Twentieth-century Russia, in all its political incarnations, lacked the basic features of the Western liberal model: the rule of law, civil society, and an uncensored public sphere. InSlavophile ...Empire, the leading historian Laura Engelstein pays particular attention to the Slavophiles and their heirs, whose aversion to the secular individualism of the West and embrace of an idealized version of the native past established a pattern of thinking that had an enduring impact on Russian political life.
Imperial Russia did not lack for partisans of Western-style liberalism, but they were outnumbered, to the right and to the left, by those who favored illiberal options. In the book's rigorously argued chapters, Engelstein asks how Russia's identity as a cultural nation at the core of an imperial state came to be defined in terms of this antiliberal consensus. She examines debates on religion and secularism, on the role of culture and the law under a traditional regime presiding over a modernizing society, on the status of the empire's ethnic peripheries, and on the spirit needed to mobilize a multinational empire in times of war. These debates, she argues, did not predetermine the kind of system that emerged after 1917, but they foreshadowed elements of a political culture that are still in evidence today.
This is a bold new study of the recent emergence of democracy in Latin America. Leonardo Avritzer shows that traditional theories of democratization fall short in explaining this phenomenon. Scholars ...have long held that the postwar stability of Western Europe reveals that restricted democracy, or "democratic elitism," is the only realistic way to guard against forces such as the mass mobilizations that toppled European democracies after World War I. Avritzer challenges this view. Drawing on the ideas of Jürgen Habermas, he argues that democracy can be far more inclusive and can rely on a sphere of autonomous association and argument by citizens. He makes this argument by showing that democratic collective action has opened up a new "public space" for popular participation in Latin American politics.
Polling shows that since the 1950s Americans' trust in government
has fallen dramatically to historically low levels. In At War
with Government , the political scientists Amy Fried and
Douglas B. ...Harris reveal that this trend is no accident. Although
distrust of authority is deeply rooted in American culture, it is
fueled by conservative elites who benefit from it. Since the
postwar era conservative leaders have deliberately and
strategically undermined faith in the political system for partisan
aims. Fried and Harris detail how conservatives have sown distrust
to build organizations, win elections, shift power toward
institutions that they control, and secure policy victories. They
trace this strategy from the Nixon and Reagan years through
Gingrich's Contract with America, the Tea Party, and Donald Trump's
rise and presidency. Conservatives have promoted a political
identity opposed to domestic state action, used racial messages to
undermine unity, and cultivated cynicism to build and bolster
coalitions. Once in power, they have defunded public services
unless they help their constituencies and rolled back regulations,
perversely proving the failure of government. Fried and Harris draw
on archival sources to document how conservative elites have
strategized behind the scenes. With a powerful diagnosis of our
polarized era, At War with Government also proposes how we
might rebuild trust in government by countering the strategies
conservatives have used to weaken it.
This book examines the impact of the Roman cultural revolution under Augustus on the Roman province of Greece. It argues that the transformation of Roman Greece into a classicizing 'museum' was a ...specific response of the provincial Greek elites to the cultural politics of the Roman imperial monarchy. Against a background of Roman debates about Greek culture and Roman decadence, Augustus promoted the ideal of a Roman debt to a 'classical' Greece rooted in Europe and morally opposed to a stereotyped Asia. In Greece the regime signalled its admiration for Athens, Sparta, Olympia and Plataea as symbols of these past Greek glories. Cued by the Augustan monarchy, provincial Greek notables expressed their Roman orientation by competitive cultural work (revival of ritual; restoration of buildings) aimed at further emphasising Greece's 'classical' legacy. Reprised by Hadrian, the Augustan construction of 'classical' Greece helped to promote the archaism typifying Greek culture under the principate.
Most Americans believe that the ratification of the Constitution in 1788 marked the settlement of post-Revolutionary disputes over the meanings of rights, democracy, and sovereignty in the new ...nation. In The Citizenship Revolution, Douglas Bradburn undercuts this view by showing that the Union, not the Nation, was the most important product of independence.
In 1774, everyone in British North America was a subject of King George and Parliament. In 1776 a number of newly independent "states," composed of "American citizens" began cobbling together a Union to fight their former fellow countrymen. But who was an American? What did it mean to be a "citizen" and not a "subject"? And why did it matter?
Bradburn's stunning reinterpretation requires us to rethink the traditional chronologies and stories of the American Revolutionary experience. He places battles over the meaning of "citizenship" in law and in politics at the center of the narrative. He shows that the new political community ultimately discovered that it was not really a "Nation," but a "Union of States"-and that it was the states that set the boundaries of belonging and the very character of rights, for citizens and everyone else. To those inclined to believe that the ratification of the Constitution assured the importance of national authority and law in the lives of American people, the emphasis on the significance and power of the states as the arbiter of American rights and the character of nationhood may seem strange. But, as Bradburn argues, state control of the ultimate meaning of American citizenship represented the first stable outcome of the crisis of authority, allegiance, and identity that had exploded in the American Revolution-a political settlement delicately reached in the first years of the nineteenth century. So ended the first great phase of the American citizenship revolution: a continuing struggle to reconcile the promise of revolutionary equality with the pressing and sometimes competing demands of law, order, and the pursuit of happiness.
Russian Conservatism examines the history of Russian conservative thought from the beginning of the nineteenth century to the present. Robinson charts the contributions made by philosophers, ...politicians, and others during the Imperial, Soviet, and post-Soviet periods. Looking at cultural, political, and social-economic conservatism in Russia, Russian Conservatism demonstrates that such ideas are helpful in interpreting Russia's present as well as its past and will be influential in shaping Russia's future, for better or for worse, in the years to come.
An insightful and original exploration of Roman Republic politics In A Companion to the Political Culture of the Roman Republic, editors Valentina Arena and Jonathan Prag deliver an incisive and ...original collection of forty contributions from leading academics representing various intellectual and academic traditions. The collected works represent some of the best scholarship in recent decades and adopt a variety of approaches, each of which confronts major problems in the field and contributes to ongoing research. The book represents a new, updated, and comprehensive view of the political world of Republican Rome and some of the included essays are available in English for the first time. Divided into six parts, the discussions consider the institutionalized loci, political actors, and values, rituals, and discourse that characterized Republican Rome. The Companion also offers several case studies and sections on the history of the interpretation of political life in the Roman Republic. Key features include: A thorough introduction to the Roman political world as seen through the wider lenses of Roman political culture Comprehensive explorations of the fundamental components of Roman political culture, including ideas and values, civic and religious rituals, myths, and communicative strategies Practical discussions of Roman Republic institutions, both with reference to their formal rules and prescriptions, and as patterns of social organization In depth examinations of the 'afterlife' of the Roman Republic, both in ancient authors and in early modern and modern times Perfect for students of all levels of the ancient world, A Companion to the Political Culture of the Roman Republic will also earn a place in the libraries of scholars and students of politics, political history, and the history of ideas.
This Violent Empiretraces the origins of American violence, racism, and paranoia to the founding moments of the new nation and the initial instability of Americans' national sense of self.Fusing ...cultural and political analyses to create a new form of political history, Carroll Smith-Rosenberg explores the ways the founding generation, lacking a common history, governmental infrastructures, and shared culture, solidified their national sense of self by imagining a series of "Others" (African Americans, Native Americans, women, the propertyless) whose differences from European American male founders overshadowed the differences that divided those founders. These "Others," dangerous and polluting, had to be excluded from the European American body politic. Feared, but also desired, they refused to be marginalized, incurring increasingly enraged enactments of their political and social exclusion that shaped our long history of racism, xenophobia, and sexism. Close readings of political rhetoric during the Constitutional debates reveal the genesis of this long history.
The 'Age of Revolution' is a term seldom used in Scandinavian historiography, despite the fact that Scandinavia was far from untouched by the late eighteenth-century revolutions in Europe and ...America. Scandinavia did experience its outbursts of radical thought, its assassinations and radical reforms, but these occurred within reasonably stable political structures, practices and ways of thinking. As recent research on the political cultures of the Nordic countries clearly demonstrates, the Danish, Finnish, Icelandic, Norwegian and Swedish experiences of the late-eighteenth and early-nineteenth centuries offer a more differentiated look at what constitutes 'revolutionary' change in this period compared with other regions in Europe. They provide an alternative story of an incipient transition towards modernity, a 'Nordic model' in which radical change takes place within an apparent continuity of the established order. The long-term products of the processes of change that began in the Age of Revolution were some of the most progressive and stable political systems in the modern world. At the same time, the Scandinavian countries provide a number of instances which are directly relevant to comparisons particularly within the northwest European cultural area. Presenting the latest research on political culture in Scandinavia, this volume with twenty-seven contributions focuses on four key aspects: the crisis of monarchy; the transformation in political debate; the emerging influence of commercial interest in politics; and the shifting boundaries of political participation. Each section is preceded by an introduction that draws out the main themes of the chapters and how they contribute to the broader themes of the volume and to overall European history. Generously illustrated throughout, this book will introduce non-Scandinavian readers to developments in the Nordic countries during the late-eighteenth and early-nineteenth centuries and both complement and challenge research into the political cultures of Europe and America.
Contents: Preface, Thomas Munck; General introduction, Pasi Ihalainen and Karen Sennefelt; Section I The Crisis and Renewal of Monarchy: The crisis and renewal of monarchy: introduction, Michael Bregnsbo; The monarchy in the Swedish age of liberty (1719-1772), Jonas Nordin; The image of kingship in Sweden 1772-1809, Henrika Tandefelt; Struensee and the political culture of absolutism, Michael Bregnsbo; The great, the pages and the end of 18th century Danish court culture, Ulrik Langen; Postal censorship and the control of public sentiment in late absolutist Denmark, Sune Christian Pedersen. Section II The Transformation of Political Debate: The transformation of political debate: introduction, Pasi Ihalainen; Gradual reconsiderations of Lutheran conceptions of politics, Michael Bregnsbo and Pasi Ihalainen; Aristocratic notions of liberty and patriotism in the age of liberty, Charlotta Wolff; Freedom of the press and social equality in Sweden, 1766-1772, Marie-Christine Skuncke; The politics of publishing: freedom of the press in Denmark, 1770-1773, Henrik Horstbøll; The transformation of Danish monarchism in the age of enlightenment, Jeppe Nevers; Continuity and change in the language of politics at the Swedish Diet, 1769-1810, Pasi Ihalainen and Anders Sundin; Marriage, family and gender in Swedish political language, 1750-1820, Karin Hassan Jansson. Section III Commercial Interests and Politics in Scandinavia, 1730-1815: Commercial interests and politics in Scandinavia, 1730-1815; introduction, Patrik Winton; The politics of commerce in Sweden, 1730-1770, Patrik Winton; The Swedish Diet as a forum for gathering commercial and political information, Petri Karonen; Political practices among merchants in Denmark and Norway in the period of absolutism, Bård Frydenlund; Iceland under British protection during the Napoleonic wars, Anna Agnarsdóttir. Section IV The Shifting Boundaries of Political Participation: The shifting boundaries of political p
Pasi Ihalainen, University of Jyväskylä, Finland, Michael Bregnsbo, University of Southern Denmark, Denmark, Karin Sennefelt, Uppsala University, Sweden and Patrik Winton, Uppsala University, Sweden.
