It seems to me that the weakness of the essays is in treating Firefly as simple allegory for the American Civil War. Allegory is a highly simplistic reading of just about any fiction: see the knots people tie themselves in trying to apply purely allegorical readings to LotR (WW2) or Star Wars (Vietnam / Cold War). It's not surprising then that they have difficulty fitting an allegorical reading to the stories.
Andy points our further that a) Mal is more anti-hero than hero. As Whedon has said himself, this is Han Solo, not Luke Skywalker; and b) that the Government in Firefly is more the classic Sci-Fi totalitarian set up.
To my mind, though, Firefly as classic Western - with all the character tropes that involves - is a much more robust reading.
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Andy points our further that a) Mal is more anti-hero than hero. As Whedon has said himself, this is Han Solo, not Luke Skywalker; and b) that the Government in Firefly is more the classic Sci-Fi totalitarian set up.
To my mind, though, Firefly as classic Western - with all the character tropes that involves - is a much more robust reading.