Food sovereignty and new peasantries: on re-peasantization and counter-hegemonic contestations in the Basque territory

This paper contributes to debates about the potential of re-peasantization and its contribution to food sovereignty with a case study from the global North, where such questions are relatively under-studied. I examine how Euskal Herriko Nekazarien Elkartasuna (EHNE)-Bizkaia, a Vía Campesina member organization from the Basque Country (Spain), advances food sovereignty through re-peasantization. I also analyze the motivations of new peasants engaged in agroecology, their understandings of food sovereignty, and the challenges that they face. Using a Gramscian political ecology framework, I argue that whereas re-peasantization contributes to a shift from corporatist to counter-hegemonic struggles, the political-economic and biophysical contexts structure agroecological production in ways that limit the extent to which new peasantries can become ‘agents of their own history’. I conclude that closer attention to peasants’ messy practices of making a living is needed to address questions of political agency.     

Performing blackness in the “Rainbow Nation”: Athi-Patra Ruga’s The Future White Women of Azania

This article applies Saidiya Hartman’s framework of performing blackness to South African performance artist Athi-Patra Ruga’s performance series, The Future White Women of Azania, to consider the ways in which the performances index the convoluted imbrications of colonialism, specifically Apartheid policy in South Africa, and postcolonialism, specifically the anti-Apartheid struggle(s) and the current political and economic structure of South African democracy. It argues that Ruga’s performance makes evident political and economic systems that tout black and queer liberation while perpetuating black queer death. Ruga’s work also relocates Hartman’s framework to a transnational, postcolonial context, expanding the notion of performing blackness (and the entangled processes of domination and subordination that it maps) beyond the trans-Atlantic paradigm, suggesting that performing blackness could be used to understand the correlation between broader spatial and temporal phenomena that shape blackness. Finally, situating The Future White Women of Azania as not only a performance of blackness, but of queerness as well, postulates that layering sexuality onto Hartman’s model reveals that the dynamics articulated under performing blackness are evident between oppressors and oppressed and between members of each of these groups as Hartman notes, but also between the contingent axes of subjectivity within an individual’s experience.     

“Vivimos en Jaula de Oro”: The Impact of State-Level Legislation on Immigrant Latino Families

This study sought to learn from Latino immigrant parents which and how state-level immigration policies impact their families. Fifty-four Latino immigrant parents participated in interviews. Constructivist grounded theory methods were used to complete the analysis. Results indicate that fear of detainment, deportation, and family separation affects participants emotionally and behaviorally. Participants experience exploitive practices in the workplace and through traffic infractions. Social support networks are constantly changing and weakened when families relocate in search of immigrant friendly communities. Simultaneously, parents develop strategies to protect their families against stringent immigration enforcement. Implications for practice, policy, and research are discussed.     

Preventing violence through hip hop: an evolutionary perspective

ABSTRACT

For decades Hip Hop cultural practices have been disparaged for allegedly inciting and being responsible for the eruption of urban violence. This assumption, likely built upon pre-existing biases regarding the street culture and ethnic minorities where Hip Hop emerged, ignored how some of the genre’s main elements – particularly freestyle rap, breakin’ or breakdancing and graffiti tagging – initially served the purpose of providing at-risk youths with real alternatives to direct physical violence in their day-to-day lives, and continue do so today. It has also ignored broader analogies with other cross-cultural and cross-species manifestations of similar practices that have served for millennia as effective mechanisms for reducing the likelihood of potentially lethal violence. By presenting these manifestations – namely song dueling and mark making – in comparative terms with Hip Hop’s freestyle song and dance battles and tagging territorial contests, this article seeks to highlight the relevance and potential of Hip Hop for preventing violence while also suggesting a common evolutionary backdrop within the context of strategies aimed at minimizing intraspecific aggression.     

Movement decision-making in violence prevention and peace practices

Studying parallels between movement behaviour and violent actions can help understand interdisciplinary possibilities for prevention, intervention, mediation and post-conflict healing. This article explores the role of unconscious and conscious movement decision-making in violent/peaceful interactions. Thematic analysis of interviews was conducted with trainers in dance/movement peace practices working in fourteen countries. The doctoral research sociologically analysed shared beliefs and a framework that was previously applied to work in schools, expanding its potential for new settings and peace contexts. The framework illustrates five stages of decision-making (Flow/Tension, Attention, Intention, Action and Reflection/Evaluation) based on Warren Lamb’s and Rudolph Laban’s systems of movement analysis. Flow/Tension refers to physiological responses to conflict and the regulation of tension, discomfort and breath. Attention involves the development of spatial awareness and awareness of our immediate environment. The Intention stage fosters the capacity for self-evaluation, assertively addressing needs and mitigating ethical pressure. The Action stage involves understanding impulses, commitment and non-action. Reflection/Evaluation promote reflexivity in practitioners and participants and a dynamic evaluation of peace practices. By analysing contributions of dance/movement to peacebuilding, this article introduces a much-needed focus on the body in conflict and inform interpersonal and intergroup conflict interventions by educators, therapists and peace practitioners of all fields.     

Demokratie als öffentliches Gut?

Political Science neglect classical insights on constitutional and economic conditions of the so called “tax state” as a fiscal institutional architecture sui generis. While studies in Political Economy focus on distribution quality of the welfare state or compare budgets from local to international level fiscal research should also consider the capitalist structure of tax paradigm again. Only after such a regeneration the discipline could better reflect old and new democratic challenges of fiscal problems. Recalling former theories of interdependencies between fiscal, constitutional and ideological orders, this article suggests to make sense of conceptualizing democratic regime itself as prime public good. Because if it is fiscal sovereignty that is foremost to produce with democracy’s budget it should be easier to analyze tax state driven regressive effects of democratic integrity.     

Was ist Rechtspopulismus?

When a new type of party labelled ?right-wing populist“ by political scientists and journalists, arrived on the political scene in Western Europe thirty years ago, many observers thought that it would only be a short-lived manifestation of political protest. Today these parties are present in almost all European countries. Building on an introductory definition, the contribution will assess the root causes of right-wing populism, its ideological and programmatic features, its organizational traits and ways of adressing voters as well as its effects on party systems, governmental policies and the democracy in general. Concluding thoughts offer a number of recommendations how the challengers—which will in all likelihood not disappear in the near future—could be politically contained.     

The effect of valence and ideology in campaign conversion: panel evidence from three Spanish general elections

This paper studies changes in voting preferences over election campaigns. Building on the literature on spatial models and valence issues, we study whether (1) ideological distance to political parties, (2) assessments of party competence to handle different policy issues, and (3) voter-updated candidate evaluations are factors that explain shifts in voter choices in the weeks preceding the election. To test our hypotheses, we use data from three survey panels conducted for the 2008, 2011 and 2015 Spanish general elections. Our findings show that valence factors are more influential than ideological indifference to account for campaign conversion.     

Is there a selection bias in roll call votes? Evidence from the European Parliament

We examine the magnitude and significance of selection bias in roll call votes. Prior to 2009, all recorded (roll call) votes in the European Parliament had to be requested explicitly by European Political Groups. Since 2009, a roll call vote has been mandatory on all final legislative votes. We exploit that change in the rules and compare differences between final legislative votes, amendment votes and non-legislative votes before and after 2009, using a difference-in-differences approach with extensive controls. Using data from the Sixth (2004–2009) to Seventh (2009–2014) European Parliaments, we fail to find any large differences in voting cohesion for the main political groups. We find even less significance when we control for changes in parliamentary membership between those two periods. The results suggest that selection biases in the European Parliament associated with strategic choices are negligible.