We kindly inform you that, as long as the subject affiliation of our 300.000+ articles is in progress, you might get unsufficient or no results on your third level or second level search. In this case, please broaden your search criteria.
This study provides a critical analysis of the conservative ideological inclination which claims a „return to Community”. To this end, he presents the classic work of German sociologist Ferdinand Tönnies Gemeinschaft und Gesellschaft (1887) by applying the analytical perspective offered by contemporary sociologists such as Robert A. Nisbet and Raymond Boudon.
More...
Over the course of Russia’s post-Soviet development, the Russian Orthodox Church has become a significant actor in social and political relations in Russia. This text deals with the ways in which the Russian Orthodox Church’s relationship toward the West has developed and how the Church features in the state’s official policy toward the West. This paper, which is based mainly on an analysis of primary sources (state and Church documents, media), is structured chronologically. Important landmarks in it include Vladimir Putin’s entrance into the position of president and Kirill’s entrance into the position of the Moscow patriarch. The study shows that, at present, the state and the Church rhetoric are almost identical and both focus on the defense of Russian foreign policy visions and plans.
More...
This article examines the ways in which national identity took shape among the Polish peasant class. Kolarzowa hypothesizes that this identity is a construct of the dominant class; the peasant class has introjected it rather superficially, and as a consequence Polish identity came to be split in a unique manner. Building on critical theory and postcolonial studies, Kolarzowa focuses on what she sees as the key practices within this process, i.e. the blurring of memory and the mimicry that characterizes identity formation. She also points out the psychosocial consequences of these practices, such as the repressed experience of one’s own social condition (which is remembered but cannot be expressed in the pubic sphere) and the transference of that experience onto a group of Others (Jews)
More...
The State Social and Political History Archive of the Russian Federation in Mos-cow include a very interesting document, dating back to April 1944. It is a state-ment made by Włodzimierz Sokorski, back then the deputy leader of the Polish 1st Tadeusz Kościuszko Infantry Division, addressed to the Soviet authorities. In a servile, obsequious form, he assures about his absolute loyalty towards the Sovi-et state and the communist ideology. He explains how comrades from the Union of Polish Patriots and the Central Bureau of Polish Communists falsely accused him of political assaults and wanted to throw him out of any power over post-warPoland’s fate. He guarantees his utter loyalty towards Moscow. This document is connected to the once famous argument among Polish com-munists about the shape of the post-war state, inspired by the announcement of the so called Theses no. 1. In that conflict, Sokorski stood against the majority of the Union of Polish Patriots’ leaders, presenting a solution for Poland as a vas-sal to the Soviets, with the army having the same political role as the communist party. Sokorski lost the case, but thanks to Moscow’s support, he did not leave the game yet. The Kremlin probably assessed, that he would be useful after the war. After a short quarantine, he came back to the so called first echelon of Polish communist authorities.I am publishing this statement along with accompanying documents found in an archive portfolio.
More...
This article presents an analysis of the political rise and fall of Igor Strelkov/Girkin – one of famous heroes of the military conflict in South-Eastern Ukraine (Donbass). The main objective of this study is to show relations between Putin's regime and pro-Russian ‘dogs of war’ in Donbass using the example of Igor Strelkov. The paper also analyses how Donbass's warlord Strelkov became an ultra-conservative challenge to Kremlin. He is defined as a social-oriented ‘imperialist’. The author argues that in terms of political activity, Kremlin is afraid of Strelkov as an unpredictable and radical person. Strelkov was retired from the Donbass war in August 2014 by Kremlin because he promoted an ideological and political alternative to Putin's oligarch capitalism and corrupted kleptocracy. Strelkov has strongly criticized war in Ukraine (after he was dismissed from Donbass) and the Russian military operation in Syria as an ‘alien war’. Nevertheless, he was mobilized by the Russian authorities as a former ideological pro-Putin activist against Khodorkovsky. The article ends with a conclusion that Strelkov is a spent force that was used by the Kremlin until the fall of the ‘Novorossiya’ project.
More...
The article outlines possible links between three types of narrative: conspiracy, critical and crime narratives. The basic methodological assumption here is that questions need to be asked about how a narrative works rather than about what genre it represents. The essay’s thesis raises questions about the need to change our understanding of the role of conspiracy theories in reconstructing the causes and courses of events. The authors argue in support of conspiracy theory as a potential narrative, because they find nothing particular in its means of reasoning that would allow us to draw a distinct boundary between conspiracy theory and critical theory within the meaning proposed by Bruno Latour. A crime narrative – Zygmunt Miłoszewski’s novel Grain of Truth – is used as a tool to analyse the functioning of a conspiracy narrative in the detective story. Utilising the division into classical and non-classical conspiracy meta-narratives proposed by Franciszek Czech, the authors of the article ask questions about the limits of the detective’s rational conduct, and the sources of his hypotheses and means of argumentation.
More...
The region of Upper Silesia is recognised as a particular due to the forms of social and political behaviour of a part of its population. Upper Silesians, as ethnic group, are convinced about their separateness. Due to that fact, they are, at least to some extent, an example of a group in which voters' alignments are based on the opposition centre-periphery. This is certainly true for the protagonists of Silesian regional movement, however, this article deals with the problem whether average voter acts similarly. Moreover, the article is a study of a possibility to create an ethnoregionalist party in the future and of consequences that it may have on the politics in the region.
More...
On 10 April 2010 Donald Tusk and Vladimir Putin met on the site of the catastrophic crash of the Polish presidential plane. One of the photographs documenting this event appeared (three years later) on the cover of the “W Sieci” weekly. Its publication gave rise to an intense public debate concerning the gesture made by the Polish Prime Minister. The presented text is an analysis of the manner it functions in the social game taking place in the visual field; it is also an attempt at perceiving the stake of the exchange set into motion by this image.
More...
The aim of the article is to provide a possible interpretation of identity in one of the contested border regions on the Balkans well known for the competing politics and interests by the two bordering countries – Bulgaria and Serbia, for the past century. This region is known as „Western Outlands” in the social and political life. The communal memory of the Bulgarian minority in Bosilegrad, Serbia, leads the narration through different historical periods and their respective politics to uncover an identity which has become a survival strategy at the intricate periods. This will reveal a complex picture of the multiple identity levels where the individual and social identity are tightly related and are further shaped by the existing number of internal and external „others.“
More...
A review of the book ‚Monologue or dialogue? The controversial world in the lens of global television‘ by Maria Neikova, ‚St. Kliment Ohridski‘ University Press. This is an outstanding study, which is concerned with the topic of the still most popular media product, namely the television newscast. The book is a meeting point of state and media politics, cross-continental, cultural and religious differences, and views on international communication. The enormous literature review and original interpretations are valuable for researchers from various academic fields.
More...
The characteristics of the so-called Y generation in post-Communist countries indicate that this generation is considerably disappointed by the changes; it is lost, full of fears, and willing to accept political solutions of an authoritarian and xenophobic kind. More distinctly than ever, these solutions are perceived by them as a better way of resolving their life problems related primarily to entry into adulthood (entering the labor market, creating a family, achieving status). This is evident when observing young people’s sympathies and political decisions, which, in many of these countries, indicate a clear “turn to the Right”. Although the tendency in Western countries is similar, its local background is different, and its political consequences might also be different. The paper shows the semantic complexity of the spatial aspect of Left vs. Right in order to describe, using the term “turn to the Right”, the scope and specificities of this phenomenon in several selected countries. The article also explains the factors that make young people in these countries more susceptible to Right-wing political proposals.
More...
In my researches in the field of media religion and culture, I have made extensive comparative analyses of the Catholic and Pentecostal churches in Nigeria and their different communication strategies. This paper highlights the appropriation of the new information and communication technologies by these two Christian denominations in Nigeria. Special attention is paid to the Catholic Church, because, unlike the Pentecostal denominations which see media technologies as an extension of the church pulpit, the Catholic Church has generally exhibited a somewhat cold attitude towards these instruments of mass communication. This attitude goes back to the advent of cinema which the Church’s hierarchy then saw as having the potential of corrupting faith and moral. The Catholic Church has remained largely a print-based Church, investing most of her communication energy in the print media and in oral catechism. But in recent years, this negative attitude of the Church has started to change. Of all the technologies of mass communication, none has been so instantly accepted and embraced by the Catholic Church as the new information and communication technologies. Using the Mater Cyberworld, (a cyber-café founded by the Ahiara Mbaise Catholic Diocese in Eastern Nigeria), as a case, this paper highlights some distinctive characteristics of the Catholic Church’s involvement in the new information and communication technologies. The analysis shows that this media appropriation is one of the means through which the Catholic Church establishes a strong presence in the Nigerian socio-political sphere.
More...