Shipping hazardous waste: implications for economically developing countries

Trade in hazardous waste has given rise to great concerns. One source of transboundary trade in hazardous waste is the ship-breaking industry. Though end-of-life vessels provide incentives to developing countries in the form of raw materials, these same developing countries are not only ill equipped to manage hazardous waste in an environmentally sound manner, but they also lack the resources to mitigate health impacts arising out of the handling of hazardous waste. These concerns of weaker economies have been addressed by the Basel Convention on the Control of Transboundary Movements of Hazardous Wastes and their Disposal. However, the shipping of vessels with hazardous waste for final disposal in developing countries continues. To illustrate the inequity involved in such negotiations, we present a case study of the French aircraft carrier “Le Clemenceau”, which was sent to a shipyard in Alang, India, for disposal. This vessel became the focus of attention given its transport of an unknown amount of toxic waste, including asbestos. Similarly, there are reports that large quantities of toxic waste are still being imported by India from countries that ban the use of this waste. The use, import, and export of these chemicals raise serious environmental and health concerns. This paper assesses the implications of shipping such hazardous waste to developing countries and emphasizes the need for promoting research to plug the gaps and for implementing stringent measures to check the trade in environmental pollutants.

A scientific approach to measure public political participation in Pakistan

Public political participation is an exhaustive subject in the democratic system that is contributing as a tilled land since the birth of democracy. It has a wide range of frequency, but voting is one of the easiest among all forms of public participation. Despite the easiness of voting, Pakistan ranks 164th in terms of voter turnout among 169 countries of the world. The voter turnout of the second largest Muslim democracy and the fifth largest among all the democratic states was recorded as 45.3% in the 2013 general election, which was less than India’s (59.4%) and even Bangladesh’s (58.2%). More than half of the population in Pakistan does not think it is its duty to cast its vote. The present study is an effort to investigate public political participation through six independent variables: democratic political party, party mobilization, security, accessibility, leadership image and moderating factor citizen distrust, and a useful sample size of 1884 was collected across the country. SPSS version 24.0 was used to measure the data. The results show significant and positive relations among the dependent and independent variables, while citizen distrust negatively moderates the dependent and independent variables of the study.     

The Rise of Resilience in Education in Emergencies

ABSTRACT

This article explores how resilience as a concept is being increasingly mobilised within the Education in Emergencies (EiE) community. Using content and a close textual analysis, it identifies the concept's growth in prominence within key EiE documents arguing it has been employed to serve a range of different purposes. It contends, however, that dominant conceptualisations of resilience within the EiE community are reflective of a number of shifts around the problem, subjects and purposes of education provision in such conflict-affected contexts. This serves to limit the transformative potential of resilience, particularly in regards to contributing to positive peace.     

Enforcement of International Human Rights Law by Domestic Courts: A Theoretical and Practical Study

Netherlands International Law Review -