Redistributive Justice Research Articles

Exploring Curriculum Transformation in Higher Education Institutions: A Critical Analysis of Equity and Social Justice Perspectives

This paper addresses the imperative of curriculum transformation within higher education in South Africa to confront and mitigate structural inequalities and promote equitable access and outcomes. Drawing upon Fraser's multi-dimensional framework for social justice, the study critically examines the efficacy of curriculum interventions, particularly Education Development initiatives in South Africa. Fraser's framework enables assessing how these interventions address justice dimensions: redistribution, misrecognition, and representation. The analysis reveals that existing interventions predominantly adopt an affirmative rather than transformative approach, primarily focusing on redistributive justice while neglecting misrecognition and representation issues. The study underscores the necessity of embracing a transformative paradigm in curriculum development within South African higher education institutions. A transformative approach necessitates a fundamental reframing of the curriculum, involving reassessing the scale of existing challenges, interrogating underlying assumptions shaping curriculum norms, and re-evaluating the delineation between 'mainstream' and 'other' students. Moreover, it advocates for revisiting the appropriateness of the curriculum for a diverse and pluralistic society. In conclusion, the paper advocates for a comprehensive reframing of the South African higher education curriculum, emphasising the imperative of transformative practices. It proposes recommendations for reformulating the curriculum to address better social justice issues, including embracing inclusivity, challenging prevailing norms, and fostering a curriculum that reflects the diversity and complexities of contemporary society.

Testing the development impact of islamic banking: Islamic moral economy approach to development

Redistributive justice and stakeholder development have been central objectives of the Islamic moral economy for which Islamic banking was considered a facilitatory operational tool. Being its institutional form, the emergence of Islamic finance is, therefore, related to rescuing ‘human, land, labour and capital’ so that extended stake-holding governance can be achieved. As opposed to the institutional logic of conventional finance, within the Islamic moral economy paradigm, Islamic finance, theoretically, is expected to essentialise justice and equilibrium and equalise development opportunities for all stakeholders to fulfil their development path towards perfection. To assess the Islamic moral economy performance of Islamic banking, this paper uses HDI and GINI as the dependent variables to determine short-run and long-run relationships between Islamic banking growth and the development of the economy through socioeconomic indicators. The data covers the period 2000–2021 with fourteen countries with a systemic presence of Islamic finance, The results show that although Islamic banks did not cause an increase in inequality, as opposed to expectations, they neither caused a decrease in the sampled countries. As for the effect of Islamic banking expansion on human development, it positively contributes to human development only in the long run under certain conditions, which cannot be established in the short run. If sustained, this should be considered positive progress as opposed to the experience observed in the initial period of Islamic banking.

Impact of land restitution benefits on Water, Energy and Food (WEF) misgovernance and social injustice

Land restitution has been used to achieve redistributive justice. However, such social justice has been compromised by the misgovernance of water, energy, and food (WEF) which has resulted in distributive injustices and compromised welfare outcomes. The objective of the study was to ascertain the land restitution benefactor impacts on WEF misgovernance in lieu of offsetting social injustice. The study was carried out in Matatiele, Magareng and Greater Taung Local Municipalities in South Africa. A purposively selected sample of 1184 households was obtained through a cross-sectional survey using a semi-structured questionnaire. Vulnerability indices, independent sample t-tests and Propensity Score Matching were used to analyze the data. The results showed that land restitution beneficiaries were vulnerable to WEF misgovernance relative to social injustice. In addition, becoming a land restitution benefactor had a significant impact and increased the level of vulnerability to WEF misgovernance. This was mainly through increased exposure and sensitivity to WEF misgovernance. Benefiting from land restitution did not have an impact on vulnerability to WEF social injustice, even though exposure and adaptive capacity to social injustice were increased. The study concludes that benefiting from land restitution increased vulnerability to WEF misgovernance while having no impact on social injustice. The study recommends improving access and fixing dilapidated WEF infrastructure in land-restituted areas. Furthermore, there is a need to implement livelihood-improving programs in addition to social protection support to enhance access to WEF resources. Water, energy, and food (WEF) decision-making should be decentralized to improve participation, governance, and procedural justice.

Taxes in the Time of Revolution: An Experimental Test of the Rentier State during Algeria's Hirak

abstract: This article examines the rentier thesis that a government's control over oil resources should help it to resist pressures for democratization. The authors' online survey experiment, implemented during a nationwide mobilization for regime change in Algeria known as the Hirak, used interactive experimental treatments to provide information about the Algerian government's subsidies for fuel resources and low value-added taxes. Based on a sample of 9,721 Algerians, the authors find that when Algerians learn about their country's relatively high level of fuel subsidies and low level of taxes, their assessments of the government's performance improve. However, the treatment has null effects for outcomes involving demands for representation, such as intentions to join protest movements. An analysis of treatment heterogeneity in terms of wealth shows that the wealthy became much more supportive of the regime in response to the treatment while in some cases the poor became much less so. This treatment heterogeneity appears to be related to divergent views among the wealthy and the poor concerning the goals of the protest movement, with the wealthy favoring institutional reforms while the poor prioritized redistributive justice.

Three Concepts of Internationalism in the Global South: Solidarism, Pluralism, and Developmentalism

Throughout modern history, internationalism has been one of the most powerful forces that drives global political changes. While existing research focuses exceptionally on liberal internationalism, studies devoted to internationalism beyond its liberal and Western forms remain relatively scant. Building on a conception that perceives internationalism as a form of human practices, this article explores the evolution of the concept of internationalism in the Global South through a series of political practices from the drafting of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948 and the 1955 Asian-African Conference in Bandung to the proposal of the New International Economic Order in 1974 and the BRICS’s contestation over NATO’s Libyan intervention in 2011. It is argued that the normative core of internationalism in the Global South is constituted of three major components – pluralism, solidarism, and developmentalism, each in its particular form. Taken together, it envisions an international order rooted in the solidarity of the post-colonial peoples based on their shared colonial past, underpinned by a pluralistic outlook of political life, and places emphasis on redistributive justice in structuring the international economic order. Though some argue that with the rise of the BRICS countries, there will be a revival of Global South internationalism, this article concludes that this is not likely to happen at present.

Convivial fences? Property, ‘right to wildlife’ and the need for redistributive justice in South African conservation

In South Africa, fences are ubiquitous. From urban centers to rural landscapes, myriad fences divide properties, fortify estates, and protect private interests. In biodiversity conservation, likewise, fences are instrumental in legally assigning property rights over wildlife. They are furthermore deemed necessary to avoid human-wildlife conflict, save human and animal lives and, most of all, safeguard wildlife properties for the benefit of their state or private owners. This normalization of fences and private property has, in practice, meant that colonial and apartheid-era racialized spatial injustices have not only often been maintained, but also progressively hardened in the democratic era. Overcoming these injustices inevitably means confronting the question of private property and the fences that protect them. This article does so by connecting debates on fences, private property and wildlife protection to emerging discussions around convivial conservation that seek to transform the conservation sector by combining biodiversity conservation with social justice concerns. It asks: can fences ever be convivial? The answer, like fences themselves, is not straightforward. Reflecting on historical, policy and legal discussions, as well as the authors extensive research on the South African conservation sector over the past decades, the article proposes a conceptual heuristic around processes of softening and hardening of both fences and property in order to challenge continuing processes of dispossession, injustice and unsustainable forms of conservation. Based on this heuristic, the article suggests various strategies, including a ‘right to wildlife’ and a ‘wildlife restitution’ process, to support redistributive justice in South African conservation.

Can redistributive policies promote reconciliation beyond its scope? The impact of inequality reduction programs on peacebuilding in Colombia

AbstractTransitional justice jurisdictions aim to promote reconciliation. Although previous research focuses on truth commissions, the reconciliatory role of redistributive justice is less clear. This article investigated the association of conditional cash transfers and victims’ reparation with demand for redistribution, belief in forgiveness, support for the peace process and community participation in Colombia. We analysed three nationally representative samples of the Latin American Public Opinion Project (LAPOP) surveys in 2011 (Study 1; n = 1503), 2016 (Study 2; n = 1563) and 2018 (Study 3; n = 1663). Consistently across studies, conditional cash transfers (and not victim reparation programs) predicted higher community participation, with little effect on other reconciliation indicators. Further, redistribution is indirectly associated with other reconciliation indicators through community participation, supporting the observation that transitional justice relates to reconciliation when it satisfies a need for agency and empowerment. We discuss how the null effects of the victim reparation program suggesting context‐specific constraints.

Alternative IP Theories: Social Planning and Redistributive Justice Guiding IP Protection

Alternative IP Theories: Social Planning and Redistributive Justice Guiding IP Protection

Surviving colonialism? A response to Neither Settler nor Native

This article engages Mahmood Mamdani's arguments in Neither Settler nor Native from the perspective of the question of Palestine. Sympathetic with his call to “decolonize the political” by severing nation from state, I, nevertheless, query his proposal to abandon, a priori, binaries such as “settler/native” and “perpetrator/victim” in order to achieve a decolonized state and polity. The unifying concept of the “survivor” that he proposes—that we are all survivors of the ravages of political modernity, I argue, has its own history and grammar of injury, victimhood, and identity that is not easily abandoned and certainly not in the context of Palestine. How might one achieve justice—redistributive justice, that is, rather than mere reconciliation—if political demands cannot be made in the name of the collectives (in this instance, Palestinians) who have suffered the displacement and violence of settler-colonialism? We might need to hold onto such binaries—even if only for a time and even as we recognize that what it means to be a “settler” does not remain stable over time—in order to decolonize the political in substantive rather than merely formal terms.

Discourse Analysis of Social Justice Policies in Post-Revolutionary Iran

: The article aims to analyze the discursive transformations of social justice to realize social welfare during five successive administrations in the Islamic Republic of Iran from 1981 to 2021. It analyzes institutional texts and official speeches by the presidents of each administration based on the discourse analysis method of Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe. The findings demonstrate that each government differently articulated the signifier of justice in its social policies. However, the central signification was tied to ‘poverty eradication’ in all five administrations. However, social justice was not considered a comprehensive discourse nor an inclusive strategic process, but rather was defined discursively by each government as a government-oriented project in a short-term perspective, mainly by reducing social justice to economic growth and redistribution of resources. Finally, according to the comprehensive discourse of the Islamic Revolution, I suggest the need to redefine social justice as the aim of realizing social welfare in Iranian society with regard to the comprehensive, multi-dimensional definition of justice which include: (1) equal access to resources and opportunities by providing backgrounds, range and scope for such opportunities; (2) considering the principle of entitlement and necessities; and (3) attention to redistributive justice and expansion of the government’s sup portive umbrella by focusing on the vulnerable and disadvantaged groups (social, physical and mental).

Indigeneidad, descolonización y la paradoja del desarrollismo extractivista en el Estado Plurinacional de Bolivia

Históricamente, los pueblos indígenas fueron marginados y oprimidos en la economía política boliviana. En tiempos de Evo Morales en la presidencia y con la Constitución de 2009, la descolonización política, económica, social y cultural ha llegado a ser el proyecto central de la transformación del Estado y la sociedad. Por un lado, la nueva Constitución ha sido clasificada como una de las más progresistas del mundo en relación con los derechos étnicamente definidos. Los principios indígenas ético-filosóficos del Suma Qamaña/Vivir Bien, acerca de la relación armónica entre individuos y naturaleza fueron incorporados en la Constitución. Por otro lado, estos derechos colisionan con los derechos sociales más amplios (definidos por clase), e igualmente, con los derechos del Estado de extraer y comercializar los recursos naturales (en especial hidrocarburos y minería) bajo la bandera de la justicia redistributiva, reformas sociales y bien común, que en este estudio se define como la paradoja del desarrollismo extractivista. Este artículo se basa en un trabajo etnográfico y se problematiza el dilema extractivista y las tensiones entre derechos étnicos y derechos de clase. De esta manera, se aporta a los debates sobre la indigeneidad y la los desafíos y dilemas de proyectos descolonizadores.

State, Land and Livelihood

Land is significant material, economic resource of our society and great number of people dependent on it. Equitable access to land not just provide access to economic need and survival to individual or community but also give impetus to other democratic and constitutional rights like education, health, food availability, social security and basic stability etc. Indian Constitution aspire for providing justice in every field and to establish an egalitarian social order which could ensure basic human rights. Under, the Neoliberal regime and economic ideology, the access to land to masses becoming difficult and even redistributive justice measures have been taking reverse step. The article is an attempt to understand the current situation around land and livelihood issues of large number of people in our country who are condemned to live in a desperate situation.

Politics of Recognition and Caste among Muslims: A Study of Shekhra Biradari of Bihar, India

The caste system among Muslim society has long been an ignorant point of debate in academia. But in recent times it emerged as a thoughtful discourse. The sociological study finds that Muslim society of India is divided into three major social groups, Ashraf, Ajlaf, and Arzal. Most Muslims of India belong to the latter two groups. The present study is an attempt to give an insight into an Arzal caste known as Shekhra. Shekhra has an occupational history of bone picking. The article will discuss how the struggle for social recognition harmed their demand for redistributive justice (reservation). They have been included in the Central OBC and in EBC in Bihar. However, later, reservation has been denied because of their self-misrecognition as Sheikh Biradari. The study is an attempt to explore the reasons behind it and suggests the possible way to find a solution.

Critical multimodal literacy practices in student‐created comics

AbstractIn the wake of grim events such as Russian invasion on Ukraine, Taliban takeover in Afghanistan, the death of George Floyd in America and mosque shootings in Christchurch, New Zealand, all occurring amid the pandemic of COVID‐19, it became increasingly more important to recognise literacy work that promotes a critically informed and just society. Thus, through the lens of critical literacy and intersectionality, this study sought to examine how pre‐service teachers drew on critical multimodal literacy practices to create open educational resources (OER) or openly licensed comics that motivate local, global and/or transnational literacy education. Data collection took place at a four‐year public university in Upstate New York. They included student‐created comics, student reflections, researcher's fieldnotes and course syllabus. Findings from the study reveal that the pre‐service teachers incorporated either a local, global or transnational connection to enact a social change. Further analysis shows that the OER or student‐created comics inherently involve actions which are aligned with the three principles of social justice: redistributive justice, recognitive justice and representational justice.

Re-educating thinking: philosophy, education, and pragmatism

Abstract John Dewey stated that ‘[h]owever far apart philosophy and educational theory may later have become, in their beginnings they were strictly identical.' Dewey's ‘progressivism' in Democracy and Education rests on this communion. A self-reflective philosophical education by the community, about the community, for the community, would create the conditions for the advance of social justice. But new progressive ideas championing redistributive justice might appear to be in worryingly short supply. That is one reason, among many, why Philip Kitcher’s The Main Enterprise of the World is to be welcomed. His rethinking about education amounts to a radical re-education of our thinking about social justice, seeking redistribution of wealth, reduction of privilege, and a redefinition of what is valuable for people and planet in regard to production, distribution, and consumption. I will summarize his book and offer critical thoughts on it relating to three themes: the relation of his proposed Deweyan Society to some current and powerful criticisms of Western rationality; his proposals for classrooms; and the extent to which its own pragmatic philosophical justifications are open to deeper philosophical and educational significance.

Algorithms of Oppression: How Search Engines Reinforce Racism

Algorithms of Oppression: How Search Engines Reinforce Racism

Justice perceptions of sanctions for unemployed welfare recipients

Institutions of the welfare state are supposed to function in accordance with normative principles of redistributive justice, which should guide not only the allocation but also the withdrawal of resources. Our study examines justice assessments of sanctions for unemployed individuals receiving welfare benefits, a much-discussed variant of benefit withdrawal. We present results from a factorial survey that asked German citizens to indicate which sanction they would perceive as just under different scenarios. In particular, we look at different kinds of deviant behavior on the part of the unemployed job seeker, which allows for a broad picture concerning potential sanction-triggering events. The findings show that the extent of sanctions perceived as just varies considerably across scenarios. Respondents would impose more sanctions on men, repeaters, and young people. Moreover, they have a clear picture of the severity of the deviant behavior.

Ruptures and resurgences: Marking the spatiality of transgender identity in India since the enactment of Transgender Persons Act 2019

Transgender groups in India constitute an indigenous community with a rich and vivid culture and history. However, it is unfortunate that under the hegemonic influence of heteronormative traditions, the democratic inclusion and accommodation of transgender groups could never take place. This exclusion and neglect have recently been challenged through the activism of several groups, which has given rise to a new chapter in the democratic unfolding in India. This article attempts to evaluate the social activism of transgender groups on two planes. One plane attempts to evaluate it in terms of the uniqueness of an indigenous social movement and the areas that distinguish it from other social movements. It is interesting to note that what started as a purely identity-based social movement has now acquired dimensions of redistributive justice. The second plane attempts to evaluate the social activism of transgender groups in terms of the achievements and advances made by the movement on the social and political fronts. This evaluation is necessary in order to appraise the trajectory of the politics of transgender groups, which could foretell the direction of the activism and help in understanding the future scope and direction. The article takes up three arguments in the context of the legal framework put in effect by the state. The first point of discussion is the effectiveness of the transgender ID provided by the Transgender Persons Act and the possible challenges and loopholes related to it. While the state provides legal recognition through the issuance of the transgender ID card, it only remains a symbolic marker as the de facto identity remains unchanged, unless changed by the person themselves. The second point of discussion is the emerging rift amongst transgender groups with respect to the reforms introduced recently. This rift has a tendency to pull in the opposite direction, causing tensions. The final aspect of my discussion relates to the subsequent challenges that emerge from the legal recognition of transgender persons. These challenges touch upon the various aspects of legal, political, social, and economic policymaking and are inevitable for understanding the concerns of transgender persons in India.

The ‘right’ policy for regional development: seeking spatial justice in the Dutch case of the region deals

ABSTRACT Central governments are increasingly preoccupied with problems of regional development, ranging from political discontent to sustainability transitions. New development funds are unfolded with different rationalities about what spatially just redistribution is. This paper aims to uncover in what ways issues are problematized in regional development policies, in which normative principle of redistributive justice the policy problem is primarily grounded, and how this affects regional development investments. This study critically examines an empirical case of policy for regional development in the Netherlands: the Region Deals (Regio Deals). The findings show that even though Dutch central government discursively problematized people who are left behind in the progress of the country, this priority was not maintained for places that are left behind. The Dutch case exemplifies that government rationalities about ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ regional development are a crucial factor to which regions benefit most from redistribution. Yet these rationalities are underexposed and inconsistently articulated in policy documents and political discourse.

Advancing the institutional perspective on informal entrepreneurship: a study of formalization intentions among street entrepreneurs

PurposeInformal entrepreneurship is seen as a direct outcome of either the failure of formal institutions or the asymmetry between formal and informal institutions. These two viewpoints are so far debated as alternative theoretical explanations for the prevalence of informal entrepreneurship. In this paper, the authors offer a theoretically integrative approach to further advance the institutional perspective of informal entrepreneurship. The purpose of this paper is to address these issues.Design/methodology/approachUsing face-to-face surveys of 322 street entrepreneurs from Lahore, Pakistan, the authors deploy the hitherto unused partial least square approach (PLS) to structural equation modeling (SEM) to analyze data within the field of informal entrepreneurship.FindingsThe empirical findings strongly support the theoretical propositions of the new institutional perspective that the authors present in their paper. The authors find no direct impact of factors like procedural justice, redistributive justice and public sector corruption (i.e. formal institutional failings) on the formalization intentions of street entrepreneurs. Their findings demonstrate that the relationship between formal institutional failings and formalization intentions can only be explained through the mediating role of institutional asymmetry (i.e. tax morality).Research limitations/implicationsFrom a policy perspective, the authors find that if they can encourage street entrepreneurs to obtain a local-level registration as the first step toward formalization, it will significantly increase their chances to opt for higher national-level registrations.Originality/valueThis paper presents a unique attempt to further understand the context of street entrepreneurship through the theoretical lens of the institutional theory. In doing so, it synthesizes the arguments of existing institutional perspectives and further develops the institutional theory of informal entrepreneurship. Moreover, the paper develops the concept of “formalization intentions”.