New Perspectives on Power and Political Representation from Ancient History to the Present Day offers a unique perspective on political communication between rulers and ruled from antiquity to the present day by putting the concept of representation center stage. It explores the dynamic relationship between elites and the people as it was shaped by constructions of self-representation and representative claims. The contributors to this volume – specialists in ancient, medieval, early-modern and modern history – move away from reductionist associations of political representation with formal aspects of modern, democratic, electoral, and parliamentarian politics. Instead, they contend that the construction of political representation involves a set of discourses, practices, and mechanisms that, although they have been applied and appropriated in various ways in a range of historical contexts, has stood the test of time.
Harm Kaal, Ph.D. (2008), VU University Amsterdam, is associate professor of Political History at Radboud University Nijmegen. He has recently published on popular politics, the scientization of the political, and the history of electoral culture and acts as co-editor-in-chief of
the Journal of Applied History. Daniëlle Slootjes, Ph.D. (2004), Chapel Hill, is associate professor of Ancient and Medieval History at Radboud University Nijmegen. She has published extensively on late antique Roman administration, geography, the history of early Christianity and crowd behavior in the period of Late Antiquity and the Byzantine Empire. Contributors: Olivier Hekster, Maaike van Berkel, Bert Roest, Peter Rietbergen, Dries Raeymaekers, Sebastiaan Derks, Marij Leenders, Joris Gijsenbergh, Vincent van de Griend, Wim van Meurs, Olga Morozova, Adriejan van Veen.
"The strengths of the individual contributions, which are well-informed and erudite, as well as the guiding hands of the volume’s editors deserve praise. The task of clearly and cogently demonstrating, in barely 200 pages, that across a wide chronological and geographic span a set of discourses, practices, and mechanisms operating as politically representative is discernable is surely an unenviable one. The collected essays are generally written in a very approachable manner and one need not be well versed in contemporary political theory to grasp the overarching arguments."
Corey J. Ellithorpe in
BMCR 2020.06.24
Contents
Acknowledgements List of Figures Contributors
1 Introduction: Repertoires of Representation Harm Kaal and Daniëlle Slootjes 2 Emperors and Councillors: Imperial Representation between Republic and Empire Olivier Hekster 3 Politics of Access at the Court of the Caliph Maaike van Berkel 4 Representative Bodies in Medieval Religious Orders: A Discarded Legacy? Bert Roest 5 The Political Rhetoric of Capitals: Rome and Versailles in the Baroque Period, or the “Power of Place” Peter Rietbergen 6 Repertoires of Access in Princely Courts, 1400-1750 Dries Raeymaekers and Sebastiaan Derks 7 The Image of Prime Minister Colijn: Public Visualisation of Political Leadership in the 1930s Marij Leenders and Joris Gijsenbergh 8 Postwar Popular Politics: Integrating the Voice of the People in Postwar Political History Harm Kaal and Vincent van de Griend 9 Majdan: Presence and Political Representation in Post-Communist Ukraine Wim van Meurs and Olga Morozova 10 Regulation without Representation? Independent Regulatory Authorities and Representative Claim-Making in the Netherlands, 1997-now Adriejan van Veen
Index
All scholars and students interested in the phenomenon of political representation, from antiquity to the present day.