From benevolent maternalism to the market logic: exploring discursive boundary making in domestic work relations in India

Framed within a discussion of boundary work and its many facets, this article develops a critical understanding of the discourses that shape the material and symbolic hierarchies of power asserted by employers of domestic workers in Indian households. We analyze the nature of discourses that are mobilized in the boundary work practiced by different groups of employers in India as they negotiate their relationships with their domestic workers. Drawing on fieldwork in Mumbai and Chennai, our analysis outlines two different discourses within the nature of boundary work – one centered on the trope of benevolent maternalism and another which mobilizes a market-based trope – and delineate how these diverge and converge in the relationship between employers and domestic workers. We also show how these discourses differ according to two key factors: on the one hand, whether the employers hire full-time or part-time workers, and on the other hand, the specific positional attributes of the employers in terms of age, occupation, and family background. We argue that these two discursive categories are not watertight compartments, but are located on a spectrum, and that employers therefore exhibit elements of both maternalism and market-based approaches within the relationship with their workers.     

Land governance as grey zone: the political incentives of land reform implementation in Africa

Weak state capacity has often been in focus when explaining why land reform in sub-Saharan Africa is not implemented. However, an analysis of the deeper politics of land reform brings our attention to a set of incentives which allow rules governing land to be open to interpretation. This article demonstrates that in Uganda, the need to maintain the ruling coalition in a clientelist political settlement to build electoral support, and the desire to attract economic investors, constitute political incentives to maintain land governance as a grey zone, even if there is apparent political will to implement land reforms.     

The Role of Youth’s Ratings of the Importance of Socially Supportive Behaviors in the Relationship Between Social Support and Self-Concept

The goal of this study was to investigate the relationship between the perceived frequency and perceived importance of social support with youth’s self-concept. Data from a large representative sample of 921 children and adolescents in grades 3 through 12 were analyzed. Results indicated that the relationships between the frequency of social support from parents, teachers, classmates, and close friends with self-concept were significant. However, only the perceived importance of social support from teachers was significantly related to self-concept. Finally, an interaction was found between the frequency of social support and the importance of social support from classmates and close friends on self-concept. These results suggest that self-evaluations of the importance of teacher support may be especially influential for youths’ self-concept, and that the ability to discount the value of support from classmates and friends, when it is lacking, may be protective to the self-concept of children and adolescents.