The Evolution of the Regulation of Labour in the USSR,the CIS and the Baltic States, 1985–2009

This article is a first systematic study of employment protection legislation in the 15 successor states of the USSR over the last two and a half decades. The analysis is based on new and unique data assembled using OECD methodology. We find that the dynamics of employment protection in the region resemble an inverted U-shaped pattern with the peak of labour market rigidity occurring in the mid-1990s in CIS countries and a decade later in the Baltic states. By now, the former Soviet states as a group are similar to the EU-15 and OECD countries in terms of the overall employment protection legislation index, although they differ in terms of contributions to the overall employment protection legislation of its three major components, namely, regulation of permanent contracts, temporary contracts and collective dismissals.     

Nationalist Jāhiliyyah and the Flag of the Two Crusaders,or: ISIS,Sovereignty, and the “Owl of Minerva”

This article argues that by understanding Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) state-building processes we are able to understand how ISIS has developed while also developing a united citizenship body built from people in Iraq and Syria and those making hijra. The fragmentation of Iraq and Syria resulted in conditions that would prove conducive to the group's expansion and identifying these conditions is imperative to understanding Sunni extremism in the Middle East. The article argues that ISIS builds citizenship in two ways: first, by developing asabiyya—group feeling—among Sunni and second, by securitizing the Shi'a threat. Identifying and engaging with the concepts of sovereignty and citizenship helps to develop much stronger policy responses.     

Transformation of the Rural Economy in the Philippines, 1988–2006

This research explores the changing structure of the rural economy in the Philippines from 1988 to 2006. We found that the expansion and upgrade of infrastructure such as electricity and roads and investment in secondary and tertiary education are important factors that induced the economic transformation of the rural economy. The importance of higher education as an entry requirement to the nonfarm labor market has declined over time, indicating that the rural nonfarm sector has been increasingly providing employment opportunities to the unskilled and the uneducated, who form the bulk of the rural poor.     

Resource powers? Minerals,energy and the rise of the BRICS

The rise of new economic powers has seen increasing attention focused on the international role of the BRICS countries. Importantly, a common feature uniting the BRICS is that they are all resource-rich, and many analysts (and some BRICS governments) have argued that natural resources are one of the key factors propelling the rise of the group. This article explores the BRICS’ emerging status as ‘resource powers’, examining how resource wealth underpins their economic development and foreign policy strategies, and thus contributes to their growing influence in international affairs. It is argued that through the use of nationalistic mining and energy policies, the BRICS governments have exploited natural resources for both domestic economic and international diplomatic objectives. However, there are several challenges and emerging risks facing the BRICS’ resource strategies, which mean that resource wealth is making a positive – though inherently limited – contribution to the growing international status of the group.     

Politicians,organisations and the public ‐ the provision of gypsy sites

Under the Best Value regime, the government requires local authorities to involve the public in determining the provision of services. Indeed, the Best Value legislation provides a legal basis for consulting citizens and the local community in relation to better management of local government functions. The guidance on Best Value also encourages local authorities to place performance management within a community strategy framework. These combined actions will, it is hoped, result in more innovative, effective and efficient provision. Arguably, however, the success of increased participation will be influenced by how and why the public are involved. This study draws on case study research to ask whether involving the public does result in innovative changes and to what extent those involved are empowered through the process, concluding that success for both the authority and service users is influenced by factors such as cost structures and whether the original intent includes careful consideration of how those involved might benefit from the process.     

The Soviet Famine of 1931–1934: Genocide,a Result of Poor Harvests,or the Outcome of a Conflict Between the State and the Peasants?

Abstract

Interpretation of the Soviet famine of 1931–1934 (mainly in 1933) has long given rise to controversy. Publication of a Russian monograph by the leading spokesman for Russia in the international debates on the famine provides an opportunity both to analyse this Russian interpretation and to sum up the present state of knowledge about the famine and its causes.     

Contested water,contested development: unpacking the hydro-social cycle of the Ñuble River,Chile

The way that water is entangled with broader social relations has become a prominent concern in political ecology, geography and beyond. Employing the concept of the hydro-social cycle highlights how water is produced by, and simultaneously constitutes, social and power relations. Applying and expanding the hydro-social cycle as an analytical lens, this paper explores the contestation of different discourses of water. Looking at the conflict over the construction of a proposed dam in Chile, we examine different meanings given to water to understand how these produce uneven power relations with material and symbolic implications. By teasing out the workings and contestations of this conflict as a hydro-social cycle, we aim to highlight the diverse range of elements enlisted in it beyond water, to expose its complexity and to search for more just and inclusive alternatives.     

In the Name of the Father? Christian Militantism in Tripura,Northern Uganda,and Ambon

Although armed groups and political violence referring to Islam have attracted increasing attention since the start of the global war against terror, one particular religion can hardly be described as the main source of inspiration of what is commonly referred to as “terrorist acts of violence.” Faith-based violence occurs in different parts of the world and its perpetrators adhere to all major world faiths including Christianity. As such, this article treats three cases of non-state armed actors that explain their actions as being motivated by Christian beliefs and aimed at the creation of a new local society that is guided by religion: the National Liberation Front of Tripura, the Lord's Resistance Army, and the Ambonese Christian militias. It analyzes the way by which they instrumentalized religion against respective backgrounds of conflict rooted in social change, the erosion of traditional identities, imbalances of power, and widening communautarian faultlines.     

The founders of the association for the study of nationalities: the case of Stepan Horak (1920–1986) and the Shevchenko Scientific Society,USA

The present article critically evaluates the contribution of the Shevchenko Scientific Society, USA, and the founder of the Association for the Study of Nationalities (ASN), Stepan Horak, to the genesis and development of the ASN.     

Staying the course in Mexico: the role of the US in the drug war, 2006–present

With drug-related violence reaching record levels in Mexico, there has been growing debate over its causes. US and Mexican officials blame many factors, including problems with their strategy in the drug war, fighting among cartels, corruption in police forces, an ineffective legal justice system and US drug demand. In this paper, I argue that the Mérida Initiative, a multi-billion dollar programme of US assistance, is an important additional factor. Drug-related violence increased in the years after the implementation of the Mérida Initiative, declined when Mexican officials paused new programmes in 2012 and increased again as US and Mexican officials implemented new Mérida programmes in the following years. Over the same time period, drug-related homicides and complementary counternarcotics assistance from the US Department of Defense are positively correlated. Using US records, I show that US officials have been willing to overlook the growing violence because they have been more focused on achieving their economic and strategic objectives. I conclude that their actions have played a significant role in increasing drug-related violence while starting an ominous new phase of US imperialism in Mexico.     

Culture,Sustainability, and Medicine in the Twenty-first Century. Re-grounding the Focus of Medicine Amidst the Current “Global Systemic Shift” and the Forces of the Market: Elements for a Contemporary Social Philosophy of Medicine

This article analyzes the role and the status of medicine within the “post-modern” culture(s) of the West. As we know, culture is a major factor that influences the perception, the interpretation, and the expectations toward medicine, medical institutions, medical politics, and the persons involved with them. When culture changes, the social construct called “medicine” changes. Today, the Western condition of “post-modernity” finds itself in a process of rapid change due to the “global systemic shift” that is manifesting since a couple of years within all four main systemic logics and discoursive patterns of Western societies: in culture, religion, politics, and economics. In this situation, the article tries to elaborate on crucial questions about how a contemporary social philosophy of medicine can be delineated within the current “global systemic shift” and what some consequences and perspectives could be. It pleas for an integrative philosophy of medicine which has to strive to re-integrate the “(de) constructivist” patterns of “nominalistic” post-modern thought (dedicated primarily to freedom and equality) with the “idealistic” patterns of “realistic” neo-humanism (dedicated primarily to the “essence” of human dignity and the possibility of intersubjective morality). Only the institution of a balanced “subjective-objective” paradigm can ensure medicine its appropriate place, role, and status within our rapidly changing society.     

Acknowledgement of the Secret Protocol of the German–Soviet Non-aggression Pact and the Declaration of State Sovereignty by the Union Republics of the USSR

In June 1989, the First Congress of People's Deputies of the Soviet Union established the Commission for Historical and Legal Estimation of the Soviet–German Non-aggression Pact of 1939. In the commission, representatives from Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania condemned the Soviet annexation of the Baltic States, prompting heated arguments regarding the invalidity of the related secret protocol of the pact with other members who continued to hold the traditional Soviet ideological view of the pact as something positive. The debate over the secret protocol had the further potential to extend to disputes over ‘recovery of lost territory’ amongst the Baltic States, Ukraine, Moldova, Belarus and Russia. This article analyses the arguments used by commission members, considering the interplay of national interests, how they balanced arguments between restoration of ‘state sovereignty’ and maintenance of borders, and how they finally compromised and concluded the commission's report.     

Religious Intellectuals, the “Woman Question,” and the Struggle for the Creation of a Democratic Public Sphere in Iran

The ideas of the new generation of religious intellectuals in Iran have been the main engine for the call for reform. These intellectuals have attempted to locate their views about the way women are and should be treated in Islamic societies in their much broader—and to them more significant—attempt to offer a modernist religious understanding and a more democratic reading of the role of religion in modern polity. Iranian feminists, on the other hand, have begun to insist that the particular situation of women in Iran is in need of more attention. Religious intellectuals have responded by engaging in reluctant analysis of the way the woman question poses itself in the Iranian context. So far, their analyses fail to take into account the gender implications of the struggle against absolutism and traditional authority. However, the dynamic interaction of the reform project with demands and aspirations of various sectors of Iranian public life will not allow the issue to rest here. Religious intellectuals, in their attempt to recreate essential religious truth in the form of new intellectual concepts and systems, will increasingly have to deal with systemic gender inequalities in a more systematic manner.     

Crime Victims’ Perceptions of Police Behavior,Legitimacy, and Cooperation: A Review of the Literature

According to Tyler’s theoretical framework, police officers can motivate cooperation among citizens during direct interactions by using fair procedures and by showing how the police perform their job in combating crime. By conducting a systematic literature review, prior research was examined to see whether perceptions of procedural justice and police performance result in higher levels of perceived legitimacy of the police institution, and in turn whether this perceived legitimacy stimulates cooperative behavior among crime victims specifically. Results of the 15 included studies indicate that partial support for the applicability of this framework on crime victims was found. However, none of the included studies tested all relationships within the framework simultaneously among crime victims; they typically focused only on one of the interrelationships between the frameworks’ key concepts. Implications for future research and police practice are discussed.     

Pan-Africanism and communism: the Comintern,the ‘Negro Question’ and the First International Conference of Negro Workers,Hamburg 1930

Abstract

This article charts the history of a now largely forgotten Pan-African gathering, the historic First International Conference of Negro Workers, organised by the Communist International (CI) and held in Hamburg in 1930. The CI had taken an interest in organising Africans and those of African descent in the colonies, and in Europe and the US, from its foundation, but the key factor in developing political work concerned with the ‘Negro Question’ was the founding of the International Trade Union Committee of Negro Workers in 1928 and the activities of black communists. The difficulties experienced in organising the conference in Hamburg suggest that these activists were key to holding this historic event. The Hamburg Conference linked the communist movement with important black trade union and anti-colonial activists in Africa, the Caribbean, the US and Europe and subsequently had a significant influence on the future development of the Pan-African movement.     

Semi-peripheral countries and the invention of the ‘Third World’, 1955–65

Revisiting the events leading to the collapse of Third World summitry in 1965, this article proposes that the rise and fall of Third World unity efforts in the years 1955–65 originated from the unsuccessful attempt by industrialised Afro-Asian (aa) countries to turn unindustrialised aa states into their export markets. As a case study, this article explores Egypt’s economic foreign policy towards other aa countries and its activity within the aa and the Non-aligned movements, and compares Egyptian strategy in this field with that of China and Ghana.     

The ‘end of diaspora’ is just the beginning: music at the crossroads of Jewish,African, and Ethiopian diasporas in Israel

ABSTRACT

The ‘return’ of Ethiopian Jews to Israel in the last three decades provides an alternative case. In this presentation, I focus on the prominent role of music as ethno-racial information for Ethiopian Israelis as they engage with the process of homing and integrating in Israel. I explore their experience as black Jews through the musical tastes of young Ethiopian Israelis. For these youths, far from leaving their Ethiopianness behind, music is the fodder for actively reinventing it. I explore how they claim their place as Jews in Israel through participation in the musical communities of Ethiopian and African diasporas.     

Deconstructing the multi-layered nature of citizen participation in Vietnam: conceptual connotations,discourses of international development,and the country’s institutional context

ABSTRACT

Citizen participation is challenging to define in terms of meaning and application. This article begins with setting out the multi-dimensional nature of citizen participation in development. Through conceptual and contextual explorations, this article deconstructs the layers in the following ways: First, citizen participation is embedded with several conceptual connotations, therefore it is manifested to varying degrees and in different scopes of opportunity for citizens to affect policy decisions. Varieties of participation become more diverse when it comes to the power dynamics of different stakeholders, ranging from the government to citizens. Furthermore, its substantive presentation is intimately linked with the variables of citizen empowerment and government responsiveness. The second layer concerns the participatory development approaches of external development agencies. This article articulates how development discourses have integrated and developed the concept of participation, exploring the trajectory and critical concerns raised. The final layer concerns context, particularly Vietnam’s legal and policy frameworks, which explores consistencies and discrepancies between institutional settings and the presentation of citizen participation.