Suchergebnisse

The present article is a summary of a quantitative Social History in three volumes (can be obtained directly from the author) treating of the 24 cathedral chapters of the Old German Empire in the 17th and 18th Century. The research on the cathedral chapters which were as well spiritual as secular corporations, until now is rather traditional in its methods, i.e. focusing on the constitutions and the biographies of the canons. Actually there are only a few monographies. Our study which comprehends all chapters examines 5 725 cases. The case-unit is not the person, but the prebend. The following variables are taken up: name (locality) of the chapter, dignitaries, degrees (for commoners), the ways of applying to and retiring from the chapters, social status (seven categories for the nobility, two for the commoners), advancements in rank, origin, cumulations. The completeness of the data is generally more than 90%, often towards 100%. All data is published in form of chronological lists of the canons in every chapter, besides an index of names is given. Therefore our work serves as a reference-book too. The data were processed with SPSS, crosstabulations and other statistics are published also. For regional inquiries the chapters were classified into three groups: Northern Germany, the chapters of the Knights of the Empire (i. e. Rhineland and Franconia), Southern Germany and Austria. To show the chronological development we divided the entire period (1601-1803) into four periods of about fifty years. The article presents some important results for every variable. Some general Statements are possible. From the viewpoint of social history the hypothesis of three regional types has been verified. Chapters at the border of the Empire form a particular group which shows more and more deviations to the Standard. On the other hand the chapters in the center assimilate. Spatial mobility decreases, local recruitment increases. There are tendencies to closeness and occasional provincialism. Cumulations increase in the second half of 18th Century. Canons from the middle and lower classes were almost completely eliminated during the two centuries. Thus the European feudal reaction can clearly be demonstrated using the example of the German cathedral chapters. Our research shows that the chapters get into a crisis in the late 18th Century. They could no more accomplish their functions as providing institutions for the German nobility. For many reasons the run to the prebends grew as well as the commoners' criticism influenced by the Enlightenment. They disapproved the loss of the chapters' spiritual functions, the prevalence of the nobility, the grewing exclusion of the commoners and the enormous cumulations. Proposals to a reform failed. The difficult Situation in the Empire during the Napoleonic Wars forced the secularization (1803) which brought the end to the old German cathedral chapters.

"The question at hand seems relatively simple and straightforward: whether and to what extent the protection and promotion of human rights is necessary for efforts to address conflict and build peace. The issue has been much debated over time. The 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights forcefully associated the protection of human rights with the prevention of violent conflict, stating that 'it is essential, if man is not to be compelled to have recourse, as a last resort, to rebellion against tyranny and oppression, that human rights should be protected by the rule of law' (UN 1948, preamble). Yet in 1996, an anonymous author in Human Rights Quarterly accused the international human rights movement of prolonging the war in Bosnia Herzegovina. There, human rights activists had rejected pragmatic deals that could have ended the violence and, from hindsight, were no worse than the eventual agreement in rewarding ethnic cleansing and aggression. In that author's view, it made 'today's living the dead of tomorrow' by pursuing a perfectly just and moral peace that would bring 'justice for yesterday's victims of atrocities' (Anonymous 1996, 259). Since then, the idea that the normative nature of human rights standards may complicate the practical demands of peacemaking has been a recurrent theme in discussions on the relationship between human rights and efforts to address violent conflict. This is especially the case when the latter is conceived of in terms of conflict settlement or resolution. Questions of definitions and objectives are thus key. Also relevant are the time frame, context and level of intervention one focuses on, though few authors on the subject make this explicit. In addition, narrow perceptions and generalizations abound in this debate as people working on human rights, peace and conflict have been grouped into categories of 'human rights activists' and 'conflict resolvers' as if these were homogenous and coherent clusters of actors. In this chapter, the authoress argues that considering human rights and conflict transformation in conjunction deepens one's analysis of what is involved in moving from violence to sustainable peace. It is informed by the idea that the two fill 'gaps' in one another, in that each contributes to a better understanding of the other by highlighting elements that are relatively under-explored in the theory and practice of each separate field. For conflict transformation, which will be the main focus here, the perspective of human rights forces a greater emphasis on structural conditions, especially the role of the state, systems of governance and issues of power in generating, escalating and transforming violent conflict. Considering human rights in relation to conflict transformation, moreover, highlights the need to employ a holistic, multidimensional understanding of human rights that does not reduce them to their legal foundations. This chapter suggests that conflict transformation, because of its explicit grounding in social justice, and hence inherently normative foundation, may provide a more nuanced and fruitful conceptual space for thinking about human rights, conflict and peace than conflict resolution and conflict management. Placing constructive social change at its core, conflict transformation acknowledges the need for addressing power imbalances and recognizes a role for advocacy and the importance of voices that challenge the status quo. Its concern with direct, structural and cultural violence is thus also highly relevant from a rights perspective. In order to place these ideas in context, the chapter will briefly comment on literature that has been published on human rights and approaches for addressing conflict and building peace (section 2). Section 3 proposes a framework for understanding the relationship between human rights and conflict transformation, using the metaphor of an iceberg, with its graphic image of things visible connected to matters unseen. It also introduces four dimensions of human rights that need to be taken into account in processes to build a just and sustainable peace. Section 4 discusses some of the practical implications of adopting a human rights perspective on conflict transformation. Nepal, South Africa, and other countries where the authoress has worked over the past 15 years, are used as illustrative examples throughout sections 3 and 4. Finally, section 5 concludes and points to some areas for further research." (excerpt)