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The article explores the philosophical exegesis in Obadiah Sforno's sixteenth-century Psalms commentary and its reception in Berlin of the late eighteenth century, where it was reprinted in the Haskalah's biggest bestseller-an edition of Moses Mendelssohn's Psalms translation with Hebrew commentary.
While the inclusion of entire commentaries by earlier exegetes was unique among all Haskalah Bible editions, I argue that the choice to include Sforno's commentary alongside Mendelssohn's translation of Psalms, itself an expression of Mendelssohn's political-theological defense of Judaism, was intended to buttress shared philosophical doctrines and concepts located by the two scholars in Psalms, notwithstanding temporal and cultural divergences: imitatio Dei, the salvation of the individual soul, and Israel's eternity.
How much influence did the former communist state security service Darzhavna sigurnost (DS) have during the transformation period in Bulgaria?
For the first time in history, there is empirical data available that allow for an analysis of the role of the Bulgarian secret police and its "afterlife" after 1990.
Bulgarian intelligence archives, which were made partly accessible following the country's admission to the European Union in 2007, provide an excellent basis for an analysis of the relationship between the DS and the Soviet State Committee for Security, the transformation of the Bulgarian security apparatus in 1990, attempts to disclose the state security archives, and continuous infiltration of Bulgarian politics, institutions, and security apparatus by former agents of the communist intelligence and security apparatus.
The empirical data suggest that personal connections, dependencies, and informal networks of former DS agents and officials played an important role during the transformation period in Bulgaria and are at least partly responsible for political corruption, continuous Russian influence, a high degree of politicization of the Bulgarian security apparatus, misuse of intelligence and illegal surveillance practices, and a high degree of domestic and international mistrust and (dis-)loyalty.
Wars and the world
(2024)
This book offers a descriptive analysis of the Soviet/Russian wars in Afghanistan, Chechnya, and Georgia, as well as an in-depth exploration of the ways in which these wars are framed in the collective consciousness created by global popular culture. Russian and Western modalities of remembrance have been, and remain, engaged in a world war that takes place (not exclusively, but intensively) on the level of popular culture. The action/reaction dynamic, confrontational narratives and othering between the two "camps" never ceased. The Cold War, in many ways and contrary to the views of many others who hoped for the end of history, never really ended.
After the Second World War, Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini were singled out as evil geniuses who misled the masses and plunged them into an “unwanted war.”
In relation to their armed forces, this narrative argued that the generals under their command had been demoted to powerless tools in the hands of the dictators, having to follow orders and with no sway over decision-making.
It was further asserted that Germany and Italy had not been able to secure a victory due to the dictators’ meddling. Yet, as this chapter shows, there are important differences between the German and Italian cases.
The chapter compares both the command structures in which the dictators operated as well as their grand strategies and how they cooperated during the war.
Their personal relationship will be also analyzed, as it is impossible to look at the Axis without understanding the complex personal relationship at the very top.
The strategies of both Hitler and Mussolini will be looked at and how each leader behaved in terms of working with their closest ally, together with some examples of cooperation on the lower military rungs.
Over the six decades since it officially ended, the Algerian War has become a key event for marking, retrospectively, the beginning of a new era in European, Western and global history. This new era is characterized by the proclaimed end of Western hegemony – by the proclaimed end of European history as global, universal history. This era, our era, understands itself as the time after the domination of the West, a time or multiple times of “post”: the time of postcolonialism, but also postmodernity, postsecularism, posthumanism.
The times of “post” are characterized by a fundamental reconfiguration of the relations between European civilization and its Others, first and foremost by the proclaimed split between Europe and its Others, and more generally by the disintegration, disruption and dispersion of the – allegedly – unified space of culture, knowledge and discourse. The postcolonial era is an era of diversity and difference, an era of dispersions and diasporas, where the space of culture is a space of multiple cultures, a space of in-between, of “inter”: the space of the intercultural, but also the interreligious, interethnic, interracial and inter-epistemic.
This conference will reflect on the “inter” in the time of “post”. We invited scholars, thinkers, intellectuals and artists to discuss various aspects and models of intercultural dynamics that have been developed and articulated in the aftermath of the Algerian War or of other events that marked the decline of Western hegemony, such as the Second Vatican, May 1968 or the Vietnam War. How did the age of decolonization reshape the discourse and practice of intercultural relations? To what extent interculturality itself is a sign or a site of decolonization? To what extent, on the contrary, intercultural relations may reproduce colonial or generate neocolonial patterns?
Contributions examine the emergence of intercultural notions and practices in various intellectual traditions, European or non-European; the development of new categories and constellations of identity, otherness and dialogue; the interrelations between epistemic, cultural, discursive, religious and political aspects; as well as reactions to these new developments and various forms of critique and resistance. We are especially interested in how this reflection may shed light on socio-political and cultural phenomena, trends and concerns of the present time.
Nationalism was declared to be dead too early. A postnational age was announced, and liberalism claimed to have been victorious by the end of the Cold War. At the same time postnational order was proclaimed in which transnational alliances like the European Union were supposed to become more important in international relations. But we witnessed the rise a strong nationalism during the early 21st century instead, and right wing parties are able to gain more and more votes in elections that are often characterized by nationalist agendas. This volume shows how nationalist dreams and fears alike determine politics in an age that was supposed to witness a rather peaceful coexistence by those who consider transnational ideas more valuable than national demands. It will deal with different case studies to show why and how nationalism made its way back to the common consciousness and which elements stimulated the re-establishment of the aggressive nation state. The volume will therefore look at the continuities of empire, actual and imagined, the role of "foreign-" and "otherness" for nationalist narratives, and try to explain how globalization stimulated the rise of 21st century nationalisms as well.
Captive Red Army soldiers made up the majority of victims of Nazi Germany’s starvation policy against Soviet civilians and other non-combatants and thus constituted the largest single victim group of the German war of annihilation against the Soviet Union. Indeed, Soviet prisoners of war were the largest victim group of all National Socialist annihilation policies after the European Jews. Before the launch of Operation Barbarossa, it was clear to the Wehrmacht planning departments on exactly what scale they could expect to capture Soviet troops. Yet, they neglected to make the necessary preparations for feeding and sheltering the captured soldiers, who were viewed by the economic staffs and the military leadership alike as direct competitors of German troops and the German home front for precious food supplies. The number of extra mouths to feed was incompatible with German war aims. The obvious limitations on their freedom of movement and the relative ease with which large numbers could be segregated and their rations controlled were crucial factors in the death of over 3 million Soviet POWs, the vast majority directly or indirectly as a result of deliberate policies of neglect, undernourishment, and starvation while in the ‘care’ of the Wehrmacht. The most reliable figures for the mortality of Soviet POWs in German captivity reveal that up to 3.3 million died from a total of just over 5.7 million captured between June 1941 and February 1945 — a proportion of almost 58 percent. Of these, 2 million were already dead by the beginning of February 1942. In English, there is still neither a single monograph nor a single edited volume dedicated to the subject. This article now provides the first detailed stand-alone synthesis in that language addressing the whole period from 1941 to 1945.