108 research outputs found

    Democracy, development and the executive presidency in Sri Lanka

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    This paper examines the developmental causes and consequences of the shift from a parliamentary to a semi-presidential system in Sri Lanka in 1978, examining its provenance, rationale, and its unfolding trajectory. drawing on a wide range of sources, it set out an argument that the executive presidency was born out of an elite impulse to create a more stable, centralised political structure to resist the welfarist electoral pressures that had taken hold in the post-independence period, and to pursue a market-driven model of economic growth. This strategy succeeded in its early years 197801993, when presidents retained legislative control, maintained a strong personal commitment to market reforms, and cultivated alternative sources of legitimacy. In the absence of these factors, the presidency slipped into crisis over 1994-2004 as resistance to elite-led projects of state reform mounted and as the president lost control of the legislature. Since 2005 the presidency has regained its power, but at the cost of abandoning its original rationale and function as a means to recalibrate the elite/mass power relations to facilitate elite-led reform agendas

    A voz dos bandos: colectivos de justiça e ritos da palavra portuguesa em Timor Leste colonial

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    Este artigo examina as relaçÔes entre o discurso da justiça e a prĂĄtica do ritual nos bandos do governo colonial portuguĂȘs em Timor Leste, entre a segunda metade do sĂ©culo XIX e as primeiras dĂ©cadas do sĂ©culo XX. Os bandos consistiam em ordens e instruçÔes de comando emanadas pelo governador portuguĂȘs em DĂ­li, e comunicadas de forma cerimonial por oficiais Ă s populaçÔes dos diversos reinos timorenses dispersos pelo paĂ­s. Bandos eram um instrumento por excelĂȘncia de governação colonial dos assuntos indĂ­genas, servindo para arbitrar conflitos, punir transgressĂ”es e, em geral, instituir realidades no mundo timorense. Contudo, esta instituição assumiu igualmente uma singular expressĂŁo nos usos timorenses, servindo bandos para comunicar tambĂ©m as ordens de autoridades tradicionais, os liurais. O artigo acompanha as variaçÔes coloniais e indĂ­genas que os bandos adquiriram em Timor Leste, conceptualizando-os enquanto colectivos de justiça. Ao considerar assim os bandos como colectivos – formaçÔes heterogĂ©neas em que elementos linguĂ­sticos e nĂŁo linguĂ­sticos se combinam na produção de efeitos de poder sobre as populaçÔes – o artigo propĂ”e uma via conceptual alternativa Ă s perspectivas linguĂ­sticas e literĂĄrias de anĂĄlise do discurso colonial

    Movimientos transnacionales, diĂĄspora y modernidades mĂșltiples

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    Form and meaning of magical acts: A point of view

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    This article is a reprint of an essay originally published as “Form and meaning of magical acts: A point of view,” in Horton, Robin and Ruth Finnegan, eds. (1973) Modes of thought: Essays on thinking in Western and non-Western societies. London: Faber & Faber
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