more critical media outlets that refuse to take them at face value.

Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft. Die Wirtschaft und die gesellschaftlichen Ordnungen und Mächte. Nachlaß, Teilband 4: Herrschaft by Max Weber Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft. Soziologie. Unvollendet 1919–1920 by Max Weber Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft. Entstehungsgeschichte und Dokumente by Max Weber (review)

[MWS 17.2 (2017) 282-296] ISSN 1470-8078 http://dx.doi.org/10.15543/MWS/2017/2/9© Max Weber Studies 2017, Rm 4-12, London Metropolitan University, 84 Moorgate, London EC2M 6SQ. Review Essay Max Weber, Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft. Die Wirtschaft und die gesellschaftlichen Ordnungen und Mächte. Nachlaß, Teilband 4: Herrschaft, ed. Edith Hanke, with Thomas Kroll (Max Weber Gesamtausgabe I/22-4; Tübingen, Mohr Siebeck, 2005), xxx + 944pp. (hbk). ISBN 978-3-16-148694-4. €369.00. Max Weber, Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft. Soziologie. Unvollendet 1919– 1920,editedbyKnutBorchardt,EdithHankeandWolfgangSchluchter (Max Weber Gesamtausgabe I/23; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2013), xxvi + 847pp. (hbk). ISBN 978-3-16-150292-7. €334.00. Max Weber, Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft. Entstehungsgeschichte und Dokumente, edited by Wolfgang Schluchter (Max Weber Gesamtausgabe I/24; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2009), xi + 285pp. (hbk). ISBN 978-3-16-150058-9. €114.00. In 1984 the Max Weber Gesamtausgabe commenced publication with Bd. I/15, Zur Politik im Weltkrieg. Schriften und Reden 1914– 1918, edited by Wolfgang Mommsen with the assistance of Gangolf Hübinger. More than thirty years later we still await publication of the ‘methodological’ writings in the MWG; but whether this matters very much is an open question. As Wilhelm Hennis pointed out in a contemporary review of Bd. I/15, given the general lack of manuscripts , typescripts, and other materials, the MWG could never be a ‘historico-critical’ edition since the editors were chiefly limited to reprinting, correcting, and annotating published versions of Weber’s writings.1 It appears to have been Weber’s practice to discard notes, drafts, manuscripts, and proofs once he was finished with them, and so for the great bulk of his work all we have are the printed versions. 1. Wilhelm Hennis, ‘Im langen Schatten einer Edition: Zum Erscheinen des ersten Bandes der Max-Weber-Gesamtausgabe (MWG)’, originally in Zeitschrift für Politik N. F. 32 (June 1985): 208-17; cited here as in his Max Weber und Thukydides: Nachträge zur Biographie des Werks (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2003), pp. 73-86 (80). Tribe Review Essay 283© Max Weber Studies 2017. Of course, since he only ever published two ‘books’—an extract from his doctoral thesis and his Habilitationsschrift—these writings were scattered through journals, newspapers, and conference proceedings ; but Marianne Weber had assembled much of this work in the early 1920s, publishing the ‘methodological’ writings in 1922 as the Wissenschaftslehre. And so we have had a working version of what will, eventually, be MWG Bde. I/7 and I/12 since 1922. What the world actually needed, argued Hennis, was not an exorbitantly expensive ‘complete works’ that turned out for the most part to contain what was already in circulation, but a cheap paperback version of the existing principal writings. He even went so far as to suggest that the publisher of the MWG had a strong commercial interest in the project, since copyright would run out in 1990 and the creation of a new standard edition would refresh the publisher’s rights.2 It soon become clear that having Weber’s writings on wartime politics (Bd. I/15 1988) or on rural and economic policy in the 1890s (I/4 1993) provided a solid basis for the re-assessment of the orthodoxies of the Weber reception. When he launched his acerbic criticisms of the MWG project in the mid 1980s Hennis was engaged in his own studies of Weber, travelling to the GDR to read the correspondence in the Merseburg archives, and subjecting Weber’s writings to line-by-line examination. The essays that resulted from this work contributed a great deal to the positive reassessment of Weber in the later twentieth century; the edition formed a valuable backdrop to this ongoing revision, but for a long time did not appear to be that central to it. The publication of the first volume of letters in 1990 revealed some of the real novelty that the edition would offer, although starting with the correspondence of 1906 and taking until 2012 to arrive at the letters of 1920 led to its own frustrations. Likewise the extension of Abteilung III, devoted to lecture notes, to seven volumes...

Primary Stein: Returning to the Writing of Gertrude Stein ed. by Janet Boyd and Sharon J. Kirsch, Gertrude Stein in Europe: Reconfigurations across Media, Disciplines, and Traditions ed. by Sarah Posman and Laura Luise Schultz

Primary Stein: Returning to the Writing of Gertrude Stein, edited by Janet Boyd and Sharon J. Kirsch. Lexington, 2014. 310 pages. Gertrude Stein in Europe: Reconfigurations across Media, Disciplines, and Traditions, edited by Sarah Posman and Laura Luise Schultz. Bloomsbury, 2015. 294 pages. Happily and in a timely way, Janet Boyd and Sharon J. Kirsch's edited collection Primary Stein: Returning to the Writing of Gertrude Stein accomplishes just what it sets out to do, which is to shift attention away from Stein's life and the spurious allegations surrounding it and back to her writing as work that can be, and demands to be, read for its literary, historical, and linguistic value. A much-needed antidote to a very tired debate surrounding Stein's politics and position in history, Primary Stein assembles critical essays by leading and up-and-coming scholars in Stein studies and modernism that, in the main, locus on individual works in a variety of critical and historical contexts. Arranged such that they trace the arc of Stein's career, the essays address Stein's and Toklas's early publishing efforts (Gabrielle Dean); the influence of Stein's experimental writing upon that of Virginia Woolf (Rachel Blau DuPlessis); the sociosexual context for Patriarchal Poetry (Jody Cardinal); the intersections between Stein's work and Romanticism (Rebecca Ariel Porte and, separately, Sarah Posman); alternative lenses for reading--and teaching--Stein's rhetoric and drama (Kirsch and Linda Voris, respectively); and the relationship of American geography to Stein's prose (Janet Boyd). Included also is a playful new close reading of the often studied Tender Buttons (Neil Schmitz), Adam Frank's introduction of readers to Radio Free Stein, and Steven Gould Axelrod's incisive analysis of Mrs. Reynolds as an anti-Hitler novel. Axelrod's essay is particularly noteworthy in that it reads Stein's wartime politics through one of her works, in a refreshing departure from the widespread allegations about her loyalties that are based on willful elisions of her writing. Taken in aggregate, these essays open new critical avenues for further investigation at the same time that they suggest new ways for teaching Stein's writing in the classroom, a point underscored in the polyvalent meaning of the book's title. Scholarship on Gertrude Stein's work has long been a fraught endeavor, marked by the notion that one must retrace the history of Gertrude Stein as a personage in order to discuss the work in a way that is not naively unaware of her lived history. It is hard to come up with any other major American writer who needs such constant reintroduction or, rather, permission to exist; and this precarity of position has meant that there have been many interruptions in discussions of the work itself. In the wake of two excellent biographies, James R. Mellow's Charmed Circle (1974) and Linda Wagner-Martin's Favored Strangers (1995), attention to Stein frequently has entailed a far greater emphasis on her life story and the famous company she kept at 27 rue de Fleurus. Often when the critical conversation has turned to Stein's writing, it has been freighted with assumptions surrounding her status as a woman--and therefore presumably feminist--artist, or else loaded with judgment of Stem's relationship to her Jewish identity. Part of what might be termed Stein's identity problem is due to the historically male-gendered category of modernist writer, a being traditionally exemplified in the form of James Joyce, T. S. Eliot, Ezra Pound, and Ernest Hemingway (on whose style Stein clearly had an influence). Part of Stein's identity problem is also due to scholars' suspicions surrounding her relationship to the Vichy regime during World War II; the fact that she and Alice B. Toklas survived the war has prompted some to suggest she did so by contributing to fascism in Europe. Female and purportedly a "bad" Jew, Stein is still treated by many as tangential to the canon of modernism, even as her linguistic inventiveness and contributions to modernist innovation are as indisputable as they are overlooked. …

American Writers in Europe: 1850 to the Present

American Writers in Europe: 1850 to the Present

The Wartime Political Thought of the Pan‐Netherlander Van Es and the Flemish Activist Van Genechten

Flemish nationalists willing to collaborate with German initiatives in occupied Belgium as well as their Dutch supporters worked under the expectation of a compromise peace to the Great War, in which they hoped to gain a say. How did these nationalists understand the nation at this moment when the anticipation of a general settlement demanded a comprehensive outlook? This contribution looks at two advocates of the Flemish cause. First, the Dutch Pan‐Netherlander Willem Van Es (1886‐1943) who proposed a New European order in September 1915. His vision is compared to the ideas of the Flemish Activist Robert Van Genechten (1895‐1945), a student at Ghent University, reopened in 1916 under German auspices.

Studies on Kuomintang’s Propaganda of New Equal Treaties During the Anti-Japanese War

During the Second World War, in order to support China’s Anti-Japanese War, US and UK have announced abolition of the previous unequal treaties to China, and signed the new equal treaties. Taking full advantage of these new equal treaties, Kuomintang (KMT) has launched propaganda of the new treaties to serve its wartime politics. In this process, KMT’s “revolutionary” image has been set up, as well as Chiang Kai Shek’s totalitarian dictatorship has been glorified and the KMT party‘s interests served; on the other hand, Wang’s puppet government has been struck, price-fixing policy has been publicized and the overall situation served. Therefore, it reflects the multi-faceted characteristics of KMT’s wartime politics: While adhering to fight against Japan, KMT took advantage of the monopoly status of state power to achieve its political dividends.

EDITORIAL FOREWORD

This special issue on World War I appears on the centennial of the war. The issue went to press as the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) was challenging the borders set nearly a hundred years ago in the Middle East by the imperial powers. Guest editor Mustafa Aksakal introduces the six research articles, part of a wave of scholarship examining the “transformative processes spawned by the war” in response to new historical questions and newly available archival sources. That half of the articles touch on sieges (in Medina) and famine (Syria/Lebanon, and in particular Beirut) produces an eerie echo at a time when civilians once again face hunger and the ravages of an armed conflict, with large numbers of refugees on the move. As we look back, so do the articles, moving backward chronologically from the “minority protection regime” established by the Treaty of Lausanne in 1923 to “atrocity propaganda” of the Balkan Wars of 1912–13. The issues raised by these two articles resonate loudly, as does the matter of American influence in the region, which is discussed in an article on the wartime politics of Syrians in Cairo. So, too, does the photograph on the cover of this special issue: Ruins of Gaza at the Time of the Great Attack, 1917.

New Art Collectives in the Service of the War: The Formation of Art Organizations during the Asia-Pacific War

This article explores Japanese artists' proactive engagement with wartime politics through the formulation of patriotic art associations during the Asia-Pacific War (1937 – 45). The main foci of this investigation are three artist collectives formed in response to the outbreak of war and the advent of the mass mobilization policy: the Army Art Association (Rikugun Bijutsu Kyōkai), the Women Artists Service Corps (Jōryū Bijutsuka Hōkōtai), and the Art Unit for Promoting the Munitions Industry (Gunju Seisan Bijutsu Suishintai). Although these three collectives were all created under the banner of promoting Japan's imperialist war, the actual motives behind the foundation of and participation in these patriotic art associations varied to a significant degree, depending on the artists' political/economic standings, age, gender, and the ever-changing conditions of the war. Carefully contemplating these sociopolitical factors, whether imposed upon or internalized by the artists, illuminates how artists from time to time actively committed to the war effort in order to pursue their own benefits. By closely examining the formulation and activities of these patriotic art associations, this article reveals how the alliances between artists and Japan's wartime state were formed, not only through top-down control but also as a result of a multilateral reciprocity, thereby exploring how artists played a proactive role in forming the wartime cultural landscape.

States, Insurgents, and Wartime Political Orders

Bargains, deals, and tacit understandings between states and insurgents are common in civil wars. This fascinating mix of conflict and cooperation shapes patterns of politics, governance, and violence. Building on recent findings about state formation, I offer a conceptual typology of political orders amidst civil war. Wartime political orders vary according to the distribution of territorial control and the level of cooperation between states and insurgents. Orders range from collusion and shared sovereignty to spheres of influence and tacit coexistence to clashing monopolies and guerrilla disorder. Examples from contemporary South Asian conflicts illustrate these concepts, which are scalable and portable across contexts. Scholars need to think more creatively about the political-military arrangements that emerge and evolve during war. A key policy implication is that there are many ways of forging stability without creating a counterinsurgent Leviathan.

Nimo's war, Emma's war: making feminist sense of the Iraq War

List of Illustrations Preface 1. Eight Women, One The Iraqi Women 2. Nimo: Wartime Politics in a Beauty Parlor 3. Maha: A Widow Returns to Baghdad 4. Safah: The Girl from Haditha 5. Shatha: A Legislator in Wartime The American Women 6. Emma and the Recruiters 7. Danielle: From Basketball Court to Baghdad Rooftop 8. Kim: I'm in a Way Fighting My Own War 9. Charlene: Picking Up the Pieces 10. Conclusion: The Long Notes Bibliography Index