Observatório da imprensa

DC

benigno — Tue, 17 Sep 2019 21:22:25 +0000

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Piçarra

benigno — Tue, 17 Sep 2019 21:18:11 +0000

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2019, September

OI — Tue, 17 Sep 2019 16:02:02 +0000

Photo of the month.

O post 2019, September aparece primeiro no Observatório da imprensa.

August, 2019

Observatório da Imprensa — Fri, 13 Sep 2019 03:26:45 +0000

Photo of the month.

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Symbolic power and the future of opposition

OI — Sat, 04 Nov 2017 23:33:39 +0000

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Domingos da Cruz | Symbolic power cannot be associated with an idea of power built upon money, military power, witchcraft, cruelty or any other aspect related to materiality. Symbolic power may be understood through existential examples. However, the comprehension of the role, influence and concept of symbolic power is not possible for people who are morally decadent or find themselves guttered in amorality; people who have no enthusiasm for humanity, nor civilizational refinement (not in the ethnological sense, but in accordance with the principles of “minimal universal morality”, as described by Spanish philosopher Adela Cortina).

Some celebrities carry symbolic power as an extension of the institution to which they belong. It takes a lot of effort from most people to build this power; they may suffer privation and overcome difficulties in ways that seem ultra-human. An example of a public persona whose symbolic power does not require effort is the Pope. This is due to the symbolism of the institution over which he rules. Such symbolism personifies itself almost automatically.

It is clear that this was not the case of Martin Luther King, nor of Thomas Sankara, or so many other “righteous” men that the world has known. For them, the symbolic power they possess was built upon effort. Some have paid with their lives. Both the ones who have built symbolic capital with their blood, sweat, and tears, as well as the ones who have reached it by force of institutional symbolic transfer can lose such power. It all depends on discourse and trajectory.

When the Pope speaks, his words are full of symbolic power. He is capable of exerting great influence, leadership. Forget the concept of symbolic as less effective in the transformation of reality. A book that advertises non-violence can have high rates of success. However, books are made of linguistic symbols through which the author exerts symbolic power upon people and societies. With all the literary tradition, symbolic of course, about libertarianism and liberalism, it was possible to mold the world with what is nowadays called democracy and free market.

In the field of business, in those societies where there is a high standard of ethics, the most successful companies are the ones that can better establish a relationship based on confidence, offering personalized costumer service. Why is it so? Because they are built upon symbolic power. They attract clients not only because of the goods and services they offer, but also because of the added value when selling good. To sum up, they are marked by the minimal morality.

Why do so many people around the world have respect for Nelson Mandela? The answer is simple: he carries symbolic power. Mandela never owned a bank, a petroleum refinery, a gold mine, a telecommunications company nor any other asset worth billions in order to purchase people’s applause.

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Amazingly enough, it is not money, nor oil, nor coltan that shapes societies. What shapes societies are men and women with symbolic power; men with passion for morality. This fierce exercise of morality, courage and intelligence attracts people like a magnet. This way society is shaped by good.

Let us come back to Mandela. His namesake foundation has an interesting project. They manufacture shirts and t-shirts, some in the style Mandela favored, and others with his prisoner number, as well as many other objects with the Madiba brand. They attract millions of customers around the world. Who forces people to buy them? Do they buy them because they are beautiful like other fashion products that abound all around the world? No! People buy them because Mandela represents leadership, symbolic capital, an elevation of civilizational standards, because he is an example of humanity and sensitivity.

What relationship can thus be established between the future of “business- opposition” and symbolic capital? Its future, whether promising or poor, will depend on the position taken face to the reality of the subversion of popular will on elections. It is up to the “business-opposition” to choose between symbolic capital and the LX 570 Lexus.

Those who shape the world and shape our lives are women and men with courage, intelligence, creativity and boldness in all fields: science, arts, sports and politics. Do we have these people in the Angolan political scene?

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The madman as a victim of Descartes

OI — Sat, 04 Nov 2017 23:07:01 +0000

[Pt|rmc]

Domingos da Cruz | The present article is a consequence of a larger project, originally titled “The Madman as a Cartesian Victim and the Inflection of Thought for the Rescue of his Citizenship”.

According to the referential frame of Cartesian rationality, does the madman think? If one admits that the madman does not think according to the standard of cogito, ergo sum — I think, therefore I am, perhaps this might translate into consequences in his exercise of citizenship. For instance, his social and political invisibility, the negation of the right of recognition due to the overvaluing of reason by René Descartes.

This text will confront the psychiatric and psychotherapeutic concepts of the madman and the Cartesian defense of the process of thought as an a priori condition for existence. The madman is here categorized as one who loses the notion of reality as a consequence of mental disturbances originating from multiple factors.

The contribution of Descartes in the history of thought allowed for a radical change of paradigm: from Middle Ages to modernity. From God as a starting point and referential of creativity to man as center of reality, translated into the philosophy of subject. The corollary of Cartesian philosophy is not reduced to the previous categories. It has influenced several western thinkers.

These are the consequences of the overvaluing of the gnoseological statement as a starting point to the edification of his philosophy. We intend to identify and understand another consequence: the negation of the humanity of the madman, of his existence, and consequentially of his exercising of citizenship, about which there seems to be no literature.

The nullity of the madman as a person and as a political / social entity can be confirmed by the following Cartesian reasoning: “[…] If I had stopped thinking, even though all other objects I once had imagined actually existed, there would had been no reason to believe I exist”, that is, all that thinks is or exists. The existence of corporeity (res extensa), or the whole man, presupposes res cogitans.

Although there may be an epistemological backbone of mind sciences that demonstrated that, in spite his state of madness, an individual thinks or has a minimum of rationality, it nevertheless seems that this reasonability does not answer the demands of permanent methodical doubt; the rules of method as correct expression of one who conducts his spiritual faculties with lucidity and mastery.

Having Descartes’ statement as a background, according to which a human being is what he thinks, without thinking man is not. This statement raises the following issues: does a madman doubt according to the demands of Cartesian thought? Is the madman aware of himself? The only certainty from which one can build arguments is the cogito. Does the madman possess this certainty? Is the madman able to impose rules on himself for the proper conduction of his thinking activity? Or yet, is he able to submit himself to the four rules of the method? If the answers to these questions are negative, this will allow us to understand why society treats the madman in a negative or indifferent manner. Negative answers nullify the madman in Descartes’ framework, which would mean that he does not think, therefore he does not exist, and therefore he cannot be the subject of any human action.

What the present article aims to understand, and it seems relevant, is the relation between the madman and his citizenship. The citizenship in which we intend to integrate the madman is the one postulated and theorized by the liberal school, in its strait relation with jusnaturalism.

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This task suspects that the anthropological and gnoseological conception of Descartes has led to the disregard of the body and the divinization of reason, and as a consequence the indifferent treatment of the madman, the negation of his existence and further still his political and social exile. This intuition can be sustained in the following propositions, uttered in common environments: “if I think, I can’t be mad”, “being mad? That’s no life”, “I’d sooner be dead than mad”, “a mad person is worth nothing”. Such judgements express the devaluation of the madman, but also express the praise of reason in an indirect manner. This cultural environment, alive and infused until our day and age, must have some influent, responsible thinker. One assumes him to be Descartes, although perhaps he might not have predicted this and other consequences from his thought.

Russell comments that the Cartesian conception of the process of thought is quite broad. That is why this project assumes that this structure of thought does not include the madman. Here the madman is on the margin, does not exist, as Descartes himself seems to suggest: “Why is cogito so evident? I have concluded that it is because it is clear and distinct. […]. True is all that we conceive very clear and distinctly”. Can the madman use his reason in the frame where all is clear, distinct, passible of being object of doubt, understood, negated, affirmed, conceived, imagined and felt?

If there is thinking that is able to demonstrate that the reasoning of the madman finds no shelter in the Cartesian scheme of thought process, then perhaps this philosophy of the subject is really a key factor in the situation into which society puts the madman in our days: in invisibility, in isolation, in definite negation of his being.

In face of this hypothetical frame into which Descartes, as a consequence of his thought, has put the madman, it seems that the jusnaturalistic principle of Kant — according to which man is an end on itself, regardless of the accidents he might carry along his personal history — might contribute to rescuing the citizenship of the madman, with all of the consequences which derive from this general category: personal identity, recognition, right to integration, humanized treatment.

It seems that Cartesianism has put the madman in this condition of non-being because the reason it postulates is mathematical, it is for what is effective and useful. According to the categories of efficacy and usefulness as they are conceived, no contribution can be expected from the madman. Nevertheless, an approach from another perspective can help understand the importance of those who have lost the notion of reality due to mental disorder. The madman is important. Were he not, I would not know that I am not mad.

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Urban youth activism and the peace process in Angola

OI — Sun, 25 Jan 2015 14:36:46 +0000

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Angolan Youth Activism_full text in Pdf

By Florindo Chivucute || For decades, Angolan youth were recruited by both the Angolan’s Armed Forces (FAA) and the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA),to fight during the civil war that lasted almost three decades. After the end of the 27-year civil war, more than 118 ex-combatants were demobilized and many young former combatants without any technical or academic skills were left to fend for themselves,(World Bank report, 2003). Despite the exceptionally high, rapid economic growth that Angola has experienced after the end of the civil war, the country is still facing high unemployment (in particular among youth), extreme poverty, lack of quality educational and health care services and environmental degradation.AsNirit Ben-Ari(who is a writer and social media editor at United Nations)“Angola’s economy grows, but what about the poor?,” put it, ”as major public infrastructure investments in energy and transport kick in, Angloa’s growth is projected to reach 7.9% in 2014 and 8.8% in 2015. Yet, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) reports that around 36% of Angolans live below the poverty line and one in every four people is unemployed” (The Africa Report, 2014). In 2011, a group of youth formed a YouthMovement (YM) in Luandaand started to mobilize Angolans and raise awareness about various political, social and economic problems that many people arefacing throughout the country. Indeed, the rise of the YM in Luanda marked a new era for the civil society since Angola became independent in 1975.

The aim of this paper is to help us understand the dynamics of urban youth activism in Luanda by examining thetactics that the Youth Movement(YM) are using in Luanda since 2011 in order to socially navigate and mobilize the masses and raise awareness about various political, social and economic problems that many are facing throughout the country. In order to explore these themes, I will examine the dynamics of social movement diffusion in Luanda, specifically why and how urbanyouth social movements choose their tactics andstrategiesto make their voices heard.This paper will not examine all the social movements in Angola; rather it will focus only in Luanda as noted above. This paper will benefit from a multiple sources of data; articles, documents, videos and narrative account of participant’s history, will be analyzed. Before proceeding further, it is worth to take a moment and briefly examine Angola’s history and it’s main current social and political issues to help us fully understand the current political, economic and social equation.

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