Three ecologies, transversality and victimization: the case of the British Petroleum oil spill

A number of critiques of the burgeoning field of green criminology have recently been articulated in the literature. The aim of this article is to begin to demonstrate what green criminological work responsive to these critiques might look like. The two primary critiques we are concerned with here are (1) that there has been little intellectual sharing between the fields of green criminology and victimology, and (2) that green criminological work has failed to be reflexive about the modernist assumptions it has largely adhered to. In response to these critiques, we draw on the theorizing of poststructuralist Felix Guattari to analyze the various interrelated layers of victimization in the 2010 British Petroleum oil spill case in the Gulf of Mexico.     

Exploring the Relationship between Operational and Financial Indicators: The Case of Water and Sewer Utilities

ABSTRACT

There is debate in the literature on whether or not general management principles are applicable to the study and practice of public administration. This research responds by exploring how local officials manage the performance of public services with private good characteristics, where general management principles could be embraced for service delivery. The relationship between operational and financial indicators is explored within the functional areas of water and sewer, with the hypothesis that operational outcomes impact financial outcomes similar to private enterprises. Because the findings do not support this hypothesis, the authors conclude that general management principles may not be applicable to all forms of administration given that public cannot be removed from the management of public services even with private good characteristics.     

The Normativity of Work: Retrieving a Critical Craft Norm

Recent social theory has begun to reconsider how the activity of work can contribute to well-being or autonomy under the right conditions. However, there is no consensus on what this contribution consists in, and so on precisely which normative principles should be marshalled to critique harmful or repressive forms of workplace organisation. This paper argues that Richard Sennett’s concept of work as craft provides a normative standard against which the organisation of work can be assessed, especially when explained within a broadly Aristotelian account of the conditions of human flourishing. More precisely, the paper argues that a craft norm can meet the standards of social critique within the Frankfurt School tradition of Critical Theory, as this tradition has been interpreted by Axel Honneth. Honneth himself now rejects craft norms as too utopian and parochial to inform Critical Theory under contemporary economic conditions. In reply, this paper uses sociological studies of call centre workers to illustrate how work motivated by craft ideals can be sustainable rather than utopian, and how craftsmanship can inform social critique across a wide variety of industries and management practices.