Activism Research Articles

More Lessons of the Accord: The 1986–87 Plumbers’ Union Dispute

The early phases of the Price and Incomes Accord sought to constrain money-wage increases in order to reduce the rate of inflation. Despite this, in 1986 and 1987 the Plumbers and Gasfitters Employees’ Union of Australia engaged in industrial action to pressure employers into increasing wages. Using this case study, we examine the capacity for individual trade union agency for wage increases in the context of Accord Mark II. The article draws on document analysis combined with interviews with six of the dispute’s key actors and close observers. It finds that trade union agency was quashed by various political and industrial actors and institutions. This threatened the financial survival of the NSW Australian Plumbers and Gasfitters Employees’ Union, which faced legal sanctions during the dispute.

Eyes on the data—How the methodology of the 2030 Agenda contributes to its probable failure

More than halfway through the 15-year timeline, the world is still far from reaching the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). This study locates one important reason for this in the specific design of the 2030 Agenda's methodology, the indicator-based goal-setting. In this, the Global Indicator Framework (GIF) should play a central role as a basis for political decisions and as an instrument for critical political communication. However, drawing on social science indicator research, this article shows that shortcomings in the GIF's genesis have led to the 2030 Agenda's effectiveness being severely limited. These limitations are: the one-sided focus on the provision of data, which results in the neglect of questions of implementation and tensions between and within political and statistical actors, which in turn leads to an undermining of the GIF itself. As a result, the GIF shows several crucial gaps in terms of content, is characterised by discrepancies between the political target and the measurement content of the indicators, and features indicators that change the goals through their measurement content. In response, the article notes a tendency towards non-use of the indicators, which undermines the whole 2030 Agenda. The results of this study can thus also be used as a basis for the future implementation of indicator-based policies.

Explaining and Understanding Formal and Informal Institutions in the Age of Globalization

Our social order is shaped by institutions, which makes them important. Governmental players adhere to the formal or informal regulations that institutions set out. Any political system has informal institutions, albeit it can be challenging to understand how they relate to formal ones. An extensive examination of the many definitions of institutions is presented in this paper. Many instances from many subfields are given, which in turn emphasize how universal the key issues facing political actors in various substantive situations are. Afterwards, it is clarified what the ramifications of considering institutions in this way are and how they contribute to these strategic problems by resolving or generating them (consciously or not). Understanding how institutions function necessitates looking at their historical background. Three specific obstacles that arise when attempting to understand and justify the beginnings of institutions are identified; these issues indicate some of the domains in which our understanding of institutions is limited. This paper aims to highlight the common challenges encountered when attempting to comprehend the formation and operation of institutions, offering valid reasons for researchers in related fields to collaborate more to improve our understanding of institutions. Generally speaking, it is untrue to say that there is a boundary between absolutely "formal" and fully "informal" institutions. This paper reveals that this unexpected claim is an invitation for academics to consider several issues. Firstly, to distinguish formal and informal institutions from one another, definitions of each are required. Second, discussing the connection between formal and informal institutions is crucial. By doing this, disparities between various forms of informal institutions and their ranges of complexity are distinguished. Third, it is critical to comprehend how formal and informal institutions affect the sort of regime (autocracy vs. democracy) and vice versa. The subject of how informal institutions are generated, created, and maintained is also discussed in this context. This paper concludes with a discussion of methodological perspectives on formal and informal institutions. It considers the use of typologies that encompass formal institutions and are frequently employed in the study of governance systems for this reason. The discovery by certain researchers that informal structures have a significant and frequently surprising impact on the functioning of formal institutions serves as the foundation for subsequent discussions.

Macedonia’s Interests in Thrace and Conflicts with Athens

From the late sixth century BC on, close connections between the political actors of Thrace, Hellespontine Phrygia, Persia, Athens, and, during their times of Greek supremacy, Sparta and Thebes are attested. When Macedonia advanced to the Hellespontine sphere, the basic understanding was ultimately disturbed. Aiming at controlling both sides of the straits, Philip could take the Phrygian satraps at the climax of their influence as an example and pursue a mirror-image policy. This paper explores the ways Philip’s connection with Artabazos may have provided him with insights into the political networks and structures in the area. It also considers the history of family ties between the Argeads and the family of Artabazos

The role of Macedonia in the decline of Aiakid monarchy in Molossia/Epeiros

From the late 6th century BC on, close connections between the political actors of Thrace, Hellespontine Phrygia, Persia, Athens, and, during their times of Greek supremacy, Sparta and Thebes are attested. When Macedonia advanced to the Hellespontine sphere, the basic understanding was ultimately disturbed. Aiming at controlling both sides of the straits, Philip could take the Phrygian satraps at the climax of their influence as an example and pursue a mirror-image policy. This paper explores the ways Philip’s connection with Artabazos may have provided him with insights into the political networks and structures in the area. It also considers the history of family ties between the Argeads and the family of Artabazos.

Partnering with Communities to Understand Social Determinants of Health (SDoH) Impacts on Access to Shared Micromobility

This study explored the facilitators and barriers of community bike share use in a mid-sized city with high incidence of poverty and racial diversity using a community-based participatory action research (CBPAR) photovoice framework with the Stanford Our Voice (OV) Discovery Tool digital application. Community members participated in one of three community citizen science walks with follow up focus groups facilitated by osteopathic medical student researcher to address “What makes it easy or hard to ride a bike using the bike share?” Twenty-seven diverse community members partnered with four osteopathic medical students exploring vulnerable individuals’ lived experiences, beliefs/understanding of the Social Determinants of Health (SDoH) and access to the bike share program. A total of 322 photos and narrative comments from citizen science walk audits developed deductive themes and follow up focus groups informed inductive themes. Themes addressed challenges to access, maintenance, safety in bike transit, comfort, and environment that create barriers to use and increase inequities for lower income and historically underrepresented communities. The use of OV provided photograph, narrative, and geocoded photo location. This novel approach served as an effective tool for community action with city decision makers. The narrative research identified the impact of the barriers, and the photographs and geocoding provided clear descriptions for locations to prioritize change by adding street signs for access and safety, fixing road safety issues or bike maintenance concerns. It actively engaged the community with the city to drive discussions and plans for change in repair systems and infrastructure that also addressed equity and acknowledged the SDoH supporting residents in lower income or historically underrepresented communities. Citizen science engaged community voices, supporting change in city policies and transportation initiatives to support the sustainability of the bike share program.

American Attitudes Toward Climate Migrants: Findings from a Conjoint Experiment

ABSTRACT The dramatic impacts of climate change presage an inevitable surge in mass migration; however, advanced democracies are ill-equipped for this impending crisis. Moreover, we know very little about how publics evaluate this group of prospective migrants, who are estimated to increase from 100 million to 200 million worldwide within decades. This study investigates American attitudes toward climate-related migrants in a conjoint experiment of more than 1,000 US adults, in which respondents evaluated fictional refugee profiles that varied across multiple attributes. Findings reveal that Americans (1) prefer political refugees over climate-related refugees; and (2) prefer climate-related and economic migrants to a similar extent, and that these preferences are not driven by concerns over climate-related refugees’ integration into American society. Subgroup analyses indicate that younger individuals, those with high climate-change anxiety, and those who previously engaged in climate-related political activities discriminated less against climate-related migrants. Analyses of open-ended responses reveal that climate anxiety is a driver of positive evaluations of climate-related migrants.

Democratisation in Southern Europe: a contingent or inevitable process?

ABSTRACT Debates on democratisation often struggle to reconcile structural and agency approaches. Structural explanations highlight factors like economic development, natural resources, inequality, and international power shifts. Agency-based explanations focus on the choices of political actors, including elites and social movements, and their interactions leading to democracy. This study compares Greece, Portugal, and Spain, harmonising these perspectives. Structural and agency forces are not contradictory when temporal scope conditions are clearly defined. Despite differing democratisation paths, Southern European countries experienced rapid modernisation, and political, social, and economic convergence during the consolidation phase. Modernisation favoured liberal democracy and democratic consolidation through varied events and actor combinations. Our analysis underscores the importance of considering both structural and agency-based factors in understanding democratisation processes.

The weapons of civilization: self-technologies and the governance of dissent

ABSTRACT This essay analyzes how liberal and radical activists battled over the subjective management strategies used in the temperance movement. First, the essay fills a theoretical gap by offering a new conceptual apparatus for examining the intersection of communication and Foucaultian technologies of the self, particularly in the context of counter-radicalism. Second, it contributes to critical Communication history by examining the clash between bourgeois activists, on the one hand, and "barbaric" activists like Carry Nation, who used bar-smashing violence as a critique of conventional public address and other “civilized” methods of dissent. The essay concludes by reflecting on how this historical clash illuminates contemporary strategies of counter-radicalism and dissent management.

The ‘Untouchable’ Communist and the Caste-Class Struggle in Sujatha Gidla’s Ants Among Elephants

This article analyses, through Sujatha Gidla’s memoir titled Ants Among Elephants: An Untouchable Family and the Making of Modern India (2017), whether the socio-economic subordination of dalits can be challenged by tackling class exploitation. Gidla’s book emphasises the Kambham family’s status as ‘untouchables’ in its very title by tracing the story of Gidla’s uncle K. G. Satyamurthy, who sought to combat class and caste exploitation with the ideology of Communism. The memoir highlights the intersectional functioning of the two oppressive structures, thus complicating the definition of subalternity, and one’s journey to emerge from it. This article probes the correlation between Satyam’s desire to fight class exploitation as a communist, his affinity with middle class political activism and his own desire for class mobility. Where does caste fit within the definition of class in terms of relations of production? Does contesting class exploitation automatically translate into battling caste? Where does social mobility fit within this complex of caste and class? Do these hierarchical structures run parallel or in tandem with one another to create an inescapable system of oppression? While analysing the complexity of dealing with caste and class, this article will examine whether Gidla’s uncle K. G. Satyamurthy’s polemics reconcile the two causes of fighting each of these structures.

“Canada remains deeply concerned”: (de)politicized feminist foreign aid, settler colonialism and reproductive justice in occupied Gaza

ABSTRACT Canada’s Feminist International Assistance Policy (FIAP) was introduced in June 2017, representing a positive shift in Canadian foreign policy and a reaffirmation of the Trudeau government’s intended global leadership on gender equality and sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR). Since its inception, FIAP has faced growing criticism as a neoliberal, individualized approach to achieving gender equality that is void of an understanding of underlying systemic inequities. This paper applies this critique to Canada’s complicity in Israel’s ongoing military violence in Gaza. Adopting a reproductive justice framework, we argue that the reproductive violence against Palestinian women enacted during the current war on Gaza must be understood as part of Israel’s larger settler colonial project. For Canada to fulfill its commitments to global SRHR as set out in its own foreign policy framework, the Trudeau government must adopt a more politicized and intersectional approach to feminist international assistance, including taking political action against Israel’s colonial violence in Gaza.

The Function of Memes in Political Discourse

AbstractThe use of memes has become increasingly widespread in political discourse. However, there is a dearth of philosophical discussion on memes and their impact on political discourse. This paper addresses this gap in the literature and bridges the divide between the empirical and philosophical work on memes by offering a functionalist account which allows for a more in-depth analysis of the role memes play in political discourse. We offer a taxonomy of the eight key characteristics of memes: 1. humor; 2. fostering in-group identity; 3. caricatures; 4. replicability; 5. context collapse; 6. hermeneutical resources; 7. low reputational cost; 8. signaling. On the positive side, the propensity memes have to foster in-group identity and to function as a hermeneutical tool for people to make sense of their own experiences are a boon especially to marginalized communities. On the flipside, the creation of an in-group/out-group dynamic can also be exploited by sinister political actors, especially since the low reputational cost of circulating memes allows for plausible deniability. We use the analysis in this paper to jumpstart a discussion of how we should understand memes and debate which norms should govern the novel speech act of posting a meme given its impact on political discourse. Based on our findings, we end with a call to adopt stricter norms for the act of posting a meme.

Simplifying the universal health coverage narrative can help to achieve political action

Simplifying the universal health coverage narrative can help to achieve political action

A community action network-based intervention for improving knowledge of zoonoses among wildlife hunters and traders in Epe, Lagos, Nigeria.

The West Africa One Health project is a multi-country project designed to utilise the One Health approach and deploy the Community Action Networks (CAN), a concept rooted in the principles of community-based participatory research, to improve knowledge of high-risk communities on zoonoses. The majority of emerging zoonoses occur at the human-wildlife interface, of which wildlife hunters and traders are critical stakeholders. We assessed the effectiveness of a CAN-based intervention involving the use of a video documentary and case studies as model tools in improving the knowledge of zoonoses among wildlife hunters and traders in Epe, an established hunting community in Lagos State, Nigeria. A single-group pre-post design involving a total of 39 consenting registered wildlife stakeholders was adopted. A pre-tested, semi-structured, interviewer-administered questionnaire was used to obtain data on the participant's sociodemographic characteristics, awareness level, and knowledge of zoonoses pre and post CAN-based intervention. Data were analysed using descriptive statistics McNemar and Wilcoxon Signed Ranks tests at a 5% level of significance. The mean age of the participants was 46.7 ± 10.9 years. Most (76.9%) identified as male and had at least secondary education (89.7%). The number of participants who were aware that diseases could be contracted from animals and that it could be through inhalation and close contact increased significantly from 13 (33.3%), 2 (5.1%), and 9 (23.1%) pre-intervention to 37 (94.9%), 11 (28.2%), and 21 (53.8%) post-intervention, respectively. The overall median knowledge score increased significantly from 1 (Interquartile range (IQR): 0-2) pre-intervention to 3 (IQR: 2-4) post-intervention. The CAN-based intervention involving the use of a video documentary and case studies as model tools was effective in improving the knowledge of zoonoses among wildlife hunters and traders in the hunting community and may be beneficial for future practice.

Triggering employee green activism through green human resource management: The role of green organizational learning and responsible leadership

AbstractSeveral studies have unveiled that green human resource management (GHRM) positively affects employees' voluntary green behaviors at work. However, the literature has overlooked the influence of GHRM on employee beyond‐work green activism—employees' participation in different environmental campaigns and initiatives and supporting/influencing organizations, environmental groups, and political actions aimed at protecting the natural environment. We hypothesize that GHRM leads to employee beyond‐work green activism directly and indirectly via green organizational learning. The present study also tests the moderating role of responsible leadership in the GHRM‐green organizational learning link. Multisource survey data collected using the time‐lagged strategy supported the proposed relationships. The findings offer important recommendations for managers that can help them signify the role of business organizations and HR practices in protecting the natural environment.

El efecto tabla redonda comunicación y política pública

The construction of public policy, in addition to political action, is communicative action. As a mechanism that complies with and gives dynamism to the principle of publicity and as an exercise in public communication that admits agreements, consensuses and commitments, it organizes and gives character to citizen participation. The “round table” effect uses metaphor to refer to the kind of broad, horizontal and inclusive conversation that this democratic exercise requires, both in public deliberation and in direct spaces of participation.

Populist Visual Communication: A State-of-the-Art Review

Even though populism is arguably one of the most researched topics in contemporary political science, the study of its communication is disproportionately focused on its verbal and written dimensions. In recent years, an increasing number of studies have explored its visual dimension, highlighting its importance in the process of meaning-construction and the interaction between political actors and citizens. In this state-of-the art review, we discuss the importance of analysing visual communication and how it relates to the main approaches to the study of populism. Then, we outline the main works conducted on the visual politics of populism and suggest some potential directions for future research. The review reveals that existing research has primarily focused on the content of visual populism, highlighting, in particular, the role of images in constructing ‘the people’, ‘the enemy’ and in depicting populist leaders as ordinary yet exceptional figures. More research is needed on how images are produced and who receives and interpret them. Beyond content analysis, future research should adopt a broader range of methodological tools to fully explore populist visual communication.

The EU’s Fifth Freedom: Why and How to Develop the ‘Freedom of Knowledge’

The goal of a fifth EU freedom – the ‘freedom of knowledge’ – emerged from working towards a unified European research area, expanding upon the four basic freedoms of the Single Market. This additional freedom is not yet guaranteed and so this task should be taken up anew. Here, I support this goal by explicating the meaning of the ‘fifth freedom’, then justifying its importance via four arguments concerning scientific progress, freedom of research, the economic and technological progress of societies, and the democratic ideals of the European project. To end the main article, I then argue that this freedom should be viewed as a right. In the supplementary material, I present problems that arise in the administration, funding, and organization of science within the EU to demonstrate that the fifth freedom is still a long way from being a reality. The evidence includes cases of national rules and practices that reduce or block the mobility of EU researchers and weaken collaboration and progress. For each type of problem, I present specific policy proposals for advancing the fifth freedom goal. The proposals are directed at academic administrations, funding agencies, and political actors at the regional, national, and European levels.

Handbook of flood risk management and community action: an international perspective

Handbook of flood risk management and community action: an international perspective

Quality Learning Environment and Community Participation: Report on a Literacy Boost Project in Indonesia

This article reports the outcomes of community participation and quality learning education resulting from the MEMBACA II project. MEMBACA (Making Early Matter through Books and Community Action) is a literacy project that targets young children in Indonesia. The MEMBACA project includes teacher training, community reading activities, and age-appropriate local language material creation to support emergent literacy skills among early-grade children. These skills include letter awareness, single-word reading of most used words, reading fluency, reading accuracy, and reading comprehension. 31 participants involved in this study, purposively selected to be interviewed through the phone. The thematic analysis found that a better learning environment was produced, a code of conduct is now available in schools, and it has helped in mainstreaming a more positive disciplining approach to teachers. This study has also identified that villages are now allocating their village fund for supporting literacy activities, although the process has experienced a setback in the year 2020 due to the pandemic. Further, while teachers’ capacities were increased due to various activities, learning environments are still troubled by poor infrastructures and a lack of community awareness. Engagement of communities and local government were mostly improved, with major problem lies in the continuity of the literacy-related activities, affected by various factors including poor advocacy and COVID-19 pandemic.