1,721,036 research outputs found
Marx, Lenin and Pashukanis on self-determination: response to Robert Knox
No full textThis response to Robert Knox’s very kind and constructive review1 of my 2008 book The
Degradation of the International Legal Order?: The Rehabilitation of Law and the Possibility of
Politics gives me the opportunity not only to answer some of his criticisms, but also, on the basis
of my own reflections since 2008, to fill in some gaps. Indeed, to revise a number of my
arguments. First, I restate my attempt at a materialist account of human rights. Next I explain
why, for me, the right of peoples to self-determination is absolutely central to a materialist
understanding of human rights; and also fill a serious gap in my own account in the book. This
leads me not only to a reply to Robert Knox on the question of ‘indeterminacy’ in international
law, but also to a disagreement with him on the use or misuse of the language of self-determination.
My fourth section returns to our very different evaluations of the significance and meaning of
the work of Yevgeny Pashukanis, and what, for me, is Pashukanis’s misunderstanding, for
reasons consistent with his general theoretical trajectory, of Marx and Lenin on the Irish
question. Finally, I present an outline of a re-evaluation of Marx’s principled position on
self-determination
Haiti cholera victims sue the UN: Bill Bowring reports on an unprecedented petition against the United Nations
No full textRights or wrongs?: Bill Bowring replies to David Renton's ‘Do socialists still have an alternative concept of rights?’
No full textMinority rights in post-war Iraq: an impending catastrophe?
Full text linkMany commentators see Iraq as divided between Sunni, Shia and Kurds – and perhaps a few Turkmen. Nothing could be further from the truth. Iraq also has significant populations of Baha'is, Christians, Faili Kurds, Mandaeans, Palestinians, Shabak and Yezidis. Some of Iraq's minority groups have been present in the region for more than two millennia. But they now face the threat of eradication in or expulsion from their ancient homeland. Since 2006, the situation has deteriorated. To make matters worse, the international law of minority and group rights has largely developed in the context of the recent history of Europe, and, perhaps, has little to contribute to the situation in Iraq. This article asks what role, if any, can international law, notably the law of human rights, minority rights and group rights, play in resolving or mitigating conflict. This is especially the case when the underlying rationale of this law is so problematic. The structure of this article is as follows. I start with an overview of the various minority groups in Iraq. There is a common theme – things have got a lot worse since 2003. Next, I explore Iraq's statehood, that it is a recent construct, a product of British imperial ambition and cynicism. In fact, Mesopotamia, the territory of contemporary Iraq, was a Persian territory for many centuries until its conquest by militant Islam, its glorious role in the Golden Age of Islam (contemporaneous with Western Europe's dark ages) and incorporation into the Ottoman Empire. Third, I reflect on Britain's disastrous adventures in the region. Mesopotamia was the scene of Britain's greatest military disaster; but Britain has been responsible for the unceasing violence and persecution which characterizes modern Iraq. Fourth, I turn to a marvellous dream, a document of extraordinary cogency and unreality: Iraq's 1932 Declaration, on admission to the League of Nations. This document is a tragic mirage: an Iraq of respect for and enjoyment of its cosmopolitan diversity. It is significant that the only two occasions on which such a vision achieved a purchase in Mesopotamia were the short periods of Kemalist and communist rule. For Britain and the United States such a trajectory was utterly impermissible. Fifth, I turn to the fact that Iraq was one of the first members of the United Nations, and ratified all the relevant human rights instruments dealing with minority rights. Iraq was until the 1990s an assiduous participant in the UN human rights mechanisms, submitting periodical reports to the treaty bodies and submitting itself to interrogation in Geneva, followed by concluding observations and recommendations. This continued despite the eight years' war with Iran, the disastrous invasion of Kuwait in 1991 and the long years of sanctions, blockade and continuous aerial attack, reminiscent of Britain's reliance on the Royal Air Force (RAF) during and after the Mandate. Finally, there is Iraq's 2005 Constitution, a joke version of the 1932 Declaration. At the same time, since 1999 Iraq has not engaged with the UN human rights mechanisms. My conclusion is not sanguine
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Variations on the Author
Full text link“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
The threat to the independence and activity of Russian NGOs
Full text linkProfessor Bill Bowring (EHRAC) critically assesses the recent changes in Russian law relating to NGO
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Full text linkWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
Dispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts
Full text linkWe conducted a full-scale evaluative citation analysis study of scholars in the XML research field to explore just how different from each other author rankings resulting from different citation counting methods actually are, and to demonstrate the capability of emerging data and tools on the Web in supporting more realistic citation counting methods. Our results contest some common arguments for the continued
use of first-author citation counts in the evaluation of scholars, such as high correlations between author rankings by first-author citation counts and other citation
counting methods, and high costs of using more realistic citation counting methods that are not well-supported by the ISI databases. It is argued that increasingly available digital full text research papers make it possible for citation analysis studies to go beyond what the ISI databases have directly supported and to employ more
sophisticated methods
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