Private Agenda Research Articles

Resilience and future heritage – the central market area of Thessaloniki; Hersus project’s 3rd International Design Workshop

Culture has recently been acknowledged as the fourth pillar of sustainability, next to Environment, Economy and Society. Built heritage preservation is considered crucial for sustainable urban development and resilience. The Erasmus+ supported Hersus project brings together five academic institutions across Europe to explore the potential for enhancing cultural heritage awareness and sustainable development of the built environment. The 3rd international student workshop, which took place in Thessaloniki in October 2022, within the project’s framework, explored the resilient and sustainable preservation of built heritage in Thessaloniki’s historic centre, focusing on the traditional central market area which constitutes an exemplary continuation of use in the diachrony of the city. Hebrard’s plan, envisioned the future built heritage that the workshop dealt with; shaped by the pressures of private and public economic agendas, the original plan has evolved, after gradual transformations of the area, in the shape of two superblocks – off the main Aristotelous Axis, delineated on their periphery by large building blocks while maintaining an internal reference to a human scale, whereby the perceived foreground is dominated by listed single or two-storey volumes and narrow pedestrianized passageways. The reality of occupancy in the greater area, shaped by economic, political and societal stress during the last 20 years, is gradually evolving into a mixed use paradigm whereby restaurants coexist with creative spaces, butchers, grocers, retail and craftsmen who co-create the variable, rich and colourful sensescape of the area. Most building stock is in need of restoration but has nonetheless been in constant use. The workshop views the area as a useful resource in achieving social, economic, cultural and environmental sustainability and resilience for the city. The case study employs sustainability and resilience indicators to evaluate recent major interventions in the area, and emerging bottom-up approaches, cultural events and actions aiming to regenerate the area.

Old Wine in a New Bottle

Resistance to neoliberal legal reforms has increased globally in recent decades due to the failure of water privatization to ensure affordable and sustainable water access in the global South. Referring to the 2004 and 2019 Water Resources Laws, this paper explores how, in the case of Indonesia, the law reproduces and normalizes neoliberal ideologies that frame water as an economic commodity. We argue that Indonesia's current legal regime governing water resources is based on populist rhetoric of fulfilling the human right to water through state management. However, the adopted water governance regime aims to facilitate the establishment of a climate conducive to private sector investment by shifting responsibility for the fulfillment of the human right to water from the state to a market-based allocation system. This paper examines the strategy adopted by the government in securing the water privatization agenda when dealing with judicial activism that requires water to be managed as a public good.

Private agendas and the public good: The contested development of high-speed passenger rail transport in the United States

During the 1960s, the United States Department of Commerce (and later the Department of Transportation) cooperated with the Pennsylvania Railroad (later, Penn Central) to develop the Metroliner, an American version of the Japanese Shinkansen. Federal officials possessed overtly political motives, including an effort to build political support for the Democratic Party in the heavily urbanized Northeast. Railroad executives sought federal subsidies for conventional rail passenger service, while building political support for the largest merger in American history. The conflicting agendas precluded the development of high-speed surface transportation in the United States.

Designing communication hierarchies

This paper studies the design of communication hierarchies in a setup with a principal and multiple agents with private agendas. The agents observe unverifiable binary signals relevant to the principal's choice and the principal is uninformed. The principal can only decide who reports to whom and in which order. We show that a two-layer hierarchy where all agents report directly to the principal is dominated by hierarchies with a larger number of layers. We characterize conditions for the choice of a three-layer hierarchy with a single intermediator, and for the choice of a three-layer hierarchy with two intermediators where the agents are separated according to their preferences.

The British Gas Fire

22 | International Union Rights | 28/2 FOCUS | A CHANGING POST-PANDEMIC WORLD FOR LABOUR The winter of 2020/21 was a dark one for many, but in the middle of it a fire was lit. Rather, 10,000 small flames, which made up the individual picket lines of striking members of GMB Union employed by British Gas. This marked the largest dispute seen in the UK during COVID, & the largest to hit the gas industry since the 1970’s. The story of British Gas, serves as an example of an underlying current in the industrial trajectory of the United Kingdom. British Gas was one of the jewels in the crown of Margaret Thatcher’s privatisation agenda. Fast forward to more recent times and the top brass of Centrica (the private company that has retained the British Gas brand) have managed to turn a company previously worth billions into a billion pound loss. While the business was busy continuing to lose money and making deeper and deeper cuts you might expect the unions on the ground to be busy resisting. That was sadly not the case, and the issues that came to the fore during the gas strike of 20/21 have their roots here. In 2016 British Gas also announced it would be closing a call centre and office in Oldbury (West Midlands), with a loss of approximately 680 jobs. The unions recognised by British Gas chose not to fight the closure. Roughly the same time as the call centre staff were facing a tidal wave of cuts, the employer made a move on the pensions of the gas engineers. The GMB approached this move by the employer through attempting to negotiate a settlement, which the senior GMB reps at British Gas then recommended to the membership. The union was forced to do an aboutface when the grassroots members of the GMB not only shot down the negotiated offer the union presented to them; but began to self-organise in their anger at the union structure which had found itself so far removed from where they the members stood. In the end the GMB managed to avoid a mass exodus through the combination of a change in the top of the union bureaucracy and a quick renegotiation of the previous offer with a slight enhancement that was reluctantly voted through. Why is understanding the backdrop so important? It matters, because while the scandal of privatisation, offshoring of jobs and cuts has been the narrative of many once great companies/institutions such as British Gas; the way the union reacted, by cultivating a serving culture rather than an organising culture-where maintaining a good relationship with the employer was prioritised over ensuring a defence of the union members interests, is also the narrative behind the continued decline of British trade unionism. The pensions dispute was the canary in the mine of the GMB’s structure within British Gas. If you could pinpoint a key moment when the eventual outcome of what happened with the British Gas strike in 20/21 could have been averted, it would have been an intervention following its failings during the pensions dispute. The saga over the pensions dispute was a clear indication that the union was out of sync with the membership. Where the union failed to learn this lesson, the employer didn’t. The lesson the employer took from the pensions dispute was that the union structure was out of touch with the membership and therefore on the one hand too weak to get a negotiated offer through the membership, and on the other too weak to fight the company off. The mistake the employer did make was in thinking that they, the company, were in touch with the workforce. Fire and rehire is nothing new to the industrial landscape in the UK, however its use has become both more prevalent and more high profile in the wake of Covid as a fast-track way for scurrilous employers to strongarm their workers into submission. Fire & Rehire is the process by which an employer can legally dismiss and re-engage its workforce en mass if it can argue (against a low threshold of proof) that contractual changes...

FREEDOM OF SPEECH AND THE PANDEMIC

Freedom of speech has always been debated as critical. A lot of people misconceived them as total rights which permits them to exercise them without limitations. Many have exceeded the limit by expressing themselves inappropriately. Freedom of speech is important to maintain human dignity. But some quarters have misunderstood it so much so that this right has been distorted and deformed to suit some private agenda. There has been prosecution made under the anti-fake news law relating to the dissemination of Covid 19 news to instil panic in the people. This paper is important as it provides some insights on how laws are made to restrict freedom and how such rights should be exercised with responsibility and accountability to bring about overall peace and harmony.

The Role of Government Ownership in the Capital Structure of State-Owned Enterprises

Using a sample of 340 privatized firms from 51 countries, I examine their capital structure after privatization and analyze the capital structure determinants of privatized firms. The results indicate that privatized firms have a target leverage ratio and it is independent of the remaining government ownership. The leverage choice of privatized firms is affected by a high level of information asymmetry and government’s future privatization agenda. In general, my study confirms the argument that privatized firms are unique and need to be separated from the sample of large firms when conducting international capital structure studies.

Adorno and climate science denial: Lies that sound like truth

Climate science denial is serious. It facilitates political procrastination and brings us ever closer to a world beset by growing food insecurity, heatwaves, floods, storms, fires and extensive losses to biodiversity. Numerous studies have unmasked the private agendas and corporate links behind organized denial, yet the question of how deniers find traction with democratic publics has received comparatively little attention. Empirical surveys demonstrate a connection between people who are susceptible to the contrarian voices of denial and those inclined towards right-wing authoritarianism. In this essay, I bring Adorno’s mid-20th-century studies of right-wing authoritarian tendencies in American democracy to bear upon climate science denial. Adorno directs us away from a sole focus on how deniers manufacture doubt so as to give the impression that the science is not settled. He examines the ways that agitators not only spread misinformation but also foster emotional connections with people who seem to want to be conned. I locate organized denial within a strain of cultural life that Adorno describes as unserious. In late 1940s America, Adorno discerned a new shape of political subjectivity, which has become highly resonant today: a formally free individual who takes pleasure in lies that sound like truth.

Convergence of public and private agendas in the shaping of the early modern Hispanic Monarchy: an economic-based approach

Este artículo revisa el proceso de la construcción del estado en la monarquía hispánica a mediados del siglo xvi a través del análisis de las relaciones en grandes financieros genoveses y emprendedores privados castellanos en el mercado internacional de lana. El artículo defiende que estos dos grupos sociales participaron en la construcción del Estado porque jugaron un papel decisivo en su formación tras la primera consolidación de deudade Felipe II en 1557. Los resultados de esta investigación demuestran que actores no estatales organizados como instituciones informales podían participar mejor en el proceso de construcción estatal que instituciones formales en grandes sistemas gubernativos. Este trabajo complementa así a la literatura reciente sobre la descentralización de poder efectivo en estados de la era moderna temprana.

Inter-business association and its effect on local economic development

The micro, small and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs) are exposed to a several situations external to their main activities, for that reason MSMEs are forced to develop new strategies that allow them to continue in the business, even in the adversity. In addition, the business association has become a relevant issue in the public and private agenda, because this is a way for the MSMEs to increase their competitiveness and achieve specific objectives, which if done individually it would be a slower process and with less impact for the local economic development. With this background, the objective of this research is to determinate if in Tepic City, Nayarit, the inter-business associations serve or can serve as a strategy for boost the economic development of the area. A semi-structured interview was conducted with two established inter-business associations: Association of Automobile Distributors of Nayarit, and Tepic Hotels and Motels Association. The main result is that the currently established business associations have as main motivation to have power of decision in the sector, moreover to have representation in front of government policies, without forgetting the join structure which has allowed them to improve their quality and training.

Does labour matter in reforms? Indications from Ghana’s environmental sanitation policy

Recent policy debates point to public service privatisation as a solution to the problems of state indebtedness, non-performance, and inefciency of the public sector. This privatisation agenda has raised concerns about the implications for jobs and working conditions. In developing countries like Ghana, where markets are weak or exhibit signs of failure, state policy becomes a vital avenue for securing decent working conditions for workers. Using an appraisal of Ghana’s Environmental Sanitation Policy and through the lens of institutional theory, the paper argues that the extent to which employment rights are framed, even at the policy stage, signals how labour rights will be impacted within privatised employment spaces. The analysis shows that the environmental sanitation policy ignores the interests of labour. The paper, therefore, recommends the need for inputs of labour market institutions such as trade unions at the policy stage. This is because trade unions remain the most credible source of response to the unrestrained exploitative tendencies of capital at the expense of labour.

The cicada announces the fire of the Brazilian public school: Analysis of the era of privatizing guidelines

This text seeks to analyze the privatization guidelines both globally and at the local level and their deployment in public basic education in Brazil. For that, a bibliographic and documentary study was used, using only public domain. It is possible to diagnose the double movement of endo and exoprivatization carried out in the educational panorama of Brazil, especially through the insertion of large business groups, as well as the reforms undertaken to put into operation the privatization agenda of public basic education. It is observed that the insertion of the private sector into the spaces of human formation reverberate metamorphoses, including that of the social function of the school institution, since it incorporates a link with the business and financial logic and, consequently, will facilitate a loss of the public sense of education as a social right.

Education governance and privatization in Portugal: Media coverage on public and private education

This paper aims to discuss recent changes in Portugal’s education policy. Portugal offers an interesting scenario to study the different ways the economic crisis has brought new opportunities to strengthen the privatization agenda. We specifically focus on media coverage and the contractualization of education services with private schools through ‘association contracts’. In the 1980s the Portuguese State through these contracts financed private schools to operate in areas where the public offering was insufficient, thereby ensuring the public access to education and preventing marginalization. Nowadays, however, these contracts are seen as an ideological banner both for and against education privatization. We present an empirical study based on documental analysis of 180 news articles published in the Portuguese media on the changes in the contractualization of education services. The results show two main audiences sustaining distinct societal projects, comprised of a variety of actors, who are either for or against ‘association contracts’. The actors justify their positions based on their understanding of the State’s role in providing education, the policies involving the right to education and decreasing inequalities.

Inevitable future: space colonization beyond Earth with microbes first.

ABSTRACTBased on modern microbiology, we propose a major revision in current space exploration philosophy and planetary protection policy, especially regarding microorganisms in space. Mainly, microbial introduction should not be considered accidental but inevitable. We hypothesize the near impossibility of exploring new planets without carrying and/or delivering any microbial travelers. In addition, although we highlight the importance of controlling and tracking such contaminations—to explore the existence of extraterrestrial microorganisms—we also believe that we must discuss the role of microbes as primary colonists and assets, rather than serendipitous accidents, for future plans of extraterrestrial colonization. This paradigm shift stems partly from the overwhelming evidence of microorganisms’ diverse roles in sustaining life on Earth, such as symbioses and ecosystem services (decomposition, atmosphere effects, nitrogen fixation, etc.). Therefore, we propose a framework for new discussion based on the scientific implications of future colonization and terraforming: (i) focus on methods to track and avoid accidental delivery of Earth's harmful microorganisms and genes to extraterrestrial areas; (ii) begin a rigorous program to develop and explore ‘Proactive Inoculation Protocols’. We outline a rationale and solicit feedback to drive a public and private research agenda that optimizes diverse organisms for potential space colonization.

Converting to Privatization: A Discourse Analysis of Dyslexia Policy Narratives

In this study, I analyze written testimony submitted to the state legislature regarding Connecticut’s 2014 Act Concerning Dyslexia and Special Education (PA-14-39), in order to engage with the discourse and rhetoric occasioned by the policy-making process and investigate the phenomenon of dyslexia in contemporary education policy. Drawing on critical discursive psychology, positioning theory, and narrative policy analysis, I examine how dyslexia advocacy discourse forms a cohesive, compelling policy narrative. I argue that this narrative can be understood as a conversion narrative, which drives a privatization agenda in which public schools become mandated consumers for a growing dyslexia industry, and in which the nature of instruction for students with reading difficulties is narrowly prescribed.

Divide and Co-Opt: Private Agendas, Tribal Groups, and Militia Formation in Counterinsurgency Wars

Recent research suggests that civilian defense forces (CDFs) – a distinct type of pro-government militia – can help states suppress insurgent movements. Considering the potential benefits, it is understandable why governments would want to use them. However, viewed from the perspective of civilian recruits, militia duty is a perilous side job that pays very little. So, why do civilians sign up to serve in them? This paper argues that civilian private agendas play a major role in facilitating the recruitment of CDFs. Because private agendas are difficult to observe directly, I examine their impact indirectly by identifying tribal groups as a population segment with particularly strong private incentives stemming from intertribal feuds and the concomitant desire to gain an upper hand relative to local rivals. The argument is tested on a novel province-level data set of CDF deployments in Turkey and the Philippines. Statistical analyses of these data show that states recruit over 50 percent more CDFs in regions with even modest tribal presence than in comparable areas without any tribal populations. These findings suggest that private agendas play a significant role in motivating militia recruitment. Private agendas thus help governments to combat macro-level insurgent movements by exploiting micro-level social tensions. The research also sheds light on the makeup of recruits and points to intensification of civilian disputes as likely ramification of CDF deployment in counterinsurgency campaigns.

The Non-Profit Industrial Complex's Role in Imposing Neoliberalism on Public Education

Essay explores the Non-Profit Industrial Complex’s (NPIC) substantive role in imposing neoliberalism on public education. Using the experiences in Los Angeles specifically, it looks at the connections between foundations and 501(c)3s that share and advance an agenda of deregulation, austerity, and privatization. Additionally, the essay examines to how privately managed charter schools aren't just part of the NPIC, but are the primary weapon in the push for privatization. Lastly, the paper looks at the pushback from communities, and some alternatives to the NPIC with movements like the demands for ethnic studies, that are genuinely grassroots, in contradistinction to the NPIC.

The political economy of women’s entrepreneurship initiatives in Pakistan: reflections on gender, class, and “development”

This article presents a critical feminist political economy of women’s entrepreneurship promotion in Pakistan. Women’s entrepreneurship is the new development mantra that has captured the imagination of global institutions, policymakers, business organizations, and academia alike. We argue in this article that this focus on entrepreneurship should be located, on one hand, within the gendered political economy of Pakistan, and on the other hand, as part of the broader project of transnational business feminism, which works to frame gender equality as “smart economics” and as compatible with the neoliberal agenda of privatization, deregulation, and financialization. Drawing on primary research conducted on a women’s entrepreneurship training program in Pakistan, this article goes on to evidence how one such program is designed and delivered and critically interrogates the impacts of this program on those it is supposed to empower. The findings of our research point to tensions between the global discourses that explicitly inform projects like the one we study and the implementation of programs in specific local contexts, troubling the assertion that there is a smooth equation between entrepreneurship, economic growth, and women’s empowerment.

The increasing role of non-State actors in education policy-making. Evidence from Uruguay

ABSTRACT Over the last decades privatization policies have taken centre stage in many processes of educational reform globally. In Latin America, these policies have played an important role since the 1990s leading to an increasing participation of private agents in educational provision. The case of Uruguay stands out for having remained somehow apart from this privatization agenda. More recently, however, research has identified a significant shift in the discursive order especially driven by a series of new actors including think tanks and civil society organizations favourable to different forms of privatization. Building on case study methods and informed by a cultural political economy (CPE) approach this paper addresses two purposes. First, it attempts to explore possible explanations for the scarce development of the private sector in Uruguayan education. Second, it aims to characterize the discourses and strategies increasingly used by different actors to frame and promote policy ideas potentially leading to privatization policies. The study shows how a small but influential number of actors have become involved in the process of promoting ideas that seek to influence policymaking. Findings reveal how these actors frame school autonomy and accountability as policy solutions by means of different strategies of networking and knowledge mobilization.

The perspectives of politicians on tobacco control in Turkey.

BackgroundTobacco use is a leading but preventable cause of non-communicable diseases and premature death. The legislature has a key role in setting tobacco control policies. Smoking trends are decreasing thanks to the introduction of effective tobacco control policies in Turkey and these policies may have been shaped by how politicians’ interpreted social problems that were prominent during the development and implementation of tobacco regulations.AimThis paper explores the long-term national relationship between tobacco consumption, tobacco control policies and the associated political discourse in Turkey, considering the varying influences through national leadership on this important public health agenda. This relationship is studied by comparing a time series analysis of tobacco consumption trends with a policy analysis of the minutes of deliberations at the Grand National Assembly of Turkey (GNAT).MethodsThis study uses Bayesian time series analysis in order investigate whether the tobacco control policies and related activities influenced the annual per adult cigarette consumption in Turkey. We used a novel method to identify change points in tobacco trends and whether they correspond with key policy changes intended to alter usage after adjusting for the effect of other non-policy related covariates, such as the purchasing power. The policy analysis included an examination of the minutes of deliberations at the GNAT—which is the Turkish parliament and unicameral Turkish legislature—1 year before and 1 year after the break years associated with an increase or decrease in tobacco consumption.Results and recommendationsTobacco consumption increased with the encouragement of tobacco production and the entrance of multinational companies in the country in 1976 and 1993, respectively. The National Tobacco Law of 1996 and comprehensive amendments in 2008, including smoke-free public places and tax increases, appear to have helped reduce tobacco consumption in Turkey. The focus of Parliamentary discussions throughout this period changed, becoming less supportive of tobacco over time. However, throughout the period there remained discussions focussing on concerns around the implications for the economy and the privatization agenda, national agriculture and the welfare of farmers. Effective control appears to require certain political ingredients to be implemented: politicians who are well informed on tobacco control measures and understand the range of issues surrounding the policies (not only those directly health-related); and supportive public health information in the community. Evidence-based public health policy should be introduced to the politicians.