This section includes book reviews of 600-900 words, as well as some book notes of 100-200 words, on books of particular interest to the members of our group. If members either have a review that they consider of interest to the SG, or a recent book of their own, which they would like to see reviewed in the newsletter, please contact Cas Mudde at: c.mudde@ed.ac.uk Book Notes Lenard J. Cohen, Serpent in the Bosom: The Rise and Fall of Slobodan Milosevic, Boulder, CO: Westview, 2001, 496 pp., GBP 24.99/USD 35.00, ISBN 0-8133-2902-7 (hbk). Reviewed by Joseph Pearson (New York) Spectators to Milosevic´s presence at the Hague will appreciate Cohen´s readable chronology of "soft dictatorship" in 1990s Serbia. Not only does Cohen unravel Milosevic as an individual -whose oscillations in policy helped him remain so long in power- but he places his charismatic leadership within the context of Serbia´s public mood from the late 1980s. This approach is a much needed antidote to the way British broadsheets reporting the Hague trial have tended to place a great emphasis on Milosevic´s 'unique role' in the break-up of former Yugoslavia. Cohen looks instead to Milosevic´s relationship with varying levels of public support and resistance which led ultimately to his overthrow in 2000. Cohen´s analysis also comes, thankfully, with nary a word of tribal hatreds making the Yugoslav debacle comprehensible through contemporary sociopolitical developments as opposed to lingering Balkan ghosts and stereotypes of bloodthirstiness. The final part of the monograph is also a welcome addition to the literature. It looks at the future of Serbia and provides an optimistic view of Kustunica: poised between anti-NATO nationalism and the desire to help Serbia return to the international community. Yet, despite these good points, the shelf life of this book seems limited. Events in the Hague such as the progress of Milosevic´s indictments are, of course, absent in a book written almost entirely before the 2000 coup (the preface is dated October 2000). The proof in the pudding is that there are occasional slips into present tense that suggest Milosevic might still be in power. These 'presentist' reservations aside, the worth of this study is indubitably in its analysis of the past: a persuasive account of how Milosevic´s charismatic leadership employed politicised ethnicity for selfish ends.
Grzegorz Ekiert and Jan Kubik, Rebellious Civil Society: Popular Protest and Democratic Consolidation in Poland, 1989-1993, Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 1999, 278 pp., USD 54.50/GBP 34.00, ISBN 0-472-11027-6 (hbk) / usd 21.95/gbp 14.00, ISBN 0-472-08830-0 (pbk). Reviewed by Cas Mudde (University of Edinburgh) While civil society and democratisation are among the most studied topics of post-communist politics, the issue of contentious politics is virtually ignored. This important book does not only fill part of that void, it also theoretically and empirically links the three fields, by assessing the role of contentious politics within civil society in the process of democratic consolidation in postcommunist Poland. This is achieved on the basis of extensive empirical data, which was collected as part of an international research project directed by the two authors. While the book deals primarily with Poland, Ekiert and Kubik regularly draw upon the project's data on the other post-communist countries the Czech Republic, East Germany, Hungary, and Slovakia -- to provide a comparative or a broader, post-communist perspective. Rebellious Civil Society is both important for its rigorous, theoretically informed and empirically grounded analysis, as for its many additional insights on various aspects of post-communist politics, often casually mentioned in the margins of the text. As such, it stands out among the still primarily shallow and highly normative studies of post-communist Europe, and will hopefully be taken as an example for many studies to come. John L. Esposito and Azzam Tamimi (eds.), Islam and Secularism in the Middle East, London: Hurst, 2000, 214 pp., GBP 12.95/USD 19.00, ISBN 185065-541-3 (pbk). Reviewed by Khalil Dokhanchi (UW-Superior) This book critically examines the concept of secularism in the context of theories of development, which have been developed using European patterns of transformation. The authors correctly point out that the assumption that modernization will result in the transference to the personal realm of religion has proved to be historically inaccurate in the Middle East. However, they completely ignore the absence, presence or experimentation with secularism in the Middle East (such as in Turkey). Moreover, they incorrectly associate secularism with authoritarian governments, and argue that both must be condemned.
This particular representation of the Middle East seems to fit the political agenda of the authors. They represent it as an area where everyone is trying to be a good religious person, but where the governments want to secularize them, often with the assistance if not blessing from "professors at American elite universities" (p.38). In a way, this illustrates how Islamic fundamentalist groups have been able to manipulate the agenda and present a rather simplified worldview and choice to the public. It is either them or the authoritarian governments and secularism. By framing the question in this manner, no one really needs to pay attention to what secularism is, how it has been applied to the Middle East, and whether it is attractive or not. The authors make that choice for the 1.25 billion Muslims by stating the problem as they do. In the final analysis, the authors, similar to the authoritarian regimes that they despise, think that by manipulating the question, they can make their choice more attractive. Oddly, both are paternalistic, and neither of the two is genuinely interested in a competition between ideas and democracy. George Kassimeris, Europe's Last Red Terrorists. The Revolutionary Organization 17 November, London: Hurst, 2001, 262 pp., GBP 14.95, ISBN 1-85065-467-0 (pbk). Reviewed by Michalis Spourdalakis (University of Athens) Although Kassimeris focuses on the "Revolutionary Organization 17 November", he essentially attempts to examines the entire phenomenon of terrorism in Greece. This can be seen in his extensive reference to the Revolutionary Peoples Struggle (ELA). Though not offering a complete review of the phenomenon, he certainly offers an excellent and thorough examination of its main factors through the detailed study of the two most active organizations in the country. The book is clearly written, therefore also accessible to the non-expert. It is well researched, which makes it impossible to ignore, even if one disagrees with certain aspects or even with the analysis of the author. It is structured around five main chapters which situate the history, the ideology and the strategy of RO - 17N within the context of post-Junta Greek politics (1974) and the overall response of the Greek state. The book contains seven very useful appendices, which support the analysis, in addition to a comprehensive bibliography.
The greatest merit of the book is that the author neither slips into an easy, conspiratorial explanation, nor into a flat, merely journalistic "understanding" of the phenomenon. On the contrary, he tries consistently to support his hypothesis in a convincing manner. The fact that for some time RO -17N activity was met with a great deal of tolerance on the part of the Greek population and the juxtaposition between growing popular consensus and terrorist activity is well made. However, the author is not immune to the easy traps bequeathed to the social sciences by the cold war jargon and logic (e.g. no real differentiation among the communist left and a stereotypical understanding of the left-wing approach to democracy, pp.70-1). However, the usefulness of the book remains in its application of the often quoted Gramscian dictum for political parties to terrorism: that to write their history is to write the history of the country from a monographic point of view. Fred Kautz, Gold-Hagen und die "H체rnen Sewfriedte": Die HolocaustForschung im Sperrfeuer der Flakhelfer. Edition Philosophie und Sozialwissenschaften 48. Hamburg: Argument-Verlag 1998. 133 pp. DM27.80 ISBN 3-88619-648-8 (pbk) Reviewed by Andreas Umland (Harvard University) This concise study is, regardless of any opinion one may have about the usefulness of Kautz's angry rebuttals to the critics of Daniel J. Goldhagen's book Hitler's Willing Executioners, recommendable for its comprehensive sixpage bibliography on the German debate about Goldhagen (pp. 119-125). For those interested in the particulars of this controversy, this is a good starting point. Kautz's essay is mainly an explicit critique of the comments on Goldhagen's book by three of the most influential historians of contemporary Germany: Hans Mommsen , Eberhard J채ckel and Hans-Ulrich Wehler. This reviewer found Kautz's attack unnecessarily one-sided. However, this becomes less inconceivable in view of some of the statements on Goldhagen's motives by the three German historians. J채ckel noted not only that Goldhagen's book was "simply bad" (as quoted on p. 9), but also suggested that Goldhagen's approach to the Germans and their anti-Semitism from an anthropological point of view brings him "in suspicious closeness to the biological collectivism [of racism]" (as quoted on p. 31). Wehler argued that, with the "ethnicization of the debate around National Socialism" in Goldhagen's book, "there re-appear the same schemes of thinking that characterized National Socialism: the 'elected people' who are to be annihilated are replaced by the 'condemned people', the Germans, as the incarnation of evil" (as quoted on p. 32). Mommsen stated not only that he
would "never" have given Goldhagen a Ph.D. (as quoted on p. 9), but adjudicated in an interview that "the book does not contain any new results", and suggested that the book should be seen "as an accusation of the Germans, and not a really academic study." (as quoted on p. 29) David Pion-Berlin (ed), Civil-Military Relations in Latin America: New Analytical Perspectives, Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 2001, 320 pp., USD 22.50, ISBN 0-8078-4981-2 (pbk) / USD 55.00, ISBN 0-8078-2656-1 (hbk). Reviewed by Ximena Sosa-Buchholz (University of Kansas) This innovative book about the complex civil-military relations in Latin America is a must-read for all sorts of students interested in the subject. David PionBerlin presents an excellent introduction to the current approaches of comparative politics and explains how by combining them, the nine authors achieve a better understanding of civil-military relations. Divided into three groups, the perspectives are rationalist/strategic action, structuralist/institutional and culturalist/subjective ones. The strategic action approach includes coalition building and game/-bargaining theory. Wendy Hunter studies the Brazilian case since 1985, whereas Harold Trinkunas, David Mares and Felipe Aguero also employ the rationalist perspective in combination with the institutional approach. For instance, Mares employs case studies of the integration between El Salvador and Honduras and between Argentina and Chile, to examine the relationship between regional economic integration and democratic civilian control. The institutional approach, which refers to organizations, rules and regimes at several levels, is employed by Deborah Norden and Pion-Berlin. Norden analyzes military bureaucracies and conspiratorial movements in Venezuela whereas Pion-Berlin examines the Argentine case. Finally, the subjective approach includes ideas, beliefs, attitudes and interpretation. By interviewing and analyzing military journal writings in Argentina and Ecuador, J. Samuel Fitch studies the variations in military doctrinal views that affect the institutionalizing democratic regimes. Ernesto L贸pez uses the Argentinean and Chilean cases to illustrate the civil-military relations as a legitimate consent rather than an imposition. Brian Loveman examines the influences of contemporary civil-military relations to understand the "permanent regime of protected democracy".
These authors have taken the first step toward overcoming the isolation of civil-military scholars who have pursued single perspectives. However, it is important that neglected countries such as Paraguay, Colombia or even Ecuador become more represented in new research. Antoine Roger, Les Grandes ThĂŠories du Nationalisme, Paris: Armand Colin, 2001, EUR 14.00, ISBN 2 247 04585 5 (pbk). Chris Flood (University of Surrey) Most of the major French academic publishers produce series of small format, introductory books, priced to attract relatively wide readerships. Antoine Roger's book is of that type. It consists of eight main chapters, each centred on the work of one or two particular theorists and prefaced by a brief discussion of other writers whose theories can be classified as sharing some distinctive feature with the work of the principal figure(s). The theorists whose works receive substantive treatment are Ernest Gellner, Karl Deutsch, Miroslav Hroch, Eric Hobsbawm, Anthony D. Smith, Louis Dumont, John Breuilly, Paul Brass, Guy Hermet and Liah Greenfeld. The short introductory and concluding chapters, as well as the prefaces of the main chapters, use a fairly complex typological matrix for locating the various theoretical positions in relation to each other and defining the degree to which they are either complementary or incompatible. However, this is not sufficiently developed to be really helpful. Since most of the theorists did not write in French and have not (yet) been translated into French, readers in France may well find the book useful. The expositions of individual theories are quite clear and the assessments, though too brief, are often cogent. On the other hand, since most of the theoretical work was originally published in English, or has been translated into English, it is less obvious why a reader of English would use this source, especially when there are valuable introductory works already available. For example, Anthony D. Smith's Nationalism (Cambridge: Polity, 2001) is more integrated, broader ranging and offers a far more coherent, analytical view of the field than Roger's book. Karl Heinz Roth, Geschichtsrevisionismus: Die Wiedergeburt der Totalitarismustheorie. KONKRET Texte 19. Hamburg: KKV konkret 1998. 152 pp. ISBN 3-930786-20-6 DM19.80 (pbk) Reviewed by Andreas Umland (Harvard University) This book is a broad, defensive criticism of a number of current academic, political and intellectual trends in Germany. Roth, a prolific left-wing publicist,
gives a comprehensive picture of some major German public debates on the Nazi and East German past in the mid-1990s. His chapters deal with "revisionist tendencies in historic research on German fascism" (pp. 15-48), the influence of the theory of totalitarianism on the special Bundestag commission dealing with the evaluation of the history and results of the SED-dictatorship (pp. 49-117), the "re-vitalization of the theory of totalitarianism by the Hamburg Institute of Social Research" (pp. 118-131), the "'revolutionization' of the NS-dictatorship by the group around Rainer Zitelmann" (pp. 132-144), and the debate about the collaboration of Swiss banks with the Third Reich in securing Nazi funds (pp. 145-152). His extensive notes provide a multitude of relevant references on these issues. Roth's tone in dealing with all these issues is distinctly pessimistic in that he detects a fundamental regrouping in German debates on Germany's recent past, marked by an acceptance of the concept of totalitarianism in nearly all political and intellectual camps. This is, according to Roth, a very regrettable development. Perhaps the greatest value of Roth's content analysis of debates informed by the shelter concept of totalitarianism is that it shows how thin the line is that divides a comparison of the Nazi and East German regimes from their equation - even if only implicit or partial. It would indeed be a sad development, if the - in comparison even to other communist dictatorships relatively moderate Soviet puppet-regime of the so-called "German Democratic Republic" becomes a major reference point for analyzing the Third Reich and its policies from a comparative perspective. If that actually happens, Roth's defensive, pessimistic tone may one day appear as not entirely inappropriate. Paul White, Primitive Rebels or Revolutionary Modernizers?: The Kurdish National Movement in Turkey, 2000, 258 pp., GBP 15.95/USD 25.00, ISBN 1 85649 822 0 (pbk)/ GBP 49.95/USD 69.95, ISBN 1 85649 821 2 (hbk). Reviewed by Cindy Jebb (US Military Academy) (The views expressed herein are those of the author and do not purport to reflect the position of the United States Military Academy, the Department of the Army, or the Department of Defense) Paul White's study is a significant work given today's security environment, which forces policy-makers to not only think about how to respond to terrorism but to also understand and address its roots. White's interdisciplinary study of
the Kurdish nationalist movements, culminating in an analysis of Ă–calan and the PKK, highlights the complexity of the state- and nation-building processes in the last eighty years. While his extensive literature review make his book a tough read, the interviews, detailed research, and conceptual framework make it a must for all who want to understand the Kurdish situation in Turkey. White provides a richly, developed history of Kurdish rebellions, and explores the definitional problems of such terms as 'ethnicity', 'tribalism', and 'Kurd,' thus highlighting the complexity of his study. While the author skilfully argues that economic marginalization of the Kurds transformed the Kurdish movement from primitive rebels to revolutionary modernizers, he does not fully develop their political marginalization. The political story is critical; White cites a former human rights minister, Algan Hacaloglu, who observed that, "The PKK is still recruiting people. Why? Because there is widespread alienation, because despite talk [the government has] not been able to apply real progress for rights, democracy." And while White describes Ocalan's analogies to the Basques, it was Spain's continuing democratization that delegitimized ETA in both the eyes of the Basques and the rest of the Spanish population. With the PKK's questionable legitimacy in the eyes of the Kurds, a truly democratic Turkey might capture legitimacy from both the Kurdish and wider Turkish populations, while de-legitimizing the PKK. Without a parent state, the European Union--with its insistence for further Turkish democratization--may be the next best ally the Kurds have. Robert S. Wistrich (ed.), Demonizing the Other: Antisemitism, Racism and Xenophobia. Studies in Antisemitism 4. Published for the Vidal Sassoon International Center for the Study of Antisemitism, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Amsterdam: Harwood Academic Publishers, 1999, 373 pp., USD 58.00, ISBN 90-5702-497-7 (hbk). Reviewed by Andreas Umland (Harvard University) This collection of papers presented at a conference on comparative dimensions of antisemitism at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in June 1995 will be welcomed by scholars from a number of disciplines and substantive foci. It assembles a wide array of contributions in the fields of cultural, literary, gender and religious studies, ancient, modern and contemporary history, psychology, sociology, philosophy, as well as political science from twenty-three scholars. The papers deal with as different subject matters as demonization of the "other" in visual arts (Ziva Amisha-Maisels), antisemitism and other -isms in
the Graeco-Roman world (Daniel R. Schwartz), Jews and Christians in the Middle Ages (Israel J. Yuval) and Medieval Muslim Thought (Hava LazarusYafeh), or images in the antisemitisms of the Third Republic (Richard I. Cohen), Nazi Germany (Philippe Burrin), Poland (Yisrael Gutman), ArabMuslim world (Rivka Yadlin) and contemporary Germany (Robert S. Wistrich). The collection also addresses directly at least two important public and academic debates: the controversy around Daniel J. Goldhagen's Hitler's Willing Executioners, and the discussion about Stephane Courtois' Black Book of Communism. The largely excellent contributions to this book are far too varied and sophisticated to do justice to them in a short review. It should be pointed out once more that this volume constitutes a useful collection of divergent observations and theories on the issue of xenophobia throughout human history. It should find a warm welcome among scholars from many different disciplines, and will influence future debates on the roots and nature of exclusionism and genocide. Book Reviews Thomas Ambrosio, Irredentism: Ethnic Conflict and International Politics, 2001, Westport, CT and London: Praeger, 226 pp, GBP 54.50, ISBN 0-2759-7260-7 (hbk). Reviewed by Jennifer Edwards and Daniel Chirot (University of Washington) In his new book Irredentism: Ethnic Conflict and International Politics, Thomas Ambrosio offers a new perspective on the Yugoslav catastrophe of the 1990s by situating the conflict in an analysis of the international setting in which it occurred. In doing so, he also attempts to bridge the gap between studies of domestic level ethnic conflict and international relations studies looking at inter-state war and conflict. Looking at the phenomena of irredentism in the Yugoslav successor states, as well as in Armenia and Hungary, he makes the argument that the role of the International Community is the single most important factor in determining whether a state seeks to claim territory outside its borders in the name of ethnic affiliation. The formal model he proposes suggests that irredentist projects result from the interaction of both the level of ethno-territorial nationalism in a state and the level of international toleration for such projects. As these two factors vary in strength the level of irredentism or, rather, the relative success of the irredentist project should vary. The assumption seems to be that the potential for ethno-territorial nationalism and thus irredentist projects exists in any state that has an ethnic diaspora living outside its territorial boundaries. Without the
existence of constraints from the International Community on ethno-territorial nationalist sentiments, or rather "if the effects of the International Community were nil," then he argues, the level of ethno-territorial nationalism would equal the level of irredentism (6). The conclusion is straightforward and certainly logical. Irredentist claims that are recognized as legitimate by great powers influential in that region have a far better chance of succeeding than those that arouse opposition. In the case of Armenia, both Russia and the United States were content to allow Armenia to keep control of Nagorno-Karabakh. This was partially due to Russian perceptions of its national interest and partially due to the pressure exerted by the large Armenian diaspora in the United States. Hungary's irredentism of the 1920's and 1930's was successful but largely as a result of its alliance with Hitler. In the post-war period these territories were taken away and have not been the subject of any further attempts at re-conquest. As a result, Hungary has maintained not only the good will of its Western allies, but also their financial support. The cases of Serbian and Croatian irredentism in Bosnia-Herzegovina are less straightforward but also support the conclusion. By 1993 the international community seemed willing to accept the de facto partitioning of Bosnia. The main difference was that the Croats were winning the public relations war in the West and successfully disguising their own irredentist objectives. However, the Bosnian Muslims managed to mount an effective resistance to the Croatian offensive and Tudjman revealed his hand by expanding his military offensive and making even his German allies somewhat nervous. Once the Americans threatened to cut off foreign aid, the Croats abandoned their claims and thus maintained Western support while Serbia continued its aggression against the Bosnian Muslims. In the end, by succumbing to Western demands regarding the Bosnian Muslims, the Croats were able to maintain support and regain lands it had previously lost to the Serbs. Convincing though this explanation is, the question remains whether his model is capable of explaining all the variance in the outcomes of irredentist projects, and, more importantly, the absence of such projects. Ambrosio claims that the model does, though he acknowledges that his test of the model is limited and provides only preliminary supporting evidence. What he does not consider or test are possible alternative explanations or variables. For example, his analysis suggests that the military ability of those whose lands are being claimed plays a critical role in determining both the overall success of the irredentist project as well as the International Community's response. Had the Muslims in Bosnia not mounted a tenacious resistance,
there is little doubt that the entire area would simply have been split between Croatia and Serbia. The International Community was slow to react in this situation and probably would not have been in time to stave off a quick military solution. Similarly, Croatian military success and not Western outrage finally won Croatia's war against Serbia, just as only American bombing stopped Serbian ethnic cleansing in Kosovo. What remains unanswered is what determines both the level of ethnoterritorial nationalism and international toleration. Particularly relevant are the causes of the former. With the exception of Hungary in the present, none of the cases could be classified as having a low-level of ethno-territorial nationalism let alone a varying level. Why don't more countries engage in irredentist projects? What considerations other than international toleration go into the decision making process of states? Is this even the rational process Ambrosio assumes? At the same time, Ambrosio's point about the critical role played by external powers is well taken. Without Western aid, Croatia would not have been able to rearm. Without the West's consistently anti-Serbian stance, Milosevic might well have been far more successful. But the burning question remains: why do ethnic similarities across some international boundaries provoke such strong political and cultural attachments while others do not? While not an issue raised by this book, it is certainly one that we are left with and would do well to re-examine. Luciano Cheles and Lucio Sponza (eds.), The art of persuasion. Political communication in Italy from 1945 to the 1990s, Manchester and New York: Manchester University Press, 2001, 384 pp., GBP 17.99, ISBN 07190-4169-4 (pbk) / GBP 49.99, ISBN 0-7190-4169-4 (hbk). Reviewed by Franca Roncarolo (University of Torino) The forms and rationales of Italian political communication have frequently drawn scholars' attention because of their variety and intensity. Not surprisingly, this interest has grown during recent years, after the electoral success of media-tycoon Berlusconi who, since 1994, has repeatedly adopted various marketing techniques and used his own television channels to promote his political career. Cheles and Sponza now enter the crowded debate about 'the art of persuasion' with a book that has various merits. The chief one is that it explores the Italian political communication system without limiting itself to the
case of Berlusconi, but trying to consider his success and some forms of his political propaganda within a more general framework. Indeed, as the title indicates, the volume aims to examine the different means through which political actors communicated their values and ideologies from the early postwar years to the 1990s. In order to achieve this, Cheles and Sponza have collected various contributions by Italian and foreign scholars representing a range of disciplines, from Semiotics to History via Sociology of culture and Fashion studies. The volume - which concludes with a comprehensive chronology - is in two parts. The first considers the more institutional dimension of political communication - that is "party propaganda and political discourse" - while the second deals with "persuasion through symbolism and spectacle". Actually, as the authors partly admit too, the distinction is not entirely convincing, not least because the use of symbolism is a key dimension not only for political movements and terrorists, but for political parties as well. However, the distinction gives rise to some interesting considerations. For example, Sponza's discussion about Italian propaganda among Italian immigrants in Britain after the collapse of Fascism or Eco's contribution about the 'meetingmania' of the 1970s; or - in addition - Portelli's political history of Italian songs and the chapters by Maria Pozzato and Cristiana Giorgetti on the political uses of clothes as a means to convey ideological allegiance or to project a specific image. Besides being interesting, various essays offer very useful contributions to understanding contemporary Italian political communication. Thus, for example, Kertzer explores the importance of ritual in periods of political change, considering the transformation of the PCI into the PDS and the conversion of the MSI into AN, while Giglioli analyses the televised trials of politicians involved in the Tangentopoli investigations as rituals of degradation. Isnenghi stresses the anomalous case of a country that had the strongest Communist Party in the West and a press "dourly presided over by an anti-Communist, pro-American, Atlanticist and clerical mix" (p.117). With the obvious consequence that a newspaper like L'UnitĂ was successful for longer than any other party daily in Europe. The peculiar traits of the 'mass-mediatisation' of Italian politics are then considered in greater depth, looking at the phenomenon of political advertising from the point of view of posters (Cheles) and party election broadcasts (Pezzini). This with regard to an apparently old media -- whose role Cheles opportunely stresses and describes as having become even more important after the last 2001 campaign - but also with reference to a sector whose
importance, on the contrary, has been greatly eroded by the norms that tried to limit the difficulties caused by the anomaly of a political leader who directly controls the biggest commercial television network. Of course, not every essay is equally successful in explaining the Italian case. So, for example, the otherwise interesting contribution by Lumley about the life cycle of a satirical magazine fails to help us understand the core role played by political satire which featured in the 2001 campaign. But the key problem is another. The point is that while the book offers a well-documented review of the forms and means through which political communication has been conveyed in Italy, it is not always convincing about the rationales that structured them. Starting from the right idea, that for a long time the highly fragmented Italian society did not overcome its cleavages, the editors end up by giving more importance to the issue of national identity than it probably deserves. On the other hand, they seem to underestimate the effects of the political system as an independent variable. A system that for almost fifty years was a consociational democracy closed to any real possibility of change by national and international vetoes. And that at the beginning of the 1990s started a transition, never completed, toward a "quasi-majoritarian" democracy, that has since been progressively "proportionalised" again. Given this institutional framework, it is hardly surprising that, during the so-called First Republic, Italian political communication was more guided by a self-referential rationale than by true strategies of persuasion directed towards its citizens. Nor is it difficult to understand how at present new forms of telepopulism can cohabit with an oldstyle political communication that continues to ignore the preferences and problems of the general public. Be that as it may, despite some questionable interpretations, The Art of Persuasion can truly help those interested in contemporary Italy to gain a better knowledge of the country. And this is the first step towards understanding it. Raphael Cohen-Almagor, Speech, Media and Ethics. The Limits of Free Expression. Critical Studies on Freedom of Expression, Freedom of the Press and the Public's Right to Know, Houndmills; New York: Palgrave, 2001, 217 pp., GBP 42.50, ISBN 0-333-770776-5 (hbk). Reviewed by Dirk Voorhoof (Ghent University) The principle of freedom of expression is probably the most complex and controversial of all constitutional guarantees. In Speech, Media and Ethics, the examination of the limits of tolerance is extended to embrace the problem of maintaining freedom of expression and press freedom in the face of
challenges from forces that, if left unrestrained, would destroy the institutions of free society and respect for human rights. It is an interdisciplinary work that employs ethics, liberal philosophy, and legal and media studies to outline the boundaries to freedom of expression and media freedom. Although the basic perspective is the emphasis on the liberal paradigm of the freedom of expression, the author substantially develops argumentations towards restrictions on the freedom of expression and press freedom. The first chapter, for instance, criticises the Supreme Court judgement in the famous Skokie-case. The conclusion of Cohen-Almagor in applying "the offence principle" is that "we have to be aware of the dangers of words, and restrict certain forms of expression when designated as levers to harmful, discriminatory actions; for words, to a great extent, are prescriptions for actions". In another part of the first chapter the author criticises a general ban to demonstrate outside private houses of politicians or on picketing private homes of public officials. But he also develops the arguments why a democracy may set regulations of time, place and manner substantially restricting the activity of pickets and the modalities of demonstrations at private places. In the last part of the first chapter the author comes to the conclusion that it is right and necessary to restrict the competition of parties in elections in as far as they endanger the very existence of the state or its democratic foundations. Anti-democratic parties should not be eligible to take part in the elections so as to enable them to further their ends. A political party that negates the basic requirements of democracy and resorts to violence to further its discriminatory ideas disqualifies itself from the right to participate in the democratic process. According to Cohen-Almagor, no evidence of danger is needed when a list aims to undermine democracy (or the state!): "the evidence that is required concerns the content of the political platform of the list in question, the list's intentions, and the fact that violent acts were undertaken to accomplish the declared aims". The next chapters of the book focus on the debate of the freedom of the press and the ethics of journalism, especially in relation to other human rights such as the right of privacy and the rights of others. The author emphasises the importance of self-regulation by the media sector and the establishment of performant press councils or media councils with significant powers of sanction. According to Cohen-Almagor, these councils should not only have the power to impose significant fines on newspapers for gross misconduct, but should also have the ability to suspend journalists and even the publication of newspapers. At the very least a very controversial point of view.
Cohen-Almagor analyses a lot of issues within the framework of the contemporary discussion on tracing limits on freedom of expression, at the same time pressing for journalistic accountability. The focus is mainly on the situation in Israel, including references to the US, Great Britain and Canada. Unfortunately, the author neglects the European developments on this issue, especially from the perspective of the European Convention on Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms. The only reference made to the instrument of the European Convention is a footnote referring to the European Commission on Human Rights in the case of Glimmerveen and Hagenbeek vs. the Netherlands (1980), without any further analysis of the case law regarding Article 10 (freedom of expression) or Article 11 (Freedom of assembly and association) of the European Court of Human Rights. It is particularly significant that Cohen-Almagor doesn't analyse Article 10 or 11 of the European Convention and the relevant Court's case law guaranteeing to a large extent the freedom of political debate. The author only refers to the socalled "anti-totalitarian clause" of Article 17 of the Convention as an instrument to restrict freedom of expression and freedom of political debate. This article stipulates that "nothing in the Convention may be interpreted as implying for any State, group or person any right to engage in any activity or perform any act aimed at the destruction of any of the rights and freedoms set forth herein or at their limitation to a greater extent than is provided in the Convention". This book's title describes its content perfectly: it is a book in which the limits of freedom of expression are developed and justified. It is a perfect illustration of the observation made earlier, that the principle of freedom of communication continues to be probably the most controversial of all constitutional guarantees. Gerald Cromer, Narratives of Violence, Aldershot; Burlington: Ashgate, 2001, 116 pp., GBP 45.00, ISBN 0-7546-2157-X. Reviewed by Joshua D. Freilich (John Jay College of Criminal Justice) The issue of terrorism is quite complex and raises a whole slew of ancillary issues that vary quite considerably in terms of the quality and quantity of the scholarly work generated. Gerald Cromer has produced an empirical piece that focuses our attention on some previously neglected topics. The book begins by pointing out that violent terrorist acts invariably implicate two issues connected to the legitimate use of force. First, the perpetrators, and or their supporters, usually seek to justify or explain the violent act.
Concurrently, the 'legitimate' governing authorities, which are charged with maintaining social order, must elucidate why they failed in their quest to prevent such acts from occurring and why the attack occurred. Cromer carefully scrutinizes both of these issues by examining two case studies for each issue. Chapter one of the book examines propaganda pieces produced by the Jewish group Lehi (Fighters for the Freedom of Israel) during their terrorist campaign against the Mandatory British authorities in the 1940s. Cromer's analysis reveals that Lehi utilized a number of different techniques to justify their violence. First, Lehi often appealed to higher loyalties by maintaining that their fight for 'freedom and justice' was so just that any means employed to achieve these goals was legitimate. On other occasions, Lehi relied upon 'condemnation of the condemners' by arguing that any illegitimate acts they committed paled in comparison to the brutal practices employed by the British. They also frequently claimed that their victory was assured not only because their cause was just and righteous, but that logically there could be no other result. An examination of (both world and Jewish) history, it was asserted, demonstrated that victory was assured. Finally, Lehi always maintained that the deaths of its members, whether 'killed in action' or executed by the British, were not in vain. Not only were the 'heroic martyrs' portrayed as role models for others to emulate, but Lehi fighters were said to willingly risk their lives only because they believed their deaths would inspire others to join the crusade. While Lehi members did not intentionally seek to commit suicide, they nonetheless willingly assumed the risk of death in pursuit of their cause. This last observation is somewhat relevant to the contemporary phenomenon of suicide bombers which, popular misconceptions aside, is not only religiously inspired as is demonstrated by the secular or atheistic organizations (e.g., PFLP; Tamil Tigers) that utilize this weapon. Chapter two focuses on the cult of supporters that emerged to venerate and justify Baruch Goldstein who murdered 29 Palestinians in Hebron in 1994 before being killed himself. Following the massacre Goldstein's supporters published an anthology of essays that sought to both praise and justify Goldstein's act. Similar to Lehi, Goldstein's followers appealed to higher loyalties by claiming that Goldstein had either pre-empted a terrorist attack against Jews, restored Jewish pride, or sanctified God's name. In other words, whatever harm Goldstein had caused was clearly outweighed by the tremendous good he had achieved. Unlike Lehi, however, Goldstein's defenders did not hold Goldstein up as a figure to be emulated. Goldstein was portrayed as a special individual who had committed an extraordinary act.
While such a person might be glorified, there was no requirement that others follow in his path. In chapter three Cromer alters his focus by training his gaze on the 1981 parliamentary elections in Israel. The election campaign featured a large amount of campaign related violence directed against the opposition Labor party. Cromer reviews the various arguments that sought to explain why the government had failed in its duty by allowing the violence to occur. Labor party supporters contended that the physical violence was inspired by verbal violence. More specifically, it was alleged that the incumbent Prime Minister, Menachem Begin, was a demagogue who exploited his unruly, unstable followers. Begin, it was said, created an atmosphere that allowed violence to flourish. Not surprisingly, government supporters fiercely contested these allegations by not only arguing that Begin had not inspired the violence, and had sought to prevent it, but that in reality the culprit was the opposition Labor party. After all, were they not the ones who gained from it politically? Chapter four studies why the Israeli government failed to prevent the emergence of a violent Jewish settler vigilante organization in the West Bank in the early 1980s. Once again, proponents of different ideological viewpoints offered competing explanations. Left wing figures tended to portray the Jewish vigilantes as representative of the settler movement as a whole, claiming that the occupation (of the West Bank) itself naturally fostered violent acts. In addition, the right of center governing coalition was not only accused of failing in its duty to prevent violence, but of actually encouraging the perpetrators to act. Supporters of the settlement movement offered a competing narrative. According to their view the vigilantes were a marginal fringe group. In sum, Narratives of Violence is a well written book that adds to the scholarship on terrorism by focusing our attention on issues, relating to the legitimization of violence, that until now have not received that much consideration. Catherine Eschle, Global Democracy, Social Movements, and Feminism. Boulder, CO; London: Westview, 2001, 279 pp., GBP 21.99, ISBN 0-81339149-0 (pbk). Reviewed by Colin Barker (Manchester Metropolitan University) This book reviews debates about feminism's contributions to critical discussion of democracy, focusing on the inner weakness of recent advances in democracy and the place of social movements within those advances.
Although Eschle notes the significance of what Sturgeon terms "direct theory" (movement activists' own theorizing of their situation and forms of action), her attention is on academic theory. This presents a difficulty, as she notes in her discussion of "new times" theorists, that they are "relatively detached" from actual struggles, relying overly on secondary texts. Within those limits, this scholarly book offers careful and often well-balanced critical judgements on a range of debates - though her discussion of liberal, Marxist and anarchist approaches seems to this reviewer biased towards an account of 'Marxism' that few Marxists would recognize. In attempting to situate the changing context of debate, she argues for a "weak postmodernism" but within this makes some telling criticisms of 'civil society' theories. Her discussion of feminist democratic theory suggests that 'second wave feminism' offered alternatives to classical arguments about reform or revolution by its stress on autonomous feminist mobilization and small group consciousness raising, its focus on cultural production and its rejection of 'state centrism'. This seems to evade some rather important strategic issues. In her brief discussion of militarism, for example, she notes that it is "still saturated with gendered codes and divisions of labour" - which is undeniably true, but leaves one asking: Is that the chief problem with militarism? The strongest chapter is that on 'feminist movement democracy', where she reviews the Freeman/Levine debate and discusses black and third world feminist critiques of (white) feminist theory. The final two chapters open new territory, in asking what feminist theory can contribute to questions about the relationship between globalization and democracy. As she notes, many of the theorists she dissects here are "relatively dissociated from movement efforts to reconstruct politics on the ground". If I'm not convinced by her own treatment of the matter of globalization and democracy, I also have to admit that the whole area still awaits any very satisfying treatment. This reviewer has two doubts about this book. The first concerns the resolute focus on the more abstract end of academic discussion. It is not always clear what the relevance of academic contributions is. Do they matter in movements? Do the actual dialogues within and around movements themselves - the 'direct theorizing' about activity, organization, leadership, coalitions, participation and the like - not provide more interesting and fruitful materials for discussion than the abstract schemas of academic theorists? The practical complexity of arguments about the contributions of women and of feminist arguments in movements in work like, say, Robnett's How Long?
How Long? (Oxford, 1997) have a richness of context and content which could enliven some of the rather arid schematics of some of the writers on whom Eschle has focused. The second is about how to situate many of the debates covered here. The 'texts' Eschle analyzes, often with great acuity, attain some of their prominence from their disconnection from movement contexts of production, a prominence I'm not sure they always deserve. There is a good case to be made that the period in which much of what is discussed here, which was itself rather conservative, was a period of retreat, or 'downturn', or 'trough' in the waves of movement development. The movements symbolized by the word 'Seattle' were beginning, but had not yet begun to register clearly on academic horizons. Feminist activism is moving on. In Seattle, a barebreasted Lesbian Avengers of Santa Cruz told a street interviewer, "My nipples stand in solidarity with the steelworkers and Teamsters and all the labouring people". Both the cheerful humour and the identification register, perhaps, something new which the often rather sorrowful tone of the writers in Eschle's book misses. Issues to do with feminism, social movements, democracy and globalization could be about to become more lively - at least, I hope so. Robert K. Fullinwider (ed.), Civil Society, Democracy, and Civic Renewal, Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 1999, 433 pp., USD 26.95, ISBN 0-84769356-2 (pbk) / USD 82.00, ISBN 0-8476-9355-4 (hbk). Reviewed by Petr Kopecky (Leiden University) Civil society has become a popular concept in contemporary political science. It features permanently in comparative studies of democratisation; it has recently gained prominence in the studies on the quality and performance of democracy in the developed industrial countries, with debates revolving most notably around Putnam's concept of social capital; the imagination of students of both international political economy and international relations has been captured by the emergence of an active network of groups that transcend national boundaries, considered to constitute an international/global civil society. However, given the wide range of interests and theoretical traditions involved in the various fields of the discipline, it is unsurprising to find that views on the meaning, importance, and normative value of the concept of civil society vary considerably among authors. The collection of papers edited by Robert Fullinwider is no exception in this respect. Indeed, it is precisely the variety of meanings and implications of civil society that this book aims to
examine by bringing together writings of several well-known US historians, political scientists and sociologists. Two features define this book. First, it is almost exclusively focused on American society and on American debates about the process of civic renewal. This means that the (few) empirical chapters in the book analyse solely activities and structures of groups in the US; most examples referred to by authors dealing with more conceptual and philosophical issues (majority of chapters) are also drawn from America. Second, rather than focusing on one major theme, the book highlights a relatively broad range of issues revolving around the concept of civil society. These issues are raised in 17 substantial chapters; some deal with definitions of civil society and related implications for its democratic potential; some consider the relationship between civil society and political structures, namely the government; finally, many chapters deal with the relationship between civil society and the attitudes and behaviour of citizens. These two defining features are the book's strength as well as its weakness. By focusing on one country, one can better see how various theoretical propositions made in the book relate to the empirical reality of associational life, without accounting for the different social and cultural context in which civil society groups operate if a broader cross-country/regional comparison was involved. It also gives the book at least some cohesion. However, the focus on the practical debate about the regeneration of political life in the contemporary US inevitably limits the scope for generalisations, especially to the Western European context (with its dominant focus on activities of social movements and contentious politics), as well as to many transition societies (with the dominant focus on civil society's ability to constrain and redemocratise the state). In other words, the book shows that the debate on civil society in the US owes much to Putnam's (and partly also to Fukuyama's) extraordinarily influential work on the impact of networks of voluntary associations on citizen's predispositions (moral, organisational etc.), and thus on institutional efficacy. Indeed, only a few chapters in this book are not directly engaged with some of Putnam's arguments. It must be said, though, that on offer here are several superbly argued and thought-provoking pieces of work that are not only critical of Putnam (especially the chapter by Jean Cohen), but also of the many other propositions that the ever growing group of keen advocates of civil society make. Thus, despite a particular empirical and theoretical focus, the book will be of great value to everyone interested in the critical assessment of a wide array of issues associated with the current civil society debate(s).
John Haskell, Direct Democracy or Representative Government. Dispelling the Populist Myth, Boulder and London, Westview, 2001, 212 pp., GBP 20.99, ISBN 0-8133-9783-9 (pbk). Reviewed by Yannis Papadopoulos (University of Lausanne) John Haskell deplores the "triumph" in American politics of simple populist ideas (p.12). Polls indicate that "by overwhelming majorities Americans believe that the country is run by a few big interests and not for the benefit of the people" (p. 3). This is caused by alienation from politics and distrust in politicians, and it results in a decline in turnout (although this is not an isolated American phenomenon, which the author fails to mention). Ballot initiatives and referenda are increasingly used in the US and polls regularly report strong support for a national referendum (the US is one of the few countries with no experience of direct democracy at the national level). Politicians are "almost obsessive consumers of polling data and other sources of information about what their constituents think" (p.37). New communication technologies contribute to the "populist age", for the author believes they promote "instant" democracy instead of deliberation (p.2). Haskell asks relevant questions and provides differentiated answers when he is well-informed, or modest answers when empirical knowledge is lacking (pp.86 ff.) Are voters sufficiently informed to make their choices in direct democracy? Haskell finds the evidence inconclusive and thinks it is hard to find any criteria for measuring voter competence. He also believes it is "probably impossible to measure" (p.105) whether representative or direct democracy is more special-interest driven. Although he defends a "presumption in favor of representative democracy" (p.106) regarding the degree of scrutiny plebiscites should be given as compared to laws made by representatives, he argues that debate on that issue is continuing. He notes that "minority groups prefer to use as venues representative institutions, knowing they cannot achieve majorities in plebiscites" (p.111), but gives no definite answer to the question of whether direct democracy is more threatening for minorities than representative democracy. Ultimately, Haskell provides a convincing definition of the dimensions of political responsibility (p.113) and maintains that the contribution of direct democracy to responsible government is poor. That could be related to the fact that ordinary voters are unaccountable (p.164) but no such connection is made. Surprisingly, the author concludes that, in the end, these considerations are not very relevant (p.149) because the populist position that the majority principle is central to democracy has won. Why this is so, is not argued in a
very convincing manner, and the author underestimates the reasons for dissatisfaction with representative institutions. Although he refers to delegation of power to "bureaucrats" and "judges" (p.169), and acknowledges that "some of the public cynicism is well founded" (p.37), he maintains that "much of it probably represents nothing more than an intense dislike of the inevitable messiness of democratic politics" (p.37). Hence he engages in a deconstruction of the populist argument that voting would reflect the preferences expressed by the population. He relies on public choice arguments (summarised on p.123), and particularly on the paradox of voting that makes the "popular will" hard to detect, and its translation into policy choices potentially dangerous (p.3), especially through initiatives and referenda which are blunt instruments. Several examples are provided of decisions by rational individuals resulting in irrational collective choices, due to the complexity of public opinion or to the arbitrariness of decisional procedures. Haskell insists that public choice findings can "dispell the populist myth" only if they are "translated into plain English" for they "use highly technical jargon and relatively sophisticated mathematics" (p.122). Furthermore, he argues that public policy in parliaments "is the result of compromise, negotiation, and consensus" (p.156) because "the process of negotiation is thought to produce the best resolution", while in direct democracy it is (erroneously) expected that the vote itself will produce such an outcome. Finally, and in contrast to an idealised view of a participatory democracy, Haskell correctly notes that participation has an upper-class bias (p.80). Unfortunately the differentiated picture of the performances of direct and representative democracy is distorted when Haskell expresses his normative preferences (esp. pp.150-3). He thinks that a wider use of direct democracy would have a corrosive effect on representative institutions. Although his account of American politics at the state level is convincing, that would not be true in a consociational polity like Switzerland. Haskell defends the Madisonian view of the need for procedural checks to majority opinion, and for fair deliberative procedures that deploy taming effects (p.16). He assigns to voting procedures the limited role of ensuring the accountability of representatives through elections (stated differently, output-assessment instead of input-formulation). Haskell is confident that "a properly functioning representative democracy gives people control over the policy-makers at the ballot box" (p.17), responsiveness being generated through the "threat of replacement" (p.163). Nevertheless, elections can only perform that role if voters' behaviour is retrospective (which is empirically challenged), and if governments can anticipate it. Finally (as perceptions show) compromise
politics can be viewed by outsiders as collusive action (by "cartel parties", etc.), and become their target. In sum this book is stronger in its empirical than in its normative parts, and contains some unnecessary repetitions. Michael Hechter, Containing Nationalism, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000, 256pp., GBP 19.99, ISBN 0-19-829742-4 (hbk). Reviewed by Brian Jenkins (University of Leeds) Theories of nationalism reflect the preoccupations of the era in which they were developed, and much has changed in the last decades. The rise of regional 'micronationalisms' in long-established West European states from the late 1960s onwards was a surprising development, but not necessarily an alarming one for (neo-)Marxists who were broadly sympathetic to the leftist discourse of most of these movements. How different the context is today when, after a decade of savage inter-ethnic conflict in ex-Yugoslavia and parts of the former Soviet Union, the term 'nationalism' has again acquired such overwhelmingly negative connotations. It is hardly surprising that explaining nationalism should now be geared to the task of containing it. Hechter's (1975) theory of internal colonialism gave primacy to economic processes. However, one of the most distinctive features of Hechter's thesis was that the occupational differences between core and periphery are reinforced by cultural ones, as the sense of relative deprivation increases solidarity and interaction within the group, and increases resistance to incorporation by the core. This model was subsequently revised in order to extend its explanatory range, and Hechter's emphasis switched to the more sociological domain of group formation, where he used 'rational choice' analysis to elucidate the development of group solidarity. In Containing Nationalism there are few traces of the alleged 'economic reductionism' of the original thesis. Indeed, according to Hechter (p.25) purely technical conditions (like print capitalism, transport infrastructure, industrialisation) "are insufficient to account for the emergence of nations. They do not preordain a sense of common history, a concept of the homeland, or any of the other aforementioned requirements of nationhood". The introduction thus focuses on 'group formation' and the 'determinants of group solidarity', on the mechanics of group dependence and social control which in turn engender the social and physical boundaries within which identities develop. So ultimately, according to Hechter (p.23) "the articulation and
promotion of culturally distinctive institutions (my emphasis) is the joint good that lies at the core of nation-formation". The existence of nations is not sufficient, however, to account for the development of nationalism, which requires the extra ingredient of the desire for national self-determination. And it is at this point that Hechter grafts onto his existing theoretical apparatus a distinctly political set of variables. To quote, "there is no motive for nationalism when the boundaries of the nation and the governance unit are congruent, for then the nation already has selfdetermination" (p.26). But, as he then proceeds to explain, the governance unit is not necessarily the same thing as the state. For example, the great agrarian empires of pre-nineteenth century Europe encompassed several nations, but this did not create the conditions for nationalism because the state relied on indirect rule via local agents. Indeed, this helps explain why nationalism is a modern phenomenon - it is only with the development of direct rule by the modern centralised state (or the collapse of the centre in multinational empires) that non-congruence of nation and governance unit becomes likely and sets in motion the forces of nationalism. This may take the form of state-building nationalism where the core seeks to incorporate and homogenise the periphery, or peripheral nationalism where local populations are mobilised in defence of their prerogatives, or the unification and irredentist nationalisms that follow in the wake of such processes. Subsequent chapters seek to illustrate this typology, but the axiom "indirect rule thwarts nationalism" (p.28) also of course points to the strategies for 'containing nationalism', which are discussed in the final chapter. Unsurprisingly, qualified support is thus extended to federalist programmes in relatively centralised states, but at the same time a less predictable observation concerns the future of 'class politics'. Hechter notes that the development of public welfare institutions in post-war western Europe was designed to assuage class conflict, but by strengthening political centralisation (direct rule) has "had the unanticipated effect of sowing the seeds of nationalism" (p.159). He concludes by speculating that the demise of the welfare state may "revive class politics in its wake". This is an ambitious attempt to develop a general explanatory framework for nationalism, and it undoubtedly has considerable interpretative power. The distinction between direct and indirect rule (and between state and governance unit) is a helpful one, though it scarcely seems a natural extension of Hechter's earlier work. Indeed, his theoretical perspective now seems to encompass three distinctive processes and stages - the laying of the economic foundations of nation-formation (ensuring
territorial exchange and interaction), the socio-cultural processes of actual nation-formation (determinants of group solidarity), and the political processes engendering nationalism (direct rule). However, while the introduction of a political variable is welcome, the overall model inevitably feels somewhat mechanistic and a-historical in its efforts to encompass all cases. If the politics of nationalism is to be given due recognition, then surely it cannot simply be reduced to patterns of territorial governance? Surely account also needs to be taken of notions of political legitimacy in the age of mass politics, of the political diversity of nationalist programmes, of the different political value systems that may underpin national identities? It is significant in this respect that Hechter counterposes 'class politics' and (ethnic) 'identity politics' as mutually exclusive alternatives. But surely in the real world 'nationalisms' and 'national identities' articulate much more than just the generalised aspiration to self-government - they may be the vehicles for a range of social and political values and objectives, including those associated with the politics of 'class'. Abby Peterson, Contemporary Political Protest: Essays on Political Militancy, Aldershot: Ashgate, 2001, 190 pp., GBP 39.95, ISBN 0-75460569-8 (hbk). Reviewed by Tomas Nilsson (University of Aberdeen) Abby Peterson is well-known within Swedish academic circles, and currently resides at the Department of Sociology at the University of Gothenburg. Her latest work,Contemporary Political Protest, will not be reviewed from a sociologist's perspective, but rather from that of a political scientist. I will freely admit that this is a caveat in case readers wonder why certain aspects have been highlighted, and others have not etc. The book is divided into five sections, each dealing with topical questions and problems that were the central focus for much of 2001 - until September 11th and Osama bin Laden replaced them at the top of the political and public agendas throughout the Western world. The areas focused on are: a) political action spaces, b) political actions, c) political militancy and the media, d) militancy and secrecy, and e) militancy and modernity. The first essay The Action Spaces of Militancy delves into the reasons behind the construction of several political counter-cultures, and their respective rivalry. I would argue that it is a piece of research much needed in political science if we are to better understand why younger generations increasingly
shy away from mainstream political culture, and their representatives - the political parties. The theoretical concepts are very sound, but, as will become apparent, I would argue that this side is secondary to the main contribution of the book - a greater understanding of the political values prevalent amongst 'youths on the outside'. Chapter two Actions Speak Louder Than Words sees the researcher engage with the emotions associated with political action, and with those that are the very basis of collective militant action. This part of the book analyses the interactive processes of conflict, and it places an emphasis on the construction of a hostile group mentality that separates societies into 'us' and 'them'. This is particularly useful as Peterson deals explicitly with political militancy, thus with groups that have a history of confrontation with the state machinery. It should be pointed out that this sort of group mentality could also easily develop within non-violent groups. The third chapter deals with the manifestation of political militancy and the 'embodiment' of political resistance. It addresses the sum total of physical and mental experiences of political militants. It discusses how the 'movement' is born through the use of direct-action, be it against individuals, corporations, or property. She argues that this is a 'hot' struggle of passions, far removed from the remoteness exhibited by the politicians and institutions it is aimed at. The rationality and acceptability of such actions are discussed. However, how do we re-introduce these elements into the mainstream of politics? The next essay The Militant Politics of Secrecy analyses how secrecy impacts on the construction of a collective identity amongst these groupings; which the author refers to as neo-sects. As the book pertains specifically to politically militant youths, it is no surprise that the use of the Internet should be addressed. However, it is shown that these groups are well aware of the potential for intensive police surveillance should they utilise this form of communication. One young activist from ALF says that it is difficult to organise large actions without the use of the net, but that they always opt for the dissemination of information by a network of people if feasible. Another separate feature of this politics of secrecy is a strengthening of the group mentality ('us' vs. 'them'). The fifth and final essay deals with media modernity and how media relations can either mean the making or unmaking of a particular cause/group. It is argued that in thepost-modern world, a term which I personally find rather too ambiguous, politics is increasingly being fought on the front-pages of tabloids. There is a warning that mass media relationships are not always beneficial,
and that they can actually widen the rift between the militant 'outsider' and mainstream political culture. The final discussion centres on the use of alternative channels of political communication - the increased use of the Internet as both a communications tool and, perhaps more importantly, as the site of future political militancy. Will these militant organisations launch the next phase of direct action in the form of cyber-terrorism? Why not read the book and find out for yourself... David C. Rapoport and Leonard Weinberg (eds.), The Democratic Experience and Political Violence, London; Portland, OR: Frank Cass, 2001, 378 pp., GBP 42.50, ISBN 0-7146-5150-8 (hbk), GBP 18.50/ USD 26.50, ISBN 0-7146-8167-9 (pbk). Reviewed by John M. Cotter (University of Kentucky) The origins of this volume go back to a 1997 conference entitled "Democracy and Violence", then to a special issue of Terrorism and Political Violence (12/3-4, Autumn 2000), and now published in book form by Frank Cass. The purpose was to bring together a group of prominent scholars concerned with the connection between democracy and political violence. As many of the contributors acknowledge, the lack of attention to this relationship is a significant shortcoming in the literature. This is all the more glaring if one considers the amount of attention paid to the relationship between inter-state war and regime type, with many concluding that democracies do not go to war against one another. The focus of this volume is on the domestic side, but the conventional wisdom is the same -- democracies are widely regarded as inherently more stable because they allow dissenting opinions to be expressed and provide peaceful methods of participation. The contributors here challenge this popular notion, concluding that democracies do not necessarily restrain political violence, and upon closer scrutiny, democracies may even encourage domestic political violence. Given the size and scope of this volume (15 chapters excluding the editors introductory and concluding remarks, covering several types of political violence), one of the more difficult tasks is to provide some kind of organization. The main subject areas that Rapoport and Weinberg identified are: elections, conflicts between domestic and international imperatives, ethnic violence, and a "general concerns" category (including the "benefits" of violence, why "democratic violence" never ends, and common explanations of violent eruptions in democracies). There is, however, considerable crossover among the chapters in terms of subject matter.
Almost all of the authors at least touch on the issue of elections and political violence, and it is the primary concern of several. Policymakers and negotiators in especially divided societies, who often push for elections to help demonstrate and consolidate democracy (or at least democratization), may be surprised by the findings of several chapters. As Rapoport and Weinberg argue in their contribution on "succession moments" in various political systems, "Ballots may avert bullets; but ballots seem to provoke bullets, too, because violence appears in each phase of the election process". Their chapter is rich in examples of going from "ballots to bullets" over time and across continents, and concludes with a typology of justifications for initiating election violence. Adrian Guelke looks at 1996 elections in Israel, Northern Ireland, and South Africa and finds that elections held under the continued threat of violence from extremists may further polarize countries, rather than advance a peace process. Another connection between the chapters is the recurring question of how much democracies should tolerate the intolerant. John Finn analyzes the numerous trade-offs for governments considering proscribing anti-democratic parties. Although he does not arrive at a firm conclusion, he maps out a series of questions for future case studies in addressing the question of whether banning the intolerant from participation actually promotes or undermines democracy. In a very timely chapter, Raphael Israeli deals with the complex relationship between Western and Islamic countries, which can become strained even though both contend they are acting in the interests of democracy. Western democracies often admit members of opposition groups in Islamic countries based on claims of political asylum. These opposition groups (some with a questionable commitment to democratic principles) may then freely establish organizations that seek to undermine the legitimacy of governments in the Middle East-the same governments that receive at least tacit support from the West in their battle against Islamic fundamentalism, sometimes by non-democratic means. Also of interest is the subject of the "benefits" of political violence, perhaps more appropriately called unintended consequences of violence in democracies. Ehud Sprinzak's chapter on extremism and violence in Israeli politics argues that the assassination of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin in 1995 by an Israeli right-wing religious militant caused such shock and outrage that extremists were further marginalized. One could make a similar argument about the militia movement in the United States -- following the Oklahoma City bombing, the anti-government militia movement went into steady decline. In Eastern Europe, according to Andrzej Korbonski, the horrors of World War II
and the Communist take-over contributed to largely peaceful transitions in 1989 based on greater popular support for democracy. William Eubank and Leonard Weinberg, taking issue with Robert Putnam's conclusions in Making Democracy Work, find that the most "civic" regions of Italy were also the areas with greater fascist mobilization and violence in the interwar era -- concluding that episodes of violence (even relatively recent ones) do not present an insurmountable barrier to the development of democracy. This review has merely scratched the surface of the diversity of issues touched upon in this volume. One will not find any theoretical breakthroughs here, but that is not the intention of the editors. Rather, it is to stimulate further attention to the relationship between democracy and political violence (hypothesis-generating analysis in most cases, rather than hypothesistesting). The number of contributors makes this book good value, but it is in the provocative nature of the contributions that the editors truly succeed in their goal. Winfried Schubarth and Richard StĂśss (eds.), Rechtsextremismus in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland. Eine Bilanz, Opladen: Leske+Budrich, 2001, 357 pp., EUR 18.50, ISBN 3-8100-3115-1 (pbk). Reviewed by Fabian Virchow (University of Applied Sciences Kiel) Schubarth and StĂśss have produced a valuable addition to the growing literature on the far right in Germany. Rechtsextremismus in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland is a sound, scholarly study that gives an up-todate inventory of the research and debate about far right extremism in Germany. In the first part (Extremism in Comparative Perspective), Gero Neugebauer outlines some basic approaches to analysing extremism, both right and left. Focusing on the left, Neugebauer is right when he says that the onedimensionality of the concept of extremism and its orientation towards a normative understanding of democracy yield only very little knowledge about the phenomenon. In a very packed overview, JĂźrgen B. Winkler not only lists the different elements of the ideology of the far right (e.g. racism, nationalism), but analyses if, how and to what extent these elements are interrelated. Furthermore, he discusses different approaches to analysing the far right (psychological profile, political culture, social change, relative deprivation). The second and most extensive part of the book is about the phenomenology of right-wing extremism covering the development of fields of activity (action,
violence, culture, politics) by Armin Pfahl-Traughber, the ideology and strategy of the far right (Richard Stรถss), the development of antisemitic attitudes (Werner Bergmann), far right extremism and young people (Bernd Wagner), far right attitudes of young people and young adults (Corinna Kleinert and Johann de Rijke), far right extremism and the relationship of sexes (Birgit Rommelspacher), and far right attitudes and elections (Kai Arzheimer et. al.). All contributions offer a concise account combining theoretical knowledge with the results of empirical research. Some chapters, like the one by Wagner, should have been longer because of the growing relevance of the wide-spread, diffuse rightist youth culture in Germany with its own cultural codes. This may have resulted in an up-to-date analysis about the new structures of mobilisation and integration of young people that the neo-nazi movement has developed over the last few years. Relevant developments like the emergence of a neo-nazi music business or the growing number of rallies, which perform quite specific functions inside the movement and have an effect on society, have to be taken into consideration. This kind of analysis, which should make use of research of social movements, will offer knowledge about the interrelation between the micro level (attitudes), the meso level (organisations) and the macro level (society) with regard to the far right in Germany. How to deal with far right extremism is at the centre of the final part of the book. The first two of the four articles in this part deal with educational and pedagogical approaches. Wilfried Schubarth gives an overview of some very basic approaches when confronted with young far rightists at school or in youth work. He argues that preventive as well as interventive activities have to be embedded into a comprehensive strategy. Franz Josef Krafeld introduces and discusses an approach that has become well known as 'accepting youth work' in Germany. This approach interprets far right attitudes of young people as efforts to escape from a situation that is characterised by feelings of powerlessness and to search for means of coping with the vicissitudes of life. Youth work, therefore, has to 'accept' far right attitudes for the time being in order to come into contact with them. Social workers will offer their support to solve day-to-day problems, thereby offering a perspective that is not related to far right attitudes or organisations. Krafeld, who has contributed to this approach extensively, does not withhold that there is profound criticism of this approach. This leads him to formulate some limitations for doing social work with young rightists and to adjust his approach. Christoph Butterwegge picks up the concept of political culture and discusses the behaviour and conduct of relevant societal actors (political parties, trade
unions, the media) towards far right extremism. His conclusions focus on the strengthening of progressive traditions of German political culture, such as the Republican values of the 1848 revolution, the ideals of solidarity and emancipation of the revolution from November 1918, and the grass-roots impulses of the citizen rights movement in the GDR in 1989. Finally, HansGerd Jaschke gives a short overview of how the secret service, the police, and judiciary deal with far right extremism. Especially his conclusion that the secret service (Verfassungsschutz) has gained some reputation as a "source of information about political extremism" (p 322) may be out-dated in light of recent developments in Germany (i.e. the activities of agents and contacts inside the neo-fascist NPD may threaten the legal proceedings to ban this party). Finally, a very useful aspect of this book is its bibliography, which lists some hundred publications in 28 categories such as "concepts and problems of researching right-wing extremism", "antisemitism", "women and the far right", or "far right media". Stephen D. Shenfield, Russian Fascism: Traditions, Tendencies, Movements. Armonk, NY and London, UK: M.E. Sharpe 2001, xiv + 337 pp., USD 66.95, ISBN 0-7656-0634-8 (hbk) / USD 29.95, ISBN 0-7656-06356 (pbk). Reviewed by Andreas Umland (Harvard University) Is there fascism in Russia today, and, if so, how important a phenomenon is it? This book by Stephen Shenfield, a well-informed, independent researcher of contemporary Russian affairs, provides the most comprehensive account of the particular ideas and overall significance of post-Soviet Russian ultranationalism published in a Western language. Shenfield starts with a short review of competing conceptualizations of fascism in the Western and Russian literature. On the basis of this, he presents his own, new, eclectic definition of generic fascism. He then asks: Does Russia have a fascist tradition?, and surveys 19th and 20th century Russian pre-revolutionary and Soviet nationalist thought and politics. His conclusion is that there were few significant, fully fascist ideas espoused by Russian publicists and politicians before the fall of the Soviet Union. Interestingly, Shenfield identifies Konstantin Leontiev (1831-91) as a significant pre-cursor of Russian fascism, a classification that may raise controversy among students of Russian thought.
Shenfield then moves to the contemporary political scene, and searches for fascist tendencies in nationalist intellectual circles, the various communist successor-parties, the Orthodox churches, and the neo-pagan movement. His fourth chapter is devoted to putatively fascist trends in the Cossack, skinhead, and soccer-fan sub-cultures. Chapter five deals with Zhirinovskii's so-called Liberal-Democratic Party of Russia. Chapter six tells the story of the rise and fall of Barkashov's neo-Nazi Russian National Unity party. Chapter seven analyzes two of the foremost Russian neo-fascist publicists, Aleksandr Dugin and Eduard Limonov as well as the latter's National-Bolshevik Party. Chapter eight surveys a number of lesser-known Russian extremely nationalist parties with fascist tendencies, or a clearly fascist doctrine. Chapter nine compares those organizations identified as fully or partly fascist in terms of their organizational structures, activities, strategies, and ideologies. In his conclusions, Shenfield asks whether it is appropriate to speak of a "Weimar Russia". Although there is "no significant near-term danger of a fascist conquest of power [...] the possibility of [such a development] in Russia in the longer term is not completely excluded" (p. 262). In a short afterword, Shenfield comments on the cracks within, and beginning dissolution of the party he had paid most attention to, Barkashov's Russkoe Natsional'noe Edinstvo. His impressive 26-page bibliography is accompanied with a short bibliographical note on the poor state of Russian and Anglo-Saxon research into contemporary Russian extreme nationalism, and right-radical party politics. Against this background, Shenfield's book is pioneering in at least two regards. First, his book represents an exemplary and uniquely successful venture to synthesize the findings of the author's own, close reading of a multitude of primary sources with a wide variety of Russian and Western secondary scholarly, publicistic and journalistic accounts. With the exception of some relevant German-language books and papers, Shenfield uses almost all the significant Russian and Western secondary literature that is available today. Second, Shenfield makes a serious attempt to integrate his research into the Russian extreme right in the field of comparative fascist study. In his introductory chapter, he introduces as many as 28 Western and Russian definitions of, or statements on, generic fascism. From this survey, Shenfield's extracts four different definitions of fascism that he uses in the ensuing narrative to test the fascist character of this or that Russian ideology. The limitations of space do not allow this review to do full justice to the
sophisticated (though, in my view, ultimately, misleading) interpretation of fascism as an international phenomenon that Shenfield presents. Apart from Shenfield's idiosyncratic conceptualization of generic fascism, there are only a few principal issues which require comment. With regard to Zhirinovskii's LDPR, Shenfield's characterization of this party's "ideology in the most recent period as one of national-imperial liberalism, severely contaminated, but not overwhelmed, by fascist elements" (p. 104) is, in my view, unnecessarily confusing. A characterization of a party as containing both, genuinely liberal and clearly fascist elements, raises more questions than it answers. Certainly, there are non-fascist elements in Zhirinovskii's party; but it would create a misleading impression to conceptualize these as liberal in any meaningful sense (something that is frequently done, however, in Russian typologies of the Russian party spectrum). Notwithstanding these and a few other imprecisions, I would once more single out Shenfield's book as by far the most informative analysis and pertinent interpretation of the post-Soviet Russian extreme Right published in the West since 1993. Shenfield is to be congratulated for having produced as dense an analysis as this of a phenomenon that is now barely ten years old. His book will surely become a standard reference in the fields of post-Soviet Russian party politics, and comparative fascist studies alike. Roger W. Stump, Boundaries of Faith: Geographical Perspectives on Religious Fundamentalism. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2000, 249 pp., USD 28.95, ISBN 0-8476-9320-1 (pbk) / USD 79.00, ISBN 0-84769319-8 (hbk). Reviewed by Steven Leonard Jacobs (University of Alabama) Among the myriad of complex realities of our so-called modern world have been the rise of fundamentalisms in all of the major identified religious communities: Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, and Sikhism. Texts have been analyzed; the communities themselves have been described and visited; historical roots have been both traced and argued; and leaders, both dead and living, have been studied and, where appropriate, interviewed all in a serious attempt by both scholars and popularizers (e.g. journalists and filmmakers) to understand not only these communities themselves but their impact on and relationship to the larger societies of which they are a part. Now comes Roger W. Stump, adding a perspective, while perhaps all too easily acknowledged, readily overlooked: that of the role and function of place in the evolution of these fundamentalist religious groups.
Early on, he identifies two major themes in this relatively short book: "the concept of contextuality - the idea that social and cultural phenomena are shaped by the specific geographical settings within which they develop" (p.2), and "the geographical character through which fundamentalist movements have responded to the contemporary world" out of "their desire to control space" (p.3). Equally, he sees these movements in the aggregate "denouncing the effects of modernism, secularism, pluralism, colonialism, or imperialism" (p.5), the result of which is the setting up of boundaries which, over the course of time, become increasingly rigidified barriers to interaction with "the others" and center themselves on specific locations (e.g. specific neighborhoods in Israel, cities in India, countries in opposition: India versus Pakistan, the pure Islamic world versus the corrupt non-Islamic world). In Chapter 1, "Introduction", Stump not only lays out his own interpretation of fundamentalism and provides the non-geographer with perspectives on religious fundamentalism from that academic discipline, importantly, he also categorizes what he refers to as "territorial concerns" important to those groups: (1) concepts of sacred space, (2) attempts to control secular space, (3) ideological boundaries, and (4) identification with a certain place or region (pp.18-21). Chapter 2, "Fundamentalist Hearths", concretizes his original discussion in terms of (1) Protestant fundamentalists in North America, (2) Jewish fundamentalists primarily though not exclusively in Israel, (3) Islamic fundamentalists in a variety of settings in the Middle East and India; and (4) Hindu and Sikh fundamentalists in India. As he contextualizes each community both historically and contemporarily, we cannot avoid reaching the conclusion that there are uncanny similarities in the way these groups tend to view the world both inside their own microcosmic societies and negatively the larger macrocosmic societies as well. Chapter 3, "Global Variations in Contemporary Fundamentalism", addresses those societies/geographic settings where fundamentalists are dominant (Iran, Afghanistan, Sudan), those where fundamentalists are participants as a "necessary evil" (North America, Israel, Egypt, Pakistan, Malaysia, India, Sri Lanka), and those where fundamentalists are isolated (Israel, Thailand, Egypt, India). Chapter 4, "Geographical Dimensions of Fundamentalism", examines the control of designated "sacred space" on the part of fundamentalist communities, both those already in possession of such spaces and those whose increasingly violent attempts to wrest such control endangers state
peace (Jews-Jews and Jews-Muslims in Israel, Hindus-Muslims in India, Muslims-Muslims in Saudi Arabia, Sikhs-Hindus in India), as well as those geographic settings where fundamentalists have, also, attempted to control secular space (Jews in Israel, Muslims in Iran and Afghanistan, Protestants in the United States). Stump further address those geographic settings where territory is inextricably bound up with the concept of identity (Hindus in India, Buddhists in Sri Lanka, Sikhs in Punjab). Chapter 5, "The Impacts of Fundamentalism", summarizes and draws together the various threads woven through the book. As Stump correctly notes: "The usefulness of the concept of fundamentalism lies in its ability to characterize the common features of these diverse religious movements. All expressions of fundamentalism exhibit a strong commitment to religious tradition, both in belief and practice, and based on that commitment, they develop an exclusive sense of group identity that sets their adherents apart from the rest of society. A fundamentalist group's adoption of such an identity serves as the foundation for a larger strategy to combat forces that it believes threatens its traditions. The most important feature of that strategy is the group's involvement in various forms of activism aimed at protecting its beliefs or advancing its objectives... By definition, fundamentalists are discontent with the current state of the surrounding society and adamantly oppose trends or groups that threaten their religious traditions (p.213). Stump further argues that the ever-present potential for societal conflict inherent in the fundamentalist outlook is based upon two factors: the group's affirmation of the correctness of its position ("The Truth as opposed to a truth") and its rootedness in an equally-affirming sense of territoriality, both its own historical and present center and the larger canvas of the world itself. Thus, the tensions which exist throughout our world between aggressive fundamentalisms and the larger societies and nation-states where they reside are not about to disappear any time soon. Boundaries of Faith is an important contribution to the growing literature on this increasingly volatile and frightening topic, as the tragic and horrific events of 11 September 2001 in the United States and the fall of the Taliban and Al-Queda in Afghanistan continue to remind us on a daily basis. Ronald Tiersky (ed.), Euro-Skepticism: A Reader, Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 2001, 328 pp., USD 24.95, ISBN 0-7425-1054-9 / USD 75.00, ISBN 0-7425-1053-0 (hbk).
Reviewed by Paul Taggart (Georgetown University & Sussex European Institute) There would be a teaching use for a good collection of Eurosceptic arguments but this book is not it. Euro-Skepticism: A Reader is an extraordinary collection of writings. This is no reflection on the collected pieces but on the selection. To be fair, Tiersky admits that this book "came together rapidly" and is designed as an accompaniment to the "Europe Today" series and therefore aimed at American college students. But even with those points in mind, this seems such a strange choice of writings to put together, missing so much of relevance, and including so much of tangential interest. I find it a little disconcerting that US undergraduates might mistake this collection for a representative sample of Eurosceptic arguments or of analyses of Euroscepticism. The collection starts with an introduction by Tiersky which suggests we differentiate between Euro-skepticism, Euro-pessimism, Euro-phobia and Eurocynicism. The rest of the collection seems a hotch-potch. They include sections from the political memoirs of De Gaulle and Thatcher detailing their records on Europe which are useful enough; a reprint of a 1966 essay by Stanley Hoffman about France, the nation-state and Europe which is interesting mainly as a historical curio; an essay on the Norwegian relationship to the EU; speeches from politicians (including Thatcher's Bruges speech and one by Michael Portillo); two interviews with Jean-Marie Le Pen; three pieces on the EU's response to Haider's Freedom Party becoming part of the Austrian government (including an interview with Haider that has more on his childhood acting aspirations than on his view of Europe and a diary account of a visit to Austria by Jacques Le Rider); a rather mundane letter to the New York Review of Books from Robert Conquest in reply to Michael Ignatieff's review of his book; a long piece by John J. Mearsheimer about nuclear defence and the bi-polar and multi-polar Europes which is interesting enough but of scant interest to those who want to know about Euroscepticism.; and, finally, a number of other reprints with the New York Review of Books being the most favoured source of Eurosceptic materials. All in all, the focus on Euroscepticism seems at best tangential. There are three pieces that are useful statements of Euroscepticism. First, Thatcher's Bruges Speech. This is worth reading as it is more often mentioned than read and makes a case for European integration and for a wider Europe (as well as opposing the centralisation of the EC). Michael Portillo's 1998 lecture "Democratic Values and the Currency" is a well rendered critique of the democratic difficulties of European economic union. And Noel Malcolm's
1995 essay "The Case Against 'Europe'" is a good example of a trenchant Eurosceptic position. But there could have been so many more of these (for example, manifesto selections by Eurosceptic parties of the rightand left perhaps the Danish June Movement or the Swedish Greens, editorials from The Sun in the UK and speeches by Meciar in Slovakia or other Central and Eastern European Eurosceptics). This reviewer would welcome a good book collecting examples of the wide range of Eurosceptic positions. This is not it. This is not a comprehensive collection that would allow the teaching of different Eurosceptic positions. For one thing it has (with the exception of Chevenment) no representation of the Eurosceptic position of those on the left or on the new left. It does not represent any Euroscepticism from the current EU candidate states and therefore misses some of the most interesting contemporary Eurosceptic arguments that have come from Central and Eastern Europe. The collection seems oblivious to any existing scholarship on Euroscepticism or on the domestic politics of European integration and therefore is a poor guide to further reading. At times, it seems to lose sight of the subject altogether. This is an esoteric, incomplete and eccentric collection of writings. If readers want to do better than this for teaching purposes in their search for statements of Euroscepticism, I strongly suggest that an hour or so, a web search engine and a non-Americanised, non-hyphenated spelling of Euroscepticism will be far more fruitful.