For feminist geographies of austerity

Austerity policies and austere socio-economic conditions in the UK have had acute consequences for everyday life and, interconnectedly, the political and structural regimes that impact upon the lives of women and marginalised groups. Feminist geographies have arguably been enlivened and reinvigorated by critical engagements with austerity, bringing to light everyday experiences, structural inequalities and multi-scalar socio-economic relations. With this paper I propose five areas of intervention for further research in this field: social reproduction, everyday epistemologies, intersectionality, voice and silence, and embodied fieldwork. To conclude, I argue for continuing feminist critique and analyses given the legacies and futures of austerity.

Nurse-led projects for people experiencing homelessness and other inclusion health groups: a realist evaluation

Nursing service development or innovation projects, even small-scale ones, can be difficult to deliver and evaluate, due to a lack of resources and support. Results can also be difficult to disseminate, limiting transfer of learning. This paper presents findings from a realist evaluation of 10 small projects supported by the Queen's Nursing Institute Homeless and Inclusion Health Programme to deliver innovation in health care for people experiencing homelessness and other marginalised groups. These nurse-led projects were funded by the Queen's Nursing Institute and the Oak Foundation, and were largely successful in achieving outcomes to support the improved health of people experiencing homelessness and other marginalised groups. This realist evaluation explores the factors that contributed to the delivery of positive outcomes. All were impacted by the context and the response (mechanisms) of people experiencing homelessness and staff within these settings. It is hoped that the lessons learned will enable better support for nurse innovation projects in the future.

Equitable Access to Water at Alfred Duma Local Municipality

Water plays a central role in the life of society. However, factors such as population growth, pollution, and poor allocation and distribution mechanisms place severe pressures on adequate and equitable water supply. The aim of this chapter was to look into equitable water access in the Alfred Duma Local Municipality as well as the ecological governance framework that supports water access in local areas. The chapter also looked at the position of local municipality in water access and the impact of ecological scale on water provision. Many people are still unable to exercise their constitutional right to water in Alfred Duma Local Municipality, where most women feel disempowered, marginalized, and excluded from the process of making water access decisions. This brings challenges to disadvantaged and arginalized groups socially, economically, and environmentally where vulnerable and marginalised groups have no opportunity to equitably benefit from water access.

Job and Organisational Level Aspects of Work in Slovenia

Marginalised groups of workers in Slovenia are traditionally most affected by labour market uncertainty, but increasingly middle-class and upper-class workers are experiencing the same. Furthermore, new work forms have given rise to ethical, psychological and legal dilemmas. In this paper, we examine the concept of decent work and focus on job-related and organisational aspects of work in Slovenia. In the empirical part of the paper we therefore focus on working time, work organisation and co-operation within teams, work-life balance, health and stress, and overall satisfaction with working conditions. Our results evidence that new work forms increase insecurity and consequently diminish worker well-being; and this is most experienced by younger, agency and self-employed workers in Slovenia. This suggests that the development of multilevel and multifaceted measures which take into account socio-psychological and legislative factors to address labour market segmentation is necessary, especially when addressing the needs of those forced to work atypically.

Conflict and the Australian commemorative landscape

Australian war memorials have changed over time to reflect community sentiments and altered expectations for how a memorial should look and what it should commemorate. The monolith or cenotaph popular after the Great War has given way to other forms of contemporary memorialisation including civic, counter or anti-memorials or monuments. Contemporary memorials and monuments now also attempt to capture the voices of marginalised groups affected by trauma or conflict. In contrast, Great War memorials were often exclusionary, sexist and driven by a nation building agenda. Both the visibility and contestability of how a country such as Australia pursues public commemoration offers rich insights into the increasingly widespread efforts to construct an inclusive identity which moves beyond the cult of the warrior and the positioning of war as central to the life of the nation.

Narrative trajectories of disaster response: ethical preparedness from Katrina to COVID-19

While COVID-19 brings unprecedented challenges to the US healthcare system, understanding narratives of historical disasters illuminates ethical complexities shared with COVID-19. In 2005, Hurricane Katrina revealed a lack of disaster preparation and protocol, not dissimilar to the challenges faced by COVID-19 healthcare workers. A case study of Memorial Hospital during Hurricane Katrina reported by journalist-MD Sheri Fink reveals unique ethical challenges at the forefront of health crises. These challenges include disproportionate suffering in structurally vulnerable populations, as seen in COVID-19 where marginalised groups across the USA experience higher rates of disease and COVID-19-related death. Journalistic accounts of Katrina and COVID-19 offer unique perspectives on the ethical challenges present within medicine and society, and analysis of such stories reveals narrative trajectories anticipated in the aftermath of COVID-19. Through lenses of social suffering and structural violence, these narratives reinforce the need for systemic change, including legal action, ethical preparedness and physician protection to ensure high-quality care during times of crises. Narrative Medicine—as a practice of interrogating stories in medicine and re-centering the patient—offers a means to contextualise individual accounts of suffering during health crises in larger social matrices.

Microfinance Services and the Clients’ Socioeconomic Wellbeing During the Covid-19 Pandemic in Uganda

Microfinance is reported to be an effective tool of empowerment for vulnerable and marginalised groups, especially women. This study set out to investigate the relationship between microfinance services and the clients’ socioeconomic wellbeing during the Covid-19 pandemic in Uganda. The study involved 73 employees of microfinance institutions that deal directly with the clients. The study findings revealed that while no significant relationship exists between microfinance services and clients’ socioeconomic wellbeing, there is a significant moderate positive relationship between microfinance client protection policies and the clients’ socioeconomic wellbeing. The regression model revealed that a unit increase in client protection policies increases the socioeconomic wellbeing of microfinance services beneficiaries by 72%. It is recommended that microfinance institutions integrate client protection policies in their activities in line with their known social mission

Contextual Bible reading and intercultural Bible reading: Four Colombian experiences

Contextual Bible Reading (CBR) and Intercultural Bible Reading (IBR) have enabled the cooperation between socially engaged scholars and marginalised groups to find new resources in biblical texts to interpret their contexts and fight against the surrounding violence. As the use of these two methods has not been the object of a comparative study based on concrete experiences, this article presents them through four cases of Christian communities in Colombia. This comparative study not only illustrates the differences between these two methods of Bible reading, but also shows how they open new hermeneutic and liberation perspectives in the struggle for social justice and the search for reconciliation. The article depicts the CBR of the story of the Levite’s concubine (Jdg 19:1–30) by a group of women living in vulnerable conditions as well as the CBR of the parable of the father and his two sons (Lk 15:11–32) by a group of violence victims’ relatives. It also depicts the IBR of the story of the widow and the judge (Lk 18:1–8) by four groups of Caribbean readers as well as the IBR of the garden story (Gn 2:4b–25) by two Andean indigenous groups. Ordinary readers’ central role as interpreters of biblical texts let them recognise their own capabilities to transform their contexts in an emancipatory way and challenge biblical scholars and theologians. Even though CBR and IBR pursue different hermeneutical goals, they converge in giving a central role to the community as the subject of counter-hegemonic interpretations that open new horizons starting from reality and triggering liberation processes.Contribution: Beyond their differences and tensions, CBR and IBR are inclusive and dialogical methods intended for liberation that should be used to transcend the limits of dominant interpretations of biblical texts as well as the isolation of marginalised ordinary readers.

In Pursuit of Visibility: Queer Space Approach to Community Architecture in Jamaica

<p>Public space is a site of contestation where people enact their identities and exercise their citizenship. Often non-conforming individuals and communities are not given this opportunity, existing solely on the fringes of these spaces. Queer, especially Trans-identified, people are members of multi-marginalised groups grappling with the realities of discrimination in Jamaica’s (public) spaces. This thesis will explore queer spaces, specifically, how architecture can be used to create safe spaces for the inclusion of the displaced Trans* youth of Jamaica. While queer space has been explored conceptually in architecture, there is now a pressing need to bring physicality to this corporeal subject. How can the experience of this community be translated into architectural expression? Playing on the theme of visibility, this research aims to develop a design of physical space through the analysis of various visual media, along with other experimental participatory design techniques. With input from members of the community, the architectural intervention will remain relevant to its target user community and grounded in its users’ Jamaican context.</p>

In Pursuit of Visibility: Queer Space Approach to Community Architecture in Jamaica

<p>Public space is a site of contestation where people enact their identities and exercise their citizenship. Often non-conforming individuals and communities are not given this opportunity, existing solely on the fringes of these spaces. Queer, especially Trans-identified, people are members of multi-marginalised groups grappling with the realities of discrimination in Jamaica’s (public) spaces. This thesis will explore queer spaces, specifically, how architecture can be used to create safe spaces for the inclusion of the displaced Trans* youth of Jamaica. While queer space has been explored conceptually in architecture, there is now a pressing need to bring physicality to this corporeal subject. How can the experience of this community be translated into architectural expression? Playing on the theme of visibility, this research aims to develop a design of physical space through the analysis of various visual media, along with other experimental participatory design techniques. With input from members of the community, the architectural intervention will remain relevant to its target user community and grounded in its users’ Jamaican context.</p>