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Postmigrant Spatial Justice? The Case of ‘Berlin Develops New Neighbourhoods’ (BENN)
Full text linkThis article discusses the introduction of a new urban policy in Berlin, Germany, in the frame of postmigrant spatial justice. In 2017, Berlin established so-called ‘integration management programs’ in 20 different neighbourhoods around large refugee shelters as a response to the growing challenges local authorities faced after the administrative collapse in 2015/16. A new policy agenda provides the opportunity to learn from previous policies and programs—especially when it is addressed to the local dimension of integration, a widely and controversially discussed issue. Drawing on fieldwork conducted in Berlin in 2018 and 2019, this article discusses how migration is framed in urban social policy against both postmigrant and spatial justice theory
Disrupting Dialogue? The Participatory Urban Governance of Far-Right Contestations in Cottbus
Full text linkThis article investigates how municipal governments negotiate far-right contestations through the format of citizens’ dialogues and contemplates to what extent they disrupt established assumptions about participatory urban governance. In doing so, I want to contribute to emerging scholarship on reactionary responses to migration-led societal transformations in cities via scrutinising their effects on institutional change in participatory practices. Building on participatory urban governance literature and studies on the far right in the social sciences, I argue that inviting far-right articulations into the democratic arena of participation serves to normalise authoritarian and racist positions, as the far right’s demand for more direct involvement of ‘the people’ is expressed in reactionary terms. I will show how this applies to two prominent notions of participation in the literature, namely, agonistic and communicative approaches. This argument is developed through an explorative case study of two neighbourhood-based citizens’ dialogues in Cottbus, East Germany, which the municipal government initiated in response to local far-right rallies. While a careful reading of these forums reveals productive potentials when the issue of international migration is untangled from context-specific, socio-spatial problems in the neighbourhoods, my analysis also shows how the municipality’s negotiation of far-right contestations within the citizens’ dialogues serves to legitimise far-right ideology. I find that to negotiate today’s societal polarisation, municipal authorities need to rethink local participatory institutions by disentangling these complex dynamics and reject far-right contestations, while designing dialogues for democratic and emancipatory learning
Casting for Change: Tracing Gender in Discussions of Casting through Feminist Media Ethnography
Full text linkThe moment of casting is a crucial one in any media production. Casting the ‘right’ person shapes the narrative as much as the way in which the final product might be received by critics and audiences. For this article, casting—as the moment in which gender is hypervisible in its complex intersectional entanglement with class, race and sexuality—will be our gateway to exploring the dynamics of discussion of gender conventions and how we, as feminist scholars, might manoeuvre. To do so, we will test and triangulate three different forms of ethnographically inspired inquiry: 1) ‘collaborative auto-ethnography,’ to discuss male-to-female gender-bending comedies from the 1980s and 1990s, 2) ‘netnography’ of online discussions about the (potential) recasting of gendered legacy roles from Doctor Who to Mary Poppins, and 3) textual media analysis of content focusing on the casting of cisgender actors for transgender roles. Exploring the affordances and challenges of these three methods underlines the duty of care that is essential to feminist audience research. Moving across personal and anonymous, ‘real’ and ‘virtual,’ popular and professional discussion highlights how gender has been used and continues to be instrumentalised in lived audience experience and in audience research
Return to De Capitani: The EU Legislative Process between Transparency and Effectiveness
Full text linkThree years after the judgment of the General Court in the De Capitani case, we assess whether the findings of the Court have settled for good the debate between transparency and effectiveness in EU law-making or rather opened new reflections on legislative transparency in the EU
Talkin’ ‘bout a Negotiation: (Un)Transparent Rapporteurs’ Speeches in the European Parliament
Full text linkFor policies to be legitimate, both the policy process and the underlying reasons must be transparent to the public. In the EU, the lion’s share of legislation is nowadays negotiated in informal secluded meeting called trilogues. Therefore, presentation of the trilogues compromise by the rapporteur to the European Parliament (EP) plenary is, arguably, one of the few formal occasions for ‘transparency in process,’ i.e., public access to the details of actual interactions between policymakers. The aim of this article is thus to examine the extent to which rapporteurs are transparent about trilogue negotiations when presenting legislative compromises to the EP during plenary sessions, and to assess whether the extent of transparency is linked to the extent of conflict between legislative actors and to elements of the political context related to rapporteurs. To this purpose, we coded 176 rapporteur speeches and, on this basis, concluded that these speeches poorly discuss the trilogue negotiations. Interinstitutional negotiations are discussed in only 64% of cases, and even when they are, the extent of information about trilogues is generally small. While we do not find support for an effect of political conflicts, some characteristics linked with rapporteurs are significantly related to transparency in process of their speeches. This is the case for their political affiliation and their national culture of transparence
Rational Actors, Passive and Helpless Victims, Neither, Both: EU Borders and the Drive to Migrate in the Horn of Africa
Full text linkThis article argues that neither borders nor the ways in which migrants see them constitute significant deterrents to the migrants’ resolve to migrate. The argument is based on an investigation of migrants en route to Europe from the Horn of Africa and the ways in which they see EU external borders and how that contributes to the decision to migrate. The article advances critiques of rational choice models of migrant decision-making that are based mainly on economic factors and contributes to theoretical explanations of why some people in the Horn of Africa migrate irregularly, despite measures enforced by state authorities to curb their movement. The article draws on a qualitative thematic analysis of personal face-to-face interviews conducted with migrants from four countries in the Horn of Africa who were in Ethiopia at the time of the research. In the interviews, there was sufficient evidence that migrants had realistic perceptions of European borders and that life in Europe might not be rosy. But this did not dampen the resolve to migrate. Solutions other than those that inhibit movement but understand, are sensitive to and include the perceptions of migrants are more likely to effectively address challenges associated with irregular migration
Social Exclusion/Inclusion and Australian First Nations LGBTIQ+ Young People’s Wellbeing
Full text linkThere is little known about the social, cultural and emotional wellbeing (SCEWB) of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander LGBTIQ+ young people in Australia. What research exists does not disaggregate young people’s experiences from those of their adult Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander LGBTIQ+ peers. The research that forms the basis for this article is one of the first conducted in Australia on this topic. The article uses information from in-depth interviews to inform concepts of social inclusion and exclusion for this population group. The interviews demonstrate the different ways in which social inclusion/exclusion practices, patterns and process within First Nations communities and non-Indigenous LGBTIQ+ communities impact on the SCEWB of these young people. The research demonstrates the importance of acceptance and support from families in particular the centrality of mothers to young people feeling accepted, safe and able to successfully overcome challenges to SCEWB. Non-Indigenous urban LGBTIQ+ communities are at times seen as a “second family” for young people, however, structural racism within these communities is also seen as a problem for young people’s inclusion. This article contributes significant new evidence on the impact of inclusion/exclusion on the SCEWB of Australian First Nations LGBTIQ+ youth
Perceived Impact of Border Closure due to Covid-19 of Intending Nigerian Migrants
Full text linkWith few exceptions, the European Council closed Europe for non-citizen travellers on 17 March 2020 because of the Covid-19 pandemic. Many African countries, including Nigeria, have placed travel restrictions on or completely shut their borders to both travellers who want to enter the country and citizens who want to leave. These decisions affect many intending migrants seeking a way to reach Europe. Health and socioeconomic uncertainties related to lockdowns, border closure, and in some cases travel restrictions directly affect the dynamics of decision-making by migrants. This article employs in-depth interviews and focus group discussions to explore the perception of Nigerians who intend to migrate considering the influence of Covid-19. The study focuses on Nigerian migrants but touches on Nigerians in transit who are trapped in Niger en route to Europe through Libya and Morocco. While border closure by most of the sending and receiving countries led to a decrease in the intention of migrants to travel, Covid-19 as a pandemic does not significantly influence migrants’ decisions primarily because of its global presence, merely leading to delays. In conclusion, after border reopening, intercontinental migration is expected to increase in both volume and intensity
How Do Scholars Communicate the ‘Temporary Turn’ in Urban Studies? A Socio-Semiotic Framework
Full text linkInterdisciplinarity broadens urban planning praxis and simultaneously deepens how urban research unfurls. Indeed, this breadth and depth diverges and converges the understanding of current and popular concepts such as temporary use (TU)—also recognized as short-term or temporally undefined use of space. Through a meta-research, or research about research approach employing socio-semiotics and bibliometric analyses for the first time in relation to TU, I clarify the increasing scholarly attention to urban interventions by asking: How are urban scholars communicating the TU discourse? A socio-semiotic framework helps unpack the production of meanings as well as symbols channeled through the scholarly institutionalization of TU. Supporting this, I use bibliometric analyses to explicate the production and reproduction of meaning through keywords and citation networks in research literature. This study illuminates epistemological activities and reflects on directions tied to our understanding and articulation of a potential ‘Temporary Turn’ in theory and practice
Qualitative Methods and Hybrid Maps for Spatial Perception with an Example of Security Perception
Full text linkThe security/insecurity of our cities has become the subject of public debate in recent years. The individual intuitions about security or insecurity can vary with age, gender, social background, personal constitution and previous positive or negative experiences. They are also constantly (re)produced, as perceptions of space are individual and selective. Noting these variations, materialised factors also play a major role, e.g., recessed house entrances, dense or high hedges, poor orientation options, dark places, etc. Attributing meaning to these materialised factors, real constructs are formed which create positive or negative narratives about certain (urban) spaces, influencing the actual use and design of urban spaces. To investigate the importance attached to certain spaces, qualitative methods are required for examining socio-spatial situations, perceptual processes and attribution. Using different methods in an explorative and in-depth descriptive research phase, such as expert interviews, user observations, surveys on go-alongs, participatory mapping with detailed information on structural and spatial locations, the advantages and disadvantages of method selection are presented. Berlin’s Alexanderplatz was used as a case study area to determine perceptions of security in urban areas. We confirmed that despite variations, certain subjective perceptions concerning visibility, brightness, and audibility are collective. Additionally, hybrid maps are used to explain how subjective perceptions of space, combined with 3D graphics, can alert architects and city planners to uncertainty among users of public space