Academic literature on the topic 'Disempowering conditions'

Subtle manipulations of wording can significantly affect behavior. We examine differences in how people respond to empowering questions (e.g., “What could you do to exercise more?”) compared with disempowering questions (e.g., “Why aren’t you exercising more?”). Responding to two different topics (exercise and eating behavior), participants in empowering question conditions offered more solutions in their responses, placed more responsibility on themselves rather than on external factors, were more optimistic, and referred more to the future. Participants in disempowering conditions gave more excuses, placed more responsibility on situational factors, were more pessimistic, and focused more on obstacles.

When disaffection on political parties and politicians is pervasive, most argue whether it could be possible, thanks to the Internet – and Information and Communication Technologies in general – forget the mainstream political system and let the citizenry express their own opinion, debate in virtual agorae and vote their representatives and policy choices directly. In other words, the claim is whether the actual intermediaries can be replaced by citizen networks or, in the limit, just be overridden.Our aim in the following lines is to (1) explain that some dire (socioeconomic) changes are actually taking place,(2) why these socioeconomic changes are taking place and (3) infer, from this, what conditions shall take place in the future for (4) another wave of changes to happen that could eventually a much acclaimed new (e-)democracy. In a last section, we will discuss that despite lack of data, the trend seems to be just in the direction of the impoverishment of democracy, partly due to the weakening of political institutions.

Embroidery provides meaningful discoveries through interactions and relations connected in the lived experiences of women hand embroiderers. A woman’s performance of her embroidery skills indicates the intimate connection of her womanhood, her daily life, and the kind of labor and effort she places upon it. Interviews, focus group discussions, and creative workshop reveal that social conditions from the past to the present, allow her to continuously construct her identity and negotiate her role in society. Embroidery has offered the women in this study an opportunity to create not only their identity as individuals but also as a community, and has helped them develop their capacities beyond realizing their womanhood. The presence of the problematics of gender and power is evident through the obvious contradictions of the empowered under disempowering conditions thus rendering their power and empowerment, symbolic.

The restructuring of biodiversity governance in Europe during the last two decades has been, inter alia, based on the argument that effective conservation hinges on consensual decision-making involving all relevant stakeholders. This has given rise to various network-based forms of governance and participatory arrangements in protected areas reinforcing the involvement of business and non-state actors, particularly through the creation of profitable public–private partnerships. Even though this shift has been framed as promoting stakeholder and public participation, in practice it has often hampered democratic decision-making and community empowerment. In this paper, we investigate the restructuring of biodiversity governance through the establishment of participatory arrangements in the governance of the natural park of Sant Llorenç del Munt i l’Obac, a place whose history has been linked with the emergence of one of the first environmental movements in Catalonia (Spain). We pay particular attention to the role of participatory arrangements in transforming power relationships and in promoting a neoliberal mode of biodiversity governance. We find that governance restructuring under the rhetoric of promoting stakeholder participation has in practice led to the exclusion of key social actors from the management of the natural park and favoured the inclusion of actors with mainly economic motivations further embedding a neoliberal agenda in the governance of the park and ultimately disempowering local community.

Teacher demoralization is a concept describing the negative emotional experiences affecting teachers’ well-being and quality of teaching. However, since the dominant discourse about teacher demoralization is influenced by psychological perspectives, especially the theory of burnout, most of effort to promote teachers’ well-being and quality of teaching reply on psychological approaches. Nevertheless, teacher demoralization is more socially constructed other than psychologically constructed. Thus, this study aims to identify the potential social causes instead of psychological roots of teacher demoralization. Using in-depth interview data, the study illustrates that school administration may, from teachers’ perspectives, structurally demoralize teachers by disempowering teachers to control over labor process of teaching and to appreciate the instructional values of work and working condition. Thus, school reformers are recommended to empower teachers to exercise control over labor process of teaching and to appreciate the instructional values of their work and working conditions.

AbstractThis article uses one case study to explore the use of criminal hate speech provisions against populist politicians. In a high-profile Finnish case, a populist politician was found guilty of hate speech after a four-year criminal process. Though the prosecution was ultimately successful, the various problems with the case helped boost the political popularity of the accused who was turned into a well-known public figure and member of Parliament. The case might thus be seen to warn against tackling populist politicians by means of criminal law. However, further analysis of the political context and a comparison with the Dutch prosecution against anti-immigration politician Geert Wilders complicate this conclusion. This article examines the consequences of hate speech prosecutions of politicians and sheds light on the conditions under which they can achieve (some of) their aims. The case also has lessons for other jurisdictions about when hate speech prosecutions of politicians are likely to be successful in terms of countering prejudice and disempowering those who spread it for electoral purposes.

In a world where paid work is touted as a development panacea, empowering women has started to look a lot like burdening them. I argue here that this burdening of women is a predictable result of the conception of empowerment as choice or agency. Dominant conceptions of empowerment characterize empowerment as the increase in a person’s ability to do what they choose. Yet conditions of gender equality and poverty structure women’s options such that choosing (among unacceptable alternatives), doing (too much), and doing more (than men) are often both women’s best option and modes of disempowerment. Seeing the way increased agency can be disempowering requires shifting away from the view that social structures disempower by constraining individual agency. We instead need a conception of power as a constraint on individual action to a conception of power as structuring the field of available actions in ways that affect the relative position of social groups. Through a discussion of the gender division of labor and the feminization of responsibility, I argue that a more feminist conception of empowerment will weaken the link between empowerment and individual agency.

The rapid growth of Low Cost Private Schools (LCPS) in developing countries has led to increasing interest in the model’s ‘sustainability’. Nearly all the literature is based on the proponents’ claims that the model is more cost-effective than government schools rather than of the implications of the model depending to a large extent on very low paid young women teachers.The article is written against the backdrop of the model of an autonomous, respected, well-prepared teacher and framed in terms of human rights and gender (dis-)empowerment. Drawing on material on literature mainly from India and Pakistan, it documents the educational levels and employment opportunities for women; reviews the arguments for and against the model pointing out the lack of attention to the high rates of profit and the plight of teachers; and demonstrates that the (mostly young women) teachers are not only very low paid but are also poorly qualified with very precarious conditions of employment. Simply put, paying women teachers less than the minimum wage denies their human rights, further disempowering those who are already socially marginalized and excluded. This is not sustainable for gender equality in the long term and, finally, detrimental to education in developing societies as a whole.

Abstract Scholarship has long recognized the centrality of white racial sexual fears in the rhetoric and practice surrounding the lynching of African Americans in the U.S. South in the decades around 1900. The topic has not previously been taken up for systematic study beyond event-level analyses. This article presents theoretical and empirical evidence that whites’ intersecting racial and gender concerns converging in racial sexual fears were conducive to lynching related to interracial sex, but not to those unrelated to interracial sex, under certain conditions. The empirical findings, based on lynchings in 11 southern states from 1881–1930, demonstrate that lynchings related to interracial sex were more likely to occur in contexts characterized by higher levels of white female dependents residing with white male householders, higher levels of white female school attendance, and higher levels of adult black male literacy. These findings suggest that interracial sex-related lynching served to recover and retain white men’s racial and gender status, which postbellum developments had undermined, by oppressing not only African American men and women but disempowering white women as well. White racial sexual fears during the lynching era should, therefore, be seen as constituting a social force in their own right with long-term consequences for race and gender relations and inequalities.

Background In a context of high migration, there are growing numbers of women living in the UK who have experienced female genital mutilation/cutting. Evidence is needed to understand how best to meet their health-care needs and to shape culturally appropriate service delivery. Objectives To undertake two systematic reviews of qualitative evidence to illuminate the experiences, needs, barriers and facilitators around seeking and providing female genital mutilation-/cutting-related health care from the perspectives of (1) women and girls who have experienced female genital mutilation/cutting (review 1) and (2) health professionals (review 2). Review methods The reviews were undertaken separately using a thematic synthesis approach and then combined into an overarching synthesis. Sixteen electronic databases (including grey literature sources) were searched from inception to 31 December 2017 and supplemented by reference list searching. Papers from any Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development country with any date and in any language were included (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development membership was considered a proxy for comparable high-income migrant destination countries). Standardised tools were used for quality appraisal and data extraction. Findings were coded and thematically analysed using NVivo 11 (QSR International, Warrington, UK) software. Confidence in the review findings was evaluated using the Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development, and Evaluation – Confidence in the Evidence from Reviews of Qualitative Research (GRADE-CERQual) approach. All review steps involved two or more reviewers and a team that included community-based and clinical experts. Results Seventy-eight papers (74 distinct studies) met the inclusion criteria for both reviews: 57 papers in review 1 (n = 18 from the UK), 30 papers in review 2 (n = 5 from the UK) and nine papers common to both. Review 1 comprised 17 descriptive themes synthesised into five analytical themes. Women’s health-care experiences related to female genital mutilation/cutting were shaped by silence and stigma, which hindered care-seeking and access to care, especially for non-pregnant women. Across all countries, women reported emotionally distressing and disempowering care experiences. There was limited awareness of specialist service provision. Good care depended on having a trusting relationship with a culturally sensitive and knowledgeable provider. Review 2 comprised 20 descriptive themes synthesised into six analytical themes. Providers from many settings reported feeling uncomfortable talking about female genital mutilation/cutting, lacking sufficient knowledge and struggling with language barriers. This led to missed opportunities for, and suboptimal management of, female genital mutilation-/cutting-related care. More positive experiences/practices were reported in contexts where there was input from specialists and where there were clear processes to address language barriers and to support timely identification, referral and follow-up. Limitations Most studies had an implicit focus on type III female genital mutilation/cutting and on maternity settings, but many studies combined groups or female genital mutilation/cutting types, making it hard to draw conclusions specific to different communities, conditions or contexts. There were no evaluations of service models, there was no research specifically on girls and there was limited evidence on psychological needs. Conclusions The evidence suggests that care and communication around female genital mutilation/cutting can pose significant challenges for women and health-care providers. Appropriate models of service delivery include language support, continuity models, clear care pathways (including for mental health and non-pregnant women), specialist provision and community engagement. Routinisation of female genital mutilation/cutting discussions within different health-care settings may be an important strategy to ensure timely entry into, and appropriate receipt of, female genital mutilation-/cutting-related care. Staff training is an ongoing need. Future work Future research should evaluate the most-effective models of training and of service delivery. Study registration This study is registered as PROSPERO CRD420150300012015 (review 1) and PROSPERO CRD420150300042015 (review 2). Funding The National Institute for Health Research Health Services and Delivery Research programme.

Many people with a mental disorder are desperate to improve their situations. It is therefore timely that a substantive theory on what it means to live with a mental illness in Western society is developed that explores a way forward for them. This study goes back to the grassroots and finds out from the people diagnosed with major depression, bipolar disorder or schizophrenia what they say helps them. Although many studies have been carried out on the impact of mental disorders, the voice of mental health consumers has not featured prominently. This study aims to redress this in reporting on what they identify as their main concern and on how they resolve it.This thesis presents the substantive theory of transforming oneself and society to resolve life being a struggle. It is based on interviews with 35 mental health consumers living in the Western Australian community. Relevant national and international literature is also included as additional data. This study used the grounded theory method to identify a commonly shared pattern of behaviour in how participants resolved their main concern. The main concern, called the basic social psychological problem of life being a struggle, was brought on by eight disempowering conditions, which disempowered participants in both personal and social spheres. Participants then engaged in a personal struggle, including identifying their intrinsic value as a person, and their struggle with relationships. This culminated in the struggle with getting through daily life.Participants resolved the basic social psychological problem of life being a struggle through the basic social psychological process of transforming themselves. This process consisted of two stages separated by a turning point. In the first stage, participants found that neither withdrawing nor trying to get on top of having a mental disorder was successful in dealing with basic social psychological problem of life being a struggle despite their best efforts. In their powerlessness at making a difference to their lives they reached a breaking point, which became a turning point, where they were forced to confront their hopeless situation. The successful confrontation, or turning point, marked the change from their hitherto powerless position into one where participants had some power for the first time. They pinpointed this as the beginning of their transformation.In stage two of the basic social psychological process of transforming themselves, participants built up their power by deciding to tackle the struggle to identify their intrinsic value as a person first rather than focusing on trying to get on top of having a mental disorder. By refocusing on getting better as a person, participants managed to gain a new perspective, which in turn allowed them to learn new strategies and take action that made a difference in their lives. This second stage was fulfilled when participants felt at peace.However, as participants pointed out, being at peace remained fragile because the disempowering conditions that had brought on the basic social psychological problem of life being a struggle were still operating and therefore these conditions also had to be changed. Empowering conditions could achieve this in given participants sufficient power or influence and authority so that the disempowering conditions could be countenanced and then banished on a permanent basis. Participants' lives would then no longer be a struggle and they could live in peace. Participants suggested that enacting these empowering conditions would amount to transformation of society, where society treated people with a mental disorder with justice and provided effective help. In accord with other identified theories and models, the substantive theory of transforming oneself and society to resolve life being a struggle established that the transformation of society was the way forward to improve the situations of people with a mental disorder and relieve their desperation.

How is black and Latino representation affected by state takeovers of local government? Since racial minorities have had a complex history in the struggle between local autonomy and centralized authority, when does state centralization lead to increased political empowerment for racial minorities? Conversely, when does centralized authority negatively affect political empowerment among racial minorities? To answer these questions, the chapter examines how state takeovers of local school districts affect black and Latino descriptive representation on local school boards. Relying on a case study of Newark, New Jersey, and analysis of every state takeover of a local school district, the chapter shows that contrary to conventional wisdom, takeovers and centralization can increase descriptive representation among marginalized populations. On the other hand, the chapter also shows that under other conditions, takeovers are even more disempowering than the scholarship has previously imagined and understood.

In the 1990s, Jeremy Holmes and Otto Kernberg alleged that, despite significant strengths, the theory of mentalization has risked becoming a disempowering, deficit-focused model of mental ill health. One resource available to Fonagy and colleagues in responding to this concern was attachment research, which had developed a model of attachment strategies as evolutionarily-primed responses to adverse conditions. We will survey the reflections of Fonagy and colleagues regarding three attachment theorists: Mary Main, Pat Crittenden, and Jay Belsky. The synthesis proposed by Fonagy and colleagues will then be described, as well as their related reflections on vigilance, trust, learning, and the structure of mental health symptoms.

In 1958–1959 Peter Townsend interviewed almost 500 residents of old age homes for his project The Last Refuge. Townsend investigated what had changed since the Labour Government introduced new legislation for residential care in 1948. Old age homes had become symbolic of continuous state support from cradle to grave. Yet the delivery of residential care was uneven, and it divided the aged by social class and health. Meanwhile researchers, workers, and elderly people often disagreed about the ethics of aged care. Townsend drove change within these institutions. During interviews, for example, researchers and residents enacted the ideal of respect for the inner lives of the old, even if midcentury research methods sometimes recreated the disempowering conditions of institutional life.