Abjects or agents? Camps,contests and the creation of ‘political space’

The ‘Urdu-speaking population’ in Bangladesh, displaced by the Partition in 1947 and made ‘stateless’ by the Liberation War of 1971, exemplifies some of the key problems facing uprooted populations. Exploring differences of ‘camp’ and ‘non-camp’ based displacement, this article represents a critical evaluation of the way ‘political space’ is contested at the local level and what this reveals about the nature and boundaries of citizenship. Semi-structured and narrative interviews conducted among ‘camp’ and ‘non-camp’ based ‘Urdu-speakers’ found that citizenship status has been profoundly affected by the spatial dynamics of settlement. However, it also revealed the ways in which ‘formal’ status is subverted – the moments of negotiation in which claims to political being are made. In asking how and when a ‘stateless’ population is able to ‘access’ citizenship, through which processes and by which means, it reveals the tension, ambiguity and conceptual limitations of ‘statelessness’ and citizenship, unearthing a reality of partial, shifting and deceptively permeable terrain. In doing so, it also reveals the dissonance and discord (constitutive of an ‘us’ and ‘them’ divide) upon which the creation of ‘political space’ may rely. Citizenship functions to exclude and, therefore, it is very often born of contestation.     

How citizenship matters (or not): the citizenship–belonging nexus explored among residents in Oslo,Norway

This article sheds light on what citizenship means for individuals’ experiences of belonging. Through 41 interviews conducted in Oslo, Norway, we trace understandings of how, when and why citizenship matters (or not) for belonging. Our interviewees fall into one of four categories: born citizens; naturalized citizens; dual citizens and non-Norwegian citizens who would qualify for naturalization, thus mixing participants with and without immigrant backgrounds. We interpret individuals’ experiences evaluating whether formal citizenship is explicitly or implicitly salient and whether it is associated with secure or insecure belonging. We find that citizenship matters for security and recognition, both linked to belonging, in expected and unexpected ways. Our findings point to how, when and why citizenship matters (or not) for belonging, constituting the citizenship–belonging nexus. Here, race continues to matter, as does the materiality of the passport document, in how the citizenship–belonging nexus interacts with the nation as locus of membership for citizens.     

‘Not Welcome at the Holiday Inn’: How a Sarajevan Hotel Influenced Geo-politics

ABSTRACT

During the reporting of the 1992–95 Bosnian War, the bright yellow Holiday Inn played host to many of the most renowned characters involved in documenting, resolving and perpetuating the conflict. It provided the visual background for numerous television broadcasts, provided the infrastructure to send the reports around the world via satellite and created the environment to negotiate agreements and hold conferences and briefings. But the building has never been regarded as anything more than a neutral or slightly bizarre backdrop to the events that took place there before, during and after the conflict. Closer examination reveals three ways in which the hotel needs to be considered as co-constitutive of the conflict: (1) in the conflict geography and conflict epistemology; (2) in the forging of a common international subjectivity; and (3) as a material, symbolic and informational resource. Taken together, this also contributes to considerations of how the built environment is an integral part of understandings of contemporary conflict.     

Who are the ‘international community’? Development professionals and liminal subjectivity

ABSTRACT

This article explores international development space at the micro-level through the career stories and discursive representations of three aid workers—two nationals, one expatriate—who worked together on the same project in Tajikistan in 2008–9. Findings bear witness to the ‘liminal subjectivity’ of development where professional aid workers are, vocationally and socially, culturally and politically, neither domestic nor foreign. Aid workers’ careers demonstrate the resilience of ‘the international’ in contemporary humanitarian practice. At the same time, their biographies are not easily sutured into emergent cosmopolitanism as they remain encumbered by the boundaries of the national and international. Moreover, the article demonstrates that, while the rhetoric of international development and its putative leaders are criticized within the community itself, the international community may be formed by subordinate individuals in their liminal subjectivities.     

Demonising ‘the other’: British Government complicity in the exploitation,social exclusion and vilification of new migrant workers

This article demonstrates the close and complex connection between the demonisation, exploitation and exclusion of new migrant workers. In so doing, it testifies to the blurred boundaries between the categories of severe labour exploitation, forced labour and slavery. This study highlights the absence of citizenship rights as crucial to understanding the vulnerability to demonisation, exploitation and exclusion that characterises the embodied experience of such workers. It also highlights the key role of citizenship as a means for such workers to make rights claims. In the UK, new migrant workers, particularly those arriving from Eastern Europe since 2004, have been increasingly designated by government and media as interlopers in a tight labour marketplace. Whilst their collective economic contribution is sometimes welcomed, they are regarded as ‘external’ to UK society and citizenship, a potential threat to indigenous values and culture, and in competition with British workers. Rarely are migrants afforded the space in public and private spheres to express their individual needs, wants, cares or perspectives. UK migrants have variously been portrayed by the tabloid media and irresponsible politicians as rapacious opportunists, as benefit scroungers, criminals and potential terrorists. The predominant discourse around new migrant workers in the UK is that they are not citizens, but temporary residents who are expected to work industriously and to remain otherwise unseen and unheard until they return to their country of origin. No further contribution to social and political life is required or expected. It is within such an unsupportive environment that new migrant workers in general, and undocumented migrants in particular, have become highly susceptible to employer and gangmaster abuse and exploitation.     

Is there such a thing as a Muslim vote?

This contribution explores to what extent there is such a thing as a distinct Muslim vote in flexible proportional list systems. We test in a new and reliable way whether the religious belonging and behavioural dimension of Muslim voters play a role in their decision-making process when casting preferential votes in a secular democracy. To achieve this, voter and candidate characteristics are modelled simultaneously in cross-classified multilevel analyses where the decision-making process of voters (the demand side) is studied while taking into account the list composition in terms of individual candidates (the supply side). We use data of an exit poll related to the local elections of 2018 in Belgium, especially at oversampled locations. The analyses show that voters who belong to Muslim faith are more likely to vote for Muslim candidates. Contrary, the behaviour dimension of Muslim voters – measured in mosque attendance - has no effect on voting primarily for Muslim candidates.     

未决羁押制度的比较分析

英、美、法、意、日等国家的未决羁押制度融入了法治的理性,未决羁押基本上已经成为一种制度化的刑事诉讼强制措施,并在程序与实体上均由法律加以控制,从而较大程度地防止了对羁押权的滥用,对被羁押人的人身自由等合法权利给予了较为充分的保障。相比之下,中国的未决羁押制度已经越来越凸现出诸多的根本性缺陷,制度的借鉴与重构成为司法改革之亟需。     

Would Bigger Councils Yield Scale Economies in the Greater Perth Metropolitan Region? A Critique of the Metropolitan Local Government Review for Perth Local Government

Forced amalgamation is a ubiquitous feature of Australian local government reform – compulsory council consolidation programs have occurred in all states and territories, with the sole exception of Western Australia. However, the Final Report of the Metropolitan Local Government – released in October 2012 – called for a reduction of about 60 per cent of the local authorities in the Greater Perth metropolitan area. The Western Australian Government responded by announcing that the number of Perth councils will fall from 30 to 14 from 1 July 2015. The Final Report recommended amalgamation on seven main counts, including scale economies. However, apart from citing work on Tasmania by commercial consultants Deloitte Access Economics (DAE) (2011), no econometric evidence was produced in support of claims on scale economies. This paper seeks to remedy this deficiency by estimating a number of econometric models on the impact of amalgamation on Perth local government. The results of our empirical modelling suggest that scale economies, cost savings and other pecuniary gains are largely illusory. Indeed, only two of the ten main local government functions provide evidence to suggest potential economies of scale.     

微博倒逼制度化反腐的成因及出路

微博反腐正成为自媒体时代中国反腐进程中方兴未艾的现象。微博反腐具有显著的正能量,它借助于焦点事件这种非制度化途径,起到倒逼政府介入腐败案件查处的功效,从而加速体制内反腐的理性化和制度化进程。微博反腐的倒逼机理在于,它把以前只是由反腐机构与当事人掌握的不对称"内部信息",通过微博这种自媒体发酵为路人皆知的"外部信息",从而实现了反腐机构、当事人与社会公众间的信息相对对称。在腐败信息相对对称的情况下,体制内反腐的工作重心将逐步从对焦点案件的被动查处,转变为对制度化反腐方略的主动探求。未来的廉政制度化建设应着力解决三大问题:一是国家廉政制度设计中制度短缺与制度剩余的并存悖论;二是既有廉政制度实际执行力不足导致的"制度软约束"现象;三是选择性反腐的合法性危机。     

Future of South Korea–Japan Relations: Decoupling or Liberal Discourse

South Korea–Japan relations are at their lowest point in decades, as colonial era disputes flare once again. Most pundits argue that the South Korean public is strongly united against Japan. We argue that South Korean elites are sharply divided over how to manage the crisis; this division is starting to impact how South Koreans understand colonial era narratives; and, long-term, bilateral relations depend on how these growing divisions play out. Despite state censorship, a rising counter-narrative in South Korea challenges the dominant, Manichaean, anti-Japanese one. For the first time, Korea and Japan have a realistic chance of reconciling based on liberal public discourse and a nuanced, empirically based understanding of history.