Energy imperialism refers to the use of natural resources for political purposes, i.e. weaponization of energy. At the state level, it means specific institutional structure, as the state building is predetermined by oil led developments. At the international level, it means international nets of energy dependency, centered around the mother state possessing oil, gas and other natural resources. In a paradox way, the so called Western world (Western Europe and North America) becomes increasingly dependent on the former colonies and Russia on energy supply. The paper examines issues of Russian energy imperialism in Central and Eastern Europe.
Energy imperialism refers to the use of natural resources for political purposes, i.e. weaponization of energy. At the state level, it means specific institutional structure, as the state building is predetermined by oil led developments. At the international level, it means international nets of energy dependency, centered around the mother state possessing oil, gas and other natural resources. In a paradox way, the so called Western world (Western Europe and North America) becomes increasingly dependent on the former colonies and Russia on energy supply. The paper examines issues of Russian energy imperialism in Central and Eastern Europe.
Energy imperialism refers to the use of natural resources for political purposes, i.e. weaponization of energy. At the state level, it means specific institutional structure, as the state building is predetermined by oil led developments. At the international level, it means international nets of energy dependency, centered around the mother state possessing oil, gas and other natural resources. In a paradox way, the so called Western world (Western Europe and North America) becomes increasingly dependent on the former colonies and Russia on energy supply. The paper examines issues of Russian energy imperialism in Central and Eastern Europe.
Historically, Pakistan has nurtured an interpretation of Islam based on Sufi philosophy, which has a reputation of being more tolerant and open-minded. Recent decades have, however, seen a rise in conservative Islam exported from Saudi Arabia; Sunni Wahhabism has become more common in Pakistan largely due to a sociohistorical context, which includes the 1970s oil crises, the 1979 Iranian revolution as well as the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. Petrodollars have given the Saudi kingdom the necessary resources to finance Wahhabi imperialism, the Iranian revolution has politicized Shia Muslims (who are seen as a threat by the Sunni), and the Afghan war has resulted in the creation of militarized Islam, supported and funded by the USA and Saudi Arabia. General Zia ul-Haq would then take power in Pakistan and capitalize on Saudi support for the hardline Islamization of the country, a policy which has left a trail of sectarian Sunni/Shia violence in its wake.
Historically, Pakistan has nurtured an interpretation of Islam based on Sufi philosophy, which has a reputation of being more tolerant and open-minded. Recent decades have, however, seen a rise in conservative Islam exported from Saudi Arabia; Sunni Wahhabism has become more common in Pakistan largely due to a sociohistorical context, which includes the 1970s oil crises, the 1979 Iranian revolution as well as the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. Petrodollars have given the Saudi kingdom the necessary resources to finance Wahhabi imperialism, the Iranian revolution has politicized Shia Muslims (who are seen as a threat by the Sunni), and the Afghan war has resulted in the creation of militarized Islam, supported and funded by the USA and Saudi Arabia. General Zia ul-Haq would then take power in Pakistan and capitalize on Saudi support for the hardline Islamization of the country, a policy which has left a trail of sectarian Sunni/Shia violence in its wake.
The article explores how solidarity and political emancipation progressed and impacted resistance against colonial imperialism movements in Bolivia. All throughout five hundred years of colonialism in South America local people sought to defend their communal way of life. Recent history of Bolivia, when Evo Morales, the leader of indigenous peoples, took the power is a result of long history of social struggle. Why is it important to analyze the history of social movements in Bolivia, what can it say about the development of democracy to democratic theory? Solidarity as one of the main elements of democracy was the only way for the indigenous Bolivians to achieve freedom and equality. While during the neoliberal political-economic reforms in Europe and the USA workers' solidarity has been marginalised, in Bolivia the resistance against neoliberal model played a vital role to build new forms of political solidarity. Thus the analysis of the history of how colonial and later system of liberal republicanism divided the strong indigenous communities and weakened their ability to resist them leading to political and economic alienation is important for theoretical reflections on a new forms of democracy. The history of indigenous in Bolivia shows that the main source of communal protection for these people was the communal ownership of land. The article demonstrates how first Spanish colonialists, then liberal republicans and later oligarchs together with transnational corporations pushed indigenous people from their lands thus threatening not just their livelihood but also their entire way of life. Since Inca Empire times indigenous people lived in very close communities, where they shared land and decision making. Communal assemblies were and remain today the most respected way of decision making. [.]
The article explores how solidarity and political emancipation progressed and impacted resistance against colonial imperialism movements in Bolivia. All throughout five hundred years of colonialism in South America local people sought to defend their communal way of life. Recent history of Bolivia, when Evo Morales, the leader of indigenous peoples, took the power is a result of long history of social struggle. Why is it important to analyze the history of social movements in Bolivia, what can it say about the development of democracy to democratic theory? Solidarity as one of the main elements of democracy was the only way for the indigenous Bolivians to achieve freedom and equality. While during the neoliberal political-economic reforms in Europe and the USA workers' solidarity has been marginalised, in Bolivia the resistance against neoliberal model played a vital role to build new forms of political solidarity. Thus the analysis of the history of how colonial and later system of liberal republicanism divided the strong indigenous communities and weakened their ability to resist them leading to political and economic alienation is important for theoretical reflections on a new forms of democracy. The history of indigenous in Bolivia shows that the main source of communal protection for these people was the communal ownership of land. The article demonstrates how first Spanish colonialists, then liberal republicans and later oligarchs together with transnational corporations pushed indigenous people from their lands thus threatening not just their livelihood but also their entire way of life. Since Inca Empire times indigenous people lived in very close communities, where they shared land and decision making. Communal assemblies were and remain today the most respected way of decision making. [.]
The article explores how solidarity and political emancipation progressed and impacted resistance against colonial imperialism movements in Bolivia. All throughout five hundred years of colonialism in South America local people sought to defend their communal way of life. Recent history of Bolivia, when Evo Morales, the leader of indigenous peoples, took the power is a result of long history of social struggle. Why is it important to analyze the history of social movements in Bolivia, what can it say about the development of democracy to democratic theory? Solidarity as one of the main elements of democracy was the only way for the indigenous Bolivians to achieve freedom and equality. While during the neoliberal political-economic reforms in Europe and the USA workers' solidarity has been marginalised, in Bolivia the resistance against neoliberal model played a vital role to build new forms of political solidarity. Thus the analysis of the history of how colonial and later system of liberal republicanism divided the strong indigenous communities and weakened their ability to resist them leading to political and economic alienation is important for theoretical reflections on a new forms of democracy. The history of indigenous in Bolivia shows that the main source of communal protection for these people was the communal ownership of land. The article demonstrates how first Spanish colonialists, then liberal republicans and later oligarchs together with transnational corporations pushed indigenous people from their lands thus threatening not just their livelihood but also their entire way of life. Since Inca Empire times indigenous people lived in very close communities, where they shared land and decision making. Communal assemblies were and remain today the most respected way of decision making. [.]
The article explores how solidarity and political emancipation progressed and impacted resistance against colonial imperialism movements in Bolivia. All throughout five hundred years of colonialism in South America local people sought to defend their communal way of life. Recent history of Bolivia, when Evo Morales, the leader of indigenous peoples, took the power is a result of long history of social struggle. Why is it important to analyze the history of social movements in Bolivia, what can it say about the development of democracy to democratic theory? Solidarity as one of the main elements of democracy was the only way for the indigenous Bolivians to achieve freedom and equality. While during the neoliberal political-economic reforms in Europe and the USA workers' solidarity has been marginalised, in Bolivia the resistance against neoliberal model played a vital role to build new forms of political solidarity. Thus the analysis of the history of how colonial and later system of liberal republicanism divided the strong indigenous communities and weakened their ability to resist them leading to political and economic alienation is important for theoretical reflections on a new forms of democracy. The history of indigenous in Bolivia shows that the main source of communal protection for these people was the communal ownership of land. The article demonstrates how first Spanish colonialists, then liberal republicans and later oligarchs together with transnational corporations pushed indigenous people from their lands thus threatening not just their livelihood but also their entire way of life. Since Inca Empire times indigenous people lived in very close communities, where they shared land and decision making. Communal assemblies were and remain today the most respected way of decision making. [.]
The article explores how solidarity and political emancipation progressed and impacted resistance against colonial imperialism movements in Bolivia. All throughout five hundred years of colonialism in South America local people sought to defend their communal way of life. Recent history of Bolivia, when Evo Morales, the leader of indigenous peoples, took the power is a result of long history of social struggle. Why is it important to analyze the history of social movements in Bolivia, what can it say about the development of democracy to democratic theory? Solidarity as one of the main elements of democracy was the only way for the indigenous Bolivians to achieve freedom and equality. While during the neoliberal political-economic reforms in Europe and the USA workers' solidarity has been marginalised, in Bolivia the resistance against neoliberal model played a vital role to build new forms of political solidarity. Thus the analysis of the history of how colonial and later system of liberal republicanism divided the strong indigenous communities and weakened their ability to resist them leading to political and economic alienation is important for theoretical reflections on a new forms of democracy. The history of indigenous in Bolivia shows that the main source of communal protection for these people was the communal ownership of land. The article demonstrates how first Spanish colonialists, then liberal republicans and later oligarchs together with transnational corporations pushed indigenous people from their lands thus threatening not just their livelihood but also their entire way of life. Since Inca Empire times indigenous people lived in very close communities, where they shared land and decision making. Communal assemblies were and remain today the most respected way of decision making. [.]
The article discuses the problem that was recently raised in the Lithuanian historical literature & public discourse by G. Beresnevieius, A. Bumblauskas, S. C. Rowell: was the medieval Lithuanian state (Grand Duchy of Lithuania; GDL) an empire? Important reason for the emergence of this problem was the partial rehabilitation of the very concept of "empire" due to the dissolution of the the USSR (reputed as "last empire") & the search for common legacies by the historians of the countries involved in the construction of the European Union as a transnational political community. There were important reasons for the traditional historiography to abstain from the use of the concepts of "empire" & "imperialism" in the work on GDL. For Non-Marxist Russian historians, GDL was simply another Russian state, so there could not be Russian imperialism against Russians. For Marxist historians, imperialism was a phase in the "capitalist formation," immediately preceding the socialist revolution & bound to the specific period of world history, so the research on precapitalist empires & imperialism was suspect of anachronism. For the opposite reason, deriving from the hermeneutic methodology, the talk about medieval Lithuanian empire & imperialism was an anachronism for Non-Marxist Polish & German historians too, because they considered as Empires only polities that claimed to be successors to Roman Empire: the Holy Roman Empire of German Nation, Byzantine Empire, Moscow Empire. Lithuanian political elite never raised such claims, although theory of the Lithuanian descent from Romans (Legend of Palemon) could be used for this goal. Starting from path-breaking work by S. N. Eisenstadt "The Political Systems of Empires" (1963), comparative politics, history, sociology, anthropology & theory of international relations witnessed the emergence of the field of interdisciplinary studies that can be described as comparative studies of empires & imperialism. Second section of the paper provides the survey of the theoretical work in this field in search of the ideas useful for the analysis of the peculiarities of the medieval Lithuanian state. This survey includes into its scope the work of S. N. Eisenstadt, I. Wallerstein, A. Motyl, B. Buzan, R. Little, A. Watson, M. Beissinger, Ch.Tilly & M. Doyle, whose book "Empires" is considered as the most important contribution to the theorizing of empires & imperialism up to this date. Adapted from the source document.
In this article by applying the ideas of M. Foucault, E. Said, A. Negri, M. Hardt, L. Wittgenstein, Z. Norkus, N. Statkus, R. Lopata, N. Luhmann and others, the model of the EU imperialism is introduced. By using the theory of family resemblance by L. Wittgenstein and logic of its employment as shown by Z. Norkus in his work on Grand Duchy of Lithuanian as the empire, the conclusion arrives that the EU gravitates from the classical or neo-classical definition of the empire. However, inaccuracies, found by applying Z. Norkus' methodology, are caused more by the form, and not by the content, thus the claim that EU holds the notion of the empire is valid. This allows entitling the EU as the post-modern empire. Adapted from the source document.
In this study, titled "Intersection of US-Russia interests in Central Asia region", the author analyses the strategies of the United States of America and the Russian Federation towards Central Asia region and the main strategic interests in the security policy and economical level. The study pays a lot of attention to the analysis of the democratization aspect, especially in the U.S. foreign policy course, and its impact on the relations between U.S., Russia and the states of the Central Asia. The study is based on the academic concept of "imperialism", which becomes an orient in the analysis of intersection of US Russia interests in Central Asia region and opportunities for cooperation. The study has been divided into four chapters. In the first chapter author introduces a theoretical foundation of "imperialism". The second chapter is dedicated to the analysis of US strategic interests in Central Asia and the role and meaning of democratization process. The geopolitical spread of Russia's influence is analyzed in the third chapter of the study, where the author underscores the importance of rally points in the relations between Russia and Central Asia states. The fourth chapter analyzes the prospects of future cooperation and competition between US and Russia. The study concludes, that US strategy towards Central Asia is discontinuous, and because of underestimation of specific situation in this region and lack of rally points (short common historical experience, differences in culture and value systems etc.), US fails to establish in this region. In addition, attempting to pass a "democratization message" to the authoritarian regimes and misjudging their reaction, US harms its other strategic interests. However, US cannot abandon "democratization" message because of it gives an ideological ground for its foreign policy course and legitimizes its actions worldwide. Therefore the study confirms the first hypothesis, that excessively underscoring the democratization aspect and forgetting the specifics of Central Asia region, US reduces the effectiveness of these relations as well as its abilities to reach other strategic goals. Russia, otherwise, does not underline "democratization" issue and avoids the rise of such tension in its relations with Central Asia states. Russia makes use of the bridging cultural connections, common historical experience, and, mostly important, common infrastructure that facilitates economical cooperation. Therefore, study concludes, that Russia manages to make use of Central Asia states' apathy towards US offered democratization model, and increases its opportunities to strengthen the instruments of economical pressure in the region. Central Asia can be seen as a testing area for the competition of US and Russia imperial ambitions. In consideration of US attempts to implement its domination policy goals and Russia's desire to see multipolar international relations system instead of unipolar, cooperation perspectives remain highly questionable.
In this study, titled "Intersection of US-Russia interests in Central Asia region", the author analyses the strategies of the United States of America and the Russian Federation towards Central Asia region and the main strategic interests in the security policy and economical level. The study pays a lot of attention to the analysis of the democratization aspect, especially in the U.S. foreign policy course, and its impact on the relations between U.S., Russia and the states of the Central Asia. The study is based on the academic concept of "imperialism", which becomes an orient in the analysis of intersection of US Russia interests in Central Asia region and opportunities for cooperation. The study has been divided into four chapters. In the first chapter author introduces a theoretical foundation of "imperialism". The second chapter is dedicated to the analysis of US strategic interests in Central Asia and the role and meaning of democratization process. The geopolitical spread of Russia's influence is analyzed in the third chapter of the study, where the author underscores the importance of rally points in the relations between Russia and Central Asia states. The fourth chapter analyzes the prospects of future cooperation and competition between US and Russia. The study concludes, that US strategy towards Central Asia is discontinuous, and because of underestimation of specific situation in this region and lack of rally points (short common historical experience, differences in culture and value systems etc.), US fails to establish in this region. In addition, attempting to pass a "democratization message" to the authoritarian regimes and misjudging their reaction, US harms its other strategic interests. However, US cannot abandon "democratization" message because of it gives an ideological ground for its foreign policy course and legitimizes its actions worldwide. Therefore the study confirms the first hypothesis, that excessively underscoring the democratization aspect and forgetting the specifics of Central Asia region, US reduces the effectiveness of these relations as well as its abilities to reach other strategic goals. Russia, otherwise, does not underline "democratization" issue and avoids the rise of such tension in its relations with Central Asia states. Russia makes use of the bridging cultural connections, common historical experience, and, mostly important, common infrastructure that facilitates economical cooperation. Therefore, study concludes, that Russia manages to make use of Central Asia states' apathy towards US offered democratization model, and increases its opportunities to strengthen the instruments of economical pressure in the region. Central Asia can be seen as a testing area for the competition of US and Russia imperial ambitions. In consideration of US attempts to implement its domination policy goals and Russia's desire to see multipolar international relations system instead of unipolar, cooperation perspectives remain highly questionable.
The article discusses the correspondence relationship between Jonas Šliūpas and Andrius Domaševičius in 1896. Šliūpas was asked to represent the Lithuanian Social Democratic Party (LSDP) at the international socialist congress, scheduled for 1896 summer in London. The establishment of the LSDP in May 1 (1896) is associated with this event. The article also shows that Šliūpas as an independent socialist played a pioneer role by establishment of the Lithuanian first newspaper, specialized for working- class (Nauja gadynė, 1894–1896). On the other hand Šliūpas raised for Lithuanian statehood demand, the entire decade before the official creation of the LSDP. Šliūpas wanted to separate Lithuanian lands from Russia and Germany, and prefered a federation with Latvia. In 1887 it expressed the idea of federation of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia as a possible version in the future. In addition, Šliūpas not rejected a possible federal version with Poland, if the Poles refuse their imperialism. The political players, who at the earliest raised Lithuania's statehood demand after the 1863/64 Uprising, was J. Šliūpas, A. Moravskis, A. Domaševičius. These Lithuanians of the socialist / social democratic orientation was related in youth to the largest city in northern Lithuania – Šiauliai. The article finally highlights the pioneering role Šliūpas by raising the question of Lithuania in the non-Lithuanian press in the West at the end of the 19th century.
