The ‘punk anarchisms’ of Class War and CrimethInc.

ABSTRACT

Many of the connections between punk and anarchism are well recognized (albeit with some important contentions). This recognition is usually focussed on how punk bands and scenes express anarchist political philosophies or anarchistic praxes, while much less attention is paid to expressions of ‘punk’ by anarchist activist groups. This article addresses this apparent gap by exploring the ‘punk anarchisms’ of two of the most prominent and influential activist groups of recent decades (in English-speaking contexts at least), Class War and CrimethInc. Their distinct, yet overlapping, political approaches are compared and contrasted, and in doing so, pervasive assumptions about the relationship between punk and anarchism are challenged, refuting the supposed dichotomy between ‘lifestylist’ anarchism and ‘workerist’ anarchism.     

Globalization and Social Movement Resistance: The Zapatista Rebellion in Chiapas,Mexico

The rebellion launched by the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN) in 1994 in Chiapas, Mexico is best understood not as a guerrilla struggle for state power, but rather a social movement resisting the dominant mode of globalization being imposed from above. Examining the political, economic, and cultural dimensions of globalization as a set of contested processes, this case study of resistance shows how the Zapatistas have contested power in spheres above and below the nation-state, appealing to global networks and universal rights, but also to local practices and identities. Globalization can paradoxically open new political space for contestation as it ruptures existing patterns of relations between state and civil society. This movement points to an important alternative strategy of "globalization from below," based on the radically democratic demand for autonomy, defined as the right to choose the forms of interaction with forces that are reorganizing on a global scale.     

Reviews

Carroll Estes and Meredith Minkler, eds.: Critical Perspectives on Aging: The Political and Moral Economy of Growing Old. Amityville, New York: Bay wood Publishing Company, 1991.

Christina Laurell and Mariano Noriega: La salud en la fabrica: estudio sobre la industria siderúrgka en Mexico. Mexico, D.F.: Ediciones Era, 1989.     

Editorial

This article addresses Pierre Bourdieu's work on the principal logics under which human beings negotiate fields and engage in practice: either practical or reflexive knowledge. Bourdieu argues that reflexivity is capable of being taught and learned, and consciously incorporated into different levels of praxis. We describe and analyse the paths Bourdieu takes in arriving at this notion via both the usual suspects associated with his body of theory (field, habitus, illusio, capital) and the theoretical specificities associated with reflexive knowledge--most importantly, the distinction made between science, practical reason and the 'scholastic point of view'. Drawing particularly on his recent (translated) works Weight of the World and Pascalian Meditations , we extend his discussion of agency as it relates to habitus, the objectivities engendered by fields, and the 'game' of social intercourse.     

Mahmud Muhammad Taha and the Rise and Demise of the Jumhuri Movement

Mahmud Muhammad Taha founded the Jumhuri (Republican) Party in 1945 in the context of the fight for Sudan's independence. The nature of the party's ideology went through a radical change after Taha emerged from a mystical retreat in 1951. In the light of this ideology, the party advocated a "neo-Islamist" position committed to a reconciliation of Islam and modernity. Some of Taha's social and political stances are critically examined. Particular attention is paid to the reasons at the root of the demise of the Jumhuri movement after Taha's execution in January of 1985.     

Water law and the American West(s)

Donald J. Pisani: To Reclaim a Divided West: Water, Law, and Public Policy, 1848–1902. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1992.

John Hart: Storm Over Mono: The Mono Lake Battle and the California Water Future. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1996.

Arthur L. Littleworth and Eric L. Garner: California Water. Point Arena, CA: Solano Press Books, 1995.     

Expanding housing choices for the sector popular: Strategies for Mexico

Abstract

By the year 2000, some 40 million people in Mexico will live in settlements commonly called the informal sector. Most will live in houses that they have constructed themselves and that have some infrastructure deficit. To meet their needs, the authors propose a set of demand and supply strategies. Emphasis is placed on the increased use of small group savings programs, the provision of progressive infrastructure, and the creation of housing‐related employment. The supply of low‐cost land must be increased, which will necessitate reforms in the ejido land tenure system. Examples of locally derived, non‐government‐supported betterment programs are presented.

The article concludes by calling on the federal government to create stronger links with the informal sector and to reestablish its role as the supporter of social housing in Mexico.     

The Cultural Foundations of the Modern Militia Movement

When Timothy McVeigh lit the fuse that fired the bomb that destroyed the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, OK on April 19, 1995, most Americans asked, "Why?" "Why," people wondered, "would anyone do such a thing?" This paper explores the way(s) in which key dimensions of American political culture support and inspire the kinds of hate and paranoia that culminated in Timothy McVeigh's horrible act. It is based on social movement theory's insight that challenges to the established order are informed by and shape the broader culture in which the challenge is pursued. Thus, in order to explore the relationship between culture and the militia movement, this paper focuses on militia ideology, circumstances of militia formation, and organizational structures. Each arena is shown to relate to and derive from the general character of public American political culture. Cumulatively, the cultural place of the militia is one of self-described individualists struggling against cultural opponents--the representatives of the New World Order. As Americans, militia members insist that only their specific brand of individualism is "real" Americanism. Thus their disputes with the federal government are not disagreements of policy, or interpretation, or degree. They are culturally-based conflicts over the meaning of America.     

Looking Backwards: 1968 Thirty Years Later 1

This essay is intended to open a discussion about building a coherent account of the decline of AIDS street activism amongst lesbians and gay men in the US in the early 1990s. It does so by demonstrating how a narrative of key events in the rise and decline of this activism can be structured by being linked to the trajectory of racial politics in the larger society. The argument is made that AIDS street activism was ultimately overwhelmed by political isolation caused by the withering of a broader "rainbow politics," and by an expanding white racial backlash in the larger society. In this context there was little room for the political development of movement participants, and movement solidarity was shattered as the broader culture and politics of racial backlash penetrated the movement.     

Notes on contributors

American political science has recently undergone a process of self-criticism principally illustrated by the so-called "Perestroika movement." This article suggests turning to Pierre Bourdieu's sociology of science to clarify some of the mechanisms that contribute to this perceived malaise, beyond the most visible and well-known debate over the supremacy of quantitative methods. In particular, in light of his analysis of the scientific field and his key concept of scientific capital, four major structuring dimensions of American political science are reviewed: academic status, research fields, sociological characteristics and political allegiances. The author then reflects upon the existence of an "establishment" in the discipline.     

Murder on the Tokyo Subway: Nerve Centres,Religion and Violence

Abstract

The 1995 Tokyo subway attack by the Japanese religious movement Aum Shinrikyō represents one of the most dramatic examples of violence by a religious movement in modern times. Initially urban-based but with a rural communal presence, Aum believed that it had a mission to transform the world and fight in an imminent apocalyptic war between good and evil, and it engaged in numerous conflicts with the secular world it despised. While emphasising the significance of religious visions in Aum's activities this article examines the degree to which Aum's associations with the city of Tokyo also featured as an element in its violence.     

The 1933 Los Angeles county farm workers strike

Abstract

Although many historical accounts touch briefly upon the ubiquitous Mexican consulates, none to date have delved beyond superficial details of that presence, preferring instead to reconstruct Chicano political history as if it were an experience shaped by factors within the United States. This study reveals that the Mexican governments in the post‐1910 Revolutionary era implemented a strategy to influence the political culture and actions of the emigrant community in the US. An important part of that strategy contained measures to influence and develop an ethnic Mexican unionization movement along conservative lines. The compiled evidence leads to the conclusion that the Mexican community forged their experiences not only in terms of the conditions extant within the US, but that their home government followed them across the border seeking to assimilate them into the social relations and political culture of the emerging Mexican state. Mexico aimed at nothing less than developing a loyal and politically dependent emigrant community, a strategy that replicated Mexico's domestic social policy and complemented Roosevelt's New Deal labor objectives, while corresponding to the labor demands of large‐scale agricultural interests.     

"More than All the Others": Meditation on Responsibility

Abstract

This essay examines one aspect of the wide-ranging philosophical back ground of the intellectual and dissident movement for human rights in one-time communist Czechoslovakia. I shall meditate on Jan Pato?ka's finite responsibility, Derrida's aporetic emphasis on the infinite dimension of responsibility, and Lévinasian-Dostoyevskyan ethico-existential variations on in/finite responsibility. Havel alludes to hyperbolic ethics in a parenthetical remark on the birth of "Charta 77", the Manifesto for Human Rights in Czechoslovakia. The question before us is this: which dimension of responsibility appears at this birth or, to put it otherwise, what responsibility is born in care for the soul and polis?     

Beyond asymmetry: cooperation,conflict and globalisation in Mexico-China relations

Abstract

Academic commentary has long emphasised the asymmetry in Mexico-China relations. In particular, much attention has focussed since the early 1990s particularly from the Mexican side on the economic imbalance in trade and investment that has become and remains acute with the expansion of the economy of the People's Republic of China. This is though far from the only sense in which the relationship between the two countries is asymmetrical. There is also a severe imbalance in the relative importance of politics and economics as determinants of this relationship for both China and Mexico. The Mexican Government seems to be more concerned with its economic relationship with China. In contrast, the PRC Government seems more concerned with its political relationship with Mexico. Moreover, there is a further asymmetry in the respective significance that each appears to have to the other as a partner. Mexico plays a small role in China's outlook but China looms large in Mexico's worldview. Identification of a number of cross-cutting asymmetrical relationships suggests that a bilateral perspective may not be the most effective for understanding the interaction or potential interaction between Mexico and China. On the contrary, there is more logic to the elements of cooperation and conflict between Mexico and China when their relationship is viewed in the wider, multilateral context of globalisation.     

Time series applications to intelligence analysis: a case study of homicides in Mexico

Abstract

The scale of lethal violence in Mexico seen in the past decade has been a pressing concern for both Mexican and US officials, including law enforcement organizations, intelligence agencies, and policy makers. With much of the homicides being a result of the trafficking of illegal drugs, it has been suggested that the homicides in Mexico follow seasonal patterns tied to the drug trade, specifically to the cultivation of heroin. In this paper, conventional econometric time series methods are applied to test this hypothesis. Results demonstrate that not only do the drug-related homicides in Mexico display evidence of seasonality, but also that seasonality appears empirically related to the heroin trade. The paper makes the larger argument that time series and other statistical methods are an untapped resource that can complement standard intelligence analysis to support defensible judgments based on the scientific method of inquiry. However, a fuller integration of statistics and traditional analysis would require sufficient support structures be developed to encourage and promote such analysis.     

The geographic scope of migration in Mexico City

"This paper reports some results of analyzing migratory dynamics in the Metropolitan Area of Mexico City, which ever since the 1970-1980 decade have affected other regions of the country, mainly the State of Mexico. The analysis describes different types and modes of migratory movement: metropolitan (from Mexico City), inter-county (within each state), and interstate (between Mexico City and other states). Data was provided by the XI Population and Household Census of 1990." (SUMMARY IN ENG)     

Techno-cultural opportunities: the anti-immigration movement in the Finnish mediascape

ABSTRACT

Horsti's article analyses how transformations in the media environment shaped the political success of the anti-immigration movement in Finland from 2003 to 2013. The qualitative textual analysis of blogs and mainstream media debates that relate to racism and the national populist Finns Party demonstrates how changes in the mediascape in general and in new media technology in particular have provided opportunities for the emerging anti-immigration movement. These changes facilitated the earlier development of the Finns Party but the fragmentation of online space later hindered the internal coherence of the movement and its integration into the populist party political family. In order to regain unity, the Finns Party performed the public scapegoating of individuals for racist speech, thus distancing itself from racism. Horsti shows that, rather than being isolated and marginal, the anti-immigration movement and the ‘uncivil’ public sphere overlap with traditional politics and the mainstream media.     

Creating an enabling environment for housing: Recent reforms in Mexico

Abstract

A recent World Bank policy statement on housing advocates the reform of government policies, institutions, and regulations to enable housing markets to work more efficiently. The policy statement identifies several instruments that governments can use to address housing market constraints, and to improve the performance of the housing sector as a whole, while paying particular attention to the needs of the poor.

In recent years, the government of Mexico has employed many of the enabling instruments described in the World Bank's housing policy statement. This article reviews the role of housing in the Mexican economy and the major reforms that the Mexican government has implemented to improve the operation of the housing market so that private lenders and home builders can play an expanded role in addressing the country's housing needs. The World Bank has supported the government's reform program, and since 1985 it has lent more than $1.2 billion to Mexico for low‐income housing projects.