‘Charlie Hebdo’ and the two sides of imitation

In a 2009 paper, one of the neuroscientists instrumental to the discovery of ‘mirror neurons’, Vittorio Gallese, argued that there are always ‘two sides’ to mimesis – in and of itself mimesis is ‘neither good nor bad’, argued Gallese, as it can be declined in terms of both conflictual or social behavior. While the great majority of work on imitation, contagion and suggestion (ICS) have emphasized imitation as either a vector of the social or as the building block of our social ontology, René Girard’s mimetic theory stands out as perhaps the approach most preoccupied with the ill effects of mimesis. Why is this so? Is Girard’s position an excessively one-sided and negative take on imitation? Drawing on the example of the 2015 ‘Charlie Hebdo’ terror attacks, in this chapter I argue, firstly, that imitation was central to both the violence perpetrated by attackers and the political and affective order that emerged around of the attacks. Thus, there is a fundamental ambivalence about the social and political workings of imitation. Secondly, I argue that behind Girard’s negative view of imitation lies an unacknowledged concern about the power of suggestion, and in particular affective suggestion. In fact, behind Girard’s growing concern about today’s escalating mimetic crisis there is a specific concern about the global and mimetic escalation of affects

The Globalisation of Resentment: Failure, Denial, and Violence in World Politics

Through the lenses of contemporary terrorism, this article charts the rise of global resentment against the background of the multiplication and denial of failure. The article examines resentment and ressentiment as emotional responses to different kinds of failure: failure of justice and failure of recognition, respectively. It then investigates their place in the affective and moral economy of the global age, teasing out the key distinctions between the two emotions and assessing the strengths of the claim concerning an ever expanding diffusion of ressentiment in late modern times. Through inroads into classical and contemporary political theory, the article seeks to rescue resentment from the relative hegemony of ressentiment. The article closes with a reading of the Paris terror attacks of 7 January 2015 and 13 November 2015, that seeks to disentangle the different forms of resentment mobilised in these acts. By raising the issue of the moral value of resentment, the article ultimately seeks to address the question of how to cope with failure while holding on to emancipatory, counter-hegemonic, and self-affirming political practices

The global politics of ugly feelings: pessimism and resentment in a mimetic world

Negative emotions are not what they used to be. As the world edges closer and closer to the brink of a dark political dystopia, sentiments of disenchantment such as pessimism and resentment stand out as dominant moods of our age. Despite being once endowed with a critical and creative potential, today these ‘ugly feelings’ sustain forms of politics that are ambivalent and equivocal. Against the background of a highly mimetic social ontology, where affects mutate into memes at dazzling speed, these sentiments of disenchantments are appropriated by the political right as well as the left, hanging dangerously between reaction and emancipation. The chapter provides a diagnosis of their re-emergence, highlighting their common phenomenological matrix, their shared dysphoric and non-cathartic nature, and their ambivalent political work

Realism and Geopolitics in Italy during the Cold War: Decline and Revival

Since the end of the Cold War, realism and geopolitics have enjoyed a remarkable revival in the study of international affairs in Italy. These approaches are often presented as linear and coherent intellectual trajectories in the history of Italian political thought, connecting Niccolò Machiavelli to Vilfredo Pareto and Gaetano Mosca. In this paper we argue that this genealogical account is not only problematic, but also has limited relevance precisely to the Cold War years. While the Cold War may be considered their «golden age», political realism and geopolitics had actually very little impact on Italian scholars during the Cold War. By exploring the fragmented and complex development of Italian realist and geopolitical thought during the Cold War, the article thus challenges the presumed continuity of these two traditions and outlines alternative genealogies. These shed light not only on the «weak» and «hybrid» versions of realism and geopolitics that survived the end of the Second World War, but also foreground the specific contribution of scholars such as Pierpaolo Portinaro, Carlo Galli and Gianfranco Miglio in returning geopolitics and realism to the intellectual debate, and highlight the unexpected convergence of Marxist and conservative thought around this revival

Italy in the Middle East and the Mediterranean: The evolving relations with Egypt and Libya

The Mediterranean and the Middle East have long constituted an important “circle” in Italy’s foreign policy, with Egypt and Libya playing a particularly important role. During 2016, two sources of tension emerged in Italy’s relations with these countries. The first reflects a wider European situation. Like the rest of the EU, Italy has followed strategic interests—on migration, energy, and security—that sometimes conflict with the promotion of human rights, democracy, and the rule of law, which the EU claims to promote in its external relations. The Regeni affair, involving a murdered Italian graduate student, exemplified this tension. The second source results from the role of corporate interests in Italy, especially those of oil and energy companies, in relation to the country’s “national interests.” Italian foreign policy toward both Libya and Egypt seems to have been driven by a combination of somewhat overlapping but also divergent national and corporate interests

Phase Stability and Fast Ion Conductivity in the Hexagonal LiBH4-LiBr-LiCl Solid Solution

This study shows a flexible system that offers promising candidates for Li-based solid-state electrolytes. The Br− substitution for BH4 − stabilizes the hexagonal structure of LiBH4 at room temperature (RT), whereas Cl− is soluble only at higher temperatures. Incorporation of chloride in a hexagonal solid solution leads to an increase in the energy density of the system. For the first time, a stable hexagonal solid solution of LiBH4 containing both Cl− and Br-halide anions has been obtained at RT. The LiBH4−LiBr−LiCl ternary phase diagram has been determined at RT by X-ray diffraction coupled with a Rietveld refinement. A solubility of up to 30% of Cl− in the solid solution has been established. The effect of halogenation on the Li-ion conductivity and electrochemical stability has been investigated by electrochemical impedance spectroscopy and cyclic voltammetry. Considering the ternary samples, h-Li(BH4)0.7(Br)0.2(Cl)0.1 composition showed the highest value for conductivity (1.3 × 10−5 S/cm at 30 °C), which is about 3 orders of magnitude higher than that for pure LiBH4 in the orthorhombic structure. The values of Li-ion conductivity at RT depend only on the BH4 − content in the solid solution, suggesting that the Br/Cl ratio does not affect the defect formation energy in the structure. Chloride anion substitution in the hexagonal structure increases the activation energy, moving from about 0.45 eV for samples without Cl− ions in the structure up to about 0.63 eV for h-Li(BH4)0.6(Br)0.2(Cl)0.2 compositions, according to the Meyer−Neldel rule. In addition to increasing Li-ion conductivity, the halogenation also increases the thermal stability of the system. Unlike for the Liion conductivity, the Br/Cl ratio influences the electrochemical stability: a wide oxidative window of 4.04 V versus Li+/Li is reached in the Li−Br system while further addition of Cl is a trade-off between oxidative stability and weight reduction. The halogenation allows both binary and ternary systems operating below 120 °C, thus suggesting possible applications of these fast ion conductors as solid-state electrolytes in Li-ion batteries

Foreign Policy and the Ideology of Post-ideology: The Case of Matteo Renzi’s Partito Democratico

The post-communist Italian Left has experienced a long phase of ideational misalignment between ideas placed at different levels, as a qualified discursive institutionalist approach demonstrates. Background public philosophies have often clashed with post-communist political ideology, while foreign policy programmes have often contradicted specific policies. Under the leadership of Matteo Renzi, however, the PD is now experiencing a moment of remarkable ideational consistency. Rather than being founded on entirely new premises, this new consensus folds old elements into new ones and shows all the defining traits of post-ideology. Yet, by espousing post-ideology, Renzi is making an ultimately ideological move whose limitations may soon start to show

A review of the MSCA ITN ECOSTORE - Novel complex metal hydrides for efficient and compact storage of renewable energy as hydrogen and electricity

Hydrogen as an energy carrier is very versatile in energy storage applications. Developments in novel, sustainable technologies towards a CO2-free society are needed and the exploration of all-solid-state batteries (ASSBs) as well as solid-state hydrogen storage applications based on metal hydrides can provide solutions for such technologies. However, there are still many technical challenges for both hydrogen storage material and ASSBs related to designing low-cost materials with low-environmental impact. The current materials considered for all-solid-state batteries should have high conductivities for Na+, Mg2+ and Ca2+, while Al3+-based compounds are often marginalised due to the lack of suitable electrode and electrolyte materials. In hydrogen storage materials, the sluggish kinetic behaviour of solid-state hydride materials is one of the key constraints that limit their practical uses. Therefore, it is necessary to overcome the kinetic issues of hydride materials before discussing and considering them on the system level. This review summarizes the achievements of the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA) innovative training network (ITN) ECOSTORE, the aim of which was the investigation of different aspects of (complex) metal hydride materials. Advances in battery and hydrogen storage materials for the efficient and compact storage of renewable energy production are discussed