resources is a less important element in intra-elite competition. In posing and answering these questions, the intention of this paper is not to present the PMF as a ‘better’ or ‘stand-alone’ approach to understanding the dynamics of violent conflict or their humanitarian knock-on effects. Instead, it is to bring a theory of politics, and in particular a theory of elite political actors and the way they behave when violence and loyalties become commoditised, to bear on
( Meza and Ciurlo, 2019 ), and in many cases the role of the affected communities ( Aguilera, 2013 ) and the intervention contexts ( Villa et al. , 2017 ) are unknown due to their marked individualistic accent ( Arango, 2021 ). Nonetheless, these studies also recognise their contribution to the emergence of new political actors and spaces ( Villa, 2014 ). According to Manuel Alejandro Moreno and Maria Elena Díaz (2016 : 196), the guiding principles of the psychosocial assistance of the displaced are the ‘recognition of agency and the depathologization of suffering
newcomers or saving those in need from suffering in Libya or death on the high seas. But what we have seen in this case bends any concept of ‘public discussion and debate’ beyond breaking point. In making accusations of collusion between people smugglers and rescuers, political actors advanced a set of false claims, the factual basis of which was limited to a small handful of ambiguous incidents which were then read in a tendentious and biased way, without
always apolitical, and that falling back on medical data would shield the organisation’s public statements from being instrumentalised by political actors. But today, in places like Syria and Nigeria, simply treating 34 war-wounded patients in the wrong part of the country is considered akin to treating 34 terrorists and sending them back to the front line. In other words, data is increasingly interpreted in partisan ways. Data also arguably recasts
shores of the wealthy by keeping those who suffer ‘over there’. Whatever the reasons, the fact that international and local NGOs are heroically working to deal with the consequences of disaster and conflict allows the deeper reasons for inequities of power and money to go unchallenged. It performs the role of alibi, in other words, for the political actors whose foreign-policy choices lie behind many of our major international crises. For example, for powerful states who had to navigate the end of the Cold War and the renewed process of
The role of national machineries, as a way to promote the status of women, acquired international relevance during the World Conference on the International Women's Year, in Mexico City in 1975. This book reflects Division for the Advancement of Women's (DAW) long-standing interest in the area of national machineries, bringing together the experiences, research and insights of experts. The first part of the book sets out the major issues facing national machineries at the conceptual level. It reflects upon five aspects of democratization: devolution or decentralization; the role of political parties; monitoring and auditing systems; and the importance of increasing the presence of women within institutions of the state and government. The second part is a comparative analysis and sets out the major issues facing national machineries at the political level. A combination of factors, including civil society, state bodies and political actors, need to come together for national machineries to function effectively in the interest of gender equality. Next comes the 'lessons learned' by national machineries in mainstreaming gender. National machineries should have an achievable agenda, an important part of which must be 'a re-definition of gender issues. The third part contains case studies that build upon the specific experiences of national machineries in different countries. The successful experience of Nordic countries in gender mainstreaming is also discussed.
essential for the development of Italian economic welfare and its generous social system.4 Throughout the history of European integration one can observe a tendency among Italian political actors to justify internal reforms or unpopular decisions – such as cuts in pension and health systems – with demands from the European level and as necessary for keeping Italy in the ‘heart of Europe’.5 Furthermore, Italian governments have traditionally preferred federalist designs for the future of the Community, they have supported the institutional strengthening of the EP, a far
something. The first case examines how key political actors worked to sustain a representation of the region as cooperative in a time of geopolitical crisis outside the Arctic itself, following Russia’s annexation of Crimea. From there, we move on to a more granular policy scale seeking to see how particular types of representations of the Arctic matter for specific political outcomes. The two remaining examples look at framings relevant for clarifying policy debates around what kind of actors belong in Arctic politics, namely the participation of non-Arctic states and
strategies for NWMs that emerge from this analysis as well as those that incorporate NWMs but go beyond them to include other political actors. Gender mainstreaming and institutionalization While in the 1970s and 1980s Women in Development advocates talked of ‘integrating women into development’, in the 1990s the emphasis was on the institutionalization of gender issues in development policy and planning. This shift in emphasis stemmed from the recognition that institutions were already ‘gendered’, typically placing women in sex-typed services and targeting women
upon this channel of information and impact. Other actors: interest groups and regions In the course of the early years of Finnish EU membership, a majority of social and political actors outside the parliamentary system began to engage, in one way or another, in EU decision-making. Their channels of influence went, however, more often directly to Brussels than to the national system of EU decision-making. Actors from the economic sector adapted themselves most smoothly to the European system owing to their existing contacts and networks. For the time being, many new