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The call for an Inter-Civilizational Dialogue informed by cosmopolitical forms of Comparative Political Theory as a way to address our unprecedented global challenges is among the most laudable projects that students of politics and related fields across the world have put forth in centuries. Unfortunately, however, up until this point the actual and potential contributions of the Indigenous or 'Fourth' World and its civilizational manifestations have been largely ignored. This has clearly been the case in what refers to Indigenous American or Abya-Yalan cultures and civilizations. The purpose of this dissertation is to acknowledge, add to, and further foster the contributions of Indigenous American cultures and civilizations to the emerging fields of Comparative Political Theory and Inter-Civilizational Relations. Guided by a cosmopolitical concern for social and environmental justice, this work adds to the transcontinental and transdisciplinary effort to decolonize knowledges and practices by offering socio-ecologically balanced alternatives beyond the crisis of globalized Western modernity. This work draws on three broad Indigenous traditions, Mesoamerican, Andean, and Native North American, to offer some historical and contemporary examples of the many possible ways in which the recovery, revalorization, and revitalization of Indigenous modes of thought, practice, organization and planning can contribute to foster forms of comparative political theorizing that address the challenges of a global age bedeviled by the confluence of social and environmental crises of an unprecedented scale and scope. The dissertation first introduces comparative political theory as a framework for the inter-civilizational dialogue, arguing that Indigenous contributions have been marginalized and must be considered. Part I then focuses and elaborates on specifically Mesoamerican contributions; Part II is dedicated to Andean contributions; and Part III to Native North American contributions. The dissertation closes with a brief reflection of how Indigenous American contributions can help us address some of our most crucial contemporary global challenges, especially in what concerns the construction of cosmopolitical alternatives built on post-anthropocentric forms of socio-ecological justice.
ContributorsFigueroa Helland, Leonardo Esteban (Author) / Doty, Roxanne L (Thesis advisor) / Ashley, Richard K. (Committee member) / Mitchell, Michael J. (Committee member) / Killsback, Leo (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2012
Description
Several Islamic organizations have experience major changes in their theological frames and political identities away from fundamentalist and revivalist theological orientation to one that embraces a progressive Islamic theology that synthesizes these norms with classical Islamic teachings. What are the factors that explain these theological changes? What are the causal mechanisms that help to promote them? Using the moral authority leadership theory, I argue that Islamic groups would be able to change their theological frames and political identities if the changes are promoted by religious leaders with 'moral authority' status, who are using both ideational and instrumental strategies to reconstruct the theological frames of their organizations. In addition to moral authority leadership, intermediary variables that also affect the likelihood of a theological change within Islamic groups are the institutional culture of the organization - the degree of tolerance for non-Islamic theological teachings - and the relationship between the Islamic group and the state. This study is a comparative historical analysis of two Indonesian Islamic groups: the Nahdlatul Ulama (NU) and the Muhammadiyah. It finds that the NU was able to successfully change its theological positions due to the presence of a charismatic moral authority leader, the tolerant institutional culture within the organization, and the ability of the organization to ally with the Suharto regime, allowing the reform to be institutionalized with little intervention from the regime. On the other hand, theological reform within the Muhammadiyah was not successful due to the lack of a leader with moral authority status who could have led the reforms within the organization, as well as to the dominance of a revivalist institutional culture that does not tolerate any challenges to their interpretation of Islamic theology. The analysis makes theoretical contributions on the role of religious leadership within Islamic movements and the likelihood of Islamic groups to adopt liberal political norms such as democracy, religion-state separation, and tolerance toward religious minorities. It identifies the mechanisms in which theological change within Islamic group become possible.
ContributorsArifianto, Alex (Author) / Iheduru, Okechukwu C (Thesis advisor) / Warner, Carolyn M (Committee member) / Rush, James R (Committee member) / Doty, Roxanne L (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2012
Description
The concept of recognition developed through the 20th century as a form of political legitimation has served a central if problematic role in understanding international politics. On the one hand, recognition aims toward establishing essential collective identities that must be conceived as relatively stable in order to then gain respect, receive political protection, and occupy both physical and discursive space. On the other hand, recognition tacitly accepts a social constructivist view of the subject who can only become whole unto itself – and in turn exercise positive liberty, freedom, or agency – through the implied assent or explicit consent of another. There is an inherent tension between these two understandings of recognition. The attempt to reconcile this tension often manifests itself in forms of symbolic and systemic violence that can turn to corporeal harm. In order to enter into the concept, history, politics and performativity of recognition, I focus on what is often viewed as an exceptionally complex and uniquely controversial case: the Israel-Palestine conflict. Undergoing a discourse analysis of three epistemic communities (i.e., the State/diplomatic network, the Academic/intellectual network, the Military-Security network) and their unique modes of veridiction, I show how each works to construct the notion of ethno-nationalism as a necessary political logic that holds the promise of everything put in its right place: Us here, Them there. All three epistemic communities are read as knowledge/power networks that have substantial effect on political subjects and subjectivities. Influenced by the philosophy of Hegel and Levinas, and supported by the works of Michel Foucault, Wendy Brown, Alphonso Lingis, Jacques Derrida, Patchen Markell, and others, I show the ways in which our current politics of recognition is best read as violence. By tracing three discursive networks of knowledge/power implicated in our modern politics of recognition, I demonstrate forms of symbolic violence waged against the entire complex of the Israel-Palestine conflict in ways that preclude a just resolution based on mutual empathy, acknowledgment, and (re)cogntion.
ContributorsBar, Eyal (Author) / Doty, Roxanne L (Thesis advisor) / Ashley, Richard K. (Thesis advisor) / Walker, Stephen (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2016