Identity,Inequality, and Legitimacy: Religious Differences in Primary School Completion in Sub‐Saharan Africa

This study uses survey data from 17 countries in Sub‐Saharan Africa, along with country‐level indicators, to examine the relationship between religious identity and the odds of completing primary schooling, as a key aspect of socioeconomic inequality. The results reveal a significant and robust schooling disadvantage for Muslims and those of traditional African faiths both relative to Christians at the aggregate level as well as within 13 country samples. This effect is seen in both rural and urban areas and is slightly smaller among men versus women, though it is still large and significant. The effect is also larger in countries in West Africa, with greater Muslim populations, with cooperative church‐state relations, and with mandatory religious education in schools. I interpret these results to indicate greater obstacles to the establishment of the legitimacy of the formal school system among Muslim and traditionalist families and communities, as a still troublesome legacy of the historical links between Christian missionization and the colonial project.     

The localised madrasas of Afghanistan: their political and governance entanglements

This paper focuses on the operation of madrasas in Afghanistan. While numerous projects, initiatives and studies have focused on education generally in Afghanistan, considerably less attention has been directed towards madrasas specifically. Part of the reason can be attributed to the unclear role they play in the wider efforts to provide education across the country and the difficulty of formally including them within the nation-building project. The claim of this paper is that madrasas in Afghanistan are by and large localised and community-driven. The localised nature of Afghan madrasas can be understood as the product of the political tensions throughout the country’s history between a state marked by tenuous authority and dispersed communities closely observant of unwelcome state interference. Moreover, the government lacks the resources and reach to provide educational services in many rural areas, thereby tacitly relying on localised madrasa to provide a base level of education to much of the population. Understanding the entanglements between education, politics and authority is crucial for appreciating the unique space that madrasas inhabit within the country.     

Why Talk about Chinese Metaphysics?

Chinese philosophy in the twentieth century has often been related to some sort of cultural or other particularism or some sort of philosophical universalism. By and large, these still seem to be the terms along which academic debates are carried out. The tension is particularly manifest in notions such as “Chinese philosophy,” “Daoist cosmology,” “Neo-Confucian idealism,” or “Chinese metaphysics.” For some, “Chinese metaphysics” may be a blatant contradictio in adiecto, while others may find it a most ordinary topic to be discussed at the beginning of the twenty-first century. In this article, I set out to examine two major discourses in which talk about “metaphysics” is frequent and popular and to which talk of “Chinese metaphysics” may wish to contribute: the history of philosophy and analytic philosophy. My contention is that it is usually far from obvious what reasons are behind putting “Chinese metaphysics” on the academic agenda and to what precise purpose this is done. What my discussion seeks to highlight is the as yet often largely unarticulated dimension of the politics of comparative philosophy—of which talk about “Chinese metaphysics” may but need not be an example.     

Mediational role of values in linking personality traits to political orientation

Two studies use the Five Factor Model of traits and Schwartz's (1992 ) theory of basic personal values to assess the mediational role of values in linking traits to voting choice and left-right ideology. Both left- and right-wing voters showed distinctive traits and values that were congruent with their ideologies. Structural equation modelling supported a hypothesized full mediation model. Individuals' traits of openness, conscientiousness and agreeableness explained significant variance in the politically relevant values of security and universalism, and these self-reported values, in turn, explained the voters' political orientations. These findings held across age (adolescents and adults) and were corroborated using both cross-sectional and longitudinal data.     

西方宗教教育在思想政治教育中的作用

西方国家的宗教教育非常活跃,并行使某种思想政治教育的职能。西方国家的宗教教育在对国民进行道德熏陶和政治控制,培养公民的民族精神和社会信仰,调和阶级关系,维护社会稳定,以及解决公民日常的思想问题和精神困惑等方面起着重要作用,对我国思想政治教育有着借鉴意义。     

The interactive effects of organizational politics and exchange ideology on manager ratings of retention

This study examined the moderating effect of exchange ideology on the relation between perceptions of organizational politics and manager-rated retention. Data collected from 178 employees of a distribution services organization indicated that employees’ perceptions of organizational politics related negatively related to manager assessments of retention. However, the variables were only related among employees with a moderate to strong exchange ideology. These individuals were more sensitive to a political environment than individuals with a weak exchange ideology. Implications for employees seeking to actively manage their careers are discussed.     

Book Reviews

Books Reviewed:
Daniel Chirot and Martin E. P. Seligman (eds.), Ethnopolitical Warfare: Causes, Consequences, and Possible Solutions
David Patrick Houghton, U.S. Foreign Policy and the Iran Hostage Crisis
Yoram Peri (ed.), The Assassination of Yitzhak Rabin
Peter Suedfeld (ed.), Light from the Ashes: Social Science Careers of Young Holocaust Refugees and Survivors     

论小康社会的政治文明建设

政治文明包括政治思想、政治制度、政治行为文明的丰富内涵。社会主义政治文明建设的提出与实施对全面推进社会主义现代化建设,实现我国小康社会的发展目标具有深远意义。社会主义政治文明建设的基本任务是社会主义民主政治建设与法制建设。     

Moral Expertise?: Constitutional Narratives and Philosophical Argument

Using the bench trial of Colorado's Amendment 2 as an example, this article focuses on the more general question of expert testimony in moral philosophy. It argues that there is indeed expertise in moral philosophy but argues against admitting such expert testimony in cases dealing with what John Rawls terms "constitutional essentials" and 'matters of basic justice." Developing the idea of public reason inherent in the Rawlsian concept of political liberalism, the article argues that philosophers can and should speak out on public issues, if they do so with due respect for certain restrictions, but that they should not serve as expert witnesses on core constitutional questions, since doing so suggests that they claim a type of authority that would require fellow citizens to defer to their views. Such claims to authority in basic ethical matters threaten the mutual respect for divergent comprehensive doctrines that lies at the core of political liberalism. Philosophers have a duty to serve the public good, and they perform this service in fruitful ways. But they should refuse a public role that appears incompatible with equal respect for the committed ethical searching of their fellow citizens.     

Democracy, knowledge, and imagination

In public debate, we can discern amostly implicit idea that politics is an affairfor politicians. This contradicts the idea ofthe active citizen, according to which thedifference between politician and citizen ismerely accidental. This article focus upon theprerequisites of such an ideal in modernsociety and especially the classical idea ofprudence as central to good citizenship. Therole of school education is stressed. MarthaNussbaum's concept of ``narrative imagination'is seen as important as well as well aneducation aiming at the Bildung of thestudent.