‘Without Education You Can Never Become President’: Teenage Pregnancy and Pseudo-empowerment in Post-Ebola Sierra Leone

ABSTRACT

This article analyses the emergence of ‘teenage pregnancy’ as a new policy focus in post-Ebola Sierra Leone and explores how Sierra Leoneans interpret the problem of ‘teenage pregnancy’. I argue that the new policy focus is not indicative of changing or new problems. Rather, ‘teenage pregnancy’ has created opportunities for donors and the Government of Sierra Leone to continue cooperation in gender politics. At the same time, Sierra Leoneans are clearly concerned about ‘teenage pregnancy’, and many agree with sensitization campaigns that responsibilize young women and girls while downplaying structural factors that render them vulnerable to arrangements involving transactional sex.     

Feminism in the Humanitarian Machine. Introduction to the Special Section on ‘The Politics of Intervention Against (Conflict-Related) Sexual and Gender-based Violence’

ABSTRACT

The prevention and mitigation of sexual and gender-based violence in (post-) conflict societies has become an important humanitarian activity. This introductory article examines the analytical discourses on these interventions, the institutionalization of SGBV expertise in international politics, and the emancipatory potential of anti-SGBV practices. It argues that the confluence of feminist professional activism and militarized humanitarian interventionism produced specific international activities against SGBV. As part of the institutionalization of gender themes in international politics, feminist emancipatory claims have been taken up by humanitarian organizations. The normal operating state of the humanitarian machine, however, undercuts its potential contribution to social transformation towards larger gender equality in (post-) conflict societies.     

Violence in the city that belongs to no one: urban distinctiveness and interconnected insecurities in Nairobi (Kenya)

ABSTRACT

Rapid urbanisation in the global South has prompted attention to the causes and dynamics of urban violence. Yet, much research tends to either analyse urban violence without attention to the broader conflict complexes of which it forms a part, neglecting linkages between different forms of urban violence and between urban and rural dynamics, or conversely study violence in cities without acknowledging the particularities of the urban context. In this article, we conceptualise urban violence, theorise how it is shaped by urban dynamics and explore its manifestations in Nairobi, Kenya. We find that while Nairobi is not uniquely violent inside Kenya, violence takes on distinct urban forms given city-level processes, and also that urban violence has led to policies that increase securitisation and militarisation of the city. Our analysis thus improves knowledge of how criminal and political violence is shaped by and shapes the stability of developing cities.     

Youth Gang Members in Rio de Janeiro: The Face of a ‘Lost Generation’ in an Age of Fear and Mistrust

This article analyses the relationship between stigmatisation, violence and marginality, and its limits to social justice and citizenship. It involves a critical reflection on the way groups living in ‘a social and symbolical shade’ are represented and treated by governments and their institutions, and the way such practices reinforce a cycle of socio‐symbolical marginality and the limits to life in the city. The article will explore the findings of a research within drug gangs in which I have been involved ( Observatório de Favelas, 2006 ; Silva et al., 2009 and, Silva and Urani, 2002 ), and my own research on violence, urban marginality and stigmatisation ( Fernandes, 2009, 2012 ).     

Majoritarian values and women’s rights: police and judicial behavior in Tajikistan and Azerbaijan

This paper analyzes judicial and police behavior in dealing with cases of family violence and divorce in Tajikistan and Azerbaijan. Police and judges deliberately violate existing legal provisions to prevent women from divorcing or filing charges against their husbands in cases of domestic violence. While the law does not recognize religious marriages in Tajikistan, judges often rule to protect women’s living space after the dissolution of such unions. Drawing on rich interview and archival data, this behavior is explained by showing that judicial and police behavior reflects their biases, which in turn are a reflection of majoritarian norms in these countries. Since current laws are derived from Soviet codes, which were never internalized by the population, police and judges bend them to fit their understanding of social justice.     

A Youth Counter-Narrative on Trafficking and Smuggling from Africa to Europe

This article features the personal experiences of a young African woman victim of trafficking and smuggling from Nigeria to Italy. The aim of the article is to provide a counter-narrative on the phenomenon of human trafficking, by engaging with the youth’s lived experiences. The story forms part of a wider database of youth counter-narratives, gathered by the authors in different parts of the world (Italy, South Africa, and Ethiopia). The narrative will be discussed on the basis of four identified elements, and the reflection addresses them within the wider context of trafficking, smuggling, and human migration. The conclusion drawn is that the language of youth counter-narratives can represent a useful tool to address the complexity of social issues, in particular when they refer to lived experiences of youngsters who have been subjected to different forms of oppression and violence. It also represents a sort of liberation from cultural homogenisation, forcing the readers to engage with a “new humanism.”     

Two sides of the same coin: can campaigns generate support for both human rights and retributive violence?

ABSTRACT

Do framing strategies that are effective at encouraging pro-social behavior, such as participation in human rights campaigns, also mobilize support for violence within the same subjects? We use an experimental research design to examine individuals’ reactions to personal, humanizing narratives about past victimization. Participants are randomly assigned to one of eight treatment groups, which variously highlighted the humanity of the subject, the intensity of the past violence, and/or an evocative photograph of the subject that underscores her loss and vulnerability. We expect narratives that emphasize the subject’s humanity will encourage the audience to see the subject as innocent and as a victim, but also to feel angry about her experience. As a result, individuals will be more likely to defend the subject’s human rights, and to condone her use of retributive violence. We find that humanizing narratives lead respondents to simultaneously support a human rights appeal on the subject’s behalf and her use of retributive violence. Perceiving the subject in the narrative as innocent or as a victim mediates these effects, but anger often does not.     

家庭暴力的法律分析

家庭暴力是古今中外家庭中常见的一种带有普遍性的丑恶现象,是一个全球性的问题.家庭暴力是指家庭成员中的一方对另一方施暴的行为,在我国有渐次多发的趋势,给正常的家庭关系造成了严重的损害,现已成为社会稳定的重要杀手.在对家庭暴力行为进行道德上的谴责与法律上的防治、惩戒之外,我们应制定专门的反家庭暴力法,纳入刑法体系,以期在预防、制止和惩治家庭暴力,构建和谐社会方面发挥应有的作用.     

从和谐的视野看亲密关系的冲突——家庭暴力与女性犯罪

家庭是社会的细胞,构建和谐家庭是构建和谐社会的基础。但在当前中国,许多家庭中男女两性并未达到真正的平等与和谐。男性对女性的家庭暴力及其所引发的女性犯罪就是这种两性冲突的极端反映。制止家庭暴力、预防女性犯罪、建构和谐家庭,是我们成功建构和谐社会的基石。