Strange Bedfellows Research Articles

Strange Bedfellows: US Occupation Officials and German Catholic Organizations

Strange Bedfellows: US Occupation Officials and German Catholic Organizations

Strange Bedfellows: Cross-Sectoral Interactions in a Mandatory CSR Regime

Strange Bedfellows: Cross-Sectoral Interactions in a Mandatory CSR Regime

Making for “strange bedfellows”: the Women, Peace and Security agenda after UNSCRs 2467 and 2493

ABSTRACT In 2019, a year before the twentieth anniversary of the adoption of United Nations Security Council Resolution (UNSCR) 1325, the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) adopted two more resolutions – UNSCRs 2467 and 2493 – under the Women, Peace and Security (WPS) thematic agenda. The WPS agenda is considered revolutionary for bringing women’s rights and security into the UNSC; however, it also reflects the precariousness of the alliance between feminist activists and the UNSC. During the drafting of UNSCRs 2467 and 2493, the United States (US), Russia, and China – all permanent members of the UNSC – objected to the inclusion of certain language in the final texts. The US pushed for the deletion of language on sexual and reproductive health from UNSCR 2467, while Russia and China challenged the definition of women human rights defenders in UNSCR 2493. These objections epitomize and contribute to the global pushback on women’s rights and security, which foregrounds concerns that the UNSC and feminist activists make for “strange bedfellows.” In this article, we consider whether the UNSC has been used as a forum to damage women’s rights and security.

The Dark Side of Branding: Language and the Real in Colson Whitehead’s Apex Hides the Hurt (2006)

The protagonist, an unnamed African American nomenclature consultant, has been a victim of his own trade: his stroke of genius, the name and advertising slogan for a band-aid that fits the many skin tones of multicultural America, “Apex Hides the Hurt”, has ironically cost him an infected toe that he merely covered with the adhesive bandage instead of having it treated. When he is asked to arbitrate the rebranding of the town of Winthrop, the ad man faces both an onomastic and an existential challenge.This paper draws on specific aspects of the philosophy of language to discuss the motivation of signs in relation to naming strategies and analyzes the performatives, performances, and diverse conditions of felicity that naming implies. The former is indebted in part to the legacy of Plato’s Cratylus and branding manuals—strange bedfellows; the latter draws from J. L. Austin’s speech act theory, as revisited by Barbara Cassin and Judith Butler. In both conceptions the real comes to dwell in language, either as a determining factor or as a product of a world-shaping activity. Since Apex is a fiction of naming, it provides an imaginary “actual” context for this verbal act. It can also describe the failed encounters between language and the real, the attempts at euphemizing or repressing reality, as well as the shattering irruptions of the real within discourse. As a satire of corporate culture and its bearing on “race”, it also generates an interface with the reality of contemporary American culture.

Off-balance-sheet policies to the rescue: The role of statistical expertise for European public–private partnerships

Off-balance-sheet policies are an important but understudied phenomenon that emerged from a technical subtlety in the calculation of public debt statistics. Taking the case of an exemplary European off-balance-sheet policy, public–private partnerships (PPPs), this paper analyzes the technocratic processes that allow the emergence of such debt-neutral instruments. In the aftermath of the sovereign debt crisis, off-balance-sheet policies have become an important policy tool for Member States in the European Economic and Monetary Union, enabling them to strike a balance between the perceived ‘public investment gap’ and the mantra of fiscal consolidation. The case study shows how the lack of political solutions to Europe’s investment-consolidation conundrum leaves it to technical experts to find workable solutions within the existing rules. The off-balance-sheet status of PPPs came under threat in 2014 but was reaffirmed through a coordinated effort by two strange bedfellows: the European Investment Bank (EIB), a promoter of PPPs, and Eurostat, the European authority responsible for public debt and deficit indicators. I argue that Eurostat and the EIB have entered into strategic cooperation to increase each other’s room for manoeuvre, diffuse political pressure and avoid bureaucratic overload. This paper contributes to a better understanding of the role of technocrats and their expertise, which shape the mutual relations between fiscal constraints and financialized investment policies in the European investor states.

Strange Bedfellows or Trusted Comrades? Digital Solidarity Building among Myanmar’s Revolutionaries

The shock and anger felt by the Myanmar public as they witnessed their democratically elected government deposed in an illegal military coup in early 2021 has led to a revolutionary break in Burmese politics. The Bamar Buddhist political elites, formerly silent on the Rohingya Muslim crisis, apologised for failing to administer justice for the Rohingya victims; the coup breathed new life and possibilities into the formation of a federal democracy; and young students and strike leaders dared to challenge the dominance of the elites. However, little is known about whether this struggling together against military dictatorship might enable a broad-based development of solidarity among Myanmar’s traditionally divided ethnic communities. Since many revolutionary communities across Myanmar took to social media to mobilise resistance, studying these groups’ online interactions can provide critical insights to this question. By analysing conversations over the year following the coup on three of the most popular resistance Facebook groups from Bamar and non-Bamar communities, this article finds a two-step process of inter-ethnic solidarity building, driven by both instrumentalist interest and organic empathy. The findings deepen understanding on solidarity building among diverse anti-dictatorship forces, revolution dynamics in post-coup Myanmar, and the role of social media on forging inter-communal empathy.

Social enterprise, food justice, and food sovereignty: Strange bedfellows or systemic supports?

There is a debate in the literature about whether one can address food system problems with mar­ket-based approaches while seeking food justice or food sovereignty. However, as part of a team of researchers and community leaders, we have found that this debate is less relevant in practice. The concepts are interrelated within real-world food systems. As such, we were motivated to ask, how do social enterprises (SEs) interact with food jus­tice and food sovereignty movements and their visions in order to realize more democratic and equitable local food systems in communities? To answer this question, we conducted a systematic review at the intersection of SE, food sovereignty, and food justice literature. Analyzing nine articles, which included 17 food-related SEs, we found evi­dence of potential interactions between food SEs, food justice, and food sovereignty that are compat­ible (e.g., create employment) and incompatible (e.g., limited ability to address issues like commu­nity employability and green gentrification). The lit­erature includes at least three important character­istics that inform how food-related SEs may interact with food justice and sovereignty, includ­ing employee and ownership demographics, the enterprise business model, and aspects of the food system targeted by the enterprise via market activi­ties. If we consider a systems perspective, we can envision the ways in which the aspects are embed­ded and interdependent in a neoliberal society. SEs, as market-based agents for social change, exist in the same system as justice and sovereignty.

“The Making of Strange Bedfellows”. A Shakespeare Quotation and Its Propagation of New Proverbs

Starting as a literary quotation, “Misery acquaints a man with strange bedfellows” from William Shakespeare’s romance The Tempest (1611) reached somewhat of a proverbial status over time but certainly never became a generally employed folk proverb. That was left to its shortened rephrasing “Misery makes strange bedfellows” and its subsequent proverbial variants “Misfortune makes strange bedfellows”, “Necessity makes strange bedfellows”, “Adversity makes strange bedfellows”, “Poverty makes strange bedfellows”, and the somewhat newer “Business makes strange bedfellows.” They all have become proverbs in their own right, and yet, “Politics makes strange bedfellows” wins the prize as far as its general currency and high frequency in oral and written communications since the late eighteenth century to the present time is concerned. As numerous historical references show, Shakespeare’s original text resulted in the fascinating propagation of several proverbs following the structure of “X makes strange bedfellows.” As such they have become so popular that anti-proverbs and mere allusions are based on them, easily recalling the underlying proverbs. It might well be that even more modern proverbs will be coined on this well-established pattern in due time. With ever more textual databases becoming available, earlier historical references might well be found, but the present case study has left no proverbial stone unturned for now.

Strange Bedfellows: How the Need for Good Governance Shapes Budgetary Control of Bureaucracy

Strange Bedfellows: How the Need for Good Governance Shapes Budgetary Control of Bureaucracy

MAGIC IN THE AIR: MEMES, MAGIC, AND THE INTERNET

Leading up to, during, and immediately following the 2016 US election of Donald Trump, there was buzz about magic on the internet. From the meme magic of the cult of Kek to liberal witches performing binding spells, magic seemed to emerge out of thin air. However, while technology and the occult may seem like strange bedfellows, they have a cozier historical relationship then we often acknowledge. For instance, it has been well-documented that there was a synergetic relationship between telegraphy and spiritualism (Sconce, 2000) and we can consider ciphers used to construct grimoires as an antecedent to modern techno-cryptography (Reeds, 1998). In this paper, I historicize internet magic situating the recent online magical wars within the broader context of both digital and occult histories. Just as spiritualist séances articulated hopes and anxieties of mass communication, meme magic speaks to contemporary concerns and desires about information spread.

Strange Bedfellows: Anti-trans Feminists, VOX Supporters and Biologicist Academics

In 2015 and 2016, Professor Esther Mayoko Arjonilla and I wrote two articles that demonstrated the absence of major conflicts between feminist and trans movements in Spain. We explained that since the democratic transition of the 1970s, Spanish feminism had been strongly committed to the sexual and reproductive rights of ‘women’, an inclusive category. This also applied to lesbians, though not without some internal struggles to claim that space (Pineda 2008). We hypothesized that lesbian feminist groups had been the necessary allies for the inclusion of trans women, often based on factors like personal friendship ties, and their leadership in addressing sexual rights (Platero & Arjonilla, 2015). Another key element was the overlap between the two movements in the feminist critique of the pathologization of women, in consonance with critiques of the psychopathologization of trans women.

Serv/eillance: Cops, Queers, and Clinics in Segregated Chicago

Abstract The Chicago Police Department’s community policing program partners with several LGBTQ service providers in and around Chicago’s white middle class “gayborhood.” These organizations make strange bedfellows for law enforcement, given that many of their clients are queer and trans people of color (QTPOC) and, indeed, targets of policing and gentrification projects. This study draws on eighteen months of ethnography and in-depth interviews to examine motivations and consequences of these inter-agency unions. The study finds that non-governmental organizations (NGOs) are incorporated into racialized policing strategies through mechanisms ranging from contractual agreement to implicit expectation. While NGOs resist directly criminalizing their QTPOC clients, some discourage them from lingering around service centers, effectively making them invisible in the white gayborhood. Findings demonstrate that in a post-welfare police state, sexual health governance is racially and economically circumscribed, as well as mediated, by institutional intimacies between governmental and non-governmental agencies. I argue that LGBTQ service provision is situated within a multilevel monitoring system, a structure I term “serv/eillance.” Providing services to LGBTQ+POC becomes conditioned on state surveillance, while receiving services is conditioned on being surveilled, by police or by proxy.

The strange bedfellows of populism and liberalism: the effect of populist attitudes on the perception of the COVID-19 pandemic and policies to contain it

The COVID-19 pandemic has had a significant impact on everyday life, where people feel affected both economically and health-wise by the spread of the novel virus, regardless of whether they have contracted it or not. At the same time, we know that populist attitudes influence how people perceive their individual situation, the political environment, and available policy solutions. Are these two factors interrelated? This article examines the role that populist attitudes play (a) in subjective feelings of being affected by the COVID-19 pandemic and (b) in choosing policies to counteract its spread. Populist attitudes may lead people to reject the policy-making process during the COVID-19 pandemic, shaped primarily by experts. The article argues that this should increase the sense of concern among people with populist orientations and lead to a rejection of commonly discussed policies to contain the virus. To test this connection empirically, we conducted a representative survey in Austria in September 2020. Our analysis shows a significant and substantive correlation between populist attitudes and the subjective feeling of being affected by the crisis in the areas of health and the economy. Similarly, we find evidence that populist attitudes affect the acceptability of policies to combat the spread of COVID-19. These findings indicate that populist attitudes have such strong effects on individuals’ perception of the world that they even influence the perception of the globally shared challenge of a pandemic.

Strange Bedfellows: Consumer Protection and Competition Policy in the Making of the EU Privacy Regime

AbstractHow was the European Union's privacy regime built? Drawing on regime theory and carrying out qualitative document analysis, we present the evolution of the privacy regime across the three decades from the 1995 European Data Protection Directive to the 2016 General Data Protection Regulation, the 2022 Data Governance Act and finally the 2022 Digital Markets package. Our analysis focuses on the European Commission and suggests that the privacy regime emerged out of the seemingly conflicting interplay between the (digital) single market whose power draws on the network effects of expanding data resources and concerns for personal privacy that seek limiting data gathering itself. Contrary to expectations, potential tensions between competition law and consumer protection have not hindered or decelerated the formation of the regulatory regime. In fact, these tensions have proven to be surprisingly productive.

A Comedian in the Pulpit: Empowering the Use of Humor in Preaching

Each week, the preacher mounts the pulpit with many tools to deliver an impactful sermon. One element of preaching that the black church should embrace is humor. Humor and preaching may appear strange bedfellows, but humor is embedded in the art of black preaching. This study explores humor within the confines of the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church.

Are the Covid-19 Pandemic and Public Procurement ‘Strange Bedfellows’? An African Perspective

The purpose of this article is to provide insights into how the Covid-19 pandemic has affected public procurement operations, and the role of public procurement during the pandemic. The article synthesises relevant literature on Covid-19 and public procurement in the African context. A review of literature from 2020 to 2022 was done to enrich the findings of the current article, which shows that the Covid-19 pandemic affected public procurement in the form of delays, malpractice, budget reallocations and supply disruptions. Furthermore, during the Covid-19 pandemic it was recommended that public procurement practices be more strategic through collaboration, and respond more quickly in obtaining vaccines and health supplies, which were critical in the prevention and treatment of related illnesses. The article provides several practical implications in terms of ensuring good governance, implementing regulatory frameworks for emergency procurement, improving collaboration among members of comparable regional organisations, and implementing Covid-19 preventative measures. Finally, because the current study’s scope is limited in terms of the selection of published articles and other relevant literature that give insights about the African continent during this period, future studies could be conducted to include literature from outside the African continent in order to broaden the scope of this current study.

Strange bedfellows: Mammal burrow disturbances may provide thermoregulatory microsites for fossorial reptiles in densely vegetated dunes

AbstractBurrow excavation by mammals generates heterogeneity within landscapes. Globally, these disturbances are known to provide significant ecosystem benefits. Most investigations of native Australian burrowing mammal disturbances has focused on the role of burrows in landscape function and interspecific thermal refugia. Herein, we present a novel observation of the fossorial skink Lerista bougainvillii utilizing burrow mounds of the common wombat (Vombatus ursinus) for possible thermoregulatory gains. In the early morning, when thermoregulatory opportunities were limited, L. bougainvillii were detected in mounds that appeared hotter than adjoining vegetation. These observations suggest that in densely vegetated habitats thermal heterogeneity caused by mammal burrows may offer important thermoregulatory opportunities for fossorial species with limited climbing capacity.

Strange bedfellows: Why right‐wing intellectuals in South Korea chose to cooperate with their country's former coloniser

AbstractWhy and when do today's Far‐Right groups cooperate across national boundaries? This paper seeks to provide answers to these questions by examining a deviant rather than representative case: the transnational connections between right‐wing intellectuals in South Korea and Japan. Analysing the recent publication of a highly controversial and provocative book and the transnational politics around it, we emphasise the roles of right‐wing intellectuals and the processes by which divergent political interests converge in changing geopolitical and domestic political contexts. By situating Far Right activities in its broader context of shaping—colonial history, American hegemony and the confrontation with socialist regimes such as China and North Korea—this paper develops a contextual account of the transnational Far Right.

Strange Bedfellows: The Alliance Theory of Political Belief Systems

What explains the contents of political belief systems? A widespread view is that they derive from abstract values, like equality, tolerance, and authority. Here, we challenge this view, arguing instead that belief systems derive from political alliance structures that vary across nations and time periods. When partisans mobilize support for their political allies, they generate patchwork narratives that appeal to ad-hoc, and often incompatible, moral principles. In the first part of the paper, we explain how people choose their allies, and how they support their allies using propagandistic tactics. In the second part, we show how these choices and tactics give rise to political alliance structures, with their strange bedfellows, and the idiosyncratic contents of belief systems. If Alliance Theory is correct, then we need a radically different approach to political psychology—one in which belief systems arise not from deep-seated moral values, but from ever-shifting alliances and rivalries.

Medical Profession and Research: Strange Bedfellows

Medical Profession and Research: Strange Bedfellows