No abstract

No abstract

The war against terrorism is being carried out not only in Afghanistan where it was first declared but also in the media around the world. Southeast Asia became a focus of international attention after the U

/ Media is at the heart of many public debates in the same way as terrorism and Islam are part of a global discourse since the events of 9/11 in the United States. This article attempts to use the social construction of social problems approach to understand the media's imaging of `terrorists' in the context of Singapore. Combining media research with social critical reflection provides the tools to identify the social rationale dimension. The application of such a procedure reveals the complex relationships between the media and their role in the process of `nationbuilding'. The city-state fits the order model of society, where social integration, order and stability are fundamental. The Singaporean population is predominantly non-Islamic Chinese; however, geographically Singapore is located between Malaysia, a Muslim country, and Indonesia, where 89 percent of the population are Muslims. The article looks at Singapore's mainstream English-language newspaper, The Straits Times , and its representation of terrorists following the events of 9/11. The data cover three periods: (1) immediately after 9/11; (2) between January and February 2002, when a group of men accused of `terrorism-related activities' were arrested in Singapore; and (3) September 2002, when Singapore's authorities announced the arrest of a second group of `suspect terrorists'.

Heuberger; a survey of the legal aspects of minority issues by Georg Brunner; and Richard L. Rudolph's excellent discussion of the concept of economic nationalism (an approach to nationalism studies too easily ignored in the rush to divine cultural motivations for national tensions). About half of the eighteen country-focused essays are brief overviews (around ten pages long), usually with tables on ethnic composition, a review of major events, and so on. Several countries are treated only in this fashion, and the reader searches in vain for any groundbreaking research in these essays. The others focus on particular aspects of nationalism. Of special interest are essays by Lorant Tilkovszky and Milco Lalkov on ethnic issues in the early communist period in Hungary and Bulgaria, respectively; and Othmar Kolar's discussion of the place of minorities in Romania during the creation of a so-called socialist economy. Two shortcomings of the book are the lack of an extended treatment of the situation in Yugoslavia-surely the events since 1991 have warranted a considerable reconsideration of the issues, perhaps by the contributors here-and (given the evident uselessness of the European Union in the face of the Yugoslav horror) the strangely cheery tone of Paul Robert Magocsi's brief concluding essay. Overall, Nationen, Nationalitaten, Minderheiten is a useful, though not fully satisfying, collection. Contemporary Nationalism in Eastern Europe belongs to the other variety of edited volumes on eastern Europe. The indirect product of a 1992 conference, it is much less ambitious than Nationen. It also, unfortunately, falls short as a handbook on east European nationalism. In fact, the title is somewhat misleading, for few articles devote much space to contemporary issues. In the six country essays, most authors seem compelled to drag the reader past the familiar bases without much explanation as to why. These are the kind of essays that provoke descriptive, essentialist papers from my undergraduates; students come to believe that one can understand nationalism by simply reporting the history and ethnic makeup of a particular country. But there are two outstanding exceptions. John R. Lampe provides a provocative reading of Yugoslavia that justifies an extensive historical overview; this is probably the best short piece on Yugoslavia by a historian that I have read. Martyn Rady, in turn, comes closest of all the contributors to meeting the expectations of the book's title; he summarizes Romanian history in one page and focuses instead on key themes in Romanian nationalism, past and present. For these two essays alone, I can highly recommend consulting this volume. Contemporary Nationalism also begins and ends with thematic essays; here, the quality is more uneven. Students will benefit from Paul Latawski's brief discussion of theories of nationalism. Raymond Pearson contributes a thoughtful consideration of the relationship between war and the nation-state. Latawski's concluding essay provocatively compares three "reconstructi...