scholarly journals Individual solutions to collective problems: the paradoxical treatment of environmental issues on Mexican and French YouTubers' videos

2021 ◽  
Vol 20 (07) ◽  
pp. A07
Author(s):  
Cecilia Lartigue ◽  
Guillaume Carbou ◽  
Muriel Lefebvre

The impact of human activity on our planet is undeniable. However, this matter of fact is not fully understandable without analyzing the narratives through which people make sense of it. In this study, we aim to describe the narratives present in environmental discourses of Mexican and French YouTubers' videos. This corpus is intended to show how environmental issues are framed in the ever-growing discursive arena of entertainment and “influencing” streaming video. We set out to perform a cross-country comparison, with the purpose of contributing to the discussion of whether environmental discourse is country-specific or shared by various nations and, possibly, even global. Our study contributes to the understanding of the social construction of the environment via these discourses. Our main result points to a paradoxical treatment of environmental issues: the YouTubers of our sample represent them as collectively induced problems, but seem to mainly believe that individual-based solutions would resolve them. More broadly, our study suggests a tendency to the individualization and, therefore, the depoliticization of environmental issues as well as a globalization of the environmental discourses in YouTubers' videos.

2008 ◽  
pp. 3777-3805
Author(s):  
Bernd Carsten Stahl

This chapter discusses the impact that open source software has on our perception and use of intellectual property. The theoretical foundation of the paper is constructionist in that it holds intellectual property to be a social construction that is created and legitimized by narratives. In a first step, the chapter recounts the narratives that are usually found in the literature to justify the creation and protection of intellectual property. The two most important streams of narratives are the utilitarian and the natural rights arguments. In a second step, the paper proceeds to the impact that the use of information and communication technology (ICT) has on the narratives of intellectual property. From there, the chapter progresses to a discussion of the impact of open source software on these narratives. It will be argued that open source software changes our perception of intellectual property because it offers evidence that some of the classical narratives are simplistic. At the same time it will become clear that open source is not a frontal assault on intellectual property because it is partly based on ownership of intellectual artefacts. The conclusion discusses how this change of narratives caused by open source software may reflect on our institutions, laws, and regulations of intellectual property.


Author(s):  
Gunnar Stevens ◽  
Volkmar Pipek ◽  
Volker Wulf

End User Development offers technological flexibility to encourage the appropriation of software applications within specific contexts of use. Appropriation needs to be understood as a phenomenon of many collaborative and creative activities. To support appropriation, we propose integrating communication infrastructure into software application that follows an“easy-to-collaborate”-principle. Such an appropriation infrastructure stimulates the experience sharing among a heterogeneous product community and supports the situated development of usages. Taking the case of the BSCWeasel groupware, we demonstrate how an appropriation infrastructure can be realized. Empirical results from the BSCWeasel project demonstrate the impact of such an infrastructure on the appropriation and design process. Based on these results, we argue that the social construction of IT artifacts should be tightly integrated in the material construction of IT artifacts in bridging design and use discourses.


Author(s):  
Mathilde Sengoelge ◽  
Merel Leithaus ◽  
Matthias Braubach ◽  
Lucie Laflamme

Decreases in injury rates globally and in Europe in the past decades, although encouraging, may mask previously reported social inequalities between and within countries that persist or even increase. European research on this issue has not been systematically reviewed, which is the aim of this article. Between and within-country studies from the WHO European Region that investigate changes in social inequalities in injuries over time or in recent decades were sought in PubMed, Scopus, and Web of Science. Of the 27 studies retained, seven were cross-country and 20 were country-specific. Twelve reported changes in inequalities over time and the remaining 15 shed light on other aspects of inequalities. A substantial downward trend in injuries is reported for all causes and cause-specific ones—alongside persisting inequalities between countries and, in a majority of studies, within countries. Studies investigate diverse questions in different population groups. Depending on the social measure and injury outcome considered, many report inequalities in injuries albeit to a varying degree. Despite the downward trends in risk levels, relative social inequalities in injuries remain a persisting public health issue in the European Region.


2007 ◽  
Vol 21 (2) ◽  
pp. 277-298 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ivana Fellini ◽  
Anna Ferro ◽  
Giovanna Fullin

Migration studies analysing firms' recruitment behaviour are quite limited.This article, built around and examining a demand-driven labour migration hypothesis, explores how recruitment decisions by companies can affect international migratory flows. The study focuses on the construction industry, where a foreign (nondomestic, or expatriate) labour force forms a major component. Through a cross-country comparison, we highlight the impact of the characteristics of the sector and of labour market conditions on recruitment decisions impinging on foreign (non-domestic, or expatriate) labour.The article finally suggests a typology of strategies that construction companies may adopt in order to recruit foreign workers, and it analyses those factors that influence the different decisions in each national context. By considering in depth the relationship between recruitment strategies and patterns of international labour mobility, it is then explained why a company's behaviour can either produce immobility or mobility of foreign workers.


2018 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 82-108 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jessica Gagnon

This article explores the limits of student engagement in higher education in the United Kingdom through the social construction of student activists within media discourses. It scrutinises the impact of dominant neoliberal discourses on the notion of student engagement, constructing certain students as legitimately engaged whilst infantilising and criminalising those who participate in protest. Exploring media coverage of and commentary on students engaged in activism, from the 2010 protests against university fee increases and from more recent activism in 2016, the article draws upon Sara Ahmed’s (2014) Willful Subjects and Imogen Tyler’s (2013) Revolting Subjects to examine critically the ways in which some powerful discourses control and limit which activities, practices and voices can be recognised as legitimate forms of student engagement.


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