Critical peacebuilding and the dilemma of difference: the stigma of the ‘local’ and the quest for equality

Recent research has revealed the need to include and understand local actors in order to improve the effectiveness of peacebuilding. According to these analyses, peacebuilding could become more respectful of cultural differences thanks to a genuine engagement with the specificities of the local. Empirical studies of the ‘different’ local have thus flourished in the field with the ambition of countering the universalist tendency of traditional peacebuilding. Through the use of the concept of ‘dilemma of difference’, this article challenges this intuitive argument and argues that these approaches risk reproducing a stigma attached to the ‘different’ local. Indeed, emphasising difference in order to ensure its respect means separating and reifying ‘it’ as a deviation from the norm(al). As such, this analytical strategy is likely to recreate the stigma that contributed to the exclusion of local actors in previous peacebuilding practice and research. In contrast, I outline three strategies for studying difference differently in peacebuilding: focusing on the institutional arrangements that enabled specific differences to emerge and become visible; recognising that these differences are internal to peacebuilding (and thus an unlikely source of alternative and emancipation); and revealing the unstated and implicit Self for/from whom local difference is relevant.     

How did the disclosure of lobbying targeting Quebec's hospitals become mandatory and with what effect?

In 2015 mandatory disclosure activity for lobbying that targeted health and social service centres in Quebec, a sector which consumes a significant share of the annual spending budget, suddenly became a mandatory disclosure activity for lobbyists operating in the province. This research note traces the trajectory of key events that led to this shift towards greater lobbying transparency in the health care sector. The study also analyzes whether this change was followed by increased lobbying registrations for activities targeting health sector institutions. The article's findings suggest that significant change in lobbying regulation may occur accidentally, against the government's will, rather than as a result of an ethical scandal, cross-jurisdictional learning, or electoral calculations, as the literature suggests. The article's findings also show that the change was followed by an increase of about 969 registered firm lobbyists (p-value 0.015) and 254 registered lobbyists from covered NGOs (p-value 0.00).     

Functional stakes and EU regulatory governance: temporal patterns of regulatory integration in energy and telecommunications

Abstract

One of the most fiercely debated questions about EU regulatory governance is the respective role played by functional and political factors in regulatory integration. This article contributes to this debate by focussing on the functional factor. Based on a refined conceptualisation of functional stakes, it finds that they vary across sectors, evolve over time, and that these variations are reflected in the degree of regulatory integration observed. When member states perceive regulatory integration as a solution to one of their most pressing problems of the moment, they value – and sometimes even actively push for – the delegation of regulatory powers to the EU. This argument is subject to a credibility probe based on two within-sector analyses of temporal patterns of regulatory integration in energy and telecommunications. The empirical analysis lends support to the conditioning role of the functional factor in the design of EU regulatory governance.     

Do Canadian university students in Political Science and Public Administration learn to perform critical appraisal?

The ability to critically appraise empirical studies of any type is a prerequisite to evidence‐informed policy making. We scanned the syllabi of all Canadian university undergraduate and graduate programs in public affairs, public administration, public policy and political science. Our findings suggest that evidence‐informed policy is not yet institutionalized in most public administration and political science training curricula. We conducted a systematic review of prospective experimental and quasi‐experimental studies examining the effect of university courses aimed at training social sciences students in critical appraisal, but did not find such a study.     

The Structural Transformation of Sociology

The advent of public sociology over the past decade represents the end of a string of crisis moments in sociology. Since the 1950s and, especially, the 1960s, sociology was argued to be in a crisis because the discipline was thought to be conservative and contributing to sustain the status quo. As a result, the 1970s witnessed a radicalization of sociology, but the 1980s saw a general decline of sociology. Upon a resurgence during the 1990s, the crisis advocates have come back with a vengeance in the form of a renewed commitment to a heavily politicized sociology under the heading of public sociology, a perspective that is now thoroughly institutionalized and widely embraced. In sociology, the effects of the 1960s thus began to be felt in earnest some 40 years late.     

Union voucher at the sickbed of French unionism? The CFDT union confederation and the AXA experiment, 1981–1993

In the 1980s, to address financial difficulties, the CFDT (a French reformist union) proposed an original solution – the union voucher – aimed at broadening its membership base and generating new resources. It affords unions with funding from a company, which annually distributes vouchers to employees, who can remit the voucher (or not) to unions of their choice. This mechanism is based both on company financing and the individual choices of employees. In the early 1990s, the insurance company AXA experimented with and then adopted this solution. This article traces the history of the union voucher and assesses the union’s experience.     

The EU’s refusal to grant China ‘Market Economy Status’ (MES)

Although relations between the EU and China have considerably improved over recent years, Brussels and Beijing still disagree on a number of key issues. These include the EU embargo on arms sales to China, various bilateral trade disputes, problems of illegal migration and, last but not least, Brussels’ refusal to grant China MES. It is this last point that this essay will scrutinise. In doing so, it will firstly present the Chinese point of view on the question. The Chinese believe that, in view of all the efforts they have made in the course of their ongoing transition towards market economy, they deserve to be granted MES without delay. Indeed, Beijing has lately put this issue very high on its list of foreign policy priorities and, claiming that it is victim of discriminatory treatment, has been exerting ever stronger political pressure on the EU and its Member States. Yet Brussels, arguing that China does not yet fulfil the necessary requirements for being granted MES, has until now resisted this pressure.

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Determination of glyphosate in biological fluids by 1H and 31P NMR spectroscopy

Identification of glyphosate in four cases of poisoning, using nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy of biological fluids is reported. It has been performed by using a combination of 1H and 31P NMR analyses. Characterization of the N-(phosphonomethyl) glycine herbicide was achieved by chemical shift considerations and coupling constant patterns: CH2-(P) presents specific resonance at 3.12 ppm and appears as a doublet with a H-P characteristic coupling constant of 12.3 Hz. Moreover, resonances due to isopropylamine were present, confirming the ingestion of the considered trade formulation. After a calibration step, quantitation was performed by 1H and 31P NMR spectroscopy. The benefit and reliability of NMR investigations of biological fluids are discussed, particularly when the clinical picture is quite confusing.