Bridging the divide between studies on disaster risk reduction education and child-centred disaster risk reduction: a critical review

There has been a recent increase in the body of knowledge related to children and disasters. These studies converge into three main fields of research: the impact of disasters on children and their psychological recovery, the integration of disaster risk reduction (DRR) into the education sectors and children’s participation in DRR. This article provides a literature review of the two latter fields of research where the focus is on reducing disaster losses and building resilience prior to a disaster. Overall, 48 studies are critically reviewed and compared in relation to the strengths and weaknesses of their aims, methods, locations of research, impact, and outcomes. The review identified a number of differences between the two fields and significant opportunities for linking the two approaches, sharing lessons and knowledge. Based on the review, recommendations for further research are outlined.     

Decolonizing Food Justice: Naming,Resisting, and Researching Colonizing Forces in the Movement

Over the past 15 years social movements for community food security, food sovereignty, and food justice have organized to address the failures of the multinational, industrial food system to fairly and equitably distribute healthy, affordable, culturally appropriate real food. At the same time, these social movements, and research about them, re‐inscribe white, patriarchal systems of power and privilege. We argue that in order to correct this pattern we must relocate our social movement goals and practices within a decolonizing and feminist leadership framework. This framework challenges movement leadership and scholarship by white people who uncritically assume a natural order of leadership based on academic achievement. We analyze critical points in our collaboration over the last four years using these frameworks. Doing so highlights the challenges and possibilities for a more inclusive food justice movement and more just scholarship.     

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights at 70: protection of human rights in Australia*

This commentary reflects on the legacy of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights on its 70th anniversary, in terms of the protection of human rights within Australia. I reflect on Australia’s failure to implement domestically the terms of the two founding Covenants, and the resulting piecemeal protections that exist for human rights. I finish by considering the growing complexities in understanding human rights, responsibilities, and limits.     

Naked scholarship: prefiguring a new world through uncertain development geographies

A favourite pastime for development scholars and practitioners is to critique the apparent failures of development assistance. This paper explores how critique might be better harnessed for productive efforts in development scholarship, using academic practice in the classroom and beyond to foster new possibilities. In this commentary, I consider whether rethinking how ‘we’ development geographers position ourselves as voices of authority in the world could be one place to begin.     

High Court review 2003: the centenary year

2003 marked the Centenary year of the High Court, an anniversary which provides an opportunity to revisit debates about its role in the Australian system of government. The first section of this article canvasses debates around this question, culminating in a consideration of the High Court's ‘new politics’. This sets the framework for an examination of events in 2003 from the perspective of the interaction between the judicial and other branches of government, in particular the executive. The article analyses the implications of executive interventions in relation to the judiciary, as well as important cases brought before the High Court. It argues that conflict between the executive and judicial branches is only likely to increase where contradictions of purpose arise between international legal norms and obligations, the rule of law and domestic policy objectives. This article is the third in a series of reviews of the High Court from a political‐science perspective published in the Australian Journal of Political Science.     

Gendered responses to the 2009 Black Saturday bushfires in Victoria,Australia

This paper presents findings from a gendered analysis of resident responses to the 2009 Black Saturday bushfires (wildfires) in Victoria, Australia. One hundred and seventy‐three people lost their lives in the bushfires and more than 2000 houses were destroyed. Previous research on Black Saturday has largely focused on issues of resident preparedness and response, with limited consideration of the role of gender in household decisions and actions. This paper examines the gendered dimensions of risk awareness, preparedness and response among households affected by the bushfires. Data were collected through in‐depth interviews with over 600 survivors and a questionnaire of 1314 households in fire‐affected areas. Analysis revealed that women more often wanted to leave than men, who more often wanted to stay and defend property against the bushfires. Nevertheless, findings suggest that broad‐brush characterisations of staying to defend as a masculine response and leaving as a feminine response are misguided. Although some women expressed a strong desire to leave, others were resolute on staying to defend. Equally, while some men were determined to stay and defend, others had never considered it an option. Despite this, the research identified numerous instances where disagreement had arisen as a result of differing intentions. Conflict most often stemmed from men's reluctance to leave, and was most apparent where households had not adequately planned or discussed their intended responses. The paper concludes by considering the degree to which the findings are consistent with other research on gender and bushfire, and the implications for bushfire safety policy and practice.     

High Court Review 2004: Limits on the Judicial Protection of Rights

The High Court's role of judicial review has often been examined for its impact on rights protection, an area of particular interest in Australia due to the historical lack of an explicit bill of rights in either statutory or constitutional form. In 2004 rights issues were presented in particularly stark relief in several key cases, demonstrating the difficulties of the role of judicial review in the Australian constitutional framework. The cases analysed here produce compelling evidence of the limitations of relying on judicial review for rights protection within the Australian system of government. They demonstrate that in the absence of a clearer framework for the protection of rights the judiciary can uphold unambiguous decisions of the legislature enshrined in statute, even where and when those provisions are considered to override the rule of law, international standards and human rights principles.     

Governing the Commercial Streets of the City: New Terrains of Disinvestment and Gentrification in Toronto's Inner Suburbs

This paper explores the commercial shopping street as a site of racialized class struggle. The argument builds around the study of a disinvested inner‐suburban neighbourhood in Toronto, which furnishes an ideal case through which to achieve the paper's objectives of, first, identifying commercial space as an important site of contestation over competing suburban futures; second, delineating how processes of racialization inform the economies of commercial gentrification and urban renewal; and third, highlighting the epistemological and theoretical insights that emerge when research is conducted collaboratively, among academic, community, and activist groupings. The paper argues that such commercial spaces play a key role in making the city accessible to vulnerable and marginalized groups. Two competing planning agendas centred on reordering commercial space, meanwhile, spell the almost‐certain demise of such arrangements: a “real estate” vision featuring new condominium developments, and a new urbanist resistance favouring “green” and “creative” alternatives. Our engagements with precarious, predominantly immigrant‐owned businesses and community‐based researchers reveal the complicity of both modes of development planning with processes of displacement and structural racism. Specifying these dynamics as “racialized class projects” opens up space for intervention and organizing.