The Alien Child’s Best Interest Ignored: When Notions of Gendered Parenthood Meet Tightening Immigration Policies

ABSTRACT

This article investigates how arguments about the “child’s best interest” are constructed in court decisions on asylum and family reunification in Finland. The article brings together two strands of scholarship that have so far been rather separate from each other, namely that of the literature on family reunification and feminist family studies. Analysis shows that the best interest of the child is insufficiently addressed and other arguments sideline the evaluation of child’s best interest. Gender has an impact as the best interest of the child seems to play a more significant role in relation to motherhood than it does in relation to fatherhood. In general, the court did not deem motherhood or fatherhood central to the child’s development as such, but rather as something that became central if it could not be performed properly due to other reasons than separation. Considerations such as ties to either Finland or the country of origin, as well as the income requirement, can become factors that override the potential separation from a parent. Finally, the results are also compared to the child’s best interest evaluation in out-of-home placement cases from the same courts. Our analysis shows a stark contrast between these two types of cases. We show that whenever a child’s case falls under immigration law, even when simultaneously being handled within the framework of child protection, the main deciding factor is not the best interest of the child. Alien affairs are decided based on—almost solely—factors other than the child’s best interest, while the same Supreme Administrative Court rules on child welfare cases based on a very different interpretation of child’s best interest.     

Turkifying Poverty,or: the Phantom Pain of Izmir’s Lost Christian Working Class, 1924–26

This article shows that ‘Turkification’, a term widely used by historians of modern Turkey to refer to the forced transfer of property from Christian into Muslim hands, ought to be conceptualized not only in the sense of ‘enrichment’ but also, with regard to the working classes, as a process in which Muslim people inherited the poverty of their Christian predecessors. Taking ?zmir as a case in point, the article first describes the plight of the overwhelmingly Christian working class prior to 1922. It then studies reports and editorials that discussed the economic and social situation in ?zmir in the years 1923 to 1926, after the Turkish victory and forced migration of her Christian population. Over the course of these years, ?zmir experienced a serious economic crisis, and bread prices reached levels that led to widespread undernourishment and hunger among the city?s poor. Agricultural production was lagging behind pre-war levels, and positive effects of ‘Turkification? policies were failing to materialize. By analyzing the contemporary journalists? attempts at explaining the crisis, but also pointing out national and transnational factors that they were probably unaware of, the article makes an original contribution to the economic and social history of early republican Turkey.     

A Model for Female-Perpetrated Domestic Violence

Child abuse often coexists with intimate partner violence. However, limited studies incorporate both phenomena in a single study. Moreover, the examination of female-on-male violence is an important development. Hence, an intrinsic case study of domestic violence is presented to provide insights regarding the nature and impact of female-perpetrated violence. The research approach was qualitative and demonstrated that a model for abusive behavior seems to be similar for both sexes. The data revealed theoretical trends such as the reality of an intergenerational transmission of violence into adulthood, as well as abusive partners presenting with borderline traits.     

Echoes of domestic silence: mechanisms of concealment in cases of ‘Family Honour Killings’ in Mandate Palestine

This article deals with the manner in which family and community in Mandate Palestine attempted to keep the criminal justice system from intervening in cases defined as ‘Family Honour Killing’. Drawing on criminal court cases, we argue that the familial, domestic and communal features of this crime and its social, predominantly rural, context were critical for the attempts to keep it within the community and to prevent state intervention by obstructing, concealing and denying evidence. We focus on the mechanisms used by members of the family and community for that purpose. Our case study is in line with previous findings indicating the under-reporting of domestic violence, especially when witnesses were closely related to both the victim and the perpetrator. This domestic and communal alignment was most likely reinforced under colonial rule, though it was not necessarily caused predominantly in opposition to it.     

Gender and Vernaculars in Digital Humanities and World Literature

Abstract

This article discusses the large-scale and world-encompassing aspirations of digital humanities and world literature and their methodological accordance with the analysis of literature in smaller languages and of texts understood in social, transnational, and gendered contexts. Are Digital Humanities and World Literature establishing themselves as fields utilizing analytical tools that are at odds with the aims and perspectives of feminist literary history and reception history as a part of literary history? We argue that gender research and theory is insufficiently developed in both computational literary history and World Literature. An unproblematic understanding of translations, canonization, English as a global language, and the use of large-scale computational methods and formalized interpretive models is in many cases not beneficial for the understanding of texts by women writers or from feminist perspectives. Drawing on feminist criticism of computational methods and arguments for specialized rather than generalized knowledge about literary history, we propose that digitization in some form, be it a bibliographical database or digitization of a corpus of texts, may be thought of as part of the research process in projects oriented towards gender and cultural exchange.     

What abolishing the family would not do

Abstract

Because families disrupt fair patterns of distribution and, in particular, equality of opportunity, egalitarians believe that the institution of the family needs to be defended at the bar of justice. In their recent book, Harry Brighouse and Adam Swift have argued that the moral gains of preserving the family outweigh its moral costs. Yet, I claim that the egalitarian case for abolishing the family has been over-stated due to a failure to consider how alternatives to the family would also disturb fair distributions and, in particular, equality of opportunity. Absent the family, children would continue to be exposed to care-givers of different levels of ability, investment in childrearing and beneficial partiality. In addition, social mechanisms other than the family would lead to the accumulation of economic inequalities. Any kind of upbringing will fail to realise equality for reasons that go deeper than the family: our partiality and unequal abilities to nurture.     

Modern poetry,popular song and their dangerous liaisons

Abstract

In this article, Tsuboi Hideto examines the mutually entwined pursuits of modern poetry and music in interwar Japan, focusing especially on the work of Nakahara Chūya, Kitahara Hakushū, and the People's Poetry group. Cutting across their respective distinctions within the poetry establishment, Tsuboi draws attention to these figures’ shared investment in symphonic, folk and popular music. In so doing, he identifies among them a prevailing concern for curating a poetic voice that might harmonize the conflictual registers of individual and collective expression and thereby attune the work of the poet to that of the ‘people’ more broadly. Meanwhile, the essay traces the currents of modernist and avant-garde thought in Japan and Europe that framed these poets’ engagements with music and sound. Tsuboi then illustrates the varying degrees to which these voices, forged within the cosmopolitan milieu of the Taisho period, bent toward the nationalizing project and later gave way to the chorus of wartime fascism and imperial expansion.     

Fund Accounting from the Italian Early Tradition to the U.S. GAAP for Governments

Surprising correspondences emerge from the parallel investigation of fund accounting practices in Italian entities until the late nineteenth century and in the contemporary U.S. public sector. The analysis attempts to interpret similarities and differences in light of dissimilar environmental features, and wonders if the Italian tradition could have some explanatory capability on the U.S. present standards. The “fund” concept and its use are strictly similar; they are founded on information needs for governance and internal control. Contemporary requirements for democracy and transparency, and opportunities coming from modern ICT tools bring U.S. organizations to be accountable to the citizenry.     

The Effects of Family Contact on Community Reentry Plans Among Incarcerated Youths

Research shows protective factors that mitigate risks for juvenile delinquency can also support the community reentry of incarcerated youths and deter future offending. Family engagement, educational attainment, and secure employment are widely accepted as important protective factors to prevent problematic behavior. Studies suggest these same protective factors are crucial for incarcerated youths and should be an integral part of reentry planning to improve post-release outcomes. Nevertheless, limited research exists on the association between these factors and the value of family involvement in reentry planning for incarcerated youths. This study addresses this gap by examining how increased family contact affects the likelihood of instituting education and employment reentry plans among youths in custody. Data were obtained from the Survey of Youth in Residential Placement (SYRP) that provides information on juvenile offenders in confinement. The SYRP is the first nationally representative cross-sectional survey to gather information directly from youths 10–20 years old in custody (N=7,073). Analyses were conducted using a sequence of regression models to test the relationship between the frequency of family contact and whether a youth had a plan for education or employment upon release. Results reflect that youths with increased family contact were one and a half times more likely to have both educational and employment reentry plans in place relative to youths with no family contact. Findings inform practice and policy to advocate for family involvement with youth in confinement, and further suggest that family plays a decisive role in preparing incarcerated youths for success upon release.     

Time for a New Paradigm? Past and Present Transitions in Economic Policy

This article seeks to place the UK's present economic ‘moment’ in historical context. Over the course of the decade since the 2007 financial crisis, it has increasingly been acknowledged that a cyclical crisis has become a structural crisis. The failure of most economists to predict the financial crash in the first place, and the inadequacy of economic policy in responding to its lasting effects, has led many to conclude that economics itself is in crisis. This article seeks to contribute to a better understanding of the present period of disjuncture. Drawing on theories of paradigm shift from both the physical and social sciences, we argue that the speed of change in UK economic policy is comparable to the two major historical transitions that ended with the post‐war consensus and neoliberalism. We conclude by offering some remarks on how and where the present change might take us.