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Experiences with racism and age negatively affect how Afro-Brazilians in Salvador and So Paulo rate democracy. Older cohorts are more likely to rate democracy high compared to younger cohorts who rate it as low. Respondents in Salvador tend to rate democracy lower than respondents in So Paulo. Moreover, interviews reveal that as citizens believe they are not accorded full rights, they do not agree that Brazil's political system is fully democratic. Studies examining democracy in Brazil and racial politics throughout the diaspora would benefit from examining racialized experiences of citizens, rather than simply including the demographic variable of race. It is these experiences that affect rating of democracy rather than ascribed notions of race.

In many social science accounts of the role of law enforcement organizations in relation to race and racism, police are positioned as the agents of racialization projects, directly or indirectly carrying out the state's work of demarcating insiders from o

The social contract in Soviet and post-Soviet Russia has concerned not classical political rights but socio-economic issues. Loyalty is accorded to the powers-that-be partly from fear of repression, but also in return for new opportunities of advancement-whether resulting from social upheaval or from educational expansion-and for modest improvements in living standards. The Soviet era ended when such benefits could no longer be delivered, on account of lower oil prices, arms-race burdens and lagging productivity and innovation. After the turmoil of the 1990s, the contract was re-established under Putin in the early 2000s. Public opinion accepts relatively authoritarian rule if economic stability appears guaranteed in return. Moreover, world events from 2008 onwards have dampened economic expectations. Nonetheless, the sustainability of the present contract is doubtful, with economic modernization likely to prove elusive in the absence of effective democratic institutions.

"A meaningful discussion about the democratic limit or boundary is only now beginning. Martha Nussbaum's call for a world citizenship in response to the terrorist bombings of 9/11 has animated this conversation in the USA. In South Africa, the political transition from apartheid to democracy keeps running-up against the substance of the 'people'. In the absence of any 'traditional' unifying principles (of language, culture, religion, race and so on), the identity of South Africans is elusive. We might note too that much of the cosmopolitan literature on democracy appeals to a shift in scale, from the territorial state to the world or globe or even planet. One of the key gaps in democratic theory, however, has been its failure to conceptualize such a limit. How can democrats discriminate between citizen and non-citizen without being discriminatory? This is the question that this article seeks to address. It does so by following a major development in the work of Ernesto Laclau - from his collaboration with Chantal Mouffe in their groundbreaking work Hegemony and Socialist Strategy to his most recent book On Populist Reason."

In the annual Seymour Martin Lipset Lecture on Democracy in the World, Nathan Glazer asks how democracies deal with deep divides-"ineraseable" divisions such as race, ethnicity, religion, and native language. One generalization that emerges from a conside

As the neoconservative idea of a clash of civilisations is increasingly challenged, a number of liberal writers - Paul Berman, Nick Cohen, Martin Amis, Andrew Anthony, Bernard Henry-Lévy and Christopher Hitchens - are rethinking the `war on terror' as a c

In Democracy and the Political Unconscious, Noëlle McAfee analyzes social pathologies that have arisen in the United States since September 11, 2001. In particular, she argues that we have been suffering society-wide repetition compulsions and time collapses, compelling us to experience the trauma repeatedly, and we have been acting out in ways that continue the cycle of suffering. She also presents a prescription for how we might work through these issues more democratically and fruitfully using deliberative talking cures. McAfee's application of the psychoanalytic model to society is fascinating, and she offers concrete and practical suggestions for how to better resolve social trauma. In the first four chapters, McAfee presents a perspective on humanization that centers on social participation. Human identity is developed in making and keeping social commitments, rather than in the achievement of autonomy. Language enables humans to sublimate and channel drives into public meaning. Silence is troubling because it reflects a social unconscious that alienates people, cutting them off from full participation. McAfee argues that modernity itself causes trauma, as the world has become disenchanted and devoid of meaning. In addition, specific elements of modernity, like colonization and the slave trade, have played significant roles in the development of the social unconscious. Because our culture remains mostly silent about privilege and race, historic traumas continue to haunt us. McAfee suggests that isolationism, repression, McCarthyism, and the abjection of supposed barbarian elements are all subconscious defenses against working through modernity's social traumas. These defenses prevent the development of a public sphere of deliberation that has demonstrated its ability to work through traumas in Eastern Europe, South Africa, and elsewhere. Following Derrida, McAfee

In a commentary on Coleman and Bassi's study of hegemonic masculinities in the British anti-globalization movement, the author brings to bear the scholarship on the gendered culture of the World Social Forum and through this, suggests the importance of contextualizing such studies in particular places and incorporating race, nation and class as salient dimensions.

"While some types of democracy can sustain ethnic and cultural diversity, others can clearly undermine it. In The Dark Side of Democracy, Michael Mann argues that extreme crimes like genocide and ethnic cleansing tend to occur, or at least be legitimized, within a majoritarian democracy framework. This article broadens Mann's approach in two directions: first, it confirms that majoritarian democracy in plural societies can provide the pre-existing institutional context where conflict, nationalism and exclusion can thrive, eventually degenerating into self-destruction. Second, it focuses on the tendency by some governments to turn to patriotism and populism as sources of legitimacy at a time when the latter appears to be crumbling. In addition, the article questions both the 'democratic peace' and the 'failed democratization' approaches for their reliance on an ideal type and fixed notion of democracy, arguing that the latter has been weakened by neoliberal globalization, particularly as it interacts with the legacy of pre-existing forms of majoritarianism. The article concludes that these forces need to be studied simultaneously in order to have a broader picture of the contemporary weakening of democratic practices and institutions within some nation-states."

Experiences with racism and age negatively affect how Afro-Brazilians in Salvador and So Paulo rate democracy. Older cohorts are more likely to rate democracy high compared to younger cohorts who rate it as low. Respondents in Salvador tend to rate democr

The post-election crisis of January 2008 brought Kenya close to collapse and the status of a failed state. Following the abrupt proclamation of Mwai Kibaki, the incumbent president, as victor in a highly contentious presidential election, peace was disrup

Dans quelle mesure les politiques du Commonwealth refltent-elles une confusion largement rpandue entre croissance et dveloppement, dmocratie et gouvernance? A travers l'tude de la place des Dalits dans une Inde dont le libralisme, le succs conomique et la

This article takes a critical look at identity politics and conflict in Jos, a setting once regarded as "the home of peace and tourism in Nigeria." The study situates the conflict within the relationship between the "indigene-settler" syndrome and the state, with its ugly hydra-headed manifestations. It argues that the conflict with a coloration of ethnic/religious garb was orchestrated under the faade of politics. It is suggested that the commitment of good governance remains the surest means of nipping in the bud the crises in Jos. The findings have important implications for aggregate research on ethnic/religious conflicts in Nigeria.