Negative Integration Is What States Make of It? Tackling Labour Exploitation in the German Meat Sector

In this article, we trace Germany's recent reform (and its precursors) seeking to remedy precarious working conditions in the meat sector. Focusing on an extreme case of labour exploitation, and asking how unique it is, allows us to uncover which institutional features of EU Member States condition the liberalization effects of negative integration. We thereby contribute to the literature on Europeanization, which has mainly emphasized weak industrial relations to account for the German meat industry's reliance on cheap migrant labour. Complicated enforcement structures, demanding requirements of administrative cooperation, and the complexities of an evolving case law, we argue, further contributed to the precarious conditions of migrant workers in Germany. Major COVID outbreaks in slaughterhouses created the political momentum for reform which specifically addresses this administrative side of labour protection, but remains limited to the meat sector – despite similar patterns of labour exploitation elsewhere.

Republic of Congo: Opposition Alliance

"There are other (parties) which will be coming along", said B Jean-Jacques Serge Yhombi-Opango b , the RDD's vice president and son of the party's founder, who died from Covid-19 in 2020. Three opposition parties in the Republic of Congo have joined forces ahead of the next elections, for which veteran hardline leader B Denis Sassou Nguesso b is a potential candidate. The Alliance for Democratic Change in 2026, unveiled on April 13th, brings together three parties that have grassroots support but no legislative seats. [Extracted from the article] Copyright of Africa Research Bulletin: Political, Social & Cultural Series is the property of John Wiley & Sons, Inc. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full . (Copyright applies to all s.)

Is Democracy Lost?

President Kais Saied's de facto dissolution of parliament in July 2021, abandonment of the constitution, and targeting of the opposition are clear signs that Tunisia is no longer a democracy and has returned to the authoritarian playbook of Arab leaders past and present. I see three main reasons for this abrupt end to Tunisia's decade-old democracy: 1) the failure to accompany political reform with socioeconomic gains for citizens;2) the subsequent rise of populism;and 3) the mistakes of the Islamic party. To move forward in Tunisia and the Arab world more broadly, prodemocratic forces must link freedom, development, and social justice.

The Politics of Female Anger in Older Age: The Good Fight , Older Femininity and Political Change

This article identifies an important conversation about the politics of female anger in older age in the CBS show The Good Fight (2017–). By centring the narrative around the emotional life of a woman in her 60s, the show offers older femininity as a site for discussing social and political changes that have occurred in the USA in the aftermath of the election of Donald Trump. Through a close analysis of the four seasons that were released before the Covid-19 pandemic, this article maps the emotional journey of Diane Lockheart through her personal, economic, and political crises, showing how different emotions are connected with Diane's engagement—and at times disengagement—with politics. Ultimately, the article contributes to the field of feminist cultural studies by exploring the way The Good Fight offers female anger in older age as key to feminist engagement and political change. [ FROM AUTHOR] Copyright of Television & New Media is the property of Sage Publications Inc. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full . (Copyright applies to all s.)

Mongolia in 2022: From the COVID-19 Lockdown to Opening the Border

As in 2020, the biggest stories in Mongolia in 2021 and 2022 were elections, COVID-19, and how to cope with the contracting economy. At the end of the year, Mongolia was struggling to meet public health challenges and to recover from the economic downturn. Both the government that was elected in 2020 and the president who took office in 2021 have promised to improve corruption, which is endemic in Mongolia, but people have yet to see much change. Popular dissatisfaction led to a huge public protest in December 2022 that demanded the government ensure more transparency in the coal trade. Thirty years after a peaceful transition to democracy, Mongolia is facing its greatest challenge: how to maintain and develop a transparent democracy that truly cares about public opinion and people's livelihoods.

The political aspects of solidarity mobilizations in the context of shrinking civil society during the first wave of COVID-19

This paper contributes to the literature on solidarity mobilizations and the framings of social and political change in the context of the shrinking welfare state, de-democratization, and repressive state policies towards civil society. These issues are explored through the lens of interview-based research on Hungarian solidarity initiatives that emerged in response to the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic between March and June 2020. We specifically look at the ways in which volunteers and activists engaged in solidarity activities associated with healthcare, care-work, and education;accounted for their aspirations;conceptualized social responsibility;and reflected on the crisis management of the state. We found that newly emerging grassroots actors reinforced the documented trend of depoliticization in civil society. Although most respondents formulated a depoliticizing narrative, they did offer interpretations of their public role and collective action, values, and responsibilities, and pronounced a desire for social change. Nevertheless, to account for these framings, we need to move beyond the binary understanding of politics in solidarity and civil society research.

Singapore in 2022: Resolving Political Succession amid Growing Geopolitical Uncertainties

As in 2021, Singapore in 2022 remained largely in crisis mode despite resolving the keystone issue of political succession, with a prime-minister-in-waiting clearly in place. Still, COVID-19, together with the continued US–China economic and political conflicts, the negative fallout from the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and the anticipation of a possible recession in 2023, continued to cast dark clouds over Singapore and its politico-economic future. These developments were somewhat counterbalanced by positive developments in regional diplomacy, which acted as possible shock absorbers of negative fallout from outside the region. Still, Singapore appears to be at a crossroads, with political changes at home being challenged by external developments, and with the shape of things to come in Singapore remaining largely unknown.

El covid-19 y la crisis del regionalismo latinoamericano: lecciones que pueden ser aprendidas y sus limitaciones

El presente artículo hace un balance de la respuesta de las organizaciones regionales latinoamericanas y caribeñas al covid-19. En especial, se pregunta si éstas han contribuido a hacer frente a la pandemia y busca encontrar explicaciones para la considerable divergencia entre las respuestas de nueve organizaciones regionales. En ese orden de ideas, en primer lugar, señala que el regionalismo latinoamericano ya se encontraba en crisis antes de la llegada del covid-19. Algunas de las características de esta crisis eran: una decreciente regionalización económica, una creciente polarización política regional, y la parálisis y la desintegración de algunas organizaciones regionales como la UNASUR. Es por eso que se argumenta que las expectativas con respecto al desempeño de las organizaciones regionales eran bastante bajas. Posteriormente, combinando fuentes académicas y primarias, se hace una valoración de las acciones desplegadas por cada organización frente a la pandemia del covid-19. Basándose en una categorización propuesta en la literatura académica de estas acciones se dividen en tres para su evaluación: el intercambio de información, la coordinación interestatal y la acción colectiva (interna y externa). En esa valoración se obtuvieron resultados mixtos: hubo algunas organizaciones que tuvieron un buen desempeño y otras que tuvieron un bajo rendimiento, en especial, si se tienen en cuenta sus mandatos fundacionales y la totalidad de sus capacidades institucionales. En segundo lugar, con base en la literatura sobre organizaciones internacionales y regionales, se propone que son cuatro las variables que tienen mayor poder explicativo para dar cuenta de la divergencia de las respuestas de las instituciones regionales a la pandemia: la diferenciación funcional, la autonomía de las organizaciones, el liderazgo y el saber hacer (know-how) acumulado. En tercer lugar, el artículo deriva unas lecciones más generales para el regionalismo latinoamericano de las respuestas regionales al covid-19 (y de la ausencia de éstas en algunos casos). Se defiende la idea de que un regionalismo más técnico, diferenciado funcionalmente y segmentado puede resistir mejor los embates de la polarización ideológica y los inevitables cambios de ciclo político en América Latina. Especialmente, si se compara con los riesgos de parálisis y crisis de organizaciones "sombrilla" que abarcan una gran multiplicidad de agendas a través de numerosos consejos.Alternate :This article takes stock of the response of Latin American and Caribbean regional organizations to Covid-19. It asks whether they have contributed to addressing the pandemic. It proposes explanations for the considerable divergence between the responses of nine regional organizations: the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America (ALBA), the Andean Community (AC), the Caribbean Community (CARICOM), the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC), the Southern Common Market (MERCOSUR), the Pacific Alliance (PA), the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO), the Forum for the Progress and Integration of South America (PROSUR), and the Central American Integration System (SICA). In other words, Latin American regional institutions are analyzed as an independent variable influencing national governments' responses and crisis management during the pandemic. In that order of ideas, first, it is pointed out that Latin American regionalism was already in crisis before the arrival of Covid-19. Some of the characteristics of this crisis were: a decreasing economic regionalization, a growing regional political polarization, a lack of leadership, and the paralysis and/or disintegration of some regional organizations such as CELAC and UNASUR. In addition, these elements have also aggravated historical structural weaknesses of Latin American regionalism, such as intergovernmentalism and inter-presidentialism, which have given impetus to regional integration in times of ideological affinities but sometimes have also paralyzed and set it ack in times of divergence and lack of leadership. For these reasons, it is argued that expectations regarding the performance of regional organizations during the pandemic were quite low. Subsequently, combining academic and primary sources, the article provides an assessment of the actions deployed by each organization in the face of the cov'd-19 pandemic. Based on a categorization prev'ously proposed in the academic literature, which we apply to more cases and test on a broader empirical basis, these actions are divided into three types for their evaluation: information pooling, interstate coordination, and collective action (internal and external). Information pooling refers to an organization's ability to provide and centralize data, knowledge, and expertise. Interstate coordination encompasses actions aimed at jointly organizing the movement of goods, services, people, and the distribution of medical supplies. Collective action refers to actions that involve combining national resources or using shared resources to achieve common goals. It is subdiv'ded into external or internal depending on whether the actors involved in the action, or the objective of the action, are internal or external to the organization itself. Mixed results were obtained in assessing the organizations based on this typology of the actions deployed. Some organizations performed well, and others performed poorly, especially if their constituent mandates and the totality of their institutional capacities are taken into account. In the second part of the article, based on the academic literature on international and regional organizations and analyzing the nine cases under study, we argue that structure, mandate(s), and past experiences of regional institutions matter. Further, four variables have the most explanatory power to account for the divergence of the responses of regional institutions to the pandemic: functional differentiation, organizational autonomy, leadership, and accumulated know-how. Accordingly, this section shows how functional differentiation of the various integration agendas can allow progress to be made on specific issues that are seen as more technical, even amid ideological divergences and beyond the presidential summits. Regarding the autonomy of the organizations, it is argued that the organizations' capacity for agency vis-a-v's the Member States also allows them to increase their margin for action. Beyond the delegation of competencies and authority, the ability to set agendas and mobilize resources more autonomously allowed several of these organizations to act more decisively. Regarding the leadership variable, it is argued that leadership, be it the president of a member country (for example holding the pro tempore presidency) or a strong general secretariat of the organization, can be decisive in bringing organizations out of paralysis (as in the case of CELAC) or in advancing in response to the crisis even amid disputes between the presidents of the member states, as shown in the case of SICA and PAHOAccumulated knowledge (know-how) also proved to be critical, as is shown especially in the cases of SICA, CARICOM, and PAHO -in this case, the accumulated experience in health crisis management proved instrumental in preparing and facing the virus. Moreover, it is interesting that the awareness of the structural weakness of SICA and CARICOM member countries has led them to develop know-how and more capacities for fundraising and channeling external resources to deal with crises.The importance of accumulated know-how makes the dismantling of regional institutions such as the UNASUR Health Council (which had experience and contributed to the management of previous pandemics) even more worrisome. In its third section, the article derives some more general lessons for Latin American regionalism from the responses of these regional organizations to Covid-19 (and the absence of particular actions in some cases). However, some caveats are also raised about the limitations of these lessons. Some theses are discussed, and so e proposals are formulated to contribute to the debate on how to shield regionalism from the ideological divergences that come with political changes in Latin America. Particular emphasis is placed on the idea that a more technical, functionally differentiated, and segmented regionalism can better withstand the onslaught of ideological polarization in Latin America.The critical point of segmentation is the creation of separate organizational bodies to deal with strategic and regionally less controversial issues -either because they are considered more technical or there are fewer dogmatic positions than in other regional agendas. For example, a South American health organization or a South American center for disease control could be created. It is argued that such an organizational approach can better withstand the assault of growing regional ideological polarization, especially when compared to the risks of paralysis and crisis of "umbrella" organizations that cover a multiplicity of issues through numerous councils or other sub-units. Segmented organizations on not-so-political or technical issues, which are endowed with greater autonomy, could be much better protected from the spillover of political polarization and conflicts between presidents. It could also be easier for civil society actors to work with such sectoral, technically oriented organizations. A more technical approach to regional cooperation would also strengthen the role of development banks such as the Development Bank of Latin America (CAF) or the Inter-American Development Bank as "orchestrators" of regional initiatives as it happened during the Cov'd-19 pandemic. The article also warns that there is also a risk that lessons will not be learned, similar mistakes willbe made again, and positive developments will be reversed. The essentially intergovernmental character of regional cooperation means that more technically oriented organs cannot be completely shielded from political cycles. Functional segmentation is not the solution to all problems of Latin American regionalism.There could always be a backlash against an overly independent and apolitical orientation of such technical organs, or they could become more politicized. Despite some positive examples of successful cooperation in combating the pandemic, many of the structural limitations of Latin American regionalism have not changed for the better.

Access to Justice in an Age of Uncertainty

In countries like Australia, where the infection and death rates have been low compared to other parts of the world, lockdowns and social restrictions associated with limiting the spread of the virus have resulted in sharp increases in domestic and family violence, alcohol and substance abuse, mental health and physical health problems, job losses and business closures that are linked to unemployment, resulting in higher rates of poverty and homelessness (Carrington et al. 2021;Morley et al. 2021). In doing so, each of the author contributors have considered the following key questions: * Which individuals, social groups, communities or populations are particularly marginalised by the current context and why? * What are the ongoing, emerging and new barriers these groups face in accessing justice in the age of global uncertainty? * What social and political changes might be helpful in addressing the urgent social problems plaguing our world? * What key changes are required (to practice, policy or other mechanisms) that augment access to justice in the current context? While drawn from wide-ranging and diverse topics - the rise of recruitment fraud;the barriers academic staff face in supporting international students in the current neoliberal higher education sector that has been butchered since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic;and the challenges human services practitioners face in neoliberal organisations that have transitioned online work during COVID-19-related lockdowns at a time when this work became much more demanding and complex - not surprisingly, most submissions have focused on accessing basic human rights, such as economic security and affordable housing. In highlighting this important issue, they explain how offenders use employment advertisements to recruit would-be applicants to send personal information that compromises their fnancial security or to pay fees that then expose them to a range of violations, including identity theft and fraud.

Mass casualty event scenarios and political shifts: 2020 election outcomes and the U.S. COVID-19 pandemic

COVID-19 models indicate a mass casualty event may potentially occur in the United States. Among numerous social and economic changes, the potential to reshape the political landscape exists. The theoretical perspective of politics-administration dichotomy is used to examine the rhetoric, power, and authority of public health messages during the pandemic. This study considers political shifts using state-level data on population, historical voter turnout, and projected COVID-19 cases number coupled with national-level data on voter participation by age group and COVID-19 fatality rates. Developing a formula to calculate these data, we project the extent to which the number of voters from each party could diminish. The analysis shows the potential for significant political changes due to the disproportionate loss of older voters in key swing states in the months leading to the 2020 presidential election.

Introduction: post-COVID transformations

This article provides an introduction to the special issue on post-COVID transformations. We raise three sets of questions relating to the implications of the pandemic for the sustainability of the present global political and economic system and the extent to which that system may as a result be undergoing transformation. First, what is likely to be the impact of the pandemic on the current global order based on neoliberal hyperglobalization? Second, what insights do earlier pandemics along with other inter-related crises such as those of climate, inequality, social reproduction, and continued fallout of the global financial crisis offer for understanding the medium- to long-term implications of COVID-19. Finally, the special issue seeks to address the question of the extent to which the COVID pandemic may lead to progressive political transformations. We conclude with a summary of each of the individual contributions to this special issue.

Malaysia in 2021: Pandemic, Emergency, and Reprieve

Malaysia remained firmly in the grip of both the COVID-19 pandemic and economic turmoil in 2021. Ongoing political instability led to an emergency proclamation that suspended Parliament for the first time since 1969, followed by an unprecedented public rebuke of political leaders by the Malaysian king, and the third new government in as many years. This returned the long-dominant UMNO to power. An unexpected political ceasefire promised extensive reforms, but their implementation was uncertain.

The Borders of #MeToo: A Conversation about Sexual Violence Against Women in Ciudad Juárez

Latino/a sociology draws from and expands on interdisciplinary feminist standpoint theories;Latino/a sociology uses emerging critical methodologies such as personal narratives, auto-ethnography, testimonios, and visual ethnography that seek to incorporate the voices of excluded groups;Latino/a sociology is neither neutral nor value free but instead takes a stand against social injustice and promotes activist and political agendas for change;Latino/a sociology seeks to produce knowledge for social justice, human rights, and social change (Baca Zinn and Mirandé 2020, 5–6). [...]different themes emerged during the conversation between the authors and only three major topics are included in this essay. [...]Cathy J. Cohen and Sarah J. Jackson engage in dialogue to examine the Black Lives Matter movement and feminism in contemporary society (2016). [...]this article was inspired by the power of conversation as a method. The authors believe in the potential of dialogue to make meaning of the social realities and gender inequalities lived in Ciudad Juárez in the #MeToo era, and they expand it by including two additional dimensions: context and analysis. [...]the structure this article follows—context, and conversation & analysis—is intentionally designed to be unconventional. Context: Why Ciudad Juárez? Since the early 1990s, hundreds of women living in the industrialized border city known for housing hundreds of assembly plants—maquiladoras—have been exposed to the most grotesque expressions of violence against women.

The Pandemic as Political Opportunity: Jokowi’s Indonesia in the Time of Covid-19

In mid-2021, the Delta strain of the Covid-19 virus caused a second wave of transmissions and deaths in Indonesia at a scale much greater than what was seen in 2020. In this paper, I examine what the Indonesian government’s handling of the Covid crisis in 2021 reveals about the priorities of President Joko Widodo (Jokowi), as well as his political agenda and attitude towards the country’s democracy, as he strives to cement his legacy. I argue that, while devastating, the Covid-19 pandemic has given Jokowi the opportunity to push through long-planned economic and political reforms. Furthermore, I contend that, under the guise of promoting social and political stability in the time of Covid, Jokowi has also allowed for further democratic regression in Indonesia through laws that restrict freedom of speech and through the further empowerment of the military and intelligence agencies in civilian life. This paper ends with an examination of Jokowi’s persistently high popularity rating and the discourse surrounding the rumoured push for a constitutional reform that would allow for a third-term Jokowi presidency.