British Muslims and the anti-war movement

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All I'm asking, is for a little respect: assessing the performance of Britain's most successful radical left party

This article offers an overview of the genesis, development and decline of the Respect Party, a rare example of a radical left party which has achieved some degree of success in the UK. It analyses the party's electoral fortunes and the reasons for its inability to expand on its early breakthroughs in East London and Birmingham. Respect received much of its support from Muslim voters, although the mere presence of Muslims in a given area was not enough for Respect candidates to get elected. Indeed, despite criticism of the party for courting only Muslims, it did not aim to draw its support from these voters alone. Moreover, its reliance on young people and investment in local campaigning on specific political issues were often in opposition to the traditional ethnic politics which have characterised the electoral process in some areas

Aesthetics relation between art, culture, politics: social turn

Рукопись поступила в редакцию 1 июня 2016 г.This article deals with the problem of important social turn in the relationship between politics and art in the contemporary situation. In the postmodern sense, the relation between politics and art is assumed as performance or, in other words, as the representation of art and politics in the realm of cultural discourses and figures. The relations between art and politics in the contemporary sense may be assumed in terms of this triple definition, as: the transfer of politics into art, as the spectacularization of politics through art, and as a potential field of intervening critical, subversive practices in the global-transitional social processes of performing forms of life in the realm of expansive neoliberal capitalism and its global crisis

The past is evil/evil is past: on retrospective politics, 'philosophy of history, and temporal manichaeism

One of the most remarkable phenomena in current international politics is the increasing attention paid to historical injustice. Opinions on this phenomenon strongly differ. For some it stands for a new and noble type of politics based on raised moral standards and helping the cause of peace and democracy. Others are more critical and claim that retrospective politics comes at the cost of present- or future-oriented politics and tends to be anti-utopian. The warnings about the perils of a retrospective politics outweighing politics directed at contemporary injustices, or strivings for a more just future, should be taken seriously. Yet the alternative of a politics disregarding all historical injustice is not desirable either. We should refuse to choose between restitution for historical injustices and struggle for justice in the present or the future. Rather, we should look for types of retrospective politics that do not oppose but complement or reinforce the emancipatory and utopian elements in present- and future-directed politics. I argue that retrospective politics can indeed have negative effects. Most notably it can lead to a temporal Manichaeism that not only posits that the past is evil, but also tends to treat evil as anachronistic or as belonging to the past. Yet I claim that ethical Manichaeism and anti-utopianism and are not inherent features of all retrospective politics but rather result from an underlying philosophy of history that treats the relation between past, present, and future in antinomic terms and prevents us from understanding transtemporal injustices and responsibilities. In order to pinpoint the problem of certain types of retrospective politics and point toward some alternatives, I start out from a criticism formulated by the German philosopher Odo Marquard and originally directed primarily at progressivist philosophies of history

False Idles: The Politics of the "Quiet Life"

The dominant Greek and Roman ideology held that the best human life required engaging in politics, on the grounds that the human good is shared, not private, and that the activities central to this shared good are those of traditional politics. This chapter surveys three ways in which philosophers challenged this ideology, defended a withdrawal from or transformation of traditional politics, and thus rethought what politics could be. Plato and Aristotle accept the ideology's two central commitments but insist that a few exceptional human beings could transcend the good of human activities. Epicurus argues that the human good is private, not shared. Socrates and some of his followers, including especially the Stoics, argue that the activities central to the shared human good are not those of traditional politics

Tensions in Young People's Conceptualisation and Practice of Politics

Young people have been characterised as apathetic and disengaged from mainstream politics. This discourse draws upon a narrow, regulatory and hegemonic model of politics that centres on parliamentary politics. This paper reports findings from a qualitative study of young people drawn from across the political spectrum that also found most participants to adhere to this dominant model of politics. However, this conceptualisation of politics did not match their forms of socio-political engagement, instead it generated a series of tensions and worked to discount their actions as not \'genuine\' or \'real\' politics. It is argued that this narrow, regulatory model of politics does not reflect contemporary social conditions and actually militates against young people understanding themselves as political actors and beings.Activism, Feminism, Politics, Young People

Medicine as Friendship with God: Anointing the Sick as a Theological Hermeneutic

A theological bioethics needs, first, a theological politics. The thesis of this essay rests on the claim that the contours of a theological politics are found in the nature of sacramental practices. More specifically, a theological politics of medicine is found in the sacramental practice of anointing of the sick. Anointing provides a radically theological hermeneutic—a theologically robust vision for interpreting medicine that, if enacted, can powerfully make real God\u27s work in the world. Such a vision is embodied in one particular twentieth-century exemplar—the organization called Partners In Health (PIH) and its cofounder, Paul Farmer. Farmer and PIH, I argue, live the théologie and theological politics of medicine embodied in the practice of anointing. What is more, they show—against those who would accuse such an approach of being naively idealistic—that such a theological politics is possible, powerful, and can even change the world

Art+Politics

For the exhibition Art + Politics, students worked closely with the holdings of Gettysburg College\u27s Special Collections and College Archives to curate an exhibition in Schmucker Art Gallery that engages with issues of public policy, activism, war, propaganda, and other critical socio-political themes. Each of the students worked diligently to contextualize the objects historically, politically, and art-historically. The art and artifacts presented in this exhibition reveal how various political events and social issues have been interpreted through various visual and printed materials, including posters, pins, illustrations, song sheets, as well as a Chinese shoe for bound feet. The students\u27 essays that follow demonstrate careful research and thoughtful reflection on the American Civil War, nineteenth-century politics, the First and Second World Wars, World\u27s Fairs, Dwight D. Eisenhower\u27s campaign, Vietnam-War era protests, and the Cultural Revolution in China. [excerpt]https://cupola.gettysburg.edu/artcatalogs/1009/thumbnail.jp

Politics as usual? The Trials and Tribulations of the Law of Historical Memory in Spain

The aim of this article is to evaluate the Law of Historical Memory from a political perspective where politics is understood as "the art of the possible". It will be argued that the Law of Historical Memory is a product of the compromises which characterise the process of politics as usual in a functioning democracy. An analysis of the Law of Historical Memory, therefore, can illuminate the way in which politics functions in Spain today. Two main issues are focused on: the primacy of electoral considerations and the interaction between state and civil society

Contested Terrain: Understanding The Persistence Of Racial Inequality In America

Review Of The Color Of Politics: Race And The Mainsprings Of American Politics By M. Goldfield, Facing Up To The American Dream By J. Hochschild, Shifting The Color Line: Race And The American Welfare State By R.C. Lieberman, Voting Hopes Or Fears? White Voters, Black Candidates, And Racial Politics In America By K. Reeves, And Reaching Beyond Race By P.M. Sniderman And E.G. Carmine