Political Science Commons^™

Edzia Carvalho On Human Rights: Politics And Practice. Edited By Michael Goodhart. New York: Oxford University Press, 2009. 455pp., Edzia Carvalho

Human Rights & Human Welfare

A review of:

Human Rights: Politics and Practice. Edited by Michael Goodhart. New York: Oxford University Press, 2009. 455pp.

Kurt Mills On Governance, Order, And The International Criminal Court: Between Realpolitik And A Cosmopolitan Court. Edited By Steven C. Roach. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009. 289pp., Kurt Mills

Human Rights & Human Welfare

A review of:

Governance, Order, and the International Criminal Court: Between Realpolitik and a Cosmopolitan Court. Edited by Steven C. Roach. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009. 289pp.

Hidetoshi Hashimoto On International Law (Sixth Edition). By Malcolm Shaw. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2008. 1542pp., Hidetoshi Hashimoto

Human Rights & Human Welfare

A review of:

International Law (Sixth Edition). By Malcolm Shaw. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2008. 1542pp.

Palestinian Refugees: Protection In Exile, Vivienne Chew

Human Rights & Human Welfare

The Palestinian refugee problem is perhaps the most critical and complex of the outstanding issues in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Sixty-two years have now passed since the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, in which hundreds of thousands of Palestinians were displaced en masse and rendered stateless. Since then, successive generations of Palestinian refugees have endured discrimination, insecurity, repeated cycles of displacement, and infringement of their basic rights and freedoms.

Amazigh Legitimacy Through Language In Morocco, Sarah R. Fischer

Human Rights & Human Welfare

Contemporary Morocco rests at a geographic and developmental crossroads. Uniquely positioned on the Northwestern tip of Africa, Morocco is a short distance away from continental Europe, cradled between North African tradition and identity, and Western embrace. The landscape is varied: craggy mountains trail into desert oases; cobbled streets of the medina anchor the urban centers; mud homes dot the rural countryside. Obscured from the outside observer, behind the walls of the Imperial cities and between the footpaths of village olive groves, Morocco’s rich and diverse Arab and Amazigh cultures and languages circle one another in a contested dance. Morocco’s identity …

Establishing Governmental Legitimacy In Iraq: The Path To Protecting Human Rights, Matt Mines

Human Rights & Human Welfare

Rule of law is essential for ensuring the protection of human rights in post-conflict societies. Contention and disagreements, however, often arise regarding the best ways to establish rule of law in a reconstructive state. It is a vital prerequisite to rule of law that a government be viewed as legitimate. Following an armed conflict, the restoration of basic services and infrastructure is essential for instilling confidence that the government is legitimate and is capable of providing for the needs of the local populace. The essential services include water, electricity, and security on a consistent basis. In order to ensure ongoing …

Necessary Fictions: Indigenous Claims And The Humanity Of Rights, Peter Fitzpatrick

Human Rights & Human Welfare

To begin, not propitiously. When checking whether my title ‘Necessary Fictions’ was being used elsewhere, Google revealed that it was going to be used in a future talk, and by me. It transpired mercifully that this use was going to be quite different to the present which suggested the prospect of a new academic genre: same title, different paper; rather than the standard combination of same paper, different title. Fortuitously, that contrast gave me the leitmotiv for this talk – that things ostensibly the same can be different, and that things ostensibly different can be the same.

© Peter Fitzpatrick. …

Tunisia–The Imprisonment Of Fahem Boukadous (Part One Of A Series), Rob Prince

Human Rights & Human Welfare

To most Americans with the exception of those few who, for whatever reason, have an attachment to the North African country of Tunisia, the name Fahem Boukadous, foreign to American ears, means nothing. It means a good deal more to "Reporters Without Borders” and to the US State Department that actually issued a statement (half way down the page) on his behalf, to the US intelligence agencies and military that have carefully followed the Spring, 2008 uprising in the Tunisian region of Gafsa–deemed the most extensive and militant social protest in that country’s history in the past quarter century.

© …

Blood In The Wells: The Troubled Past And Perilous Future Of U.S.-Saudi Relations, Maxwell Czerniawski

Senior Honors Theses and Projects

Perhaps no region other than the Near East plays a more important role in the shaping of both the foreign and domestic policies of the United States. The 9/11 terrorist attacks and subsequent deployment of hundreds of thousands of US soldiers to Afghanistan and Iraq, as well as the massive budgetary burden placed upon the United States government (and, by extension, its citizens) as a result of the War on Terror, lay heavily upon the consciousness of the media and the concerns of the American people. Much recent focus has also been placed on the impact that the need for …

The Politics Of Higher Education And The Student Presidency, Regina Royan

Senior Honors Theses and Projects

The student body president is an advocate, spokesperson, figurehead and leader. The student presidency is a role that few get to experience and many do not understand. I have found that in my four years involved with student government at Eastern Michigan University and my recent interviews with several other student body presidents across the state that the power associated with an administration can vary greatly, but the nature of the office remains intact. Attempts were made to interview each of the student body presidents at the fifteen state sponsored universities in the state of Michigan. These student body presidents …

Can Mature Democracies Be Perfected?, Guy-Uriel Charles

Faculty Scholarship

One of the more vexing questions about democracy that is often debated among political theorists, political scientists, and legal scholars is whether the democratic character of mature democracies can be improved. From one view, that of democratic realists, mature democracies are perfected as a matter of definition and as a matter of realistic expectations. Because mature democracies are those that respect core democratic principles, variations outside the core are simply policy differences based upon each democratic polity’s willingness to engage in a different set of trade-offs. For democratic realists, variations in democratic practice that are not related to core democratic …

Dangerous Obscurity: A Study Of The Female Suicide Combatants Of Sri Lanka, Jessica Santala

Political Science Theses and Capstones

Since 1991 the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam have used female suicide operatives in their civil war with the Sri Lankan government. Gaps in research about these phenomena suggest that it’s not seen as a gender specific problem and that female suicide bombers can be compared toe to toe with their male counterparts. I contend that the situation surrounding female suicide terrorism is unique and that certain discernable socioeconomic indicators can explain the reasons behind why some women of Sri Lanka become more active in suicide terrorism. I have compiled a suicide terrorism dataset out of terrorist acts perpetrated by …

Paul Okojie On Darfur And The Crisis Of Governance In Sudan: A Critical Reader. Edited By Salah M. Hassan And Carina E. Ray. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2009. 528pp., Paul Okojie

Human Rights & Human Welfare

A review of:

Darfur and the Crisis of Governance in Sudan: A Critical Reader. Edited by Salah M. Hassan and Carina E. Ray. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2009. 528pp.

Arbitrary Arrest And Detention Of Human Rights Defenders In Iran: Subduing The Voices Demanding Rights, Sachchi Karki

Human Rights & Human Welfare

Arbitrary arrest and detention, oftentimes used to curtail the freedom of opinion and expression, as well as the right to association and peaceful assembly, has continued to characterize Iranian regimes since the 1979 Islamic Revolution. Such arrest and detention of human rights defenders (HRD)–who individually or with others act to protect and promote human rights—has demonstrated the repressive nature of the Iranian regime. Human rights lawyers, civil society representatives, journalists, and women’s rights movements and trade union activists are among the most commonly targeted HRD.

Ann Hui’S Films And The Poetics Of Mundane Redemption, Peter Zarrow

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

Seen from above, people are ants. As ants are specks in nature, so people—at least Hong Kongers—are specks in the massive infrastructure of forty- and fifty-storey highrises, the limitless concrete of train and highway networks, and the forbiddingly busy shops. Seen up close, however, face-to-face, they become souls. The camera in the masterpiece directed by Ann Hui, “The Way We Are,” switches between these two perspectives. “The Way We Are” (lit. “Day and Night in Tin Shui Wai” 天水圍的日與夜, 2008) simply shows the quotidian, extremely ordinary events in the lives of a few characters, gradually revealing how they came to …

The New Red Guards

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

“Far out to the East of Beijing, past the city’s fifth ringroad, the Cultural Revolution isn’t over yet.

We’Re Back!

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

We’re returning from a two-week hiatus just in time to call your attention to the final event in a series of author talks that China Beat has produced in cooperation with several other UC Irvine organizations during the 2009-2010 academic year. Tomorrow’s dialogue at UCI, featuring Ian Johnson and Angilee Shah, is free and open to the public (details here).

The Tao Of Avatar — And Why This Sort Of Movie Cannot Be Made In The Prc At This Point In Time…, Sam Crane

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

We saw Avatar last night (I know, I’ve been on a movie kick of late…). It was visually stunning. The story was unremarkable: a melodramatic morality tale (the good guy wins in the end!). But it did have a couple of Taoist elements, which were no doubt quite consciously incorporated into the story.

China’S Promise, Geremie R. Barme

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

The year 2009 was marked by a series of important anniversaries in the history of the People’s Republic of China. Some of these were commemorated with due pomp and circumstance in the official media and dissected at length during learned gatherings and discussions. Others, those events that I think of as ‘dark anniversaries’, passed by in an atmosphere of heightened alertness, surveillance and official anxiety. Dark anniversaries are the signposts of quelled protests, social unrest and state violence, events such as the 1959 rebellion in Lhasa, the shutting down of the Xidan Democracy Wall in Beijing in 1979, the tragedy …

Behind The Wheel, About To Snap, Peter Hessler

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

. . . A photo, that is. Below, Peter Hessler shares some of the photographs he took while traveling across China doing research for his latest book, Country Driving: A Journey Through China from Farm to Factory. Read our review of Country Drivinghere; for other takes on the book, check out Jonathan Yardley’s review at theWashington Post, and Adam Daniel Mezei’s write-up at his blog.

Readings Around The Web: Fun In The Sun Edition

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

• Heading for the beach and looking for the perfect book to toss in your tote bag? At Five Books, authors are interviewed and asked to recommend five books on a specific topic. Though the site covers far more than China, several of the features are China-focused and worth a look; check out Rod MacFarquhar on the Cultural Revolution, Isabel Hilton on China’s environmental crisis, and Richard McGregor on the Chinese Communist Party.

Expo Watch 2010, Shellen Xiao Wu

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

In Shanghai these days it is impossible to avoid the World Expo. Hotels are packed with domestic tourists and school groups; subway and bus televisions show a constant news loop about events at the Expo; and Haibao, the rectangular, blue mascot of the Expo, graces numerous government offices, posters, and official merchandise stalls. To ensure the target of 70 million visitors is met and exceeded for the duration of the Expo from the beginning of May to the end of October, various government offices in Shanghai have handed out Expo “gift packs” of one free ticket per Shanghai resident family. …

Beijing Bibliophile, Part Ii: Market Change And New Technology, Eric Setzekorn

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

Dozens of bookstores continue to dot Beijing but recent developments are changing the landscape for readers and publishers by forcing many smaller stores out of the market. Part of this trend is due to advances in public transportation, particularly the enlarged subway system, that make it possible to travel across town for a larger selection and lower prices, leading to a decline in neighborhood bookstores. A less positive part of the bookstore consolidation is the increasing leverage state sector bookstores such as Xinhua can exert on private booksellers using market and political forces. A mixed element in the dynamic Beijing …

Review: China’S Megatrends: The Eight Pillars Of A New Society, William A. Callahan

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

The future is a hot topic in China; bookstores are full of tomes asserting the 21st century as China’s century: Liu Mingfu’s The China Dream(2010) and Chan Koon-chung’s The Gilded Era: China 2013 (2009) are but two of the most recent books that describe how China is destined to become the number one country in the world.

New Release: Coming To Terms With The Nation

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

On Monday, China’s decennial census began, sending six million census workers door-to-door in a quest to record and count the country’s population over the course of only ten days. A key issue in this census, according to some observers, will be placing China’s population in terms of place of residence. One thing analysts are waiting to find out, for example, is how many citizens of the PRC are described as living in cities rather than villages, as this census, which comes after a period of massive rural-to-urban migration, is supposed to describe where people physically live and work, not their …

As China Goes, So Goes The World

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

Karl Gerth is a tutor and fellow at Merton College and a historian of modern China at Oxford University. His new book is As China Goes, So Goes the World: How Chinese Consumers are Transforming Everything (Hill & Wang, 2010). (See this review by Christina Larson at the Washington Monthly and this oneat Kirkus Reviews for more on Gerth’s book.) Below, an excerpt from chapter 1 of As China Goes, which takes a look at one of the most notable phenomena of 21st-century Chinese life: the sudden boom in car ownership and its far-reaching consequences.

China Beat Is Heading To The Beach . . .

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

. . . well, not exactly. But we are taking a short vacation, to focus on wrapping up the academic year here at UC Irvine. We’ll be back online June 6 (though we will keep up our Twitter feed during the break, so follow us today!). Before we go, a few links we’d like to share:

“A Wildly Weird And Wonderful Event”

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

For updates and insights on the 2010 Expo, one of the first places we turn isShanghai Scrap, where Shanghai-based writer Adam Minter has been following the story for almost two years. Minter’s Expo posts cover topics such as the emergence of Haibao (September 2008), the renovation of the Bund (December 2009) and demolition of neighborhoods (October 2009), and an ongoing in-depth investigation of the twisted saga of the U.S. pavilion (most recent posthere; full archive here). Minter also has an article and slideshow about the Expo atThe Atlantic. In the wake of last Saturday’s opening ceremony, we posed a few …

Bloggers’ Breakfast At Aas

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

It’s become a tradition for China Beat contributors and friends of the blog to assemble at the Association for Asian Studies annual meeting (as well as at the American Historical Association’s meeting) for a “bloggers’ breakfast” that provides China Beatniks the chance to get together and meet face-to-face — often for the first time, since so much of our business is conducted via e-mail. Last Saturday morning, we gathered at a Starbucks near the AAS conference site and talked about China, writing, and many other topics over coffee and pastries. A couple of photos from the AAS 2010 bloggers’ breakfast:

What I Read On My Summer Vacation (Part Ii), Kate Merkel-Hess

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

Moving across the country (from Irvine, California to State College, Pennsylvania) meant that most of my books—even the new ones—spent the summer packed in boxes. But alongside a rapid inhalation of all three Stieg Larsson novels, I still did a little China reading. Here, a few recommendations.