Feckless and reckless or forbearing and resourceful? Looking behind the stereotypes of HIV and AIDS in "fishing communities"

Over the last decade evidence has emerged suggesting that inmany countries fisherfolk, as an occupational group, are atgreater risk to HIV and AIDS than the general adult population.This high vulnerability has been explained in terms of the lifestylesassociated with fishing and related occupations, such as fishprocessing and trading. Fishermen have been portrayed as risktakers, their attitudes and behaviour shaped by the physicaland economic risks of the fishing lifestyle. Women in fishingcommunities, often engaged in fish processing and trading andproviding food and lodging in fishing settlements, are portrayedas being in subordinate social and economic positions and preyto sexual exploitation by cash-rich fishermen. There is a dangerin such lifestyle summaries that fisherfolk are characterizedas feckless risk takers with a reckless attitude to the chanceof contracting HIV. In this article we look at the lives ofsome men, women, and children living in a lake-side communityin Uganda severely affected by HIV and AIDS to illustrate howexisting portrayals of fisherfolk, and fishing communities,need to avoid stereotypes in order to better inform appropriatehealth sector and livelihood support measures.     

Understanding the War in Syria and the Roles of External Players: Way Out of the Quagmire?

With Western commentators, media and think tanks still being the predominant determinant of the global international relations discourse and therefore also of the discourse relating to Syria, discerning actual realities coherently from the fog of a very biased narrative presents great challenges. Deciphering the complexities of West Asia has never been easy and the situation in Syria is particularly complicated. This article argues inter alia that the Commonwealth as an entity needs to add its efforts, voice and prestige to the global effort to prioritize the restoration of peace in West Asia in general and Syria in particular.     

Ist der Schweizer Föderalismus zu kleinräumig?

Welche territoriale Gliederung sollte der Schweizer Föderalismus annehmen? Könnte ein Zusammenfügen von Kantonen zu Grossregionen Kostenersparnisse im öffentlichen Sektor zur Folge haben? Wohlfahrtstheoreti‐sche Argumente betonen steigende Skalenerträge in der Nutzung öffentlicher Leistungen und die Internalisierung von Nutzenspillovers urbaner Zentren als Argumente für Gebietszusammenlegungen. Wer hingegen politisch‐ökonomisch argumentiert, sieht im kleinräumigen und autonomen Schweizer Föderalismus eine Möglichkeit zur Verringerung politischer Verzerrungen durch Begrenzung der staatlichen Monopolmacht. In einer gepoolten Querschnitts‐Zeitreihenanalyse von 1988‐1998 wird der Schweizer Föderalismus anhand von fünf Hypothesen zu den beiden kontroversen Standpunkten diskutiert. Die empirischen Ergebnisse weisen darauf hin, dass die politisch‐ökonomischen Vorteile der starken Dezentralisierung in der Schweiz ihre wohlfahrtstheoretischen Nachteile der Kleinräumigkeit mehr als kompensieren. Direktdemokratische Institutionen spielen dabei eine wichtige Rolle.     

Is Brazil becoming a “boring” country?

The article looks at the condition of Brazil's political system in light of the 1998 electoral results. It critically examines arguments that electoral volatility, political fragmentation and weak institutionalisation have produced a highly unstable political system unsuitable for sound policy‐making and processing change. While not underestimating the influence of electoral rules, it argues that given the combination of political, institutional and economic turmoil of the 1980s, it is not surprising that electoral volatility over the period was amongst the highest in the world. Arguably, however, these factors are now having a diminished impact on the political system, lessening volatility and allowing the emergence of a more institutionalised party system.     

Politically Alienated Through Low‐Wage Work? Evidence from Panel Data

Does low‐wage work lead to political alienation? Even though low‐wage sectors have grown in the advanced industrialized world, empirical evidence so far is sparse. This paper uses household panel data to investigate the effect of low‐wage work spells on political alienation. We argue that repeated low‐wage work spells lead to preference divergence between a low‐income and the median‐income earner, leading to withdrawal from democratic politics among low‐wage earners. Using Swiss household panel data and fixed‐effects regressions, we show that the accumulation of low‐wage work spells decreases systemic trust. In a second step, we demonstrate that an interaction of eroding systemic trust with low‐wage work is associated with increased individual abstention probabilities. These results highlight the threat of a systematic under‐representation of low‐wage workers in the political sphere.     

Does “Real-Freedom-for-All” Really Justify Basic Income?

We here examine Philippe Van Parijs's concept of \"real freedom\" which justifies in his view the introduction of a basic income. What we call into question is whether this concept can be understood, as Van Parijs argues, as the counterfactual freedom to do what one might want to do, that is as a notion of freedom based on the idea of potential desire. We oppose to it an alternative conception of \"real freedom\" related, first, to a notion of basic needs which a well-ordered society can satisfy by means of compensation, second, to a notion of social mediation in the evaluation of individual preferences. In this way we restore the relationship between freedom and desire, which allows us to take into account the conception the social actors have of their own freedom, more than does the too abstract conception of freedom based on the idea of potential desire.     

Is Narco‐Violence in Mexico Terrorism?

Mexico's drug ‘war’ produced 100,000 deaths between 2006 and 2012. The extreme violence has raised the notion that Mexico has become a failed state wracked by terrorism. We categorise the forms of narco‐violence in Mexico in light of the literature on terrorism and contemporary Mexican politics. Our study suggests three overlapping dimensions of narco‐violence that should be considered terrorism: (a) narco‐terror as a struggle for regional political control; (b) narco‐terror as a practice ordered by cartel leaders rather than spontaneous violence of foot soldiers; and (c) narco‐terror as an expansion strategy from solely drug trafficking to other kinds of organised crime.     

God’s Campesinos? Mexico’s Revolutionary Church in the Countryside

While revolutionary attempts to eradicate religion have been well studied, this article explores a little-known attempt to construct state hegemony within the religious sphere by founding a revolutionary Church (the Iglesia Católica Apostólica Mexicana, or Mexican Catholic and Apostolic Church) in 1925. The article first explores the agrarian ideology of the schism, conceived as a revolutionary form of spiritual modernisation. It then charts the popular reception of the schism in Mexico State and argues that some agrarianised communities appropriated the new religion because it was seen as the spiritual adjunct of land reform, a means of blending popular revolutionary and religious beliefs, and a sectarian political weapon.     

Discipline and Punish? Youth Gangs' Response to ‘Zero‐tolerance’ Policies in Honduras

The response of youth gangs to ‘zero tolerance’ policing in Honduras are examined with respect to territoriality. Focusing on two main gangs, the Mara Salvatrucha and the 18^th Street Gang, the ways in which state authority is challenged are assessed from an analysis of body territoriality, the respatialisation of organisational structures across urban neighbourhoods, and the production of new enclosed spaces of gang territoriality. These redefinitions of group territoriality strengthen the emotional bonds and sense of belonging towards the gang, enabling the emergence of a transnational/imagined community.