Introduction

Welcome to the second issue of JSR: Journal for the Study of Radicalism. Like our inaugural issue, our second issue is thematically unified, not only by its broad topic of music and radicalism, but also by a prevailing spirit of inquiry rather than of polemics. Our second issue is international in focus, featuring Charles McKinley on the roles of anarchist music in the French Revolution, French scholar Stéphane François on Euro-pagan music and the European far right, Brian Cogan on seminal British punk bands Crass and Throbbing Gristle, and Jonathan Silverman on the "dove with claws" radicalism of country music singer Johnny Cash. This issue also features a major sociological study of millenarian movements and violence by Canadian scholars Martha Lee and Herbert Simms, as well as Ann Larabee's and Mathew Bartkowiak's interview of MC5 band manager and founding member of the White Panthers, John Sinclair, who offers some revealing observations about radicalism and music during the 1960s and 1970s. Finally, the issue features an array of reviews of recent books on radicalism of both the right and the left.

One of our reviewers raised an interesting set of questions concerning the ways opinions often are encoded into the language used in discussions of radical groups or individuals. The use of "freedom fighter" versus "terrorist" is the obvious, overused example in the mediascapes of geopolitical debate, but the encoding may be more sweeping and subtle in our own discourses of culture and politics. For instance, one may term some musicians as merely "socially active" while others are "extreme." But what characterizes the "extreme" as separate, say, from the "alternative," and what makes one group merely "socially active" while another is "radical"? To what extent are such distinctions polemical rather than analytical, and how transparent are we in revealing these distinctions? We know scholars in this field have not come to any consensus, but it is important to raise the question of our own social and political investments in any discussion of the pagan, the alternative, the extreme, the revolutionary, and the radical. As editors, we remain open to what our writers, reviewers, and audiences regard as radical, and what frames they may use to establish a definition. The closer one looks at particular radical groups and individuals, the more one feels compelled to differentiate amongst them, and such analysis is precisely what we wish to encourage. In particular, Stéphane François's pioneering article on Euro-pagan music introduces a range of intellectual and cultural figures and associations, and asks us to reconsider the origins and significances of what is sometimes termed the contemporary "pagan revival."

We also include in this issue another provocative study, this one of North American religious and secular millenarianism in relation to violence. "American Millenarianism and Violence: Origins and Expression," by Canadian scholars Martha Lee and Herbert Simms, offers some perhaps unexpected conclusions concerning violence generated by North American religious and secular radical groups. This is an important subject for a whole constellation of reasons. Given the twentieth century's contribution to history of the industrialization and modernization of genocide, it is critically important to understand the nature of this phenomenon, both from the point of view of state violence and from the perspective of emergent genocidal tendencies in groups. Both secular and religious millenarianism has generated fanaticisms and radical forms of violence, so we offer this article not as the final word, but as an invitation to consider this central topic further. What roles do the expectation of a religious or secular millennium play in violent radicalisms? Here we may find the keys to a much deeper understanding of violent radicalisms across the political spectrum.

From the enthusiastic national and international response to the journal's announcement, we remain convinced that the time is right for a journal devoted to this broad area of scholarship. In our view, it is critical that the journal remains an open forum and does not become a vehicle for a particular ideology. JSR continues to be eclectic, without dogma or strict political agenda, and to range broadly across social and political groups worldwide, whether typically...