State Terrorism

For around fifteen years now, anthropology has been engaged in the study of neoliberalism. What contribution does the discipline have to make to a debate largely monopolized by economics and political science? To answer this question, the present article returns to the major texts and highlights the three perspectives from which anthropology has approached neoliberal expansion: culturalist, systemic and the approach based on governmentality. Each has its own epistemological presuppositions and a specific conception of anthropology, globalization and neoliberalism. The article highlights the relevance and limitations of these approaches.

Engaging Terror seeks to reveal the diverse forms of terror that persist in contemporary societies. For instance, cultural forms such as the fine arts, film, literature, mass media, religion, and market economy continue to define and limit rationality and freedom through institutionalized forms of terror. In this way, terror shapes our experiences not only through the politics of nation-building and international relations, but also through the social and ideological production of fear in everyday life. Topics covered in this volume include the representation and production of terror from a multiplicity of sites, ranging from mental health practices and organized religion, to news coverage and musical scores.

"The study of international relations and human rights has focused on the discussion on the promotion and protection of human rights by Western powers, and the respect of them by Third World countries. These discussions were about how human rights could influence the course of a country’s foreign policy.
This paper analyzes the human rights foreign policy of two developing and medium countries -Argentina and Brazil- between 2003 and 2010. The hypothesis is that developing countries also have a foreign policy on human rights that can be compared in their level of activism. This foreign policy can be seen in multilateral and bilateral levels. At the multilateral level is discussed a) the proposal or ratification of human rights international treaties. At the bilateral level are discussed a) participation in discussions and presentation of projects in the UN Human Rights Council, and b) international development cooperation undertaken by these countries in the field of human rights.
It also explores some determinants that cause variation in the level of foreign policy activism. Determinants analyzed are: a) development of an internationalized civil society on human rights, b) the statewide effort in human rights, and c) the power of the state in the international system.
Finally, I develop some considerations and conclusions that point to highlight the importance of studying the foreign policies of developing countries in areas that have traditionally been linked to the activities of Western powers, such as the promotion and protection human rights and liberal democracy.
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"""The growing scholarship on ethnic diasporas has prompted various off-shoots. Two significant directions are the relationship of diasporas with globalisation and their role in the expansion and radicalisation of ethnic conflict. The corporate enthusiasm of the 1990s for globalisation has been followed by sombre reflections on its destructive impact upon a vast array of areas, including inter-ethnic relations worldwide. This article explores one crucial aspect of this wave of disruption—the rapid expansion of radical forms of long-distance nationalism, often leading to a stress on maximalist goals and an abdication of responsibility. It conceptually distinguishes between stateless diasporas and diasporas that conceive themselves as tied to, and represented by, an existing ‘nation-state’. Examples include ethnic lobbies from the former Yugoslavia, greater Han xenophobia among overseas Chinese, and Hindutva technocratic chauvinism among Hindu-Americans. Finally, the article identifies the onset of ‘online mobbing’ or ‘cyber bullying’ as a new and ominous trend in Internet radicalism.
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This article explores the value of scholarship on state terrorism for the critical study of terrorist violences. The article begins by identifying four primary contributions of this scholarship: first, a rethinking of the status and significance of terrorism; second, an unsettling of broader assumptions within International Relations (IR) and terrorism research; third, an ability to locate state violences within pertinent, but potentially camouflaged, contexts; and, fourth, a prioritisation of critique as a responsibility of scholarship. The article’s second section then argues that the purchase of this work could be further extended by greater conceptual engagement with the state itself. In particular, we point to the value of contemporary approaches to the state as a terrain and outcome of social and political struggle, rather than as a singular actor of unitary purpose. Rethinking the state in this way has value, we argue, first, for moving research beyond the identification and typologising of state terrorisms; and, second, for circumventing the perennial problem of identifying intentionality in efforts to designate violences as (state) terrorism.