Cultural politics and iconography : an introduction

This collection of papers reflects on the many dimensions of contemporary narratives of iconography in public culture in Australia and Asia. The idea for the volume arose from a series of seminars held at the Centre for Cross-Cultural Research in 2002. The series ‘Iconographies’ was convened by Penny Edwards and centred on research undertaken in the Asia-Pacific, with papers that interrogated national and cultural icons. Just as a biography might examine the makings of a particular personality and her or his shaping of inner and outer worlds, so also iconographic narratives that trace and explore both the evolution and appropriation of particular icons help us mark key moments in the cultural politics of communities, nations and global public spheres. The present volume has two papers (Taylor and Seth) from that series and others on the themes of iconography and iconoclasm that were solicited from a group of interdisciplinary authors working on these themes.

The Politics and Policies of Reproductive Agency

This study examines the politics and policies of reproductive agency through a redescription of three Finnish policy documents dealing with the declining birth rate: the Government report on the future 'Finland for people of all ages' (2004), Business and Policy Forum EVA report 'Condemned to Diminish?' (Tuomitut vähenemään?) (2003), and the Family Federation's 'Population Policy Program' (2004). The redescription is done with the help of the notion of reproductive agency, which draws on Drucilla Cornell's concepts of the imaginary domain and bodily integrity. The imaginary domain is the moral and psychic space people need in order to form their personality, which is created in constant identificatory processes. The aim of the processes is imaginary coherence. As the personality is embodied, forming one s imaginary coherence always includes attempts for bodily integrity, also entailing attempts to arrive at an understanding of one's procreative capacities. Besides Cornell, I draw on Judith Butler's thinking and comprehend gender performatively as doing, and in relation to that agency as part of the performative process of one's personality. Reproductive agency is understood in this study as the possibilities to live differently the hegemonic forms of procreative life. I deal with three redescriptive themes: the family, economics and gender. The family is a central element in that it is considered the main location of reproduction. With regard to reproductive agency, the documents include problematic conceptions of the family. It is defined as a heterosexual, monogamous, conjugal relationship, which affects reproductive agency in that these notions do not allow for different modes of family life. The second prominent aspect, economics, features on two levels: the macroeconomic level of GDP, employment and competitiveness, and the level of family policies and concern about family finances. Macroeconomic-level argumentation is problematic in the context of reproductive agency because it implies that procreation is a duty of citizens, and thus has effects on values attached to reproductive potential. On the other hand, family policies may advance reproductive agency in supporting families financially. However, such policies also define how the family is understood, thereby affecting reproductive agency. The third theme, gender, intersects with many issues in the policy documents. All three texts consider the roles of men and women differently: women are primarily responsible for the family, and both men's and women's reproductive agency is affected in that the roles in the procreative process are predefined. EVA and the Family Federation see women as the main target of population policies, and consider it legitimate to try to change women s reproductive decisions. Implicit in the notion of reproductive agency is the idea that it should be possible to overcome and live differently the sex difference, but the three documents do not open up opportunities for that. The notion of reproductive agency makes it also possible to question the legitimacy of population policies in general and offers new perspectives on the vocabularies used in the three policy texts, providing insights into the values and logics that support the concepts.

The Hindered Self-Help: Housing Policies, Politics And Poverty In Kolkata, India

The housing dimension in Kolkata has been changing in recent years. Since 1991, the city has initiated housing reform that has taken many forms and manifestations characterized by the reduction in social allocation, cutbacks in public funding and promotion of a real estate culture in close partnership between the state and private actors. There has been increasing concern about the housing condition of the poor in the deserted slums and bustee settlements amidst the evident ‘poor blindness’ in housing and investment policies. Against this background the paper discusses self-help housing in Kolkata. It seeks to answer a simple question – why the concept of self-help has not been recognised as a viable policy option for a city with widespread slums and bustee settlements by visiting the complex urban context of Kolkata set within the city's politics, poverty and policies. The paper concludes that there is a need to recognise the existing structural duality in the city and support self-help housing as a parallel housing approach.

Decadent Conservatism: Politics and Aesthetics in The Senate

The relationship between late-Victorian Decadence and Aestheticism and politics has long been vexed. This article explores the hitherto under-explored confluence of conservatism and avant-garde literature in the period by introducing The Senate, a Tory-Decadent journal that ran from 1894-7. While Decadent authors occupied various political positions, this article argues that The Senate offers a crucial link between conservatism and Decadence The article presents the journal in its political and publishing context, outlining its editorial position on such issues as the Liberal Unionist-Conservative coalition governments, Britain's relationship with Europe and the threat of ‘State Socialism’, as well as its valorisation of Bollingbroke and eighteenth-century Toryism, and its relationship to, and difference from, key Decadent journals the Yellow Book and The Savoy. It then goes on to articulate its relationship to Decadence by focussing on the presence of Paul Verlaine in its pages and its vitriolic response to the press coverage of Oscar Wilde's trials. The article concludes by exploring the surprising wake of The Senate, briefly tracing the editors' influence in the development of Modernism and links with the journal BLAST.

Politics and Gender in Ireland: The Quest for Political Agency

This book explores the relationship between women, the state and democratic politics in Ireland today. It highlights the conservatism of the political culture shared by all traditions on the island, and how this culture circumscribes women’s political agency in Northern Ireland and Ireland. The book explores the opportunities and obstacles to women’s participation and representation on each side of the border. The chapters take the view that public decision-making institutions and processes are subject to rules and practices that reinforce the gendered foundations of democratic politics. They document women’s continuing quest for full participation and equal representation in these male-gendered arenas. The contributors focus on the marginalised experiences of women in modern politics in Ireland and detail their efforts to challenge the masculinized status quo. The book addresses the classical issues of citizenship, participation, representation and equal rights in a sustained analysis of the political systems on the island. It also deals with modern issues – multiculturalism, peace-building, the male-gendered legislature and the unequal nature of women’s citizenship in constitutional, institutional and policy contexts. The book is completed by a comprehensive appendix of all women elected to political office on the island from 1918-2013.

Theorizing Literacy, Politics and Social Process: revisiting Maktab literacy in Rian in search of a paradigm

Literacy as a social practice is integrally linked with social, economic and political institutions and processes. As such, it has a material base which is fundamentally constituted in power relations. Literacy is therefore interwoven with the text and context of everyday living in which multi-levelled meanings are organically produced at both individual and societal level. This paper argues that if language thus mediates social reality, then it follows that literacy defined as a social practice cannot really be addressed as a reified, neutral activity but that it should take account of the social, cultural and political processes in which literacy practices are embedded. Drawing on the work of key writers within the field, the paper foregrounds the primary role of the state in defining the forms and levels of literacy required and made available at particular moments within society. In a case-study of the social construction of literacy meanings in pre-revolutionary Iran, it explores the view that the discourse about societal literacy levels has historically constituted a key terrain in which the struggle for control over meaning has taken place. This struggle, it is argued, sets the interests of the state to maintain ideological and political control over the production of knowledge within the culture and society over and against the needs identified by the individual for personal development, empowerment and liberation. In an overall sense, the paper examines existing theoretical perspectives on societal literacy programmes in terms of the scope that they provide for analyses that encompass the multi-levelled power relations that shape and influence dominant discourses on the relative value of literacy for both the individual and society

Shot by both sides: Punk, politics and the end of “Consensus”

This article examines the ways in which political organisations of the far left and far right responded to punk-informed youth culture in Britain during the late 1970s. It examines how both tried to understand punk within their own ideological framework, particularly in relation to the perceived socio-economic and political crises of the late 1970s, before then endeavouring to appropriate—or use—punk for their own ends. Ultimately, however, the article suggests that while punk may indeed be seen as a cultural response to the breakdown of what some have described as the post-war ‘consensus’ in the 1970s, the far left and far right's focus on cultural expression cut across the basic foundations on which they had been built. Consequently, neither left nor right proved able to provide an effective political conduit through which the disaffections expressed by punk could be channelled.

The radical: and advocate of equality; presenting a series of expostulatory animadversions on the present state of practical politics and morals; with a view to an access of improvement. Addressed to the people of the United States.

Microfilm. Ann Arbor, Mich., Xerox University Microfilms, 1973. 35 mm. (American Culture Series, reel 544.13)

[Review of] Ivo Mijnssen, The Quest for an Ideal Youth in Putin’s Russia I. Back to Our Future! History, Modernity and Patriotism According to Nashi, 2005–2012. Soviet and Post-Soviet Politics and Society, Stuttgart: Ibidem Verlag, 2012, 202pp., e 34.90 p/b

THE YOUTH MOVEMENT NASHI (OURS) WAS FOUNDED IN THE SPRING of 2005 against the backdrop of Ukraine’s ‘Orange Revolution’. Its aim was to stabilise Russia’s political system and take back the streets from opposition demonstrators. Personally loyal to Putin and taking its ideological orientation from Surkov’s concept of ‘sovereign democracy’, Nashi has sought to turn the tide on ‘defeatism’ and develop Russian youth into a patriotic new elite that ‘believes in the future of Russia’ (p. 15). Combining a wealth of empirical detail and the application of insights from discourse theory, Ivo Mijnssen analyses the organisation’s development between 2005 and 2012. His analysis focuses on three key moments—the organisation’s foundation, the apogee of its mobilisation around the Bronze Soldier dispute with Estonia, and the 2010 Seliger youth camp—to help understand Nashi’s organisation, purpose and ideational outlook as well as the limitations and challenges it faces. As such,the book is insightful both for those with an interest in post-Soviet Russian youth culture, and for scholars seeking a rounded understanding of the Kremlin’s initiatives to return a sense of identity and purpose to Russian national life.The first chapter, ‘Background and Context’, outlines the conceptual toolkit provided by Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe to help make sense of developments on the terrain of identity politics. In their terms, since the collapse of the Soviet Union, Russia has experienced acute dislocation of its identity. With the tangible loss of great power status, Russian realities have become unfixed from a discourse enabling national life to be constructed, albeit inherently contingently, as meaningful. The lack of a Gramscian hegemonic discourse to provide a unifying national idea was securitised as an existential threat demanding special measures. Accordingly, the identification of those who are ‘notUs’ has been a recurrent theme of Nashi’s discourse and activity. With the victory in World War II held up as a foundational moment, a constitutive other is found in the notion of ‘unusual fascists’. This notion includes not just neo-Nazis, but reflects a chain of equivalence that expands to include a range of perceived enemies of Putin’s consolidation project such as oligarchs and pro-Western liberals.The empirical background is provided by the second chapter, ‘Russia’s Youth, the Orange Revolution, and Nashi’, which traces the emergence of Nashi amid the climate of political instability of 2004 and 2005. A particularly note-worthy aspect of Mijnssen’s work is the inclusion of citations from his interviews with Nashicommissars; the youth movement’s cadres. Although relatively few in number, such insider conversations provide insight into the ethos of Nashi’s organisation and the outlook of those who have pledged their involvement. Besides the discussion of Nashi’s manifesto, the reader thus gains insight into the motivations of some participants and behind-the-scenes details of Nashi’s activities in response to the perceived threat of anti-government protests. The third chapter, ‘Nashi’s Bronze Soldier’, charts Nashi’s role in elevating the removal of a World War II monument from downtown Tallinn into an international dispute over the interpretation of history. The events subsequent to this securitisation of memory are charted in detail, concluding that Nashi’s activities were ultimately unsuccessful as their demands received little official support.The fourth chapter, ‘Seliger: The Foundry of Modernisation’, presents a distinctive feature of Mijnssen’s study, namely his ethnographic account as a participant observer in the Youth International Forum at Seliger. In the early years of the camp (2005–2007), Russian participants received extensive training, including master classes in ‘methods of forestalling mass unrest’ (p. 131), and the camp served to foster a sense of group identity and purpose among activists. After 2009 the event was no longer officially run as a Nashi camp, and its role became that of a forum for the exchange of ideas about innovation, although camp spirit remained a central feature. In 2010 the camp welcomed international attendees for the first time. As one of about 700 international participants in that year the author provides a fascinating account based on fieldwork diaries.Despite the polemical nature of the topic, Mijnssen’s analysis remains even-handed, exemplified in his balanced assessment of the Seliger experience. While he details the frustrations and disappointments of the international participants with regard to the unaccustomed strict camp discipline, organisational and communication failures, and the controlled format of many discussions,he does not neglect to note the camp’s successes in generating a gratifying collective dynamic between the participants, even among the international attendees who spent only a week there.In addition to the useful bibliography, the book is back-ended by two appendices, which provide the reader with important Russian-language primary source materials. The first is Nashi’s ‘Unusual Fascism’ (Neobyknovennyi fashizm) brochure, and the second is the booklet entitled ‘Some Uncomfortable Questions to the Russian Authorities’ (Neskol’ko neudobnykh voprosov rossiiskoivlasti) which was provided to the Seliger 2010 instructors to guide them in responding to probing questions from foreign participants. Given that these are not readily publicly available even now, they constitute a useful resource from the historical perspective.

Gender and politics in the devolved assemblies

The devolution of powers from Westminster to the Northern Ireland Assembly, the Scottish Parliament and the National Assembly for Wales led to much speculation about the creation of a new political era that would herald new ways of 'doing politics'. It was thought that the new institutions would provide a more inclusive, less combative culture that aimed to include a greater proportion of women members. With the 'new' institutions now over ten years old, linguistic research into the participation of men and women on the debate floor shows that they participate more equally and that improvements have been made in relation to the extent that women feel included. However, the devolved institutions retain some of the adversarial features associated with Westminster, and women are still subject to the burden of gendered stereotypical judgements and expectations that may affect their performance and inclusion within them.

Digitizing dissent: cyborg politics and fluid networks in contemporary Cuban activism

Communication technologies shape how political activist networks are produced and maintain themselves. In Cuba, despite ideologically and physically oppressive practices by the state, a severe lack of Internet access, and extensive government surveillance, a small network of bloggers and cyberactivists has achieved international visibility and recognition for its critiques of the Cuban government. This qualitative study examines the blogger collective known as Voces Cubanas in Havana, Cuba in 2012, advancing a new approach to the study of transnational activism and the role of technology in the construction of political narrative. Voces Cubanas is analyzed as a network of connections between human and non-human actors that produces and sustains powerful political alliances. Voces Cubanas and its allies work collectively to co-produce contentious political discourses, confronting the dominant ideologies and knowledges produced by the Cuban state. Transnational alliances, the act of translation, and a host of unexpected and improvised technologies play central roles in the production of these narratives, indicating new breed of cyborg sociopolitical action reliant upon fluid and flexible networks and the act of writing.