Pub Date : 2023-07-04DOI: 10.1080/00358533.2023.2244290
Philip Murphy
In Alan Bennett’s play ‘A Question of Attribution’, Queen Elizabeth II complains that whenever she meets anybody, they are always on their best behaviour, ‘And when one is on one’s best behaviour, one isn’t always at one’s best’. The UK’s capital was certainly on its best behaviour over the Coronation weekend. The Metropolitan Police had apparently been primed to come down hard on signs of dissent. Graham Smith, the director of the campaigning group Republic, was arrested and detained along with a number of his colleagues in the process of unloading anti-monarchist placards. It was all a reminder that, although British representatives are apt to take the moral high ground on these issues in Commonwealth gatherings, defending freedom of speech and protest really should begin at home. The Coronation was also a reminder of the way in which the Commonwealth has changed out of all recognition in the 70 years since the previous monarch was crowned. In 1953, there were only eight members, and all but one of them (India) were Realms. Now there are 56, in only 15 of which (including the UK) King Charles remains the sovereign. Despite this, or perhaps because of it, one senses that everyone was a bit more relaxed about matters of protocol and precedence this time around. The Coronation of Elizabeth II was the last great piece of Imperial theatre in the UK, designed in part to project an impression of control over an Empire in which hierarchy was essential to the exercise of power. In that respect, the 1953 crowning mattered to the UK in a way that its 2023 counterpart never could. That’s not to say there were not tensions behind the scenes. In case there were any questions about how dignitaries from Africa should be treated, on 29 April Kenyan president William Ruto complained publicly that he and some of his fellow African representatives at Queen Elizabeth’s funeral the previous September had been ‘loaded into buses like school kids’, whereas Western heads of state had been driven in private cars. Ruto was duly accorded full VIP treatment when he arrived in London just hours before the Coronation was due to begin. But this was relatively small beer compared with some of the jostling for position that accompanied the preparations for the 1953 Coronation. Another difference was that whereas in 1953, the Commonwealth was largely conceived of as something external to the UK, the 2023 ceremony stressed the way in which the King valued the contribution of Britain’s internal Commonwealth diaspora communities. Prominent roles were taken by Baroness Amos and Baroness Benjamin, both of Caribbean heritage, and by Dame Elizabeth Anionwu, whose father was Nigerian. Also prominent in the Coronation
在艾伦·贝内特（Alan Bennett）的戏剧《归因问题》（A Question of Attribution）中，英国女王伊丽莎白二世（Queen Elizabeth II）抱怨说，每当她遇到任何人，他们总是表现得最好，“当一个人表现得最好时，他并不总是处于最佳状态”。英国首都在加冕周末的表现无疑是最好的。伦敦警察局显然已经做好了严厉打击异议迹象的准备。竞选团体“共和国”的负责人格雷厄姆·史密斯和他的一些同事在卸载反君主主义标语牌的过程中被捕并被拘留。这一切都提醒我们，尽管英国代表在英联邦集会上倾向于在这些问题上占据道德高地，但捍卫言论和抗议自由确实应该从国内开始。加冕典礼也提醒人们，自前任君主加冕以来的70年里，英联邦已经失去了所有的认可。1953年，只有八名成员，除一人外（印度）都是王国。现在有56个，其中只有15个（包括英国）国王查尔斯仍然是君主。尽管如此，或者可能正因为如此，人们感觉到这一次每个人对协议和优先事项都放松了一点。伊丽莎白二世的加冕典礼是英国帝国剧院的最后一部伟大作品，其设计部分是为了给人一种对帝国的控制印象，在这个帝国中，等级制度对权力的行使至关重要。在这方面，1953年的加冕典礼对英国来说意义重大，而2023年的加冕礼却从未如此。这并不是说幕后没有紧张局势。4月29日，肯尼亚总统威廉·鲁托公开抱怨说，去年9月，在伊丽莎白女王的葬礼上，他和一些非洲代表被“像小学生一样装上公交车”，而西方国家元首则被开着私家车。鲁托在加冕典礼开始前几个小时抵达伦敦时，得到了正式的贵宾待遇。但与1953年加冕典礼筹备期间的一些职位争夺相比，这只是相对较小的啤酒。另一个不同之处在于，1953年，英联邦在很大程度上被认为是英国之外的东西，而2023年的仪式强调了国王重视英国内部英联邦侨民社区贡献的方式。阿莫斯男爵夫人和本杰明男爵夫人都是加勒比裔，伊丽莎白·阿尼翁武女爵士的父亲是尼日利亚人。在加冕典礼上也很突出
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Pub Date : 2023-07-04DOI: 10.1080/00358533.2023.2244288
Cynthia Barrow-Giles, Ronnie R. F. Yearwood
{"title":"“Closing” the March 2020 election saga in Guyana","authors":"Cynthia Barrow-Giles, Ronnie R. F. Yearwood","doi":"10.1080/00358533.2023.2244288","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00358533.2023.2244288","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":35685,"journal":{"name":"Round Table","volume":"112 1","pages":"438 - 439"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-07-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42188914","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-05-04DOI: 10.1080/00358533.2023.2219545
Segun Oshewolo, A. Azeez
{"title":"Nigeria and the flawed 2023 elections","authors":"Segun Oshewolo, A. Azeez","doi":"10.1080/00358533.2023.2219545","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00358533.2023.2219545","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":35685,"journal":{"name":"Round Table","volume":"112 1","pages":"351 - 352"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-05-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45211782","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-05-04DOI: 10.1080/00358533.2023.2219531
Altaf Deviyati
The result of Malaysia’s 15th General Election (GE15) defied the popular pre-election prediction that young voters would vote for progressive parties driven by youthful ideals and that the Malay-based parties vying for the same voter base would struggle to gain traction. Thanks to the implementation of two electoral reforms, the Automatic Voter Registration (AVR), and the lowering of voting age from 21 to 18 (Undi18), young voters constituted the bulk of six million new voters since 2018. While the Malays’ voting patterns were indeed more diverse than those of other groups, the sentiment against the Chinese-dominant Democratic Action Party (DAP), whose image has been smeared as anti-Malays and anti-Islam, was prevalent and appeared to be a unifying factor. The assumption that new young voters would vote for the multiethnic Alliance of Hope (Pakatan Harapan, PH) was a myth. The PanMalaysian Islamic Party (PAS) and its coalition National Alliance (Perikatan Nasional, PN) had almost a clean sweep in five Northern and East Coast states of the Peninsula. Ethno-religious campaigning is nothing new, but it increased significantly after the last election in 2018. More Malay-based parties vying for the Peninsular Malay votes – exceeding 50% of the electorate, whose weight was further amplified by malapportionment and gerrymandering of electoral constituencies – meant that each party tried to out-do the other in their Malay-ness. However, when it came to protecting Malays and Islam, PAS had a head start, especially during a time when the Malays had lost their trust in the United Malays National Organisation (UMNO) and did not trust that other Malay-based parties could address the DAP threat. PAS has a clear and consistent faithbased ideology, which in recent years has been intertwined with Malay identity and ethnonationalism. As the constitutional definition of Malay is tied to Islam, PAS easily equated protecting Islam with protecting Malay rights and positioned itself as the logical alternative to UMNO. Both Undi18 and AVR were implemented in December 2021 without any programme of democratic education, which is necessary to nurture a democratic culture. Based on IMAN Research’s sentiment analysis on the GE15, many youths, while being excited to vote, were in general unfamiliar regarding key concepts of democracy, human rights, the Constitution and the rights of minorities etc. In this situation, the immediate understanding on democracy would only be from family members and social media. Social media played a significant role in the campaign for this election, partly because the Covid-19 pandemic had earlier limited public gatherings due to social
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Pub Date : 2023-05-04DOI: 10.1080/00358533.2023.2219558
M. Balakrishnan
ABSTRACT The inclusion of women ministers in cabinet is vital in redistributing political power and increasing participation. However, increasing the number of women ministers is insufficient; the type of portfolios also matters. In Malaysia, following the 14th general election, the number of women ministers almost doubled; this increase survived government turn-overs between 2020–2022, and the 15th general election. Using cabinet composition and budget data, and a customised typology of portfolio salience, this paper analyses women’s cabinet representation between 2008–2023, finding significant improvements after the 15th general election, and identifying imperatives for cabinet formation if participation is to be increased.
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Pub Date : 2023-05-04DOI: 10.1080/00358533.2023.2220552
V. Iyer
vaccines more freely available’ (p. 140). This story is also personal: Nyabola herself had to go to America to get vaccinated, as Kenya would not be offering her a vaccine, planning to vaccinate only 30% of its population (pp. 117, 139). Nyabola reflects on her European and American ‘supposed colleagues and “partners” gushing effusively about how vaccines had fixed everything’ with no acknowledgement of how different her experience was (p. 116). Following this line of thinking, the book ends with a chapter entitled ‘Necessary, Righteous Rage’ (p. 149). Here, Nyabola argues that ‘Anger is the only appropriate response’ (p. 151) to the way Africa and Africans have been side-lined in research and in the distribution of global vaccines. At the end of reading this book, it is hard to disagree.
{"title":"Politics, poverty and belief: a political memoir","authors":"V. Iyer","doi":"10.1080/00358533.2023.2220552","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00358533.2023.2220552","url":null,"abstract":"vaccines more freely available’ (p. 140). This story is also personal: Nyabola herself had to go to America to get vaccinated, as Kenya would not be offering her a vaccine, planning to vaccinate only 30% of its population (pp. 117, 139). Nyabola reflects on her European and American ‘supposed colleagues and “partners” gushing effusively about how vaccines had fixed everything’ with no acknowledgement of how different her experience was (p. 116). Following this line of thinking, the book ends with a chapter entitled ‘Necessary, Righteous Rage’ (p. 149). Here, Nyabola argues that ‘Anger is the only appropriate response’ (p. 151) to the way Africa and Africans have been side-lined in research and in the distribution of global vaccines. At the end of reading this book, it is hard to disagree.","PeriodicalId":35685,"journal":{"name":"Round Table","volume":"112 1","pages":"356 - 358"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-05-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43328047","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-05-04DOI: 10.1080/00358533.2023.2219522
Chin-Huat Wong
Malaysia’s 15th General Election (GE15) on 19 November 2022 produced a 19-party coalition government led by Anwar Ibrahim, which now controls a two-third parliamentary majority. This government comprises four coalitions: Anwar’s Alliance of Hope (Pakatan Harapan, PH), the once dominant National Front (Barisan Nasional, BN), Sarawak Parties Alliance (Gabungan Parti Sarawak, GPS) with and Sabah People’s Alliance (Gabungan Rakyat Sabah, GRS), which have, respectively, four, four, four and three parties in the Federal Parliament. The coalition also has four standalone parties, Heritage Party (Parti Warisan, Warisan), the youth-based Malaysian United Democratic Alliance (MUDA) and two regional parties. GE15 itself has at least four significant implications. First, it led to the fourth peaceful transfer of power since the end of BN’s 61-year rule in 2018, such that Malaysia technically passes Huntington’s test of ‘two consecutive turnovers’ even though her democracy is far from consolidated. Second, it produced a hung parliament right after the election, the first time at the federal level. A hung parliament first emerged after the ‘Sheraton Move’, described in detail elsewhere in this issue, in February 2020, which saw the Malaysian United Indigenous Party (Parti Bersatu Pribumi Malaysia, PPBM) leaving PH and installing its president Muhyiddin Yassin as the new Prime Minister. Third, it recorded an unprecedented rise of the Pan-Malaysian Islamic Party (PAS) which became the largest single party in Parliament with 19% of seats. Driven by both PAS and Bersatu, the National Alliance (Perikatan Nasional, PN) is now the sole Opposition with one-third of seats. Fourth, only three of Malaysia’s 13 states had their elections concurrently, ending the conventional vertical and horizontal simultaneity in the election calendar, indicating the decoupling of federal-state politics since 2018. In his opinion piece, Kian-Ming Ong, political scientist at Taylor’s University and exparliamentarian of the Democratic Action Party (DAP), welcomes the intrigues Malaysia’s increasingly competitive and constantly evolving political landscape bring to comparative researchers in at least three areas: ethnically divided societies, democratic change and electoral reform in authoritarian regimes and the dynamics of electoral coalitions.
马来西亚于2022年11月19日举行的第15届大选产生了由安瓦尔·易卜拉欣领导的19党联合政府，该政府目前控制着议会三分之二的多数席位。这届政府由四个联盟组成:安华的希望联盟(Pakatan Harapan, PH)，曾经占主导地位的国民阵线(Barisan Nasional, BN)，砂拉越政党联盟(Gabungan Parti Sarawak, GPS)和沙巴人民联盟(Gabungan Rakyat Sabah, GRS)，分别在联邦议会有四个，四个，四个和三个政党。这个联盟还有四个独立的政党，传统党(Parti Warisan, Warisan)，以青年为基础的马来西亚统一民主联盟(MUDA)和两个地区政党。GE15本身至少有四个重要含义。首先，它导致了自2018年国阵61年统治结束以来的第四次和平权力转移，这样马来西亚在技术上通过了亨廷顿的“连续两次更替”测试，尽管她的民主远未巩固。其次，它在选举后产生了一个悬浮议会，这是第一次在联邦一级。2020年2月，马来西亚土著统一党(Parti Bersatu prihumi Malaysia, PPBM)离开希盟，并任命其主席慕尤丁·亚辛为新首相，“喜来登行动”(Sheraton Move)之后，无多数议会首次出现，这在本期其他地方有详细描述。第三，泛马伊斯兰党史无前例地崛起，以19%的议席成为国会最大的单一政党。在PAS和Bersatu的共同推动下，全国联盟(Perikatan Nasional, PN)现在是唯一拥有三分之一席位的反对党。第四，马来西亚13个州中只有3个州同时举行选举，结束了传统的选举日历纵向和横向同时进行，这表明自2018年以来联邦-州政治脱钩。泰勒大学(Taylor’s University)政治学家、民主行动党(Democratic Action Party, DAP)前议员王健明(Kian-Ming Ong)在他的观点文章中，欢迎马来西亚日益激烈的竞争和不断演变的政治格局给至少三个领域的比较研究者带来的阴谋:种族分裂的社会、独裁政权的民主变革和选举改革，以及选举联盟的动态。
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Pub Date : 2023-05-04DOI: 10.1080/00358533.2023.2219538
Yi-Jian Ho
While some might see Malaysia’s 15th General Election (GE15) as a critical juncture for political developments or research agendas in Malaysia, my outlook for sustainability and conservation in Malaysia is guarded against the possibilities of not meeting urgent climate change goals, even though there may be better prospects under the new government. GE15 was contested on the primacy of race, religion and regional autonomy, then on issues of corruption and bread-and-butter issues, rendering environment conservation and sustainable development a relatively fringe issue. This is a double-edged sword – progress will come from policy elites, moving at their respective individual paces. This shields them from the vagaries of politics and moral panics, but at the same time, it does not lend a sense of urgency. Coming out of the 14th General Election in 2018, activists were hopeful that the new federal Alliance of Hope (Pakatan Harapan, PH) government would be able to move the behemoth of Malaysia’s government bureaucracy towards better conservation and sustainability policy. The then Minister of Energy, Science, Technology, Environment and Climate Change Yeo Bee Yin had the right moves in planning for energy sector reform towards decarbonisation, increasing public transport usage, eliminating single-use plastics, and also beginning work on a Climate Change Act and an Energy Efficiency and Conservation Act. The bipartisan All-Party Parliamentary Group Malaysia on the Sustainable Development Goals (APPGM-SDG) also was formed in late 2019. My personal experience with the Prime Minister’s Department saw greater openness towards access to information reform (Target SDG 16.10). However, with the emergent COVID-19 crisis and the ‘Sheraton Move’ in February 2020 which led to a 17-month-long new government headed by the National Alliance (Perikatan Nasional, PN), these plans were at the very least deprioritised, if not scrapped. Tellingly, the new government no longer had a ministry which featured climate change as a named portfolio. Having said that, the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) continue to feature in subsequent government rhetoric and/or official efforts. Malaysia managed to submit its second SDG Voluntary National Review in 2021. The 12th Malaysia Plan, launched under the next government under the National Front (Barisan Nasional, BN), has several
{"title":"A guarded optimism for sustainability, before and after Malaysia’s GE15","authors":"Yi-Jian Ho","doi":"10.1080/00358533.2023.2219538","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00358533.2023.2219538","url":null,"abstract":"While some might see Malaysia’s 15th General Election (GE15) as a critical juncture for political developments or research agendas in Malaysia, my outlook for sustainability and conservation in Malaysia is guarded against the possibilities of not meeting urgent climate change goals, even though there may be better prospects under the new government. GE15 was contested on the primacy of race, religion and regional autonomy, then on issues of corruption and bread-and-butter issues, rendering environment conservation and sustainable development a relatively fringe issue. This is a double-edged sword – progress will come from policy elites, moving at their respective individual paces. This shields them from the vagaries of politics and moral panics, but at the same time, it does not lend a sense of urgency. Coming out of the 14th General Election in 2018, activists were hopeful that the new federal Alliance of Hope (Pakatan Harapan, PH) government would be able to move the behemoth of Malaysia’s government bureaucracy towards better conservation and sustainability policy. The then Minister of Energy, Science, Technology, Environment and Climate Change Yeo Bee Yin had the right moves in planning for energy sector reform towards decarbonisation, increasing public transport usage, eliminating single-use plastics, and also beginning work on a Climate Change Act and an Energy Efficiency and Conservation Act. The bipartisan All-Party Parliamentary Group Malaysia on the Sustainable Development Goals (APPGM-SDG) also was formed in late 2019. My personal experience with the Prime Minister’s Department saw greater openness towards access to information reform (Target SDG 16.10). However, with the emergent COVID-19 crisis and the ‘Sheraton Move’ in February 2020 which led to a 17-month-long new government headed by the National Alliance (Perikatan Nasional, PN), these plans were at the very least deprioritised, if not scrapped. Tellingly, the new government no longer had a ministry which featured climate change as a named portfolio. Having said that, the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) continue to feature in subsequent government rhetoric and/or official efforts. Malaysia managed to submit its second SDG Voluntary National Review in 2021. The 12th Malaysia Plan, launched under the next government under the National Front (Barisan Nasional, BN), has several","PeriodicalId":35685,"journal":{"name":"Round Table","volume":"112 1","pages":"347 - 348"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-05-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45912169","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-05-04DOI: 10.1080/00358533.2023.2219525
T. Yeoh
ABSTRACT Malaysia’s 15th general election (GE15) in November 2022 took place on the back of a tumultuous period in which the country experienced government alternation several times at federal and state levels from 2018. This article primarily addresses whether incumbency advantages were prevalent, and if so, how and when? Based on interviews and documentary data, the article concludes that, especially in a post-pandemic setting, incumbency mattered. However, Barisan Nasional (BN) experienced a form of ‘unrealised incumbency’. Without institutional reforms, trends in GE15 indicate that patronage and dependence on politicians for welfare gains seem to be a mainstay of Malaysian politics.
{"title":"Incumbency and patronage politics in Malaysia’s GE15","authors":"T. Yeoh","doi":"10.1080/00358533.2023.2219525","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00358533.2023.2219525","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT Malaysia’s 15th general election (GE15) in November 2022 took place on the back of a tumultuous period in which the country experienced government alternation several times at federal and state levels from 2018. This article primarily addresses whether incumbency advantages were prevalent, and if so, how and when? Based on interviews and documentary data, the article concludes that, especially in a post-pandemic setting, incumbency mattered. However, Barisan Nasional (BN) experienced a form of ‘unrealised incumbency’. Without institutional reforms, trends in GE15 indicate that patronage and dependence on politicians for welfare gains seem to be a mainstay of Malaysian politics.","PeriodicalId":35685,"journal":{"name":"Round Table","volume":"112 1","pages":"286 - 306"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-05-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48919153","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-05-04DOI: 10.1080/00358533.2023.2219547
R. Bourne
{"title":"Ukraine and the South","authors":"R. Bourne","doi":"10.1080/00358533.2023.2219547","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00358533.2023.2219547","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":35685,"journal":{"name":"Round Table","volume":"112 1","pages":"353 - 354"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-05-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42045667","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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