Probabilistic Regional Population Forecasts: The Example of Queensland, Australia

The variability of demographic trends at the subnational scale, particularly internal and international migration, renders subnational population forecasting more difficult than at the national scale. Illustrating the uncertainty of the demographic future for subnational regions is therefore a crucial element of any set of subnational population forecasts. However, subnational forecasts are currently prepared using deterministic models, which fail to properly address the issue of demographic uncertainty. The traditional high, medium, and low variants approach employed by many national statistical offices poses a number of problems. Probabilistic population forecasting models have the potential to overcome many of these problems, but these models have so far been limited to national-level forecasts. This article reports a first attempt to implement a probabilistic approach to subnational population forecasting using a biregional projection framework. The article sets out the forecasting framework, outlines the approach adopted to formulate each of the assumptions, and presents probabilistic forecasts for 2002–2051 for Queensland and the rest of Australia. The forecasts show a two-thirds probability that Queensland's population in 2051 will be between 5.4 and 7.7 million while the same range for the rest of the country is 18.6 and 22.7 million. The forecasts quantify to what extent greater uncertainty exists about the demographic future at the subnational compared with the national scale.     

Military Anxiety and Genocide: Explaining Campaigns of Annihilation (and Their Absence)

When and why do states launch campaigns of genocide against minorities? In 2017, in a violent campaign increasingly described as genocide, the Myanmar military drove almost 700,000 Rohingya from Rakhine State into Bangladesh killing an estimated 6,700 in the first month and an unknown number overall. This assault is particularly puzzling given the international goodwill and economic benefits the regime was accruing since it opened its political system after decades of isolation. Scholars have identified a number of causes of genocide yet this literature requires development in two areas. First, few studies compare cases of genocide with situations of lower level political violence, meaning it is difficult to distinguish between societies that are simply violent from those which are genocidal. Second, despite the central role played by militaries in genocide, most studies have treated the institution as simply a tool of nationalists and other genocidal leaders rather than as actors with their own incentives and fears. In this study, I develop an explanation of genocide that places militaries at its centre. I contend that armed forces sometimes choose genocide during periods of rapid political change when they perceive a serious threat to their political and economic interests or self-appointed status as “guardian of the nation.” My study begins with a comparison between Rakhine State, Myanmar and a similarly volatile region that has avoided genocide, Assam in Northeast India. In a later stage of theory testing I examine another case of genocide, Indonesia in 1965/66.     

Evaluating Ancient Whale Exploitation on the Northern Oregon Coast Through Ancient DNA and Zooarchaeological Analysis

Whales have long been an important part of Pacific Northwest Coast human subsistence and lifeways. Native peoples on the Oregon Coast were not known to hunt whales, but a humpback whale phalange with an embedded bone harpoon at the Par-Tee site (35CLT20) and ethnographic accounts raised the possibility of opportunistic whale hunting. We analyzed a suite of whale remains from Par-Tee and performed ancient DNA-based species identifications on 30 specimens. The assemblage includes gray whales (Eschrichtius robustus, 60.7% of the assemblage), humpbacks (Megaptera novaeangliae, 32.1%), minkes (Balaenoptera acutorostrata, 3.6%), and orcas (Orcinus orca, 3.6%). While the species composition is similar to those found in archaeological deposits from systematic whaling areas in Washington and Vancouver Island, bone modification patterns and element representation reveal important differences. Our analysis demonstrates that whales were likely a supplementary part of human subsistence at Par-Tee and, while opportunistic whale hunting likely occurred, it may have been secondary to scavenging and utilization of beached and/or drift whales.     

At Once the Saviours and the Saved: “Diaspora Girls”, Dangerous Places,and Smart Power

This article explores how racially marked young women and girls are sought to be discursively and materially incorporated into markets and imperial economic and geopolitical strategies in spatially differentiated ways, through an examination of a series of media productions which portray the engagement of young racialised British citizens with their countries of heritage. I propose the term “diaspora girls” to refer to the protagonists of these media productions, who are understood as embodying “British” post‐feminist gender values and heroically carrying them to “dangerous” spaces of gender oppression and violence. In the context of current constructions of diasporas as agents of development, alongside the framing of migration as a “security threat” to the global North, these British citizens are viewed as ideally positioned to further the contemporary imperialist project. Their perceived empowerment is understood to be fragile and contingent, however, because of their affective connection with these spaces. Further, for those who are Muslim in particular, their perceived Britishness is understood as requiring continual reaffirmation and proof, thus reinforcing racialised structures of citizenship, and legitimising a border regime which reinscribes permanent North–South inequality.     

Long-term trends in health status and determinants of health among the off-reserve Indigenous population in Canada, 1991–2012

The Indigenous population in Canada totals approximately 1.6 million individuals, representing about 5% of the total population. The off-reserve Indigenous population represents the fastest growing segment of the Indigenous population, with over 50% living in urban settings. Despite the size of the off-reserve population, research on the health of Indigenous peoples tends to remain focused on reserve-based populations. The purpose of this paper is to contribute to a better understanding of health and social determinants of health among off-reserve Indigenous peoples in Canada. Using data from the 1991 and 2012 Aboriginal Peoples Surveys this paper examines changes in health status and the social determinants of health over a 20-year time span. Results show a decline in health care use and self-reported health status in the period between 1991 and 2012. The results may be related to urbanization, aging, and increased prevalence of some chronic conditions. The findings may also be tied to barriers to achieving adequate off-reserve health care—jurisdictional disputes, disjointed program coverage, systemic racism, and a lack of equity-oriented health services. There remains a pressing need for Indigenous and non-Indigenous governments, researchers, and policymakers to build new relationships that bridge these gaps in health and access to timely care.     

Hope,Cynicism, and Complicity: Worldly Resistance in Reinhold Niebuhr's Criticism of Karl Barth

This paper seeks to investigate the relationship between hope, cynicism, and despair in the stakes of a well-known dispute between Karl Barth and Reinhold Niebuhr. Niebuhr accuses Barth, and those who adopt Barth's central doctrinal and political positions, of quietism: in the name of religious perfectionism, such Barthians are not disposed toward incremental but necessary social reforms. For Niebuhr, this is a sure sign of “Barthian pessimism,” the despair that results from a conscience oversensitive to the absolute demands of God's righteousness. This paper seeks to show that a certain form of Barthian political theology is defensible as an ethical disposition since it need not fall victim to the helpless despair that Niebuhr fears, and simultaneously that a defensible account of what I call “total complicity” reflects the self-awareness and self-criticism that often become deformed into cynical despair and reshapes them toward repentant engagement with the world.