|
|
|
|
Fall/Winter 1994: State And Communalism
State and Communalism (PDF, 4 pages, 18.5 KB) , by Christophe Jaffrelot
Communalism is above all marked by its claim to oppose to a citizenship relation another allegiance asserting itself to be first and foremost. A result of the proliferation of identity trends, it must initially be analysed under a strategic and non-primordialistic angle. It is to be defined as an ideology, a modern and largely strategic construction distinguishing from nationalism (which seeks to transcend cultural divisions in the name of an all-encompassing identity) and particularism (which mostly consists in claiming the acknowledgement of specificity, perceived by the State as absent until then). Secondly, communalism is to be analysed in its relations to the State. The strategies of both these actors pursue the creation and control of identity mobilisations. Furthermore, the international dimensions of these mobilisations are also to be emphasised.
State and communalism in Bosnia-Herzegovina (PDF, 12 pages, 43 KB) , by Xavier Bougarel
Most analyses of the Bosnian conflict tend to either lessen its internal dimensions (the inter-communalist relationships) or to reduce them to a mere territorial clash. However, in order to understand the origins and development of this conflict, one ought to stress the deeply rooted reality of communalism within the social, political and cultural life of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Between 1989 and 1992, the conversion of institutionalised communalism into territorial and exclusive nationalisms led to the dismantling of the State and the breaking out of armed conflict. The latter provoked the further crumbling of the communities themselves. Paradoxically, this second stage of decomposition might be the preliminary condition to a restoration of the State and of the communities around it.
The Lebanese communalism's new clothes (PDF, 19 pages, 61.4 KB) , by Elizabeth Picard
Although the lifting of the communalist constraints over the Lebanese State was one of the major issues of the 1970s, the new Constitutional Law adopted at the end of the war (September 1990) entrenches a neo-communalist triumph substituting the notion of a co-existence pact to that of a National Pact. Such a choice corresponds to the dominant perception in post-war Lebanon assuming that the community is the most operational resilient social structure. It is also explained by the identity of the signing parties (the deputies) and of the sponsors (Saudi Arabia and Syria) of the Taïf Entente Document (1989). The communalist rehabilitation is sustained by two considerations. The first opposes the democratic character of communalist pluralism to the authoritarism of the «secular " surrounding Arab regimes. However, this argument passes over the truly communalist character of these latter regimes and lessens the risk of a totalitarian walled isolation of the communalist organisation. The second consideration concerns the possible dictatorial ambitions of a sociological majority (the Shiite), whose hegemonic organisation, Hezbollah, could be tempted to impose on all Lebanese its own system of law and Islamic culture. Nevertheless, such suspicions do not give sufficient importance to the modernising and individualising processes affecting the Shiite community, nor to its wide social diversity. Still, the reinforcement of communalism favours the contamination by militia habits of political practices and the mixing of public and private interests, through the agreed election of community leaders to government, parliament and civil service - functions in which the clash of opposing brutish forces has replaced negotiation as the operating procedure. A weakness of the post-war communalist State is the absence of an overall project, of a definition of the national expanse and of an authority capable of regulating the inter-communalist competition without recourse to Syrian power, the great beneficiary of the new Lebanese regime. This loss of a common project threatens the State's legitimacy, if not even its sovereign existence and independence, to the point of tempting to establish the analysis of the Lebanese entity in terms of a political system.
Entering into the Movement: distance and participation on a sensitive field in Turkey, by Elise Massicard
Elise Massicard was put under a particular pressure working on the alevis minority in Turkey: her own enquiry could participate to the constitution of a knowledge on the alevis – and even the construction of an alevi subject – that could serve the interests of the community. The author shows all along the article the various political implications of her research and what they imply for the researcher: which distance is right? How could she conciliate the research imperatives with the necessary trustful relations without which there would have been no exchange? The author shares her experience of Turkey without pretending to generalise her conclusions. She details the concrete difficulties she was faced to and the answers she had to find.
Notebook on Jordan, from field inquiry to the experience of mediation (PDF, pages, KB), by Géraldine Chatelard
This contribution suggests a particular illustration of the dynamics that can lead a researcher to voluntarily engage on his field. Through the form of a diary not destined to publication, this article mixes field notes and subsequent comments. A conflict emerged in South Jordan between public authorities and Bedouins from the creation of a natural resource. Several events and requests led the anthropologist to act as a mediator. A series of questions then emerged on the work and status of a researcher in the society he pretended studying in a distanced way. Are the objectivity and the refusal to become implicated tenable positions in contexts profoundly affecting ethical convictions? More generally, isn't the French ethnographical traditional will to defend the paradigm of the objective researcher becoming illusory?
Sikh Communalism (PDF, 16 pages, 53.4 KB) , by Anne Vaugier
The article discusses various aspects of Sikh communalism since 1947. The concept Sikhs have of their identity has ever since been dramatically threatened by various political, socio-economic and religious factors. The central issue emerging from the Sikh question concerns the process of "re-communalisation" or reshaping of identities as a consequence of social, cultural and political frustrations. Should this question be interpreted as an example of the failure of the Indian State? Or, on the contrary, can communal polarisation, far from being a threat to the existing political framework, be viewed as the linchpin of an ethnic counter-strategy encouraged by the State? These themes are illustrated by analyses on the history of "Punjabi Suba", the persistent ethnic politics since the mid-seventies of the Congress party and the influence on the rise of communalism in the Punjab of international factors such as the Sikh diaspora or India's neighbour countries.
Mauritius Islan (PDF, 12 pages, 41 KB) , by Marina Carter and Hubert Gerbeau
Independent in 1968, a republic since 1992, Mauritius, a Commonwealth member, has had a different political fortune compared to the «Southern island ", Reunion, its close neighbour and a French overseas department since 1946. Mauritius holds a population of over one million inhabitants, almost 70% of which are from Indian origin. It thus seems to have passed the test of conciliating the exercise of democracy with the granting of guarantees - or favours - demanded by its different communities. Following this compromise, the system of "best losers» is practised at the time of elections: 8 deputy seats on 70 are reserved for the "best losers ", to assure, as stated in the Constitution, a representation "adequate to each community". More than half the population follows Hinduism. The rest is generally divided between Catholicism and Islam. Furthermore, there are many sects and groupings whose divisions aggravate the tendency of communities' multiplication. Sino-Mauritians only represent 3% of the total population whereas the «general population «is close to 30%. "Whites" and "Creoles" form the latter. The more or less visible African origin of the Creoles evokes a slavery past still important within political life, just as the «coolie trade " and the life conditions endured in other times by Indian workers. Thanks to universal suffrage, the descendants of the latter have been able to control political power. Still, the economic power and related aspects remain controlled to a large extent by the old oligarchy of French origin. Three case studies have allowed the observation of reactions of different groups to different situations including all the elements stated above. This text deals with the way the media treated them in 1993 and 1994, as well as how the State, having retreated from the practice of communalism, played a part in the difficult game of the articulation of discourses in the name of the nation by its representatives, whilst at the same time remembering elections or nominations where the community membership had played a crucial role. Today, the Mauritian microcosm, an offspring of the «indo-oceanic cultural continuum ", reveals being the fragile but hard-headed location of an economic as well as political balance. (N.B.: Mauritius Republic, besides the 1865 km._ island on which this study has been based, also includes the small island of Rodrigues, where there are almost no Indo-Mauritians, and the tiny Agalega).
The Evangelists in Latin America (PDF, 28 pages, 82.3 KB) , by Ariel Colonomos
Evangelical churches in Latin America and the Evangelists at their head are transnational actors whose specific actions must be emphasised. Multiple transnational logics may be observed and analysed thus giving a clearer meaning to the presence and efficiency of these Churches and their priests within Latin American societies. We have witnessed since the end of the 1970s the regionalisation of a religious area in Latin-America, structured as a network. From it has developed an evangelical political economy governed by a transnational logic; portraying this area and its economy may thus enable the understanding of the strategy of these social actors.