Capital Accumulation,Hegemony and Socio-ecological Struggles: Insights from the ENTITLE Project

This special issue presents findings and reflections of scholars who participated in the European Network of Political Ecology (ENTITLE). By mobilising conceptual frameworks from several strands of Marxist and post-structuralist theory—and empirically engaging with a range of historico-geographical processes—the articles in this issue contribute to debates in political ecology in two main ways. First, they critically analyse the political economy and ecology of contemporary capitalism, with an emphasis on accumulation strategies associated with the uneven expansion and crisis of neoliberalism. Specifically, they unpack and critically extend the frameworks of “accumulation by dispossession” and “nature's neoliberalisation” to engage with, among other cases, the political ecology of “austerity” in Southern Europe; historical and contemporary cases of “capital-driven disasters”; and political ecological dynamics taking place around relationships of “rent”. Second, the authors of this special issue analyse new and re-emerging forms of socio-ecological resistance and contestation, including both distributional struggles and movements against “commons' enclosures”. Moreover, they focus on how struggles can (and do) move from contesting capitalist forms of dispossession towards creating alternative “hegemonic” projects and blocs, by critiquing received “common sense” and constructing and performing alternative political ecological imaginaries informed by principles of solidarity and “commoning”. Taken together, the articles in this special issue present new ways of thinking and enacting political and ecological struggles outside established scholarly traditions and conventional disciplines.     

Decolonising online development studies? Emancipatory aspirations and critical reflections – a case study

Academics in high-income countries are increasingly launching development studies programmes through online distance learning to engage practitioner-students in low-income countries. Are such initiatives providing opportunities to critically tackle social injustice, or merely ‘mirroring’ relations of global inequality and re-entrenching imperial practices? Building on recent scholarship addressing efforts to ‘decolonise development studies’ and the complex power dynamics they encounter, we reflect on this question by analysing experiences of faculty and students in a United Kingdom-based online development studies programme, focusing particularly on perspectives of development practitioner-students working from Africa. We discuss barriers to social inclusivity – including the politics of language – that shaped participation dynamics in the programme as well as debates regarding critical development course content, rethinking possibilities for bridging counter-hegemonic development scholarship with practice-oriented approaches in a range of social contexts. Our analysis unpacks key tensions in addressing intertwined institutional and pedagogic dilemmas for an agenda towards decolonising online development studies, positioning decolonisation as a necessarily unsettling and contested process that calls for greater self-reflexivity.     

Choctaw Tales: An Interview with LeAnne Howe

LeAnne Howe, a citizen of the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma and the Eidson Distinguished Professor of American Literature in the Franklin College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Georgia, writes poetry, fiction, screenplays, plays, creative non-fiction and critical essays. Her work is primarily concerned with the experiences and the perspectives of American Indian people and communities. Howe’s latest book, Choctalking on Other Realities (2013), which she describes as ‘three parts memoir, one part tragedy, one part absurdist fiction, and one part “marvellous realism”’, received the inaugural Modern Language Association Prize for Studies in Native American Literatures, Cultures and Languages in 2014. Along with being the recipient of a United States Artists Ford Fellowship and a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Native Writers’ Circle of the Americas, Howe also received the 2015 Western Literature Association Distinguished Achievement Award. Howe’s writing could easily be described as enlivening, eclectic and often hectic, and, more often than not, she brings together a plethora of stories concerning the historical and contemporary experiences of the Choctaw Nation. Various geographical, spiritual, familial and narratological spaces are revealed or plotted during the course of Howe’s narratives, and, as a consequence, images that relate to the act of mapping, the basis of storytelling, and the subject of community and place become recurring motifs throughout her writing. Concerned with the ways in which Choctaw lifeways have been mapped out across time, Howe appears to be especially interested in the representation of travel, exchange, contact and consumption not only in the pre-contact and post-contact United States, but also within the global village.     

Immigrant Social Workers and Transnational Practices: The Example of Latin Americans in Switzerland

This article explores how Latin American social workers living in Switzerland develop transnational practices in their professional and civic life. It focuses more particularly on the forms of support that these migrants provide to their societies of origin or to their immigrant compatriots through the activities they carry out either through their job, through their extra-professional commitments, or by combining these two dimensions of their existence. From interviews with 17 Latin American social workers, a typology of four forms of transnational commitment is suggested: local social work and transnational civic activity, professional transnationalism, transnational alternative professional exchanges, and “glocal” social work.     

美国经济霸权与全球经济失衡

当前世界经济发展的一个重要特征,就是全球经常账户失衡,美国的逆差持续扩大,且顺差国主要集中在东亚地区。这种现象的出现,是东亚经济依附于美国经济霸权的必然结果。由于对美国商品市场和金融市场存在着双重依赖,东亚地区成为当今美国经济霸权最重要的支撑者。正是由于双方在世界经济发展中的这种不对称地位,调整失衡的压力将主要由东亚来承担。     

Shirley Chisholm： Unbought and unbossed An African American woman in U.S. politics

The article explores how an African American woman, Shirley Chisholm, was involved in American politics in the 20th century. Chisholm＇s political career took off in 1964, when she won the campaign for the New York State General Assembly. In 1968, after finishing her term in the legislature, Ms. Chisholm campaigned to represent New York＇s twelfth congressional district. She won the election and became the first colored woman elected to congress. During her first term in congress, Chisholm hired an all-female staff and spoke out for civil rights, women＇s rights, the poor and against the Vietnam War. In 1970, she was elected to continue a second term. She remarked that women in the United States must become revolutionaries and they must refuse to accept the old, the traditional roles and stereotypes. On January 25, 1972, Shirley Chisholm announced her candidacy for president. Ms. Chisholm became the first African American woman to campaign for the presidency. Not surprisingly, she met a lot of resistance, even from the congressional black caucus and women＇s right groups. The Democratic National Convention in 1972 in Miami was the first major convention in which a woman was considered for the presidential nomination. Although she did not win the nomination, she received 151 of the delegates＇ votes. The whole aim of her campaign was not to win but enter the struggle and pave the way for the future. Ms. Chisholm believed her black colleagues in congress failed to rally around her because she was a woman. Shirley is one of the many African American women who have been denied their rightful place in American history, She fought for change and the article tries to remember the role she played in the United States politics in the 20th century.     

试论尼克松对华决策机制及其面临的内部反弹——以对台军援问题为中心

出于结束越战和地缘政治考虑,尼克松和基辛格有意打开中美关系大门,但因保守派和亲台势力竭力反对,加之两人政治个性等原因,他们在对华决策时选择了相当封闭的“总统-国家安全事务助理”机制,并在早期采取了对华秘密接触方式,这导致美国国内对华政策的极大反弹。秘密外交公开前,美国政府各部门在削减对台军援以缓和中美关系问题上曾达成脆弱一致;而秘密外交公开后,军方、保守派、亲台势力则借增加对台军援向白宫发难,以示其被排除在对华决策核心之外的不满及对中美缓和的反对。这说明对华“总统-国家安全事务助理”决策机制、秘密外交手段对当时中美关系具有“双刃剑”式的影响。     

Cross-ethnic Invariance of Self-esteem and Depression Measures for Chinese,Filipino, and European American Adolescents

Self-esteem and depression are fundamental psychological adjustment constructs in the study of adolescent well-being. Most measures of these constructs have been developed and validated using European American samples, and while the correlates and predictors of psychological adjustment have been examined in multiple cultural settings, no existing research explicitly compares the equivalence of measures of self-esteem or depression for contemporary Chinese, Filipino and European American adolescents. Using data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (the Add Health study), this study examines the factorial invariance of self-esteem and depression measures for European American adolescents and the two largest Asian American ethnic groups in the U.S.: Chinese and Filipino Americans. Results indicate strong evidence for invariance of the measure of self-esteem; however, the often-used measure of depression (CES-D) does not satisfy basic tests of measurement invariance for Asian Americans in this sample.

韩美同盟的现状:以战略同盟构想为中心

本文旨在以李明博政府的韩美战略同盟构想为中心,对韩美同盟的现状进行探讨。李明博政府正力图将现有韩美安保同盟发展为一揽子战略同盟,以此提升国力。由于面临着霸权的现实性局限,深感全球层面的同盟合作变得更加切合实际的美国奥巴马政府正在接受这一构想,但是对于具体的方案,两国的理解并不完全一致。而这一点正是本文的要旨之所在。     

美国新政权与六方会谈前景探析

美国大选,执政八年的共和党政府结束了其历史使命,民主党奥巴马新政府建立.根据其上台前后的言行来看,美国奥巴马新政权的基本政策主要在于重振经济、结束伊战以及坚持反恐.在外交政策上,美国新政权将改变其前任布什政府初期的单边主义武力政策,更多地采取多边或双边的协调与合作政策.在朝鲜核问题以及六方会谈机制方面,虽然美国和朝鲜同为当事国,以及中国在其中也发挥了非常重要的作用,但是美国仍然握有相当的主动权.美国新政权的基本政策同样会延续布什政府后期利用六方会谈框架与朝鲜接触和谈判的政策,甚至会采取一些更积极的政策,因为奥巴马政权要解决其面临的内外难题,需要其盟国的协助,也需要中国等国家的协助,对朝鲜这样的国家也希望能够在国际压力下促使其和平地放弃核开发.当然,半岛无核化及防止核扩散仍然是美国的根本利益,要求朝鲜放弃核开发的目标不会有丝毫的改变,甚至从原则上来说美国新政权仍然没有承诺放弃使用武力.此外,美国新政权或者还仍然存在同中国和朝鲜之间在意识形态上的对立,但是,除非发生预料不到的突发事件,美国在朝核问题上使用武力的可能性极小,在意识形态上的某些不同也不会影响奥巴马政权务实灵活的现实主义政策.总之,美国新政权的基本政策有利于朝核问题的缓和,同样也有利于六方会谈持续发挥作用.虽然美国新政权有可能同朝鲜之间有更多的双边直接接触和谈判,但是不可能脱离六方会谈的框架,即或者两国的双边谈判在六方会谈框架范围内加以实现,或者彼此都需要六方会谈框架作为自己外交回旋的余地.作为美国新政权,虽然为了能够使朝核问题有所突破而有可能更加重视双边谈判,但考虑到同中俄的战略性关系以及同其盟国日韩的伙伴关系,也不可能弃六方会谈框架而不顾.