Activism Research Articles

The pandemic sovereign: how the war against the virus redefined sovereignty in Italy and Spain

ABSTRACT This article investigates the redefinition of state sovereignty during the COVID-19 pandemic, focusing on Italy and Spain as illustrative cases of what we term ‘pandemic sovereignty’. Drawing from Critical Military Studies and Critical Security Studies, we argue that the state-security-society nexus was fundamentally reshaped during this health emergency, marked by three interrelated pillars: (1) legitimizing use of warfare metaphors; (2) the militarization of pandemic responses; (3) the responsibilisation of society and societalisation of security. These pillars collectively enabled the state to extend its sovereign authority, normalizing exceptional measures and incorporating military and civilian actors into the governing of the public health emergency. While these dynamics have been observed globally, the Italian and Spanish cases reveal distinctive patterns rooted in their legal, political, and societal contexts. Our analysis underscores how these processes, rather than collateral byproducts of neoliberal governance, are deeply embedded within and reinforced by its rationalities. By conceptualizing ‘pandemic sovereignty’ in this way, this study wants to put forward a novel lens to understanding neoliberal sovereignty’s governance of security crises.

Voting with their dollars: partisan donations of United States emigrants

ABSTRACT Research about emigrant participation in origin-country politics most often studies voter turnout. But emigrants influence their origin countries’ politics in ever-increasing ways, including financial campaign donations. Who donates, and to whom, helps reveal distinctive phenomena in emigrant political behavior, shedding particular light on the relatively influential population with the resources and political interest to donate. This paper considers how and why overseas citizens may differ from their domestic counterparts in supporting candidates financially, arguing that donation trends can capture emigrants’ distinctive characteristics and parties’ international outreach strategies – in ways likely favoring some parties over others. Our original empirical research contribution examines campaign donations from emigrant nationals of the United States, a case with rich data available, where we argue that out-of-country donors are disproportionately, and increasingly, likely to favor the Democratic Party. Indeed, federal election reports from 1999 to 2018 show that emigrant donations are more Democratic than are domestic donors’, with the gap increasing recently. Further, this Democratic leaning holds within major emigrant occupational backgrounds, as well as world region of residence. Our contribution develops the study of electoral behaviors and political preferences of US emigrants within the broader contexts of political remittances, political transnational activities, and diaspora politics.

Youth and the pandemic: health information imaginaries and practices while navigating COVID-19 in Nigeria

This study explores young adults’ perceptions, behaviors, and how they navigated pandemic-related information, drawing from social cognitive theory. In the digital age, young people, characterized as “digital informavores,” actively seek, consume, and share information, playing a crucial role in health communication. The research, involving participants aged 18–30 in two urban centers in Nigeria, focused on COVID-19 socio-health concerns, including social distancing, masking, sanitizing, movement restrictions, vaccination, infection, testing, and treatment. The analysis, employing the social cognitive lens, and following a critical thematic approach, indicates that the degree of infodemic exposure experienced during the pandemic impacted participants’ understanding, attitudes, behaviors, and risk perceptions. Participants primarily relied on digital sources and social support systems for pandemic-related health information. Their self-efficacy and risk perceptions, as well as pandemic-induced affectations, were evident throughout the data. Attitudes toward the pandemic evolved from its onset, through the announcement and easing of the national lockdown, to the vaccination rollout. Dominant perceptions included the use of “copy and paste solutions” in Nigeria’s pandemic response, COVID-19 denialism, and politicization of the pandemic, leading to mistrust in government and health authorities. The pandemic’s impacts included mental health issues and economic hardship, particularly in a country lacking social security or welfare plans. Following a low vaccination rate among participants, the data revealed vaccine lethargy, “vaccinformation void,” vaccine misinformation, vaccine distrust, and vaccine inaccessibility, due to various reasons and factors at play. Some young adults adhered to health rules due to fear and anxiety, while others were nonchalant, overwhelmed by the rules or discouraged by others’ non-compliance. The young adults’ imaginaries and behaviors were influenced by sociocultural intermediaries, religious and political actors, and Nigeria’s socio-economic conditions.

The case of romantic relationships: analysis of the use of metaphorical frames with ‘traditional family’ and related terms in political Telegram posts in three countries and three languages

Abstract Language technology – starting from the handwriting in early ages of humanity and perfectionated in the age of social media and micro-targeting - is used to gain and maintain power, and to rebel against it. Social media such as Telegram provide a safe space for freedom fighters in authoritarian regimes but also offer a stage for extremist, aggressive and manipulative content. This work uses romantic relationships as an example topic. The article discusses how the language used shapes the interpretation of political reports based on literature. Further, this work analyses metaphorical frames around the concepts related to romantic relationships and family in influential news outlets from three countries in three languages. The analysis shows that conservative political actors use similar metaphorical frames for relationship-related concepts such as LGBT and ‘traditional family’, and with similar, manipulative purposes. The results suggest that anti-democratic discourses build on exploitation of social categories rendered subordinate to men in a similar way across conservative movements. However, changes in political leadership can facilitate societal changes towards more open and more democratic societies, but they can also change cultures and traditions to suit power interests.

Multilevel Analysis Applied in High-Impact Environments: Causes and Effects of Firm and Political Activities During the Pandemic in the Restaurant Sector

The COVID-19 pandemic has meant a serious risk to the economic viability of companies and the sustainability of employment in the restaurant sector, a high-impact activity for the economy and employment in Mexico and Spain. This paper analyzes the causes of the prolonged and intense damage to companies and employees via multilevel analysis techniques and a qualitative, inductive methodology drawing on multiple sources. Research propositions posit that the sectoral structure, management practices, and institutional actions during and after the pandemic are predictors of recovery or continued losses. The balanced result of these three levels of analysis, in a severe crisis situation, such as the global pandemic, reveals that the combination of low institutional protection at the macro level, a hostile industry structure at the meso level, and a focus solely on economic sustainability as the primary business objective resulted in widespread resignation and put survival at risk, particularly for smaller companies and entrepreneurs. Analysis of the firms’ and stakeholders’ actions also shed light on the inter-relations, such as the negative effect of macro general policies on a fragmented, asymmetric meso level. Inter-relations among customers and firms’ behavior gave insights that could increase resilience before general critical events. Finally, the balanced results recommend a simultaneous effort from firms and policy makers to make possible a profound change while addressing the sector’s shortcomings. Firms’ effort in managing key assets, such as human capital, to acquire the capacity for the flexibility, adaptability, and innovation essential for change and renewal, must be endorsed by institutional support and customer recognition of the contributions of this singular service and cultural industry.

Review Essay: Postanthropocentric Political Theories

At least since Aristotle defined human beings as “political animals,” politics in the Western tradition has largely been defined in anthropocentric terms. Politics was a realm of distinctively human endeavors, while nonhuman nature remained outside. Nature might impinge on or set limits to political action, but was conceived as constitutively outside of politics. However else nonhuman entities might engage with humans or each other, these relations or engagements were not understood as political. Until quite recently, Western political theory was decidedly anthropocentric. The rise of environmental problematics, and particularly the political salience of the global climate crisis, however, have made the idea of a constitutive separation between (nonhuman) nature and (human) politics less tenable. Not only the material manipulation of the nonhuman world, but also its conceptual framing, are increasingly understood as political projects.1 At the same time, Western political thought has become increasingly open to non-Western cosmologies that do not posit a rigid divide between human and non- (or more-than-) human worlds. Environmental (or green) political theory has become an increasingly robust subdiscipline,2 and political theory, like a number of other humanities disciplines, has undergone an “animal turn.”3 Three of the four recent books under consideration form part of this latter animal turn while Sharon Krause’s Eco-Emancipation is firmly situated in the field of environmental political theory.

Discourses of division during the cost-of-living crisis: digital popular culture responds to governmental actions

Abstract The global 2023 economic slowdown contributed to a cost-of-living crisis that has impacted the daily lives of many, it being a structural and ‘well-being emergency’. Governments respond differently, based in part on political orientation and election cycles. The UK Conservative government, accused of leaning on populist discourses, responded in part with its 2023 budget. This paper uses Multimodal Critical Discourse Studies to investigate how a music mash up shared widely on social media criticises the UK government’s response, digital popular culture being a vital form of political participation and activism today. I examine lexica, images and musical sounds to reveal how government actions are ‘recontextualised’, that is, transformed through deletions, rearrangements, substitutions, and additions. Analysis provides a lens into what issues and events are raised and how these are articulated through divisive discourses. It is through this close reading that I consider digital popular culture’s roles in society.

Subnationalization as a Megatrend: World Development after Westphalia

Introduction. The transformation of the world order has been one of the main topics of political research since the 1990s. Nevertheless, the dominant approaches are characterized by a certain one-dimensionality. In the scientific and expert discourse, predominant attention is paid to the prospects of forming a new configuration of great powers on the world stage, i.e. a new iteration of the world order based on the state-centered (Westphalian) paradigm. Meanwhile, in the last thirty to fifty years, in addition to a significant change in the world political actor lineup, the state itself has been undergoing profound structural changes, and other actors are also acquiring a new quality. And an important element of this institutional dynamics of states is associated with the processes of subnationalization, which can be understood as the strengthening of the political subjectivity of subnational regions and local communities. And this has not only domestic political, but also an in-creasingly tangible international political dimension. How does the subnational factor (subnationalization) affect the transformation of the world order and the problem of development?Materials and Methods. Data from different political-geographical areas and different spheres of subnational political activity are used. The range of case studies presented is intended to demonstrate the significance of the subnational factor in a wide variety of societies and diverse states. It is important to emphasize that subnationalization is not a Western phenomenon, as it is often inertially presented in academic discourse. Also, subnationalization is less and less tied to federalism as the most appropriate type of state structure. The theoretical and methodological basis of the study consists of the actor approach and the comparative method for comparing processes in different subnational regions. Elements of identity theory are also applied.Results of the study. Subnationalization is a phenomenon related, but not reducible to regionalization. It is related to the problem of global and country socio-political development. The crisis of numerous sustainable development programs generates alternative concepts, which are also influenced by the subnational factor.Discussion and conclusion. The author concludes that sub-nationalization is an independent phenomenon and trend that should be taken into account in the analysis of current processes and projecting scenarios of world development. At the same time, sub-nationalization correlates with the problem of development in a binary way, being both a resource and a tool. Both socio-political development of specific societies and world political evolution will increasingly rely on the subnational factor.

Exploring the political astuteness of registered nurses

Registered nurses (RNs) play critical roles in advocating for policies that impact patients and the profession, yet nursing’s voice is largely silent when it comes to shaping health policy. Despite efforts to increase nurses’ voice in health policy, the extent to which nursing expertise shapes health policy remains relatively unknown. The purpose of this study was to examine levels of political astuteness among registered nurses. A cross-sectional study of RNs (n = 212) was conducted using the Political Astuteness Inventory. Nurses in the sample voted (91%) at a higher rate than the general public (66.8%) in the 2020 federal election; however, levels of political activity beyond voting were minimal. Age and education were positively associated with political activity. Findings of this study indicate positive movement by nurses toward increased levels of political engagement, yet there is room for improvement in shaping health policy.

Dynamic Co-Clustering and Self-Sorting in Interactive Protocell Populations.

The design and implementation of collective actions in model protocell communities is an on-going challenge in synthetic protobiology. Herein, we covalently graft alginate or chitosan onto the outer surface of semipermeable enzyme-containing silica colloidosomes to produce hairy catalytic protocells with pH-switchable membrane surface charge. Binary populations of the enzymatically active protocells exhibit self-initiated stimulus-responsive changes in spatial organization such that the mixed community undergoes alternative modes of electrostatically induced self-sorting and reversible co-clustering. We demonstrate that co-clustering, but not self-sorting, mitigates signal attenuation in a binary community of enzyme-containing sender and receiver protocells due to increased proximity effects. The level of signal attenuation is correlated with a time-dependent pH-mediated switch in the spatial organization of the sender and receiver populations. Our results pave the way towards the development of programmable networks of adaptive life-like objects and could have implications for the development of interactive cytomimetic materials and agent-based robotics.

From Inclusion to Transformation: Politics & Gender as a Critical Actor for Intersectional Political Science

Abstract The popularization of intersectionality within political science, feminist scholarship, and activism has constituted nothing less than a paradigm shift (Hancock 2007a). Politics & Gender has been a critical actor in enabling change within our discipline. However, this development has been hard won and there remains much to be done to operationalize intersectionality in line with Black feminist theory, and to center women of color and other intersectionally marginalized groups within scholarship. This article both traces the evolution of intersectional approaches within Politics & Gender over two decades and articulates pathways for future gender and politics research which aims to employ intersectionality. We employ quantitative and qualitative analysis of articles’ foci on different inequality structures and categories, their methodological approaches, and how they employ the concept of intersectionality. Subsequently, we argue in favor of approaches which center rather than include diverse intersectionally marginalized groups, emphasize the normative commitments of Black feminist theory to transformative justice rather than liberal inclusion, analyze intersectional structures and institutions as well as individual experience and identity, treat the constitution of categories and groups as contextual and contingent, dare to address the dangers of “women” as a theoretical starting point, and challenge fundamental raced-gendered assumptions of liberal democracy.

The Everyday Commoning Practices in Urbanising Localities

Negotiating Rights to Inhabit Common Lands for Housing in Two Cities of South India This paper presents a framework for understanding the everyday political dynamics of commoning initiated by residents to secure their claims to ‘common land’ in urbanising localities. This paper puts forward the proposition that a spatialised approach would serve to reveal the extent to which unique socio-political and geographical factors exert an influence upon the dynamics of collective actions (commoning). It examines the experience of households in two squatter settlements on the outskirts of two South Indian cities: Villupuram, a medium-sized town in the state of Tamil Nadu, and Bangalore, a large metropolis in the state of Karnataka. It demonstrates how common land could serve as a foundation for the inclusion of poor communities within the city. The two cases presented in this paper reflect a trend observed in Indian cities since the mid-1990s, whereby rural common lands in urbanised localities, previously allocated to poor households for housing, have been targeted for more profitable development, eventually justified by environmental arguments. Consequently, those in poverty are compelled to compete with more powerful actors in order to assert their right to the common land they occupy for the purpose of housing. The two case studies demonstrate the capacity of such communities to unite and engage in practical political actions to regularise their settlements and dwellings. We describe their engagement with multiple government institutions across the rural and urban continuum and illustrate the influence of contextual factors, including geographical and temporal factors, in shaping the unique and diverse trajectories of commoning.

Временная перспектива личности как ресурс преодоления кризиса идентичности на различных этапах жизнеосуществления

<p style="text-align: justify;"><strong>Objective. </strong>Investigating the role of personality's time perspective in overcoming the identity crisis and determining its potential as a resource of personal growth at different stages of life realization. <br><strong>Background. </strong>The growth of identity crisis manifestations in modern conditions determines the necessity to search for new directions of psychological work on its prevention and effective resolution. The available theoretical data on the presence of interrelation between temporal and identification characteristics allows to consider the content features of personality's time perspective as a resource for overcoming the identity crisis. <br><strong>Study design. </strong>A set of diagnostic techniques aimed at studying the features of a personality's time perspective and the specifics of the manifestations of experiencing identity crises allowed us to collect data on samples formed in accordance with age periods. The primary data were subjected to a comparative analysis of the average values for the studied characteristics and a comparison of the features of the correlation relationships between the indicators of the time perspective and the identity crisis. Later, using the regression analysis of the analysis, the assumption was confirmed about the influence of time perspective indicators on the level of experiencing an identity crisis in the selected age groups. Also, using regression analysis, the hypothesis was tested that the variability of the time perspective in different age groups is conditioned by indicators of stress in crisis areas of life realization. <br><strong>Participants. </strong>The study involved 139 people aged 16 to 55 years. The total sample was divided into groups according to age periods: older adolescence (15-17 years, 38 people), adolescence (18-22 years, 47 people), early adulthood (23-29 years, 26 people), maturity/late adulthood (30-55 years, 28 people). All groups were equalized by gender. <br><strong>Measurements. </strong>Zimbardo's ZTPI time perspective methodology (modified by A. Syrtsova, E.T. Sokolova, O.V. Mitina); “Crisis Identity Questionnaire” by N.V. Dmitrieva and N.A. Samoilik; questionnaire of crisis events and experiences by V.R. Manukyan; methodology for the study of professional identity and personal identity by L.B. Schneider. The methods of statistical analysis (correlation analysis, Mann-Whitney U Test, Kruskal–Wallis test, regression analysis) were used in the processing of the obtained data. <br><strong>Results. </strong>Belief in a just world increases political trust; belief in a dangerous world reduces it. Political trust positively predicts readiness to participate in various forms of normative political activity. The presence of cross-cultural differences in the characteristics of the model between the Russian and Ukrainian samples is established. <br><strong>Conclusions. </strong>Content characteristics of the personality's time perspective are an important potential resource for overcoming the identity crisis. It has selective significance at different stages of life realization determining the age-specific features of a possible “therapeutic target” within the framework of psychological influence.</p>

Blocking Oil Development in Yasuní National Park: Ecuador’s Unprecedented Strides Towards Environmental Justice

This paper explores Ecuador's proposal to protect Block 43 of the Yasuní National Park from oil drilling through the Yasuní-ITT Initiative proposed in 2007. The paper will examine why the initiative failed and how community activists responded. Ultimately, it will argue that the Yasuní-ITT Initiative upheld environmental justice through its assertion of a moral economy and its potential to help Ecuador step away from oil dependency and protect the rights of Indigenous communities, particularly the two tribes living in voluntary isolation in the Yasuní region. When the initiative was terminated and Indigenous communities were not consulted in the decision to begin drilling for heavy crude oil, citizen activism and mobilization of democracy through a referendum reasserted environmental justice and Indigenous rights.

Assessing the Implementation of ARPA Coronavirus State and Local Fiscal Recovery Funds: The View from City Officials

Abstract The 2021 American Rescue Plan Act created the Coronavirus State and Local Fiscal Recovery Funds (SLFRF), which provided $350 billion for state and local governments to aid with pandemic recovery efforts. This research examines the local implementation of SLFRF from the point of view of city officials. We assess the effectiveness of grant implementation on two dimensions: funding allocation (the ease or difficulty of selecting and prioritizing projects to be funded) and project management (the ability to complete projects on time and within budget). Our research focuses on the contributions of three general groups of factors on grant implementation performance: federal control and oversight, local capacities, and the role of local political actors. We conducted a national survey of cities that received SLFRF grants and gathered information from city officials responsible for administering the grant on different aspects of SLFRF implementation. Using ordinary least squares and ordered logit regressions to analyze the survey data, the empirical results uncover some consistent patterns. Specifically, local management discretion, perceived clarity of federal rules, a centralized local grant administration structure, and mayoral involvement are positively associated with grant implementation effectiveness.

From home to community: The role of parenting and religious identity in Muslim American emerging adults' civic engagement.

This study expanded on the existing literature by examining the unique associations between maternal religious socialization, as a form of cultural socialization, along with civic socialization practices, and Muslim American emerging adults' civic engagement. In addition, the mediating role of Muslim American emerging adults' religious identity in the association between maternal socialization practices and their civic attitudes and behaviors were assessed. Participants included 329 self-identified Muslim American emerging adults (Mage = 21.4, SDage = 1.9, 63% female). Path analysis results revealed indirect associations between maternal religious socialization and civic behaviors through religious identity private regard and a direct link between maternal civic socialization and civic attitudes. Thus, Muslim American emerging adults whose mothers engaged in transmitting their heritage values, beliefs, and virtues reported a greater sense of pride about their religious group and subsequent higher engagement in informal helping and lower engagement in political actions. Additionally, discussions about social and political issues with their mothers directly fostered Muslim American emerging adults' civic responsibility. Our findings revealed specificity in how civic engagement can be promoted and provided insights into efforts to build civic capacity for minoritized emerging adults.

Canadian Medical Assistance in Dying: Provider Concentration, Policy Capture, and Need for Reform

Canada’s rapid rise in deaths from euthanasia and physician assisted suicide, termed Medical Assistance in Dying (MAID) in the country, now ranks it second only to the Netherlands in terms of MAiD deaths as percentage of overall deaths, with one province already hosting the highest rate of all jurisdictions in the world. Analyzing Health Canada’s annual MAID reports, which show that up to 336 out of 1837 providers are likely responsible for the majority of MAID deaths in a given year, we discuss how the rapid increase likely reflects not a broad Canadian consensus but the capture of a policy-making and implementation process by a small group of activists and clinicians colonizing medicine to become an ideologically driven vehicle for expanding MAID access and delivery. As a remedy and to reprioritize patient safety and protection against premature death, a more transparent, relevant, and safeguarded compliance regime based on evidence-based, multi-perspective policy-making is needed.

The Role of Political Actors in Realizing Sustainable European Energy Markets: Insights From the Trinational Upper Rhine Region

The Role of Political Actors in Realizing Sustainable European Energy Markets: Insights From the Trinational Upper Rhine Region

African feminist interpretations of political actions, practices and policies: Zimbabwe’s Bustop TV

ABSTRACT This paper focuses on Bustop TV, a Zimbabwean media house that participates in digital activism and shares on social media video skits featuring two women in leading roles. It explores how Bustop TV relies on some of the basic tenets of African feminisms, including women’s collective action, solidarity, agency, and an emphasis on African women’s specific social, cultural and political contexts. Additionally, the paper examines how Bustop TV navigates the complex relationship between local and international agendas, especially since the media house receives international funding, often linked to the “NGO-ization” phenomenon and the potential alienation of local audiences. The paper combines a cultural approach and an African feminist perspective to analyse three video skits selected from Bustop TV’s over 1350 videos. These three videos were purposively selected because they represent videos produced by Bustop TV to critique or comment on significant political events and processes. The paper argues that Bustop TV underscores Zimbabwean women’s agency in political participation by framing their everyday experiences as taking place in spaces of resistance and contestation. In these spaces, men and women interact with each other and their society’s structural conditions as agents in pursuit of their socio-economic and political interests.

System justification and the American alt-right

ABSTRACT While a non-trivial number of Americans identify with the political positions and preferences often associated with the “alternative right” (alt-right) movement, scholarly debate exists concerning adherents’ core beliefs and their potential for supporting violent mobilization. In this paper, we examine supporters of the movement in greater detail. We argue that contrary to its name, the alt-right, from the perspective of the individual supporter of the movement, is not perceived as an alternative to conventional conservatism, but rather the rightful heir to political power. Using data from two original, national surveys of Americans, fielded in June 2020 (N = 2563) and January 2022 (N = 2223), we identify the common psychological orientation underpinning alt-right identity. We find strong support for our core hypothesis that system-justifying individuals – those with a psychological orientation to legitimate and defend the status quo – are significantly more likely to identify with the alt-right. Moreover, the alt-right’s system-justifying ideology is used to legitimate their use of political coercion while delegitimizing political collective action on the left.