Mary Bridges Adams and education reform, 1890-1920: an ethics of care?

This article uses biographical inquiry to piece together the political career of Mary Bridges Adams, who made a name for herself through her work as an educator-activist, a hundred years ago. The objective is to rethink and re-see the place of the personal in academic study and research in the field of education. After briefly reviewing recent developments in theoretical and research uses of auto/biography, the discussion revolves around three main issues: (1) the values and practices of a woman who moved from earning and learning as a pupil-teacher to elementary teaching to political action; (2) her entry into labour politics; and (3) her educational activism. It is argued that the organised activism of the socialist profiled here can be analysed in terms of the idea of the caring subject. Her story not only contributes to an understanding of what it meant to be a socialist woman in this period but shifts our understanding of the left and educational politics itself.     

Mainstreaming gender in refugee protection

The issues of gender-related persecution and violence against women have been put onto the international agenda, largely thanks to lobbying by feminist NGOs and transnational networks. There is a question, however, of how successfully this agenda-setting has translated into effective policy-making and policies that will increase the protection of women who are victims of gender-related persecution. One of the problems with policies to support women refugees and asylum seekers lies in a failure of transmission of the goals of gender sensitivity through all the various bureaux and representatives of a large bureaucratic organization such as the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). For nearly twenty years, since the early 1990s, the UNHCR has identified ‘refugee women’ as a policy priority, and yet, despite this prioritization of concerns about women refugees and gender issues in the asylum and refugee process, it could be argued that little progress has been made in implementation of policies on refugee women. This article will examine the way in which the concept of gender has been adopted within the UNHCR and the processes that have been put in place to mainstream gender within refugee protection activities. How far has mainstreaming managed to move policies to protect women beyond a mere focus on ‘vulnerable’ groups, and to integrate a gendered understanding of the global processes that produce refugees, and of the protection needs of these refugees?     

Cultural variations in management practice: an exploration of the management trainer's dilemma

This article is a contribution to the debate on cross-cultural transfer of management practice. It describes the difficulties experienced in introducing ‘western’ management theory in a Pakistan government training centre; considers the social and cultural context and the local management style; analyses the differences in six key areas of management and discusses their implications for management trainers; and proposes a ‘middle way’ to ensure that management material is culturally acceptable and practically appropriate. © 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.