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- Co-Ability and embodied data: blurring the lines between human and
nonhuman entities in an interconnected world
Authors: Renata Dezso
Abstract: This article explores the dynamic interplay between human and non-human entities, focusing on how embodied data representation is distributed. It examines how predictive coding, which utilizes preconceived knowledge, interacts with tangible experiences to shape our understanding of the world. Emphasizing this, I propose the concept of co-Ability as a deep underlying explanatory framework for understanding adaptive behaviors within a networked world. A non-verbal dialog between humans and a data-saturated environment is analyzed through an action-oriented perspective and the predictive coding framework in cognition, utilizing digital craft and rapid prototyping. This transformative approach augments human interaction with digital landscapes through tangible prototypes, bridging physical experience with abstract information, and identifying potential ways to conceptualize data materially. The article discusses the various aspects of connectivity among network agents and the evolving nature of these connections as they adapt to real-world conditions and dynamic shifts in data, highlighting that information exchange in an interconnected network is more than bilateral; it generates ripple effects that extend beyond immediate connections. These reciprocal exchanges simultaneously alter both the digital and analog domains, with data constantly bifurcating into multiple pathways and outcomes. A significant challenge addressed in this article is the question of how to frame information materially, inviting further exploration.
PubDate: 2024-07-23T00:00:00Z
- Vulnerability of elderly people during climate-induced disasters in
Sub-Saharan Africa: a scoping review
Authors: Frans Koketso Matlakala, Katlego Magdeline Rantho, Curwyn Mapaling
Abstract: Climate-induced disasters present significant challenges to vulnerable populations, especially elderly individuals with disabilities who face unique difficulties in preparing for, responding to, and recovering from such catastrophic events. Despite growing concerns about the impact of climate-induced disasters in sub-Saharan Africa, there is a notable lack of information regarding the specific vulnerabilities experienced by elderly people with disabilities in this region. This study aims to address this gap by identifying and synthesizing the existing literature on the subject. Researchers conducted a scoping review, selecting articles from regional (Sabinet African Journals, Science Direct) and global databases (PubMed, PsycINFO, and ProQuest) using search strategies with Boolean operators, truncations, and MeSH terms. The review included primary studies (qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods) published between 2013 and 2023 that met specified inclusion and exclusion criteria, with a focus on assessing the quality of the included studies. The findings revealed that elderly people in sub-Saharan Africa face significant physical, cognitive, and socio-economic challenges due to limited access to resources, inadequate infrastructure, and social exclusion. These challenges are amplified in the sub-Saharan context, highlighting a critical gap in inclusive risk reduction strategies during disasters. The review emphasizes an urgent need for targeted research and the development of community-based intervention programmes to improve the resilience and wellbeing of elderly individuals with disabilities facing climate-induced disasters. This study not only mapped the existing literature but also underscored the scarcity of research in the field of climate-induced disasters, with only six articles focusing on the elderly. The researchers recommend the development of more inclusive disaster risk reduction strategies and policies.
PubDate: 2024-07-16T00:00:00Z
- Strategies of survival, livelihood, and resistance in transit: a narrative
Authors: Maria De Jesus, Bronwyn Warnock, Zoubida Moumni, Zara Hassan Sougui, Lionel Pourtau
Abstract: The concept of “transit” is an understudied phenomenon in migration studies. Transit is not necessarily a linear and unidirectional temporal movement from origin to destination countries, nor is it a clearly demarcated event in time and space. This article examines the complex dimensions of transit, that is, the geospatial, social, economic, psychological, and relational aspects that both shape and are being shaped by asylum seekers. Drawing on a unique qualitative phenomenological approach, the study utilizes an in-depth case narrative to trace and analyze the transit of Mamadou, a Guinean 26-year-old male asylum seeker in France. The salient themes of the narrative fall into five parts: (1) Triggers of transit; (2) Transit as a survival strategy; (3) The complex legal hurdles of asylum; (4) The politics of discomfort and dispersal; and (5) Acts of resistance. Throughout the narrative, an analytic lens is interwoven as informed by relevant literature. The results highlight how Mamadou's migration trajectory is characterized by various cycles of trauma, while he simultaneously employs survival, livelihood, and resistance strategies to confront and overcome these different forms of trauma. This paper highlights the much-needed call to depoliticize transit through adopting a pragmatic approach to asylum that promotes a virtuous cycle of policies, which contribute to the wellbeing and integration of asylum seekers.
PubDate: 2024-07-10T00:00:00Z
- Challenges for unaccompanied asylum-seeking minors in Swedish compulsory
institutional care
Authors: Isabelle Stjerna Doohan, Mehdi Ghazinour, Malin Eriksson, Mojgan Padyab, Johanna Sundqvist
Abstract: This qualitative thematic study aimed to examine the placement of unaccompanied asylum-seeking minors in compulsory institutional care in Sweden, to expand knowledge regarding their care and treatment. The dataset comprised official documents and anonymized journal documents from personnel detailing the experiences of twenty-five unaccompanied asylum-seeking minors in compulsory institutional care organized by the Swedish National Board of Institutional Care in 2015. The study identified three main themes: traumatic life events and mental health, alignment between needs, goals, and treatment, and language difficulties. The findings revealed a high prevalence of severe traumatic experiences among the asylum-seeking minors, with half having endured significant psychological and physical trauma. Mental health issues were inconsistently addressed, and prior traumas were often overlooked in care planning. The majority exhibited various mental health problems, underscoring the need for tailored interventions. The study highlights challenges in aligning unaccompanied asylum-seeking minors' individual needs, treatment goals, and provided care. Language barriers emerged as a critical concern, impeding effective communication and treatment. Approximately 80% of the asylum-seeking minors experienced difficulties in understanding and expressing themselves in Swedish. The limited use of professional interpreters further exacerbated this issue. The study underscores the need for targeted interventions to better support unaccompanied asylum-seeking minors within compulsory institutional settings.
PubDate: 2024-07-10T00:00:00Z
- The use of digital platforms by citizen aid actors during the Ukraine
humanitarian crisis
Authors: Tererai Obey Sithole
Abstract: Following the Ukraine humanitarian crisis, which was a result of the war in Ukraine, ordinary citizens stepped up to spontaneously coordinate various humanitarian responses to support affected populations. In this article such individuals who founded or coordinated this form of spontaneous humanitarian aid are referred to as citizen aid actors (CAA). This paper explores the work of citizen aid actors in Poland, a country which received many of the people displaced by the war in Ukraine. The study applies the concept of digital affordances to illustrate and argue that citizen aid actors relied on the features available on digital platforms to attain their goals. It is an outcome of a qualitative research approach where interviews, participant observation, and analysis of relevant online material about the studied citizen aid actors were used as methods of collecting data. The findings indicate that these actors used diverse digital platforms at different stages of the humanitarian aid projects, from establishment, organization and sustenance. While this study demonstrates how specific digital platforms contributed to the accomplishment of the work done by CAAs, it also highlights how problematic it can be when the actors largely rely on digital platforms. As such, potential risks associated with overreliance on digital platforms as a way of implementing projects are factored in. Ensuing concerns include the presence of online trolls, the spreading of fake news, and internet disruptions as potential obstacles for the success of the aid projects.
PubDate: 2024-07-09T00:00:00Z
- Transparency and accountability in AI systems: safeguarding wellbeing in
the age of algorithmic decision-making
Authors: Ben Chester Cheong
Abstract: The rapid integration of artificial intelligence (AI) systems into various domains has raised concerns about their impact on individual and societal wellbeing, particularly due to the lack of transparency and accountability in their decision-making processes. This review aims to provide an overview of the key legal and ethical challenges associated with implementing transparency and accountability in AI systems. The review identifies four main thematic areas: technical approaches, legal and regulatory frameworks, ethical and societal considerations, and interdisciplinary and multi-stakeholder approaches. By synthesizing the current state of research and proposing key strategies for policymakers, this review contributes to the ongoing discourse on responsible AI governance and lays the foundation for future research in this critical area. Ultimately, the goal is to promote individual and societal wellbeing by ensuring that AI systems are developed and deployed in a transparent, accountable, and ethical manner.
PubDate: 2024-07-03T00:00:00Z
- Refugee agency in secondary mobility decision-making: a systematic
literature review
Authors: Sinem Kavak, Mo Hamza, Thomas Gammeltoft-Hansen, Russell A. Stone
Abstract: Decisions made by millions of refugees about where to go, how to make a living and how to secure a future are fundamental drivers of secondary movements. While a substantial body of literature addresses factors contributing to migrants’ decision-making, a comprehensive understanding of the central role of refugees in secondary mobility decision-making, including agency and strategies employed, remains underexplored. This is partly due to the belief that refugees are constrained by external and structural factors and cannot exercise agency, which we challenge. This article provides a systematic analysis of the literature on refugees’ secondary mobility decision-making processes. Using a systematic literature review (SLR) methodology, it presents an in-depth analysis of 40 peer-reviewed, English-language research articles selected from the Web of Science and Scopus databases published before September 2022. The article critically examines the drivers, prevailing dichotomies and conceptual frameworks surrounding refugee categorization, agency, and mobility. By synthesizing a wide range of literature, our paper presents emerging alternative concepts and frameworks that shed light on the complex dynamics of decision-making.
PubDate: 2024-07-02T00:00:00Z
- Common animals: sedentary pastoralism and the emergence of the commons as
an institution
Authors: Katherine Kanne, Mark Haughton, Ryan Lash
Abstract: Animal husbandry was of fundamental consequence in the planning and development of larger and more permanent communities. Pastoralism is often assumed to be highly mobile when considering social institutions and political formations, despite the diversity of husbandry practices that are either wholly, or largely, tethered to relatively sedentary social aggregations. Key tenets of more settled animal husbandry are intensive social relations between people, and between people, animals, and landscapes. This entails reciprocal, multispecies cooperative efforts to decide how to utilize pastoral resources, choose where to settle, and how to organize settlements with an eye for the animals. Yet, scholars have rarely considered how the logistics and social dynamics of pastoralism shaped the transition to sedentism and, particularly, the development of collective forms of governance in prehistory. In this paper, we re-center pastoralism in narratives of settling down, in order to recognize the critical ways that relations with animals shaped how humans learned to move and dwell in emergent grazing landscapes. We take an institutional approach to the concept of “the commons,” demonstrating the dynamics through 19th-century Irish rundale, then draw on case studies from Southern Scandinavia and the Carpathian Basin to consider the commons as a multispecies institution which resulted in variable sociopolitical formations of the European Bronze Age.
PubDate: 2024-07-02T00:00:00Z
- Navigating collaborative learning across national boundaries: a
comparative study of educators’ perspectives in Israel and Turkey
Authors: Eleni Pothou, Dolly Eliyahu-Levi, Begüm Sonbahar, Michal Ganz-Meishar
Abstract: The primary goal of the KIDS4ALLL project was to empower educators to foster a flexible, innovative, and collaborative learning environment within their classrooms. This article delves into teachers’ experiences with implementing collaborative learning during the KIDS4ALLL project. Additionally, it explores how teachers perceived the implementation of the KIDS4ALLL pilot in learning environments across different national educational settings, specifically in Israel and Turkey. Given that both Israel and Turkey have centralized education systems and adhere to a traditional teaching approach, the two research questions offer insights into how the national education context of both countries influences the implementation of the collaborative learning approach of KIDS4ALLL and the experiences of educators. The methodology employed in this study involved semi-structured interviews with 16 educators and participant observation during the two pilots. The findings highlight a sense of fear and uncertainty among educators regarding their ability to conduct lessons in an unfamiliar yet innovative and flexible learning environment. These feelings were accompanied by challenges such as technological and language barriers, sociocultural diversities, and occasional behavioral issues. The results also underscore similarities between the two countries, emphasizing that centralized education systems, teachers’ previous training, curriculum, and available physical space posed challenges to the pilot program’s implementation.
PubDate: 2024-06-05T00:00:00Z
- Traditional, complementary, and alternative medicine and the provision of
health care to internally displaced persons in South Kivu, Democratic
Republic of the Congo
Authors: Muzee Kazamwali, Arsène Kisanga, Juvenal B. Balegamire, Euphrasie Kaningini, Jean-Benoît Falisse, Germaine Furaha, Denise M. Mapendo, Clayton Boeyink
Abstract: IntroductionTraditional, complementary and alternative medicine (TCAM) providers are central for many when seeking healthcare. Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) are no exception. This paper seeks to better understand the use of TCAM by IDPs and its connection with the local integration of IDPs into the social fabric of the communities where they have taken refuge. We compare IDPs and non-IDPs access to TCAM providers and their level of confidence in having their healthcare needs met by these sources in Uvira and Kabare territories of South Kivu, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).MethodsWe draw from a mixed method, social connections design comprised of participatory workshops with 111 participants; a survey with 847 participants capturing exploring access and trust of TCAM and other wealth and demographic indicators; 24 interviews with traditional healthcare providers; and 56 in-depth life history interviews with IDPs. Collected data were analysed using both qualitative and quantitative approaches. Descriptive statistics (mean, percentage, and standard deviation) and statistical tests (proportions test and t test) were used as quantitative analysis tools whereas thematic content analysis was used for qualitative data.ResultsWe show that IDPs use TCAM more than non IDPs. Access to and trust in traditional healers seems dependent on the exact nature of the services they offer, which varies across our sample. As such, processes of recognition and integration of both IDPs and TCAM providers into formal healthcare systems should be treated cautiously with an understanding of the socio-economic rationales that displaced people and TCAM providers operate under. While many of these TCAM providers are not highly trusted sources in South Kivu, their highly valued treatment of certain conditions such as what is locally known as “mulonge” (and bears similarities with the Buruli ulcer) suggest there may be potential specific areas where collaboration could be successful between biomedical health workers and TCAM providers.
PubDate: 2024-05-30T00:00:00Z
- Ethical and legal considerations of mood enhancement technology
Authors: Erik Kamenjasevic
Abstract: Technology qualifying as human mood enhancement can be developed, on the one hand, for the well-being and mental health of their users (therapy) and, on the other hand, for changing the mood of their users above levels of normality (enhancement). Such technology provokes debates concerning its societal, ethical and legal consequences for individuals and society as a whole. This paper’s aim is twofold. It first aims to show an overview of the often-occurring arguments in the ethics debate about mood enhancement technology and outline which arguments should be considered relevant for supporting the legislative debate. The second aim of the paper is to highlight some of the main legal aspects concerning this technology through the human rights lens of the United Nations, the Council of Europe, and the European Union.
PubDate: 2024-05-30T00:00:00Z
- Exclusion and the growth of AI technology: a trade-theoretic analysis
Authors: Bharat Hazari, Vijay Mohan
Abstract: This study provides a four-good general equilibrium framework with international trade for assessing the impact of the advancement of automation and artificial intelligence (A&AI) on the welfare of a group of agents who are excluded from both owning productive assets, such as capital and land, as well as consuming digital output (digital exclusion). We show that, depending on the magnitude of the factor intensities, the accumulation of A&AI capital may negatively affect the income of the excluded group, who provide unskilled labor, or the owners of land. In doing so, we bring out the conflict of interests that may arise between the owners of A&AI capital and other groups within society, which has implications for the pressure that exists to slow down the adoption of A&AI in an economy.
PubDate: 2024-05-24T00:00:00Z
- Settlement ecology of Bronze Age Transylvania
Authors: Colin P. Quinn
Abstract: The Bronze Age was a time of technological, socioeconomic, and political transformation in Europe. Since Bronze Age socioeconomic institutions were rooted in the landscape, they can be investigated using a settlement ecology approach to how people positioned themselves relative to the environment and each other. Transylvania is home to a rare combination of mineral resources, trade infrastructures, and productive agropastoral land, all of which were critical to Bronze Age societies. This study combines size-and rank-size analyses to suggest that there were several shifts in how people positioned themselves across settlements in Transylvania during the Bronze Age. This research contributes to a broader understanding of the factors that inform where people choose to settle down and the consequences those decisions have on the development of social, economic, and political institutions.
PubDate: 2024-05-24T00:00:00Z
- Chasing colonization back: rethinking parks, returning place-names, and
restoring buffalo medicine—an interview with Ninna Piiksii, Dr. Mike
Bruised Head
Authors: Ninna Piiksii, Elizabeth Lunstrum, Madison Stevens
Abstract: In this interview, we hear from influential Blackfoot Elder and Cultural Educator Ninna Piiksii, Dr. Michael Bruised Head. Mike reflects on the colonial naming of national parks and the need to return to Indigenous place-names, examining how we occupy a pivotal moment where park staff are more open to substantive Indigenous engagement and presence within parks, although more needs to be done. Drawing connections across topics that may initially seem discrete, Mike reflects on his experience as a survivor of the Canadian residential school system, colonial dispossession by parks and more broadly, and how Blackfoot restoration efforts—including the return of buffalo or iinnii—can offer paths for healing from these traumas and build a more just, Blackfoot-led future. Through this, Mike asks us to rethink the profound value and potential of conservation, pushing beyond Western understandings. He closes by asking the interviewers to reflect on what motivates them to support Tribal buffalo restoration, turning the tables on the interviewer and interviewee, and reinforcing the importance of connection and responsibility among non-Tribal research collaborators. We open with an introduction to Mike and then turn to hear his words. The interview format reflects a growing trend of expert-interviews-as-articles and Indigenous practices of oral knowledge transmission. We also link to an audio recording of the interview to allow readers to become listeners and hear Mike’s words in full context. The conversation and format are offered in the spirit of opening more space for Indigenous—and particularly Blackfoot—voices, perspectives, and methodologies in conservation scholarship.
PubDate: 2024-05-17T00:00:00Z
- Risk and low-density dispersed urbanism
Authors: Roland Fletcher, Kirrily White, Dan Penny
Abstract: Settlements operate across a wide range of densities and do so for every socio- economic mode of life from those based on hunter-gatherer economies to those which are based on industrial production. Human beings also live across a range of residential densities from very high to very low. Why they do so is a function of many factors, especially differing socio-cultural ways of managing interaction and communication and the associated social and political practices of the communities. Settlement forms are seen as a derivative of many factors because they are. But they are not thereby an epiphenomenon - especially as they become larger, more durable, and bulkier. That gives them inertia and, as a consequence, they become an agency in their own right which produces outcomes with consequences for the communities, which inhabit them. They are not a neutral background. Instead, their materiality, their sizes, and their densities have an impact on the viability of social life. This paper considers the outcomes generated by the regional networks of low-density, urban settlements larger than 100 sq km in extent. The implications of what happened to agrarian-based low-density urban settlements, like Greater Angkor and the Classic Maya settlements, such as Caracol, are of consequence for the risk faced by the regional networks of present-day, low-density urban giants – the megalopoleis and desa-kota. A further perspective is provided by placing these great cities of the past and the present in the larger context of the trajectories and outcomes of smaller low-density settlements over the previous six millennia. The concern is the implications for the viability of low-density urbanism in contexts of the rapid, extreme climate change we are now beginning to experience. The implications are ominous, yet the past also indicates that social and cultural systems are robust, that human beings can survive, and that they retain and continue to remake their social traditions as they adjust to seriously changing circumstances.
PubDate: 2024-05-15T00:00:00Z
- Xenophobia: a hindrance factor to South Africa’s ambition of
becoming a developmental state
Authors: Eric Blanco Niyitunga
Abstract: The prevalence of xenophobic violence toward foreigners has hindered South Africa’s ambition to become a developmental state since 2007, when the concept of a “democratic developmental state” was first endorsed during the African National Congress (ANC) conference in Polokwane. This ambition has also been thwarted by the inability of the post-apartheid regime to provide adequate and sustainable services to the citizens. Xenophobia has disrupted economic growth and has contributed to poor service delivery in local municipalities, thus leading to social protests. The developmental state depends mainly on a solid balance of economic growth and human development. It also leans on the capacity of the state to establish policies that address poverty and promote the expansion of solid economic opportunities. In this endeavor, migrants increase economic growth and make it sustainable, increase productivity, and promote the labor market. They also promote the labor force and human capital, economic growth, and public finance, thus enabling the realization of a developmental state. However, xenophobia has limited migrants’ contributions to economic growth and social well-being in South Africa. It has destructive effects on South Africa’s economic structure and growth, thus affecting the delivery of adequate services that would enhance its ability to achieve a developmental state. The paper recommends that there is a need for South Africa to understand that xenophobia affects economic growth and the service delivery framework. To address the prevalence of xenophobia and achieve its ambition of a developmental state, South Africa needs to hasten its responses to curb xenophobia and integrate migrants into economic opportunities. The paper adopted a qualitative research methodology and conceptual and document analysis techniques to collect data that enabled the achievement of the above assertions.
PubDate: 2024-05-03T00:00:00Z
- Navigating the peer-to-peer workflow in non-formal education through an
innovative e-learning platform: a case study of the KIDS4ALLL educational
project in Hungary and Italy
Authors: Tanja Schroot, Borbála Lőrincz, Anikó Bernát
Abstract: The digital revolution is affecting all aspects of life, radically transforming everyday tasks and routines. The ability to cope with new challenges in life, including new forms of learning are key skills in the 21st-century, however, education systems often struggle with tackling digital inequalities. A digital learning platform developed by the KIDS4ALLL educational project, implemented in face-to-face student interactions, aims to mitigate the divide and the resulting social disadvantages among children with and without migration/ethnic minority background. Analyzing data collected during the pilot phase of the project in two of the participating countries, Italy and Hungary, this paper examines how students and teaching staff adapt to a newly introduced digital learning tool based on peer-to-peer workflows. Firstly, it examines the role of educators' interpersonal competences in navigating the innovative learning activities and delves into how they use them and how they manage resources. Secondly, the study explores what attitudes and behaviors are observed among students engaged in the proposed peer-led activities, in particular in terms of their ability to cope with uncertainty and complexity. The analytical framework of the paper is based on two cultural dimensions offered by Hofstede, the index of uncertainty avoidance (UAI) and power distance (PDI), and it utilizes the personal, social and learning-to-learn competence of the eight LLL Key Competences as defined by the European Commission to conceptualize the skills of educators and students. Interpreting data from Italy and Hungary in their respective social and educational contexts, the study finds that the most important features that proved to be effective and useful during the pilot phase were the democratic power-relations between students and educators, the peer-to-peer scheme and its further development to the peer-for-peer approach. The child-friendly and real-life-related new curriculum and its appealing digital learning platform, embedded into a flexible, playful and child-centered pedagogical approach, were also successful. These are all complementing the traditional, formal school environment and pedagogy which, despite all developments in formal education in the past decades, can be characterized as teacher-centered and frontal.
PubDate: 2024-04-25T00:00:00Z
- “If I fall down, he will pick me up”: refugee hosts and everyday care
in protracted displacement
Authors: Zoe Jordan
Abstract: Around the world, refugees share shelters and homes with other refugees. Such household-level hosting relationships play a central role in the lives of displaced individuals and families, offering support to meet basic needs, safety, and a sense of belonging. Yet, the role of displaced people as refugee hosts is often overlooked, an omission that fails to account for the active role of displaced populations in supporting one another and the dynamic social connections between refugees. Thus far, hosting relationships have often been understood through hospitality. Instead, in this paper I develop an understanding of refugee-refugee hosting as constituted through care. Drawing on qualitative research conducted with Sudanese refugee men in Amman, Jordan, I demonstrate the value of this framework in explaining the emergence and experiences of their hosting relationships. I highlight the importance of everyday interdependencies for life in displacement, alongside the challenges and ambivalences of providing and receiving care in such contexts, and show how configurations of care shift and alter throughout protracted displacement. In doing so, I center informal and everyday acts of care among refugees in relation to external humanitarian care, arguing for a re-conceptualisation of the relationship between ‘hosts’ and ‘humanitarians’, and propose avenues for those working with displaced populations to engage with the vital support that refugee-refugee hosting provides.
PubDate: 2024-04-19T00:00:00Z
- State care services as devices of acceptance to the social body: the case
of Afro-descendant migrant mothers in Chile, beneficiaries of the National
Child Health Program
Authors: Yafza Reyes Muñoz, Vania Reyes Muñoz
Abstract: IntroductionIn the field of medical anthropology, particularly from the practices of medical care in a situated context, the text discusses how state care services under the “National Child Health Programme” implemented by nursing professionals in Chile transmit values and expectations that could be transformed into devices of acceptance to the social body for migrant mothers of African descent who come with their children to health centres.MethodsThe Methodology employed in this study was devised through a case study in the commune of Talca, within the Maule region, utilizing semi-structured interviews with nurses who work within the Programme, as well as open interviews and thematic workshops with migrant women users of the Programme.ResultsThe results point to the valuation of the programme by the women, who identify it as an instance of providing and receiving care for their children; they also recognise that they are judged by their caregivers for not “correctly” following the instructions given to them with their children living in Chile or for exercising transnational maternity. On the other hand, nursing professionals revealed racial and class prejudices about women of African descent, especially Haitian women.DiscussionIt is suggested that this programme, recognized regionally as an effective assistance and care policy in the fight against infant mortality and morbidity, becomes an acculturation device for migrant mothers and their children born in Chile. It is expected that both mothers and children adhere to the program’s guidelines, resulting in similar behaviours and attitudes as those of Chilean mothers. This generates few instances of learning and appreciation of the native cultures of the new Chilean infants and reveals that categories of differences such as ethno-racial, gender, and migratory status are articulated in the nurses’ health practices, emphasising the mandate to follow the instructions of migrant mothers and their children.
PubDate: 2024-04-12T00:00:00Z
- Eco-fascism: an oxymoron' Far-right nationalism, history, and the
climate emergency
Authors: Daniele Conversi
Abstract: Can we conceive of a continuity in the way right-wing nationalisms address environmental issues from the origins of fascism to the currently ongoing global “polycrisis”' This article explores the use of the term “eco-fascism” in connection with the climate crisis and considers the political relationship between ecologism and the contemporary far right through a historical perspective, seeking to determine persisting patterns in the relationship between the far right and the environment. Section 1 travels back to the historical origins of this relationship between nationalism, fascism and the environment, arguing that the conceptions of nature adopted and nourished by fascism had scarcely anything to do with ecology in its contemporary meaning. Section 2 explores the most well-known and consolidated studies on the relationship between the far right and climate change denialism, identifying a broad consensus that unites scholars from various disciplines on the density, intensity and persistence of this political relationship in the current millennium. The article concludes by underlining the irreality, falsifiability and internal contradictions of the notion of “eco-fascism” at a time when right-wing regimes have seized power in many countries through the use of vocabularies and sentiments in defense of the territory and its resources, but with a substantial refusal to tackle global environmental problems.
PubDate: 2024-04-09T00:00:00Z
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