The revenge of geopolitics: the space as a metaphor of fear in the clash of civilizations

Una de las obras que más ha contribuido a forjar el imaginario geopolítico del mundo occidental es el libro de S. P. Huntington El choque de civilizaciones. En este artículo pretendo evidenciar que este libro y su tesis son estrictamente geopolíticas, es decir, que entran en el marco de los análisis que adoptan un enfoque de ciencia geográfica aplicada, útil para los políticos y para orientar y movilizar a los lectores. De acuerdo con mi lectura, la interpretación de Huntington se encuentra alineada con el imperialismo de Estados Unidos y tiene un impacto insospechado en la política interna de los países occidentales; Por otra parte, la tesis del choque de civilizaciones se basa en una ceguera consciente de la naturaleza de la sociedad contemporánea y los efectos de la globalización. Esta “zona oscura” de la teoría de Huntington revela la preocupación principal del trabajo, a saber, la defensa de Occidente frente a la des-occidentalización. El objetivo de este artículo, por lo tanto, es demostrar en primer lugar que el modelo geopolítico de Huntington se deriva de una fuerte tradición de la historia de la hegemonía estadounidense; en segundo lugar, que su principal objetivo es reconstruir un orden y homogeneidad estables dentro de la civilización occidental; por último, que el incremento reciente en el uso de este modelo puede dar lugar a un aumento de las tensiones entre grupos y los individuos.One of the works that forged the Western geopolitical imagination was The Clash of Civilizations by Samuel P. Huntington. This book, which has been dealt with primarily as a political, sociological work, is imbued by schemes and categories coming from the geographical and geopolitical. My contribution shows that Huntington’s geopolitical approach, that enjoyed a huge success in the world, has an origin in USA imperialism and that it has a much stronger impact than usually noticed. Here I will argue that the Clash of civilizations thesis is based on a conscious blindness with regard to the nature of contemporary societies and by a strong internal contradiction between its description of the world market and its interpretation of culture. These blind spots reveal the main focus of Huntington’s approach: the celebration of homogeneity inside each civilization – and in particular the protection of the West against any de-westernization

Humanity in the State of Nature: Notes on José Saramago’s “Blindness” and Cormac McCarthy’s “The Road”

I examine two dystopian novels that share some common starting points: they both refer to afar-distant past, before civilization as such began; they attempt to describe the re-establishment of human moral behavior in the extremely hostile conditions such a pastentails; and their respective authors believe that the only possible basis for re-establishingmorality may be found in the relation of hospitality between the self and the other. The twonovels are Blindness, by José Saramago, and The Road, by Cormac McCarthy. In spite ofthe difference between the historical contexts in which these novels were written— Blindness was written in 1995 and The Road in 2006—and between the authors, they present strikingsimilarities, even though they ultimately seem to reach different conclusions. Indeed, the twonovels pose the same fundamental political and philosophical question: how is moralitypossible in a condition almost similar to the state of nature? Saramago’s answer issuggested in the behavior—not the language— of the doctor’s wife, the only character whokeeps her eyesight; McCarthy, on the other hand, chooses a child as the moral agent in aworld characterized by death and deprived of order

‘Missed Revolutions’: Historical Narratives During Italian Fascism (from Delio Cantimori to Camillo Pellizzi)

This article analyses some examples of historical narratives that, long before the emergenceof so-called postmodern history, had a specific narrative character: the reconstructions of‘missed revolutions’ taking into account a possible alternative history and tracing back thereasons for a social, political, and economic crisis to an interrupted process, one that, had itbeen completed, would have triggered some sort of progress. Even if this kind of historicalrepresentation cannot properly be classified as a form of alternate history, it can be placedbetween traditional historical accounts of the past and a more innovative pattern, whichentails a more speculative argumentation, and therefore has been used to justify or suggestspecific political claims. One of the most obvious examples of this literature are thenarrations of the ‘unaccomplished Risorgimento’, which was a highly debated theme in thepolitical, intellectual, and historical discussion from the period of the Italian unificationuntil the economic and political reconstruction following the Second World War. Thisarticle will stress four possible functions of the ‘missed revolution’narratives: first, as a wayto discover some currents that have been underestimated by the official historiography ormainstream political discourse; second, to observe the role assigned to particular eventsin altering the destiny of a nation; third, to show how political and intellectual actorsuse history to justify political actions or events; and finally, to reveal how, conversely,by reconstructing ‘missed revolutions’ individual historians and, more generally, publicintellectuals can take up a specific political stance while writing histor

Cultures of Populism and the Political Right in Central Europe

In their paper, Cultures of Populism and the Political Right in Central Europe, Patricia Chiantera-Stutte and Andrea Petö analyze the common points and differences in which imagined and mythologized histories are serving as a mobilizing force for extreme-right movements in three Central European countries, in Austria, Hungary, and Italy. The authors discuss how populist and right-wing political parties in these countries construct their conceptions of an alternative identity for the European Union. Further, the authors analyze the politico-territorial myths constructed by the three populist right-wing parties, the Freedom Party in Austria, the Northern League in Italy, and the Party of Hungarian Life and Truth. The programs of the three parties assert the equasion of the German concept of Volk with territory: the Freedom Party propagates a particular concept of Central Europe (Mitteleuropa), the Northern League of Padania assumes to be the true nation of the reagion, and the Party of Hungarian Life and Truth builds on imagined and mythologized concepts of an ancient Hungary with a homogeneous society and culture. The authors analyze the construction of essentialist identities based on imagined historical communities and on the exclusion of the Other where anti-Semitism is a driving factor represent a sceptical ideology evident in the discourse of the said parties

Adnexal Torsion in Pediatric Age: Does Bolli's Score Work? Report of Two Cases

Adnexal torsion is a surgical emergency requiring early diagnosis in order to avoid demolitive surgery. Adnexal torsion's diagnosis could be very difficult in pediatric patients because children cannot explain symptoms accurately. Furthermore reproductive organs lie high in abdomen, causing unclear examinations findings. For reducing diagnostic mistakes or delay clinical and hematological criteria could be useful. No radiological criteria (CT or MRI) should be taken in count because of the costs and the required time. By combining clinical presentation in patients with OT three useful diagnostic variables have been identified: age, duration of pain, vomiting. Presence of vomiting, short duration of abdominal pain and high CRP levels have great predictive value for the diagnosis of adnexal torsion. In those patients an exploratory laparoscopy should be performed without any doubt and/or delay. These data may aid physicians in the evaluation of abdominal pain in premenarchal girls

Dall’Oecologie al Blut und Boden: interpretazioni ecologiste da Haeckel al Nazionalsocialismo

This contribution reconstructs a particular period in the history of ecological thought in Germany from the end of the 19th century to Nationalsocialism. Indeed, some key concepts used largely in ecological thought are formulated at this time: Oecologie, Umwelt, milieu and Lebensraum. The reconstruction of the meaning, use of these pivotal concepts, as the consideration of the political and intellectual milieus where they were developed are the object of this contribution, that considers their further development and appropriation during the phase of Nationalsocialism. In particular the changing meaning of the ideas of Oecologie, Umwelt, Oecumene and Lebensraum will be explored from the works by Ernst Haeckel and Friedrich Ratzel, to the Nationalsocialist ecological movements, supported by Rudolf Hess and Richard W. Darré

The State as a “form of life” and the space as <i>Leistungsraum</i>: the reception of Ratzel in the First and Second World Wars

My contribution explores the meaning of war and the role of Germany, which was seen as representing a Mittellage, before the First and the Second World Wars, through the eyes of two main authors who radically reinterpreted and appropriated geographical political thinking, particularly the work of Ratzel. I am referring to the Swedish political scholar Rudolf Kjellen and the “crown jurist” of the Third Reich, Carl Schmitt. The consideration of the triple relation between space, Ratzel and war casts light on Kjellen's and Schmitt's use of Ratzel as a lever in order to promote their idea of politics and political science. Ratzel's concepts offered Kjellen and, in a different way, Schmitt, a means of justifying their way of overcoming and stretching the “limits” of their disciplines and, at the same time, of introducing a new idea of political and geographical organization, which de facto legitimized German expansion, in two crucial periods of German political life – the First and the Second World Wars. As a consequence, their Ratzel was oriented toward militant aims. Moreover, their scientific and political ideas were clearly intertwined – they explicitly rejected the idea of separating their roles as political activists and as members of a scientific community.</p

Measuring the Impact of Breakthrough Clinical Data and Related Publicity on Physician Practice Patterns in the United States

Physicians are constantly being exposed to new evidence that may effect how they practice medicine. While they read medical journals that contain peer-reviewed publications and attend scientific meetings at which results are presented, quite often they learn of new medical developments through the general consumer media. This paper summarizes the results of two case studies evaluating the impact of new clinical data and related media events on physician prescribing behavior within two different therapeutic classes: antipsychotics, used to treat psychosis, and female contraceptives. The analysis included a time-series analysis of total prescriptions (TRx) and market share(% of TRx) in the timeframe pre- and post- publication of landmark clinical data and surrounding media events. Results from these case studies suggest that the communication of landmark clinical data had a significant influence on physician prescribing behavior within both therapeutic classes. Although more rigorous statistical analysis would be required to definitively prove a correlation, in both case studies- antipsychotics and contraceptives physicians appear to be more influenced by media communication of new data than by the publication of the CATIE study results (antipsychotics) and the FDA's advisory on updated labeling for the contraceptive patch Ortho Evra (contraceptives), respectively.Master of Public Healt