Civil society knowledge networks: how international development institutions reshape the geography of knowledge

What role have the processes and institutions of international development played in creating and propagating ideas around the world? This paper demonstrates that networks of development-focused civil society institutions can form global epistemic bridges even where communication technology, global markets, infrastructure, or state services do not reach. Given the penetration of these ‘civil society knowledge networks’ throughout the world, it is crucial to understand how these networks form, and how they create and spread ideas, mediating between global discourses and local needs. This paper builds on a multi-sited case study of one such civil society knowledge network, which includes an international foundation, its partner non-governmental organisations (NGOs) in Kenya, and one village where these NGOs run a forest conservation project. The case study provides a closely textured analysis of the mechanisms of knowledge production and consumption in the network, including personality politics, language, technology, political connections and the power dynamics of knowledge flows. It demonstrates the ways remoteness and disconnection are overcome through the epistemic reach of institutional networks involved in development interventions.     

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.     

How Public Officials Gain Policy Influence—Lessons from Local Government in Sweden

That public officials influence public policy is generally agreed upon, but the issue of how individual officials gain this influence is less developed in the literature. Here, the stories and experiences of 10 officials, active in local environmental governing in Sweden, are used to identify, describe, and discuss key strategies for gaining policy influence. The result shows the importance of accessing key politicians; avoiding isolation within the administration; developing long-term strategies; and being skilled in communication, networking, and generating external resources. The way these officials act and think challenges some well-established theoretical notions and adds empirical insights to the democratic dilemma of bureaucratic power.     

Differences in the executive council of the American federation of Labor

The 1936–1937 General Motors sit-down strike may be the most famous work stoppage in American history. The victory in Flint so heartened workers that a veritable “sit-down fever” wave spread across America. But are labor scholars guilty of unintentionally spreading a Whiggish view of history? Just 7 weeks after the victory in Flint, Hershey Chocolate workers sat down. Within 7 days they were forcibly ejected from the factory and beaten by a mob. This article takes a look at the events in Hershey with an eye toward raising questions about the overall efficacy of sit-down strikes. Although it by no means wishes to diminish the heroism or the usefulness of the Flint sit-down, it argues that a balanced look at the past requires a deeper look into the strikes that failed. The question is of the utmost importance for the contemporary labor movement, as some activists have called for a revival of sit-down militancy as a tactic for organized labor to reverse decades of decline. This may not be wise strategy, as past sit-down strikes are too narrowly filtered through the triumphant lens of Flint.     

The fractured state in the governance of private game farming: the case of KwaZulu-Natal Province,South Africa

Conversion from livestock and/or crop farming to game farming has been a notable trend on privately owned land in South Africa over the last decades. The rapid growth of wildlife ranching is associated with an annual increase in the areas enclosed by game fences and high demand for wildlife which is being traded privately and at wildlife auctions. Key environmental, agricultural and land reform legislation has been passed since 1994 that impacts this sector, but this legislation does not provide a clear regulatory framework for the game farming industry. This article seeks to understand why game farming is thriving in a regulatory environment plagued with uncertainty. The focus is on one province, KwaZulu-Natal. It is clear that the state is not a homogeneous and monolithic entity applying itself to the regulation of the sector. There is no clear direction on the position of private game farming at the interface of environmental and agricultural regulations. The argument put forward is that the fractured state, in fact, provides space within which the game farmers are able to effectively manoeuvre and to maximise their advantages as private landowners. While game farmers may complain about strict wildlife regulation in the province, the benefits they gain from the combination of a divided state and the presence in this province of a strong, autonomous conservation body are considerable.     

Is there a global environmental justice movement?

One of the causes of the increasing number of ecological distribution conflicts around the world is the changing metabolism of the economy in terms of growing flows of energy and materials. There are conflicts on resource extraction, transport and waste disposal. Therefore, there are many local complaints, as shown in the Atlas of Environmental Justice (EJatlas) and other inventories. And not only complaints; there are also many successful examples of stopping projects and developing alternatives, testifying to the existence of a rural and urban global movement for environmental justice. Moreover, since the 1980s and 1990s, this movement has developed a set of concepts and campaign slogans to describe and intervene in such conflicts. They include environmental racism, popular epidemiology, the environmentalism of the poor and the indigenous, biopiracy, tree plantations are not forests, the ecological debt, climate justice, food sovereignty, land grabbing and water justice, among other concepts. These terms were born from socio-environmental activism, but sometimes they have also been taken up by academic political ecologists and ecological economists who, for their part, have contributed other concepts to the global environmental justice movement, such as ‘ecologically unequal exchange’ or the ‘ecological footprint’.     

All the labor problems fit to print: the New York Times and the cultural production of the U.S ‘labor problem’, 1870–1932

The period that spanned the Gilded Age to the onset of the Great Depression saw the rise and relative decline of the US labor movement. The salient events of labor movements over these years undoubtedly shaped public perception about labor issues, and some scholars have been attempting to unpack the mechanisms through which depictions and characterizations of the ‘labor problem’ were produced in authoritative venues that could have shaped the future of the movement. This study goes beyond the standard practice of explaining news report volume to feature the political valance of the reports on the labor problem over a 63-year time period. The aforementioned period also saw significant changes in news reporting practices, with the rise of objective informational writing and the embrace of journalism as a profession. The change within journalism itself could potentially shape the depiction of the labor problem, yet such change has been overlooked by existing literature pertaining to the topic. This research makes a theoretical case for integrating social processes central to the labor movement and journalism from 1870 to 1932 and explains patterns in the cultural production of the labor problem in the New York Times by analyzing these two tracks of history in conjunction using both qualitative and quantitative data.     

Contested Resource Extraction,Anti-Corporate Protests and the Politics of Movement Alliance in Bangladesh

Why do activist groups form alliances and why do some alliances later fall apart? This article asks these questions in the context of a popular mobilisation against resource extraction in Bangladesh. It focuses on the dynamics of a strategic alliance between a locally organised community mobilisation against a British mining company and an urban radical activist group, known for its anti-capitalist activism, to explore the subsequent collapse of the alliance and the demobilisation of one group. Based on the qualitative analysis of in-depth interviews with activists and organisational documents, the article probes the underlying causes of rupture. Although several individual and organisational factors are identified, it is argued that Bangladesh’s confrontational political culture and its authoritarian party system played a critical role, with local activists vulnerable to co-optation or being silenced by powerful political actors. The article contributes to social movement scholarship by emphasising that specific political cultures can undermine efforts to build strategic alliances between diverse social movement organisations.     

Vote Blue,Go Green? Cameron's Conservatives and the Environment

How genuine is the Conservative party's rediscovery of the environment? Would a Conservative government led by David Cameron implement a wide‐ranging and progressive environmental policy? This article explores why Cameron has embraced the environment so enthusiastically when Conservative governments have had a poor record of environmental protection and the Conservative party has traditionally shown little interest in the issue. It assesses the impact of Cameron's strategy both on his own party and on the wider world of environmental politics and it evaluates the continuing commitment of the Conservatives to the issue by assessing what kind of policies a future Conservative government might implement. Although Cameron remains committed to the issue and he has already had a positive impact on Labour government policy, he has not yet convinced his party or its supporters, so a future Conservative government would probably represent continuity rather than significant change in environmental policy.