Between taboo and demonisation: anti-Palestinian racism and Palestinian subjectivities in Germany

Based on nine months of ethnographic fieldwork, this article examines Palestinian political graffiti in Berlin as a visible form of resistance against state repression. It conceptualises this repression as a transnational extension of settler-colonial mechanisms – understood as settler coloniality, following Anna-Esther Younes – and deeply entangled with Germany's anti-Palestinian racism and institutionalised memory politics. This framework legitimises surveillance, censorship, racialized policing, and the deployment of high-tech state power against Palestinian activists. Amid this repressive landscape, political graffiti functions as a counter-public, confronting dominant narratives, resisting structural silencing, and reimagining Berlin's urban surfaces as spaces of response. These visual interventions are not merely symbolic; they provoke ideological opponents, nurture political consciousness, and resist historical erasure. Much of this graffiti is created by recently arrived Palestinian refugees, particularly those affiliated with Samidoun, the now-banned Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network. The suppression of political graffiti and the framing of Palestinian activism as ‘new antisemitism’ serve to uphold a colonial hierarchy that systematically delegitimizes Palestinian resistance. While acknowledging the limitations of graffiti as a tool for political change – its vulnerability to erasure, alteration, and smudging – this paper emphasises its role in asserting agency, sustaining transnational anti-colonial solidarity, and exposing the contours of anti-Palestinian racism in Germany.

Educational institutions are places of identity formation and reformation, contributing differently to existing identity politics. In the author's biographical narrative interviews with people who position themselves as Kurds, conducted as part of her PhD project, “Experiences of Racism among Kurds in Germany—Functions and Effects of (Not) Speaking About Anti-Kurdish Racism,” the author frequently encounters instances of devaluation of Kurdish identities due to racialization and everyday invisibilization. The professional demands on educational institutions, on the other hand, require them to give resonance and validity to the multitude of identities and diversity of experiences in society and to make these visible. A critical pedagogy of decolonization involves overcoming colonized perspectives and acquiring alternative forms of knowledge. The author adopts a decolonial perspective to acknowledge and problematize the mechanisms of invisibilization and identity erasure, and thus not only shifts the content of hegemonic orders of knowledge but also enables the recognition of different modes of articulation. This article asks, what characterizes anti-Kurdish racism, and how does it impact Kurdish individuals within the German educational system? Through interview excerpts, the author addresses how these questions can be structurally addressed through biographical clues in Germany.

Introduction: This article examines the characterization of neo-Pentecostalism in Costa Rica and its implications for women's sexual and reproductive rights arising from the presence of political groups linked to certain religious groups. Objective: To analyze, from a critical human rights theory perspective, the interrelationship of the concepts of cultural warfare and gender ideology present in the political interventions and practices of the New Republic Party and their impact on women's sexual and reproductive rights. Methodology: Qualitative research whose data was collected through research diaries and consultation with documentary sources such as print media, social media, audiovisual materials, conferences, participant observations in churches, and related literature. Results: The group's positioning motivates a series of political discourses and interventions that hinder the recognition and implementation of public policies and education on sexual and reproductive health issues. Conclusions: The politicized mobilization of faith in matters of human rights promotes actions and discourses that condition the recognition of human rights to certain social roles and behaviors. The reversal of human rights present in these narratives constructs a social and political environment of non-recognition and symbolic violence against women's rights.

Many countries, including the United States, lack consensus about the core ethical principles concerning health and health care, beyond a market‐based approach to resource allocation. This chapter offers a normative theory for analyzing health policy decisions and recognizes that norms need fundamental restructuring to address existing health problems. Substantive normative principles (moral legitimacy) should be introduced into deliberative democratic process (political legitimacy) for a comprehensive, integrative theory of health and social justice. The chapter reviews the role of moral values in motivating citizens' support for public policies, and explores differences between social agreement frameworks such as incompletely theorized agreements (ITAs) and overlapping consensus and more traditional political bargaining models. ITA analysis of the American Clinton health care reform attempts reveals agreement on the mid‐level concept of universal coverage, but disagreement on both high‐ and low‐level principles. The chapter concludes that high‐level principle (e.g. health for all) or low‐level principle (e.g. willingness to pay for other's and future selves' health insurance) agreement, arising from internalization of shared public moral norms, might lead to more stable support for reform.

In this paper, we draw on Pierre Bourdieu's concepts of ‘misrecognition’, ‘condescension’ and ‘consent and complicity’ to demonstrate how domination and violence are reproduced in everyday interactions, social practices, institutional processes and dispositions. Importantly, this constitutes symbolic violence, which removes the victim's agency and voice. Indeed, we argue that as symbolic violence is impervious, insidious and invisible, it also simultaneously legitimises and sustains other forms of violence as well. Understanding symbolic violence together with traditional discourses of violence is important because it provides a richer insight into the ‘workings’ of violence, and provides new ways of conceptualising violence across a number of social fields and new strategies for intervention. Symbolic violence is a valuable tool for understanding contentious debates on the disclosure of violence, women leaving or staying in abusive relationships or returning to their abusers. While we focus only on violence against women, we recognise that the gendered nature of violence produces its own sets of vulnerabilities against men and marginalised groups, such as LGBT. The paper draws on empirical research conducted in Sweden in 2003. Sweden is an interesting case study because despite its progressive gender equality policies, there has been no marked decrease in violence towards women by men.

The dominant research strands into social interaction in culturally diverse workplaces have focused on issues of organizational efficiency and discrimination, and they have treated cultural identity as static, monolithic, and universally shared. This study aims to problematize this view. It is argued that our understanding of cultural workplace diversity could be extended through the integration of interpretive and critical interpersonal communication theorizing on cultural identity as dynamic and processual, constructed between and among people in everyday workplace interactions and in relation to larger social, political, and historical forces. This argument is illustrated by an analysis of in-depth interviews with 10 female Russian immigrants in Finland who performed interactionintense knowledge work. The women talked about their everyday workplace interactions and how they thought Russian identity mattered in them. These data were analyzed with the inductive method of interpretive description designed to provide a systematic description of the phenomenon delineating its characteristic themes and accounting for individual variations within it. The analysis led to the identification of four communication sites for distinct formations of Russian identity: expressing professionalism, managing initial encounters, facing stigma, and facilitating intercultural learning. The findings offer novel insights into social interaction in culturally diverse workplaces with implications for both employee well-being and organizational processes.

Показано, що у процесі взаємодії між владою та суспільством його вихідним моментом є легітимація влади в очах громадян. Зазначено, що демократичні процедури у плюралістичному суспільстві стають базисом легітимності влади. Зауважено, що центральним елементом демократичної легітимації влади та однією з найважливіших складових комунікації влади і суспільства є вибори. Вказано, що у ході електорального процесу численні групові та індивідуальні ідентичності, що існують у суспільстві, у певний спосіб артикулюють себе в публічному просторі, у відкритому та визначеному певними правилами суперництві з іншими. Зазначено, що така артикуляція стає однією з передумов для формування загальнонаціональної ідентичності громадян держави. Доведено, що спільна національна ідея/ідеологія та демократичні засади політичного співжиття є взаємопов’язаними чинниками, оскільки саме формування спільної ідентичності через діалог, через інтеграцію цінностей прав людини, політичних та громадянських свобод до цілої багатовимірної конструкції національної ідентичності може бути фактором консолідації суспільства.

Scanning for argument: the argument was relatively well signalled by the introduction and the headings. What is the main argument? The following has been divided into proposition and evidence supporting it. Many readers do not differentiate the two which is a major error and leads to confusion and misunderstanding. A proposition is a statement being put forward as a point

The article examines the role of legal norms and institutions in the formation of national identity, the influence of memory policy on legislation, cultural heritage and historical memory. Important in the formation of identity in our time is the new perception of historical facts from the point of view of their legal assessment and interpretation. The states of the post-Soviet space use legal instruments to influence the formation of selfidentification, setting a specific vector of development. Particular attention is paid to the analysis of the impact of the new Constitution of the Kyrgyz Republic and the approved development concepts on the formation of civil identity, as well as the historical and legal analysis associated with the 100th anniversary of the formation of the Kara-Kyrgyz Autonomous Region. The study presents a new look at the role of law in the preservation and transmission of historical memory, the formation of national identity in Kyrgyzstan.

The aim of this chapter is to develop the measurement of corporate legitimacy among Government-linked Companies (GLCs) in Malaysia. Corporate legitimacy is important for determining the survival of the corporation. The term of legitimacy can be classified into three different aspects, namely, political, economic, and social legitimacy. Political legitimacy indicates the right to govern and rule; economic legitimacy reflects on success through product selling, customers’ satisfaction, and providing better services and goods. However, in the corporate sectors, corporate social responsibility is used as a platform not only to gain economic legitimacy, but most importantly to achieve social legitimacy. Social legitimacy focuses on corporation as a societal institution that is more complex by combining the social norms, values, and expectation. With the above argument, this chapter explores how corporate social responsibility (or corporate responsibility) can be used to show societal acceptance reflecting their corporate legitimacy. The corporations are expected to be socially acceptable according to social norms, values, and beliefs. The growth of the corporation has faced a number of challenges in gaining and maintaining their existence. While the corporations are expected to deal with the challenges effectively, the corporations must also be relevant in the eyes of the stakeholders. To establish this, corporations emphasized on gaining and maintaining legitimacy through various mechanisms. The principles of legitimacy are related to the conformity to the norms, values, and expectation of their stakeholders’ engagement through corporate social activities. The study employed a cross-sectional sample survey designed to collect data from a pre-selected list of non-governmental organization (NGOs) obtained from the Registrar of Societies, Malaysia. From a list of about 22,000 societies, 377 were shortlisted covering five categories of societies: community welfare, education, sport, social and recreation, and business and trade union. This study measured three dimensions of corporate legitimacy comprising pragmatic, moral, and cognitive legitimacy. Using Partial Least Square-Structural Equation Modeling (PLS-SEM), this study found that there is a high level of corporate legitimacy from the perspective of NGOs, which indicated that the NGOs highly view the corporate legitimacy of Malaysian GLCs through their corporate responsibility activities.

The aftermath of the 2008 general election saw a series of upheavals occur in the Malaysian political landscape, not least of which was the emergence of a so-called “new politics.” Driven primarily by concerns over issues of public governance, this politics contained a set of interrelated questions involving changing notions of legitimate political authority. Although much has already been written about whether or not the post-2008 changes to Malaysia's socio-political terrain are genuine and enduring, I argue that many such analyses are too narrow in scope and fail to adequately recognise the complexity involved in such social realities. By distinguishing between the images and practices of the Malaysian state, this article aims to highlight the dynamic, contingent and contested nature of processes of legitimation. A detailed investigation of the consensus/dissensus surrounding Prime Minister Najib Razak's concept of 1Malaysia as the basis of a collective national identity reveals a more fundamental contestation occurring within contemporary Malaysian politics and society over the source(s) of political and moral legitimacy. While the opposition's challenge to Najib's administration remains formidable, of more pressing concern to Najib might be the objections arising from within his own party over the direction in which he is taking them. To define the present horizon of socio-political possibilities in Malaysia it is not enough, therefore, to simply explain how legitimation occurs; we must also be able to account for the way(s) in which it can occur.

Resumen:Se aborda el presente político y social marcado por un retroceso de políticas igualitarias y una normalización de la crueldad. Se destacan actos de represión y un tratamiento deshumanizante hacia sectores vulnerables, mostrando un cambio en los umbrales de tolerancia. Esta violencia no solo es física sino también simbólica, manifestada en el lenguaje que circula en medios y redes sociales, y que reduce el discurso a expresiones de dominación y jerarquía. El experimento anarco-capitalista que se impulsa en Argentina pretende desmontar estructuras estatales que protegen lo social, favoreciendo una lógica de mercado que prioriza el lucro sobre la vida y las condiciones dignas. En este contexto, se ataca a movimientos como el peronismo, el feminismo y los derechos humanos, tachándolos de “obstáculos” para la “libertad”. Estos movimientos, aunque esenciales para la justicia social, también presentan limitaciones y contradicciones internas, que deben revisarse para fortalecer las resistencias. Finalmente se insta a reconstruir lo común a partir de las “ruinas” del pasado, no como nostalgia, sino como cimientos para nuevas luchas y un compromiso ético, que apueste por un porvenir de justicia, cuidado y resistencia ante la crueldad sistémica.Palabras clave: Crueldad - Violencia simbólica - Refundación de lo común. SummaryThe political and social present is addressed, marked by a decline in egalitarian policies and a normalization of cruelty. Acts of repression and dehumanizing treatment of vulnerable sectors are highlighted, showing a change in the thresholds of tolerance. This violence is not only physical but also symbolic, manifested in the language that circulates in the media and social networks, and that reduces discourse to expressions of domination and hierarchy. The anarcho-capitalist experiment that is being promoted in Argentina aims to dismantle state structures that protect the social, favoring a market logic that prioritizes profit over life and decent conditions. In this context, movements such as Peronism, feminism and human rights are attacked, labeling them as “obstacles” to “freedom.” These movements, although essential for social justice, also present limitations and internal contradictions, which must be reviewed to strengthen resistance. Finally, there is a call to rebuild the common from the “ruins” of the past, not as nostalgia, but as foundations for new struggles and an ethical commitment, which bets on a future of justice, care and resistance to systemic cruelty.Key words: Cruelty - Symbolic violence - Refoundation of the common.

Violence

This thesis is about understanding the dynamics involved in the socialisation of international human rights norms. It examines the process within an analytical framework of transnational advocacy networks, the spiral model, in the context of China’s modernisation. Existing literature points to China’s economic power and potential political influence on the international arena and the Chinese state’s authoritarian regime domestically in explaining the limited achievements transnational advocacy networks have had in inducing human rights changes in China. This thesis responds with a novel perspective constructed in three steps by examining: 1) the relationship between China’s identity and political legitimacy since the beginning of China’s modernisation in the 1840s; 2) how China’s modernisation drive impacts the development of its domestic civil society; 3) the potential of human rights INGOs in inducing human rights changes with case studies of the Dui Hua Foundation and the Rights Practice. It is found that under this novel perspective, the Chinese state’s authority has been limited by rising social problems, which threaten the state’s political legitimacy to rule. Chinese civil society actors play an important role in producing solutions to these social problems, convincing the state to further relax its control. Human rights INGOs contribute to this relationship through strengthening Chinese civil society actors’ capacity in solving social problems and monitoring official institutions, while also informing government officials about reforms that could make domestic practices more compatible to international human rights norms. In this vein, despite the fact that international human rights norms have been altered by China’s power, they remain influential on China’s behaviour by the careful alignment of the human rights work of transnational advocacy networks to suit China’s interest to political legitimacy. This thesis confirms and strengthens the spiral model as a framework to understand the socialisation of international human rights norms. This thesis contributes to understanding the power of international human rights norms, i.e. the extent to which they influence the behaviour and practices of states, as well as the role of transnational advocacy networks in situations where human rights violations persist.

Vietnam's cross-border timber crackdown and the quest for state legitimacy