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Ruling Elite (ruling + elite)
Selected AbstractsIgnoring ,History from Below': People's History in the Historiography of SingaporeHISTORY COMPASS (ELECTRONIC), Issue 1 2007Ernest Koh Wee Song The history of Singapore is widely understood as a history of its economic success. From its heyday as a nexus of trade during the imperial era to the ,technotropolis' that boasts high living standards for most of its citizens, Singapore as a historical subject is often viewed through the lens of the ruling elite. By expending the need to acknowledge the historical function of the citizenry in the island's socio-economic development, the policies and personalities of the Singaporean leadership have been erroneously and simplistically used by many as an example of how the sheer genius of a few can triumph in the face of overwhelming adversity. This article seeks to trace tangents in the wider development of Singapore's historiography in order to account for the general disinterest in people's histories of Singapore. [source] Osteobiography of a high-status burial from the lower Río Verde Valley of Oaxaca, MexicoINTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF OSTEOARCHAEOLOGY, Issue 6 2008A. T. Mayes Abstract This paper presents the osteobiography of an individual from an early complex society who was clearly of "special" social status but was not classified a ruling elite. Our case derives from a unique burial found at the small site of Yugüe, located in the lower Río Verde valley on the Pacific coast of Oaxaca, Mexico. Burial 14-Individual 16 (B14-I16) dates to the late Terminal Formative Period (CE 100,250), an era of regional political centralization and concomitant social inequality. B14-I16 was interred with several valuable grave offerings. A plaster-backed pyrite mirror was found below his mandible, and his left hand held an elaborately incised flute made from a deer femur. The flute is the only object of its kind known for all of Terminal Formative Mesoamerica. Drawing on the physicality of inequality, we employ osteobiography to assess the social hierarchy. Although B14-I16 was clearly an individual of unusual status in the context of Yugüe, he was not immune from the biological assaults that affected people of less distinguished social position at this time. Like his contemporaries of all social statuses, he suffered ill health in the years during which he was weaned. However, a longer weaning period and access to additional resources may have positioned him to endure later illness better than others in this population. Passing the critical transition period at age 6 ½, a time when many children died in this burial site, his adolescent health was better than that of others in this population. Although B14-I16 did have adult responsibilities, he didn't engage in the kinds of physical labour that marked the skeletons of others. The placement of Burial B14-I16 in the middle tiers of the lower Río Verde valley's ancient social hierarchy provides insight into issues of inequality and status on an individual scale. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] Political Parties in South Korea and Taiwan after Twenty Years of Democratization*PACIFIC FOCUS, Issue 2 2009Heike Hermanns South Korea and Taiwan are often cited as successful cases of third-wave democracies where democracy has taken roots. However, electoral volatility is high and disenchantment among citizens is rising, especially regarding the performance of politicians and political parties. Since political parties play a vital role in the democratic process their institutionalization is seen as an indicator of democratic consolidation. An analysis of Taiwanese and South Korean parties in terms of age, organization and structure, as well as programs and leadership style of parties indicates that parties are weakly institutionalized. The Korean party system is a weak point in democratic deepening, as it is reminiscent of a carousel of party creations, mergers and dissolutions. Parties lack distinguishing ideological or programmatic markers and remain cadre parties, focusing on their charismatic leader and their home regions. In Taiwan, in contrast, a clear cleavage in the form of Taiwanese identity led to the appearance of two distinct political camps, each consisting of several parties. Taiwanese parties have progressed in their institutionalization in terms of longevity, organization and programmatic differences. However, membership numbers and party identification remain low and regular corruption scandals show the slow attitudinal change among Taiwanese politicians. In the light of politicians' behavior, citizens in both countries thus are feeling increasingly disenchanted with the ruling elite as well as the democratic system. [source] Impacts of Demographics on Citizen's Access to Information: An Empirical Study of District Dera Ismail Khan, North Western Frontier Province, PakistanASIAN SOCIAL WORK AND POLICY REVIEW, Issue 2 2008Najeebullah Khan The impact of demographic dimensions on local government behavior is well identified, analyzed and documented at the global level. Likewise, several studies are available on developing countries, but empirical evidence on the conditions of Pakistan is lacking. This study is an effort to unearth empirical evidence on access to information in the local government system exemplifying data from the district Dera Ismail Khan (DIK), North Western Frontier Province (NWFP). Most global hypotheses for developing countries are accepted in this study but the statistics on local data are far more different in terms of the value and weight of variables, relationships and impacts on the research concepts. The most dominant concept in the impact of access to information on the local government system is "education for all." Mass education is a leading concept in making or breaking the role of people participation in the success or failure of local democracies. Data show that illiteracy is causing many problems, including the mass population's unawareness of their interests and duties at the public level, thereby giving the ruling elite a free hand in exploiting public resources for self-interest, at the cost of the public good. [source] Viking and native: re,thinking identity in the DanelawEARLY MEDIEVAL EUROPE, Issue 1 2002D.M. Hadley This paper addresses the impact of the Scandinavian settlements in England in the ninth and tenth centuries, and the role that ethnic identity and affiliation played in the society of the so,called Danelaw. It is argued that ethnic identity was not a constant factor, but one that only became relevant, at least in the evidence available to us, at certain times. It is suggested that the key to understanding expressions of ethnicity lies in the absorption of new ruling elites in northern and eastern England, and in subsequent political manoeuvring, rather than in the scale of the Scandinavian settlement. Indeed, the scale of the settlement does not easily explain most of our evidence, with the exception of some of the linguistic data. This paper stresses the importance of discussing the Scandinavian settlements not simply by reference to ethnic factors, but within the social and political context of early medieval society. [source] Islam in Northern Mozambique: A Historical OverviewHISTORY COMPASS (ELECTRONIC), Issue 7 2010Liazzat Bonate This article is a historical overview of two issues: first, that of the dynamics of Islamic religious transformations from pre-Portuguese era up until the 2000s among Muslims of the contemporary Cabo Delgado, Nampula, and to a certain extent, Niassa provinces. The article argues that historical and geographical proximity of these regions to East African coast, the Comoros and northern Madagascar meant that all these regions shared a common Islamic religious tradition. Accordingly, shifts with regard to religious discourses and practices went in parallel. This situation began changing in the last decade of the colonial era and has continued well into the 2000s, when the so-called Wahhabis, Sunni Muslims educated in the Islamic universities of the Arab world brought religious outlook that differed significantly from the historical local and regional conceptions of Islam. The second question addressed in this article is about relationships between northern Mozambican Muslims and the state. The article argues that after initial confrontations with Muslims in the sixteenth century and up until the last decade of the colonial era, the Portuguese rule pursued no concerted effort in interfering in the internal Muslim religious affairs. Besides, although they occupied and destroyed some of the Swahili settlements, in particular in southern and central Mozambique, other Swahili continued to thrive in northern Mozambique and maintained certain independence from the Portuguese up until the twentieth century. Islam there remained under the control of the ruling Shirazi clans with close political, economic, kinship and religious ties to the Swahili world. By establishing kinship and politico-economic ties with the ruling elites of the mainland in the nineteenth century, these families were also instrumental in expanding Islam into the hinterland. Only at the beginning of the twentieth century, the Portuguese rule took full control of the region as a result of military conquests of the ,effective occupation', and imposed new legal and administrative colonial system, called Indigenato, impacting Muslims of northern Mozambique to a great extent. After the independence in 1975, and especially since 1977, the post-independence Frelimo government adopted militant atheism and socialist Marxism, which was short-lived and was abolished in 1983 owing to popular resistance and especially, because of government's perception that its religious policies were fuelling the opposition groups to take arms and join the civil war. The 1980s and 1990s were marked by an acute rivalry and conflicts between the two emerging national umbrella Islamic organizations, the Islamic Council and the Islamic Congress, each representing largely pro-Sufi and anti-Sufi positions. In the 2000s, these organizations became overshadowed by new and more dynamic organizations, such as Ahl Al-Sunna. [source] | ||||||||||