1 day ago
BOSTON (AP) — Samuel Huntington, a political scientist best known for his views on the clash of civilizations, died Wednesday on Martha's Vineyard, Harvard University announced Saturday. He was 81.
Huntington had retired from active teaching in 2007 after 58 years at Harvard. His research and teaching focused on American government, democratization, military politics, strategy, and civil-military relations.
He argued that in a post-Cold War world, violent conflict would come not from ideological friction between nations, but from cultural and religious differences among the world's major civilizations.
He identified those civilizations as Western (including the United States and Europe), Latin American, Islamic, African, Orthodox (with Russia as a core state), and Hindu, Japanese, and "Sinic" (including China, Korea, and Vietnam).
He made the argument in a 1993 article in the journal Foreign Affairs, and then expanded the thesis into a book, "The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order," which was published in 1996. The book has been translated into 39 languages.
In all, Huntington wrote 17 books including "The Soldier and the State: The Theory and Politics of Civil-Military Relations," published in 1957 and inspired by President Harry Truman's firing of Gen. Douglas MacArthur, and "Political Power: USA-USSR," a study of Cold War dynamics, which he co-authored in 1964 with Zbigniew Brzezinski.
His 1969 book, "Political Order in Changing Societies," analyzed political and economic development in the Third World.
"Sam was the kind of scholar that made Harvard a great university," Huntington's friend of nearly six decades, economist Henry Rosovsky said in a statement released by the university.
Huntington was born on April 18, 1927, in New York City. He received his B.A. from Yale in 1946, served in the U.S. Army, earned an M.A. from the University of Chicago in 1948, and a Ph.D. from Harvard in 1951. source
Monday, December 29, 2008
Tuesday, December 16, 2008
Six Prominent American Freethinkers
by James Farmelant and Mark Lindley
An article in the March 2008 issue of Aufklärung und Kritik1described four "new atheists" in the USA (Sam Harris, Daniel Dennett, Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens); the present article describes some earlier prominent American freethinkers. We won't go back as far as the deists (Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, Thomas Paine) among the leading 18th-century founding fathers of the USA, and we will leave aside (a) Mark Twain (the genial humorist, who merits an essay all to himself and whose atheism was not part of his publicpersona during his lifetime but became evident in writings published many years after his death), (b) Ralph Waldo Emerson (a freethinker in his own somewhat mystical way, but not clearly an agnostic, let alone an atheist) and (c) Henry David Thoreau (a radical whose ideas had, however, far less impact in the USA than upon Mahatma Gandhi in southern Africa). We will focus instead on the following six figures:
- Col. Robert Ingersoll (1833-1899), in his day famous throughout the USA as an attorney, a top-level political figure, a great orator, a colorful writer and, most saliently, a public spokesman for agnosticism.
- Felix Adler (1851-1933), who founded The Ethical Culture Society, a rationalistic, humanist, non-theist religion promoting ethical conduct as its central aim and sponsoring an historically important social-work NGO.
- George Santayana (1863-1952), a sophisticated philosophy professor well known in the USA for a best-selling Bildungsroman and fairly well known also as an atheist, but also a lifelong admirer of Roman Catholicism.
- John Dewey (1859-1952), an eminent pragmatist philosopher whose outlook was avowedly naturalistic and non-theist but who proposed to retain much of the traditional language of religion while redefining many of its traditional concepts to make them compatible with a scientific outlook.
- Ayn Rand (1905-1982), an outspoken atheist who considered altruism and all other forms of social concern to be "anti-human" and whose advocacy of laissez-faire capitalism provided to her close personal disciple, Alan Greenspan, the ideological platform upon which he, as executive head of the central banking system in the USA from 1987 to 2006, played a leading role in pumping up the financial bubble which is currently in the process of bursting.
Saturday, December 13, 2008
NOBEL LECTURE by MARTTI AHTISAARI
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| NOBEL LECTURE | |||
| Peace Is A Question Of Will | |||
| Wars and conflicts are not inevitable. They are caused by human beings. There are always interests that are furthered by war. Therefore those who have power and influence can also stop them. | |||
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Your Majesties, Your Royal Highnesses, Excellencies, |
Tuesday, December 9, 2008
Nation: V.P. Singh remembered by Kanchan Ialaiah
V.P. Singh remembered by Kanchan Ialaiah
Death of a stateman: Indian Lincoln ignored
- Kanchan Ialaiah -
If someone, who stood by the oppressed, is ignored, even in death, the oppressed will treat that as their own humiliation.
On November 27, I was back home at around 3 pm. Prof Bhagya Naik, who once was a student leader in the Mandal movement, called me and said, "There is bad news amidst worse news of terrorism. VP Singh has died and an occasional scroll (news ticker) on NDTV is informing us of that."
All TVs were hooked on to the Taj, Oberoi and Nariman House. I tried to catch up with the news of the death of India's former Prime Minister. I went on looking for at least flash news, on any one of the English channels, which are considered to be "national channels". No ticker could be seen. After quite a long time one channel put out the news, "VP Singh dead". No details. No channel was showing his dead body, no discussion was being organised around his role as Prime Minister.
The next day I looked up several news papers. In almost all the publications, a small news item in a corner of the front page with a regular photo (not of his dead body) was published.
The electronic media has treated his death as inconsequential, at a time when they were protecting the nation, while broadcasting about what was happening minute to minute around the Taj and Oberoi. In fact, the police and military officials were saying that the round the clock TV cameras around those hotels had obstructed the operation of flushing out the terrorists. On those three days TV channels were competing to get top spot to make more advertising revenue. No one would pay to view that 'Mandal ghost's' dead body. The upper caste media had taken its revenge against a man who initiated a mini civil war in order to establish an egalitarian India.
VP Singh was the one who deployed a serious discourse of social justice and and worked out a method to make India caste free from the position of Prime Minister. In one sense he was comparable to Abraham Lincoln who initiated a major civil war to abolish slavery in America, in late nineteenth century. He was a white man who stood for the rights of the black people. VP Singh initiated a similar battle of social justice in a country of castes and brazen inequality in 20th century India while holding the position of Prime Minister.
He was a Kshatriya who stood by the lower castes who had been suffering inequality for centuries. Abraham Lincoln was killed by the whites. The upper caste anti-reservationists saw to it that VP Singh lost his power within just eleven months. His political life with any meaningful visibility had been murdered since then. Abraham Lincoln became a hero of the blacks and became a villain among racist whites.
Similarly VP Singh became a hero among Dalit-Bahujans (particularly OBCs) and a villain among the upper castes who claimed themselves to be anti-quota. These anti-reservation upper caste forces claimed that they wanted to save the nation from terrorists. But the forces that are working in the media must remember that a nation that promotes equality alone can checkmate terrorism that was working in full force on the day when VP Singh died.
The media and the UPA leaders, by treating him like dirt, even in his death, forgot a basic fact of human life. If someone, who stood by the oppressed, is ignored and humiliated, even in death, the oppressed will treat that as their own humiliation. If this is the attitude of the elite towards a man who sacrificed his Chief Ministership (Uttar Pradesh) on moral grounds, his Defence Ministerial position on the grounds of opposing corruption (Bofors case) and became Prime Minister of the nation on his own political movement's strength (transforming Jan Morcha into Janatha Dal) people know how to read the signs. Therefore such media cannot protect the nation from even the terrorists, as the oppressed majority do not believe in it at all.
VP Singh was a philosopher in his own right, a poet and painter. The media behaved as if he was nobody to this nation. He implemented the Mandal Commission Report, to which suicide attempts by upper caste youth were made. This was subsequently followed with a Kamadal Yatra of Advani, who then became a hero of the upper castes.
If Advani had died amidst the trauma of the Bombay terror attacks, would they have ignored his death as they did in the case of VP Singh? Certainly not, because there is big business in talking about him. Most of the people in the press claim to be secular but when it comes to business and caste communalism, they give it major coverage as it means big money. The media plays a major role in every thing, including arresting terrorism. But it must remember that if people come to disbelieve what they churn out, then even the terrorists would have be placed in safe havens in our civil society.
More than any other prime minister, VP Singh made Indian democracy transformative. But for his intervention from the position of Prime Minister even the survival of politicians like Mulayam Singh, Lalu Prasad, Kanshiram, Ram Vilas Paswan and Mayawati would have been difficult. Ironically, these leaders from backward communities also did not bother about him. But he was an icon who had a dream for social equality. Ever since he implemented 27 per cent reservation forCentral government jobs he never compromised on the philosophy of social justice and equality.
The media must have ignored him today but a man of his calibre, will be resurrected soon.
On November 27, I was back home at around 3 pm. Prof Bhagya Naik, who once was a student leader in the Mandal movement, called me and said, "There is bad news amidst worse news of terrorism. VP Singh has died and an occasional scroll (news ticker) on NDTV is informing us of that."
All TVs were hooked on to the Taj, Oberoi and Nariman House. I tried to catch up with the news of the death of India's former Prime Minister. I went on looking for at least flash news, on any one of the English channels, which are considered to be "national channels". No ticker could be seen. After quite a long time one channel put out the news, "VP Singh dead". No details. No channel was showing his dead body, no discussion was being organised around his role as Prime Minister.
The next day I looked up several news papers. In almost all the publications, a small news item in a corner of the front page with a regular photo (not of his dead body) was published.
The electronic media has treated his death as inconsequential, at a time when they were protecting the nation, while broadcasting about what was happening minute to minute around the Taj and Oberoi. In fact, the police and military officials were saying that the round the clock TV cameras around those hotels had obstructed the operation of flushing out the terrorists. On those three days TV channels were competing to get top spot to make more advertising revenue. No one would pay to view that 'Mandal ghost's' dead body. The upper caste media had taken its revenge against a man who initiated a mini civil war in order to establish an egalitarian India.
VP Singh was the one who deployed a serious discourse of social justice and and worked out a method to make India caste free from the position of Prime Minister. In one sense he was comparable to Abraham Lincoln who initiated a major civil war to abolish slavery in America, in late nineteenth century. He was a white man who stood for the rights of the black people. VP Singh initiated a similar battle of social justice in a country of castes and brazen inequality in 20th century India while holding the position of Prime Minister.
He was a Kshatriya who stood by the lower castes who had been suffering inequality for centuries. Abraham Lincoln was killed by the whites. The upper caste anti-reservationists saw to it that VP Singh lost his power within just eleven months. His political life with any meaningful visibility had been murdered since then. Abraham Lincoln became a hero of the blacks and became a villain among racist whites.
Similarly VP Singh became a hero among Dalit-Bahujans (particularly OBCs) and a villain among the upper castes who claimed themselves to be anti-quota. These anti-reservation upper caste forces claimed that they wanted to save the nation from terrorists. But the forces that are working in the media must remember that a nation that promotes equality alone can checkmate terrorism that was working in full force on the day when VP Singh died.
The media and the UPA leaders, by treating him like dirt, even in his death, forgot a basic fact of human life. If someone, who stood by the oppressed, is ignored and humiliated, even in death, the oppressed will treat that as their own humiliation. If this is the attitude of the elite towards a man who sacrificed his Chief Ministership (Uttar Pradesh) on moral grounds, his Defence Ministerial position on the grounds of opposing corruption (Bofors case) and became Prime Minister of the nation on his own political movement's strength (transforming Jan Morcha into Janatha Dal) people know how to read the signs. Therefore such media cannot protect the nation from even the terrorists, as the oppressed majority do not believe in it at all.
VP Singh was a philosopher in his own right, a poet and painter. The media behaved as if he was nobody to this nation. He implemented the Mandal Commission Report, to which suicide attempts by upper caste youth were made. This was subsequently followed with a Kamadal Yatra of Advani, who then became a hero of the upper castes.
If Advani had died amidst the trauma of the Bombay terror attacks, would they have ignored his death as they did in the case of VP Singh? Certainly not, because there is big business in talking about him. Most of the people in the press claim to be secular but when it comes to business and caste communalism, they give it major coverage as it means big money. The media plays a major role in every thing, including arresting terrorism. But it must remember that if people come to disbelieve what they churn out, then even the terrorists would have be placed in safe havens in our civil society.
More than any other prime minister, VP Singh made Indian democracy transformative. But for his intervention from the position of Prime Minister even the survival of politicians like Mulayam Singh, Lalu Prasad, Kanshiram, Ram Vilas Paswan and Mayawati would have been difficult. Ironically, these leaders from backward communities also did not bother about him. But he was an icon who had a dream for social equality. Ever since he implemented 27 per cent reservation forCentral government jobs he never compromised on the philosophy of social justice and equality.
The media must have ignored him today but a man of his calibre, will be resurrected soon.
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