Governing failure: development,aid and audit in Haiti

This paper analyses practices for monitoring, tracking and assessing the international aid and reconstruction efforts in Haiti in an attempt to ‘build back better’ from the devastation of the January 2010 earthquake. We suggest that aid and reconstruction efforts filter through an international network of development organisations. This network also acts as a governing auspice, overseeing the transformation of Haiti from a ‘failed state’ to a strong democratic state. The central governing mechanism in this reconstruction effort involves the embedding of the ideas and practices of audit within Haitian political and civic culture. We reveal how, in Haiti, this culture of audit monitors aid and reconstruction through biopolitical technologies such as benchmarks and performance indicators, and through the constitution of calculable and accountable entities. More than a means of implementing disaster recovery, audit culture is a technique of biopolitical governance that aims to transform Haiti's state, civic institutions and citizens into entities accountable to an international development agenda.     

Collective Bargaining during Times of Crisis: Recommendations from the COVID-19 Pandemic

The COVID-19 pandemic dramatically changed employment across sectors in 2020. This Viewpoint essay examines public sector labor relations during the pandemic and describes the impact bargaining process that is used to protect public employees. The authors draw on their own experience with impact bargaining negotiations and the public labor relations, conflict management, and civil service reform literatures to develop recommendations for public union labor leaders during times of crisis. They suggest that public unions have an important role in crisis management but must act strategically to develop good working relationships with leadership and successfully negotiate employee protections in uncertain times.     

The working of electoral corruption: the Ekiti model of vote buying

Crime, Law and Social Change - In Nigeria, politicians and parties have developed a sophisticated vote-buying scheme, which we label, according to the state, where it happens, the Ekiti model of...     

From centralisation to fragmentation and back again: the role of non-state actors in Brazil’s transformed foreign policy

Abstract

Since the 1990s, Brazil’s foreign policy-making, traditionally a highly centralised and hierarchical process, has become more fragmented, plural and horizontal. In this context, the role of non-state actors has been increasingly relevant. The impact and significance of these actors have been however a matter of debate. While there are authors that consider that non-state actors play only a secondary role in the policy-making process, there are others that assert that these actors work alongside governmental actors and directly influence policy choices. Drawing on the concept of network governance, the paper proposes a different view from the two recurrent approaches in the literature mentioned above. It argues that the recent steps to transform Brazil’s state governance from hierarchy to horizontal networks have indeed expanded the room for the direct participation of non-state actors in the policy process. However, state authorities fought to adjust this tendency, in order to retain control over the decision-making process, by putting in place formal and informal coordinating mechanisms led by the Ministry of Foreign Relations and the Presidency. This suggests Brazil’s foreign policy was made in the shadow of hierarchy. The paper demonstrates the argument using the case of Brazil’s foreign policy towards China.     

Neville Laski,Anglo-Jewry and the crises of the 1930s

ABSTRACT

Neville Laski, president of the Board of Deputies of British Jews from 1932 to 1939, led Anglo-Jewry through the most challenging period in its modern history. Internally, the community was deeply divided, with half a century of mass immigration placing great strain on its pre-existing structures and institutions, and particularly the traditional elites who controlled them. Externally, it faced the unprecedented threat of an emerging domestic fascist movement, while also dealing with the consequences of growing antisemitic persecution in continental Europe. Despite playing a leading role in responding to these developments, Laski has received remarkably little attention from historians. Where he has, the consensus is that he failed to rise to the challenges of the 1930s, acting as an impediment to internal reform and remaining complacent and ineffective in his response to antisemitism. Drawing on a range of contemporary sources, Tilles’s article offers a comprehensive reassessment of Laski’s role. It argues that he acted as a transitional figure between the rule of the old, anglicized elites and the new immigrant community, seeking to balance the demands of competing factions. Meanwhile, his defence policy against antisemitism was not only active and effective, but eventually saw all major sections of Anglo-Jewry unite behind his leadership in this area.