This bachelor’s thesis deals with the topic of collective memory in Latin America. It analyzes the role of the Centro Nacional de Memoria Histórica (CNMH) in the construction of collective memory...Show moreThis bachelor’s thesis deals with the topic of collective memory in Latin America. It analyzes the role of the Centro Nacional de Memoria Histórica (CNMH) in the construction of collective memory and concludes that it can be understood as a new approach to peace building. The thesis is divided into three parts: first it gives a theoretical background about the concept of collective memory. The second part deals with collective memory in the Southern Cone of Latin America and shows recent developments in the field. The third part turns to the Colombian case study. Here the Colombian conflict is shortly explained and the CNMH tasks are presented. Thereafter the discussion follows, which concludes that the construction of collective memory can be understood as a peace-building tool. In this context the focus of the CNMH on the victims is explained. The focus on the victims in the construction of collective memories about the Colombian conflict serves as a tool to relieve them from the psychological burden that presses on their shoulders due to the experienced violence. In addition the victims serve as a common denominator in memory, since by the focus on the victims the actual cause of the conflict, political and societal polarization, is taken out of the focus of the public commemoration process. In addition to that, by the focus on the victims, the CNMH registers civil society’s voices and ensures that they are heard. By giving civilians a greater level of participation in the public debate, the civil society becomes a third party actor, which is seen as crucial to an enduring peace process.Show less
A unique perspective on the personal development of Ernesto 'Che' Guevara towards the Cuban revolution, using the Bhagavad Gita as an interpreting tool.
An examination of the shift in solidarity flows within the Zapatista network.The Zapatistas originally received humanitarian solidarity as receivers of altruism from the North. Their anti...Show moreAn examination of the shift in solidarity flows within the Zapatista network.The Zapatistas originally received humanitarian solidarity as receivers of altruism from the North. Their anti-neoliberal, anti-globalisation discourse facilitated a shift towards the South becoming the dominant actor in these solidarity exchanges by providing inspiration for First World movements and events.Show less
Francis Fukuyama's "End of History and The Last Man" hypothesis has become a much maligned and often misused one. Here, his concept of Thymocracy is tested against a non-Western society, Singapore.
This thesis concludes that Gabriel Marcel’s notion of the spirit of abstraction provides us with important insights regarding how and why the Republican army was able to repress the community of...Show moreThis thesis concludes that Gabriel Marcel’s notion of the spirit of abstraction provides us with important insights regarding how and why the Republican army was able to repress the community of Canudos as viciously as it did. As put by Blundell, “The process of abstraction, which Marcel also refers to as primary reflection, “is, roughly speaking, purely analytical and (…) consists, as it were, in dissolving the concrete into its elements.””(p. 59). Once one of those elements is accorded, “isolated from all other categories, an arbitrary primacy, we are victims of the spirit of abstraction.” (Marcel, p. 155-156). By connecting his battle against the spirit of abstraction with issues such as fanaticism, the role of (communication) technology and the press, violence and war, religion and historiography, Marcel provides us with a unique perspective to use when analysing conflicts such as the Canudos War. Especially his emphasis on the role of language in the process of justifying war turned out to be particularly useful. As put by Johnson, “Naming, says De Certeau, is not “the ‘painting’ of a reality any more than it is elsewhere; it is a performative act organizing what it enunciates. It does what it says and constitutes the savagery it declares. (…) To understand subalternity thus is to side with the argument that it is a discursive effect.” (p. 30). Words, so it seems, are the primary vehicle through which the spirit of abstraction manifests itself.Show less
