Afro-Asian Networks in the Early Cold War, 1945-1960

该项目与AHRC的研究主题“关注未来：回顾过去”有关。它有助于我们理解全球化、非殖民化和公民社会的社会历史。它从全球南方的角度审视了冷战早期的经历。通过关注非国家行为者而不是国家元首的跨国活动，项目负责人试图突出迄今尚未受到审查的全球网络和社区。20世纪50年代是一个变革时代，在这个时代，非殖民化和相互竞争的冷战大国的赞助为殖民地和后殖民世界的人民创造了新的联盟机会。最近，学者们重新关注在新世界秩序的政治想象中的重大外交倡议，即1955年的万隆亚非国家会议。但这也是非国家行为者之间密集的社会和文化交流的十年。在整个亚洲和非洲，知识分子、活动家和革命者探索了跨越国家、语言和意识形态边界的团结的新载体。艺术家、诗人和表演者试验了知识和文化表达的新想法和新技术，以创造国家的新愿景。他们批判性地与流通中的共产主义、社会主义和民主思想接触，不断调整自己的政治忠诚，建立起知识和激进的社交网络。这个项目探索对话和联盟，帮助塑造了一代亚洲和非洲人，他们寻求在一个新的世界秩序中改变他们的社会。该项目寻求打破南亚、东南亚和东亚以及亚洲和非洲之间的国家和地区界限，着眼于这些地区的跨国和跨地区交流。通过了解非国家行为者使用这些网络的方式，我们希望阐明我们对软实力倡议和国际主义心态对全球南方公民社会形成的影响的理解。该项目的主要组成部分是2016年1月在阿姆斯特丹举行的合作研究周，届时14名参与者将在国际社会史研究所的档案中共同工作，其中大部分是早期研究人员。该网站汇集了世界上最重要的社会和解放运动之一。项目负责人认为，当不同地区的专家有机会将他们的发现与自己所在地区以外的其他地区的专家‘实时’联系起来时，才能获得最好的结果。这一周将包括一次介绍性研讨会、非正式会议以及与熟悉档案的荷兰殖民主义和非殖民化资深学者举行的研讨会。在这一研究周之后，将于2016年9月在布里斯托尔举行一次国际会议，在会上，研究人员将向更多的听众介绍他们的书面研究结果，这些听众包括来自各种学术机构和学科观点的学者以及非学术利益攸关方。我们还将邀请“社会主义走向全球网络”的参与者，在非殖民化的背景下研究第二和第三世界之间的联系。这笔赠款的成果包括一期特刊、一个公共网站，以及布里斯托尔大学历史系“过去的事情”节的一部分的公共参与活动。这项名为“第三世界网络的过去和现在”的活动将使我们能够在与利用当代世界跨国网络的亚洲和非洲活动家的对话中介绍我们的研究。这场关于亚非网络的优势、局限性和成功时期的辩论将载入一份关于全球南方民间社会的国际起源的历史和政策工作文件。

This project relates to the AHRC research theme 'Care for the future: thinking forward through the past'. It contributes to our understanding of the social history of globalisation, decolonization, and civil society. It examines the experiences of the early Cold War from the point of view of the Global South. By focusing on the transnational activities of non-state actors rather than heads of state, the project leaders seek to highlight global networks and communities that have so far remained unexamined.The 1950s constituted an era of transformation, where decolonization and patronage from competing Cold War powers created opportunities for new alliances among people across the colonial and post-colonial world. Recently, scholars have given renewed attention to major diplomatic initiatives - namely the 1955 Bandung conference of Afro-Asian nations - in the political imagining of a new world order. But this was also a decade of intensive social and cultural exchange among nonstate actors. Across Asia and Africa, intellectuals, activists, and revolutionaries explored new vectors of solidarity across national, linguistic and ideological borders. Artists, poets, and performers experimented with new ideas and techniques for intellectual and cultural expression to create new visions of the nation. They engaged critically with communist, socialist and democratic ideas in circulation, constantly reformulated their political loyalties, and built up networks of intellectual and radical sociability. This project explores conversations and alliances that helped shape a generation of Asian and Africans seeking to transform their societies within a new world order.The project seeks to break out of national and regional boundaries between South, Southeast, and East Asia, and between Asia and Africa, to look at transnational and trans-regional exchanges across these areas. By understanding the way in which non-state actors used these networks, we hope to illuminate our understanding of the effects of soft power initiatives and mentalities of internationalism on the formation of civil society in the Global South.The main component of the project is a Collaborative Research Week in Amsterdam in January 2016, where fourteen participants, mostly early-career researchers, will work together in the archives of the International Institute of Social History, which holds one of the most important collections of social and emancipatory movements from around the world.The project leaders believe that the best results are to be gained when specialists on different regions are given the opportunity to connect their findings in 'real-time' with specialists on other regions than their own. The week will consist of an introductory seminar, informal meetings, and seminars with senior Netherlands-based scholars of colonialism and decolonization familiar with the archives.This research week will be followed by an international conference in Bristol in September 2016, during which researchers will present their written findings to a larger audience made up of scholars from a range of academic institutions and disciplinary perspectives, as well as non-academic stakeholders. We will also invite participants of the "Socialism goes global network", to examine connections between the Second and Third World within the context of decolonization.The outputs of this grant include a special journal issue, a public website, as well as a public engagement event as part of the University of Bristol History Department's 'Past Matters' Festival. The event, 'Third World Networks Past and Present', will allow us to profile our research in dialogue with Asian and African activists who make use of transnational networks in the contemporary world. This debate about the strengths, limitations, and periods of success for Afro-Asian networks will feed into a History and Policy Working Paper on the international origins of civil society in the Global South.