- Overcoming the ‘Barrier of Fear’ in Order to Resist: the 2020 Protests against the Lukashenko Regime in Belarus$ 20.00[av_heading heading='Article by Craig S. Brown' tag='h3' style='blockquote classic-quote' size='' ] [/av_heading] [av_hr class='short' height='50' shadow='no-shadow' position='center' custom_border='av-border-thin' custom_width='50px' custom_border_color='' custom_margin_top='30px' custom_margin_bottom='30px' icon_select='yes' custom_icon_color='' icon='ue808' font='entypo-fontello'] In August 2020, widespread open resistance emerged against Lukashenko’s regime in Belarus, in the wake of the presidential elections. Through a media content analysis, this paper assesses how the emotion of fear was presented by English language European and North American print and online media, with the departure point being the perceived loss of fear among Belarusians. It seeks to understand: how was fear discussed in relation to resistance in Belarus in the mainstream media accounts? How did fear manifest among Belarusians and what were its effects? For resistance movements, what are the practical implications of understanding how fear manifests and affects actors? Although several headlines in the key period of mid-August 2020 reflect the phenomenon of a ‘barrier of fear’ being broken, Belarusian resisters’ perspectives present in some of the articles show how feelings of fear are far more complex. The themes are as follows: ‘fear remains’; the ‘loss of fear’ among opponents of Lukashenko; ‘pre-election loss of fear’; ‘fear among the regime and security force elements’; ‘taking action as imperative—regardless of fear’, as well as a ‘point of no return’ being reached. It is clear that it is more accurate to talk about people making a decision to resist despite their fear. Moreover, there seems to be a crucial relationship between feelings of anger about regime brutality and the willingness to act regardless of fear about the implications.
- A Resistance History of India$ 20.00[av_heading heading='Article by Stellan Vinthagen' tag='h3' style='blockquote classic-quote' size='' ] [/av_heading] [av_hr class='short' height='50' shadow='no-shadow' position='center' custom_border='av-border-thin' custom_width='50px' custom_border_color='' custom_margin_top='30px' custom_margin_bottom='30px' icon_select='yes' custom_icon_color='' icon='ue808' font='entypo-fontello'] This article takes a historical view on the Indian civil society; its actors, strategies and issues, and evaluates its democracy-promoting resistance, and the impact from globalization. After a brief overview of the pre-independence context, and the early post-independence developments, the period of advanced globalization from the 1990s is focused. India is a country with a strong social movement culture, formed through its history of anticolonial struggle. The civil society is vibrant, diverse and conflictual, with a multitude of groups. Key examples are the anti-colonial movement, the land reform movement, the mobilization for “Total Revolution”, as well as alliances of movements and recurrent mobilizations by peasants, women, Adivasi (Indigenous), Dalits (“untouchables”). The analysis outlines four historical periods with very different conditions for democracy-promoting resistance. The conclusion is that resistance has been very successful, especially initially. However, the analysis also shows how the counter-mobilization by Hindu nationalists grew strong and more impactful during advanced globalization. The result is that Indian democracy has been undermined. Thus, despite initial and fundamental impact, it is the Hindu nationalist counter-resistance to the resistance of pro-democracy civil society groups, that is impacting contemporary democracy.
- Humanitarian Grass-roots work in Refugee Resettlement during the Trump Administration: A Study of Constructive Resistance$ 20.00[av_heading heading='Article by Barbara Franz' tag='h3' style='blockquote classic-quote' size='' ] [/av_heading] [av_hr class='short' height='50' shadow='no-shadow' position='center' custom_border='av-border-thin' custom_width='50px' custom_border_color='' custom_margin_top='30px' custom_margin_bottom='30px' icon_select='yes' custom_icon_color='' icon='ue808' font='entypo-fontello'] The COVID-19 pandemic, in combination with the Trump administration’s anti-immigration policies, has led to policy shifts and temporary bans that essentially ended asylum and refugee resettlement in the United States for the period from 2019 to 2021. Regional organizations, however, have continued to sponsor refugees and provide community-based educational, employment, and material support work. In the Tri-State area of New Jersey, New York and Connecticut, local pockets of resistance initiated grass-roots programs such as COVID-19 Relief Funds, the Mask Making Initiative, the Lighthouse, and the Fun Club. The text investigates these programs and the four humanitarian NGOs in which they are housed, through the lens of ‘constructive resistance’, especially the works of Mona Lilja, Majken Jul Sørensen, and Minoo Koefoed. Situated between the politics of governance (Maiguashca 2003) and individual and grass-roots forms of resistance, this paper looks at local reactions that led to projects aiming at actively remaking community. The four projects exemplify the communities’ efforts to create humanitarian and localized structures of compassion, by developing programs that assist and help those individuals who were exposed to the most aggressively exclusivist policies of the Trump administration.
- Reviews by Crisol González García, Brian Martin, Bob Overy, Matthew Hewett, and Dalilah Shemia-Goeke$ 20.00[av_heading heading='Reviews by Crisol González García, Brian Martin, Bob Overy, Matthew Hewett, and Dalilah Shemia-Goeke' tag='h3' style='blockquote classic-quote' size='' ] [/av_heading] [av_hr class='short' height='50' shadow='no-shadow' position='center' custom_border='av-border-thin' custom_width='50px' custom_border_color='' custom_margin_top='30px' custom_margin_bottom='30px' icon_select='yes' custom_icon_color='' icon='ue808' font='entypo-fontello']
- Volume 7, Number 2 – 2021$ 59.00 – $ 299.00You may choose from the digital (PDF) and paperback version.
- Editorial, Volume 7, Number 2 – 2021$ 20.00[av_heading heading='Editorial by Matt Meyer' tag='h3' style='blockquote classic-quote' size='' av_uid='av-4f7f0v'] [/av_heading] [av_hr class='short' height='50' shadow='no-shadow' position='center' custom_border='av-border-thin' custom_width='50px' custom_border_color='' custom_margin_top='30px' custom_margin_bottom='30px' icon_select='yes' custom_icon_color='' icon='ue808' font='entypo-fontello' av_uid='av-8ej7j']
- The Indigenous Bangladeshi Nonviolent Resistance to Corporate Coal$ 20.00[av_heading heading='Article by Elizabeth Schmidt' tag='h3' style='blockquote classic-quote' size='' ] [/av_heading] [av_hr class='short' height='50' shadow='no-shadow' position='center' custom_border='av-border-thin' custom_width='50px' custom_border_color='' custom_margin_top='30px' custom_margin_bottom='30px' icon_select='yes' custom_icon_color='' icon='ue808' font='entypo-fontello'] This paper analyzes strategic choices by the 2006-2014 Indigenous Peoples’ resistance movement opposing construction of a coal mine in Phulbari, Bangladesh. The campaign successfully prevented the mine’s construction. However, conflicts over land use in Bangladesh persist. This case study examines how closely the strategic choices of the campaign adhered to Ackerman and Kruegler’s Principles of Strategic Nonviolent Conflict, and how those choices furthered or impaired the campaign. Fostering collective identities to mobilize supporters and resources was integral to the campaign’s strategy, as was integration of diverse voices. Promoting powerful female voices furthered the campaign’s goals and contributed to advancing women’s status. Combining extra-institutional methods with traditional politics also enhanced the movement’s strategic potential. Managing perceptions and demonstrating autonomy allowed resistors to maintain collective power, despite holding less traditional sources of power. The campaign also found success in using external supporters to weaken their oppressors, while organizers inside the country set the vision of the movement. The campaign provides an example of how the Principles may be applied in contemporary campaigns against corporations across cultural contexts. The outcomes suggest that the Principles are still a relevant framework for nonviolent resistance. However, more research is needed to determine the conditions under which some principles apply
- Masked struggle: Uncivil disobedience on the streets of Finland$ 20.00[av_heading heading='Article by Johan-Eerik Kukko' tag='h3' style='blockquote classic-quote' size='' ] [/av_heading] [av_hr class='short' height='50' shadow='no-shadow' position='center' custom_border='av-border-thin' custom_width='50px' custom_border_color='' custom_margin_top='30px' custom_margin_bottom='30px' icon_select='yes' custom_icon_color='' icon='ue808' font='entypo-fontello'] In this article, I examine the messages that are connected to masks and other symbols in the short history of the Soldiers of Odin (SOO). Moreover, I compare the use of masks to the way that another Finnish activist group, Loldiers of Odin, used masks and symbols. SOO started street patrol activity in 2015 to ‘safeguard’ Finnish cities from the alleged threat of asylum seekers. In 2016, the Loldiers of Odin were founded to oppose SOO’s vigilante activity. They carnivalized the anti-immigrant group by appearing at their demonstrations and harassed their street patrols dressed as clowns. I discuss the dynamics of the two groups and analyze how they used masks and symbols in their activities. Especially in the case of SOO, I will focus on situations where the group uses Guy Fawkes masks, and in the case of Loldiers of Odin using clown costumes and make up. Additionally, I ask if their vigilante actions with masks can be understood as ‘uncivil disobedience’, a term that has been discussed for example by Jennet Kirkpatrick and Candice Delmas. In the end I will also show that both of these groups have two kinds of masks; one to wear and one to hide their real purposes
- The Method of Political Resistance and the Concept of the ‘People’ in Tosaka Jun and Enrique Dussel$ 20.00[av_heading heading='Article by Dennis Stromback' tag='h3' style='blockquote classic-quote' size='' ] [/av_heading] [av_hr class='short' height='50' shadow='no-shadow' position='center' custom_border='av-border-thin' custom_width='50px' custom_border_color='' custom_margin_top='30px' custom_margin_bottom='30px' icon_select='yes' custom_icon_color='' icon='ue808' font='entypo-fontello'] It is rather common to couple Japanese Marxist Tosaka Jun (1900-1945) with critical theorists like Walter Benjamin or Theodor Adorno in the comparative philosophy literature, but little, if anything at all, has been said about the shared discursive strategies of political resistance theorized by Tosaka Jun and Latin American philosopher Enrique Dussel (1934- ). Despite being continents and generations apart, Tosaka and Dussel nonetheless offer similar critiques of empire building within a system of capitalism as well as methods of resistance to disrupt to its ideological justification. Linked by the lineage of Marxism and their suspicion of the deterministic aspects of modernist thought, both Tosaka and Dussel present accounts of political power bound to the ‘people’ themselves, packaged as hegemonic strategies (à la Gramsci) that privilege those on the periphery, that which refuse to be subsumed into the capitalist system generating colonial expansion. Where they diverge, however, is in their view of the ‘people’ for constructing, positioning, and localizing collective struggles and democratic movements, with each account being stronger in an area where the other is more limited, thus pointing towards a space of synthesis. This article therefore argues for a teaming up of what Dussel calls ‘el pueblo’—which is a theoretical category referring to the political power articulated by localized communities—with Tosaka’s critical method of journalistic and philosophical reflection, with the aim of empowering the people, because it will provide us with a stronger view of political resistance at the periphery that will act as a force for democratic possibilities.