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In prehistoric times, Southeast Asian women enjoyed high status. When, how and why did that change? This book explores the history of gender relations through economics, politics, art and literature. This title is a narrative and visual tour de force, of interest to scholars and the general public.
The Islamic kingdom of Aceh was ruled by queens for half of the 17th century. Was female rule an aberration? Unnatural? A violation of nature, comparable to hens instead of roosters crowing at dawn? Indigenous texts and European sources offer different evaluations. Drawing on both sets of sources, this book shows that female rule was legitimised both by Islam and adat (indigenous customary laws), and provides original insights on the Sultanah's leadership, their relations with male elites, and their encounters with European envoys who visited their court. The book challenges received views on kingship in the Malay world and the response of indigenous polities to east-west encounters in Southeast Asia's Age of Commerce.
Political scientists have, on occasion, missed subtle but powerful forms of ’everyday resistance’ and have not been able to show how different representations (pictures, statements, images, practices) have different impacts when negotiating power. Instead they have concentrated on open forms of resistance, organized rebellions and collective actions. Departing from James Scott's idea that oppression and resistance are in constant change, Resisting Gendered Norms provides us with a compelling account on the nexus between gender, resistance and gender-based violence in Cambodia. To illustrate how resistance is often carried out in the tension between, on the one hand, universal/globalised representations and, on the other, local ’truths’ and identity constructions, in-depth interviews with civil society representatives, politicians as well as stakeholders within the legal/juridical system were conducted.
Examining the historical, economic and political context for the current prohibition of particular drugs, this study investigates the problem of drug control and provides a systematic analysis of the development of the international system of regulation. It identifies the political rationalities that provided the basis of that system and positions these moral justifications for exercising power in relation to the practical programmes that put them into practice. The work not only catalogues the techniques and strategies employed in the process of governing illicit drugs, it also notes the failures, unintended consequences and other difficulties associated with getting such programmes to work. It will be of key interest to students and scholars of crime and criminology, law and society, medico-legal studies and health studies.
The ability of a small elite of highly educated, upper-class Asian women to obtain the highest political positions in their country is unmatched elsewhere in the world and deserves study. But there is a marked lack of relevant research as well as of comprehensive and user-friendly texts. Aiming to fill the gap is this timely and important study of the various obstacles and opportunities for women's political participation and representation in Asia.
While games of chance have been part of the Aboriginal cultural landscape since before European contact, large-scale commercial gaming facilities within First Nations communities are a relatively new phenomenon in Canada. First Nations Gaming in Canada is the first multidisciplinary study of the role of gaming in indigenous communities north of the 49th parallel. Bringing together some of Canada’s leading gambling researchers, the book examines the history of Aboriginal gaming and its role in indigenous political economy, the rise of large-scale casinos and cybergaming, the socio-ecological impact of problem gambling, and the challenges of labour unions and financial management. The authors also call attention to the dearth of socio-economic impact studies of gambling in First Nations communities while providing models to address this growing issue of concern.
Written by leading international experts, this book provides an overview of the history and current context of feminism in 12 Asian countries. This breadth of coverage, together with suggestions for further study, and an integrated cross-national timeline makes Women's Movements in Asia ideal for use on courses looking at women and feminism in Asia.
Are non-human animals our friends or enemies? In this provocative book, Dinesh Wadiwel argues that our mainstay relationships with billions of animals are essentially hostile. The War against Animals asks us to interrogate this sustained violence across its intersubjective, institutional and epistemic dimensions. Drawing from Foucault, Spivak and Derrida, The War against Animals argues that our sovereign claim of superiority over other animals is founded on nothing else but violence. Through innovative readings of Locke and Marx, Dinesh Wadiwel argues that property in animals represents a bio-political conquest that aims to secure animals as the “spoils of war.” The goal for pro-animal advocacy must be to challenge this violent sovereignty and recognize animal resistance through forms of counter-conduct and truce.
The Mortal God is a study in intellectual history which uncovers how actors in colonial India imagined various figures of human, divine, and messianic rulers to battle over the nature and locus of sovereignty. It studies British and Indian political-intellectual elites as well as South Asian peasant activists, giving particular attention to Bengal, including the associated princely states of Cooch Behar and Tripura. Global intellectual history approaches are deployed to place India within wider trajectories of royal nationhood that unfolded across contemporaneous Europe and Asia. The book intervenes within theoretical debates about sovereignty and political theology, and offers novel arguments about decolonizing and subalternizing sovereignty.
This book is the first comprehensive academic effort to examine the phenomenon of top female political leaders in Asia. It portrays prime ministers, presidents, and opposition leaders, but it is not a conventional biographical volume. Rather, it analyzes female politicians by means of case studies that are based on a common theoretical framework. The case studies were conducted over three years of field research, which included interviews with the female leaders themselves and members of their inner circle. Each chapter explores the similarities, but also points to the distinctiveness of each female leader, arising from political and social systems, cultural and religious conditions, and economic parameters. (Series: Political Science Perspectives / Politikwissenschaftliche Perspektiven - Vol. 16)