Between Nation and State: Albanian Associations from Ottoman Origins to a Communist Party, 1880 - 1945

This dissertation addresses the broader antecedents of the Communist Party of Albania (CPA) as one of a number of associations whose experience was central to Albanian political history. This long experience dates back to the informal national associations formed in the Ottoman Empire of the late nineteenth century. The dissertation examines the role of these associations which, pursuing language rights and political representation through imperial state reforms, set a pattern that struggled to connect nation and state, rather than asserting the territorial demands for a nation-state familiar across the region. Starting out in the Ottoman Empire, but then maturing in the Albanian diaspora in Romania, Bulgaria, Egypt and the United States, this dissertation shows politically significant processes of longer-term adaptation that created informal associations as institutional structures able to channel collective action. It then traces the reframing of these patterns through their destruction in the Balkan Wars and the First World War to the emergence of communist associations in the interwar period and beyond. This dissertation is a sustained study that traces long-term Ottoman imperial political legacies in the Albanian successor state. The story of the associations, based on hitherto unexamined archival documents, shows that the Albanians possessed a far greater capacity for political mobilization that previously acknowledged by historians. Moreover, the dissertation successfully challenges the conventional wisdom that portrays the Albanians as irreparably divided along sectarian and regional faultlines. It finds that Albanian national activism was civic in character rather than ethnic as elsewhere in the Balkans. The Albanians fought to remain within a multinational framework because this afforded them political security, social advancement and potential economic growth. In the late Ottoman period, this political objective was manifested in the acceptance of the supranational imperial order whereas during the Second World War, in the aspiration to become members of the Comintern internationalist movement. Another important find, is the newly-discovered evidence concerning the founding of the CPA and its wartime conduct as an organization created and led by the Albanians themselves, albeit with Yugoslav ideological assistance under the transnational umbrella of the Comintern.

Global Lessons from Fitzgerald : From State and National to Global Integrity Systems

Tony Fitzgerald’s visionary leap was to see beyond localised, individual wrongdoing. He suggested remedies that were systemic, institutionalised, and directed at underlying structural problems that led to corruption. His report said ‘the problems with which this Inquiry is concerned are not merely associated with individuals, but are institutionalized and related to attitudes which have become entrenched’ (Fitzgerald Report 1989, 13). His response was to suggest an enmeshed system of measures to not only respond reactively to future corruption, but also to prevent its recurrence through improved integrity systems. In the two decades since that report the primary focus of corruption studies and anti-corruption activism has remained on corruption at the local level or within sovereign states. International activism was largely directed at co-ordinating national campaigns and to use international instruments to make these campaigns more effective domestically. This reflects the broader fact that, since the rise of the nation state, states have comprised the majority of the largest institutional actors and have been the most significant institution in the lives of most individuals. This made states the ‘main game in town’ for the ‘governance disciplines’ of ethics, law, political science and economics.

Global Media and National Policies : The Return of the State

Conventional wisdom views globalization as a process that heralds the diminishing role or even 'death' of the state and the rise of transnational media and transnational consumption, that defy state control or regulation. This book questions these assumptions and shows that the nation-state never left and is still a force to be reckoned with.

State Agent, Identity and the "New World Order" : Reconstructing Polish Defence Identity after the Cold War Era

National identity signifies and makes state s defence- and foreign policy behaviour meaningful. National consciousness is narrated into existence by narratives upon one s own exceptionalism and Otherness of the other nations. While national identity may be understood merely as a self-image of a nation, defence identity refers to the borders of Otherness and issues that have been considered as worth defending for. As national identities and all the world order models are human constructions, they may be changed by the human efforts as well; states and nations may deliberately promote communitarian or even cosmopolitan equality and tolerance without borders of Otherness. The main research question of the thesis is: How does Poland constitute herself as a nation and a state agent in the current world order and to what extent have contextual foreign and defence policy interactions changed the Polish defence identity during the post-Cold War era? The main empirical argument of the thesis is: Poland is a narrated idea of a Christian Catholic nation-state, which the Polish State, the Catholic Church of Poland, the Armed Forces of Poland as well as a majority of the Polish nation share. Polish defence identity has been almost impenetrable to contextual foreign and defence policy interactions during the post-Cold War era. While Christian religious ontology binds corporate Poland together, allowing her to survive any number of military and political catastrophes, it simultaneously brings her closer to the USA, raises tensions in the infidel EU-context, and restrains corporate Poland s pursuit of communitarian, or even cosmopolitan, global equality and tolerance. It is not the case that corporate Poland s foreign and defence policy orientation is instinctively Atlanticist by nature, as has been argued. Rather, it has been the State s rational project to overcome a habituated and reified fear of becoming geopolitically sandwiched between Russian and German Others by leaning on the USA; among the Polish nation, support for the USA has been declining since 2004. It is not corporate Poland either that has turned into a constructive European , as has been argued, but rather the Polish nation that has, at least partly, managed to emancipate itself from its habituation to a betrayal by Europe narrative, since it favours the EU as much as it favours NATO. It seems that in the Polish case a truly common European CFSP vis-à-vis Russia may offer a solution that will emancipate the Polish State from its habituated EU-sceptic role identity and corporate Poland from its narrated borders of Otherness towards Russia and Germany, but even then one cannot be sure whether any other perspective than the Polish one on a common stand towards Russia would satisfy the Poles themselves.

The `Ulama' and the State: Negotiating Tradition, Authority and Sovereignty in Contemporary Pakistan

This dissertation is an account of how contemporary Pakistani ulama grapple with their political realities and the Islamic state of Pakistan. The central conceptual question that scaffolds my dissertation is: How do Pakistani ulama negotiate tradition, authority and sovereignty with the Islamic Republic of Pakistan? In engaging with this issue, this dissertation employs a methodology that weds ethnography with rigorous textual analysis. The ulama that feature in this study belong to a variety of sectarian persuasions. The Sunni ulama are Deobandi and Barelvi; the Shia ulama in this study are Ithna Ashari.

In assessing the relationship between Pakistani ulama and their nation-state, I assert that the ulama's dialectical engagements with the state are best understood as a dexterous navigation between affirmation, critique, contestation and cultivation. In proposing this manner of thinking about Pakistani ulama's engagements with their state, I provide a more detailed and nuanced view of the ulama-state relationship compared to earlier works. While emphasizing Pakistani ulama's vitality and their impact on their state, this dissertation also draws attention to the manners in which the state impacts the ulama. It theorizes the subject formation of the ulama and asserts the importance of understanding the ulama as formed not just by the ethico-legal tradition in which they are trained but also by the state apparatus.

Abortion and Nation: The Politics of Reproduction in Contemporary Ireland

Abortion politics are contentious and divisive in many parts of the world, but nowhere more so than in Ireland. Abortion and Nation examines the connection between abortion politics and hegemonic struggles over national identity and the nation-state in the Irish Republic. Situating the abortion question in the global context of human rights politics, as well as international social movements, Lisa Smyth analyses the formation and transformation of abortion politics in Ireland from the early 1980s to the present day. She considers whether or not the shifting connections between morality, rights and nationhood promise a new era of gender equality in the context of nation-state citizenship.
The book provides a new sociological framework through which the significance of conflict over abortion and reproductive freedom is connected to conflict over national identity. It also offers a distinctive in-depth consideration of the connection between gender and nationhood, particularly in terms of its impact on women's status as citizens; within the nation-state; within the European Union; and as members of a global civil society.

The "Fair trade nation": market-oriented development in devolved European regions

Scholars have largely ignored the roles played by government and public sector institutions in the fair trade movement. This article addresses the knowledge gap through examining government involvement in fair trade networks in the context of European devolution and the localization of international development action. Proposing a relational view of fair trade networks, and considering the Fair Trade Nation as a social category for development, it highlights how power sources outside the centralized nation-state permit a political community to associate itself with fair trade. Research from Wales demonstrates that government acts in a leadership role rather than as regulator, conferring political voice and finance while enhancing its international credentials and contributing to the politics of nation-building. Our conclusion is cautious; campaigners celebrate political commitment to fair trade embodied within the category of the Fair Trade Nation, but evidence suggests that government reliance on the market as a vehicle for decentralized development action is limited by how the Fair Trade Nation is currently executed.

Transformation of wealth produced into quality of life: analysis of the social efficiency of nation-states with the DEA's triple index approach

Although an essential condition for the occurrence of human development, economic growth is not always efficiently converted into quality of life by nation-states. Accordingly, the objective of this study is to measure the social efficiency-the ability of a nation-state to convert its produced wealth into quality of life-of a set of 101 countries. To achieve this goal, the Data Envelopment Analysis method was used in its standard, cross-multiplicative and inverted form, by means of a new approach called 'triple index'. The main results indicated that the former Soviet republics and Eastern European countries stood out in terms of social efficiency. The developed countries, notwithstanding their high social indicators, did not excel in efficiency; however, the countries of south of Africa, despite having the worst social conditions, were also the most inefficient.

Work in Progress: Social Work, the State and Europe

Social work has had varying relationships with the nation state both over time and between different countries. From its early stages the occupation had both state sanctioned and voluntary streams. Its international dimension has been enhanced in the European context through policy and funding measures over the past few decades. During this period we have also seen the rise of globalising trends leading to questions about the ongoing powers of nation states. This paper examines some aspects of the relationship between social work and the state, taking into account the emergence of European and also international policies and frameworks. The paper focuses initially on migration as an example of a common trend; an area of policy with both national and European dimensions; and a field in which social professionals are engaged to varying degrees. Secondly, it considers the progress of the ‘professional project’ in Europe, using developments in five countries to illustrate some of the issues associated with ‘professionalization’. European and international frameworks may lead to some convergence in national understandings of the key roles of social workers and an enhanced sense of professional identity across nation states, despite very different starting points and current forms of organisation.

State Transformation and the European Integration Project. Lessons from the financial crisis and the Greek paradigm. CEPS Special Report No. 130/February 2016

The financial crisis that erupted in the eurozone not only affected the EU’s financial governance mechanisms, but also the very nature of state sovereignty and balances in the relations of member states; thus, the actual inequalities between the member states hidden behind their institutional equality have deteriorated. This transformation is recorded in the case law of the Court of Justice of the European Union and the member states’ constitutional courts, particularly in those at the heart of the crisis, with Greece as the most prominent example. It is the issue of public debt (sovereign debt) of the EU member states that particularly reflects the influence of the crisis on state sovereignty as well as the intensely transnational (intergovernmental) character of European integration, which under these circumstances takes the form of a continuous, tough negotiation. The historical connection between public debt (sovereign debt) and state sovereignty has re-emerged because of the financial crisis. This development has affected not only the European institutions, but also, at the member state level, the actual institutional content of the rule of law (especially judicial review) and the welfare state in its essence, as the great social and political acquis of 20th century Europe. From this perspective, the way that the Greek courts have dealt with the gradual waves of fiscal austerity measures and structural reforms from 2010 to 2015 is characteristic. The effect of the financial crisis on the sovereignty of the member states and on the pace of European integration also has an impact on European foreign and security policy, and the correlations between the political forces at both the national and European level, thus producing even more intense pressures on European social democracy. In light of the experience of the financial crisis, the final question is whether the nation state (given the large real inequalities among the EU member states) currently functions as a brake or as an engine for future European integration.

The Struggling State : Nationalism, Militarism, and the Education of Eritrea /

The Struggling State explores Eritreans’ disillusion with a government that permanently conscripts the vast majority of its citizens into the military, and examines teachers’ paradoxical roles as educators who are trying to create a bright and peaceful future for the nation while situated to shuttle their students into the military. This title was made Open Access by libraries from around the world through Knowledge Unlatched.