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Police and racial identity formation: thinking the Military police of São Paulo as a site of racial socialization to Whiteness
Get PDFBased on ethnographic observations in the Military Police of São Paulo, this article examines how police identity formation shapes officers’ racial self-identification and complicates existing conceptualizations of how the police reproduce racial domination. I show that the police environment influences officers from mixed-race backgrounds in their choices of racial identification, often prompting a rejection of Blackness and/or encouraging a self-racialization as White. I argue that this occurs because the institution functions as a racially socializing environment, structuring officers’ interpretations of race through the transmission of a ‘White socialisation’. In a police force where Black and Brown officers constitute the majority of lower ranks, I demonstrate how these dynamics inform our understanding of the mechanisms that sustain racialized policing, and operate as a means to secure the foundations of a police system that relies on the embodied denial of race to enforce racial inequalities
Contraceptive access in displacement settings: a quantitative study of Syrians displaced to Türkiye
Get PDFAccess to contraception for displaced populations is both lifesaving and a right. This paper argues that displacement demands a separate analytical lens from other mobilities and crisis contexts. I offer a framework, based on established concepts and available evidence, to understand different aspects of contraceptive access in displacement. I then use the case study of Syrians displaced to Türkiye, a population for whom data quality and availability is comparably better than other displacement settings, as a worked example to test the framework using empirical analysis of nationally representative survey data. I analyse contraceptive use and reasons for non-use as a proxy for access among married women, optimising data from the Syrian sample of the 2018 Türkiye Demographic and Health Survey (n = 1,736) and the 2006 Syria Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey (n = 13,619). The results show that the most relevant dimensions of the framework that constrained access to displaced women’s preferred methods of contraception were cognitive accessibility and perceived quality of care, specifically fear of side effects and other health concerns. A minority of women who were currently using contraception still faced barriers in accessing their preferred method, suggesting limits to contraceptive autonomy. This case study offers theoretically transferable findings about data and evidence for other displacement settings. Notably, the present data landscape on the sexual and reproductive health of displaced populations does not adequately capture issues around contraceptive access and understandings will remain partial with the currently available metrics
The impact of primary care networks on emergency hospitalisations in the English NHS: an interrupted time series analysis
Get PDFRecent years have seen an emergence of collaborative primary care models in the English National Health Service and other international health systems. Primary Care Networks (PCNs) were introduced in England in July 2019, marking the first time collaboration between general practices was incentivised through a nationwide policy. While participation was not mandatory, nearly all general practices joined a PCN, largely due to strong financial incentives. Our study aim was to estimate the impact of PCNs on emergency hospitalisations using an interrupted time series design. Quarterly data between October 2016 and March 2023 from the North West London Whole Systems Integrated Care dataset was used to construct two primary outcomes: all-cause and ambulatory care sensitive conditions (ACSC) emergency hospitalisations, as well as Accident and Emergency attendances, considered as a secondary outcome. Furthermore, we analysed whether the impact of PCNs varied based on practice characteristics. A reduction in all-cause and ACSC hospitalisations was observed following the PCNs’ introduction, until the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. The analysis also revealed a smaller reduction in ACSC hospitalisations among practices with more deprived patient populations and larger populations of patients with long-term conditions. While PCNs’ implementation appears to have led to a reduction in emergency hospitalisations in North West London, this effect was only observed in the very short term as it stopped with the COVID-19 pandemic. Future studies should examine the effect across England and evaluate their continued impact
Capacity in derivatives with public bodies after Dexia credit local S.A. v Patrimonio del Trentino S.p.A. [2024] EWHC 2717 (Comm) ('Dexia v Trentino')
Get PDFThis case note examines Dexia v Trentino, a key case on capacity in derivative transactions involving public or quasi-public entities. The comment suggests that the case is consistent with the distinction between hedging and speculation being determined objectively by reference to the entity’s financial exposure and economic purpose. It is also consistent with the leading authority, particularly that in Banca Intesa Sanpaolo Spa & Anor v Comune Di Venezia [2023] EWCA Civ 1482. The comment illustrates a judicial movement towards objective assessments of capacity in light of the distinction between hedging and speculation. The note, however, critiques reliance on legal form and argues that hybrid entities like Trentino, though private in structure, are publicly accountable. Unlike private entities, the public impact of decisions involving their capacity has ramifications that extend beyond those applicable to private companies. The comment argues that courts should look past legal form to the public accountability common to entities emanating from public law and those utilizing private structures
The moral force of the benefit principle
No full textWhat gives the benefit principle its moral appeal as an idea of tax justice? And what can count as a benefit for that purpose? My claim is that we can trace the moral force of various versions of the principle to five ideas: individual justification, causal feedback, reciprocity, opposable valuation and non-objectionable baseline. I develop those ideas into an account of the moral permissibility of benefit-based taxation, and explain how that account addresses problems about the quantification and valuation of benefits and the relationship between benefit and the justice of the background distribution
Citizens as problems or resources: power, diplomacy and the contested voice of the nation
No full textWorks in public diplomacy, nation branding, and soft power generally disregard conflict and disorder, depicting the relationship between states and citizens as harmonious and productive. This is a relevant blind spot that overlooks several social, political and technological transformations –such as the emergence of digital media– which have destabilised the monopoly of states over the representation and communication of the nation. Actors outside the state nowadays have greater capacity for cultivating and disseminating alternative versions of national identity which may disrupt those produced by authorities. This chapter outlines these transformations, focussing on two areas where tensions between states and citizens are notorious. The first one refers to episodes of protest, when, due to their coverage by different forms of media, the perception of political elites as the main conduit of the national voice becomes unsettled. The second one denotes attempts by authorities to incorporate citizens within processes of national representation and communication, through apparently ‘bottom-up’ initiatives that may cast people as resources or as individuals to be disciplined about their ‘correct’ identities. An acknowledgement of these tensions has relevant implications for the study and practice of public diplomacy and nation branding, opening empirical and normative questions about the role of ordinary citizens in the task of representing and communicating the nation. Moreover, it interrogates the extent to which democratic ideals of participation and representativeness align with a set of initiatives that to date have prioritised the concentration of symbolic power in the hands of the state
The formation of European Studies
No full textAcademic studies of Europe in the postwar period increasingly focused on aspects of European integration. This development was led by contributions from the social sciences, not the humanities. The article explores a text first written in the 1950s and then revised in the 1960s which provides a strong rationale for the present focus and approach. The text in question is Denys Hay’s book Europe: The Emergence of an Idea, which argues that Europe’s relatively recent historical emergence as a cultural unity makes it fit for a distinctive form of regional studies. Hay conceived such studies as having their centre of gravity in concrete problems that stand in the way of achieving closer European union; concrete problems in, especially, politics, economics, and law, which closer union would raise. What Hay did not think such studies required was a contribution from the humanities. The article explores Hay’s argument for that view, and offers a counterargument to the effect that, in light of the fundamental changes in the humanities since the 1960s, European Studies today would significantly benefit from incorporating humanities elements and approaches into its formation
Rejection, failure and success in academia
No full textPurpose Success is very visible in academia, yet quite rare. Rejection and failure are ubiquitous, yet largely invisible. Against the background of this discrepancy, this essay reflects on the roles of rejection, failure and success in academia. Design/methodology/approach The essay draws on our personal reflections, which are informed by numerous experiences of rejection and failure alongside occasional successes. Findings We argue that rejections are an essential part of academic life, that they are inevitable, and that they happen to everyone. We moreover discuss how we can respond to rejections and how we can learn from them. Finally, we reflect more generally on what failure and success mean in academia. In this context, we highlight the dangers of instrumentalism and neglecting life beyond work, and we seek to promote more inclusive notions of success that go beyond a focus on “top-ranked” publications and better reflect the broad range of valuable contributions academics can make to society. Originality/value This essay seeks to contribute to a more open and explicit discussion about rejection, failure and success in the academic community. In doing so, we hope that the paper can help academics in general, and emerging researchers in particular, make sense of and navigate the various pressures and contradictions that pervade academic careers in the 21st century
Approximating maximum-size properly colored forests
No full textIn the Properly Colored Spanning Tree problem, we are given an edge-colored undirected graph and the goal is to find a properly colored spanning tree, i.e., a spanning tree in which any two adjacent edges have distinct colors. The problem is interesting not only from a graph coloring point of view, but is also closely related to the Degree Bounded Spanning Tree and (1,2)- Traveling Salesman problems, two classical questions that have attracted considerable interest in combinatorial optimization and approximation theory. Previous work on properly colored spanning trees has mainly focused on determining the existence of such a tree and hence has not considered the question from an algorithmic perspective. We propose an optimization version called Maximum-size Properly Colored Forest problem, which aims to find a properly colored forest with as many edges as possible. We consider the problem in different graph classes and for different numbers of colors, and present polynomial-time approximation algorithms as well as inapproximability results for these settings. Our proof technique relies on the sum of matching matroids defined by the color classes, a connection that might be of independent combinatorial interest. We also consider the Maximum-size Properly Colored Tree problem asking for the maximum size of a properly colored tree not necessarily spanning all the vertices. We show that the optimum is significantly more difficult to approximate than in the forest case, and provide an approximation algorithm for complete multigraphs
Global communication and the scalar politics of race: tensions in transnational articulations of (anti)-racism(s)
No full textThe media and cultural imperialism paradigm’s reliance on Marxist world-system analysis and class, alongside the globalization paradigm’s faith in cosmopolitanism, has made debates on race relatively uncommon in global media and communication studies. Recent literature on race and digital technology has placed race more firmly on the map within our wider field, but the bulk of this work remains nation-centric and has not addressed the tensions in transnational articulations of (anti)-racism(s). This article develops an analytical framework—“the scalar politics of race”—to understand how various actors strategically deploy scale to address race via social media, legacy media, and physical space. I apply this framework to 3 case studies, examining the global disciplining of national forms of racism, the hegemony of transnational forms of anti-racism and solidarity, and translocal appropriations of anti-racism