Feminist Politics

Understanding the ways in which the discursive construction of gender allowed for the US-led attacks on Afghanistan to be considered a legitimate response to the attacks of 9/11 is vital to the study of international relations and for the reclaiming of a feminist politics of the attacks. Through the identification and exploration of various representations of identity in the period after 9/11 and before the attacks on Afghanistan, I will illustrate the centrality of narratives of gender to the production of a recognizable and legitimate narrative of war. I focus on the identities of ‘the nation’, ‘the enemy’ and ‘the intervention’, with each exploring not only the ways in which they are created and perpetuated, but also the ways in which they make certain responses, actions and attitudes permissible and censor others. In conclusion, I draw attention to the economic concerns of the USA that were marginalized within the discursive construction of identity post-9/11, and the ways in which the tensions created by this marginalization can be used as a critical tool to begin to unpick gendered constructions that were represented as seamless at the time.

Incluido en un monofráfico de la revista Riff-Raff, editada por el Departamento de Filosofía de la Universidad de Zaragoza (Elvira Burgos, coord.) sobre Políticas feministas.

Debate sobre la construcción de la identidad, desde el pensamiento de Chantal Mouffe. Democracia radical y conflicto, sobre ciudadanía y politica feminista, sobre Butler y Mouffe  y sobre el pensamiento maternal de Sara Ruddick.

This article explores the aims, activities and challenges of women's movements in the Middle East. It demonstrates the similarities among movements, which are related to both the historical emergence of women's movements, and in particular their close affiliation to nationalist struggles, as well as contemporary circumstances such as ambiguous government policies, repression of civil societies and prevailing authoritarian political cultures. This contribution also looks to the specific factors and conditions that shape women's movements in particular countries differently, thereby highlighting the great degree of heterogeneity among women's organizations in the Middle East. An analysis of the actual goals and activities of women's groups in various countries, such as Jordan, Egypt and Palestine reveals that women activists tend to get mobilized around issues related to modernization and development. Issues such as women's rights to education, work and political participation have traditionally been both the accepted demands of women activists as well as part of the discourses of male modernizers and reformers. However, the more sensitive issues of women's reproductive rights and violence against women, for example, have been taken up by only a few women's organizations in recent years. The relationship of women's organizations to the state is key to the analysis of women's movements in the region. Varying levels of dependence and autonomy can be detected not only in the comparison of one country with another but also within given country contexts.

While populism has been subject to growing scholarly interest, its relationship to feminist politics has remained conspicuously understudied. This article investigates this relationship by analysing two cases of European populism: left populism in Spain (Podemos), and right populism in Finland (the Finns Party). The questions asked, and the challenges posed to feminist politics from populist political forces are intriguing: How is feminist politics articulated in both left and right populism? What differences can be discerned between left and right populism for feminist politics? To explore this, the article analyses three core dimensions: (1) political representation: descriptive representation (numbers of women, men and minority positions) and substantive representation (policy content in relation to gender equality); (2) populist parties' formal and informal gender institutions such as internal quotas, gender equality plans and institutional culture; and (3) dedicated spaces for feminist politics such as women's sections or feminist groups. It is argued that political ideology matters for feminist politics, and while left parties are more responsive to feminist concerns and populism poses specific problems for feminist politics, it is the gendered culture of political parties that ensures both left and right parties are problematic for feminist politics.

peacekeeping operations has led many feminists to question the appropriateness of using soldiers to create peace. They argue that the problems stem from a particular form of military masculinity, hegemonic within Western militaries, associated with practices of strength, toughness, and aggressive heterosexuality. Masculinities, however, are multiple, dynamic, and contradictory. As they are constructed in relation to the contexts men find themselves in, involvement in peacekeeping may itself play a role in the construction of alternative military masculinities. Examining autobiographical accounts of soldiers involved in peacekeeping in Bosnia in the 1990s, I argue that there is evidence of an alternative discourse of 'peacekeeper masculinity', but question whether it fully challenges the hegemony of the warrior model. I acknowledge that peacekeeper masculinity is also problematic because although it disrupts elements of the traditional linkages between militarism and masculinity, it still relies on a feminized and racialized 'Other.' Yet, I suggest that this is not the only way in which peacekeeper masculinity can be viewed. It can alternatively be considered part of a 'regendered military' which may be a necessary component of successful conflict resolution.

In this article we discuss the ways in which a feminist ethos of care and the associated practice of mentoring allows feminist geography to flourish in teaching, working and learning spaces. We argue that our working relationship – based on care, mentoring and friendship – is crucial in order to survive and deflect structural inequalities. Our working relationship spans across undergraduate, graduate, postgraduate and early career stages at a single university. We offer our personal stories as examples of establishing and maintaining collaborative mentoring and caring work relationships. Further, our commitment to a feminist ethos of care and mentoring is vital for our selfcare and causes trouble for structural power differentials. First, we share stories about how our working relationship began and developed within the critical, caring and fragile spaces of the Geography Programme at the University of Waikato and other feminist geography networks. Second, literature on care, mentoring and collaboration is discussed, with a focus on feminist politics of mentoring and collaboration. Third, we return to our own experiences to illustrate the ways embodied and emotional subjectivities and associated power dynamics shape mentoring and care relationships. Examples of joint supervision and research are offered to illustrate complex sets of spatially significant emotions, feelings and subjectivities. Finally, we highlight the ways in which place matters if feminist geography is to flourish.

In the past decades, market liberalization and globalization have taken large strides, and the trend is making an impact on women's economic participation. United Nations Research Institute for Social Development (UNRISD) (2000) report states that now more women have to work to ensure family survival, there is an increase in the number of women-headed households, and there is greater demand for women workers in particular sectors of the economy, such as low-skilled manufacturing. Women's participation in the labor force has reached levels that have never been reached before.

The paper illustrates the operational difficulties arising from simultaneously performing exothermic and endothermic reactions, and demonstrates that the plant can be built and safely operated by integrating the design and plantwide control issues. The behaviour of reactorseparationrecycle systems carrying the coupled reactions A →P + Q (endo) and B + Q → R (exo) is investigated. Irrespective of the control structure, state multiplicity cannot be removed if the intermediate component Q is recycled. Therefore, the chemical reactor should be designed such the recycle of Q can be avoided without economic penalty. The theoretical findings are applied to the design and control of a plant coupling ethylbenzene dehydrogenation and nitrobenzene hydrogenation for simultaneous production of styrene and aniline. After plant design, a rigorous dynamic model is developed using AspenDynamics. A plantwide control structure is implemented and shown to be able to achieve large production rate changes and to effectively reject various disturbances. .

This essay offers a critical analysis of the Feminist Majority Foundation's Campaign to Stop Gender Apartheid in Afghanistan in terms of its synchronicity with US imperialism and militarism. While the FMF's Campaign draws public attention to the discrimination and violence facing Afghan women under the Taliban, its discourse is embedded in an ahistorical and Orientalist framework that assumes the benevolence and superiority of the US in establishing gender equality. Thus, the FMF reproduces an imperial feminism tied to US state interests in empire building – a feminism that evades accountability for the consequences of US militarism while it establishes its own power and authority in determining the future of Afghanistan. The imperial feminism of the FMF is an example of how actions taken to challenge hegemony can in fact support and reify the hegemonic projects of the state. In effect, the FMF draws upon the same imperialist and problematic ideas about women as those expressed by the Bush administration to protect Afghan women in the name of empire.

... Niamh Moore takes on an important issue within ecofeminism and feminist theory generally – the relationship between maternalism, pacifism, ecofeminism and essentialism – arguing for new ways of reading 'eco/feminist' activism. ...

... of Turpin and Kurtz's (1997) classic question concerning the relationship of wife-beating and war, but to underscore the degree to which the quest for political ... Power without visibility; pro t without sanctions: shadow institutions. ... Carolyn Nordstrom/Visible wars and invisible girls ...

Beneath the layers of what constitutes entertainment lies a worldview about gender that informs our understanding of everyday realities. Rape and sexual abuse have been part of movies, videos and songs for a long time. As Cucklanz (1998, 425) argues, “the importance of this relationship between media representations of rape and social attitudes about it cannot be underestimated.” It is in growing up with such depictions that shape our understanding of the cause and effect of rape, or what has been termed as the production of a rape culture, in which the media play no small part. Sexual violence and rape have long been common plots for movies and even music videos, but we are increasingly witnessing problematic images of the sexual abuse of women. Moreover, we have also seen a shift toward sometimes portraying women in an agential role, using their sexuality to trap and falsely accuse men of sexual harassment. In doing so, popular culture reinforces stereotypes about women and their sexuality, trivializing the question of rape. Such ideas go a long way in shaping common perceptions of rape and sexual abuse, which need to be challenged and re-examined. The connection between rape and revenge, as both narrative device and social phenomenon, is well known. Katrina Lee-Koo argues that, “the subjugation, humiliation and degradation are not just an assault upon the woman and her body, but are also an assault upon her state/culture/religion/ethnic group and men who belong to it” (2002, 528). The act of rape is thus, in the eyes of rapists and their apologists, the subjugation of both the victim as well as what they represented: communities of caste; religions; nations; sexualities; and forms of femininity and masculinity. It is therefore not surprising to note that the rape-revenge theme is one that has been represented in popular culture. Such depictions are rarely critical in nature, adopting instead what the feminist film scholar Laura Mulvey calls the male gaze, where the narrative is driven primarily by the male protagonist and a perceived male audience, while women serve a purely “exhibitionist role” onto which men project their fantasies (1975, 9). Here, we examine two recent films that both employ the rape-revenge theme, although in seemingly different ways – the Hindi film Badlapur (2015) and the

Introduction: Gender, Migration and Exile Jane Freedman, Zeynep Kivilcim, Nurcan Ozgur Baklacioglu Destabilising Gender Dynamics: Syria Post 2011 Nour Abu-Assab Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transsexual (LGBT) Syrian Refugees in Turkey Zeynep Kivilcim The Violence of Tolerated Temporarity: Syrian Women Refugees on the Outskirts of Istanbul Nurcan Ozgur Baklacioglu "Trust no one, beware of everyone": Vulnerabilities of LGBTI refugees in Lebanon Henri Myrttinen, Lana Khattab, Charbel Maydaa Gender, Social Class, and Exile: The case of Syrian women in Cairo Maysa Ayoub Death at Sea: migration and the gendered dimensions of border insecurity Sharon Pickering and Rebecca Powell Women's experience of forced migration: gender-based forms of insecurity and the uses of "vulnerability" Jane Freedman Gender Performativity in Diaspora: Syrian Refugee Women in the UK Nof Nasser-Eddin Aggressor, Victim, Soldier, Dad: Intersecting Masculinities in the European `Refugee Crisis' Jennifer Allsopp Conclusions

This article explores the ways in which feminist and women’s agency is articulated in the Cypriot context through the paradigms of nationalism, peace, and conflict. It does so to broaden our understanding of gendered and peace agency in troubled and divided societies, in which complex and conflicting discourses meet. Analyzing data from interviews with feminist and women’s groups’ representatives, it examines how nationalism and women’s approaches to gender, politics, peace, and conflict enable or restrict feminist and women’s agency. It finds that a strategic essentialist approach has initiated a reconfiguration of gender(ed) power relations, women’s agency, and peacebuilding processes. It argues that when this approach is combined with feminist theory and praxis and the employment of transnational peace paradigms, the possibilities for feminist and women’s agency increase, as long as feminist scholarship and grassroots activism inform each other through dialogue. Therefore, it highlights the nuanced and complex dialectic between essentialist and anti-essentialist feminist gender discourses. Moreover, it challenges theories that posit a rigidly hierarchical relation between local and transnational gendered and peace agency paradigms, by demonstrating their malleability and reciprocity. Thus, it contributes to the debate about the modalities and possibilities of feminist sociopolitical intervention in nationalism- and conflict-ridden contexts.

European Union (EU) policies are a good case to explore with regard to the extent to which intersectionality has been institutionalized, given that the EU has broadened its equality agenda from the 1997 Amsterdam Treaty onwards and can be expected to impact on the trajectories of institutionalization in member states. Situated in an analysis of the EU legal framework and machinery on gender and anti-discrimination, this article explores the interface between European institutions and civil society in relation to the treatment of intersectionality by analysing alliances and competition between groups representing different inequalities and the positioning of institutions in the debate. It also investigates whether the EU's current institutionalization may encompass positive developments in the treatment of previously neglected inequalities and thus promote more inclusive equality policies, or may create barriers between and exclude different inequalities. The article concludes that the EU legal framework is merely juxtaposing inequalities rather than intersecting them, and is not giving equal importance to the different inequalities. Debates on the creation of recent institutions, such as the European Institute for Gender Equality and the Fundamental Rights Agency, show that tensions exist between different positions and groups. Dynamics of interaction within European civil society reveal evidence of both contestations and alliances.

The aim of this study is to investigate the distribution and excitation of the methanol gas around Cep A and to describe the physical conditions of the region. In addition the large scale abundance distribution is determined in order to understand the morphology and kinematics of star forming regions in which methanol masers occur. The spatial distribution of the methanol is studied by mapping line emission, as well as the column density and excitation temperature, which are estimated using rotation diagrams. For a limited number of positions the parameters are checked with non-LTE models. Furthermore, the distribution of the methanol abundance is derived in comparison with archival dust continuum maps. Methanol is detected over a 0.3x0.15 pc area centred on the Cep A HW2 source, showing an outflow signature. Most of the gas can be characterized by a moderately warm rotation temperature (30-60K). At the central position two velocity components are detected with different excitation characteristics, the first related to the large-scale outflow. The second component, uniquely detected at the central location, is probably associated with the maser emission on much smaller scales of 2". Detailed analysis reveals that the highest densities and temperatures occur for these inner components. In the inner region the dust and gas are shown to have different physical parameters. Abundances of methanol in the range 10E-9 - 10E-7 are inferred, with the abundance peaking at the maser position. The geometry of the large-scale methanol is in accordance with previous determinations of the Cep A geometry, in particular those from methanol masers. The dynamical and chemical time-scales are consistent with the methanol originating from a single driving source associated with the HW2 object and the masers in its equatorial region.

ABSTRACT The contributions and experiences of women in conflict at the grassroots level in India are not well recognized by the Indian state. In this article, I examine women's engagement with conflict in the Darjeeling Hills and Nagaland in the Eastern regions of India, highlighting both the varied forms of conflict and women's experiences of them. I use these case studies to engage with the question of “participation” as envisioned by the Women, Peace and Security agenda, which has often been understood only in terms of the representation of women at the “high table” of peace negotiations. Restricting the idea of participation to representation alone not only constrains women's agency but also reproduces a binary of “participants” and “non-participants,” obscuring the different ways in which women actually participate in peace activism and conflict prevention. By examining women's experiences and engagement in these “hidden” conflicts, I provide a more nuanced account of women's agency and open up space for different conceptualizations of participation in the Women, Peace and Security agenda.

A software project has "Hero Developers" when 80% of contributions are delivered by 20% of the developers. Are such heroes a good idea? Are too many heroes bad for software quality? Is it better to have more/less heroes for different kinds of projects? To answer these questions, we studied 661 open source projects from Public open source software (OSS) Github and 171 projects from an Enterprise Github. We find that hero projects are very common. In fact, as projects grow in size, nearly all projects become hero projects. These findings motivated us to look more closely at the effects of heroes on software development. Analysis shows that the frequency to close issues and bugs are not significantly affected by the presence of heroes or project type (Public or Enterprise). Similarly, the time needed to resolve an issue/bug/enhancement is not affected by heroes or project type. This is a surprising result since, before looking at the data, we expected that increasing heroes on a project will slow down how fast that project reacts to change. However, we do find a statistically significant association between heroes, project types, and enhancement resolution rates. Heroes do not affect enhancement resolution rates in Public projects. However, in Enterprise projects, heroes increase the rate at which projects complete enhancements. In summary, our empirical results call for a revision of a longheld truism in software engineering. Software heroes are far more common and valuable than suggested by the literature, particularly for medium to large Enterprise developments. Organizations should reflect on better ways to find and retain more of these heroes.

in May 2016 and is the theme of this special issue arising from it. The continuing annual conferences of this journal seek to identify and coalesce research on emergent and major currents in feminist International Relations (IR) and transnational feminist thought and action. The theme of the 2016 conference and this special issue refers to both sighting decolonizing knowledges already present in feminist world politics inquiry and seeking ways to further decolonize it. Although the "decolonial turn" (Maldonado-Torres 2008) in critical thinking has a long history, embedded in centuries of resistances to colonization and settler colonialism, it is only recently that IR, as a discipline, has been recognized as a fundamentally colonial project. Eurocentric (and later US-centric) colonialism and imperialism both founded and remain constitutive of IR (Barkawi and Laffey 2002; Jones 2006; Tickner 2014). Past and continuing stories of Westphalian "sovereignty and liberal democracy" as the history and foundations of the discipline cover up "the authoritarianism, theft, racism, and in significant cases, massacre and genocide" at the heart of the "colonial state and political economy" that IR represents and legitimizes (Jones 2006, 3-4). Moreover, the structure of contemporary IR knowledge production has been likened to a colonial household in which perspectives of colonized peoples and post-colonial critiques are either consigned to servitude in it or kept outside of it altogether (Agathangelou and Ling 2004). Also relatively recently, feminist studies have been challenged for still present colonial legacies and colonizing moves within it, particularly in the US but also elsewhere. Although gender, ethnic and queer studies have importantly exposed the hegemonies and costs of gendered, racialized, and heteronormative ideologies and structures, without a central interrogation of colonization and particularly settler colonialism, such studies can devolve into "liberal multicultural discourses" that champion "inclusion and equality" within the nation (Arvin, Tuck, and Morrill 2013, 10). These can play into "the expansion of the settler state" by increasing the "opportunity" of previously excluded majorities and minorities to take part in the settling processes that dispossess" Indigenous peoples (Arvin, Tuck, and Morrill 2013, 10). "Indigenous communities' concerns are often not about achieving formal equality and civil rights within a nationstate, but instead achieving substantial independence from a Western nation-stateindependence decided on their own terms" (Arvin, Tuck, and Morrill 2013, 10). Moreover, a neglect of colonialism can mean inattention to the appropriation and destruction of

This paper focuses on the Anti-eviction Campaign (AEC) in Cape Town, South Africa, which is part of the larger Anti-privatization Movement, mobilized by disadvantaged township residents to assert their constitutional rights and resist evictions and service disconnections. It introduces the mutually constituted concepts of invited and invented spaces of citizenship and stresses the range of grassroots actions spanning those. The paper also sheds light on the gender dynamics of the Campaign and how its patriarchal order may be destabilizing. The AEC case study engages the feminist scholarship that has pioneered an inclusive conceptualization of citizenship embracing both formal and informal arenas of politics. The study points out the risk in constructing yet another binary relation within the informal arena of politics and a bifurcated civil society, by celebrating grassroots coping strategies (invited spaces) and demonizing resistance strategies (invented spaces). The paper calls for a refinement of feminists' extended notion of politics, recognizing the oppositional practices of the poor in order to construct an inclusive citizenship. It argues that doing so better reflects the practices of the grassroots and furthers a progressive feminist praxis. This paper examines the struggle of the poor in South Africa with respect to basic needs such as water and shelter. It presents the specific case of the Anti-eviction Campaign (AEC) in Cape Town, a movement by the poor to protect their shelter against eviction orders by the city council and the private banks. The case example of AEC, which is part of the larger Anti-Privatization Movement, is placed within the citizenship debate. The paper calls for a careful rethinking of the critique, first put forward by feminist scholars, that urges an expanded notion of politics: namely, the rejection of binary constructs of formal/informal and attention to the informal arena of community-based activism, where women and disadvantaged groups are most effective politically and as citizens.

Recent advances and debates surrounding general/developmental and static/dynamic theories of crime can be traced to the 1986 National Academy of Science Report on criminal careers and the discussion it generated. A key point of contention lies in the interpretation of the age-crime curve. For Gottfredson and Hirschi, the decline in the agecrime curve in early adulthood reflects decreasing individual offending frequency (λ) after the peak. Blumstein et al. claim that the decline in the aggregate age-crime curve can also be attributable to the termination of criminal careers, and the average value of λ could stay constant (or increase with age) for those offenders who remain active after that peak. Using data from the Criminal Career and Life Course Study-including information on criminal convictions over 60 years of almost 5,000 persons convicted in the Netherlands-and applying a Two-Part Growth Model that explicitly distinguishes between participation and frequency-the paper assesses the participation/frequency debate. Results suggest that the decline in the age-crime curve in early adulthood reflects both decreasing individual offending participation and frequency after the peak, that the probabilities of participation and frequency are significantly related at the individual level, and that sex and marriage influence both participation and frequency.

This article examines the infamous Land Rover ' Himba' advertisement (2000) that shocked South Africans because of its racism and sexism. The South African Advertising Standards Authority ruled that the advertisement constituted a violation of human dignity that perpetuated gender and cultural inequality. This article takes the position that the Himba advertisement builds on the colonial notions of adventure, exploration and discovery of the African continent by the western male. The mystique of travel and discovery during the nineteenth century inscribed the control of the African landscape and its people; colonial explorers and travellers consequently feminized Africa to signify conquest and control. It is proposed that these ideas are re-inscribed in the deeply embedded cultural connotations attached to the Land Rover and Africa as its so-called spiritual home. An investigation into some of the myths and ideologies in the Himba advertisement reveals that a set of binary oppositions operates that draw attention to the distinctions between culture/nature, power/powerlessness, male/female, technology/primitivism and West/Africa. An interrogation of this advertisement is important because of the contentious nature of its content, and because fantasy adventure is a significant tendency in tourism and leisure activities in South Africa.