The moral politics of LGBTI asylum: how the state deals with the SOGI framework

Author(s):  
Massimo Prearo

Abstract The article proposes a political ethnography of lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans and intersex (LGBTI) asylum founded on a fieldwork (2017–19) in an associative and activist context that supports LGBTI asylum applicants. Through the analysis of the narratives mobilized and produced during the interviews between asylum applicants and institutional agents in charge of receiving and assessing the requests for international protection, the article explores the institutional uses of the SOGI framework. The hypothesis that the article puts forward is that, far from concerning exclusively a confrontation/dispute among models of sexual orientation and gender identity, these interactions actually bring forth a logic of exchange of moral goods (vulnerability, feelings of shame and fear, identity, narratives). Given the impossibility for LGBTI asylum applicants to produce probatory documentation, this study exposes the strategies for determining legitimate from illegitimate LGBTI migrant subjects, ‘good’ from ‘bad’ migrant stories, and, therefore, the political and moral dimension of the institutional work and the grant of the right of asylum.

Sociology ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 53 (1) ◽  
pp. 156-173 ◽  
Author(s):  
Darragh McGee

This article examines the biopolitical footprint of a new wave of non-governmental organization (NGO) interventions which conjoin the futures of youth with that of the nation, and which thereby seek to naturalize an institutional sovereignty over moral temporalities of future-making. By inverting the political onto the personal, these unorthodox interventions challenge extant sociological constructs of development, and further affirm the salience of an ethnographic turn in NGO scholarship. To this end, I trace the quotidian coordinates of such a moral politics out of the Right to Dream Academy, Ghana, which serves as a prototype for NGO interventions concerned not solely with locating the ontological limits of self-transformation but in redeploying such limits to address Africa’s development crises. Opening up novel theoretical directions for NGO scholarship, I propose an extension of the concept of the reinventive institution, positing a sociologically informed reframing of NGO interventions connected to interdisciplinary work on youth, morality and futurity.


2016 ◽  
Vol 43 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 221-244
Author(s):  
Tatiana Borisova

The article aims to demonstrate that while the jurors’ acquittal of the famous terrorist Vera Zasulich has often been interpreted in terms of sympathy for ‘a desperate girl’, previously underestimated legal and political claims also played an important role in the trial. The key legal experts at the trial – her defense attorney Aleksandrov and the president of the court Koni – interpreted Zasulich’s attempt on Trepov’s life as an act of societal self-defense: Zasulich was presented as a victim of a society which could no longer tolerate arbitrariness by authorities. The flogging of political prisoner Bogolyubov following Trepov’s illegal order made Zasulich desperate to take revenge in order to alert Russian society of the humiliating arbitrariness and the unfairness of the political and legal structures of late Imperial Russia. Her victimization highlighted her “moral right” to act as a defendant of true law and legality in Russia. This idea of “moral right,” which empowered Zasulich to act in defense of society, was supported by Koni’s conceptualization of law and state power as an embodiment of the people’s will and responsibility. This conceptualization was elaborated in detail in his scholarly legal writings scholarship on the right to self-defense. The article brings together Koni’s theory and his practical role in Zasulich’s acquittal and demonstrates tensions between the Great Reforms and their political and social limitations.


2006 ◽  
pp. 54-75
Author(s):  
Klaus Peter Friedrich

Facing the decisive struggle between Nazism and Soviet communism for dominance in Europe, in 1942/43 Polish communists sojourning in the USSR espoused anti-German concepts of the political right. Their aim was an ethnic Polish ‘national communism’. Meanwhile, the Polish Workers’ Party in the occupied country advocated a maximum intensification of civilian resistance and partisan struggle. In this context, commentaries on the Nazi judeocide were an important element in their endeavors to influence the prevailing mood in the country: The underground communist press often pointed to the fate of the murdered Jews as a warning in order to make it clear to the Polish population where a deficient lack of resistance could lead. However, an agreed, unconditional Polish and Jewish armed resistance did not come about. At the same time, the communist press constantly expanded its demagogic confrontation with Polish “reactionaries” and accused them of shared responsibility for the Nazi murder of the Jews, while the Polish government (in London) was attacked for its failure. This antagonism was intensified in the fierce dispute between the Polish and Soviet governments after the rift which followed revelations about the Katyn massacre. Now the communist propaganda image of the enemy came to the fore in respect to the government and its representatives in occupied Poland. It viewed the government-in-exile as being allied with the “reactionaries,” indifferent to the murder of the Jews, and thus acting ultimately on behalf of Nazi German policy. The communists denounced the real and supposed antisemitism of their adversaries more and more bluntly. In view of their political isolation, they coupled them together, in an undifferentiated manner, extending from the right-wing radical ONR to the social democrats and the other parties represented in the underground parliament loyal to the London based Polish government. Thereby communist propaganda tried to discredit their opponents and to justify the need for a new start in a post-war Poland whose fate should be shaped by the revolutionary left. They were thus paving the way for the ultimate communist takeover


Author(s):  
Daniel A. Dombrowski

In this work two key theses are defended: political liberalism is a processual (rather than a static) view and process thinkers should be political liberals. Three major figures are considered (Rawls, Whitehead, Hartshorne) in the effort to show the superiority of political liberalism to its illiberal alternatives on the political right and left. Further, a politically liberal stance regarding nonhuman animals and the environment is articulated. It is typical for debates in political philosophy to be adrift regarding the concept of method, but from start to finish this book relies on the processual method of reflective equilibrium or dialectic at its best. This is the first extended effort to argue for both political liberalism as a process-oriented view and process philosophy/theology as a politically liberal view. It is also a timely defense of political liberalism against illiberal tendencies on both the right and the left.


2020 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
pp. 101-120
Author(s):  
Yousef M. Aljamal ◽  
Philipp O. Amour

There are some 700,000 Latin Americans of Palestinian origin, living in fourteen countries of South America. In particular, Palestinian diaspora communities have a considerable presence in Chile, Honduras, and El Salvador. Many members of these communities belong to the professional middle classes, a situation which enables them to play a prominent role in the political and economic life of their countries. The article explores the evolving attitudes of Latin American Palestinians towards the issue of Palestinian statehood. It shows the growing involvement of these communities in Palestinian affairs and their contribution in recent years towards the wide recognition of Palestinian rights — including the right to self-determination and statehood — in Latin America. But the political views of members of these communities also differ considerably about the form and substance of a Palestinian statehood and on the issue of a two-states versus one-state solution.


2020 ◽  
pp. 46-66
Author(s):  
Bоris N. Florya ◽  

Based on an analysis of sources, the author tries to reconstruct the course of events during the political crisis on the Right Bank, at the center of which was the confrontation between the right-bank hetman P. Doroshenko and his opponent, P. Sukhovey, an elected hetman of the Zaporozhian Sich with the support of the Crimean Khanate. The author shows that the opposition to Doroshenko was significant and was formed as well under the influence of the news about his Turkish citizenship. It was approved by the Korsun Rada, to participate in which the Right-Bank hetman was able to mobilize a significant number of supporters from the Right-Bank foreman. This caused discontent not only among the Cossacks, but also among the Cossack mob in a part of the Right-Bank regiments. Doroshenko’s attempts to get help from the Ottoman Empire were unsuccessful and in the summer his position became threatening: only two Cossack regiments stood on the side of the hetman. Only the arrival of the ambassadors of the Sultan in August 1669, who demanded that the Crimean Khanate stop supporting the opposition to Doroshenko, and the subsequent departure of the Tatars defused the situation and saved the Right-Bank hetman from losing the power. These events, as well as the ensuing similar domestic political crisis in the Right-Bank Ukraine in 1672, demonstrate how shaky the Doroshenko’s position was and how difficult it was for him to maintain the power.


2008 ◽  
Vol 21 (02) ◽  
pp. 140-146
Author(s):  
M. R. Edwards ◽  
S. P. James ◽  
W. S. Dernell ◽  
R. J. Scott ◽  
A. M. Bachand ◽  
...  

SummaryThe biomechanical characteristics of 1.2 mm diameter allogeneic cortical bone pins harvested from the canine tibia were evaluated and compared to 1.1 mm diameter stainless steel pins and 1.3 mm diameter polydioxanone (PDS) pins using impact testing and four-point bending. The biomechanical performance of allogeneic cortical bone pins using impact testing was uniform with no significant differences between sites, side, and gender. In four-point bending, cortical bone pins harvested from the left tibia (204.8 ± 77.4 N/mm) were significantly stiffer than the right tibia (123.7 ± 54.4 N/mm, P=0.0001). The site of bone pin harvest also had a significant effect on stiffness, but this was dependent on interactions with gender and side. Site C in male dogs had the highest mean stiffness in the left tibia (224.4 ± 40.4 N/mm), but lowest stiffness in the right tibia (84.9 ± 24.2 N/mm). Site A in female dogs had the highest mean stiffness in the left tibia (344.9 ± 117.4 N/mm), but lowest stiffness in the right tibia (60.8 ± 3.7 N/mm). The raw and adjusted bending properties of 1.2 mm cortical bone pins were significantly better than 1.3 mm PDS pins, but significantly worse than 1.1 mm stainless steel pins (P<0.0001). In conclusion, cortical bone pins may be suitable as an implant for fracture fixation based on initial biomechanical comparison to stainless steel and PDS pins used in clinical practice.


Author(s):  
Melanie M. Hughes

Around the world, countries are increasingly using quotas to enhance the diversity of political representatives. This chapter considers the histories and policy designs of ethnic and gender quotas that regulate national legislatures. Most countries with quotas target only one type of under-represented group—for example, women or ethnic minorities. Even in countries with both gender and ethnic quotas (called ‘tandem quotas’), the policies typically evolved separately and work differently. Women and ethnic minorities are treated as distinct groups, ignoring the political position of ethnic minority women. However, a handful of countries have ‘nested quotas’ that specifically regulate the political inclusion of ethnic minority women. The second half the chapter focuses explicitly on nested quotas. It lays out how nested quotas work, where and how they have been adopted, and the prospect for their spread to new countries in the future. The chapter concludes with reflections on the promises and pitfalls of nested quotas as a vehicle for multicultural feminism.


1967 ◽  
Vol 2 (4) ◽  
pp. 509-524 ◽  
Author(s):  
B. J. O. Dudley

In the debate on the Native Authority (Amendment) Law of 1955, the late Premier of the North, Sir Ahmadu Bello, Sardauna of Sokoto, replying to the demand that ‘it is high time in the development of local government systems in this Region that obsolete and undemocratic ways of appointing Emirs’ Councils should close’, commented that ‘the right traditions that we have gone away from are the cutting off of the hands of thieves, and that has caused a lot of thieving in this country. Why should we not be cutting (off) the hands of thieves in order to reduce thieving? That is logical and it is lawful in our tradition and custom here.’ This could be read as a defence against social change, a recrudescence of ‘barbarism’ after the inroads of pax Britannica, and a plea for the retention of the status quo and the entrenched privilege of the political elite.


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