One medium has dominated accounts of American art in the years following the Second World War. The period witnessed, in the words of one critic, a 'Triumph of American Painting', with advances in the easel picture far surpassing those in other media. Whilst more recent accounts have nuanced this view, drawing attention to developments in music and sculpture, literary contributions to the new American modernism have gone almost without assessment. Were there advances in literature comparable to those of Mark Rothko and Barnett Newman, David Smith and John Cage? Drawing extensively on his unpublished writings, After the New Failure of Nerve reveals the poet Charles Olson to have been the keenest literary advocate of the new American avant-garde and one of the most astute observers of its conditions and possibilities. Paying special attention to unpublished notes, lectures, and correspondence, the thesis utilises Olson's early writings in order to examine the momentum given early postwar modernism by a potent contemporary reaction against abstract rationality, a reaction identified at the time as a 'New Failure of Nerve'. Born of recent disillusionment with 'scientific' Marxism and New Deal progressivism, the thesis demonstrates the several ways in which this 'New Failure of Nerve' fuelled vanguard American art from the middle of the Second World War to the end of the decade. It argues that the new critique of abstract rationality - which was also reflected in the contemporary American work of the Frankfurt School - defined the way American artists understood the function of postwar modernism, the posture of the postwar modernist artist, and the status of the postwar modernist artwork. This pivotal moment in the history of modernism was shaped, I contend, by a philosophical critique explored most ambitiously by an American poet.

This thesis offers a new policy history of the National Endowment for the Arts, the federal agency responsible for providing grants to artists and arts organisations in the United States. It focuses in particular on the development of conservative perspectives on federal arts funding from the 1950s to the 1980s, and hence, illuminates the broader evolution of conservative political power, especially its limits. The most familiar narrative holds that the Endowment found itself caught up in the Culture Wars of the late 1980s when Christian right groups objected to certain federal grants, particularly to Andres Serrano's Piss Christ and Robert Mapplethorpe's Self-Portrait with Whip. This thesis, however, uncovers the older origins of conservative opposition to state support for the arts, analyses conservative conceptions of art, and illuminates the limited federal role the right sought to secure in the arts in the post-war period. Numerous studies have analysed the meanings and origins of the Culture Wars, but until now, scholars had not examined conservative approaches to federal arts politics in a historical sense. Historians have generally been too interested in explaining change to the detriment of examining continuity, but this approach under-emphasises the long-term tensions that underlie seemingly sudden political eruptions. This work also offers a deep account of the conservative movement and the arts world, an area that has so far been almost completely ignored by scholars, even though a focus on marginalised players is essential to understanding the limits of conservatism. In a general sense then, this thesis evaluates the range and diversity of the conservative movement and illuminates the overall odyssey of the right in modern America. In so doing, it provides a new insight into the ways we periodise political history and also invites a broader view of how we understand politics itself.

The thesis deals with Britain's early Cold War history and the political history of the Church of England. It mainly uses primary sources, and contributes to our growing understanding of the early Cold War, especially in its cultural/religious elements. It explores how the Church of England dealt with the development of the early Cold War in Britain. It argues that in order to understand better the Church of England's role, an account of its perspective on issues of state modernisation dating back to at least the 1930s is necessary. It was then, during a decade of authoritarianism, and especially at the Oxford Conference of 1937, that the Church' standpoint towards secularisation was established, while the transnational agenda of the ecumenical movement was also adopted and internalized by Church of England. The thesis also examines the agencies which it built and worked with: in particular the British Council of Churches and the World Council of Churches. As the Church is the Established Church, its relationship with specific government agencies, especially the British Foreign Office and the Ministry of Information also became increasingly important. The thesis reveals the Church of England's lack of autonomy in time of crisis and the importance of key individuals for the institutional leadership of the Church. Its ecumenical agenda had played an important role, but this was under pressure after the War, as a Europe-wide Christian community was increasingly challenged by 'Western Union' plans for a Cold War Western, Christian community and bloc. By 1948 the Church had been enrolled in the Cold War between East and West which was apparent in its alignment with British government policies and its withdrawn role in the ecumenical community. The thesis adds to our understanding of the Church of England's relationship to the state in these years, and contributes to the cultural dimension of the early Cold War in Britain.

The September 11, 2001 Jihadists attack on the West and the subsequent wars on terrorism indicate that war may be a permanent condition of life in the contemporary world. This implies that to understand contemporary society, culture and communication requires an understanding of war because war could perhaps provide a perspective through which to understand the world. The aim of this study is to provide such a perspective and to critically explore the link between war and communication. However, in approaching a study of war one is confronted with a pervasive pacifist anti-war ideological bias. To overcome the bias the study adopts a critical strategy: firstly it deconstructs the taken for granted assumptions about the positive value of peace and then it reconstructs and traces the contours of a Western tradition of philosophical thought that considers war as being an integral and formative aspect of human identity and communication. Chapter 2 uncovers the limitations of the pacifists' discourse on war. Chapter 3 traces the Western tradition originating in Heraclitus that considers war as formative experience of being human. Chapter 4 traces war and killing as formative of language and communication. Using these insights a careful reading and interpretation of how war informs the thought and functions in the texts of selected social theorists of the twentieth century. Chapter 5 traces war as an agonistic structure in the works of Johan Huizinga on the role of play and in the political theory of Carl Schmitt. Chapter 6 explores the idea of war as a model of society in the works of Foucault. Chapter 7 investigates the central influence of real and imagined war on Marshall McLuhan’s theory of the media. Chapter 8 explores the way war structures the thought of Lyotard on the postmodern condition. Chapter 9 concludes by drawing implications on how a perspective on war contributes to development of communication theory and understanding life in the postmodern condition. / Communication Science / D. Litt. et Phil. Communication )

This thesis explored a regional comparison of education in post-revolutionary Mexico. It involved a micro-look into the relationship between violence, education, religion, and politics in the states of Durango and Jalisco. Research methods included primary sources and microfilms from the National Archives State Department records related to education from the internal affairs of Mexico from 1930-1939 from collection file M1370. It also utilized G-2 United States Military Intelligence reports as well as records from the British National Archives dealing with church and state relations in Mexico from 1920-1939. Anti - clericalism in the 1920’s led to violent backlash in rural regions of Durango and Jalisco called the Cristero rebellion. A second phase of the Cristero rebellion began in the 1930s, which was aimed at ending state-led revolutionary secular education and preserving the folk Catholic education system. There existed a unique ritualized culture of violence for both states. Violence against state-led revolutionary secular educators was prevalent at the primary and secondary education levels in Durango and Jalisco. Priests served as both religious leaders and rebel activists. At the higher education level there existed a split of the University of Guadalajara but no violence against educators. There existed four competing factions involved in this intellectual battle: communists followed Marx, anarchistic autonomous communists, urban folk modern Catholics, and student groups who sought reunion of the original university. This thesis described how these two states and how they experienced their unique culture of violence during the 1930s. It suggested a new chronology of the Cristero rebellion. This comparison between two regions within the broader context of the country and its experiences during the 1930s allowed for analysis in regards to education, rebellion, religion, and politics.

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / This dissertation analyzes the efforts to develop a pluralistic political culture and democratic practices of governance through the training of democratic leaders in Germany's first school of public affairs, the German School of Politics. The investigation of the thought-leaders that formed this school illustrates two main points. First, through the prism of the School, I detail the efforts to develop a conception of civil society that, by being grounded in civility, could retie social bonds and counter the brutalization of politics characteristic of the post-World War One years. By providing practical knowledge, courses in public affairs could not only free Germans from the blinders of ideologies, but also instill in them an ethos that would help viewing the political enemy as an opponent with an equal right to participate in the political process. Secondly, I point to the limits of trans-national philanthropy in supporting the development of civil society in young democracies. By analyzing the relationship between U.S. foundations and the School, I focus on the asymmetry that existed between American ideals of democracy and the realities of the German political system. This study thus focuses on the dynamics between the actions of institutions and organizations, and the broader social behaviors that constitute public life.

In July 1979, Nigeria's federal military government declared a 100% takeover of select operations belonging to the London-based oil company, British Petroleum (BP). The takeover of BP marked the takeover of Nigeria's most lucrative industry that had been controlled by foreign investors. Within the secondary literature a more elaborate version of this event is offered by scholars, declaring it nationalization with little agreement over why this "Giant of West Africa" nationalization BP. Some mention South Africa, others Southern Rhodesia (present-day Zimbabwe); some mention oil, while others solely discuss UK diplomacy. Why the discrepancy over the reason for nationalization? This project sets out to explain not only why Nigeria nationalized BP in 1979, but also how the nationalization fits into the broad theoretical discussions on nationalism, economic policy, foreign relations, and nationalization. It challenges the popular narrative of why Nigeria nationalized BP and substantially revises it. The argument is put forward that the nationalization of BP hinged almost entirely on the notion of economic nationalism and that the nationalization fit into an established trend of takeovers aimed at foreign companies. The federal military government simply used southern Africa --discussed as the sole reason for nationalization within the secondary Literature-- as a way to bolster international support. This project also project uses the nationalization as a looking-glass into Nigeria and its oil industry during the 1970s. Also, this project addresses the impact the nationalization had on Nigerian society. With regard to nationalism, Nigeria represents an excellent case for understanding the existence and application of economic nationalism, which functions not only as a subject of study much like ethnic nationalism or civic nationalism, but also as a new perspective on the relationship between the various expressions of nationalism and economic policy.

This thesis examines the factors affecting the outcome of the 1948 presidential election. The factors which will be take up are not a complete list of all those influences on the election but will be those which appeared most frequently in writings on the subject and those which, in the writer's opinion, exerted the strongest influence. By combining specific studies of the tree large pivotal states, with the investigation of general factors affecting the election, it is believed that certain rather definite conclusions can be drawn concerning what happened in the country as a whole.

This dissertation is a cross-national, empirical study of human rights conditions in a dynamic international political economy. The scope of the examination covers 176 developed and developing countries from 1980 through 1993. Through evaluating the numerous theoretical aspects of human rights conceptualization, I draw upon Shue's framework and consider whether there are indeed "basic rights" and which rights should fit into this category. Further, I address the debate between those who claim that these rights are truly universal (applying to all nations and individuals) and those who argue that the validity of a moral right is relative to indigenous cultures. In a similar vein, I empirically investigate whether various human rights are interdependent and indivisible, as some scholars argue, or whether there are inherent trade-offs between various rights provisions. In going beyond the fixation on a single aspect of human rights, I broadly investigate subsistence rights, security rights and political and economic freedom. While these have previously been addressed separately, there are virtually no studies that consider them together and the subsequent linkages between them. Ultimately, a pooled time-series cross-section model is developed that moves beyond the traditional concentration on security rights (also know as integrity of the person rights) and focuses on the more controversial subsistence rights (also known as basic human needs). By addressing both subsistence and security rights, I consider whether certain aspects of the changing international political economy affect these two groups of rights in different ways. A further delineation is made between OECD and non-OECD countries. The primary international focus is on the effects of global integration and the end of the Cold War. Domestic explanations that are connected with globalization include economic freedom, income inequality and democratization. These variables are subjected to bivariate and multivariate hypothesis testing including bivariate correlations, analysis of variance, and multiple OLS regression with robust standard errors.

Thesis submitted in fulfillment of the requirements of the degree of Masters in History at the University of the Witwatersrand Johannesburg, South Africa 2017 / This dissertation examines and explains the underlying social, ideological and economic reasons why the white population of Ermelo gravitated to a politics of the extreme in the years 1960-1994. In contrast to commonly held views that the growth of ultraconservatism correlates neatly with economic trends this dissertation argues that ultraconservatism in Ermelo emerged due to varying complex and at times contradictory reasons. By examining white society at the time of conquest in the 1860s, it is argued that whites in this area formed racist views from the time of settlement as the commercial success of their newly acquired farmland was dependant on the exploitation of cheap black labour. The focus of this study is however, on the emergence of new ultraconservative political parties from the late 1960s to the early 1990s which formed in reaction to National Party and local political dynamics. It is argued that the bedrock of conservative views was moulded during the time of initial settlement, however, for various reasons throughout the years these views were held and propagated. This study is a local history of ultraconservatism in Ermelo and illuminates particularities in the town’s white politics within the context of profound changes in Afrikaner politics nationally. White working-class workers and farmers supported ultraconservatives while white business people supported the NP and their politics of reform. This dissertation made use of public and private archives as well as life history interviews with various long-time residents of the town. It is argued that although capitalism was the main motivator for ultraconservative views and politics in the mid 1800s, it was also capitalism that brought about reform and created a platform for negotiation in the 1990s when ultraconservative political parties threatened the peaceful transition into a democratic South Africa. / XL2018