MWP Lectures: Published Papers (2007-2016)https://hdl.handle.net/1814/69582024-03-29T09:33:39Z2024-03-29T09:33:39ZReligious dimensions of political conflict and violenceBRUBAKER, Rogershttps://hdl.handle.net/1814/425442021-09-02T15:08:14Z2016-01-01T00:00:00ZReligious dimensions of political conflict and violence
BRUBAKER, Rogers
How should we understand the religious dimensions of political conflict and political violence? One view sees religiously grounded conflict and violence as sui generis, with a distinctive logic or causal texture. The alternative view subsumes them under political conflict and violence in general, or under the rubric of politicized ethnicity. I seek to highlight both the distinctiveness of religiously informed political conflict and the ways in which many conflicts involving religiously identified claimants are fundamentally similar in structure and dynamics to conflicts involving other culturally or ethnically defined claimants. I identify the distinctively religious stakes of certain political conflicts, informed by distinctively religious understandings of right order. And I specify six violence-enabling modalities and mechanisms (though all can also enable nonviolent solidaristic or humanitarian social action): (1) the social production of hyper-committed selves; (2) the cognitive and affective construction of extreme otherhood and urgent threat; (3) the mobilization of rewards, sanctions, justifications, and obligations; (4) the experience of profanation; (5) the translocal expandability of conflict; and (6) the incentives generated by decentralized and hyper-competitive religious fields. None of these violence-enabling modalities and mechanisms is uniquely religious; yet religious beliefs, practices, structures, and processes provide an important and distinctively rich matrix of such modalities and mechanisms.
The lecture was delivered on 15 June 2016.
2016-01-01T00:00:00ZSame-sex marriage and backlash : constitutionalism through the lens of consensus and conflictSIEGEL, Revahttps://hdl.handle.net/1814/413242020-09-01T16:04:59Z2016-01-01T00:00:00ZSame-sex marriage and backlash : constitutionalism through the lens of consensus and conflict
SIEGEL, Reva
In the decades before the United States Supreme Court recognized the right of same-sex couples to marry in Obergefell v. Hodges, Americans disdained, denounced, and debated same-sex marriage. When state courts recognized the right of same-sex couples to marry, opponents passed laws and state constitutional amendments that defined marriage as the union of a man and a woman. This fierce conflict provoked argument about the capacity of courts to defend minority rights. Critics argued that judicial judgments shutting down politics were counterproductive and provoked a backlash that exacerbated political polarization. Conversation about the backlash ranged widely from academics and advocates to judges. These “realist” accounts of judicial review depicted courts as majoritarian institutions whose authority is tied to public consensus. In this lecture, I argue that the backlash narrative and the consensus model of constitutionalism on which it rests simultaneously underestimates and overestimates the power of judicial review. The Court’s decision in Obergefell was possible not simply because public opinion changed, but also because the struggle over the courts helped change public opinion and forge new constitutional understandings. Even so, Obergefell has not ended debate over marriage but instead has channeled it into new forms. Constitutions do not merely reflect consensus; they also structure conflict. I employ concepts of constitutional culture to explore how constitutions can give contested beliefs legal form and structure conflict in ways that help sustain community in disagreement.
The lecture was delivered on 16 March 2016.
2016-01-01T00:00:00Z'Brown babies' in postwar Europe : the Italian casePATRIARCA, Silvanahttps://hdl.handle.net/1814/411652020-09-01T16:05:00Z2016-01-01T00:00:00Z'Brown babies' in postwar Europe : the Italian case
PATRIARCA, Silvana
The paper addresses the issue of the persistence of the idea of race in its close intersection with ideas of national identities in post-1945 Europe, by looking at the racialization of the children of European women and non-white Allied soldiers born on the continent during and right after the war. The case of Italy is closely examined through a variety of sources, some of which have only recently become available. Similarly to what happened in Great Britain and Germany, in Italy these children were considered a "problem" in spite of their small numbers. Because of their origin, but especially because of the color of their skin, they were often portrayed as alien to the (white) nation. Fantasies concerning their disappearance paralleled the elaboration of plans for their transfer to non-European countries. Italy, however, had its own specificity, namely the extensive role of the Catholic Church and more generally of the Catholic world in the "managing" of these children, as well as in shaping the self-representation of post-fascist Italy as a non-racist country. In fact Catholic racial paternalism was pervasive and underwrote the support that prominent Catholic figures gave to Italy's attempt to hold on to the old colonies in the aftermath of the war.
An earlier version of this paper was given as a Max Weber Lecture at the European University Institute on 18 November 2015.
2016-01-01T00:00:00ZThe electoral tango : the evolution of electoral integrity in competitive authoritarian regimesBIRCH, Sarahhttps://hdl.handle.net/1814/403312020-09-01T16:05:00Z2016-01-01T00:00:00ZThe electoral tango : the evolution of electoral integrity in competitive authoritarian regimes
BIRCH, Sarah
In recent decades, the politics of electoral reform has revolved mainly around the implementation of democratic electoral principles rather than around the principles themselves. This means that electoral authoritarian leaders tend to employ forms of electoral abuse that entail giving unfair advantage to pro-regime electoral competitors, rather than excluding either voters or competitors from the electoral arena altogether. When such regimes become weakened, they tend to ramp up forms of manipulation that favour pro-regime political forces. This deterioration in election quality often serves as a focal point which mobilises both domestic and international pressure for electoral reform, as the erosion of established electoral rights generates grievances. Under the right circumstances, such mobilisation can lead to step changes in the quality of elections. This suggests that improvements in electoral integrity commonly follow increases in fraud, in a one-step-back-two-steps-forward pattern which is in several ways quite distinct from existing understandings of the relationship between elections and democratisation. This model, which I term the 'electoral tango', has implications for how we evaluate and address electoral malpractice in the contemporary world.
The lecture was delivered on 17 February 2016.
2016-01-01T00:00:00Z