attention has almost fetishised the spectacular Kurtz, and ‘his’ Africa, minimising their systemic relations with European capitalist bureaucracy in Europe. It is important to extend criticism by examining how overseas domination is rendered in the textures of ordinary European metropolitan life, labour and leisure in the novella. And equally important is the way metropolitan political power, consumerism and fantasy are seen to control the Company’s African employment structures, just as they control Kurtz up to his death. When viewed from this angle, Conrad’s critique
unit, seemed to be an obscure and undefined entity which gained a clear shape only if nationalist issues were touched upon. If asked about power holders, the names of politicians, military leaders and criminals were mentioned repeatedly, but none of them seemed to be anything other than second- or third-rank as far as political power was concerned. T 46 Non-existent states with strange institutions So what happened? How was this amorphous and decidedly nationalistic political monster created? It may be argued that a general lesson can be learned from the Herceg
Anglophobia (‘May the English lose the Middle East soon if the loss of their political power could restore their sense of beauty,’ for example) and virulent misogyny. Woman in a Dressing Gown rejects Godard’s suggestion that the basic situation ‘should at least have been handled with humour. Alas! Alas! Alas! Cukor is not English’. Why is the possible abandonment and unhappiness of a
postnationalism is as good a framework as any other, but also demonstrates that the fractured narrative makes a range of interpretations possible. The emphasis on personal responses and emotions could be seen as an attempt to ground the political content in individual experiences instead of constructing overarching narratives or myths. The main criticism directed against the novel, however, is that the characters fail to engage, which ultimately means that their search for identity becomes less interesting and weakens the political power of the text. The absence of linear
conquest’, thereby acting as a form of imperial propaganda that encourages colonial expansion with ‘the southern hemisphere offer[ing] the space lacking in a crowded homeland’. 36 This myth-making of Australia as a land of boundless space returns us to Hiatt’s notion of the Antipodes as a ‘blank’ and ties the idea of the Antipodes to that of terra nullius . 37 Punch ’s participation, here, in the legacy of booster literature to the goldfields nonetheless also hints at the potential reversal of pecuniary and political power between colony and metropole, with a sense
, förgiftning . In light of this, we can also find an explanation for Hans Palmstierna’s having become so influential during the late 1960s. He had access to political, media, and organizational resources that no other contemporaneous environmental debater came close to. His access is remarkable from an international perspective as well. In comparison with Palmstierna, even the most influential actors, such as Rachel Carson and Barry Commoner, were very far from actual centres of political power. My seventh and final point concerns
with a humanitarian purpose and almost untouchable moral values, untainted by politics, power and persuasion, attributes which have now been replaced by concepts such as morality, authority and force. In this sense, Behnke claims, NATO has conducted an epistemic war to secure its privileged moral status, fighting against the systemic anarchy of the international system and the inherent ambivalence and undecidability that
so. The most elaborate attempt to rationalise these assumptions is found in Aristotle’s Politics .In this first recognisable work of political science, Aristotle of Stagira (384–322 bc ) described the behaviour patterns of the inhabitants of city-states ( poleis ), the communities he saw as the natural endpoint of biological developments. He showed less interest in theorising the supra -political power by which non
. Fourth, the theories of the rule of law discussed here differ from certain notions of the Rechtsstaat with which the doctrine is sometimes conflated. These last centre on upholding a certain list of rights reflecting a particular conception of justice, rather than simply preventing the arbitrary use of political power by virtue of law or law-making having a given form. Joseph Raz cites as an instance of this approach the
, and the literature of political theory, would not be available. Much of conventional political theory has been descriptive and naturalising, telling us what must be the case about ‘man and society’, such that we can understand why relations of political power in society are necessary, and then see which principles and institutions are most advisable within realistic bounds of possible change. Power theories of