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ID: 164023

Metaphors and paradoxes: secrecy, power and subjectification in Sufi initiation in Aleppo, Syria / Pinto, Paulo G

Pinto, Paulo G	Journal Article
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Summary/Abstract

Based fieldwork in Aleppo between 1999 and 2010, this article analyzes how secrecy and revelation, two forms of codification, maintenance and transmission of religious knowledge central to the mystical tradition of Sufism in contemporary Syria were constructed and enacted in the process of initiation (tarbiyya) into the mystical path in two Sufi zawiyas (ritual lodges) in pre-war Aleppo. Access to the unseen spheres of divine reality through initiation created both structures of charismatic power in the Sufi communities and religious subjectivities that empowered its holders as moral agents in the pre-civil war Syrian public sphere. I argue that Sufi practices of initiation that gradually revealed the divine reality to students while simultaneously also enhanced the mystery of this reality enabled Sufi practitioners to cope with the opacity of power and contradictions of everyday life of late-Ba‘thist modernity in Syria.

Key Words

Power ; Syria ; Sufism ; Secrecy ; Subjectification ; Metaphors ;
Paradoxes ; Initiation

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ID: 140812

War and revenge: explaining conflict initiation by democracies / Stein, Rachel M

RACHEL M. STEIN	Article
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While we know much about what differentiates the conflict behavior of democracies from autocracies, we know relatively little about why some democracies are more belligerent than others. In contrast to existing studies, I argue that it is public opinion and not institutions that drives these differences. All democratic leaders have an incentive to take public opinion into account, but public opinion is not the same everywhere. Individuals’ attitudes towards war are shaped by core beliefs about revenge, which vary across countries. Leaders with more vengeful populations will be more likely to initiate conflicts because they generate popular support for war more effectively. Using retention of capital punishment as a proxy for broad endorsement of revenge, I find that democracies that have retained the death penalty for longer periods of time are significantly more likely to initiate conflicts. This research has important implications for existing theories of democracy and war.

Key Words

Democracy and War ; Democracies ; Democratic Leaders ; War and Revenge ; Explaining Conflict ; Initiation

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