Identity transformation, stigma power, and mental wellbeing of Chinese eSports professional players

In China, the expanding eSports culture has produced a vast cohort of video-game players whose peak age ranges between 16 and 22 years. This study explores the dynamic identity transformation and mental wellbeing development processes of eSports professionals in a risk-prone society. It comprises in-depth interviews with players, coaches, managers, and commentators working in 15 top eSports clubs in the Chinese cities of Shanghai, Guangzhou, Suzhou, and Chengdu. We find eSports is perceived as non-secure, casual, and irregular by the Chinese public and that the mental changes experienced by eSports professionals throughout their careers have been significantly influenced by a more sophisticated form of state power and social norms, including cultural cognitive beliefs, economic stimulation, and authority attributions.

Constitutional Alchemy

In ‘The End of Law’, Bill Scheuerman illustrates the ways normativity, context and decision interlace, putting the lie to Carl Schmitt’s claim that decision is pure will. In doing so, Scheuerman gestures toward a truth about the alchemical nature of constitutions. Like decisions, I argue, constitutions are alchemical mechanisms for actualizing norms and normativizing facts. They accomplish this in part through mediating between dynamic (individual and political) selves before and after the moment of decision or coming-into-force. Schmitt’s error – or perhaps his strategy – is to make static this dynamic process of political self-formation. Viewed as static, it is more difficult to discern the process of normativizing facts and concretizing norms. I show how contemporary populist authoritarians are particularly skilled at harnessing this strategy. Populist authoritarians often use constitutional change to consolidate not just power but constructed identity. They are able to do so because constitutions provide this strategy of dynamic identity formation, which, by generating new normative imperatives, in turn shores up legitimacy.

Hyphenated. Transnational Feminism in Contemporary Israeli Art

The chapter discusses Jewish Israeli women immigrant artists through the case study of artist Jennifer Abesirra (b. 1984), an immigrant from France of Algerian origin. Abesirra's artworks stand as examples of the complex, multilayered, and dynamic identity of immigrant women in Israel. The discussion in the chapter integrates global and transnational aspects of women's migration with local perspectives, which are unique to the ethnic, religious, social and civic circumstances in the state of Israel. It tackles feminist issues, arguing for a new understanding of the role played by immigrant women within the nation–state. While striving to problematize essentialist theorisation, it examines heterogeneous constructions of gendered selves by women who live in transnational contexts: out of the mosaic of artistic artefacts analysed arises an argument that challenges the binary thinking that distinguishes the ‘Israeli society’ from ‘women migrants, and ‘the State of Israel’ from the ‘Middle Eastern space’.

Enabling the Secure Use of Dynamic Identity for the Internet of Things—Using the Secure Remote Update Protocol (SRUP)

This paper examines dynamic identity, as it pertains to the Internet of Things (IoT), and explores the practical implementation of a mitigation technique for some of the key weaknesses of a conventional dynamic identity model. This paper explores human-centric and machine-based observer approaches for confirming device identity, permitting automated identity confirmation for deployed systems. It also assesses the advantages of dynamic identity in the context of identity revocation permitting secure change of ownership for IoT devices. The paper explores use-cases for human and machine-based observation for authentication of device identity when devices join a Command and Control(C2) network, and considers the relative merits for these two approaches for different types of system.

Enabling the secure use of Dynamic Identity for the Internet of Things — using the Secure Remote Update Protocol (SRUP)

This paper examines dynamic identity, as it pertains to the IoT; and explores the practical implementation of a mitigation to some of the key weaknesses of a conventional dynamic identity model. This paper explores human-centric and machine-based observer approaches for confirming device identity, permitting automated identity confirmation for deployed systems. It also assesses the advantages of dynamic identity in the context of identity revocation permitting secure change of ownership for IoT devices. The paper explores use-cases for human and machine-based observation for authentication of device identity when devices join a C2 network, and considers the relative merits for these two approaches for different types of system.