Women,gender and feminism in the Australian Journal of Political Science: A review

This review article, written for the fiftieth anniversary of the Australian Journal of Political Science (formerly Politics), analyses articles focusing on women, gender and feminism that were published in the journal. The analysis demonstrates that the study of gender is relevant to a broad range of fields, and methodological approaches used, in political science. It also demonstrates that political science knowledge is itself historically and socially constructed, reflecting both traditional social power relations and the influence of the social movements that challenge them. Consequently, key articles have drawn attention to the ways in which the frameworks of mainstream forms of political science were gender-biased and have sometimes continued to be so, particularly in terms of narrow constructions of the ‘political’. Such narrow constructions may still be contributing to some ongoing gaps in the literature, despite the important contributions made by work published in the journal.     

A mindful shift: an opportunity for mindfulness-driven tourism in a post-pandemic world

Abstract

Many see the COVID-19 pandemic as a turning point for tourism, a chance to reflect on the pressing environmental and socio-economic concerns of the industry, and an opportunity to pinpoint a more desirable direction. However, for tourism to revive as a less impactful and more meaningful industry, more mindful consumers are needed to take factual benefits from the gravity of the current situation. Mindfulness as a practice of bringing a certain quality of attention to moment-by-moment experiences has become an important asset for individuals to cope with the problems of modern life. It is even seen as a significant driver of lifestyle change in Western societies, resulting in an increasing number of more conscious consumers and mindfulness-driven products and services. The COVID-19 pandemic is a wake-up call and opportunity for the tourism industry to embrace the mindfulness movement, trusting in its capacity to reflect on the current problems and to pave a new way forward towards more compassionate and meaningful tourism for both hosts and guests.     

以党员先进性教育活动为契机积极探索流动党员教育管理的新机制

流动党员的教育和管理问题是新形势下党建工作面临的一个突出课题。如何针对流动党员形成的特点和规律,积极探索加强流动党员教育和管理工作的新机制,不仅是各级党组织肩负的重要责任,也是加强党的执政能力建设和先进性建设、巩固党的执政基础以及加强党的基层组织建设的迫切要求。     

The COVID-19 crisis as an opportunity for escaping the unsustainable global tourism path

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has halted mobility globally on an unprecedented scale, causing the neoliberal market mechanisms of global tourism to be severely disrupted. In turn, this situation is leading to the decline of certain mainstream business formats and, simultaneously, the emergence of others. Based on a review of recent crisis recovery processes, the tourism sector is likely to rebound from this sudden market shock, primarily because of various forms of government interventions. Nevertheless, although policymakers seek to strengthen the resilience of post-pandemic tourism, their subsidies and other initiatives serve to maintain a fundamentally flawed market logic. The crisis has, therefore, brought us to a fork in the road – giving us the perfect opportunity to select a new direction and move forward by adopting a more sustainable path. Specifically, COVID-19 offers public, private, and academic actors a unique opportunity to design and consolidate the transition towards a greener and more balanced tourism. Tourism scholars, for example, can take a leading role in this by redesigning their curriculum to prepare future industry leaders for a more responsible travel and tourism experience.     

The rise and fall of the NPT: an opportunity for Britain

Long seen as an unexpectedly successful example of international cooperation, the NPT is now like a wisdom tooth that is rotten at its root and the abscess is poisoning the international body politic. The price for agreement to the substance of the treaty was the inclusion of Article 6, which committed the Nuclear Weapon States (NWS) to the ultimate elimination of nuclear weapons. With the strategic arms race underway, in 1968 the NWS saw Article 6 as an empty aspiration; 25 years later it had acquired a whole new significance. The first half of the 1990s was a period of constructive optimism as non-signatories hastened to sign the treaty and the non-nuclear weapon states were persuaded to agree to its indefinite extension. The second half brought disillusionment as it became increasingly clear that the NWS had no intention of meeting their Article 6 obligations or the promises made at the five-yearly review conferences (1995, 2000, 2005), and that Washington was set on developing useable nukes for pre-emptive prevention. The bad faith and double standards fuelled wide-spread resentment (particularly in the Non-Aligned Movement) and contributed to the post-9/11 image of the 'The West against the Rest', a corrosive concept that is reinforced by US rhetoric. Rather than 'cooperative security', America is explicitly set on global military supremacy, which will evoke countervailing power and inevitably lead to nuclear arms racing and the renewed danger of inadvertent nuclear war. The likely long- and short-term consequences of the present situation require a fundamental response involving a major policy initiative. Only Britain is in a position to take such an initiative, but it will require us to withdraw from our self-appointed role of 'loyal vassal' to America and to adopt a role that has the potential of being not only more important and influential, but also more appropriate to our history, capabilities and talents.     

Gender Segregation,Effacement, and Suppression: Trends in the Status of Women in Israel

The aim of this article is to analyze the phenomenon of the exclusion of women from the public sphere in Israel. The article describes some of the causes of this phenomenon, its impact on Israeli society, and the difficulty in confronting it. Israeli women have made impressive gains on many fronts, but the exclusion of women from the public sphere as a result of the influence of the growing Ultra‐Orthodox minority, which imposes its norms on the general public, raises serious concerns. The exclusion of women manifests itself in several forms: gender segregation in public spaces, the effacement of women's images from the public sphere, and the suppression of women's voice. The infiltration of Orthodox Jewish fundamentalism into Israeli society may cause the regression of advancements previously made in women's rights in Israel. The article points to the limitations of the treatment of this phenomenon within a theory of multiculturalism, and suggests an alternative framework of discourse, which relies on concepts that are drawn from the literature on environmental ethics, public rights, and public ownership of space and resources.     

Rethinking the Historiographical Impulse: The History of Ancient Israel as a Problem

The first part of this paper provides some insights into the problematic nature of the genre “history of ancient Israel”, both in terms of historiography and of historical epistemology. It is argued that the concept “history of ancient Israel” is essentially valid within a particular modern theological or biblical historiographical context. As such, this history of ancient Israel may indeed progress and generate new understandings but is nonetheless seriously limited by its main concern with “biblical Israel”. It is also proposed that in order to overcome these thematic and epistemological historical limitations, a wider history of ancient Palestine or the Southern Levant should be envisioned, into which to understand the epigraphic and archaeological realia of the kingdoms of Israel and Judah, together with other contemporary polities in the region, and the later development of biblical traditions and texts. The second part of the paper addresses questions of ethnogenesis, socio-political organization and identity in the light of the previous discussion, setting the stage for an alternative history of Israel and other historical realities in ancient Palestine.     

Indigenous claims and heritage conservation: an opportunity for critical dialogue

Abstract

Indigenous claims of ownership and access to material culture challenge the field of heritage conservation. This article illustrates how indigenous concerns conflict with basic constructs of Western conservation, and how conservators respond to these claims. Despite efforts of inclusion, relatively few conservation projects integrate indigenous knowledge with scientific research. Redistribution of conservation authority is rarely put into practice. The article concludes by pointing to conservation as a meeting ground where collaborative decisions can be made about material culture on display. Conflict negotiation in conservation presents a potential forum for cultural representation and contested meaning of objects on display.     

Geographies of gender and feminism in Mexico: a field in construction

Abstract

This paper sets out to present geographies of gender and feminism in Mexico in order to identify some of the conceptual contributions, thematic axes and key problems within the field’s corpus of knowledge that, while widely-recognized internationally, is only beginning to develop in Mexico. I examine the academic production of feminist geography with an emphasis on the institutional contexts that may facilitate or perhaps impede putting such studies into practice in different institutions throughout the country. Additionally, I provide an account of the main objects of study that have contributed to configuring original, committed field research under the conditions of exclusion and marginality that women face on a daily basis.     

Women who DARE: driving attitudes and road experiences among ultraorthodox women in Israel

This study seeks to gain insight into a unique group, ultraorthodox women in Israel, and their views and attitudes on driving and road experiences. Ultraorthodox women are generally contending with spatial and mobility restrictions due to stringent gendered spaces and social norms in their communities. Specifically in Israel, throughout the ultraorthodox sector, women are strictly forbidden to drive. In this research, we put the emphasis on driving dilemmas that have received marginal attention both socially and empirically. A qualitative method was used, based on face-to-face in-depth interviews, with women from three major ultraorthodox communities. The findings reveal that the driving ban for ultraorthodox women in Israel generates ambivalence and conflict, and exacts a heavy social price. Moreover, in line with approaches of feminist geography, it raises issues of gender relations and cultural implications, such as restricting the space and the mobility of women in order to keep them in a subordinate position. The results are discussed in terms of gender roles, cultural exclusion, and spatiality, on both the practical and emotional levels. The study opens a window to a unique sector of the Israeli population, revealing unique dilemmas with which ultraorthodox women grapple daily in their community.     

Tropes of fear and the crisis of the west: Trumpism as a discourse of post-territorial coloniality*

We examine ‘Trumpism’ as a contemporary form of colonial domination, showing how this discourse represents both a crisis of coloniality and a stimulus for a movement of ‘decoloniality’. A critical discourse analysis is applied to seven speeches delivered by Donald Trump between his announcement of his presidential candidacy in June 2015 and his inauguration in January 2017. In assessing Trump's arguments, we focus mainly on those concerning national security, illegal immigration, and the threats posed by various foreign countries. Although these arguments sit within a long colonial tradition, they also indicate a crisis of modernity, as witnessed in the growing challenges to colonial masculinity, nationalism, and rationality. We conclude that Trumpism articulates a reaction to these challenges, and that Trump's rise to power is a symptom of the crisis of post-territorial coloniality in contemporary global society.     

Feminism in the Post-Soviet space: the geopolitics of Estonian feminism

The article deals with the problem how Estonian geocultural difference (Estonia as a small, economically vulnerable post-socialist country in the borderlands of Europe) constructs Estonian feminism(s) both in today’s and historical context. The geocultural location has had a great influence upon Estonian society and culture, and the Estonian situation can be understood as a state of being somewhere in-between (see Koobak and Marling 2014 Koobak, Redi, and Raili Marling. 2014. “The Decolonial Challenge. Framing Post-Socialist Central and Eastern Europe within Transnational Feminist Studies.” European Journal of Women’s Studies 21 (4): 1–14. doi:10.1177/1350506814542882.[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]), not only geographically but also socio-culturally. Estonian feminism began in close connection to the Estonian national movement in the second half of the 19^th century. The Soviet period in Estonia (1940–1991; from 1941 to 1944 Estonia was occupied by Nazi Germany) which interrupted the feminist tradition had a controversial meaning considering the gender aspect. Although the idea of gender equality was an integral part of Soviet ideology, it was not implemented in reality. Estonia was regarded as the Soviet republic both economically, geographically (the neighborhood of Finland) and culturally closest to the West. Thus, Estonian gender ideas consisted of a mixture of Soviet gender equality rhetoric, the ideas of Estonian nationalism, some Western influences, puritanical attitudes toward sexuality and the female body. Feminism reappeared in Estonia after the restoration of independence. The Estonian experience belongs to those small stories set in a specific local context (see Lykke 2010 Lykke, Nina. 2010. Feminist Studies: A Guide to Intersectional Theory, Methodology and Writing. New York, London: Routledge.[Crossref] , [Google Scholar]) and as such, it has shaped feminist practices that are a result of complex socio-spatial power relations and intersections of ethnicity/nationality, gender, geocultural place etc., both historically and in today’s context.     

The model of ethnic democracy: Israel as a Jewish and democratic state

The liberal democratic nation–state is on the decline in the West as a result of globalisation, regionalisation, universalisation of minority rights, multiculturalism and the rise of ethno–nationalism. While Western countries are decoupling the nation–state and shifting toward multicultural civic democracy, other countries are consolidating an alternative non–civic form of a democratic state that is identified with and subservient to a single ethnic nation. This model, ‘ethnic democracy’, is presented; its defining features, the circumstances leading to it and the conditions for its stability are elaborated upon; and it is applied to Israel. Contrary to its self–image and international reputation as a Western liberal democracy, Israel is an ethnic democracy in which the Jews appropriate the state and make it a tool for advancing their national security, demography, public space, culture and interests. At the same time, Israel is a democracy that extends various kinds of rights to 1 million Palestinian Arab citizens (16 per cent of the population) who are perceived as a threat. The criticisms against the general model and its applicability to Israel are discussed. The model has already been applied to other countries, but more applications are needed in order to develop it further.     

Transcending Nationalist Divides: Religious Reconciliation as the Basis for a One‐State Solution in Israel/Palestine

Nationalism's inability to yield peacefully coexisting forms of political identity in Israel/Palestine has persisted for more than a century. This is so whether one refers to strands of secular nationalism that composed predominating, modern historical foundations for Israeli and Palestinian political consciousness, or subsequent forms of nationalism that have become intertwined, ever more, with religion. Further, nationalism's failure to foster a way out of the Israel/Palestine impasse infects not only the familiar (but increasingly problematic) “two‐state” solution but also the contested (but perhaps more productive) “one‐state” solution. The one‐state solution has tended to involve a secular approach, for example, the binational variety emblematized by Edward Said, or, alternatively, a nonbinary democratic state where equal citizenship is not contingent on distinct forms of identity. However, the untapped promise of the one‐state solution could be better actualized with ingredients for the construction of citizenship that, in a real, spiritual sense, transcend the limiting divisions of nationalism. Specifically, shared religious roots, including the modes of reconciliation integral to the three Abrahamic traditions—Judaism, Christianity, and Islam—most directly ensnared within the Israel/Palestine bind might offer a more fruitful basis for coexistence.     

Gender relations in Bedouin communities in Israel: local government as a site of ambivalent modernity

In this article, we examine the perceptions towards women and gender relations maintained by male, local authority officials within two Bedouin towns in Israel. As such, the current research lies at the intersection of local politics, gender, space and culture. We argue that analysis of these perspectives provides insights into the ambivalent nature of modernity: into the tension between the desire to preserve the traditional role of women in maintaining the family, and the recognition of the powerful potential of women to act as agents of change. Based on an analysis of personal interviews, the study traces the ways in which both power and vulnerability impact the attitudes and perspectives of these men officials. By applying narrative analysis, gendered power structures are examined within Bedouin society in the context of the local authority – zooming in on the narratives provided by the male authority officials. The findings reveal that the officials maintain a series of ambivalent and conflictual attitudes towards the role of women. Bearing in mind their potential impact on the quality of women's daily lives in local public spaces, it seems vitally important to account for the entire matrix of tensions and vulnerabilities that impact the municipal policy instruments at their disposal. The findings are relevant beyond the Bedouin communities in Israel and may serve as a platform for a wider discussion of the dilemmas of minority women in rapidly changing cultural environments, and ambivalent modernity.