Liberal Orientation Research Articles

Resisting politics of male control and gender-based violence in the Borana girls’ song

This paper interrogates the songs of girls that contest this marginalised position by questioning the authorities of parents, brothers, husbands and mothers-in-law. It documents, analyses and teases out the meaning of these oral songs within a theoretical framework of feminist orientation. The girls’ song was collected from Sololo Division, Moyale District. The Borana songs by girls were collected in situ. The paper also drew the library research for purposes of theoretical grounding, literature review and profundity in data analysis and interpretation. A focused group discussion was also held with some informants who demonstrated their knowledge of these songs and the culture of the Borana community in general. Finally, the collected data were analysed for their contents. These were texts of the songs, field notes for the critical responses from the audience in the form of condemnation or commendation, and cultural contexts of the performances. Singers who invoke alternative viewpoints contest the very instruments of power such as culture, tradition, religion, age and gender used by patriarchy to legitimise its practice of marginalisation of and control over girls. As a result, a fresh dimension of social transformation emerges. The paper argues that the girls have a collective desire to be part of the Borana community without being subjected to gender-based discrimination. It concludes that the songs are used as sites of contestation that invoice the rejection of these discriminations and reaffirm their belongingness to mainstream society.

U.S. state policy contexts and mortality of working-age adults.

The rise in working-age mortality rates in the United States in recent decades largely reflects stalled declines in cardiovascular disease (CVD) mortality alongside rising mortality from alcohol-induced causes, suicide, and drug poisoning; and it has been especially severe in some U.S. states. Building on recent work, this study examined whether U.S. state policy contexts may be a central explanation. We modeled the associations between working-age mortality rates and state policies during 1999 to 2019. We used annual data from the 1999–2019 National Vital Statistics System to calculate state-level age-adjusted mortality rates for deaths from all causes and from CVD, alcohol-induced causes, suicide, and drug poisoning among adults ages 25–64 years. We merged that data with annual state-level data on eight policy domains, such as labor and taxes, where each domain was scored on a 0–1 conservative-to-liberal continuum. Results show that the policy domains were associated with working-age mortality. More conservative marijuana policies and more liberal policies on the environment, gun safety, labor, economic taxes, and tobacco taxes in a state were associated with lower mortality in that state. Especially strong associations were observed between certain domains and specific causes of death: between the gun safety domain and suicide mortality among men, between the labor domain and alcohol-induced mortality, and between both the economic tax and tobacco tax domains and CVD mortality. Simulations indicate that changing all policy domains in all states to a fully liberal orientation might have saved 171,030 lives in 2019, while changing them to a fully conservative orientation might have cost 217,635 lives.

Tko podržava uvođenje poreza na nekretnine u Hrvatskoj?

This article analyses public support for a property tax in Croatia. Who supports this tax and who opposes it? The analysis uses public opinion polls conducted by the Faculty of Political Science in 2016 and 2020. This makes it possible to compare the structure of public opinion before and after the large public debate from 2017 which resulted in a postponement of the tax. The article relies on previous work that showed a link between party identification and support for property taxation and extends this analysis with new data. The article shows that this link still existed in 2016 but that it disappeared in 2020. The article also examines the nature of citizens' economic views and asks if a new liberal orientation arose in the structure of public opinion in Croatia, following the debate on the property tax. The analysis suggests that moderately left-wing opinions still prevail in Croatia, but following the turbulent public discussion of the property tax, new combinations of economic views appear in which liberal and interventionist views intermingle.

Do Pure Liberals Both Endorse Immigration and Reject Muslims? Examining the Inconsistency Hypothesis

Some people have consistently positive attitudes toward ethnic minority members in every respect. Sniderman and Hagendoorn (2007) characterize these individuals as “pure liberals.” Because of limited empirical evidence on the characteristics of this category of majority members, the consistency thesis, claiming that pure liberals have no negative reactions toward Muslims, remains contentious. Accordingly, we introduce a new idea – the inconsistency hypothesis – claiming that pure liberals’ commitment to greater ethnic diversity may not convert into unprejudiced reactions toward Muslim minority members. To test our inconsistency hypothesis, we fielded a survey in 2018 that also included a so-called list experiment among 716 Danish university students. The list experiment was designed to measure prejudice toward Muslims. Our analyses of the survey’s observational data revealed that pure liberals supported the general idea of greater diversity and remained positive toward ethnic minorities. However, and unlike previous research, the list experiment showed that around 34 percent of pure liberals in the survey were prejudiced toward Muslims. When we combine the observational and experimental evidence, it appears that many pure liberals had inconsistent attitudes: around a third of pure liberals combined support for the general idea of a multiethnic society with prejudice toward Muslims. Our inconsistency hypothesis contributes to literatures on liberal orientations and prejudice toward Muslims: Many liberals are not liberals, and prejudice is surprisingly powerful. The conclusion emphasizes the role of self-interest and distinct values as drivers of prejudice among the strongest advocates of a multiethnic society.

Taking a critical look at the critical turn in data science: From “data feminism” to transnational feminist data science

Through a critical analysis of recent developments in the theory and practice of data science, including nascent feminist approaches to data collection and analysis, this commentary aims to signal the need for a transnational feminist orientation towards data science. I argue that while much needed in the context of persistent algorithmic oppression, a Western feminist lens limits the scope of problems, and thus—solutions, critical data scholars, and scientists can consider. A resolutely transnational feminist approach on the other hand, can provide data theorists and practitioners with the hermeneutic tools necessary to identify and disrupt instances of injustice in a more inclusive and comprehensive manner. A transnational feminist orientation to data science can pay particular attention to the communities rendered most vulnerable by algorithmic oppression, such as women of color and populations in non-Western countries. I present five ways in which transnational feminism can be leveraged as an intervention into the current data science canon.

Inter-imperiality: Vying Empires, Gendered Labor, and the Literary Arts of Alliance by Laura Doyle

Reviewed by: Inter-imperiality: Vying Empires, Gendered Labor, and the Literary Arts of Alliance by Laura Doyle Lidan Lin Laura Doyle. Inter-imperiality: Vying Empires, Gendered Labor, and the Literary Arts of Alliance. Duke UP, 2020. ix + 392 pp. The concept of postcoloniality has offered some hope for a more equal world because national independence in former colonies undoubtedly signifies victories of human justice, retribution, and morality. In the wake of European colonialism, scholars have continued to ask challenging questions: How did European colonialism happen? Why is racism still permeating many quarters of life? How can we prevent the existence of colonialism and racism? Inter-imperiality innovatively engages these questions and locates the origin of colonialism and racism in the "denial of interdependence" (35). From this fresh angle, Doyle investigates the complex dialectical relations and power structures among competing empires from the premodern era to the twentieth century. Focusing on interimperial alliance and resistance and weaving together postcolonial, feminist, and global studies, Doyle initiates a new "decolonial" (5) or a "360-degree" (1) approach that analyzes Asia, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and the Caribbean. Doyle argues that a multitude of infrastructural programs shaped such alliance and resistance, along with cultural programs that facilitated the co-construction of imperial states, from intercultural influences in Asia and travel writings by premodern Western missionaries, to the later translations of literary and religious works by Western and non-Western writers. Literature, for Doyle, is a vital site that registered the interlocking world history of colonial hegemony and decolonial subversion. While postcolonial studies have primarily focused on the colonizer-colonized relationship in the context of European colonialism, Doyle shifts this focus to the co-construction of contending empires. This shift is necessary, and it signals a significant new direction in postcolonial studies. Yet, Doyle does not consider "postcolonial" (5) and "decolonial" approaches to be incompatible; instead, she deems them "complementary rather than opposed." This dialogic handling of diverging methods is one of her book's strengths. Drawing on the work of feminist critics such as Judith Butler, Gayatri Spivak, and Nancy Chodorow, Doyle brings a feminist orientation to bear on her analysis and reveals colonial labor as gendered labor. A critical revisit of Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel's dialectical theory allows Doyle to reaffirm the centrality of the dialectical conditions of being human, conditions devoid of the ontological independence of any kind. While sharing scholars' reservation of Hegel's racist thinking, [End Page 383] Doyle adds her feminist critique of Hegel's male-dominated dialectic by inserting the feminine into the "lord and bondsman" (2) relation on the one hand and by stressing the co-constitution of subjectivity or intersubjectivity implied in Hegel's dialectic on the other. Here, Doyle perceives Hegelian affinities not only in Western thinkers such as pre-Socratic Greek philosophers, Karl Marx, and Maurice Merleau-Ponty but also in Asian philosophy, including the Chinese Daoist philosophy. Rather than dwelling on the polemics involving poststructuralist and materialist thinking in decolonial studies, Doyle appeals to both, another dialogic appropriation of differing modes of thinking. While incorporating Hegel's dialectic in the analysis of interimperial coformations cogently revalidates the continued relevance of dialectical thinking to decolonial studies, a bit more explanation as to how the revised Hegelian dialectic differs from the dialectical thinking that informs the self-other correlation widely discussed in postcolonial studies would have been helpful. Doyle's book contains a substantial theoretical introduction. The stated theoretical grounding and analytical approaches are mostly lucid, readers will easily follow, if they have some background in critical theory and postcolonial studies. The main body includes seven chapters divided into three parts. The texts chosen for analysis include cultural texts, political writings, and literary texts, among others. While some analyses are more substantial than others, which is necessary to serve different purposes, all will be accessible to readers who have some background in literary and cultural studies. In the two chapters in part 1, Doyle first provides a structural frame for examining ideological and infrastructural formations in Afro-Eurasia and the Americas, and shows that they "converged" (28) in their mutual attempts to conquer the "dissent" from the colonized natives. She then stages a...

All-encompassing ethnographies: Strategies for feminist and equity-oriented institutional research

This article addresses the challenges inherent to conducting ethnography in all-encompassing institutions and presents strategies for equity-oriented research in such restrictive settings. All-encompassing institutions are organizations that have no separation between home, work, and play, with forms of surveillance, power imbalances, and control that create logistical and ethical challenges for ethnographers. Building on feminist orientations to qualitative inquiry, the author shares vignettes from her research in a military institution to introduce four strategies for ethnography in these contexts. The strategies are: (a) adopting a participant-centered approach; (b) attending to power dynamics; (c) negotiating consent and confidentiality; and (d) engaging participants in research presentation. These strategies are applicable to ethnographers across contexts looking to meaningfully engage interlocutors in research generation and presentation.

Towards trans-feminist coalitions in the post-Yugoslav space: Building feminist radical solidarities

The conflict between trans-inclusive and trans-exclusionary radical feminists (TERFs) has recently erupted in the post-Yugoslav space, adding to the urgency of embracing trans-feminism. In order to forge the ground for such a feminist orientation, this paper interweaves two theoretical reflections: the subject of feminism, and the historical lesbian experience of becoming ‘included’ with/in it. Beginning with the idea that, similarly to trans, it also took time and effort for lesbianity (see discussion on this concept in the article) to be recognised as a ‘legitimate’ subject of feminist emancipation, I extend Wittig's negation of lesbian womanhood to trans women. With this in mind, I argue that feminist radical solidarity requires an open-ended, liminal conception of gender. I then draw upon nine interviews with predominantly cis-gender lesbian activists from the post-Yugoslav space to explore the ways in which they endeavoured to bring about feminist radical solidarity in their activist engagement. I conclude that solidarity rather than normative inclusion that we, lesbians, fought for as feminists, should eventually be put at the service of trans-feminism. Like that, trans-feminism can become an integral part of women studies, trans women can be recognised as subjects of feminism, and trans persons embraced as our political and personal allies.

Sensing the border(s): Sound and carceral intimacies in and beyond indefinite detention

This article examines a sound-based digital project co-created with refugees and asylum seekers held in indefinite detention in Australia and Papua New Guinea to advance understandings of the sensory violence of borders – and resistance to borders – and their reordering of intimate realms. In where are you today (2020), refugees/asylum seekers catalogued their carceral environments in 10-minute sonic vignettes which were distributed to listeners daily via text message, for 30 consecutive days. Drawing on sensory methodologies and feminist orientations towards the intimate, the article considers how this sound project alerts us to an alternative sensory politics attuned to the quiet, quotidian and exhausting labour of resisting Australia’s racialised border regime. Through a close listening to selected recordings, we argue the intimacies shared through where are you today produce knowledge about embodied practices of care, breath, touch and waiting in indefinite detention. Networked, transborder sound projects can unsettle both incarcerated and non-incarcerated subjects’ relationships to their environments, opening affiliative possibilities for coming into relation with the border(s) in new ways. We conclude that the project’s creators forge and sustain carceral intimacies within and despite the border’s affective violence, and that sound is a particularly affective and evocative means of conveying and creating these intimacies, in and beyond indefinite detention.

Bridging theory and practice: conceptualisations of global citizenship education in Dutch secondary education

ABSTRACT With the rise of Global Citizenship Education (GCE) in education systems worldwide, recent research has attempted to categorise its various types and orientations. There are, however, limited insights into how different education stakeholders perceive and implement GCE in pedagogical practice. To bridge this gap between theory and practice, we apply a social cartography of GCE types from a recent study to identify management staff’s, teachers’, and pupils’ perceptions of GCE in the context of Dutch (bilingual) secondary education. Based on a content analysis of 12 interviews and three focus groups with pupils, our findings indicate a clear dominance of a liberal orientation towards GCE, focusing on political and moral themes, but also evidence of a critical orientation, as well as liberal-critical and neoliberal-liberal interfaces. We propose that the reflections of practitioners and pupils presented in this study should be used to further develop (Dutch) GCE.

Dreaming Differently

Dreaming Differently

Determinants of Entrepreneurial Intentions: Impact of Culture, Gender, Self-Esteem, and Self-Efficacy on University Students

The main objective of this study is to examine the socio-cultural and individual factors that influence the entrepreneurial intentions among students studying the Public Sector Universities in Sindh Province. In the cultural context, three variables i.e., collectivism, power distance and uncertainty avoidance, one variable in social context i.e., gender-role orientation and two variables in individual context i.e., self-esteem and self-efficacy are used and empirically tested through the SEM model. It was found that all three components of culture have been negatively correlated with entrepreneurial intentions. These results infer that the prevalent family culture in Sindh Province is not supportive of entrepreneurial intention as respondents found strict control of elder family members over their future career choices, depressing and a hurdle in their way to become entrepreneurs. The feminist gender orientation of an individual is found to have a negative effect on the development of entrepreneurial spirit. This stands in support of the dominant notion that masculine gender orientation is required to become a vibrant entrepreneur. Under the masculine approach, an individual prefers to have characteristics like tough, assertive, calculated and pursue material success in life; contrary to the feminist orientation which focuses on being tender, modest and pursuing the relational quality in life. The findings reveal that individuals who carry a high worth for themselves and believe in their abilities to address the challenges of running a business tend to have more entrepreneurial intentions. Lastly, the role of gender as moderator shows that the cultural barriers have a more negative impact on the formation of entrepreneurial intents of female than male students. Based on the findings of this study and informal observations from students during the field, it is recommended that the policymakers should invest in strengthening the entrepreneurial ecosystem, focusing on the provision of entrepreneurial educational infrastructure, building family & culture support structures that can help potential students enhance their self-esteem, self-efficacy and get necessary socio-cultural capital to become successful entrepreneurs.

Saviors, nurturers, or magically insane: a braided reading of white women characters in three ecological narratives

ABSTRACT Media can both perpetuate and disrupt the patriarchal, anthropocentric discourses that shape social understandings of “woman” and “nature.” Using a braided feminist lens, we investigated media discourses about white women’s relationships with the human and more-than-human world. We present our analysis in three cases: Olivia from the novel, The Overstory; mother from the film, mother!; and Eleven from the Netflix series, Stranger Things. These characters illuminate stories of injustice and separation at the intersections of gender, race, species, and settler colonialism. We specifically consider the discourses of woman as crazy, woman as magical, woman as white savior, and woman as nurturer. Recognizing that no text tells a single story, we explore how we might re-story the discourses around white womanhood to invite a more reciprocal and feminist orientation to relationships, building from Donna Haraway’s notion of the Chthulucene (a trans-species, non-hierarchical response to the Anthropocene). Finally, we discuss how “othering” may not always occur as explicit marginalization and inferiority. For instance, by constituting white women as “saviors” or essentially magical (and possibly crazy), media may reinforce social and ecological hierarchies.

Poor Air Quality during Wildfires Related to Support for Public Safety Power Shutoffs

Millions of Americans experienced impacts from the 2020 wildfire season, including unhealthy air quality from smoke. We examine how exposure to poor air quality during wildfires relates to public opinion toward Public Safety Power Shutoffs (PSPSs). PSPSs have been increasingly deployed in the Western U.S. during extreme wildfire conditions to reduce ignition risk from power equipment by de-energizing sections of the electrical grid, potentially leaving impacted areas without electricity for multiple days. We surveyed Oregon residents (n = 1,308), a state where few PSPSs have been deployed, and found that a majority of respondents supported PSPSs, and that poorer air quality during wildfires, recorded from monitoring stations proximal to respondents, was related to increased support for PSPSs. We also found that females and those with liberal political orientations were more supportive of PSPSs. This research has implications for utilities, emergency managers, and policymakers as they consider deployment of PSPSs to mitigate wildfire.

Value dynamics in support to social movement: Hong Kong civil servants in the anti-extradition bill movement

PurposeIn 2019, civil servants in Hong Kong publicly protested against their government as part of the anti-extradition bill movement. This study aims to understand how civil servants formed their support to the movement despite a deep-rooted bureaucratic culture. The authors argue that moral values (e.g. impartiality and integrity) and aspirations to liberal democracy are powerful motivations that override bureaucratic values (e.g. political neutrality and political loyalty) in the context of social movement.Design/methodology/approachBased on a protest on-site survey (n = 277), this study analyzes the relationship between civil servants’ value orientations and their political demands and actions.FindingsRegression analyses show that civil servants’ consideration of moral values relates positively to support to investigative demands, while a more liberal orientation predicts greater support to consequential demands and action intentions. A moderation effect is found in which greater consideration of moral values attenuates the negative effect of bureaucratic values on the support to both types of demands. In addition, the two types of values interact with each other to influence support to consequential demands, which, in turn, predicts willingness to further political actions.Originality/valueThis study seizes a valuable opportunity to examine the political participation of civil servants in Hong Kong. As Hong Kong and the civil service system face tightening authoritarian controls, the findings shed light on the dynamics of moral values, bureaucratic values and liberal orientation in motivating resistance among civil servants.

The Objects that Remain. Dimyonot: Jews and the Cultural Imagination by Laura Levitt

Reviewed by: The Objects that Remain. Dimyonot: Jews and the Cultural Imagination by Laura Levitt Mara H. Benjamin Laura Levitt, The Objects that Remain. Dimyonot: Jews and the Cultural Imagination. University Park: Penn State University Press, 2020. 184 pp. Hardcover $24.95. ISBN: 9780271087825. In the last scene of Raiders of the Lost Ark, a glimpse of gold flashes up, only to be quickly occluded from the viewer's gaze. The wooden box enclosing the treasure is nailed shut, and the camera pans out to reveal a warehouse full of identical boxes, all labeled "Top Secret—Army Intel—Do Not Open!" This iconic last shot of the movie, juxtaposing the numinous and the bureaucratic, the singular and the anonymous, came to mind as I read Laura Levitt's The Objects that Remain. In her powerful meditation, Levitt contemplates the experience of holding and beholding objects that pulse with almost otherworldly power even as they sit in archives, vaults, and storage facilities. The objects to which Levitt turns her attention here are neither the lost ark nor the holy grail, however, but prosaic objects that have been transformed into extraordinary objects by acts of violence. The items she considers have been in contact with specific bodies. They include the sheets and sweatpants Levitt was wearing the night of her rape in graduate school in 1989 and the heaps of shoes and clothing that once adorned and protected [End Page 105] specific people, and which are now displayed in the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Levitt is particularly drawn to textiles—marked as they are with a person's scent, sweat, and perhaps DNA—lying in climate-con-trolled rooms, life vibrating quietly within them as they await (re)discovery by police, investigators, and other custodians. For Levitt, the material objects of trauma speak and engage us in reciprocal processes of witnessing. These objects enable us to bear witness to horror, and, at the same time, they themselves witness our survival. The objects that remain after violation, Levitt writes, "bridge time and space, connecting past to present, before to after … Their continued, albeit fragile, existence in the present interrupts the dreaminess, the frightening, alluring, and untenable notion that life after is after life itself. They remind us that we did not die" (15). Levitt explores this power of witness from two perspectives: the perspective of the person who has been violated and the perspective of the one whose body is not itself violated, but whose love for and identification with the victimized person draws her close to the object. These two vantage points are not wholly extricable from one another; in meditating on "the objects that remain" after her own rape, Levitt is drawn to reflect on the experience of being witness to the material evidence of other traumas: the bloodied clothes locked away in police custody (as documented by Levitt's friend Maggie Nelson in Jane: A Murder); the hair of Holocaust victims collected by the Nazis. Levitt's work is deeply informed by the material turn. Levitt, like scholars in a wide variety of fields, regards objects as exercising the capacity to "demand our attention" and "embody a kind of agency," even when they are stored in the functional equivalent of the "Top Secret—Army Intel" box. But religious studies in particular grounds Levitt as she considers the eerie pull of the mysterium tremendum et fascinans in these objects. Notably for a scholar of Jewish studies, Levitt turns to terms rooted in specific forms of Christian religiosity, such as relics (sheets bloodied by rape, pantyhose bearing the DNA of a murderer and a victim) and reliquaries (the storage facilities that house these objects). In so doing, Levitt unapologetically expands Jewish scholars' and practitioners' religious lexicon, convincingly demonstrating how generative this language is for her purpose. Objects, like people, cannot survive without the work of individuals who carefully preserve them from decay. A significant dimension of The Objects that Remain concerns the labor of conservators, which Levitt makes visible to the reader. Much of the most exciting scholarship in the new materialisms implicitly bears a feminist orientation, and certainly that is true in Levitt's attention to the care through which...

Machines for Living: Modernism and Domestic Life by Victoria Rosner

Reviewed by: Machines for Living: Modernism and Domestic Life by Victoria Rosner Václav Paris (bio) MACHINES FOR LIVING: MODERNISM AND DOMESTIC LIFE, by Victoria Rosner. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2020. ix + 292 pp. $35.00 cloth, ebook. This book takes its title from Le Corbusier's 1923 phrase, "Une maison est une machine-à-habiter"—"a house is a machine for living in."1 "The phrase," as Victoria Rosner explains, "is a provocation: What could be more antithetical to the cozy, individualistic spaces of the house/home ('maison' is both) than a machine?" (1) This provocation is at once theoretical and practical: theoretical because it involves a kind of twisting of familiar concepts and an [End Page 359] attempt to put them together like the poles of a magnet. Machines involve work, while living happens outside of work. But it is also a practical challenge or aspirational motto for transforming one's domestic life into something more efficient, more hygienic, and more automatic. The first chapter, or introduction, describes how literary modernism took up this provocation. As we learn almost immediately, the specific backdrop is the impact of the so-called "Rational Household" (2) on the lives of women. During the period covered—roughly 1900-1950, it was female homemakers who were at the frontline of the encounters between new technologies and domestic space such as electricity, the vacuum cleaner, or the indoor plumbing. This feminist orientation introduces a rich ambivalence to Rosner's study: on the one hand, literary modernism involves a utopian reimagining of domestic space; on the other hand, and often at the same time, it proves to be an important site of critique of this revolution. We see this, for instance, in Buster Keaton's 1922 film The Electric House,2 where a well-to-do family commits to electrifying their home, but many of the "efficiencies" introduced are showy flourishes rather than actual labor-saving practices. Dinner is served via an electric toy train that runs from the kitchen to the dining room on tracks around the table, stopping in front of each diner so that a plate can be removed. Meanwhile a traditional uniformed maid hovers in the kitchen (13). The conflicted story of modernism in the kitchen, in the intimate, private, and familial spaces of everyday life—is one that has been ignored: "Critics of modernism have largely bypassed the home, perhaps because modernist writers themselves often insulted and dismissed domesticity and its ideologies" (4). In order to remediate this critical neglect, Rosner's book dwells on the domestic theme in familiar and unfamiliar texts by Anglo-American modernists, most often T. S. Eliot and Ezra Pound. It also, more importantly, knits together a skein of surprising links between modernist writers and representatives of other tangential discourses: domestic reformers, architects, planners, interior designers, child development experts, and so forth. Chapters 2 and 3 are dedicated to growing this networked and ambivalent involvement of modernism and domestic life through tracing formal analogies between the modern home and the modernist text. In chapter 2, the analogy is between so-called "Minimum Writing" (think of Pound's imagist directive—"[u]se no superfluous word"3) and the range of ideas surrounding the Czech architect Karel Teige's "Minimum Dwelling" (52)—a dwelling that would meet the minimum existential requirement of the masses of modern man.4 [End Page 360] Both of these concepts, as Rosner shows, were influenced by Adolf Loos's 1908 attack on ornament as crime.5 To be clear, the analogy between writing and architecture is not direct: it is not that a poem is like a house. It is rather that both minimal writing and new architecture begin at this moment to obey a set of functionalist requirements, whereby every component (whether of the bedroom or the novel) supposedly serves a non-decorative purpose. This parallel receives its fullest exploration in the analysis of the works of Ivy Compton-Burnett, whose archive is interspersed with that of her lifelong companion, Margaret Jourdain—a furniture and design historian. The analogy in chapter 3, "Fear in a Handful of Dust" (87) is between modernist writing and germ theory. Rosner describes how the shift from...

IRAN: PROBLEMS AND PROTESTS

This paper analyzes the causes, course, driving forces, modus operandi, and goals of the September-November 2022 protest movement in Iran following the death of a girl detained by the patrol guidance police for wearing an inappropriate hijab. A comparison is made between the ongoing protests and the opposition movements of previous years. The article begins with a brief analysis of the economic situation in the country during the first year of President Raisi's government, and reveals the main problems of economic development. The authors proceed from the fact that the economic crisis as a result of the imposition of sanctions has not been overcome, despite the positive growth of the country's GDP in the last two years. The problems in the social and cultural sphere are exacerbated as a result of generational changes, and the limitations of political life as a result of the consolidation of power in the hands of radical conservative forces. Their attempts to increase control over the observance of Islamic norms of dress and behavior, bans on cultural events lead to increased discontent in Iranian society. Young generations are actively fighting for freedom of choice and the right to make their own decisions. Society's conflict potential is increasing, which threatens the existence of the Islamic Republic. The government's efforts to suppress the movements by force do not lead to their extinguishment, and the forms of protest are changing. While radical forces call for harsher reprisals against protesters, many politicians of both moderate conservative and liberal orientations call for public dialogue and reforms in order to solve the most serious problems and preserve the Islamic regime.

Mikalojus Konstantinas Čiurlionis’s Socio-Cultural Connections and Professional Self-Realisation in Lithuania

In 1907–1909, Mikalojus Konstantinas Čiurlionis worked with seven national societies active in Lithuania: Lithuanian Art Society, Amateur Music and Theatre Society “Vilniaus Kanklės”, Lithuanian Association “Rūta” in Vilnius, Music and Theatre Society “Daina” in Kaunas, Lithuanian Scientific Society, Lithuanian Mutual Aid Society of Vilnius, and Charitable Society for Pupils and Students “Žiburėlis”. He was a member of the formerthree organizations. The Lithuanian Art Society was the main platform for Čiurlionis’s professional and social self-realisation. He served as its vice-chair and from September 1907 to September 1909 stood in for its chair, Antanas Žmuidzinavičius. He organised the Second Lithuanian Art Exhibition. On Čiurlionis initiative, the music section was established at the Society. Together with his colleagues, he organized a competition for Lithuanian composers; he also envisaged a periodical of music, art, and literature.The article discusses the question of the affiliation with the Lithuanian Vilnius Choir led by Čiurlionis. The research has revealed that Čiurlionis conducted a united choir consisting of the singers from the Lithuanian Mutual Aid Society of Vilnius and “Vilniaus Kanklės”. His participation in two soirees organised by “Žiburėlis”, quite favourable reviews of his artworks written by the liberals, and the principled criticism by the conservative cleric Aleksandras Dambrauskas (nom de plume Adomas Jakštas) demonstrate that Čiurlionis found it easier to work with democratic left-wing cultural figures. In June of 1909, Čiurlionis’s concert and the design of the curtain on the premises of the Lithuanian Association “Rūta” were associated with Andrius Domaševičius and Kipras Petrauskas. In his letter, Čiurlionis called himself “progressive.” It was uncharacteristic to indicate one’s party affiliation; in Čiurlionis’s case, it meant to be of liberal orientation. However, it was precisely because of his “leftist” views that the Educational Society “Aušra” deemed his membership unreliable. On July 11, 1909, Čiurlionis was nominated to the commission to collect songs for the Lithuanian Scientific Society. Unfortunately, the illness that manifested itself in December of 1909 prevented the composer from carrying out the work.

Political orientations, economic policies, and environmental quality: Multi-valued treatment effects analysis with spatial spillovers in country districts of Poland

Many studies have found a positive association between liberal political views and support for environmental protection activities even though they require greater involvement of the state in market economies. However, such a conclusion is contradicted by empirical studies on pro-environmental activities with regard to the theory of planned behavior. On the one hand, subjective norms (including the expectations of public authorities) are usually found to be insignificant or very weak drivers of ecological behavior. On the other hand, self-efficacy (individual attitudes and beliefs in one’s capabilities) is perceived as a leading factor. This inspired us to explore the long-term effects of localism on environmental quality in Poland. Because liberalism and conservatism exist in their ‘pure’ forms, Poland is very well suited to such a study. The aim of the article is to assess the long-term impact of local and liberal orientations (with conservatism as the reference), as reflected by electoral decisions on the quality of the environment. First, the current state of the environment is measured over four dimensions (air, water, soil, and biodiversity), and the effects of environmental policies (including spatial dependence) are estimated. Subsequently, the treatment effects on the environment when a particular political orientation is adopted are estimated using multi-valued treatment effect analyses. The study confirms that local orientation is conducive to long-term environmental care. Moreover, greater coordination of environmental policies at different levels is recommended, focusing on the negative spatial dependence of local environmental expenditure.