Further resources for participatory research and gender analysis

So much work has been done on participatory research and gender analysis – their implementation, evaluation, and institutionalisation – that it is difficult to recommend a limited set of resources. The context here is ‘challenges to operationalising participatory research and gender analysis’, so we have sought out resources which shed light on some new practical issues and are based on empirical evidence. Some of the classics in the field have also been included. Readers will find additional resources in and through the bibliographical references of articles included in this issue.

This list was compiled by Guy Manners from annotated submissions by contributors to this special issue.     

We are here,they are there: between peace and exclusion in Israel/Palestine

The purpose of this work is to offer a critique of partition, not on the basis of its impact on the relations between the sides to the dispute, but on its implications for majority-minority relations inside the (non-homogeneous) state. Using the Israeli-Palestinian example, the paper argues that the dynamics of partition idealize the notion of a homogeneous nation-state and, consequently, marginalize minorities and accentuate internal political divisions. Specifically, Israeli policymakers' ‘demographic trade-off’ between territorial compromise and a ‘Jewish state’ underscores some of the recent national tensions within Israel over the citizenship status of the minority Palestinians.     

Building ties across the Green Line: the Palestinian 15 March youth movement in Israel and occupied Palestinian territory in 2011

In 2011 Palestinian youth joined together across the Green Line, demonstrating grassroots solidarity and a challenge to the elite consensus in favour of the two-state Oslo process. The movement drew inspiration from the concurrent Arab Spring and the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement, organising joint demonstrations in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territory. However, the movement struggled to develop as a result of challenges regarding its objectives, strategy and representation, and of external threats from Israel and Palestinian political elites.     

Teachers’ Conditional Regard and Students’ Need Satisfaction and Agentic Engagement: A Multilevel Motivation Mediation Model

Teachers’ conditional positive regard and conditional negative regard are common motivational techniques in the classroom. This study investigated their respective effects on adolescent students’ agentic engagement, while considering students’ basic psychological needs for autonomy and relatedness as potential mediators. Data collected from 30 teachers and 651 7th to 10th graders (52% female) were used to test a multilevel mediation model. The results indicated that teachers’ conditional negative regard undermined students’ agentic engagement by frustrating both of their autonomy and relatedness needs. Teachers’ conditional positive regard thwarted students’ sense of autonomy, which consequently undermined their agentic engagement. The findings are discussed in terms of conditional positive and negative regard as undesirable classroom motivational practices and the mechanisms through which they operate. The discussion also notes the importance of investigating contextual factors at the classroom level.

     

Governance is where you find it

The concept of governance is used frequently and in a variety of different ways. This article discusses Mark Bevir’s use of an interpretative approach to governance and its implications for understanding better how we govern. This approach has particular relevance to democratic forms of governance, and to the use of deliberative and direct forms of democracy.     

Comptes Rendus Book Reviews

This article follows the efforts of white settlers to impose cotton as an export crop in Natal and Zululand. Touted as a commodity capable of remaking land and life in the region in the 1850s, the 1860s, and again in the 1910s and 1920s, cotton never achieved more than marginal status in the region's agricultural economy. Its story is one of historical amnesia: although faith in the region's cotton prospects dipped following each spectacular failure, it was routinely resurrected once previous failures had been accounted for, or memories of them had faded.

Two crucial issues are at the centre of this episodic history. First, I explore the logistics of planned expansion, and the reasons for the repeated collapse of cotton-growing schemes. Second, I unravel the side effects of these difficult and disappointing efforts and argue that, despite repeated failure, cotton facilitated important structural changes to the region's agricultural, political and economic landscape.     

Post-hegemony and Gramsci: a bridge too far?

This article expands upon the theory of post-hegemony so as to maintain the multitude as an operative political category alongside the State. Ironically, it does so by returning to Antonio Gramsci. It argues that the multitude – or, for Gramsci ‘civil society’ – is constitutive of statal politics in two specific ways: (1) the multitude as a constitutive outside or alterity that the State carries; and (2) constitutive in its positivity, as a productive immanence that affects the social field from which the State is drawn. This relationship of constituent participation – not representation – is demonstrated by investigating changes in politics-as-usual in Venezuela.