still,nothing: Mammy and black asexual possibility

Although many iterations of the mammy in the last two centuries have received analytical attention, the construction of this figure as asexual or undesiring and undesirable remains to be interrogated. This essay attends to this under-theorised dimension of her image. Resisting a reading of the mammy as fixed in silence, I assert that she might instead ‘say nothing’, and bring into focus a black asexual agency that I call a declarative silence. This strategy of ‘saying nothing’ is then explored in a reading of the withholdings of the character of Mama in Gayl Jones’s neo-slave narrative, Corregidora (1975).     

reflexivity and queer embodiment: some reflections on sexualities research in Ghana

The ‘reflexive turn’ transcended disciplinary boundaries within the social sciences. Feminist scholars in particular have taken up its core concerns, establishing a wide-ranging literature on reflexivity in feminist theory and practice. In this paper, I contribute to this scholarship by deconstructing the ‘story’ of my own research as a white, genderqueer, masculine-presenting researcher in Ghana. This deconstruction is based on thirteen months of field research exploring LGBT activism in the capital city of Accra. Using a series of ethnographic vignettes, I examine questions of queer subjectivity, embodiment and self/Other dynamics in the research encounter. Specifically, I interrogate what a reflexive concern for power relations means when researchers share moments of commonality and difference with research participants, here in relation to axes of gender, sexuality, race and class. Finally, I explore the challenge of theorising resistance in light of feminist postcolonial critiques of the politics of representation. I conclude that it is only by locating these tensions and dissonances in the foreground of our inquiries that reflexivity becomes meaningful as a way of rendering knowledge production more accountable and transparent, of practising feminist solidarity, and of excavating our own queer research journeys.     

active women and ideal refugees: dissecting gender,identity and discourse in the Sahrawi refugee camps

Since the Moroccan invasion in 1975, official reports on visits to Sahrawi refugee camps by international aid agencies and faith-based groups consistently reflect an overwhelming impression of gender equality in Sahrawi society. As a result, the space of the Sahrawi refugee camps in Algeria and, by external association, Sahrawi society and Western Sahara as a nation-in-exile is constructed as ‘ideal’ (Fiddian-Qasmiyeh, 2010, p. 67). I suggest that the ‘feminist nationalism’ of the Sahrawi nation-in-exile is one that is employed strategically by internal representatives of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Saguia el-Hamra and Río de Oro (POLISARIO), the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR) and the National Union of Sahrawi Women (NUSW), and by external actors from international aid agencies and also the colonial Moroccan state. The international attention paid to the active role of certain women in Sahrawi refugee camps makes ‘Other’ Sahrawi invisible, such as children, young women, mothers, men, people of lower socio-economic statuses, (‘liberated’) slave classes and refugees who are not of Sahrawi background. According to Elena Fiddian-Qasmiyeh (ibid.), it also creates a discourse of ‘good’, ‘ideal’ refugees who are reluctant to complain, in contrast to ‘Other refugees’. This feminisation allows the international community not to take the Sahrawi call for independence seriously and reproduces the myth of Sahrawi refugees as naturally non-violent (read feminine) and therefore ‘ideal’. The myth of non-violence accompanied by claims of Sahrawi secularity is also used to distance Western Sahara from ‘African’, ‘Arab’ and ‘Islamic’, to reaffirm racialised and gendered discourses that associate Islam with terrorism and situate both in the Arab/Muslim East. These binaries make invisible the violence that Sahrawis experience as a result of the gendered constructions of both internal and external actors, and silence voices of dissent and frustration with the more than forty years of waiting to return home.     

Why Do Firms Obey?: the State of Regulatory Compliance Research in China

Journal of Chinese Political Science - Enforcement and compliance is a classic issue of concern in regulation literature. Despite a vast literature on regulatory agencies, compliance behavior of...     

先民主化,还是先自由化——达尔政体转型理论对后发国家的启示

达尔的政体转型理论为后发国家的政体转型提供了重要启示.在后发国家,民主化先于自由化是一条比较稳妥的渐进式民主转型的道路.自下而上的民主化,不是着眼于政权的交替,而是着眼于民主的制度建设,能够保障各方政治力量的安全,为实现向宪政民主的和平转型奠定良好的制度基础.     

创建中国发展的新模式

该文分析了人类的生俘与社会发展的关系、社会的发展与人类文明的关系以及人类文明的演替与转折进程,并针对中国工业化历程的分析,提出要在科学发展观的统领下,创建中国发展的新模式。     

造血干细胞捐献若干问题的法律思考

造血干细胞捐献本质上是附条件的赠与合同和第三人利益合同.造血干细胞捐献不单单是一种公益行为,它还会在多方当事人之间形成各种法律关系.志愿者尽管基于身体权可以撤销赠与,但由此造成患者的损害应由志愿者承担.我国应加快造血干细胞捐献方面的专门立法,通过法律对失衡的利益进行调整.