Unsettled Relations Research Articles

Обычай в регулировании отношений с использованием цифровых платформ

The article examines the features of legal custom as a source of regulation of relations in the digital environment. The doctrinal approaches of Russian scientists to the emergence and definition of the nature of custom in comparison with modern realities are compared. It is proved that unsettled relations with the use of digital platforms have now become a field for the creation and testing of new rules of community behavior, which in the near future can be formalized as digital legal customs, and later as norms of laws.

Family Values under the Auspices of Law: The New in Tradition and Tradition in the New

The paper analyzes prerequisites for the formation, content, types, methods of ensuring and protecting traditional family values that have been consolidated at the constitutional level with their subsequent implementation in the principles of family legislation, as well as in its key institutions and structures, namely: marriage, family, parenthood, childhood. Within each of them, the author determines gaps, unsettled relations, as well as decisions that do not meet the meaning of the latest constitutional amendments. The paper provides an assessment of typical and atypical doctrinal approaches to the diversity of significant family values, in particular the idea of auxiliary (peripheral) elements, including elements that are located in the «gray zone». Particular attention is paid to the compliance of the normative-legal structure of marriage and the family union related to it (actual marriage), parenthood, and the status of the child. The latter, taking into account the constitutional provision on the need to educate children in respect for elders, explicitly requires the addition of its content with elements of their duty (duties) under family law. It is suggested that there is a need to return to the idea of judicial specialization in family cases based on the actualization of attention to family problems, the state’s attitude to system protection and protection of its interests. The paper examines the problems of implementing the principle of family autonomy, protecting its sovereignty from arbitrary interference, ensuring the possibility of self-regulation, and emphasizes the need to maintain harmony between the independence of the family union and public control (prevention of deviant family development and response to factors and actions that destroy it).

Mountain regions in the legal space of Russia

The allocation of the mountainous regions of Russia as a subject of legal regulation is a relatively new trend in Russian lawmaking, which began in the 1990s. The initiation of the process of developing mountain laws was influenced by the international experience of European countries that have mountain areas in their composition. An important event at the end of 2020 is the adoption by the CIS Interparliamentary Assembly of the Model Law “On the Protection and Development of Mountain Areas”. The purpose of the article is to analyze modern initiatives in the field of legal support for the sustainable development of the mountain regions of Russia. The results are based on an analysis of documents adopted in the field of mountain legislation, as well as on interviews with experts and expeditionary work. The program for the development of the mountainous territories of Dagestan, initiated on the basis of the implementation of the regional law on mountainous territories, became a certain “litmus” test that revealed the problems of modernization and ensuring sustainable development in the mountains. These include, first of all, distrust of the government’s initiatives, unsettled land relations, fear of getting into credit dependence, the complexity of bureaucratic procedures, etc.

Participatory video: a new outlook for international relations research

ABSTRACT This article considers the implications of incorporating participatory video in International Relations (IR) research. Drawing on existing aesthetic and visual IR research, I critically reflect on a case study incorporating participatory video in research investigating young women’s leadership in Asia and the Pacific. Through participatory video, young women redressed their common invisibility and challenged portrayals situating them as unable to lead and make decisions. In this way, participatory video disrupted and unsettled power relations often resulting in young people’s marginalisation from policymaking. Given its ability to make space for productive reflections on, and challenges to, existing power dynamics amongst and between researchers, research participants, and the state, participatory video can productively push the boundaries of IR research. Limitations and challenges of using participatory video are also evident and require reflection. Overall, I suggest that participatory video can generate new critiques and knowledge to productively shape current and future IR research, including through offering unique insights that could be missed by other methods in IR, including other filmmaking approaches.

НАБЛИЖЕННЯ ДО МОДЕЛІ УПРАВЛІННЯ ПОРТ-ЛЕНДЛОРД: УКРАЇНСЬКИЙ КОНТЕКСТ

With the beginning of port reform in Ukraine, the model of port sector gover-nance was changed. Established in 2013, the Ukrainian Sea Ports Authority was endowed with administrative, maritime safety and security functions. Purely commercial activities remained with public and private stevedoring companies and marine terminals. This distribution of functionality in seaports has brought the domestic governance model closer to the well-known in North America and North-Western Europe – landlord-port model. The aspects identified as a result of the study,namely control over land plots, legal status of the Ukrainian Sa Ports Authority, the presence of state stevedores, and unsettled relations with local authorities, do not allow to classify the domestic port governance model in the classical sense of landlord-port. The latter points rather to a hybrid model in Ukraine with some elements of landlord-port model, such as concessions, private participation in services etc. The most vulnerable element in the context of the port-landlord model at the Ukrainian Sea Ports Authority is the lack of a mechanism for managing port areas due to the presence of several types of landowners in a seaport including public, local and private entities. The article proposes a number of measures, including corporatization of the Ukrainian Sea Ports Authority, amendments to the legislation, innovations in the distribution of concession fees, support of the state's exit from the stevedoring activity segment in ports, as wellas an inventory of port territories, the implementation of which can qualitatively bring the Ukrainian model closer to the port management practices of North-Western Europe. In addition, involvement of local authorities into activities of seaport councils as permanent members, and -after corporatization of Ukrainian Sea Ports Authority- to participate in pilot projects of joint ownership of autonomous port authorities (for example in the ports of Odessa and Mykolayiv) could facilitate a sustainable cooperation between a port and local governance

Inter-Branch Analogy in the Practice of Overcoming Gaps in the Legal Regulation of "Golden Parachute" Payments

The author of the article explains the advantages of using the method of inter-branch analogy and the use of established civil-law mechanisms to govern unsettled labor relations associated with the need to exercise judicial control over the amount of compensation paid for early dismissal to chief executive officers, their deputies, chief accountants of organizations in cases when dismissal occurs in the absence of any wrongdoing on behalf of an employee due to the change of ownership of the legal entity property or individuals controlling the legal entity. The author argues that lack of clear regulatory criteria applicable to determine the limits of discretion to establish the amount of such payments, legal uncertainty with respect of prior approval necessity and possibility of subsequent challenge of "golden parachutes" agreements on behalf of the beneficiaries of the organization constitute the most significant legal gap in the field in question. Due to the fact that a high degree of similarity was established with respect of the regime of transactions and labor agreements of top managers with regard to "golden parachutes" arrangements and a significant legal similarity was revealed between "golden parachutes" and civil law compensations paid to the creditor when the debtor exercised the right to unilaterally refuse to fulfill of the obligation, the author insists on doctrinal support for the application of rules applied to challenge major transactions and (or) interested party transactions to labor "golden parachutes" agreements, as well as the application of the mechanism of judicial reduction of abusive civil-law compensation to labor disputes in question.

Fluid attachments in Northeast India: introduction

This introduction presents the context and theoretical basis of fluidity of attachments in Northeast India. A large cultural, linguistic, and ethnic diversity, an international border situation, and various forms of unsettled relations with ‘mainstream India’ characterize Northeast India. These aspects form the frame of highly dynamic movements of identity and ethnicity formation. This special issue includes five papers that focus on these dynamics in terms of ‘fluidity’; they present new situations of shift between different layers of identification, re-signification of cultural practices in the process of their selection as emblems of groups‘ identity, changes in groups’ specific practices after religious conversion, and shifts from one identity to another. They show that shifts of ethnic identity are old processes in the region, whereas other levels of identification, such as lineages, clans, villages, and new ‘cosmopolitan’ identities coexist alongside ethnic identity, and gain particular salience in certain situations or points of time.

Fiji’s Foreign Relations: Retrospect and Prospect

Of all the island states of the Southwest Pacific, Fiji’s foreign relations have been the most fraught since the advent of independence in the region, due largely to a succession of coups d'état. These have invariably precipitated adverse responses from major partners and aid donors, notably Australia, New Zealand, the United States and the European Union. The last coup in 2006 also unsettled relations in Fiji’s more immediate region, especially among some of its smaller Polynesian neighbours, contributing to Fiji’s unprecedented suspension from the Pacific Islands Forum. This article reviews Fiji’s foreign relations from the time of independence in 1970 through the period of successive coups to the 2014 elections. It also examines Bainimarama’s strategies in extending foreign relations in the broader international sphere as well as issues surrounding the ‘normalisation’ of relations with its traditional partners.

Who is Responsible for Instability in the Democratic Republic of Congo?

The research focuses on the problem of military-political instability in the Democratic Republic of the Congo experiencing continued armed conflict for a long time. Dozens of illegal armed groups both Congolese and foreign origin continue to destabilize situation in the eastern part of the country causing humanitarian disasters. Due to governmental weakness, economic backwardness, chronical lack of finance resources, interethnic conflicts, all-round and widely spread corruption of the authorities, the Congolese government at the moment is not able to overcome scores of problems including the problem of security. Assistanceprovided to the DRC by itspartnerssuch as, first of all, the former metropolitan country Belgium, as well as the USA, Great Britain, the Europe Union and China works only in favourof these country-donors. They are attracted by rich Congolese natural resources which the DRC remaining one of the poorest countries in the world cannot turn to advantage to the full extent because of its economic backwardness. In exchange for so-calleddevelopment programmes, expensive strategic raw material (such as coltan, wolfram, casseterit, cooper, gold, niobium, and other) is being extracted and exported from the country, in addition, often on the inequivalent basis. This is taking place for the reason that numerous mines and open-cast mines are being controlled by different illegal armed groups and not by the central government. Therefore, it turns out that in the context of a military-political crisis, for so-called partners it is more beneficial to pursue their own interests. Furthermore, western ideologists arouse "separatism-oriented" theories similar to "balkanization", in other words, a breakdown of this giant country into several independent states. The Congolese are tremulous to this issue, they try to counter such approachs and defend the territorial integrity of the DRC. However, it is not an easy task. The impediment is unsettled relations with neighbouring countries - Rwanda, Uganda and Burundi which for tens of years exploit illegally natural resources of the DRC and try to lay hold of frontier Congolese territories.

International reactions to the Scottish referendum

The referendum on whether Scotland should become an independent country will be held on 18 September 2014. This article reflects on the evolution of foreign governments' attitudes towards the referendum since its confirmation in October 2012, and on their expectations should a �yes� vote result. With few exceptions, they have adopted a policy of non-intervention, treating the referendum as the UK's domestic affair. President Obama's expression on 5 June 2014 of his desire for the UK to remain �a strong, robust, united and effective partner� may, however, be seen as a sign of increasing apprehension abroad. Concerns of foreign governments aroused by the referendum include the diminution of the UK's power and role in international affairs, the possible encouragement of other secessionist movements, and disturbance to international organizations and alliances. It is commonly assumed that Scotland would become a reasonably prosperous and reliable small state. But how would the rest of the UK (rUK), a much more powerful and populous country, respond to �the loss of Scotland�? How would it affect the UK's already unsettled relations with the EU, including the prospect of a referendum on EU membership? Despite many uncertainties and a febrile political atmosphere, it is widely expected abroad that Scotland and rUK would settle into a cooperative relationship after a difficult transitional period, and that an independent Scotland would be accepted into the EU and NATO if it displayed flexibility on important issues.

The Stands of the Political Parties in the Republic of Macedonia towards the 2001 Armed Conflict and the Signing of the OFA Agreement

Although the dissolution of the ex Yugoslav Federation is one of the bloodiest processes of the newer European history, due to e specific set of factors and circumstances the Republic of Macedonia was the only country that managed to separate from the federation without a single shot being fired. But as it was later proved, The Republic of Macedonia was not immune and was faced with an armed conflict at the beginning of this century due to the many unsolved issues that had mostly to do with the unsettled interethnic relations in the country. The Armed Conflict of 2001, was without a doubt perceived a turning point in the development of the Republic of Macedonia. This paper strives to provide insides regarding the attitudes of the main political parties and political elites in the country regarding the 2001 conflict and the evolution in their attitudes during the conflict and nowadays a whole century after the conflict has ended. DOI: 10.5901/ajis.2014.v3n3p388

Conflict of roles: A conflict of ideas? The unsettled relations between care team staff and independent mental health advocates

Drawing on a national study of independent mental health advocacy, we explored the social relations of independent advocacy. The study was commissioned by the Department of Health (England), and involved a case study design covering eight different geographies and service configurations, and interviews or focus groups with a total of 289 stakeholders across two phases of inquiry. This paper focused on the analysis of qualitative data relevant to the relationship between mental health-care services and independent advocacy services, drawn from interviews with 214 participants in phase two of the study. Discussion of these particular findings affords insights into the working relations of independent advocacy within mental health services beset by reorganizational change and funding cuts, and increasing levels of legally-sanctioned compulsion and coercion. We offer a matrix, which accounts for the different types of working relationships that can arise, and how these are associated with various levels of understanding of independent advocacy and appreciation for the value of advocacy. The discussion is framed by the wider literature on advocacy and the claims by practitioners, such as nurses, for an advocacy role as part of their professional repertoire.

Unsettled Relations: Schools, Gay Marriage, and Educating for Sexuality

AbstractIn this article, Cris Mayo examines the relationship among anti‐LGBTQ policies, gay marriage, and sexuality education. Her concern is that because gay marriage is insufficiently different from heterosexual marriage, adding it as an issue to curriculum or broader culture debate elides rather than addresses sexual difference. In other words, marriage may be an assimilative aspiration that closes down discussions of what sexuality is and can mean, that sidesteps other related social issues such as health care for all, and that reinforces sexuality and gender identity as privatized, not political, concerns. Mayo examines different strands of LGBTQ history that complicate the meanings of sexuality and that critique a variety of antigay or heterosexist policies for their exclusions. She concludes by suggesting that the possibilities of sexuality are not served by advocacy for one gay relationship formation and calling for a sexuality education that is instead directed at sexual diversity.

Unsettled Relations: Feminism and Cultural Studies

"Unsettled Relations: Feminism and Cultural Studies." TOPIA: Canadian Journal of Cultural Studies, 9(), pp. 124–125