Challenging gender norms: women’s leadership, political authority, and autonomy

Purpose In patriarchal settings, cultural barriers continue to influence women’s participation in positions of leadership and political authority. This paper aims to explore these findings in light of the theoretical concepts of “hegemonic masculinity” and “patriarchy,” which explain gender disparities in the occupancy of political power and leadership positions in Qatar. Design/methodology/approach Data from original face-to-face national surveys conducted among subjects in Qatar were used, including 1,611 completed household interviews. Findings The findings were consistent with the prevailing patriarchal beliefs present in Qatari society and Arab Gulf States. The analysis showed that there was greater significant support for men holding key leadership and authority positions than women. Individual-level factors were found to have a significant association with attitudes favoring women. Compared to respondents who had never attended school, those who had completed secondary school and those who had partaken in higher education favored having women in leadership roles. Practical implications As a means to fix the gender imbalance within the occupancy of positions of political power in Qatar, this study recommends putting substantial efforts into increasing the number of interventions underpinning gender equality through social awareness programs that may improve the public’s perceptions. Furthermore, gender-equitable affirmative actions are needed to promote the inclusion of women in power and increase their presence in leadership roles. Originality/value This study is among the very few that have theoretically and empirically addressed the issue of women’s authority and involvement in key leadership roles in the context of Qatar.

The Right to Higher Education and Political Authority

This chapter provides an account of the nature and scope of political authority over higher education. The account sets out a proactive role for the state the autonomous flourishing of adults. It affirms the idea that the liberal state’s educational obligations to citizens extend beyond a basic or compulsory education, not only for reasons of political justice, but also because it is politically legitimate for the state to do so. The chapter defends this account against the concern that such authority is too paternalistic, and gives examples of how this conception of authority would apply (and not apply) to higher education.

Religion as an Instrument of Soft Power in International Relations

The article examines the cases of using religion as a “soft power” in the example of Russia and Turkey. Based on foreign policy strategies, each state forms its own discourse in the use of religions as “soft power”. The article substantiates the idea that world religions have the greatest potential in solving interstate issues, as carriers of a unique historical experience of spiritual and political globalization, as institutions of spiritual power that accumulate significant material and other resources, as well as as institutions of civil society that promote the values of freedom and humanism. The use of religion as «soft power» becomes another argument in criticizing the theories of secularism. The analysis of the discourse of religion as a “soft power” was made on the example of the foreign policy strategies of Russia and Turkey, taking into account their political authority in the international arena, as well as their perception as one of the centers of world religions.

The Khon Clan and the Sakyapas

Khon Konchog Gyalpo, the main disciple of Drogmi, founded a monastery at Sakya. It was this monastery that gave its name to the whole monastic order of Drogmi. Konchog was a member of the Khon clan, the family that went on to produce the successive abbots or chief lamas of Sakya who have continued as the heads of this order ever since. The succession of abbots within the family was established on the father-to-son or uncle-to-nephew pattern. In the instance of an abbot remaining celibate, it was his brother or a close relative who continued the family line and oversaw the monastery’s worldly affairs; when the abbot died, he was succeeded by one of his nephews. The Sakyas reached the summit of political power when Sakya Pandita and Phagpa won the confidence and favour of Mongolian khans. The Sakyas were appointed as regents of Tibet, whereby Tibet became subject to a single political authority for the first time after the collapse of the monarchy. The aim of this paper is to show the development of the Khon clan, how a minor aristocratic family was transformed into a significant power in Tibet in both historical and religious aspects, through the efforts of some prominent members of Khon family.

Pandemic politics – an introduction

The outbreak of COVID-19 in early 2020 and the various measures taken subsequently, either by individual countries or by government and non-government bodies with a global reach, have had a profound effect on human lives on a number of levels, be it social, economic, legal, or political. The scramble to respond to the threat posed by the rapid spread of the virus has, in many cases, led to a suspension of ordinary politics whilst at the same time throwing into sharp relief the profoundly political nature of the pandemic. In addition to the new issues that have arisen regarding detection and treatment of the COVID-19 virus, perennial political issues regarding the limits of political authority, racial and gender justice, and populism and demagoguery have thrust themselves to the forefront of mainstream political discourse.

Organizing Warfare and Diplomacy in Western India, 1778–83

This chapter examines the origins of a distinctive system of organizing military conquest in the final quarter of the eighteenth century. It seeks to de-centre the study of politics and military contestation by looking at the war against the Marathas (1778–82) from the vantage point of the region most directly affected by it—the western peninsular territory of the Bombay presidency. The advantage in shifting the focus away from the politically dominant Bengal presidency allows identification of a critical component in the political economy of conquest—the transfer of political authority from a civilian council to the commander of a military force. This shift in political power was essential to the success of the EIC regime of conquest even as it became a perennial source of conflict within the governing structures of the Company state. The debate and dissension that accompanied the deployment of military force both enabled the success of the machine of war and characterized the creation of a distinctive early colonial ideology of rule that subverted civilian control of the military.

Decolonizing Authority: The Conflict on Wet'suwet’en Territory

One of the leading features of colonialism is the imposition on a given territory and people a framework for what constitutes authority that renders pre-existing governing practices and legal orders unrecognizable as features of legitimate law and governance. Understood in this way, colonialism renders Indigenous law and governing practices invisible. As a result, decolonization requires changing how authority is apprehended and not only how it is distributed. This article compares two frameworks of authority in relation to the conflict on Wet'suwet’en territory: liberal postcolonial statism and relational pluralism. It shows how each framework provides a distinct lens through which to understand the pertinent features of political authority but argues that relational pluralism presents a better account of how to reconceive political authority in the context of real-world conflict.

A critical review of the Cabinet Circular on Te Tiriti o Waitangi and the Treaty of Waitangi advice to ministers

The New Zealand state developed from a treaty between the British Crown and hapū (sub-tribes) in 1840. The te Reo (Māori language) text and the English version of the agreement are fundamentally different. Breaches of this treaty and tension over how the political relationship between Māori and the Crown should proceed are ongoing. In 2019, the Cabinet Office issued a Circular instructing bureaucratic advisers of the questions they should address when providing advice to ministers on the agreement’s contemporary application. In this article, we use Critical Tiriti Analysis (CTA) – an analytical framework applied to public policies – to suggest additional and alternative questions to inform bureaucratic advice. The article defines CTA in detail and shows how using it in this way could protect Māori rights to tino rangatiratanga (a sovereignty and authority that is not subservient to others) and substantive engagement, as citizens, in the formation of public policy. This article’s central argument is that the Circular reflects an important evolution in government policy thought. However, in showing how the Circular privileges the English version (the Treaty of Waitangi) over the Māori text (Te Tiriti o Waitangi), the article demonstrates how Māori political authority remains subservient to the Crown in ways that Te Tiriti did not intend. We show through the conceptual illustration of the care and protection of Māori children, despite the significant evolution in government thought that it represents, these rights are not fully protected by the Circular. This is significant because it was Te Tiriti, with its protection of extant Māori authority and sovereignty, that was signed by all but 39 of the more than 500 chiefs who agreed to the British Crown establishing government over their own people, but who did not agree to the colonial relationship which may be read into the English version.

Land Reform for a Landless Chief in South Africa: History and Land Restitution in KwaZulu-Natal

Land claims and contests have been central to the construction of political authority across the African continent. South Africa’s post-apartheid land reform program aims to address historical dispossessions, but the program has experienced numerous obstacles and limits—in terms of pace, communal land access, productivity, and rural class divides. Drawing on archival and newspaper sources, Kelly traces how the descendant of a colonially-appointed, landless chief manipulated a claim into a landed chieftaincy and how both the chief and the competing claimants have deployed histories of landlessness and firstcomer accounts in a manner distinct to the KwaZulu-Natal region as part of the land restitution process.