Syria: Consultations on the Geneva Talks
Tomorrow afternoon, Council members will be briefed by Special Envoy Staffan de Mistura on the fourth round of the intra-Syrian talks held between 23 February and 3 March. Council members will be interested in hearing de Mistura’s assessment of the talks, and his plans for the next round, which is scheduled for the end of March.
By the end of this most recent round, it seems that de Mistura had convinced the Syrian government and three opposition delegations to discuss the formation of a transitional government, which would draft a new constitution and hold elections. Ahead of the talks, he had repeatedly stressed that the agenda for the Geneva talks is resolution 2254, which provides for the establishment of credible, inclusive, and non-sectarian governance in Syria, and sets a timeline and process for drafting a new constitution and holding free and fair elections within 18 months. At the talks, de Mistura proposed discussing these three issues in parallel as part of three “baskets”: governance, constitution, and elections. The Syrian government insisted that counter-terrorism should be included as a fourth “basket”. The High Negotiations Committee (HNC), a Riyadh-based opposition umbrella group, initially refused the inclusion of a fourth “basket”, fearing that this would be used by the Syrian government to sideline discussions about a political transition, but were able to agree after de Mistura proposed that this “basket” tackle other security-related issues and medium-term confidence-building measures along with counter-terrorism.
Council members might be interested in hearing of de Mistura’s efforts to ensure that tensions over the format of the talks, particularly the absence of one collective opposition delegation, did not derail the talks even before they started. On 11 February, the HNC announced a 21-member unified opposition delegation comprising representatives of political and armed groups, as well as one representative each from the opposition groups based in Cairo and Moscow (which are tolerated by the Syrian government). However, the Cairo and Moscow opposition groups did not attend as part of the HNC delegation, but participated separately in the talks. De Mistura, who met separately with the HNC and the two other opposition groups, conveyed the desire of the Syrian government that there be just one opposition delegation. Council members might want to hear about the steps de Mistura plans to take in the coming weeks to bring the opposition groups closer together. This may be particularly important in the light of Syrian government statements that for the next round to succeed they need a unified opposition.
Council members may be interested in discussing the efforts to establish a mechanism to monitor the nationwide ceasefire, brokered by Russia and Turkey, which started on 30 December 2016. Following 23-24 January talks in Astana, Turkey and Russia, joined by Iran, signed a joint communiqué deciding to establish a trilateral mechanism to observe and ensure full compliance with the ceasefire. The three countries held a technical meeting in Astana on 6 February to establish the mechanism to monitor the ceasefire, with the participation of the US and Jordan, as well as the UN in an advisory role. A second meeting on 16 February also included representatives of the Syrian government and opposition groups. Now with a meeting planned for 14-15 March in Astana, Council members may want to inquire about the working methods of this joint group, and whether there are provisions to ensure accountability for ceasefire violations, They may also ask what influence the guarantor countries have over the parties, particularly given the persistence of government airstrikes against rebel-held areas, including in the vicinity of Damascus, despite a formal request by Russia to the government of Syria to “silence the skies” in the areas covered by the ceasefire during the Geneva talks.
In a press conference following the adjournment of the Geneva talks, de Mistura expressed UN support for the Astana efforts and the expectation that the talks will address issues related to the maintenance of the ceasefire, immediate confidence-building measures and operational counter-terrorism issues.
Finally, Council members might inquire about de Mistura’s efforts to get the parties to agree to a 12-point memorandum, building on a similar proposal discussed in 2016, in order to establish common ground ahead of the next round of the Geneva talks.
Dispatches from the Field: Final Day in Abuja
On Monday (6 March), Security Council members concluded their visiting mission to the Lake Chad Basin countries in Abuja. The day involved a meeting with the Vice-President of Nigeria, Yemi Osinbajo, as well as meetings with the UN Country Team in Nigeria, Nigerian civil society organisations, the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), donors and partners, the Minister of Budget and National Planning, and female representatives of the Nigerian Senate and House of Representatives.
During the meetings, the overarching message was the complexity of the challenges facing Nigeria, in particular the conflict with Boko Haram in Nigeria’s northeast. The terrorist group remains a threat, and there is a need to alleviate and bring under control the associated humanitarian crisis, while addressing the underlying causes of this conflict. Among the root causes is acute poverty, and particularly important for overcoming this are the creation of jobs and education.
The UN Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator Edward Kallon, after presenting Nigeria’s economic and security challenges, said that there is an 18-month window to bring the crisis in northeast Nigeria under control, or it risked becoming protracted. Nigerian-based ambassadors and donors highlighted that, despite the military gains of the last two years against Boko Haram, the international community needs to take a holistic approach that simultaneously tackles the immediate challenges and underlying problems, or it will pay a much greater price in the future.
When members met Vice-President Osinbajo at the end of the day (in the absence abroad of President Muhammadu Buhari), he told them that Nigeria was committed to solving the Lake Chad Basin region crisis and preventing its spread. The military situation, however, was no longer the main challenge, although Boko Haram asymmetric attacks remained a threat. The Vice-President stressed that the most important issue now is how to deal with longer-term issues. He cited programmes to support displaced persons and reintegration, as well as to promote youth employment and education. At the meeting, Osinbajo acknowledged that abuses had occurred during counter-terrorism operations, but said Nigeria was now trying to strictly observe human rights. In their responses, several members stressed the importance of protecting human rights within counter-terrorism strategies. Osinbajo also highlighted how livelihoods had been affected The concept of modernisation emerged as the response of the western social science to the many challenges faced by the third world .With the process of political decolonisation following the second world war .The new nation were in a hurry to launch massive programmes of economic development and technical change . The need for developing new paradigms to shape and order their development programme was strongly felt .Modernisation was one such formulation which held out considerable promise. We explore the concept of development in the context of modernisation .At the outset we discuss the notion of modernisation as a paradigm in sociological literature , particulaly in writing of Giddens.The purpose here is to develop an understanding of modernisation theory and then go on to its criticism and emergence of postmodernism as paradigm. In the course of tracing this trajectory we explore the many dimensions of development that acquire importance at different stages. The similarities between classical modenisation stidies and new modernisation studies can observed in constancy of the research focus on third world development
There are important distinction between the classical studies and the new studies of the modernisation school.For example in the classical approach tradition is seen as an obstacle to development whereas in the new approach tradition is an additive factor of development .With regard to methodology, the classical approach applies a theoretical construction with hig h level of abstraction the new approach applies concrete case studies given ina historical context .Regarding the direction of development , the classical perspective uses a unidirectional path which tends towards the united states and european union model , the new perspective prefers a multidirectional path of development . Finally the classical perspective demonstrates a relative neglect of the external factors factors and conflict bestowed by the new approach .Development , in the changed context ,poses a challenge and, at the same time, presents an opportunity .
This begin with an attempt to understand the process of modernisation and the evolution of modernisation theories .
A CONSERVATIVE CASE FOR CONSEVATION OF ENVIRONMENT:
A CONSERVATIVE CASE FOR CONSEVATION OF ENVIRONMENT:
CRAZY
as it may sound, this is the perfect time to enact a sensible policy to
address the dangerous threat of climate change. Before you call us
nuts, hear us out.
During
his eight years in office, President Obama regularly warned of the very
real dangers of global warming, but he did not sign any meaningful
domestic legislation to address the problem, largely because he and
Congress did not see eye to eye. Instead, Mr. Obama left us with a grab
bag of regulations aimed at reducing carbon emissions, often established
by executive order.
In
comes President Trump, who seems much less concerned about the risks of
climate change, and more worried about how excessive regulation impedes
economic growth and depresses living standards. As Democrats are
learning the hard way, it is all too easy for a new administration to
reverse the executive orders of its predecessors.
On-again-off-again
regulation is a poor way to protect the environment. And by creating
needless uncertainty for businesses that are planning long-term capital
investments, it is also a poor way to promote robust economic growth.
ears in office, President Obama regularly warned of the very real dangers of global warming, but he did not sign any meaningful domestic legislation to address the problem, largely because he and Congress did not see eye to eye. Instead, Mr. Obama left us with a grab bag of regulations aimed at reducing carbon emissions, often established by executive order.
In comes President Trump, who seems much less concerned about the risks of climate change, and more worried about how excessive regulation impedes economic growth and depresses living standards. As Democrats are learning the hard way, it is all too easy for a new administration to reverse the executive orders of its predecessors.
On-again-off-again regulation is a poor way to protect the environment. And by creating needless uncertainty for businesses that are planning long-term capital investments, it is also a poor way to promote robust economic growth.
by the impact of the shrinking of Lake Chad due to climate change, and expressed the hope that the mission would focus attention on the Lake Chad Basin.
One of the issues discussed during the concluding day of the mission was the access challenges for delivering humanitarian aid. In the UN country team meeting, concerns were raised about the requirement by authorities of military escorts for aid deliveries during active conflict, as this risked compromising the neutrality of relief efforts. Funding shortages were also highlighted, with members told that this has led to UN relief efforts being unable to meet the scale of needs even in the areas where there is access. At present, the UN’s 2017 humanitarian relief plan for northeast Nigeria, targeting the 6.9 million people most in need, has received - already one-quarter into the year - only $51 million, or 1.8 percent of the amount required for the year which exceeds $1 billion.
Meetings with the UN country team and Nigerian civil society groups revealed the problems of governance and corruption in Nigeria. These are issues that have contributed to northeast Nigeria’s marginalisation and underdevelopment, enabling the extremist ideology of Boko Haram to be embraced by a part of the population. When members met Minister of Budget and National Planning Udoma Udo Udoma, he elaborated on the reforms that President Buhari has pursued since his election in 2015 to tackle corruption and diversify the economy from its dependency on oil. He further sought to answer members’ questions about how Nigeria intended to fulfill the $1 billion commitment it announced for the war-torn northeast at the 24 February Oslo Donor Conference for Nigeria and the Lake Chad Basin, where donor countries pledged $458 million for the crisis in 2017.
Discussions during the day highlighted Nigeria’s huge economic and demographic challenges. Abuja-based ambassadors stressed the risk that by not adequately supporting Nigeria in addressing the current crises, a revived or new insurgency could emerge that could further destabilise the region and exacerbate Europe’s refugee crisis. Nigeria was described during the day as being “too big to fail.”
Members appeared to want to build on their experience from the previous day in Maiduguri and were keen to learn more from the UN country team, civil society groups and the women legislators about how they try to address gender dimensions of the conflict, including sexual violence and exploitation, stressing the importance of empowering women.
Council members also made their first visit in ten years to ECOWAS. At a session with the Vice-President of ECOWAS, Edward Singhatey and the Secretary-General of the Economic Community of Central African States (ECCAS), Ahmad Allam-Mi, members urged the creation of a common ECOWAS-ECCAS strategy to address the drivers of the Boko Haram conflict. Central Africa heads of state and government first announced they would pursue such a strategy with ECOWAS at an ECCAS summit held on 29 January 2015. The meeting afforded Singhatey the opportunity to comment on some of the other situations that both ECOWAS and the Council have been seized with: Mali, Guinea-Bissau, and The Gambia. On The Gambia, Singhatey spoke of ECOWAS’s intention to maintain a 500-strong force in the country following its recent political crisis, highlighting the financial support that ECOWAS would need for this.
Briefing on the Mission
On Thursday (8 March), the ambassadors of the three co-lead countries of the visiting mission, Francois Delattre (France), Fode Seck (Senegal), and Matthew Rycroft (UK), will brief the Council on the mission. Deputy Secretary-General Amina Mohammed may also brief. Over the course of the mission, the co-leads emphasised its objectives: to generate more attention to a conflict that has been neglected by signaling their support to the four countries they visited - Cameroon, Chad, Niger, and Nigeria - in their efforts to combat Boko Haram; and to gain a better understanding of the scale of the humanitarian crisis and the root causes of the conflict. The mission seemed to impress on members the complexity of the crisis.
During the visit, members observed the progress by the four countries achieved through the MNJTF. Members seemed to have a stronger appreciation of the regional approach required for addressing the threats and problems of the Lake Chad countries
As next steps, it seems that the co-leads will seek the adoption of a draft presidential statement that covers the key messages and findings of the mission, including the need to support regional efforts to combat Boko Haram, to scale up the humanitarian response, and to address the structural causes underlining the crisis.
Burundi :
Tomorrow (9 March), the Council will be briefed in consultations by the Special Adviser to the Secretary-General for Conflict Prevention, Jamal Benomar, on the Secretary-General’s report on the situation in Burundi (S/2017/165).
The security and political situation in Burundi, which deteriorated sharply after April 2015 when Burundian President Pierre Nkurunziza announced that he would run for a controversial third term, remains dire. While the number of casualties has declined and the security situation has improved, the report notes that the current situation is unsustainable. Serious human rights abuses continue to be committed daily with impunity, mainly by the government and the Imbonerakure, the youth group of the Nkurunziza’s party. The overall level of oppression and state control over Burundian society has increased, manifested by arbitrary deprivations of life, enforced disappearances, cases of torture, and large-scale arbitrary detention. Furthermore, these actions are taking place in an environment where freedoms of expression, association, and assembly are virtually non-existent. An estimated 387,000 people have fled the country since the beginning of the crisis, and the report notes that it is estimated that that number will surpass 500,000 by the end of the year. The report highlights, in particular, allegations of more than 200 cases of enforced disappearances since October 2016.
Council members will be interested in Benomar’s views on possible avenues for renewed engagement with Burundi, which has shunned international cooperation, particularly since the political crisis began. According to media reports, in October 2016, Nkurunziza requested the replacement of Benomar as Special Adviser. (Over the years Burundi has rejected engagement with successive UN envoys.) Burundi has ceased all cooperation with OHCHR, refuses to cooperate with the Commission of Inquiry mandated by the Human Rights Council (HRC), and withdrew from the ICC, which has been conducting a preliminary investigation into the situation in Burundi. In particular, they may be interested in hearing whether Burundi would allow for greater UN involvement in facilitating dialogue between Burundian stakeholders. In addition, members may be looking for recommendations on how to incentivise Burundi to find a political solution to the crisis.
The Inter-Burundian Dialogue, led by the East African Community (EAC) and facilitated by former Tanzanian President Benjamin Mkapa, continues to struggle. The latest round of talks was held in Tanzania between 16-19 February. On the first day, the Burundian government officially demanded that Tanzania arrest several of the opposition attendees, whom it accuses of violent insurrection and leading a foiled coup plot in May 2015. The warrants, which were not issued, would have affected several members of the main umbrella opposition movement, the National Council for the Restoration of Arusha Agreement and Rule of Law (CNARED), who are currently in exile. After the ruling party refused to sit down with the opposition, Mkapa met with them in a hotel outside the International Arusha Conference Center. The government also rejected Benomar’s participation in the Arusha talks. On the last day of the meetings, Mkapa called for an urgent EAC heads-of-state summit in order to invigorate the dialogue.
The two sides remain divided: the government claiming there is no crisis and focusing on the 2020 elections, and the opposition demanding a transitional government and the removal of Nkurunziza before those elections.
Moreover, Nkurunziza has hinted he may run for a fourth term in 2020. The Secretary-General’s report notes that Nkurunziza has suggested in a statement at the end of 2016 that he might seek a fourth term in office “if the Burundian people decide to change the Constitution according to their wishes”. On 16 February, the Council of Ministers of Burundi established a commission to amend the Burundian constitution, though it is as yet unclear if those amendments would touch upon presidential term limits. This follows an internal Burundian dialogue process which concluded that the majority of citizens demanded an end to presidential term limits. However, many opposition and civil society groups did not participate in the process which they claim was marred by a lack of inclusiveness and transparency, with the objective of producing a predetermined political outcome by the government. Council members will also be interested to hear from Benomar about the current status of the internal dialogue process.
The report, due by 29 January, was circulated to Council members only on 23 February, thus postponing the consultations from February to March. It concludes that the foundational values of the Arusha Agreement, namely, justice, the rule of law, democracy, good governance, respect for the fundamental rights and freedoms of individuals, unity, solidarity, gender equality, and tolerance among the various political and ethnic components of the Burundian people, have all been undermined. It notes that adoption of constitutional amendments that would reverse provisions of the Arusha Agreement and eliminate presidential term limits would, under the current circumstances, bear the risk of plunging the country back into armed conflict, with unpredictable repercussions for the region. It calls for urgent measures to ensure accountability and prevent impunity, and calls on Burundi to renew cooperation with the Commission of Inquiry mandated by the HRC and to hold all perpetrators of human rights violations and abuses to account. It further calls on Burundi to renew cooperation and engage with the international community more generally.
The report also highlights other areas of resolution 2303, adopted on 29 July 2016, which have not been implemented. The resolution authorised a police component with a ceiling of 228 officers to monitor the security situation and support the human rights monitoring of OHCHR, under the authority of Benomar’s office, and urged Burundi to cooperate fully with the police component, including giving unhindered access to detention facilities. Burundi has publicly rejected the resolution. Council members may seek Benomar’s views on the prospects of implementing resolution 2303, in full or in part, with the cooperation of Burundi.
Another issue raised in the report is the partial deployment of the AU human rights observers and military experts to Burundi, due to the fact Burundi has yet to sign a memorandum of understanding with the AU on their deployment and activities. As of February 2017, only 45 human rights observers (out of 100), 32 of whom are funded by the Peacebuilding Fund, have been deployed to Burundi, and only 23 military experts
South Sudan: Consultations on the UN Mission and the Human Rights Situation :
Tomorrow (23 February), in a meeting requested by the US, Assistant Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations El Ghassim Wane and Assistant Secretary-General for Human Rights Andrew Gilmour are scheduled to brief on the situation in South Sudan. The meeting is expected to focus on the following three areas:
• the Secretary-General’s 30-day assessment of the UN Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS), including the deployment and future requirements of the Regional Protection Force (RPF), obstacles to setting up the force and impediments to UNMISS in carrying out its mandate;
• the implementation of the recommendations of the independent special investigation regarding the violence in Juba in July 2016, and the response of UNMISS to this violence; and
• the human rights situation in South Sudan.
Wane will provide the overview of the Secretary-General’s 30-day assessment, a confidential document that was circulated to Council members on 13 February. The assessment reportedly noted that UNMISS continues to face obstacles in carrying out its responsibilities. The freedom of movement of UNMISS personnel continues to be restricted by government forces [i.e. the Sudan People’s Liberation Army or SPLA], including to places where civilians have been displaced and where there are allegations that they have been subjected to violence at the hands of the SPLA. Humanitarian access to populations in need continues to be hindered, an ongoing problem that takes on heightened urgency in light of the 20 February announcement by the Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO), the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and the World Food Program (WFP) that famine has been declared in Unity State in South Sudan. The three agencies warned that “the total number of food insecure people is expected to rise to 5.5 million … [in South Sudan] at the height of the lean season in July if nothing is done to avert the spread of the food crisis”.
There will most likely be interest in learning more about interactions between UN officials and the government regarding repeated violations of the Status of Forces Agreement. Members will want to know from Wane about efforts undertaken to lift or limit the restrictions imposed by the government on the freedom of movement of UN personnel and on humanitarian access in various parts of the country. Of particular concern over the past week has been the fate of some 30,000 people displaced by fighting in Wau Shilluk and Malakal in Upper Nile State. An UNMISS patrol to Wau Shilluk was stopped by government troops on 16 February.
Another issue that will be raised in the meeting is the planning for the deployment of the RPF, which is expected to consist of 4,000 troops who will be responsible for protecting UN staff, humanitarian actors and civilians in Juba. One outstanding issue is that the government has indicated to UNMISS that it cannot allocate one of two plots of land identified to house the Force. Members may be interested in knowing if there have been additional discussions on this issue with the government, and whether other potential sites to locate the troops have been considered or discussed with the government.
The timing of deployment of the RPF is another issue that will most likely be discussed. The RPF was originally authorised in August 2016 but will probably not be deployed for several months. Council members may inquire about the timeframe for the deployment of enablers such as construction engineering, hospital and unmanned aerial systems units followed by the infantry battalions that constitute the Force. Ethiopia and Rwanda have committed to provide infantry for the RPF. It now appears that Kenya is again willing to contribute troops to the RPF, based on the results of a 29 January meeting between Secretary General António Guterres and President Uhuru Kenyatta on the margins of the AU Summit in Addis Ababa. This represents a reengagement by Kenya with UNMISS, as it had rescinded its original offer to take part in the RPF on 2 November 2016 following the dismissal of the UNMISS Force Commander, a Kenyan national, by then Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in response to findings of poor performance by the independent special investigation into the July 2016 violence in Juba.
In early November 2016, following the public release of the executive summary of the report of the independent special investigation, the UN Secretariat established a taskforce, headed by Wane, to implement the recommendations of the report of the special investigation within three months. Among others, the following recommendations were made in the executive summary and may be discussed in tomorrow’s meeting: “enforcing a forward-leaning, highly mobile posture” among UNMISS troops; revising “operational and tactical arrangements in Juba to better facilitate crisis management”; and ensuring that “integrated dismounted patrols are conducted when possible to include (female) military, police and civilian sections” of the mission in places near the Protection of Civilians sites and other key locations. Members will be interested in the status of implementation of these and other recommendations from the report, whether there are any impediments, and if so, how these can be overcome.
Gilmour is expected to brief Council members on his mission to South Sudan earlier this month, including on his visit to Malakal. On 17 February, following his trip, Gilmour released a statement describing the “brutal reality” of the situation in the country as a war being “waged against the men, women and children of South Sudan.” He called for the perpetrators of human rights violations, including rape and gang rape and arbitrary detention, to be held accountable, expressed concern at the severe access restrictions faced by UNMISS, and said that elements of the SPLA had engaged in what could amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity.
In light of his findings during the visit, members may be interested in Gilmour’s views on the potential establishment of an independent investigative mechanism to collect information on human rights violations that could be used by the Hybrid Court for South Sudan, envisioned in the August 2015 peace agreement. The establishment of such a mechanism was proposed on 17 February by the three members of the UN Commission on Human Rights in South Sudan, which was established by the UN Human Rights Council in March 2016.
MOSUL SITUATION:
Tomorrow afternoon (10 March), Council members will meet in consultations on the situation in and around Mosul, Iraq. Briefings are expected from OCHA head Stephen O’Brien and High Representative for Disarmament Affairs Kim Won-soo. Russia requested the meeting earlier this week in light of the deteriorating humanitarian situation in Mosul and the alleged use of chemical weapons.
Humanitarian needs in Mosul continue to grow as Iraqi government forces make steady progress towards retaking the remaining parts of the city still under control of the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL). In January, three months after the military operation began, Iraqi government forces, with the US-led anti-ISIL coalition providing air support, regained control over the eastern part of Mosul. As a result, some 160,000 people were displaced, while an estimated 750,000 people who were trapped in the western part of Mosul faced dire humanitarian consequences. O’Brien last briefed Council members on the humanitarian situation under “any other business” on 4 January, following a request by Russia.
Council members are expected to express concern about the latest surge in the displacement of civilians and further deterioration of the humanitarian situation. On 19 February, Iraqi government forces launched an offensive on the remaining ISIL stronghold in western Mosul and made steady gains. O’Brien is likely to update Council members on the latest humanitarian needs. According to OCHA estimates, in the first week of March some 42,000 people have been displaced, and on 3 March over 13,000 were displaced in a single day making it the highest continuous displacement so far. OCHA and the UN Refugee Agency have reported that around 250,000 people in total have been displaced since the start of the military operation on 17 October 2016. Although about 64,000 internally displaced persons (IDPs) have returned to their area of origin, there are still an estimated 211,000 IDPs living in refugee camps run by the Iraqi government and various humanitarian agencies.
In addition to the humanitarian situation, Council members are likely to share their concern over the alleged use of chemical weapons in Mosul. On 3 March, the International Committee of the Red Cross and the World Health Organization both reported that 12 people including children from eastern Mosul were treated for exposure to a toxic chemical agent. Council members will be keen to hear more details from Kim, given that there is still no official confirmation regarding the type of chemical agent used and who was responsible for the attack. This incident marks the first recorded use of chemical weapons since the start of the military operation to take Mosul. According to media reports, ISIL in Iraq has been suspected of access to and use of some forms of chemical weapons. In a statement following the attack, the UN Humanitarian Coordinator in Iraq, Lise Grande, said that there needs to be an investigation into the alleged use of chemical weapons. She said that if confirmed, such an attack would be a war crime and a serious violation of international humanitarian law. Some Council members may raise the possibility of investigation of the incident.
In comparison to the humanitarian crises in Syria and Yemen, the Council has been relatively unengaged regarding the humanitarian situation in Iraq. This will be only the third meeting on the humanitarian situation in Mosul since the start of the military operation by the Iraqi government in October 2016. Though the Council members seem open to occasional updates on the humanitarian situation, there seems to be little willingness on the part of members to engage on the issue more substantively. With regard to ISIL, the Council has been very active on this issue in the context of its work on counter-terrorism, while the security response to ISIL has remained outside Council’s purview. However, if the current case of alleged use of chemical weapons is confirmed or should new cases be recorded the Council could potentially become more engaged on this issue.
DEBATE OVER THE FORCE LABOUR: On Tuesday (14 March), the Security Council will hold a ministerial-level open debate on “Trafficking in persons in conflict situations: forced labour, slavery and other similar practices”, held under the Council agenda item “Maintenance of international peace and security”. The open debate will be presided over by the UK Secretary of State for International Development, Priti Patel. The three briefers will be Secretary-General António Guterres, UK Independent Anti-Slavery Commissioner Kevin Hyland, and Ilwad Elman, a Mogadishu-based Somali human rights activist who will brief by video teleconference. Several member states are expected to be represented at ministerial level, including by ministers who will be in New York for the opening of the Commission on the Status of Women.
The Council has been intensifying its focus on the scourge of conflict-related human trafficking and the often-resulting forced labour, slavery and similar practices. It initially addressed the issue in a briefing held in December 2015, organised by the US during its presidency, at which the Council adopted its first decision on human trafficking in the form of a presidential statement. In December 2016, the Council held a ministerial-level open debate on the issue, presided over by Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy, resulting in resolution 2331. In the concept note for the open debate on Tuesday—which comes less than three months after resolution 2331 was adopted—the UK poses several questions related to the implementation of the earlier decisions both by member states and by the UN system (S/2017/198).
Council Decisions
In its presidential statement adopted on 16 December 2015 (S/PRST/2015/25), the Council condemned instances of trafficking in conflict-affected areas; expressed concern that in some regions terrorists benefit from transnational organised crime, including from the trafficking in persons; called on member states to hold accountable those who engage in trafficking in persons; and expressed its intent to continue to address trafficking in persons with respect to the situations on its seizure list, among other things.
Resolution 2331 of 20 December 2016, among other elements, condemned all acts of trafficking, particularly by the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), and condemned violations and other abuses committed by Boko Haram, Al-Shabaab, the Lord’s Resistance Army, and other terrorist or armed groups for the purpose of sexual slavery, sexual exploitation, and forced labour. It recognised the need for accountability and in this context, the importance of collecting and preserving evidence. The resolution expressed the Council’s intention to “integrate the issue of trafficking in persons in the areas affected by armed conflict and sexual violence in conflict into the work of relevant sanctions committees … and to ensure that sexual violence in conflict expertise, including when it is associated with trafficking in persons in the context of armed conflict consistently informs the work of sanctions committees”, and to consider targeted sanctions for individuals and entities involved in trafficking in persons in areas affected by armed conflict.
Both the 2015 presidential statement and the 2016 resolution stressed the need to ensure that persons who have been trafficked are treated as victims of crime, and are not penalised or stigmatised for their involvement in any unlawful activities in which they have been compelled to engage.
The Open Debate
No outcome is expected from Tuesday’s open debate. In addition to highlighting several provisions of resolution 2331, the concept note places particular emphasis on two aspects of the worldwide problem of human trafficking. First, rather than focusing on the process of trafficking as such, it looks at its outcomes, such as different forms of slavery, forced labour, and forced recruitment into armed groups. Second, it highlights the role of transnational organised crime in conflict-related human trafficking and these groups’ ability to adapt in targeting newly vulnerable groups such as displaced populations.
The debate on Tuesday will afford the Secretary-General his first opportunity to address the Council on the range of issues related to human trafficking and share his thoughts about the role of the UN in the implementation of resolution 2331 and, more specifically, on how the efforts by existing subsidiary bodies of the Council and Council-mandated peacekeeping operations and special political missions, could be strengthened in this context.
Hyland is likely to share his experience as Commissioner working to ensure that modern slavery is tackled by the UK in a coordinated and effective manner, including through international collaboration.
Elman may choose to share her experience working with the victims of trafficking into sexual slavery, forced labour, and conscription of civilians by Al-Shabaab. She may also speak of her work on de-radicalisation and rehabilitation of former child soldiers and with survivors of sexual and gender-based violence.
Some members may want to take stock of measures being taken domestically in the aftermath of the adoption of resolution 2331, or share their national best practices in addressing issues resulting from conflict-related human trafficking, leading up to slavery, forced labour, or other similar practices.
Some Council members may choose to reflect on the visiting mission undertaken in early March to the area of operation of Boko Haram, one of the armed groups most notorious for trafficking in persons and using different forms of slavery to advance its goals. Visiting Cameroon, Chad, Niger, and Nigeria, Council members heard first-hand testimonies about the devastating impact the results of trafficking have on the affected communities, including from women whose children were abducted by Boko Haram, and children who were unlawfully detained on the basis of suspected association with a terrorist group. (For details regarding the 3-6 March Council visiting mission please refer to our What’s in Blue
HUMAN SECURITY:
by the impact of the shrinking of Lake Chad due to climate change, and expressed the hope that the mission would focus attention on the Lake Chad Basin.
One of the issues discussed during the concluding day of the mission was the access challenges for delivering humanitarian aid. In the UN country team meeting, concerns were raised about the requirement by authorities of military escorts for aid deliveries during active conflict, as this risked compromising the neutrality of relief efforts. Funding shortages were also highlighted, with members told that this has led to UN relief efforts being unable to meet the scale of needs even in the areas where there is access. At present, the UN’s 2017 humanitarian relief plan for northeast Nigeria, targeting the 6.9 million people most in need, has received - already one-quarter into the year - only $51 million, or 1.8 percent of the amount required for the year which exceeds $1 billion.
Meetings with the UN country team and Nigerian civil society groups revealed the problems of governance and corruption in Nigeria. These are issues that have contributed to northeast Nigeria’s marginalisation and underdevelopment, enabling the extremist ideology of Boko Haram to be embraced by a part of the population. When members met Minister of Budget and National Planning Udoma Udo Udoma, he elaborated on the reforms that President Buhari has pursued since his election in 2015 to tackle corruption and diversify the economy from its dependency on oil. He further sought to answer members’ questions about how Nigeria intended to fulfill the $1 billion commitment it announced for the war-torn northeast at the 24 February Oslo Donor Conference for Nigeria and the Lake Chad Basin, where donor countries pledged $458 million for the crisis in 2017.
Discussions during the day highlighted Nigeria’s huge economic and demographic challenges. Abuja-based ambassadors stressed the risk that by not adequately supporting Nigeria in addressing the current crises, a revived or new insurgency could emerge that could further destabilise the region and exacerbate Europe’s refugee crisis. Nigeria was described during the day as being “too big to fail.”
Members appeared to want to build on their experience from the previous day in Maiduguri and were keen to learn more from the UN country team, civil society groups and the women legislators about how they try to address gender dimensions of the conflict, including sexual violence and exploitation, stressing the importance of empowering women.
Council members also made their first visit in ten years to ECOWAS. At a session with the Vice-President of ECOWAS, Edward Singhatey and the Secretary-General of the Economic Community of Central African States (ECCAS), Ahmad Allam-Mi, members urged the creation of a common ECOWAS-ECCAS strategy to address the drivers of the Boko Haram conflict. Central Africa heads of state and government first announced they would pursue such a strategy with ECOWAS at an ECCAS summit held on 29 January 2015. The meeting afforded Singhatey the opportunity to comment on some of the other situations that both ECOWAS and the Council have been seized with: Mali, Guinea-Bissau, and The Gambia. On The Gambia, Singhatey spoke of ECOWAS’s intention to maintain a 500-strong force in the country following its recent political crisis, highlighting the financial support that ECOWAS would need for this.
Briefing on the Mission
On Thursday (8 March), the ambassadors of the three co-lead countries of the visiting mission, Francois Delattre (France), Fode Seck (Senegal), and Matthew Rycroft (UK), will brief the Council on the mission. Deputy Secretary-General Amina Mohammed may also brief. Over the course of the mission, the co-leads emphasised its objectives: to generate more attention to a conflict that has been neglected by signaling their support to the four countries they visited - Cameroon, Chad, Niger, and Nigeria - in their efforts to combat Boko Haram; and to gain a better understanding of the scale of the humanitarian crisis and the root causes of the conflict. The mission seemed to impress on members the complexity of the crisis.
During the visit, members observed the progress by the four countries achieved through the MNJTF. Members seemed to have a stronger appreciation of the regional approach required for addressing the threats and problems of the Lake Chad countries
As next steps, it seems that the co-leads will seek the adoption of a draft presidential statement that covers the key messages and findings of the mission, including the need to support regional efforts to combat Boko Haram, to scale up the humanitarian response, and to address the structural causes underlining the crisis.
Burundi :
Tomorrow (9 March), the Council will be briefed in consultations by the Special Adviser to the Secretary-General for Conflict Prevention, Jamal Benomar, on the Secretary-General’s report on the situation in Burundi (S/2017/165).
The security and political situation in Burundi, which deteriorated sharply after April 2015 when Burundian President Pierre Nkurunziza announced that he would run for a controversial third term, remains dire. While the number of casualties has declined and the security situation has improved, the report notes that the current situation is unsustainable. Serious human rights abuses continue to be committed daily with impunity, mainly by the government and the Imbonerakure, the youth group of the Nkurunziza’s party. The overall level of oppression and state control over Burundian society has increased, manifested by arbitrary deprivations of life, enforced disappearances, cases of torture, and large-scale arbitrary detention. Furthermore, these actions are taking place in an environment where freedoms of expression, association, and assembly are virtually non-existent. An estimated 387,000 people have fled the country since the beginning of the crisis, and the report notes that it is estimated that that number will surpass 500,000 by the end of the year. The report highlights, in particular, allegations of more than 200 cases of enforced disappearances since October 2016.
Council members will be interested in Benomar’s views on possible avenues for renewed engagement with Burundi, which has shunned international cooperation, particularly since the political crisis began. According to media reports, in October 2016, Nkurunziza requested the replacement of Benomar as Special Adviser. (Over the years Burundi has rejected engagement with successive UN envoys.) Burundi has ceased all cooperation with OHCHR, refuses to cooperate with the Commission of Inquiry mandated by the Human Rights Council (HRC), and withdrew from the ICC, which has been conducting a preliminary investigation into the situation in Burundi. In particular, they may be interested in hearing whether Burundi would allow for greater UN involvement in facilitating dialogue between Burundian stakeholders. In addition, members may be looking for recommendations on how to incentivise Burundi to find a political solution to the crisis.
The Inter-Burundian Dialogue, led by the East African Community (EAC) and facilitated by former Tanzanian President Benjamin Mkapa, continues to struggle. The latest round of talks was held in Tanzania between 16-19 February. On the first day, the Burundian government officially demanded that Tanzania arrest several of the opposition attendees, whom it accuses of violent insurrection and leading a foiled coup plot in May 2015. The warrants, which were not issued, would have affected several members of the main umbrella opposition movement, the National Council for the Restoration of Arusha Agreement and Rule of Law (CNARED), who are currently in exile. After the ruling party refused to sit down with the opposition, Mkapa met with them in a hotel outside the International Arusha Conference Center. The government also rejected Benomar’s participation in the Arusha talks. On the last day of the meetings, Mkapa called for an urgent EAC heads-of-state summit in order to invigorate the dialogue.
The two sides remain divided: the government claiming there is no crisis and focusing on the 2020 elections, and the opposition demanding a transitional government and the removal of Nkurunziza before those elections.
Moreover, Nkurunziza has hinted he may run for a fourth term in 2020. The Secretary-General’s report notes that Nkurunziza has suggested in a statement at the end of 2016 that he might seek a fourth term in office “if the Burundian people decide to change the Constitution according to their wishes”. On 16 February, the Council of Ministers of Burundi established a commission to amend the Burundian constitution, though it is as yet unclear if those amendments would touch upon presidential term limits. This follows an internal Burundian dialogue process which concluded that the majority of citizens demanded an end to presidential term limits. However, many opposition and civil society groups did not participate in the process which they claim was marred by a lack of inclusiveness and transparency, with the objective of producing a predetermined political outcome by the government. Council members will also be interested to hear from Benomar about the current status of the internal dialogue process.
The report, due by 29 January, was circulated to Council members only on 23 February, thus postponing the consultations from February to March. It concludes that the foundational values of the Arusha Agreement, namely, justice, the rule of law, democracy, good governance, respect for the fundamental rights and freedoms of individuals, unity, solidarity, gender equality, and tolerance among the various political and ethnic components of the Burundian people, have all been undermined. It notes that adoption of constitutional amendments that would reverse provisions of the Arusha Agreement and eliminate presidential term limits would, under the current circumstances, bear the risk of plunging the country back into armed conflict, with unpredictable repercussions for the region. It calls for urgent measures to ensure accountability and prevent impunity, and calls on Burundi to renew cooperation with the Commission of Inquiry mandated by the HRC and to hold all perpetrators of human rights violations and abuses to account. It further calls on Burundi to renew cooperation and engage with the international community more generally.
The report also highlights other areas of resolution 2303, adopted on 29 July 2016, which have not been implemented. The resolution authorised a police component with a ceiling of 228 officers to monitor the security situation and support the human rights monitoring of OHCHR, under the authority of Benomar’s office, and urged Burundi to cooperate fully with the police component, including giving unhindered access to detention facilities. Burundi has publicly rejected the resolution. Council members may seek Benomar’s views on the prospects of implementing resolution 2303, in full or in part, with the cooperation of Burundi.
Another issue raised in the report is the partial deployment of the AU human rights observers and military experts to Burundi, due to the fact Burundi has yet to sign a memorandum of understanding with the AU on their deployment and activities. As of February 2017, only 45 human rights observers (out of 100), 32 of whom are funded by the Peacebuilding Fund, have been deployed to Burundi, and only 23 military experts
South Sudan: Consultations on the UN Mission and the Human Rights Situation :
Tomorrow (23 February), in a meeting requested by the US, Assistant Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations El Ghassim Wane and Assistant Secretary-General for Human Rights Andrew Gilmour are scheduled to brief on the situation in South Sudan. The meeting is expected to focus on the following three areas:
• the Secretary-General’s 30-day assessment of the UN Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS), including the deployment and future requirements of the Regional Protection Force (RPF), obstacles to setting up the force and impediments to UNMISS in carrying out its mandate;
• the implementation of the recommendations of the independent special investigation regarding the violence in Juba in July 2016, and the response of UNMISS to this violence; and
• the human rights situation in South Sudan.
Wane will provide the overview of the Secretary-General’s 30-day assessment, a confidential document that was circulated to Council members on 13 February. The assessment reportedly noted that UNMISS continues to face obstacles in carrying out its responsibilities. The freedom of movement of UNMISS personnel continues to be restricted by government forces [i.e. the Sudan People’s Liberation Army or SPLA], including to places where civilians have been displaced and where there are allegations that they have been subjected to violence at the hands of the SPLA. Humanitarian access to populations in need continues to be hindered, an ongoing problem that takes on heightened urgency in light of the 20 February announcement by the Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO), the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and the World Food Program (WFP) that famine has been declared in Unity State in South Sudan. The three agencies warned that “the total number of food insecure people is expected to rise to 5.5 million … [in South Sudan] at the height of the lean season in July if nothing is done to avert the spread of the food crisis”.
There will most likely be interest in learning more about interactions between UN officials and the government regarding repeated violations of the Status of Forces Agreement. Members will want to know from Wane about efforts undertaken to lift or limit the restrictions imposed by the government on the freedom of movement of UN personnel and on humanitarian access in various parts of the country. Of particular concern over the past week has been the fate of some 30,000 people displaced by fighting in Wau Shilluk and Malakal in Upper Nile State. An UNMISS patrol to Wau Shilluk was stopped by government troops on 16 February.
Another issue that will be raised in the meeting is the planning for the deployment of the RPF, which is expected to consist of 4,000 troops who will be responsible for protecting UN staff, humanitarian actors and civilians in Juba. One outstanding issue is that the government has indicated to UNMISS that it cannot allocate one of two plots of land identified to house the Force. Members may be interested in knowing if there have been additional discussions on this issue with the government, and whether other potential sites to locate the troops have been considered or discussed with the government.
The timing of deployment of the RPF is another issue that will most likely be discussed. The RPF was originally authorised in August 2016 but will probably not be deployed for several months. Council members may inquire about the timeframe for the deployment of enablers such as construction engineering, hospital and unmanned aerial systems units followed by the infantry battalions that constitute the Force. Ethiopia and Rwanda have committed to provide infantry for the RPF. It now appears that Kenya is again willing to contribute troops to the RPF, based on the results of a 29 January meeting between Secretary General António Guterres and President Uhuru Kenyatta on the margins of the AU Summit in Addis Ababa. This represents a reengagement by Kenya with UNMISS, as it had rescinded its original offer to take part in the RPF on 2 November 2016 following the dismissal of the UNMISS Force Commander, a Kenyan national, by then Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in response to findings of poor performance by the independent special investigation into the July 2016 violence in Juba.
In early November 2016, following the public release of the executive summary of the report of the independent special investigation, the UN Secretariat established a taskforce, headed by Wane, to implement the recommendations of the report of the special investigation within three months. Among others, the following recommendations were made in the executive summary and may be discussed in tomorrow’s meeting: “enforcing a forward-leaning, highly mobile posture” among UNMISS troops; revising “operational and tactical arrangements in Juba to better facilitate crisis management”; and ensuring that “integrated dismounted patrols are conducted when possible to include (female) military, police and civilian sections” of the mission in places near the Protection of Civilians sites and other key locations. Members will be interested in the status of implementation of these and other recommendations from the report, whether there are any impediments, and if so, how these can be overcome.
Gilmour is expected to brief Council members on his mission to South Sudan earlier this month, including on his visit to Malakal. On 17 February, following his trip, Gilmour released a statement describing the “brutal reality” of the situation in the country as a war being “waged against the men, women and children of South Sudan.” He called for the perpetrators of human rights violations, including rape and gang rape and arbitrary detention, to be held accountable, expressed concern at the severe access restrictions faced by UNMISS, and said that elements of the SPLA had engaged in what could amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity.
In light of his findings during the visit, members may be interested in Gilmour’s views on the potential establishment of an independent investigative mechanism to collect information on human rights violations that could be used by the Hybrid Court for South Sudan, envisioned in the August 2015 peace agreement. The establishment of such a mechanism was proposed on 17 February by the three members of the UN Commission on Human Rights in South Sudan, which was established by the UN Human Rights Council in March 2016.
MOSUL SITUATION:
Tomorrow afternoon (10 March), Council members will meet in consultations on the situation in and around Mosul, Iraq. Briefings are expected from OCHA head Stephen O’Brien and High Representative for Disarmament Affairs Kim Won-soo. Russia requested the meeting earlier this week in light of the deteriorating humanitarian situation in Mosul and the alleged use of chemical weapons.
Humanitarian needs in Mosul continue to grow as Iraqi government forces make steady progress towards retaking the remaining parts of the city still under control of the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL). In January, three months after the military operation began, Iraqi government forces, with the US-led anti-ISIL coalition providing air support, regained control over the eastern part of Mosul. As a result, some 160,000 people were displaced, while an estimated 750,000 people who were trapped in the western part of Mosul faced dire humanitarian consequences. O’Brien last briefed Council members on the humanitarian situation under “any other business” on 4 January, following a request by Russia.
Council members are expected to express concern about the latest surge in the displacement of civilians and further deterioration of the humanitarian situation. On 19 February, Iraqi government forces launched an offensive on the remaining ISIL stronghold in western Mosul and made steady gains. O’Brien is likely to update Council members on the latest humanitarian needs. According to OCHA estimates, in the first week of March some 42,000 people have been displaced, and on 3 March over 13,000 were displaced in a single day making it the highest continuous displacement so far. OCHA and the UN Refugee Agency have reported that around 250,000 people in total have been displaced since the start of the military operation on 17 October 2016. Although about 64,000 internally displaced persons (IDPs) have returned to their area of origin, there are still an estimated 211,000 IDPs living in refugee camps run by the Iraqi government and various humanitarian agencies.
In addition to the humanitarian situation, Council members are likely to share their concern over the alleged use of chemical weapons in Mosul. On 3 March, the International Committee of the Red Cross and the World Health Organization both reported that 12 people including children from eastern Mosul were treated for exposure to a toxic chemical agent. Council members will be keen to hear more details from Kim, given that there is still no official confirmation regarding the type of chemical agent used and who was responsible for the attack. This incident marks the first recorded use of chemical weapons since the start of the military operation to take Mosul. According to media reports, ISIL in Iraq has been suspected of access to and use of some forms of chemical weapons. In a statement following the attack, the UN Humanitarian Coordinator in Iraq, Lise Grande, said that there needs to be an investigation into the alleged use of chemical weapons. She said that if confirmed, such an attack would be a war crime and a serious violation of international humanitarian law. Some Council members may raise the possibility of investigation of the incident.
In comparison to the humanitarian crises in Syria and Yemen, the Council has been relatively unengaged regarding the humanitarian situation in Iraq. This will be only the third meeting on the humanitarian situation in Mosul since the start of the military operation by the Iraqi government in October 2016. Though the Council members seem open to occasional updates on the humanitarian situation, there seems to be little willingness on the part of members to engage on the issue more substantively. With regard to ISIL, the Council has been very active on this issue in the context of its work on counter-terrorism, while the security response to ISIL has remained outside Council’s purview. However, if the current case of alleged use of chemical weapons is confirmed or should new cases be recorded the Council could potentially become more engaged on this issue.
DEBATE OVER THE FORCE LABOUR: On Tuesday (14 March), the Security Council will hold a ministerial-level open debate on “Trafficking in persons in conflict situations: forced labour, slavery and other similar practices”, held under the Council agenda item “Maintenance of international peace and security”. The open debate will be presided over by the UK Secretary of State for International Development, Priti Patel. The three briefers will be Secretary-General António Guterres, UK Independent Anti-Slavery Commissioner Kevin Hyland, and Ilwad Elman, a Mogadishu-based Somali human rights activist who will brief by video teleconference. Several member states are expected to be represented at ministerial level, including by ministers who will be in New York for the opening of the Commission on the Status of Women.
The Council has been intensifying its focus on the scourge of conflict-related human trafficking and the often-resulting forced labour, slavery and similar practices. It initially addressed the issue in a briefing held in December 2015, organised by the US during its presidency, at which the Council adopted its first decision on human trafficking in the form of a presidential statement. In December 2016, the Council held a ministerial-level open debate on the issue, presided over by Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy, resulting in resolution 2331. In the concept note for the open debate on Tuesday—which comes less than three months after resolution 2331 was adopted—the UK poses several questions related to the implementation of the earlier decisions both by member states and by the UN system (S/2017/198).
Council Decisions
In its presidential statement adopted on 16 December 2015 (S/PRST/2015/25), the Council condemned instances of trafficking in conflict-affected areas; expressed concern that in some regions terrorists benefit from transnational organised crime, including from the trafficking in persons; called on member states to hold accountable those who engage in trafficking in persons; and expressed its intent to continue to address trafficking in persons with respect to the situations on its seizure list, among other things.
Resolution 2331 of 20 December 2016, among other elements, condemned all acts of trafficking, particularly by the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), and condemned violations and other abuses committed by Boko Haram, Al-Shabaab, the Lord’s Resistance Army, and other terrorist or armed groups for the purpose of sexual slavery, sexual exploitation, and forced labour. It recognised the need for accountability and in this context, the importance of collecting and preserving evidence. The resolution expressed the Council’s intention to “integrate the issue of trafficking in persons in the areas affected by armed conflict and sexual violence in conflict into the work of relevant sanctions committees … and to ensure that sexual violence in conflict expertise, including when it is associated with trafficking in persons in the context of armed conflict consistently informs the work of sanctions committees”, and to consider targeted sanctions for individuals and entities involved in trafficking in persons in areas affected by armed conflict.
Both the 2015 presidential statement and the 2016 resolution stressed the need to ensure that persons who have been trafficked are treated as victims of crime, and are not penalised or stigmatised for their involvement in any unlawful activities in which they have been compelled to engage.
The Open Debate
No outcome is expected from Tuesday’s open debate. In addition to highlighting several provisions of resolution 2331, the concept note places particular emphasis on two aspects of the worldwide problem of human trafficking. First, rather than focusing on the process of trafficking as such, it looks at its outcomes, such as different forms of slavery, forced labour, and forced recruitment into armed groups. Second, it highlights the role of transnational organised crime in conflict-related human trafficking and these groups’ ability to adapt in targeting newly vulnerable groups such as displaced populations.
The debate on Tuesday will afford the Secretary-General his first opportunity to address the Council on the range of issues related to human trafficking and share his thoughts about the role of the UN in the implementation of resolution 2331 and, more specifically, on how the efforts by existing subsidiary bodies of the Council and Council-mandated peacekeeping operations and special political missions, could be strengthened in this context.
Hyland is likely to share his experience as Commissioner working to ensure that modern slavery is tackled by the UK in a coordinated and effective manner, including through international collaboration.
Elman may choose to share her experience working with the victims of trafficking into sexual slavery, forced labour, and conscription of civilians by Al-Shabaab. She may also speak of her work on de-radicalisation and rehabilitation of former child soldiers and with survivors of sexual and gender-based violence.
Some members may want to take stock of measures being taken domestically in the aftermath of the adoption of resolution 2331, or share their national best practices in addressing issues resulting from conflict-related human trafficking, leading up to slavery, forced labour, or other similar practices.
Some Council members may choose to reflect on the visiting mission undertaken in early March to the area of operation of Boko Haram, one of the armed groups most notorious for trafficking in persons and using different forms of slavery to advance its goals. Visiting Cameroon, Chad, Niger, and Nigeria, Council members heard first-hand testimonies about the devastating impact the results of trafficking have on the affected communities, including from women whose children were abducted by Boko Haram, and children who were unlawfully detained on the basis of suspected association with a terrorist group. (For details regarding the 3-6 March Council visiting mission please refer to our What’s in Blue
'I Can't Settle If It's Not Tidy; I Blame That On My Mum':
Exploring Women's Relational Household Work Narratives:
Introduction
1.1 Drawing
on a qualitative study exploring the household work[1] narratives
of two generations of mothers, this article examines how these were shaped by
discourses of individualisation, and also how they can be analysed through a
lens of connectedness. The article sets out the theoretical background in terms
of individualisation and relational narrative identities, particularly in
relation to motherhood, before moving on to show how mothers in this study
constructed self-narratives around the theme of household work in terms of
remembered, imagined and ongoing relationships. I look at how stories of
growing up were framed in terms of developing the sense of responsibility
required within an individualised society, while at the same time the mothers I
interviewed made sense of their identities as constituted relationally. By
considering how household work practices were incorporated into broader
self-narratives, I argue for further consideration of household work narratives
as a way of developing our thinking on individualisation, connectedness and
relational identities.
Individualisation and mothers'
relational narrative identities
2.1
Individualisation theorists argue that individuals are compelled to make
choices as individuals and reflexively construct their own biographies in order
to make sense of this process (Giddens 1991;
Beck and Beck
Gernsheim 2002). In this context, household work is a source of conflict
for contemporary heterosexual couples because the organisation of the mundane
activities involved in maintaining a household is closely bound up with the
self-image and life projects of men and women (Beck and
Beck-Gernsheim 2002). In terms of household work then, a reflexive
biography would account for practices and division of tasks as the result of an
autonomous individual making 'identity choice[s]' (Lash and Friedman
1992: 7) within a couple relationship, as part of a required process of
making conscious decisions about their relationships and how they work on a
day-to-day basis (Beck-Gernsheim
2002). In theorising the self who makes these choices, Beck and
Beck-Gernsheim (2002)
and Giddens (1991)
emphasise the resulting responsibility placed on individuals for the way in
which they make these decisions.
2.2 However,
this work has been criticised for misrepresenting the agency to make these
decisions as a characteristic of the individual taken out of a relational and
structural context (Duncan 2011).
Feminist research in this area has highlighted the structural context in which
household work takes place (Jackson 1992)
and thus a tendency for heterosexual couples to 'fall' into traditionally
gendered patterns without negotiation (Van Hooff 2011).
While this has been recognised in feminist analysis, in constructing
self-reflexive biographies individuals in these relationships can still draw on
a felt sense of responsibility for the way in which they divide household work
and make decisions about managing this in the context of heterosexual relationships,
and Van Hooff's study points to this in the 'justifications' provided by her
participants (see also Charles and Kerr
1988; Hochschild
1989; Beagan
et al., 2008; Wiessman et al.
2008). Although these responses show how women take on this sense of
responsibility, explanations for practices and decisions can involve framing
this in a more relational way, accounting for one's own attitude as the result
of the behaviour of one's mother. Explanations of partners' attitudes can also
involve this sort of framing, and they can include suggesting that a male
partner does not do a particular household work task, or does not 'see' that it
is necessary, because of the way he was brought up. Other research has shown
how women construct biographies in which their mothers play various roles, and
participants describe consciously trying to emulate or avoid particular
practices in the way they choose to engage in household work (Oakley 1974; Hochschild
1989; DeVault
1991; Pilcher
1994). This article builds on this literature to further explore how
mother/daughter relationships continue to be incorporated into self-narratives
around the theme of household work.
2.3
Multi-generational research on motherhood has considered how women make sense
of their relationships with their mothers, and the ways in which values and
practices can be consciously reproduced and changed (Brannen et al.
2004; O'Connor
2011; Thomson
et al. 2011). Brannen et al. (2004) explore
the transmission of motherhood as an identity, suggesting that women identified
with or reacted against their mothers as role models in various ways. While
decisions about work and care were partly internalised and framed in terms of
personal morals and a felt sense of individual responsibility, such decisions
were often explained biographically, and shaped by ongoing relationships which
had implications for the process of identification of both people in the
relationship. By paying attention to how mothering identities can be understood
as relational and in process (Miller 2005),
we can explore how connections are made across generations of mothers (Kehily and Thomson
2011). In this context, individualisation can be
viewed as a discourse by which people make sense of their
lives in their narrative accounts, emphasising autonomy and downplaying
structural aspects (Brannen and Nielson 2005). While this may
influence the way in which people construct accounts in which they are
'choosing, deciding and shaping' (Beck and Beck-Gernshiem 2002: 22-23), and which
emphasise values of independence and self-sufficiency, these accounts also rely
on a relational sense of agency and identity (Mason 2004).
2.4 In
emphasising relationality, this article draws on the work of Smart (2007), who has argued for employing connectedness
as a theoretical lens. This can be set alongside individualisation, in that
focusing on how people live their lives while embedded in relationships allows
for a consideration of how these relationships are incorporated into accounts
of choices and actions, while also allowing for the ways in which people can
choose which relationships to maintain and how they can shape and reshape these
over time. The overlapping core concepts which for Smart (2007) constitute the interiorities of personal
life offer a useful approach for analysing the relational aspects of these
accounts, and particularly for reflecting on how the self who is the subject of
these narratives is conceptualised.
2.5 The idea
of narrative identities uses an idea of a reflexive social self in process (Mead 1934; Jenkins 2008; Jackson 2010) and emphasises how people
constantly reconstruct and renegotiate their sense of who and what they are
through the stories they tell, both to themselves and to others (Somers 1994; Plummer 1995; Lawler 2014). The telling of stories relies on
the use of narrative resources that are culturally available at that moment in
time, to someone in that social location (Frank 2010), and thus the individualised
narratives of growing up that involve taking more responsibility in terms of
household work and becoming independent, as constructed by participants in my
study, can be seen as a recognisable way in which incidents could be emplotted
in household work narratives.
2.6 However,
while narratives can draw on discourses of individualisation, Somers emphasises
that our personal narratives are located within 'cross-cutting relational
storylines' (1994: 607). Similarly Benhabib (1999) argues that we are born into pre-existing
webs of narrative in which we start to learn how to make sense of ourselves,
although we have the agency to draw on these narratives to construct our own
life stories that make sense to us. Nevertheless, our life stories can be
challenged; as Benhabib suggests, the characters in any one person's story are
'also tellers of their own stories, which compete with my own, unsettle my
self-understanding, and spoil my attempts to mastermind my own narrative' (1999: 348). Understanding narratives as
interconnected in this way means that they remain in process; they cannot have
'closure' because a connected narrative could always have an effect on the way
in which one constructs a personal narrative.
2.7 Somers (1994) also points out that narratives are embedded
in spatial relationships, and while that is not the focus of this article, I
recognise the importance place can have for narrative identities (Taylor 2010). Community has specifically been
shown to be relevant in previous studies of generations and household work that
focus on class, for example, Luxton (1980) looked at three cohorts of working-class
housewives of 'Flin Flon', a mining town in Canada, while Pilcher (1994) explored responsibility for household work
across three generations of women living in South Wales. Mannay's (2014) work, which revisits Pilcher's study in
contemporary Wales, uses a multi-faceted understanding of place to show how, in
a deprived village affected by the loss of local industry, women who have taken
on breadwinning roles also feel their 'place' is looking after the family home.
This literature offers important examples of relational identities, in the
sense that what it means for women to identify themselves as 'the "lazy but
breadwinning Welsh mam"' (Mannay 2014: 35) relies on various comparison
referents, both remembered and imagined in idealised terms.
2.8 This
article argues similarly that household work narratives can be usefully
conceptualised as interconnected and constructed in relation to other
narratives, and will make a case for looking at the way in which women talk
about their household work practices over the life course in terms of relationships
to others, drawing on empirical data from a qualitative project exploring
household work with two generations of mothers. In particular, this article
will focus on how relationships with mothers shape accounts of household work
practices, and conversely, the role household work plays within these ongoing
relationships between mothers and their adult daughters. Furthermore, if we
consider the person engaging in these household work practices over the life
course, we can usefully consider the role that household work plays in personal
narratives, as a way in which women conceptualise 'growing up'.
2.9 As I
suggested above, literature on household work has shown the relevance of
mother/daughter relationships and ideas of what it means to be a 'good' mother,
when making sense of women's accounts of their housework and foodwork practices
(Oakley 1974; Hochschild 1989; DeVault 1991; Pilcher 1994; Bugge and Almås 2006; Curtis et al. 2009; Meah and Watson 2011). However, I would argue
that by thinking about household work as part of the personal life of these
women, in the sense that it is a something that 'impacts closely' on them (Smart 2007: 28), and their changing sense of
self, accounts of both individual responsibility and relational identities can
be brought out further through a focus on how self-narratives are constructed
around the theme of household work. In particular, the personal life concepts
of biography, embeddedness and relationality (Smart 2007) can be usefully deployed to develop
an understanding of how household work figures in people's personal lives.
The study
3.1 This
article is based upon a study investigating women's household work narratives,
and the fieldwork took place between December 2012 and February 2014.
Participants were 24 British women who were interviewed individually.[2]
This sample was comprised of 12 pairs of mothers and their adult daughters, who
were themselves mothers of at least one young child, defined as 0-11 (see Table
1). The use of two generations from 12 families,
rather than more strictly defined cohorts, means that there is only 6 years
between the oldest younger generation participant, and the youngest older
generation participant. While this approach allowed me to compare the
narratives of mothers and daughters, and to reflect on intergenerational
relations, I am not able to draw any conclusions about the experiences of any
particular cohort.
3.2 Initial
recruitment (6 participants, pairs 1-3) was through personal contacts, although
the women I interviewed were not women I knew personally; other participants
were recruited through advertising in schools, nurseries, libraries and on
mailing lists. All but one of the interviews took place either at participants'
homes, or for some of the older generation participants, at the home of their
daughter.[3] Interviews were semi-structured
qualitative interviews and lasted between 30 minutes and 1 hour 50 minutes. All
but one of the interviews were audio-recorded and transcribed verbatim,[4]
and participants (and any other people mentioned) were given pseudonyms which
will be used in this article. The project complied with institutional ethical
approval guidelines, and before each interview I explained the project and
obtained informed consent to conduct the interview and analysis, and for quotes
to be used in publications. A key concern for me was that in such a small
study, any woman who chose to read any publications would be able to identify
herself and her daughter/mother, and I have tried to be sensitive to this in
deciding what quotes to include.
|
le 1. Table
of Participants
|
  |
3.3 The women
interviewed were white British and heterosexual and all of the younger
generation women were middle-class on the basis of their education and/or
occupation. Some of the older generation participants could be designated as
middle-class in terms of their training and employment in a professional role
(six participants) or most recent employment in a managerial role (one
participant). The other five participants had histories of no paid employment
or part-time paid employment in lower status occupations, but three of these
women were or had been married to partners in higher status occupations when
they had young children (Jean, Kate and Hilary), while the other two (June and
Maureen) were married to partners in manual occupations. Nevertheless, several
of the older generation participants, including those who had been employed in
middle class occupations, spoke about economic constraints at different times
in their lives or growing up in working class families, and this points to the
difficulties of unambiguously assigning a class location over time and between
generations (Hockey et al. 2007). The participants recruited
through personal contacts included pairs of mothers and daughters living in
East Midlands, West Midlands and North Yorkshire. The other participants were
recruited from different areas within a large city in the Yorkshire and the
Humber region. In 8 cases, the daughter saw the recruitment advert and
contacted me; in one case a mother contacted me, and her daughter lived in the
same large city. Of the 8 daughters who contacted me, 4 of their mothers lived
in the same large city; the other 4 lived in Northumberland, East Midlands,
North Yorkshire and another part of Yorkshire and the Humber.
3.4 The
transcripts were analysed using a Listening Guide approach (Mauthner and Doucet 1998). The first stage of
this process involved multiple readings of each transcript with a different
focus each time (reading for the plot and reflexive reading; listening for the
voice of 'I'; reading for relationships; placing people within cultural
contexts and social structures). Data on each of these readings was collated in
individual documents for each participant, which included an outline of the
overall narrative, recurring phrases and ideas, my reflections on how my
experiences related to those of the participant, reflections on the use of
different voices (I, we, you etc.) and 'I-poems'[5]
produced from the data, reflections on how other people were spoken about and
reflections on references to what I interpreted as broader cultural ideas and structural
factors. Following this, Nvivo was used to code the data thematically across
the sample, using the analysis from the existing readings as a starting point
to look for recurring themes, discourses and narratives.
3.5 The
Listening Guide approach is based on the Voice-Centred Relational Method, which
is designed to 'bring the researcher into relationship with a person's distinct
and multi-layered voice' (Gilligan et al. 2006: 255; see also Brown and Gilligan 1992). However, the more
sociologically-informed Listening Guide approach, as developed by Mauthner and
Doucet, challenges the original intention of accessing an 'interiority' (Brown and Gilligan 1992) through listening to the
voices of participants, arguing that, 'All we can know is what is narrated by
subjects, as well as our interpretation of their stories within the wider web
of social and structural relations from which narrated subjects speak' (2008: 404). A Listening Guide approach lends
itself to understanding narrated selves as relational, as reading for the voice
of 'I' and how 'I' in the present reflects on 'I' in the past and in potential
futures, and noting where the participant shifts between 'I' and other voices
(such as 'we', 'you' and 'it'), can allow for a sociological understanding of
how participants weave different perceptions of the self into narrative
accounts. Hermans (2002) has also argued for considering how one
negotiates between different 'I' positions at any given point in time, likening
the multi-voiced self to a society reflecting multiple viewpoints. The rest of
this paper will explore how participants drew on different discourses in the
way they explained their attitudes to household work and accounted for
particular practices, and how this was related to reflexive understanding of a
self in process.
Growing up and taking
responsibility: Narratives of household work and adulthood
4.1 The
values of independence, responsibility and self-sufficiency were highlighted in
various ways across accounts, which influenced how some women talked about
their relationships with their mothers. Sally (pair 5, younger generation)
talks about the occasions when she has lived with her parents as an adult and
describes how,
'I live then as I live on my own, like I take, you know,
responsibility and I'll do stuff around the house and I'll bring shopping in so
I think she values that and sees that I do, that I don't take advantage of
her'.
4.2 This is
in contrast to her brothers who 'tend to just fall back into the pattern of
like being looked after and being kids'. Sally's contrast between
'responsibility' and being 'looked after', with the latter as something
inherently childish, draws on contemporary Western understandings of adulthood
in which 'childish dependency on parental care is expected to give way at a
certain age to independent adulthood, a pattern inscribed most readily through
familial role expectation' (Hockey and James 2003: 167).
4.3 Growing
up and becoming an adult is also understood to include thinking more about the
effect of one's actions on others, replacing 'self-centredness with
responsibility and commitment for self and others' (Blatterer 2010: 13). Nicola constructed a
narrative of 'my journey from an absolute scruffbag to, I don't know, a mum', in
which she made sense of a process of making an increasing effort to keep her
house tidy and increased consideration of other people she lived with as
'starting to grow up a bit really'. As with other participants, her narrative
draws on a natural process of maturation, but also constructs an agentic self
that was able to think "no, this is it" and change her behaviour as
part of a 'finding myself moment'. Reflecting on how Nicola used 'I' in
different ways throughout this narrative highlighted how she makes sense of
herself growing up, and demonstrates the conflict and negotiation involved
between different 'I's in her story (Hermans 2002). For example, she notes how her
attitude to tidiness has changed over time, which illustrates how Nicola in the
present reflects on the actions and attitudes of Nicola in the past:
'Now it's things start to annoy me and grate on my a bit,
whereas before I'd be like "pffft, whatever" and now I'm like
"no I can't deal with this" and I'll have moments where I'm like
"right, I'll just blitz things", which I never used to do.'
4.4 The
recognition that 'blitzing' mess rather than ignoring it was beneficial in the
longer term was evident for several women. Other participants spoke about
'keeping on top' of household work by doing a little every day or having a
routine for various tasks, and having a system for keeping one's home tidy was
presented as allowing more time for enjoyable activities such as spending time
with children.
4.5
Similarly, this link between adulthood and responsibility was highlighted in
the way that mothers spoke about trying to teach their children to 'think for
themselves instead of me telling them what to do' (Eleanor, pair 6, younger
generation). In terms of preparing their children to leave home, several
younger generation participants emphasised the importance of children being
'independent' and 'self-sufficient', and able to look after themselves and
their homes (including being able to cook for themselves, not bringing washing
home and managing household finances). As Hockey and James suggest, full
membership of Western society is considered in terms of 'autonomy,
self-determination and choice' (1993: 3), and this discourse of adulthood shapes
what the mothers in my study talk about their children needing to learn.
4.6
Participants also reflected on learning various household work practices from
their mothers, such as sewing, cooking and ironing, and teaching these to their
children in order to prepare them for leaving home. However, some of the older
generation participants explicitly rejected my reference to their mothers (or
grandmothers) 'teaching' them things; 'We didn't get taught it as such, you
just did it' (Lynne, pair 12, older generation).[6]
Reflecting on how she made sense of learning about housework, June (pair 2,
older generation) usefully distinguished between being 'taught like
"you'll do it this way"' and learning 'by looking and watching'.
Expanding on the second of these, she said:
'I think you learn off your mum, to a certain degree. You
know with like housework and this that and the other you see what your mum does
and as you grow up you tend to do the same so it's like your mum's your […]
like your mentor, like you watch her and you do what she does.'
4.7 Other
participants also drew on both ways of learning, including accounts of being
taught (particularly about food and cooking) and 'watching and imitating' or
'naturally picking up' other tasks, which was sometimes referred to as
'osmosis' (see also DeVault 1991 who similarly found participants
using this language to describe learning about foodwork). However, several
participants constructed narratives in which they made decisions to engage in
household work that their mothers did not, and avoided simply unreflectively
'picking up' the practices they had witnessed growing up. For example, Hilary
(pair 11, older generation) and Lynne (pair 12, older generation) spoke about
how growing up in untidy houses made them want to achieve tidiness and order in
their own homes. Similarly, younger generation participants talked about having
different priorities which influenced their own practices, or working out their
own systems that suited their lives.
4.8 These
accounts can be seen as reflexive biographies, in the sense that each
participant is individually making sense of what appear to be potentially
conflicting interrelated factors in order to explain things like her attitude
to household work and to account for particular practices. It is also evident
that participants recognised that individual responsibility for household work
practices is valued, and that they are trying to instil this in their children.
However, Smart argues that a focus on individualisation directs the
sociological researcher towards 'gathering information and evidence about
fragmentation, differentiation, separation and autonomy' (2007: 189). By employing connectedness as a
theoretical lens through which to view women's household work narratives, this
article will move on to explore what Smart's (2007) conceptual approach can offer.
Household work and connectedness
5.1 This section
explores how connectedness shaped women's household work narratives: firstly by
outlining how participants accounted for their attitudes and behaviour with
regard to household work and then by considering the role household work plays
in maintaining ongoing relationships (and how household work is incorporated
into more problematic narratives of constraint and conflict (Mason 2004)).
Self-narratives: Biographies and
embeddedness
5.2 Drawing
on the idea of 'linked lives', which views the lives of individuals as
meaningful in the context of other lives, (Bengston et al. 2002; Elder 1994), Smart argues that people are
embedded in webs of relationships that go beyond couple relationships,
stressing the importance of vertical connections to children, previous
generations and ancestors (although horizontal ties can also be considered; see
Davies 2015). Individuals are seen to be taking
forward parts of the past, which can be physical resemblances, skills and
personal characteristics, or shared values. Thus people make sense of
themselves in relation to others to whom they are linked in this way, which
Lawler (2014) sees as the active identity work of
'recognition', between the extremes of complete choice or determinism. The idea
of being embedded in relationships influences biographical accounts of oneself
which rely on both personal memories and family stories (Thompson 1993). Focusing on narrative identities
highlights how participants account for the way they do and think about
household work in relation to what are viewed as inherited and 'natural'
characteristics that are part of a stable sense of self, but also particular
experiences that are emplotted into a biography to explain the practices of the
self in the present.
5.3
Sociological work on inheritance shows how various attributes and behaviours
are presented as inherited, and understandings of inheritance are developed
from a variety of sources and may rely on contradictory discourses in relation
to different questions (Edwards 2000). In my research, describing oneself
in terms of inherited characteristics also extended to tidiness:
'I think the really interesting thing like with the family
dynamic is actually I'm much more like my dad, personality-wise, but I seem to
have got Mum's tidying things, whereas my sister is much more like my mum,
she's like a mini-me of my mother to look at, the way she talks, everything,
but just tidying she seems to have got my father's genes.' (Jo, pair 12,
younger generation)
5.4 Jo also
described herself as a 'naturally tidy soul', which is also how she presents
her mother. The idea of mother and daughter as the same kind of 'soul' evokes a
tangible affinity between them that goes beyond simply behaving in the same way
(see Mason 2008). As with other participants in this
study who use the language of genetic inheritance, Jo's idea that she and her
mother are bound in this way allows for a fixing of a close relationship that
is used to shape a personal narrative.
5.5 While
'natural' explanations did not resonate for all my participants, it was at
least recognised as a way of understanding one's self in relation to household
work. For instance, Nicola (pair 7, younger generation), who mentioned an
inherited tendency towards untidiness, felt 'it was never something that came
naturally' and later talks about making a 'conscious effort' to tidy up when
she gets home from work. Nevertheless she says 'I've always just assumed it
comes naturally to some people because I'm just, just being rubbish at it and
hating it'. Ideas of 'natural' tidiness or untidiness could be read as evidence
of different personality types. However, participants combined the language of
natural characteristics and personalities with more relational accounts. Kim
(pair 2, younger generation) described herself as 'a very organised person, so
I kind of let everything get in a mess but it's always put back tidy and a
place for everything and everything in its place' and she describes this as her
'personality'. She also links this to her job, explaining these personality
traits as 'probably why I do accountancy as well because we tend to be quite
[um] rigid people'. This suggests a strong sense of self, rather than behaviour
tied to a particular place or context. However, Kim then frames her tidiness in
a different way, drawing on a biographical understanding:
'I can't settle if it's not tidy. I blame that on my mum
because our house is always, we could play but at the end of the day it was
always put back tidy so it's kind of how I've grown up, how my nan was so it's
kind of a generation thing in that's how I think we should be.'
5.6 Thus
according to her narrative, Kim's 'personality' was partly formed through these
family relationships, and allows her to frame her attitude to household work as
not simply something she is individually responsible for.
5.7 Across
the sample, biographies were seen as relevant to the household work practices
of participants. For example, Fiona (pair 9, younger generation) describes how,
because her parents 'divided the household work pretty well between them' and
had paid help in the form of a cleaner, she and her brothers 'were never given
duties or things as kids…we never had anything set'. Fiona suggests that her
mother 'had in her mind when we were growing up…that we shouldn't give them
[household work tasks] massive importance'. She recalls that her mother 'never
offered advice then about getting in a routine with cleaning or anything', and
this forms part of a narrative in which she remembers 'not having a very
structured routine around it and [um…] never really feeling I was doing it very
well' when she had her own place. For Fiona, 'growing up' included learning
about the importance of a routine for doing household work, which she worked
out when she was living on her own. In terms of her own mothering practices,
Fiona emphasises that she wants her son to be involved in household work, and
grow up with the 'mentality' that 'there are ways of everybody chipping in to
make things better'. This connects her son's biography to her own narrative, in
which she has grown up from somebody who felt overwhelmed by things that seemed
'too difficult' to someone who has a clearer sense of what she wants and who
acts in particular ways to make things happen (such as actively trying to
influence her son's approach to household work).
5.8 Other
participants spoke about the biographies of their male partners, and explained
their household work practices as adults in relation to how they were brought
up. For example, Karen (pair 5, older generation) draws on her remembered
experiences with her husband in explaining why she taught her sons to cook in
order to prepare them for leaving home:
'I just thought back really to the fact of what my
mother-in-law had done and thought that he, you know, John [husband] had come
into the marriage with me unable to do anything really and that I didn't really
want to put my sons into that situation, I wanted them to be able to do
something.'
5.9 Karen's
explanation of her husband's behaviour focuses on the role of his mother, and
this has shaped how she explains her practices. This emphasis on mothers' roles
was evident across several participants' accounts. Amy (pair 10, younger
generation) describes how her husband 'wasn't taught to cook, he wasn't taught
to clean, he wasn't taught to do anything by his mother', while she and her
brother were involved in tasks including cooking, tidying, vacuuming, dusting,
and washing and drying up. Amy draws on these biographies to explain their
different approaches to household work, and as part of a narrative of her
husband 'not noticing' what needs doing in the way that she does and doing
cleaning tasks only if asked to do so. Thus her account of being 'selective' in
what she asks him to do can be seen as an individual strategy in line with Beck
and Beck-Gernsheim (2002), but by analytically drawing attention to connectivity,
the way in which Amy makes sense of 'the difference between my husband and I'
can be seen in terms of biographical accounts of what their mothers expected
and encouraged.
5.10 However,
growing up without being expected to do much household work can be part of a
different story, as Kim shows:
'I didn't leave home till I was twenty seven and my mum did
everything for me. So likewise I do everything for Joe and Molly [laughs]… I
think that's kind of where I've kind of become the way I've become because it's
kind of, it was always done for me so I expect it to be done for my children,
for me to do it.'
5.11 Kim uses
this aspect of her childhood as part of her story of why she behaves in the way
she does, as other participants do in accounting for the behaviour of the
various characters they introduce. These biographical stories can be seen as a
way of accounting for one's present self, and thus past events are made sense
of as part of a process of forming the self. As Smart (2007) suggests, stories about one's parents can
be used in different ways as part of explanations of one's own identification
and behaviour. Thus rather than seeing the behaviour of parents, and particularly
mothers, as determining the behaviour of children, it is the process of
telling the story of one's self that makes sense of these practices, giving
them meaning in the context of the plot developed by the storyteller. In her
interview then, Kim highlighted her own personality, but framed this in a
relational context in which the way she was brought up has influenced her
attitude to household work and her practices with her children.
5.12 While
Smart's work focuses on personal relationships, what also emerged from my data
was a sense in which participants drew on wider networks to emphasise the
typicality of their biographies. As part of the second analytical reading (for
different voices), I considered how 'you' was used by participants (aside from
when it was addressed to me personally). Several older generation participants
used 'you' to make sense of what were presented as 'normal' experiences,
whether on a day to day basis in terms of household work, or as part of what
transitions such as marriage and motherhood meant. For instance, Jean (pair 6,
older generation) linked her experiences to other women of a similar age:
'Most of us went from being at home to being married. We
didn't go away to university and things so you went from being looked after,
and obviously you learn by observing what others are doing so you know, you
learnt a lot like that.'
5.13 As well
as constructing narratives that showed how they were embedded within a network
of personal relationships, which involved comparisons to specific others,
participants across both generations commented on ways in which they thought
their biographies were likely to be similar and different to those of other,
imagined women, who functioned as generalised others (Mead 1934; Holdsworth and Morgan 2007) as in the
generalising narratives about the negative behaviour of other families
described by Finch and Mason (2000).
5.14 What is
evident here, and in the previous section, is that the narratives women
construct to explain their household work practices draw on different discourses,
including language of individual, autonomous choices and personalities, but
also ideas of 'natural' processes across generations, wider shared experiences
and practices shaped by particular relationships. While this shows various ways
in which household work is linked to a sense of self, the next section will
explore how these selves can be understood as not just having
relationships and responsibilities, but as relational (Mason 2004).
Providing help and advice:
Relationality in household work narratives
5.15 The
concept of relationality expresses the idea that people are constituted through
their close kin ties. As with the other concepts, and in keeping with her
theoretical links to Morgan's family practices approach (2011), Smart stresses the active nature of
relationality as a constant process, suggesting 'the term relationism conjures
up the image of people existing within intentional, thoughtful networks which
they actively sustain, maintain or allow to atrophy' (2007: 48). These processes of relationality
depend on the quality of relations, not just their existence (Gabb 2008), and previous work has shown how
caring acts between people work to maintain the relationship between them (see,
for example, Ellis 2013). Finch and Mason's (1993) work on family responsibilities
demonstrates that responsibilities between people develop over time through a
process of negotiation, rather than being seen as an inherent part of a
particular family or kin relationship.
5.16 In this
study, the issue of help with, and advice about, household work was discussed
in all the interviews, and this emerged as both a positive aspect of particular
relationships, and as a source of tension in others. Within most pairs, the
older generation participants in this study helped their daughters with
household work in various ways, particularly when children were born, but also
continuing this alongside providing childcare (for example, Nicola (pair 7,
younger generation) spoke about how her mother 'does loads' when she looks
after Nicola's son, such as vacuuming, cleaning and washing clothes. As well as
practical help, several women also spoke about calling their mothers for
recipes or help with cooking, and some mentioned getting advice about other
household work tasks such as cleaning curtains or sewing. Following Smart's
definition of relationism, these practices are part of the process of
identifying as a mother and a daughter, and making sense of what this means in
the context of one's personal relationships. Mason (2004) distinguishes between 'selves in relation'
and 'relational selves', highlighting that the narrated selves are constituted
through an ongoing process of relating to others. Thus the way in which
participants as daughters made sense of ongoing help from their mothers
reflects an understanding of motherhood as a relational identity, albeit one
that changes over the life course of one's children.
5.17 Nicola's
mother, Brenda, describes practically helping her daughter with household work,
and explains that she does this because 'I see the, part of looking after Alfie
is helping Nicola out with other things that she needs doing.' Brenda is
identified both as a grandmother to Alfie, and a mother to Nicola, and the
household work tasks that she does while looking after Alfie can be seen as
mothering in the sense of meeting her daughter's needs (Lawler 2000). Mason et al. (2007) have argued that as parents as well as
grandparents, the participants in their study had to achieve a balance between
letting their children live their own lives by 'not interfering' and 'being
there' to help and support them when this was wanted. Brenda's account shows
how she makes sense of doing household work tasks for her daughter in terms of
suggesting these were necessary for Nicola's well-being.
5.18 Some
participants spoke about an increased closeness with their mothers, which was
linked to becoming mothers themselves. Sally (pair 5, younger generation)
suggests that her having her daughter Leah 'made us [her and her mother] really
close', as they were both able to offer practical help and emotional support
(her mother and father had recently split up when Leah was born). While Karen's
help is focused on looking after Leah, she recognises 'I don't tend to go there
and do housework in the same way'. She links this to when she had young
children herself and how she appreciated someone looking after the children
because it was nice to be able to 'get on with stuff you want to get on and do
it in the way you want to do it'. This may be shaped by how Karen experienced
her mum's helping when Karen had young children as in some ways problematic (for
example, she mentioned getting 'agitated' that her mother would 'iron
everything, absolutely precisely, where I wouldn't have bothered' and describe
it as "I'm helping you" despite Karen seeing it as unnecessary). Thus
Karen avoids doing tasks such as cleaning as a way in which she can 'not
interfere', but at the same time can 'be there' to 'comfort' Sally when she is
upset about Leah's behaviour (Mason et al. 2007). Nevertheless, she
comments that 'if she asked me, if she said "Mum will you come across and
clean for me one day?" then obviously I would'. Therefore if she would be
helping Sally and meeting her needs by cleaning, this would fit into the
mothering identity she constructs throughout the interview.
5.19 Bearing
in mind that relationality is not an inherently positive concept, practical
help with housework that was unwanted or that was carried out in a way that
contributed to the identification of a daughter or daughter-in-law as a 'bad'
wife could worsen relationships. Kate (pair 8, older generation) spoke about a
difficult relationship with her mother-in-law, which included criticism of
Kate's cleaning ('no matter how clean it was and tidy, she'd always look down
her nose and criticise and say "oh I came, I had to do so much, your
kitchen was a disgusting mess"') and taking it upon herself to clean items
'to make me feel embarrassed'. This subsequently affected other decisions, such
as those around childcare, which was part of a narrative of constraint in which
she was not able to continue working in the same job; as she put it, it was
'just not worth it' to ask her mother-in-law to watch her children, because she
felt under pressure for the house to be 'spotless' if her mother-in-law was
going to see it. Later in the interview, Kate explains how the way she helps
her eldest daughter is 'not anything like how it was with my mother-in-law, you
know her coming in and looking at vases and washing them to prove a point'
which she describes as 'belittling'. Instead she emphasises that she asks her
daughter if she wants help; 'I don't just walk in and say "right I shall
do this and I'll do that"'. Although this does not relate to being a
grandmother (as Jodie does not have children), the idea of not-interfering (Mason et al. 2007) is key here; any help
from Kate should be requested or approved by her daughter. Returning to the
role of biographies in accounting for women's selves and their household work
practices, Kate's explanation of how she helps her daughter with household work
is shaped by her experiences with her mother-in-law, and thus how she accounts
for her mothering identity in the way in which she maintains her relationship
with her daughter is framed biographically.
5.20 Some of
the older generation participants reflected on household work as a problematic
aspect of their relationships with their adult daughters. Lynne (pair 12, older
generation) mentions her daughter Abby who had a 'horrendous' room when she
lived at home, but suggests that she saw Abby's untidiness as an immature
practice that could be changed. When Abby moved into her own place, Lynne
mentioned that 'I really thought it would be lovely and she'd be inviting us
occasionally for meals', showing how this relationship is imagined. However,
the reality does not match this as she is not invited often (at the time of the
interview, Lynne estimates it was nine months ago). From Lynne's account it
seems that Abby is particularly concerned about her mother's opinion: 'And if
I've got some stuff for her she'll say "can you send me Dad down with that
stuff?", I'll say "well no, Dad's not available" "well can
you come and keep your eyes shut then?"'. This does not appear to just be
Abby's perception; Lynne comments that 'I find it very difficult to bite my
tongue' and admits to giving advice like 'well it doesn't take much to keep it
tidy like this'. The difficulties in Lynne's mother/daughter relationship with
Abby seem to be partly based on expectations that having bought a house, her
daughter would 'grow up' (in the sense of developing an identity of a
responsible adult) and take care of her home. However, Abby's continued
untidiness limits the extent to which she and Lynne can relate as equals, two
adult heterosexual women who can enjoy spending time together, having meals in
a 'lovely' home. Instead, Lynne appears to be trying to avoid maintaining a
parent/child dynamic, but by implicitly trying to avoid being 'told off' for
the state of her house, it appears that Abby is continuing to identify her
mother as a 'nagging parent' and thus spoil Lynne's self-identification in this
regard (Benhabib 1999).
Conclusion
6.1 This
article has argued that looking at household work through the lens of both
individualisation and connectedness can help us to explore this as part of
self-narratives. Values such as self-sufficiency and independence are evident
in the narratives participants constructed around household work, which
demonstrate how the women I interviewed recognise how they are held responsible
as individuals for managing household work practices, and making decisions. In
addition, a focus on connectedness highlights various way in which their
narrative identities can also be seen as relational, and this in turn shapes
the ways that the self who engages in household work practices is
conceptualised within these accounts. This article has outlined various other
discourses that participants drew on in their self-narratives, including
naturalistic links between generations, accounts of direct and indirect
socialisation and broader shared experiences. In particular, this article has
focused on how looking at the ways in which participants could be seen to be
embedded in webs of ongoing relationships shaped how they made sense of their
household work practices and how they constructed relational mothering
identities through narrative accounts.
6.2 In
considering the role household work plays in narrative of 'growing up', this
article has also drawn attention to the ways in which household work practices
can be incorporated when considering transitions to adulthood. Arguably the focus
on household work in this study has shaped the narratives, which are
constructed interactionally between the researcher and participant within the
interview context (Elliott 2005). Nevertheless, existing literature
suggests that adulthood is framed in terms of 'settling down' with a partner
and having children (Blatterer 2010; Brooks 2010), and in this study, women's
narratives of growing up often linked an increased consideration of, and
responsibility for, household work to becoming a wife and mother and 'settling
down' in this way. Contemporary understandings of standardised adulthood
include independence due to having an income and living arrangements of one's
own (Blatterer 2010), and this formed part of the
'growing up' narratives of some participants (such as those who distinguished
between household work in student houses and in a home with their partner and
children). Thus it may be useful to consider those who are adults in terms of
chronological age, but are not cohabiting in couple relationships (such as
studies of housemates, or adult children who have returned to live with their
parents).
6.3 While
this article is based on research with a small, relatively homogenous sample, I
would argue that the themes highlighted are worth further exploration in order
to continue to develop an understanding of connectedness and personal lives. A
focus on self-narratives allows for a consideration of how household work can
be incorporated into ways of talking about oneself over the life course, and as
I have demonstrated, the seemingly mundane practices involved in household work
can be viewed through different lenses. By viewing narratives of household work
practices through a lens of individualisation, we can identify accounts of the
'choosing, deciding and shaping' self, while a focus on connectedness
highlights ways in which this sense of self is also understood in terms of
various remembered, imagined and ongoing relationships.
REFRAMING RESEARCH ETHICS:
Introduction
1.1 This
article is premised on the idea that were we able to articulate a positive
vision of the social scientist's professional ethics, this would go some way
towards enabling us to reframe the notion of research ethics in the social
sciences as something that is internal or, at least, more fully embedded within
its constitutive disciplines, these fields of enquiry or, as I will have it,
profession.[1] This perspective runs counter to the
currently dominant view, one that is tied to perspectives on ethics that are
external to social science as a professional form of enquiry, and where the
discourse of research ethics is seen as offering an unbiased, non-partisan and,
as a result, more objective form of normative analysis. This is something that
is carried over into those aspects of institutionalized research governance
that, through audit driven processes, purport to ensure research is conducted
ethically. However, this conception of research ethics was originally developed
in relation to biomedical research and has subsequently been applied to social
science research (Schrag 2010). In seeking to question the utility of this
conception of research ethics in relation to the social sciences my intent is,
albeit at some remove, to mitigate the negative impact that the contemporary
discourse of research ethics has had on social scientific research (Dingwall 2012; Hammersley 2010; Van Den Hoonaard 2011).
1.2 This
essay proceeds as follows. First I suggest that, not only does contemporary
research ethics have its roots in the governance of biomedical research, but
the initial impetus for its emergence was the ethical challenges raised by the
development of a disciplined program of biomedical research. These concerns
included: the conduct of medical professionals; the potential for conflicts of
interest to arise between the professional's clinical responsibilities and the
demands of research; and the scope of professional medical ethics. Whilst
research ethics – or, rather, the implementation of a procedural solution to
the concerns of ethical research in the biomedical sciences – provided some
resolution to these issues, we might ask if the same questions arise in other
contexts, such as in social scientific research and, thus, if the same
resolution is required. Whilst recognizing that some social scientific research
is, today, conducted by those who have other professional responsibilities I
suggest that, for the most part, social scientists do not labor under the same
or even similar ethical conditions similar to those that initially gave rise to
research ethics. As a result we are in a position to reconsider the ethics of
social scientific research is whether or not they might be encompassed by the
professional ethics of social science researchers.
1.3 In this
light I suggest that whilst neither academia nor academics underwent a
classical process of professionalization they – we – can be collectively
considered as a profession in the moral sense of the term. This is what we
might call a 'true profession,' the practice of which aims at some kind of
higher good. Furthermore the nature of this good, and the practical
requirements of its pursuit, gives rise to and shapes the distinctive ethics
(or, more broadly, ethos) of a profession. As such, the ethical perspectives
that have been developed without a full and proper recognition of this ethos,
such as those that have been produced in relation to biomedical research, may
be problematic when transferred to this domain.
1.4 Having
presented some reasons for thinking that the social sciences, or 'research'
more generally, might be construed as a professional activity I consider why,
even as the discourse of research ethics has advanced, the idea of a
professional ethics has not previously been given serious consideration. I
first note that the professoriate pre-dates the emergence of the (true)
professions and that one of the major benefits of such institutionalization,
professional autonomy, was already granted to universities and those situated
within them. Thus, there was no historical imperative for academics to
collectively lay claim to professional status and, therefore, no impetus
towards further professionalization. However, we might still consider what, if
anything, the higher good of academia as a 'profession' might be.
1.5 In the
first instance we can draw on the pedagogic and scholastic ends of the
university. The dissemination of knowledge is obviously a social good embraced
by the state. However, our concern is less with the educational mission of
university professors than it is with the more recently developed notion of
'research.' The idea of the research university emerged in late 18th
century Germany and was accompanied by a reorganization of knowledge into the
disciplinary formation we currently take for granted and, on occasion,
unreflectively naturalize (Wellmon 2015). In this context we might consider
if research can be considered a professional activity, the pursuit of which
involves some sort of socially sanctioned higher good. Whilst one might
consider 'knowledge' as the required social value and end, it does not offer
any normative guidance. Whilst it might bind together academics of all
disciplinary backgrounds the pursuit of knowledge contributes little of
substantive or practical value when we consider the ethical conduct of
research. Rather, following Schrag, we should recognize that 'research' is not
a singular activity (Schrag 2012), something that would mean that all
researchers are members of one profession. We should instead consider the
nature, motivation and ends of specific disciplines or disciplinary groupings
and the endeavors, methods and methodologies associated with them. In this
context, I argue that the social sciences can lay claim to a democratic ideal
as its 'higher good' and, therefore, its guiding ethos or end.[2]
1.6 Given
this end – democracy – social science research is persuaded not for its own
sake or for the sake of knowledge in itself. Rather, its pursuit is rooted in
the (admittedly diverse) socio-political needs of 'democracy,' understood as an
ethos or normative as an end in itself. As with any form of government
democracy is predicated on the exercise of power and control but, nevertheless,
it is also distinctive; modes of government that embody the democratic ethos
are normatively invested in the creation and promotion of a society that is
able to understand itself. This is consistent with Shils' suggestion that
"[t]he true calling of sociology is to contribute to the
self-understanding of society" (Shils 1980: 76).[3]
Of course we might also note that such social self-understanding will not be
possessed by all citizens and, furthermore, its pursuit "is not likely to
ever be a wholly consensual affair" (Shils 1980: 36). It seems, then, that social
self-understanding is at least as difficult as self-understanding. More than
this, it also seems that this task is "far more likely to be an act
performed by only a few persons in that society" (Shils 1980: 36). According to Shils, sociologists
are some of these few and, furthermore, this end – social self-understanding –
is constitutive of the calling or vocation of the sociologist. What
sociologists have to is a distinctive form of critical engagement, a 'social
maieutics' (Bourdieu and Wacquant 1992: 201-202) that has no
other source. Thus sociologists do not merely produce knowledge about the
societies they are a part of, they inhabit them. As such they are
socio-political actors, embedded in a democratic context, and accountable to
the normative landscape, structure and ends of that context – social
researchers are accountable to what Bernstein (1998) calls the democratic ethos.[4]
1.7 Although,
pace Dewey, Bernstein considers democracy to be a way of life, his discussion
of the democratic ethos is focused on Habermas' "discourse theory of law
and democracy" (1998: 289). Thus he presents the democratic ethos
as something "that conditions and affects how discussion, debate, and argumentation
are practiced" (1998: 290). This is an important aspect of what I
have in mind. However, properly understood, the notion of a democratic ethos
can be expanded beyond the constitutive norms that underpin (but do not
determine) the political exchanges we find in Habermas' public square i.e. the
discussions, debates, and arguments that concern questions of ethico-political
significance. In this broader view, the democratic ethos is a set of values,
norms and, perhaps, even principles that are constitute of a particular kind or
sort of socio-political arrangement term 'democratic'. Given Habermas'
concerns, it is understandable that Bernstein focuses on political debate. Nevertheless,
understood as a way of life, the idea of democracy and the democratic ethos is
something that conditions and affects more than debate. It should be understood
as underpinning the broader social, cultural and institutional contexts within
which such debates take place. Furthermore, it should be seen as shaping all
contributions to such discussions, including the knowledge generated by
(social) scientists. Thus the view presented here positions the social sciences
as part of that broader context and, therefore, as normatively informed by the
democratic ethos.[5]
1.8 Whilst
the notion of a democratic ethos might be seen as a somewhat tenuous basis or
foundation for a profession and its ethics, it is consistent with the
complexity we find in the ideals of the classic professions. For example,
health is a similarly amorphous ideal that, nevertheless, serves as the end of
medical practice. Furthermore, properly understood, the nature of
confidentiality is consistent across the true professions of law, medicine, the
clergy and, I will suggest, the social sciences. Whilst the discourse of
research ethics has reconstructed it as a function of respect of autonomy, the
professional commitment to maintain the confidence of patients, clients,
parishioners (especially the penitents of the Catholic faith) and, I suggest,
research subjects is, in fact, primarily adopted for methodological, and
therefore instrumental, ends. Certainly, once it is has been promised
confidentiality takes on an ethical dimension. Nevertheless, it essentially
functions as a methodological commitment. As such, the promise of
confidentiality is collective commitment; one that is not only made by
the relevant profession but by the society or, better, the state that that
recognizes it. Following Luban (2007) I suggest that this, and not simply the
fiduciary relationship between professional and client, is indicative of a true
profession.
1.9 In the
final section of the paper I consider what, if anything, might follow if we
consider social science from the perspective of a professional, rather than
research, ethics. Building on the idea that the social sciences are guided by a
commitment to democracy I suggest the Clinical Ethics Committee (CEC) might
provide a better model for considering the ethics of social science research
than the Research Ethics Committee (REC).[6]
The reason for this is that RECs are organized and constituted in such a manner
that they can be considered representative of our contemporary culture of
audit. As Strathern has pointed out ethics is "frequently enrolled to
justify auditing practices" whilst also being vulnerable to being
"betrayed by or in resistance to them" (Strathern 2000: 5). Conducting research in a
manner that is ethical does not imply that research must be auditable as much
as it implies researchers should be accountable (Emmerich 2013).
1.10 Thus,
when considering how best to understand the ethics of social science research
we should consider how we might structure and institutionalize research in such
a way as to promote such accountability among and on the part of researchers.
Taking the CEC as a model would mean researchers engage is a more discursive
and dialogical debate about the ethics of their research rather than merely
'getting ethics' (Chadwick 2015) or seeking to ensure their
proposals 'pass' ethical review. Similarly committee members would be able to
more fully engage with researchers and the ethical dimension of their research
rather than merely applying (ir)relevant 'local precedents,' complicating
information sheets, or spotting minor grammatical errors (Stark 2013; Stark 2011). Whilst CECs are certainly engaged
with bioethical thinking, they are not colonized by it. The constitution of
CECs is such that they maintain and promote ethics and ethical reflection in
practice. Thus, engaging with this approach does not represent another
reiteration of 'bioethical imperialism'; it is not a case of just another
'biomedical approach' being applied to the ethics of social science research.
Rather, it represents an opportunity for the social science community (or
profession) to exercise a greater degree of control over the ethics and ethical
governance of social research whilst also being open to the input of others.
This can including scholarly analysis from non-social scientists, such as
(bio)ethicists, as well as the perspectives of research participants and
organizations that purport to represent them.
The Historical Roots of Research
Ethics
2.1 Whilst
research ethics came of age with the advent of bioethics and, more
specifically, the publication of the Belmont Report and Beauchamp and
Childress' Principles of Biomedical Ethics (2009), its roots can be found in the early
history of the National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Maryland circa
1950-1960. In presenting an account of these origins I draw on the work of
Stark (2011) and Schrag (2010) who convincingly claim that the origins of
ethical review of research should be located as this time and place. Their work
uncovers something of the particular concerns that motivated these developments
that, for the most part, are not replicated within the social sciences.
2.2 Whilst
the origins of medicine as a specialized and scientific endeavour can be located
in the early 18th century, and its subsequent trajectory can be traced through
the 19th century,, the mid-twentieth century saw two significant
developments. First, biomedical researchers were beginning to make use of
placebo-controlled trials and, second, they were beginning to study healthy
human beings as a sui generis phenomenon, not least when they were used
as controls for the aforementioned trials. Both of these endeavors raised
particular and relatively novel ethical questions. In the first instance, there
was a realization that the interests of biomedical researchers may
substantially differ from those of patients. In the second instance, conducting
research on healthy individuals meant that the therapeutic basis of the
doctor-patient relationship, the foundation of medical ethics, did not obtain.
The divergent ends of research and patient care produced the distinct potential
for a conflict of professional interests.
2.3 In Behind
Closed Doors (2011), Stark examines the research ethics that
arose as part of the advent of research on healthy volunteers over the course
of the 1950s at the Clinical Centre of the USA's National Institutions of
Health (NIH). This institutional and geographical specificity leads her to term
the focus of her research an 'ethics of place.' Conducting research on healthy
volunteers not only brought into being a new class of patient – what Stark and
the NIH researchers of the 1950's called the normal patient – but also created
a new type of physician, the physician-researcher. However, unlike other
categories of physician that of 'researcher' was not positioned as a specialty
in its own right. Rather it is an endeavour that some medical professionals pursue
and do so in relation to their own field, an activity undertaken within the
confines of one's clinical specialty. This remains the case even when they are
conducting research in relation to 'normal patients.' For example,
nutritionists based at the NIH studied the short and medium term effects of
different diets on healthy individuals. As Stark puts it rather than being
defined by some malaise, malfunction or illness the normal patient was defined
as such in virtue of being the site of medical examination and intervention; by
their status as an object of medical inquiry.
2.4 Given
this context there was no impetus to formally codify a new professional
ethics and, given the potential for conflicting perspectives between those from
differing medical specialties, every reason not to do so. Instead, the NIH
responded with a procedural approach to the ethics of research titled 'expert
review' or 'group consideration.' As an essentially bureaucratic endeavour this
approach to ethics could be layered on top of existing doctor-patient
relationships without disturbing them. The ethical relationship that obtained
between medical professionals and those they cared for was left untouched by an
ethics that did little more than review research protocols. Similarly, such an
approach positions both 'researchers' and 'research subjects' as objects,
abstract placeholders that 'stand-in' for concrete, actual or 'real'
individuals. This was an appealing strategy not only because no professional
therapeutic relationship obtained between normal patients and researchers but
because it was consistent with the epistemology of scientific research. Taken
collectively, these points suggest why it was that, once it has been
institutionalized with regard to research on normal patients, group
consideration came to be applied to biomedical research more generally.
2.5 In the
context of biomedical research the therapeutic nature of the doctor-patient
relationship comes to be seen as a source of bias. Thus, researchers adopt a
variety of methodological strategies that introduce a degree of distance
between the researcher and the research subject. For example, notions regarding
the need for research to be blind or double blind, as well as the randomization
of participants and the need for placebo controls, are all suggestive of the
way research enacts the objectification of research subjects. It is, therefore,
unsurprising to find that that the process of ethical review institutionalized
at the NIH is not only consistent with the way distance between the researcher
and research subjects was being produced but that it is symbolically reproduced
and reiterated in this new context. Thus 'group consideration' – the initial
practice of which could include interested researchers i.e. those
involved with the research being reviewed – gave way to the disinterest of
'expert review.' Whilst the methodology of review remained essentially the
same, it was now conducted by those uninvolved with the research at hand. Those
involved with particular research projects were now positioned as sources of
bias, and a threat to their ethical integrity. This, what we might call a
quasi-objectivist perspective on ethics, is the opposite of what we find in
professional medical ethics. In this latter context, where the therapeutic
relationship is seen as the foundation of ethical responsibility and, whether
majority or minority, the CECs opinion is merely something for those involved
with the case to consider.
2.6 The
formal development of biomedical research as a programmatic form of enquiry
furthered the emerging separation of biomedical research from the clinical
practice of medicine. However, this objectification runs counter to the
intimacy of the doctor-patient relationship and, therefore, to the professional
ethics founded upon it. As such both biomedical research and its associated
ethics exhibits significant potential to conflict with the accepted norms and
ethics of professional medical practice. One way to resolve this conundrum
would be to position research as an 'extra-professional' activity. However,
beginning with Beauchamp and Childress' Principles of Biomedical Ethics (Beauchamp 2009),[7]
it seems clear that the substantive, and not just procedural, content of
research ethics has become highly influential in the sphere of professional
medical ethics. The contemporary discourses of professional medical ethics and biomedical
research ethics are clearly intertwined. Thus insisting that clinical practice
and research differ insofar as one is an activity undertaken by medical
professionals as such, whilst the other is something undertaken by
biomedical scientists, resolves little. The conundrum merely reappears
elsewhere; if they differ, why is it that there is an evident relationship
between the substantive ethics both medical professionals and biomedical
researchers adhere to?
2.7 An
alternative resolution would be to accept that biomedical research was, or has
become, a professional activity in its own right. In this view the notion of an
ethics of research was been developed in order to manage the potential
conflicts of interest and actual ethical tensions that arise in the planning
and pursuit of research. This, it seems to me, has the virtue of being both
historically accurate and consistent with our common sense of the field;
biomedical research is an activity undertaken by medical professionals who are
acting as such. The conclusion we should draw is that whilst it is commonly
presented that way, the substantive ethics of biomedical research are not fully
distinct from professional medical ethics. Furthermore, the particular
administrative format(s) with which it is associated, first group consideration
and subsequently expert review, acts to disperse or distribute the ethical
responsibility that accrues to both the individual researcher and the
profession as a whole. The objectification of research, researchers, research
subjects and their relationships facilitates such collective and procedural
decision-making and, therefore, the management of potential and actual ethical
conflicts and tensions. This has obvious value in regards the elimination of
bias and claims regarding the objectivity of the ethical perspective that
results. Nevertheless, it contrasts with the ethics required when acting in
particular social contexts; situations which cannot be subject to the same
level of objectification and where such procedural approaches to ethics may
themselves be sources of ethical concern.
2.8 Whilst
the specific ethics of research has been the subject of further development is
has not altered the focus that biomedical research provided. Nevertheless, the
remit of research ethics has gradually expanded beyond biomedicine and now
covers all 'human subjects research' broadly defined. However relatively little
consideration has been paid to the differences between biomedicine and the
social sciences. Furthermore, whilst one might think of the social sciences as
taking the equivalent of healthy individuals or 'normal patients' as their
research subjects, on fuller reflection this cannot be maintained. The normal
patient is constituted by and through the fact that they are collectively
distinct from those usually subject to medical interventions: patients. There
is no such contrast to be found in the social sciences. Thus social scientific
research does not present the same inherent potential for ethical conflicts.
The responsibilities of social scientists are generated through relationships
that, for the most part, are produced by the conduct of research alone. There
are no other professional commitments with which they are in tension and with
which they might conflict. Nonetheless, despite having significant potential to
be conducted on the basis of epistemological paradigms (or moral economies)
different to that of the biomedical research, social science remains subject to
the same procedural approach to ethical review. One way to challenge this
'ethical imperialism' (Schrag 2010) is to consider if the social
sciences are in need of a specific ethics of research or if a viable
professional ethics might have sufficient scope to address the issues and
concerns found in the contemporary literature. If we are to do so we must first
consider if social scientists can be considered professionals in the required
sense.
Professionals and the Professoriate
3.1 As
Wilensky (1964) foresaw, we live in an era when everything,
and everyone, has become subject to the discourse of professionalism. It is,
one could say, the guiding ethic or moral norm of modern life, at least 'in
public.' In this context the council does not employ Bin Men but Waste Disposal
Professionals and the criteria for a good tradesman is not just their ability
to do the job and to do it on time, but their professionalism; the way in which
they conduct themselves as they perform the tasks they are employed to do.[8]
Such notions are, however, insufficient to formally ground a professional
ethics; neither Waste Disposal Professionals nor the world's best plumber has
any such thing. Thus, we should distinguish between the classic or true
professions, the variety of auxiliary professions or 'occupations' and the
contemporary moral norm of 'professionalism.' Whilst these relatively simply
divisions stand up to scrutiny the picture is undeniably more complex than they
imply. For example, it is indisputable that medicine is a classic or true
profession. Nevertheless, the notion of professionalism is clearly a central
concern of the contemporary literature on medical ethics, particularly the more
'internal' literature focused on practice and education (Cruess, Cruess, and Steinert 2008). However, this
is not the place to explore the current dialogue between professionalism and
professional ethics, whether it be those of medicine or any other true
profession.[9] Rather, our present purpose intimate
that we distinguish between the classic or true professions and those that are
merely auxiliary.
3.2 In formal
discussions of the classic professions the focus is generally on medicine and
law however, in reflecting on the nature of the classic or true professions, we
should also include the clergy and the military. In discussions of the ethical
dimension of professions it is common to find the suggestion that it is, in
some essential manner, predicated on the existence of a fiduciary relationship
between professionals and their patients or clients (McCullough 1998; 2004). The nature of such
relationships is that they are supposed to give rise to the particular ethical
duties bourn by professionals and, therefore the professional ethics of
medicine and law as a whole. However, in the case of the clergy or the
military, it is not clear that such relationships exist. Whilst one might
suppose that a priest has fiduciary duties with respect to his parishioners, it
is less a matter of individual relationships than it is with respect to the
parish, and the congregation, as a whole.[10]
Similarly, unless one construes the head of state as an 'individual' rather
than the embodiment of a nation, the military cannot be positioned as having
any fiduciary relationships comparable to those of doctors and lawyers.
Clearly, unless we are to eliminate or otherwise ignore the military and the
clergy from the list of the true professions, there must be some alternative to
'fiduciary relationships' that acts as the foundation for their status.
3.3 In his
essay 'Professional Ethics' Luban (2007) gives some sense of what this foundation
might be. He argues that we ought to restructure our conception of professional
ethics from one that has two-levels to one that has four. A two-level
conception presents professionals as acting in the interest of their clients.
However, professionals do not pursue such ends without constraint; they do so
according to the broader norms, principles and rules that guide their practice.
This picture accounts for – but does not necessitate, explain or justify – the
existence of a fiduciary relationship between professionals and their clients
as individuals. Luban presents an expanded account via the introduction of two
additional levels. He suggests we should move our focus beyond that of
individual profession-client relationships, and the values, norms and
principles that are positioned as guiding professional practice at the
coalface. Instead we should consider the way that the role of the professional,
and professions as social institutions, is collectively specified at what we
might consider a socio-political level. Here, the existence of professions and
professionals are justified because 'society,' and not just individual clients,
values the ends of a profession. The social institutionalization of the
professions facilitates their ends. In the case of medicine and law the ends
can be considered as 'health' and 'justice,' whilst those of the clergy and the
military are, respectively, 'the glory of god' and the (existential) security
of the nation state. Such ends are shared, which is to say valued, by society
more generally.[11] Given that the values and goals of
true professions are shared by society as a whole, society formally
accommodates such professions so that, at least ideally, they can pursue these
ends with the greatest possibility of success.
3.4 At this
point it is worth turning away from trying to specify the nature of a true
profession and consider if there is a prima facie case that academics in
general, and social scientists in particular might be considered professions
and professionals of this kind. It will surprise no one if I point out that the
terms profession and professional are related to the term professor. All are
connected to the idea of someone who not only has knowledge but also professes
it. Whilst the clergy and the military can be thought of as pursing the ends of
their professions in the good of their parish and the state respectively, legal
and medical professionals place their specialized and technical knowledge in
the service of discrete individuals. In so doing they put the interests of
their clients, or their patients, above their own. The sense in which academics
'profess' differs slightly; they do not profess knowledge in the service of
others, but in order that others might learn what they know. The notion is
connected to the medieval idea of the university, when universities were
repositories of knowledge, and those who inhabited them were its stewards (Wellmon 2015). Their function was to hold
knowledge in trust for the good of society, humanity and, we might add, the
glory of god. Whilst we might think of the pedagogic endeavours of the early
university as a professional activity, such claims would be unavoidable
anachronistic. As used here, the notion of a profession and a professional
cannot really be thought of as having currency until the 19th
century. Furthermore, given that we are not primarily interested in the
educational activities of academics, but the disciplined practice of social
science research, there would be little value to the claim that we are
professionals on this basis; we must do so on the basis that academic social
scientists engage in 'research.'
3.5 In the
contemporary sense of the term 'research' did not become a formally
identifiable activity undertaken by scholars with university positions until
the late 19th century (Wellmon 2015). Furthermore when they, and the
idea of a research university emerged, there remained a good deal of 'amateur'
scholars. These were often Victorian gentleman, such as Charles Darwin, someone
who stands as an exemplar of such individuals. However we must, again, be wary
of apply the contemporary terms to the past. Whilst, today, the professional is
considered superior to the amateur this was not the case in the 19th
century.[12] As they were remunerated for their
endeavours it was the professional's motivation that was called into question,
whilst the amateur's motivation was understood to be pure, and connected to the
activity as an end in itself. As such it was the professional who could be
called into (moral) question. In contrast, our contemporary conception of the
amateur suggests an enthusiast or hobbyist – an individual who is motivated by some
kind of personal or subjective interest(s) rather than the objective reasons of
professional practitioners. Whilst there may be no moral question about the
character of amateurs it is clear that, today, the social status of
professionals is the greater.
3.6 Properly,
which is to say sociologically, speaking the contemporary professional is a
member of an institutionalized and disciplined community who practices with
direction and purpose. Certainly personal interests can initially motivate an
individual to become a professional researcher, and certainly such interest
persist once an individual becomes a professional, however such interest become
sublimated to, or disciplined by, the social structures and collective ends of
a community of academic researchers. Whilst we need not think that the amateur
is incapable of making any significant contributions to knowledge, they
nevertheless exist on the periphery of the disciplinary field, the norms of
which stand as the ultimate test of any contribution they might make.
3.7 As
indicated in the previous paragraph the foundation of the research university –
something that is vital to the idea of research as a professional activity – is
associated with scholarly ideas about epistemologically defined subjects, disciplines
and, therefore, the emergences of distinct disciplinary communities. Not
co-incidentally, this approach to the social organization of knowledge and
knowledge creation was consecrated around the same time and place as the advent
of the social sciences. The emergence of the disciplines and disciplinarity
began a process of dividing academics and reconstructing their identities.
However, whilst the institutional community as a whole began to fracture –
think of the two cultures written several decades after this process began – it
meant the emergence of coherent academic communities organized around
disciplines. Such formations are not defined by their subject matter alone, but
by their approach to such matters; by the ways in which they generate knowledge
and, indeed, know. Or, to put it another way, disciplines are identified by the
epistemologies and methodologies they bring to bear on their subject matter(s).
As such they are collectively constituted by and structured around a set of
shared practices regarding the creation and development of knowledge.
Disciplinary practices are therefore predicated upon on a shared body of
technical and specialized knowledge, something that they have in common with
other professions. Whilst, today, many such disciplinary communities contain a
number of sub-disciplinary groupings, even to the extent that some sub-groups
may rarely encounter one another, this does not pose a challenge to the idea
that they might be considered as shared professional identities. After all, one
could say the same about certain specialisms in both law and medicine.
3.8 Whilst we
can take the emergence of disciplines and disciplinary sub-specialisms as an
indication that academic research communities might be thought of as social
groups of a professional disposition, more is needed if we are to think of them
as true professions. One could, again, lay claim to the pedagogical activities
of modern universities and their central importance to the knowledge society.
But, again, this does not provide sufficient foundation for the claim that
research itself is a professional activity. In order to make this claim we
must, I think, focus on the social sciences in more detail.
3.9 The
methods of the social science are not unique, at least not in the sense that
they are without historical antecedents. Nor are they used by those we would
call 'social scientists' alone. Rather, the methods of the social science
originated in the methods of the bureaucratic state. In turn these methods can
be found in the social organization of post-feudal societies; in the
administration of the realm of kings, and the tasks undertaken by their
emissaries. Furthermore, particularly in the case of revolutionary France, the
advent of the bureaucratic state is synonymous with the advent of modern
secular democracies or, at least, the conditions that gave rise to them (Kafka 2012; Rosanvallon 2007). Thus, in the first
instance, the social sciences draw on the information made available by the
bureaucratic state – indeed, brought into existence by the bureaucratic state,
– and used it to produce further insights. The classic example of this is
Durkheim's suicide (2002), a founding text of sociology as a
disciplinary formation. In the second instance, social scientists make
increasing use of these methods created by the bureaucratic state. However,
when they do so they not only also pursue a greater degree of methodological
rigor but have also developed conceptual and theoretical tools that allow for
critical insight and engagement.
3.10 Thus,
whilst it not only remains a matter of degree but varies across both academic
and non-academic domains, the social sciences are distinctive insofar as they
exhibit a high(er) level of reflexivity (Bourdieu and Wacquant 1992: 183-184). Whilst the
bureaucratic state is concerned with the practical accomplishment of the
everyday life of the state, with the administrative tasks themselves, the
social sciences are concerned with something a little deeper; with the
accumulation and development of not only knowledge, insight and meaning but
ways of producing knowledge, insight and meaning both with the discipline
itself and, more broadly, as an object of research and a concern of
researchers. Furthermore, without leaving ourselves committed to the view that
that the concerns, values or ends of the social sciences are immediately
meliorist we might think that such concerns, values and ends express a
commitment to society, to self-understanding, self-comprehension and,
therefore, to our own betterment, even if that commitment sometimes, perhaps
even oftentimes, means we might learn uncomfortable truths.
3.11 Such a
perspective suggests that there is a connection between the social sciences and
the modern, secular, liberal democratic states. Obviously this connection is
not a matter of necessity, Bauman's (1991) study of the Holocaust stands as a
convincing demonstration that it is all too easy to turn the basic methods of
the social sciences into instruments of genocide. However, whilst I have only
gestured towards the connection between the social sciences and democracy,
there is further support within the literature (Van Bouwel 2009; Bourdieu 2004). Furthermore, many see social
research as having a fundamentally ethical character (Bellah 1983). This connection is not, of course,
simple. The social sciences are not any one thing. However, they are, we might
say, predicated on the democratic ideal of pluralism, on remaining open to
alternative perspectives and being responsive to criticism. In short, the
social sciences are not wedded to any one instantiation or particular iteration
of the bureaucratic state, but to the democratic ideals that provide the
foundation of some bureaucratic states – the social sciences are consistent
with the ethos of democracy.
3.12 Pace
Shils (1980) the social sciences might be considered the
critical conscience of a society, something Sieghart (1985) has argued in regards the (true)
professions in general. In this view the state and the social sciences share a
commitment to the same concerns, values and ends. One might, with some
justification, consider this point as appealing to a rather undefined ideal,
one that lacks the sort of specificity that would provide concrete direction to
social scientific researchers. However, if one considers the guiding principles
of law, medicine, the clergy and the military as well as other, less
well-institutionalized, true professions such as education, journalism and
social work, we find similar ideals with similar ambiguity. For example, the
pursuit of the guiding good of medicine, health, has become the subject of
concern not only insofar as medicalisation has both positive and negative
consequences but insofar as health itself has the potential to dominate human
life (Downing 2011; Metzl and Kirkland 2010). Similarly whilst law
might involve the pursuit of justice the practicalities of how this is to be
accomplished are not only complex but require a host of compromises.
Furthermore, whilst we might think further education is always a good thing it
cannot be endlessly prioritized over other pursuits. Finally, and with regard
to both individuals and society, education is a transformative endeavour, the
effects of which are never entirely clear. We might conclude then that whilst
we value our highest ideals as ends in themselves, this does not imply that
their pursuit will always have welcome consequences.
3.13 Further
confirmation of the suggestion that social science can be considered a true
profession something that is lead by an ideal and subject to a concordat
between it and its host society – can be found by comparing the function of
confidentiality in the professional practice of law, medicine and, I would
suggest, social science research. If they are to pursue their professional
ends, which is to say serve the interests of their clients/ patients with
regard to the broader pursuit of justice / health, both lawyers and doctors
provide clients/ patients with assurances of confidentiality. The principle is,
certainly, an ethical one and it is present in the Hippocratic Oath. However,
it is an ethical principle because it has been promised and, furthermore,
it is promised because the ends of justice and health are served by doing so.
The ability of such professionals to make these promises, and to do so in good
faith, is quite possibly the primary requirement and consequences of the mutual
beneficial arrangement that exists between society or the state and the true
professions. As such confidentiality is first and foremost, a methodological
principle, adopted in the interests of good practice and end served by the
professional practice at hand. The discourse of research ethics rarely
considers confidentiality as anything other than an ethical principle stemming
from the duty of researchers to respect the autonomy of their research
subjects. This is misguided. We must recognize that the confidentiality we promise
in practice is only tenable insofar as it can be collectively guaranteed.
3.14 Before
continuing it is important to note that such collective agreement does not
necessarily imply it has any formal existence in the sense of being recognized
in law. Thus, in the UK for example, the idea of doctor-patient confidentiality
is not the subject of any legal protection. Rather it is an aspect of the
quasi-legal framework for Good Medical Practice set out by the General Medical
Council (GMC). Given the institutional existence of the medical profession
medical doctors are in a better position to maintain the confidentiality of
their patients than social scientists. Or, to put it another way, the
socio-political life of the medical profession is such that both officials (and
the public) are more likely to respect the duty of confidentiality when medical
professionals appeal to it than they are were social scientists to make similar
claims. Nevertheless, it remains the case that a judge can order a doctor to
testify in the same way as they can compel the testimony of any other
individual, say a social scientist who has gathered data on a criminal
enterprise during the course of their research.
3.15 Of
course, that the state has provided no formal assurances with regard to the
confidentiality of participants in social science research, means we could
attribute the current difficulties regarding social research, state intrusion
and the assurances of confidentiality given to research participants to this
fact. No socio-political agreement has been reached, implemented or
institutionalized and, despite recent events surrounding the Boston College
Tapes, the issue has barely been broached.[13]
As such, rather than reject the notion that social science is a profession one
might take the view that social scientists are best understood as members of an
un- or insufficiently recognized profession. Of course, even though there have
been cases where social scientists have come under pressure to break
confidentiality, we should recognize that this could have happened many more
times in the past that has in fact occurred. Researchers are not acting in bad
faith when making promises to research participants about confidentiality.
Nevertheless, pace Lowman and Palys (2013) analysis of British sociology, pressure on
confidentiality in social science research seems to be increasing. Indeed, what
Lowman and Palys show is that confidentiality is only as strong as the degree
to which we, both individually and collectively, are prepared to commit to it.
3.16
Confidentiality is a methodologically vital part of social science research
and, if it is to be promised in good faith, it must be provided for through
some kind of collective socio-political agreement between 'the profession' and
its host society or state, as is the case in other professional domains.
Properly speaking, only once it has been subject to such agreement can it be
considered as a valid ethical commitment, one that can be offered in practice.
Nevertheless, researchers have little choice but to continue to promise
confidentiality to participants in their research, and attempt to ensure it
through anonymization and other techniques of deidentification, as doing so
contributes to the veracity of the data that can be collected, and thereby acts
to secure the ends of research. Regardless of such practices it is clear that
the tendency of RECs to perceive the anonymity and confidentiality of research
participants as an ethical shibboleth is, at best, misguided. Not only should
it be seen as a methodological principle and its presence or absence should,
therefore, be subject to methodological – rather than ethical – justification.
It is unethical of RECs to insist that research participants should be provided
with the kind of assurances as to the confidentiality of their participation,
as is currently the case. In the present climate such assurances cannot be
maintained and, therefore, many such promises are invalid. As a matter of
methodology and ethics both researchers and RECs need to more clearly think
through when, where, and to what degree confidentiality can be offered and
maintained. Only then can research participants be considered fully cognizant
of the potential consequences of participating in research. Furthermore, social
scientists should engage in a collective deliberation about the need for (and
limits of) confidentiality in research, both internally and externally. In
short, they should lay claim to research ethics as a matter of professional
ethics and, one this basis, and whether in the person research participants,
the public or the state, they should engage others in a broader discussion of
the ethics of social science research and how they can be secured.
What Difference would a Professional
Ethics make?
4.1 Whether
as a whole or as more focused disciplinary formations, social scientists may
not wish pursue a full-scale project of professionalization and, indeed, may be
well advised to avoid doing so (Timmons 2011). Nevertheless, there would seem to
be value in the collective analysis and articulation of a professional ethics.
Whilst this is not the place to pursue such a project we might legitimately
consider what the effect of doing so might be. After all, despite being largely
neglected by those we might consider to be 'research ethicists' and the burgeoning
'research ethics' literature, there is a longstanding tradition of discourse
and debate on the ethics of research by social scientists (Barnes 1977; Nash 1974; Rapoport et al. 1974; Sieber 1982; Kimmel 1988; Rynkiewich and Spradley 1976; Cassell 1987). In my view we might take such work
as the collective expression of professional responsibilities of social science
researchers by social science researchers and, therefore, as a 'first take' on
the professional ethics of social science researchers. Laying claim to such
work in this way, and to the discourse of professional ethics more generally,
will mean that others – be they ethicists or, more importantly, stakeholders
such as those working in research governance, university administration,
funders bodies (especially research councils), gatekeepers and the public or
relevant publics – will be more inclined to listen to and respect the claims
being made.
4.2 The
notion of a professional ethics also has implications for the ethical governance
in social science research. As such, whilst the previous discussion can be
construed as a somewhat 'post hoc' justification for the suggestions made below
it can, nevertheless, be seen as adding a reasoned motivation for pursuing
these same suggestions. If we predicate the validity of professional ethics on
the notion that the social sciences share a commitment to the ends of democracy
then support can be found in a variety of scholarly discussions about the
relationship between democracy and the social sciences (Van Bouwel 2009) as well as the UK's recent
Campaign for the Social Science.[14]
Furthermore, we might note that that the first principle set out in a working
paper produced by recent project aimed at developing generic ethical principles
for social science research conducted under the aegis of the UK's Academy of
Social Sciences (Dingwall et al 2014) it explicit about the notion
of 'a free social science' being 'fundamental to the UK as a democratic
society.'[15] The nature of this principle is such
that it lays claim to a number of factors considered signifiers of a
profession. In the first instance a free social science is, it would appear, a
relatively autonomous social science. Whilst funding for research is not
without conditions, and whilst the overall direction or topics of some research
projects are dictated externally, this need not be taken to undermine the
professional autonomy of social science researchers. A good deal of funding is
distributed on the basis of proposals made by researchers and, when pursuing
research proposed by others, social scientists should ensure that their
professional or disciplinary standards are maintained. Similar commitments can
be found in recent discussions of 'integrity' in the natural, biomedical, and
social sciences.
4.3 Given the
disciplinary and methodological diversity of the social sciences one might
think that any professional ethics needs to reflect the diversity of
professional practices. This is, for example, what we see in the case of the UK
medical profession. Whilst the overarching professional body, the General
Medical Council's (GMC), sets the profession-wide standards of professional
ethics and 'Good Medical Practice' there is a range of associations, societies,
and, in particular, Royal Colleges that also articulate standards appropriate
to particular areas, specialisms and sub-specialisms. It would, I think, be
misguided to position statements pertaining to more focused domains of medical
practice as, simply, reiterations – or even mere 'contextualizations' – of the
more general perspective set out by the GMC in its publications. The ethics of
professional practice can, indeed should, be such that it is able to
accommodate the need for a practical or pragmatic diversity in the ethical
standards that guide practice. This is not, of course, a claim that 'anything
goes' or indeed a justification for the existence of outright contradictions in
ethical guidance. Rather it is, simply, to recognize that the ethical
requirements of a profession as a whole need not be an entirely aligned, and
that there may be a justification for the adoption of alternative perspectives
in professional sub-domains.
4.4 This kind
of view has been adopted by the Academy working group that produced the common
principles working paper (Emmerich 2017). The aim is not for the various
Learned Societies that are members of the Academy to simply adopt the statement
or its principles. Given the range of interests represented by the Learned
Society Members of the Academy there is clearly a need for a broader engagement
with the principles generated by the Academy project and for individual or
overlapping Learned Societies to reiterate them in such a way as is appropriate
to their disciplinary or sub-disciplinary practices, interests and
requirements.[16]
4.5 The
medical profession can provide further instruction on how we might approach the
ethics of research as a matter of professional ethics. Whist the social
contexts in which medical professionals' work includes ethical codes and formal
guidance they remain the locus of practical moral responsibility. When medical
professionals encounter ethical difficulties they must make, and be able to
justify, their own decisions. This remains the case when they consult CECs. In
so far as they contain expert and lay members such committees can be considered
as parallels to RECs. However, rather than receiving formal proposals CECs
generally engage with clinicians directly and on the basis of an oral
presentation of their concerns. CECs then discuss the case and do so with
the individual concerned and, in certain cases, discussion might also include
other individuals who are directly involved. Furthermore, whilst CECs might
offer substantive comment or even make a recommendation, it remains the
clinicians responsibility to act upon them or, indeed, not to do so.
4.6 It seems
to me that, given social science researchers do not have to manage the same
kinds of conflicts of interest that arise in the conduct of biomedical research
and that the social sciences often operate according to an epistemology that
differs from that which operates in the natural sciences, that the CEC model
might provide a better model for engaging with the ethical dimension of social
scientific research. Whilst the majority of social science researchers have
substantial proposals for particular research projects this does not, in
itself, justify a bureaucratic approach where researchers complete formal
applications to RECs. There is no ethical reason why a researcher could
not present their research proposal to a REC in person and do so in such a way
as to promote a dialogical focus on the ethical dimension of the proposed
research. This could be taken as an opportunity for, in the first instance,
researchers to justify the ethical aspects of their proposal with reference to
the specific disciplinary norms that guide their work as professionals. The
subsequent discussion would, of course, offer critique or raise additional
issues as necessary. Such committees could, if they saw fit or if it were
considered helpful to do so, produce a written comments or recommendations but,
in so far as they are justified in doing so, the individual researcher could
proceed within the boundaries of their own professional ethics.
4.7 One might
counter that the demands of good governance are such that this approach to
research ethics cannot be supported. However, we should discriminate between
'ethics' and its administration or 'governance' or, to put it another way,
between what I have previously called the accountable and the auditable (Emmerich 2013). Having done so we might reflect
on both the positive and negative consequences of an institutionalized
bureaucratic approach to the ethical governance of social science research (Van Den Hoonaard 2011; Emmerich 2017). In so doing we can consider the
ethics of this particular facet of our audit culture and, furthermore, do so in
relation to the social value of social scientific research. If we wish to see
social science researchers conducting themselves ethically and we think that
ethical governance ought itself be conducted ethically then, to my mind, a less
bureaucratic approach – one that does not audit research proposals but engages
with researchers dynamically – has much to recommend it. Given that CECs are
consistent with the good governance of medical practice, such an approach
should be considered and, perhaps, trialled in social science research.
JUSTIFICATION ANALYSIS: UNDERSTANDING MORAL EVOLUTION S IN
PUBLIC DEBATES;
Introduction
1.1 The
argument of this paper is that in public debates, over a wide variety of issues
and across different political contexts, participants tend to justify their
arguments using a relatively limited set of moral principles. They do this to
rally potential supporters and convince potential opponents by envoking
principles that are widely shared - although interpreted in varying ways - by
the participants in the debate. Following Luc Boltanski and Laurent Thévenot,
we outline a typology of these principles and show how they form the common
basis for justifying arguments in debates over two very different issues
(globalization and local politics) and two political contexts (Finland and
France).
1.2 We
make a contribution to two sociological literatures: the recently reinvigorated
literature on the sociology of morality on the one hand, and the methodological
literature on analyzing 'framing' in textual material on the other. The
empirical study of human morality – once presented as the core task of
sociology by the likes of Emile Durkheim (1912; 1893) and Edward
Westermarck (1908) –is experiencing a renaissance. Empirical
studies on morality are now conducted by social psychologists (Haidt 2012), anthropologists (Robbins 2012), political scientists (Abulof 2013) and increasingly, again, by
sociologists (Hitlin and Vaisey 2010). In sociology, the most
important development in this field is the emergence of the 'sociology of
valuation and evaluation' (Lamont 2011), on the rise in the US (eg Fourcade 2011; Stark 2009) and Europe (eg Adkins and Lury 2011; Blokker 2011). These recent approaches address
morality through both theoretical currents and empirical phenomena topical
today, and connect the traditional sociological conceptions of morality to e.g.
questions of justice, the world society, risk, work and family, economics, or
the body (see Hitlin and Vaisey 2010).
1.3 Perhaps
the most important discursive field where competing moral evaluations are
presented in modern democracies is the mass media. Opposing political parties,
interest groups, social movements and other political actors present competing
claims, and justify them based on a set of moral principles. The participants
in public debate need to provide legitimate answers for questions like 'why is
the problem you are addressing important' and 'how does the solution you
propose contribute to the common good', in short, justifications for their
claims. The growing literature on moral sociology, however, has hardly looked
at media texts, let alone presented a framework for systematically analyzing
the use of moral principles of evaluation in the public sphere. Developing such
methods is the aim of this paper. The literature on the methodology of text
analysis, on the other hand, has remained rather superficial with regard to the
moral content in media texts. The concept most widely used for analyzing the
grounds given for political claims in the public sphere is that of a 'frame'.
Much work in sociology, political science and media studies has looked at how
political actors frame their claims (Kriesi et al. 2012: 237; Koopmans & Statham 2010; Entman 1995). In this literature 'moral frames',
if present at all, play a marginal role. For example, according to one widely
used definition, a moral frame is one that 'contains a moral message or makes a
reference to morality, God and other religious tenets' (Neuman et al., 1992). Neuman et al. contrast
moral frames with four other kinds of frames, namely, economic, responsibility,
human interest and conflict frames. Studies using their framework tend to
systematically find that moral frames are the least common kind, even when the
topic of the debate analysed is one that could intuitively be thought of as
'morally sensitive', such as asylum seekers or climate change (d'Haenens and de Lange 2001; Dirikx and Gelders 2010).
1.5 To arrive
at a broader understanding of the moral content in public debates that
contributes to the development of the sociology of morality, we draw on a
foundational text in the field, De la justification by Luc Boltanski and
Laurent Thévenot (1991). Following Boltanski and Thévenot, we argue
that justifying a claim, say, in economic terms, also amounts to taking a moral
stand. To say that policy option A should be chosen over B because it is more
beneficial in economic terms is not just a neutral, practical statement (or a
practical way of 'framing' the claim). It amounts to taking the moral stand
that money is a relevant measure of worth and ought to be privileged
when policies are evaluated.
1.6 This
becomes especially evident in situations when monetary gain/loss is juxtaposed
with some other measure of worth, such as equality. Some participants in a
debate may argue that economic considerations should come first, while others
may take the stand that equality, for example, in education or healthcare ought
to be prioritized no matter what the cost in economic terms. This kind of
conflict between economically justified arguments and those using equality
justifications is, indeed, a moral conflict.
1.7 In this
paper, we propose an analytical framework, Justifications Analysis (JA), that
bridges the literatures on moral sociology on the one hand and 'framing'
political claims in the public sphere on the other. The need to work at the
intersection of these two literatures arose during conversations we had while
working on two independent studies, one on the globalization debate in the mass
media in Finland (Ylä-Anttila 2010), and the other on local
political disputes in France and Finland (Luhtakallio 2012). We were struck by the
similarity of justificatory repertoires in these two very different issue
fields and two political contexts. Differences, of course, existed, but it
became clear they could be fruitfully understood in a broader framework of
underlying similarities. That is, the differences were about combining and
interpreting the same principles, rather than differences that would render the
two issue fields and political contexts incommensurable. Inspired by these
observations, we proceeded to organize a series of international workshops with
the research group led by one of the two original developers of Justification
Theory, Laurent Thévenot. The result of these workshops was the
operationalization of our sociological intuition into the systematic analytical
framework presented in this paper (see also Luhtakallio & Ylä-Anttila 2011).
1.8 The paper
proceeds as follows. First, we present the typology of moral justifications
proposed by Boltanski and Thévenot and show how it can be operationalized to
systematically analyze political claims in the public sphere. We then go on to
demonstrate the usefulness of the method through two research examples, first
on the globalization debate in Finland and then on local political conflicts in
Finland and France. Finally, we discuss the usefulness and limits of JA, and
its implications to the further development of the sociology of moral
evaluations.
From justification theory to
analysing public debates
2.1 Let us
imagine a situation where city A announces that it is going to close down day
care centre X. Parents whose children attend day care in this centre engage in
a public struggle to save it from closing down. How can they justify their
claims in public discussion? In what different ways can they argue that saving
the centre serves the common good? Following Boltanski and Thévenot (1991), they have at their disposal at least the
following seven principles of worthiness for building justifications for their
arguments. These orders of worth – that all refer to the common good, although
in different ways – are based on different philosophical foundations concerning
moral worth.
2.2 Inspired
worth. 'The children's creativity flourishes because the employees of the
centre emphasize arts in the day care activities and create an inspiring
atmosphere with their devoted approach to nursing'. The most well-known
representation of inspired worth is St. Augustine's The City of God (Augustine 1972[1470]), in which spiritual
commitment, independence and indifference towards both market goods measured
with money and personal dependencies are considered worthy. In addition to
religious devotion, this conception of the common good can be embodied, for
example, by an artist or an environmentalist inspired by the greatness of
nature (Boltanski and Thévenot 1991: 201).
2.3 Domestic worth.
'The day care centre has been the heart of the neighbourhood for decades and
its leader is respected by the whole community'. An important philosophical
formulation of domestic worth can be found in the works of the
eighteenth-century French philosopher Bossuet (1967 [1709]) and is based on tradition, personal
relationships, inherited status, intimacy and hierarchy. A paradigmatic worthy
person is a patriarchal head of the house or a prince who rules his subjects
accordingly. This principle is also deployed when an argument is based on a
position in a hierarchic institutional structure (Boltanski and Thévenot 1991: 207-208, 212, 215).
2.4 The worth of fame.
'The day care centre is well known and established by a famous, award-winning
paediatric.'. The worth of fame is drawn from Hobbes' Leviathan (1999 [1651]). The measure of worth is the
recognition gained from as many followers as possible. Celebrities and opinion
leaders are therefore worthy figures (Boltanski and Thévenot 1991: 223-225).
2.5 Civic
worth. 'Children have the right to proper day care, and if this centre is
closed down the children of the neighbourhood will be forced into an unequal
position compared to other children in the city.' Civic worth is most clearly
present in Jean-Jacque Rousseau's work The Social Contract (1997 [1762]). Solidarity, equality, the will of
the people and collective wellbeing are ideas that invoke respect. Worthy
persons are collectives, rather than individuals, and worthy things are
mutually agreed conventions (Boltanski and Thévenot 1991: 231-233, 237, 240).
2.6 Market
worth. 'Day care organized in small units will cost less than in larger
ones'. Market worth is sketched out by Adam Smith in his work The Wealth of
Nations (1776). Worth is measured simply by money. Worthy
persons are those who possess the most fortune, and worthy acts are the ones
that promote the production of the most material goods. The common good is a
byproduct of profit (Boltanski and Thévenot 1991: 244-245, 250).
2.7 Industrial
worth. 'The day care centre network has been designed by experts. It has
been planned according to studies showing the benefits of small day care units
to the development of the children's language capacities'. The industrial order
of worth values efficiency, planning that leads to efficiency, regulation, and
scientific expertise. Saint-Simon is the classic political philosopher whose
work presents this order of worth at its purest. A typical worthy person in
this world is a skilful engineer who can design systems that work efficiently.
Equally important is the measuring and design of social processes (Boltanski and Thévenot 1991: 252, 254, 259).
2.8 Ecological
worth. 'If the day care centre is closed down, parents will have to take
their children to day care at greater distance from their homes, often using
their cars. This will increase pollution and accelerate climate change'.
Ecological order of worth is a principle that gives intrinsic value to nature
and the natural environment, as well as their protection and conservation (Lafaye and Thévenot 1993).
2.9 These
orders of worth form a relatively well institutionalized cultural toolkit for
justifying claims in public debates[1]
by offering shared coordinates for actors, and therefore operating as means for
reaching agreement. Thus, in any given non-violent conflict situation, all
parties would be to some extent forced to acknowledge this variety of
conceptions of common good, even if there was disagreement over which
justification prevailed, or how. In the latter case, when the disagreement
occurs within one order of worth, all parties agree on the criteria of
justification, but disagree whether they are fulfilled. This is the case when,
for example, actors agree that the procedure that produces (or saves) more
money should be chosen out of two suggested procedures, but disagree on which
one does; ie whether closing or keeping the famous day care centre is
economically profitable to the city. In the case of two principles of worth
clashing against each other, the conception of the common good based on one
principle of justification is criticized according to criteria based on
another; eg rather than the profitability of the day care centre, the basis of
the decision should be the equal treatment of children living in different
neighbourhoods.
2.10 One of
the key features in working with JA is taking into account the relations of
different orders of worth within one argument. Boltanski and Thévenot consider
these relations as denouncing (dénonciation) and compromising (compromis)
principles of justification. There are, however, other ways of combining or relating
different justifications; for example, the fictional example above can also
serve for a case of different justification principles operating as arguments
for one and the same claim without directly influencing each other.
2.11 In JA,
the unit of analysis is a claim, an act made in public (cf. Koopmans and Statham 1999). A claim can be a
statement to the reporter, but also, for instance, a speech, a published
report, a letter to the editor or a demonstration. Thus, a typical newspaper
article contains numerous claims by different actors. Table 1 presents the coding of two claims from our two
sets of research material. The first claim is reported as follows: 'Protestors
from all around the world have arrived to Seattle, attempting to prevent the
meeting of the World Trade Organization (WTO). In their view, WTO's free trade
policy will increase economic inequality in the world'. The second claim is
reported as: 'The tenants of the city of Helsinki worry about their rights. In
their view, the city's plan to narrow tenants' rights to participate in
negotiations will result in the city raising rents'. Justifications Analysis
breaks the claims into the following elements:
|
|
|
Table 1: Coding
a claim in Justifications Analysis
|
||||
|
|
||||
|
Who: Speaker
|
To whom: Addressee
|
How: Means
|
What: Content
|
Why: Justification
|
|
1: Civil society organization/ international
2: Civil society organization / local
|
1: Intergovernmental organization / international
2: Political establishment / local
|
1:Demonstration
2: Statement
|
1:WTO meeting must be stopped
2: Tenants have the right to participate in decision
making on rents
|
1:Civic +
Market -
2:Civic +
Market -
|
|
|
||||
2.12 In JA, we
code the claim makers (speakers) and addressees, as well as the means of
claimsmaking and content of the claim. The core of the coding is the following
three justification variables: the worth that a given claim refers to, whether
the reference is positive or negative and the potential combinations of
different justifications.
2.13 As is
apparent by now, the most pronounced difference between the typical uses of
"framing" as the basis for coding public debates and JA is that in
the latter, the codes are not identified inductively from the data, but are
based on a more or less fixed set of justification principles. Leaning on such
relatively stable principles makes the approach particularly suitable for comparative
research, as we will demonstrate in section 4, comparing Finland and France
(see also Lamont and Thévenot 2000). Seen through the lens
of JA, the public sphere is an arena of contestation between competing moral
principles. Studying public debates from this point of view becomes an exercise
in understanding the moral constitution of modern societies as much as
dissecting the details of particular debates. With JA, the moral principles
that guide different political actors and projects are brought to spotlight.
Thus, we want to stress the importance of understanding the consequences of the
tools used in social research. It is crucial to develop and deploy sociological
tools capable of bringing to light the moral components of, for instance,
economistic public talk that likes to portray itself as morally neutral.
Research example: The globalization
debate in Finland
3.1 How do
certain arguments become successful in media debates? In this section, we will
show that Justifications Analysis can be useful in addressing this question. We
argue that success can be achieved by justifying one's claims by invoking moral
principles that are acceptable to potential allies and in some form, also to
opponents. Thus, we look at three measures of success: (1) the salience of
certain arguments and justifications, (2) the adoption of these arguments by a
wide range of allies and (3) the acceptance of the arguments by potential
opponents.
3.2 The research
material used to illustrate these points is a sample of newspaper articles on
globalization in Finland between 1999 and 2005[2].
The mass media debate on globalization began with the challenge presented by
the Global Justice Movement (GJM) that staged mass demonstrations and shut down
the meeting of the World Trade Organization in Seattle in 1999. The activists
forcefully made the claim that the current form of economic globalization
results in prioritizing economic growth over just distribution and that the
system of governing globalization is not organized according to democratic
principles. These claims raise two kinds of civic justifications, those
prioritizing equality and those prioritizing democracy, and denounce
justifications that prioritize economic worth. '
The diverse NGOs…were all against the WTO's idea that trade
will generate wellbeing to the whole world…The activists want to limit free
flows of goods, money and people, referring, for example, to human rights and
environmental norms.' HS 5.12.1999
3.3 These
justifications proved to be strong enough to politicize the concept of
globalization and start a debate over the kinds of moral values that current
processes of economic globalization and current institutional structures for
governing these processes, such as the WTO were advancing. The mentions of the
word globalization in the news went from 16 per year on average between
1988-1998 to 150 in 1999 and 508 in 2005 – that is 1,4 times every day (see
Table 2).
|
|
|
|
Table 2: Frequency
of the keyword globalization in the news, 1988-2005
|
|
|
|
|
|
Year
|
N
|
|
1988-1998
|
16*
|
|
1999
|
150
|
|
2000
|
255
|
|
2001
|
417
|
|
2002
|
297
|
|
2003
|
223
|
|
2004
|
458
|
|
2005
|
508
|
|
|
|
|
* Average frequency per year during the 10-year period
|
|
3.4 Moreover,
globalization became a phenomenon that was mainly discussed in the light of its
implications for justice and democracy, rather than, for example, its economic
implications. Table 3 shows that 82 per cent of claims made about
globalization in our sample were justified in civic terms, while only 55 per
cent were justified in market terms. By our first measure, the salience of the
issue of globalization and the share of civic justifications in the debate, the
GJM and its arguments were successful.
|
|
|
|
Table 3: Share
of claims using each justification, 1999-2005 (%)
|
|
|
|
|
|
Justification
|
Share (%)*
|
|
Domestic
|
2
|
|
Fame
|
3
|
|
Civic
|
82
|
|
Market
|
55
|
|
Industrial
|
18
|
|
Ecological
|
10
|
|
N
|
1217
|
|
|
|
|
* The total shares add up to more than 100% because each
claim can include several justifications
|
|
3.5 The
arguments of the GJM and their justifications were also successful in a second
sense: they were adopted by a significant number of influential political
allies. But in order to achieve this success, the GJM activists had to adopt a
wider repertoire of justifications. A simple denonciation of economic worth
from the perspective of civic worth – saying that globalization of the economy
is bad and globalization of justice and democracy is good – would not do.
Instead, the main argument of the movement became that 'to advance the common
good, global markets need democratically agreed rules of the game'. This
argument is based on thinking that three orders of worth, economic (growth of
the world economy), civic (democratic means of agreeing on the rules) and
industrial (regulation based on scientific planning) can support each other.
3.6 This
version of the argument for global justice and democracy was successful because
it invoked a set of justifications that appealed to a wide range of political
actors. A Green Party MP argued:
'Our aim is to create global rules of the game that curb the
restless movements of capital and the unemployment and insecurity that are
consequences of these movements' (HS, 26 September 1999).
3.7 These
kinds of arguments also found some resonance in the Trade Unions, in Finland
and internationally, and made their way to the very top of the political
hierarchy. The President of the Republic, a Social Democrat, headed the
International Labour Organization's World Commission on the Social Dimension of
Globalization with the President of Tanzania, Benjamin Mkapa. The two
presidents argued, in an op-ed on the publication day of the Commission's
report:
'Just globalization requires building international
institutions that represent the interests of all…We must prioritize sustainable
economic growth…social goals and just rules of trade and finance.' HS 25.2.2004
3.8 A
particularly interesting variant of this type of argumentation was the idea of
the so-called Tobin Tax, also known as the currency transaction tax. The idea
was promoted by the French-born global justice organization Attac that became
very successful in Finland upon its launch. The idea was to make global
financial markets generate wealth for humanity (market justification) by
establishing a democratically controlled institution (civic justification) that
levies a cleverly engineered tax on currency transactions (industrial
justification) and redistributes the wealth to development needs globally
(civic justification). This combination of three justifications, as we have
seen, was successful in itself in many ways. In addition to this winning
combination, the success of the idea of the Tobin Tax was further helped by
adding yet another kind of justification – that of fame. The tax was initially
proposed in the 1970's by the economics Nobel Laureate, James Tobin. Not only
was he a world famous authority on the financial markets, but also a mainstream
neoclassical economist. His fame and scientific authority thus went far beyond
the left wing social movement organizations that resurfaced his old idea.
3.9In a poll
in 2001, 70 per cent of MPs in Finland were in favor of the Tobin Tax (Ojala 2001). In 2015, quite some time after the
resurfacing of the idea in the late 1990's, the European Union was in the
process of adopting a version of the tax (Strupczewski 2015). The idea, thus, served as a
discursive tool to the Global Justice Movement activists to draw mainstream
attention to their other demands, but also succeeded in changing legislation.
3.10 Finally,
the 'rules of the game' argument was also successful in the third sense of the
term introduced above: it convinced not only allies but also many initial
opponents. The acceptance of the idea of the Tobin Tax across party lines was
one example of this. Another one was an op-ed by the Finnish representative of
the International Chamber of Commerce, an organization very much in favor of
the kind of free trade agreements that the GJM initially rose to oppose. For a
while around the turn of the millennium, the acceptance of the rules of the
game argument and its triple justification of market-civic-industrial, was so
successful that even this former opponent felt the need to say:
'Businesses do not want to see deregulation leading to
savage markets…the liberalization of world trade must continue, but in an
internationally regulated and controlled manner. The WTO and UN are examples of
institutions which can develop common rules of the game.' (HS, 27 May 2001).
3.11 In sum,
Justifications Analysis is useful for understanding why some arguments become
successful in public debates. When political actors are willing and able to
modify their arguments to lean on a wide enough range of moral justifications
and thus resonate with a wide range of allies and sometimes opponents, they are
more likely to succeed.
Research example: Local disputes in
Finland and France
4.1 In our
second research example, we analyse local disputes between citizens and city
officials. The data consists of reports of such disputes in local newspapers in
Helsinki and Lyon[3]. Local newspapers have a particularly strong
role in providing their readers with tools to imagine and re-imagine the
community they live in, and representing the 'common' in terms of disputes over
the common good (cf. Thévenot 2006). Therefore, in order to understand
the definition struggles concerning the common good comparatively, we asked
what kind of disagreements attracted public attention, and how they were
represented in these newspapers. Construction plans and sites, zoning, and
different public services were common sources of conflict, but more explicitly
value-laden topics like minority rights, interpretations of laws, and grounds
for legitimate decision-making were also often debated. The themes of dispute also
varied between the two contexts[4]:
In Helsinki, the big issue at the time of the study were budgetary cuts
targeted at the school network. In Lyon, the foci were multiple. Some topics that
attracted much attention were the installation of parking meters and abolition
of free-of-charge parking, the living conditions and the right to education of
the children of undocumented immigrants, and the repeated disappointments and
difficulties met in the work of neighbourhood councils. The topics of dispute
were, nevertheless, not the most captivating point of comparison. Instead, it
was the ways in which different positions and opinions were justified in the
local public spheres in Lyon and Helsinki.
4.2 When a
group of parents in Finland opposed the city's plans to close down a local
primary school, they claimed that the plan was based on inaccurate demographic
statistics. When a group of residents in France opposed plans to install
parking meters to their neighbourhood, they grounded their opposition in
claiming that the city's plan was unjust and treated residents of different
city districts unequally. Overall, the Finnish claim makers relied most
willingly on arguments based on expertise, efficiency and scientific knowledge.
The French claim makers counted most of all on argumentation based on equality,
justice and solidarity. These justifications, based on industrial worth in the
former case and civic worth in the latter, were the most prevalent in the
articles dealing with local disputes. They also formed the central axis
describing the differences between the Finnish and the French data.
4.3 Civic
justifications appeared in their purest form in the claims of civic actors who
stipulated the fulfilment of rights and democratic rules and laws, as
illustrated in the following claim from the French data:
Demonstrators against assaults on the freedom of expression:
The demonstrators protest against police violence, arbitrary arrests and
abusive imprisonments in recent demonstrations, because these are attacks
against the basic rights and liberty of expression (LP, May 19, 2005).
4.4 The
abovementioned protest built on the idea of shared democratic values and
mutually agreed rules: police conduct was denounced solely on the basis that
the freedom of speech and other basic rights cannot be neglected, as they are
principles of high civic worth. It was not denounced, for instance, by
insisting for more efficient training of crowd management in the police forces,
which would have been an industrial justification.
4.5 Civic
justifications were also recurrently combined with other justifications, a
feature that brought up significant differences between the two contexts. In
the Finnish context civic and industrial justifications were often combined, as
in the following excerpt:
The teachers' union wants to clear out the legality of
school policies in Vantaa. The local teachers' union insists that the legality
(civic) of the planned cutbacks in schools have to be re-examined (industrial),
and that the municipal council must further debate the matter (civic),
because saving money through cutbacks leads to impossible working conditions
for teachers (industrial), and possibly to practices violating the law
on primary education (civic) (HS, April 27, 2005).
4.6
Industrial justifications were common in both contexts, but in the French data
they were hardly ever used as the single justification, but rather in
combination with others. In the Finnish data, in contrast, a citizen group
could ground its claim solely on industrial worth and thus fully utilize the
'expert card', as in the example below:
The Finnish Nature Protection League and a local
environmental association claim that the city's proposition of gasworks cannot
be built as a power plant as planned, because recycling waste in this way turns
it into an incineration plant, which requires the installation of specific
types of filters (HS January 18, 2005).
4.7 Even
though few citizen justifications deployed the industrial justification to this
degree, references to statistics and scientific studies recurrently formed a
central part of the argument in the Finnish data.
4.8 In the
Finnish disputes, both citizens and city representatives eagerly invoked the industrial
order of worth in their arguments. The same holds for civic worth in France. In
the Finnish data, a quarter of the citizens' and almost half of the city
representatives' justifications were industrial. Hence, both sides relied on
justifications based on efficiency, quality and expertise. In the French data,
more than a third of the citizens' and nearly half of the city representatives'
justifications referred to civic worth. Common denominators were justifications
based on law, civil rights, deliberation and solidarity. The industrial worth
in Finland and the civic worth in France formed, respectively, the 'common
ground' – an array of justifications that both sides of the dispute considered
either right and suitable, or strategically reasonable, if not unavoidable.
4.9 This
'common ground' did not mean resolution or consensus. Instead, it produced what
Boltanski and Thévenot call tests, in which the opponents argue on
similar grounds. The following examples from the Finnish data illustrate this by
way of a dispute portraying a compromise between industrial and market worth.
A: The representative of the municipal education department
asked for constructive suggestions concerning the reduction of the number of
schools – if the school spaces cannot be objects of cutbacks, something else
will have to be cut, because as the number of pupils will decrease in the
future (industrial), the price per capita (of primary education) cannot
rise (market).
B: The citizens call for more clarity in the calculations (industrial)
and actual need for saving (market), as the statistics and prognosis
concerning the number of pupils are currently controversial (industrial)
(HS March 9, 2005).
4.10 The
citizens attempted, firstly, to prove the city representatives' industrial
justification wrong by claiming that their calculations were based on
inaccurate statistics, thus relying on the very same statistics instead of, for
example, holding the city representatives accountable for trampling upon
children's rights by referring to statistics. Secondly, the citizens questioned
the market justification made by the city by calling for proof of this
'austerity argument'.
4.11 In the
French data, disputes took a similar form, but often within the civic order of
worth, testing its criteria:
Gerland and urban planning: the encounter of inhabitants and
representatives
A: The inhabitants of Gerland demand that the decisions
concerning the area's urban development have to be made in accordance with
their demands, because in a democracy, the representatives must follow the will
of the people, and listen to what they want, and the citizens' words have to be
taken into account.
B: The councilor in charge states that a consensus has to be
found, and that the councilors have to make the basic decisions after which the
citizens can be consulted, because the councilors have been mandated for
decision-making (LP April 21, 2005).
4.12 The
inhabitants appealed to general rules of democracy in justifying their claims
about the plans – instead of, for example, relying on industrial justifications
about efficiency and suitability of the plans for their district. In fact,
their justification resembled a 'democratic governance check list', one not
very concretely connected to the case at hand. The representative, on the other
hand, questioned the inhabitants' interpretation of democracy, and used a civic
justification to construct a claim for representative democracy.
4.13 The
'common ground' we observed in these local disputes leads us to reflect upon
the impact of political culture: different justifications appear to be
culturally successful in Finland and in France. Be it a library threatened of
closing, or heavy savings targeted to preliminary schools, the Finnish mode of
argumentation often treated these as questions of efficiency and technical
expertise. Or, when they did appeal to civic justifications, they emphasized
legality and contracts more than solidarity and rights. In the French data,
civic worth had more amplitude, and justifications based on civic worth
emphasized the aspects largely missing from the Finnish disputes.
4.14 In sum,
using JA to analyse the local disputes helped us to discover the
"toolkits" of local and national political cultures that everyone
knows how to use, or at least understands to be essential in public debate. The
different grounds of justification in the two contexts provided for different
grounds of raising the level of generality, and politicizing. The civic
justifications seemed to be closer to the arenas of politics altogether,
whereas the technical facts the Finns argued about were sometimes neutralized
to a point in which it seemed it was a mere misunderstanding between two
experts whether a library should be closed or not. So, in the newspaper
representation of local conflicts, the crucial conflicts resided in different
worlds – in France, in the civic world, in Finland in the industrial world –
making them very different conflicts with very different consequences
altogether. The matter-of-fact, engineering-like industrial worth was the
'common ground' on which the parties of the Finnish local disputes understood
each other the best, whereas the civic world with its groundings on solidarity,
equality, and fairness were the most common 'meeting point' in the French
conflicts – the city representatives used civic justifications even more
abundantly than the citizens. This analysis drew portraits of 'the civic
French', relying on solidarity-based justifications, and 'the industrial
Finns', trusting in rational-functional justifications.
4.15 In both
cases, however, the citizens seemed to be somewhat forced to justify on the
shared grounds. The French were stuck with continuous 'reality tests' within
the civic world, accused of being too 'domestic', or civic in a wrong way by
their adversaries. The Finns were prone to back up even the strongest civic
justifications with industrial 'facts', and however capable they were of expert
argumentation they still were on the defense. Thus, in both cases, even if the
citizens got their voices heard in the newspapers, they were the underdogs that
had to try all possible arguments in order to convince the opposing party.
4.16 As for
the implications of such analyses, they enable an in-depth discussion on the
relationship between national political cultures and democracy, and therefore a
comparison of the moral groundings of democratic practices and the
opportunities for politicization. In other words, they tell not only about whether,
but also about how does democracy work or fail in different contexts.
Theoretical contributions to further
development of the justification framework: Subcategories and combinations
5.1 Above, we
have shown how justification theory can be operationalized to analyse public
debates. Our empirical studies using this approach also point out possibilities
to further develop the theory itself. The most central notions in this regard
relate to, first, the possibilities of dividing and combining the orders of
worth and, second, identifying power relations, and henceforth the contextual
opportunities to open issues for politicization, and to succeed in bringing
forth one's arguments in the public sphere, by asking who gets to define which
of the orders are dominant.
5.2 Most
methods of textual analysis, including several variants of discourse and frame
analysis, derive their categories inductively from the research material. One
typical example of the type of findings such studies tend to report are the
'five predominant frames' which 'emerge from the interactive relationship
between social movements and the mass media' (Boykoff 2006: 201). This is of course informative
of the public debate – here the early protests of the Global Justice Movement –
in question, but draws only a limited picture of what are the meanings and
values at stake in the debate. What kind of moral evaluations lay behind the
(supposedly journalist-led) frames Boykoff identifies[5]
as the discursive forces delegitimizing the protesters' cause? And what about
the protesters, what is worthy for them, why were they fighting this then
seemingly desperate battle against global financial institutions? With JA, the
battle of meanings that goes on in the public sphere is made evident, as the
justifications of different actors are considered; not only the ones that
'determine' the frame. Clearly, some party often dominates a public debate, but
this is exactly why analysing the political and moral dimensions of the
arguments is crucial. Hence, the analysis of what is going on in a public
debate becomes more nuanced when (also the dominating) arguments are analysed
as subject to tests between different moral values. Furthermore, with JA,
sociological analysis avoids the risk of neutralizing the dominant discourse
that is often portrayed as apolitical in mainstream public sphere, and instead,
can fully incorporate the power dynamics of public debates (for a critique of
the neglect of power in framing literature, see e.g. Carragee & Roefs 2004).
5.3 In
contrast to mainstream inductive approaches to 'framing', JA starts with the
seven predefined categories of the justification theory. Perhaps the most
important insight of the theory, based on Boltanski and Thévenot's empirical
studies, is that people in everyday disputes and political conflicts in the
public sphere tend to resort to a relatively limited number of moral
principles, which have also been elaborated throughout the history of modern
political philosophy. Beginning with this kind of relatively stable set of
principles has the advantage that it encourages one to see how today's disputes
are related to more general discussion about moral principles, much of which is
repeated (and gradually evolves) over long periods of time. [6]
Using a theoretically constructed set of categories has another advantage over
approaches that draw the categories inductively from the research material: it
enables comparisons between cases, be it countries or different public debates
within the same country. If categories are drawn from the material by each case
study separately, systematic comparison across cases is difficult and
accumulation of knowledge about things such as political cultures is limited.
Our approach presents one way of addressing these limitations.
5.4 Moreover,
justifications analysis is by no means limited to looking for the occurrence of
these seven categories in the data. Instead, Boltanski and Thévenot's original
categories can be divided further as necessary, and their combinations are not
limited to compromises and denunciations. The need to divide the orders of
worth into subcategories came up in both of our case studies, especially
regarding civic justifications. In the globalization debate civic claims were
divided into democracy claims on the one hand, and equality claims on the
other. In the local disputes it was clear that civic justifications were used
in very different ways in Finland and in France.
5.5 In the
globalization debate democracy justifications represent the procedural side of
civic worth. According to arguments based on this type of justification, the
biggest problem regarding globalization is that no democratic institutions
exist for its governance. The other side of civic worth – arguments demanding a
more equal distribution of income – focuses on the outcomes of globalization
instead of governance procedures. The question is what consequences does
globalization have for the distribution of income between and within countries,
and for the mechanisms of taxation and redistribution.
5.6 Our second
research example revealed important differences in the use of civic
justifications in Finland and France. Whereas Finns emphasized laws and
commonly agreed contracts when resorting to civic justifications, the French
emphasized solidarity, equality between citizens and the significance of
democratic participation. Regardless of this difference, the civic
justifications in both countries clearly sprouted from the same root. By
accounting for this variation in the use of civic justifications, we were able
to deepen the results of our comparative analysis. The differences reflect the
profoundly different conceptions held in the two political cultures about
democracy, the collective understanding of the role of citizens and the
different starting points of social bonds and solidarity (see Luhtakallio 2012).
This observation describes the sensitivity of JA as a tool for comparative
analysis. The method lends itself to examining cultural differences and
similarities at different levels, from simple frequencies of the use of
different justifications to delicate tones of cultural variations.
5.7 Another
way to sensitize JA to the specificities of the data at hand is to focus on the
different combinations of the orders of worth. Based on the two forms of
combinations presented by Boltanski and Thévenot, compromise and denunciation,
it is possible to form 42 pairs from the seven orders. When one includes cases
where a compromise is formed between three orders of worth or where, for
example, a compromise between two orders is denounced from the viewpoint of a
third order, the number of possible combinations increases to hundreds.
Moreover, both of our case studies revealed ways of combining justifications
beyond denunciations and compromises.
5.8 Analysing
the globalization debate, we found that two justifications are often combined
by saying that one is a consequence of the other. In other words, it is
claimed that the common good as defined in one order of worth automatically
results from policies promoting the good as defined in another. Some
participants in the globalization debate argued that promoting the market good
automatically leads to an increase in civic good, while others had the opposite
view of this relation. The first argument claims that markets produce
democracy. In an op-ed dealing with China's membership in the WTO, this
relationship is presented as something resembling a law of nature:
'Liberalization of the economy is always followed by demands for other rights'
(HS November 25, 1999). According to this conception, China's WTO membership
will eventually result in the collapse of the rule by a single party. Thus, the
best way to promote democracy in China is to liberalize the economy. On rare
occasions in the globalization debate, this idea about the relationship of
civic and market worth is reversed. It is argued that redistribution of income
does not hinder economic growth, as neoclassical economic theory would claim,
but, to the contrary, promotes it. Such Keynesian thinking was very important
in the building of Nordic welfare states, including Finland, beginning in the
1950s. In the 2000s, the number of Finnish actors making this argument is
surprisingly low. But as it happens, the World Bank, criticized heavily by the
GJM for its hostility to social policy, does take up this argument – perhaps as
a reaction to the widespread criticism of its programs around the world. The
main theme of the Bank's World Development Report 2005 is equality. A
journalist summarizes the report as follows:
The message of the report is simple: a good social and
educational policy which provides equal possibilities for all, is also good
economic policy. It makes possible the full use of the nation's resources,
raises national economic productivity, and accelerates economic growth (HS
September 22, 2005).
5.9 This
example shows how JA helps in relating current public debates not only to the
long history of political thought, but also to the more recent history of
public debates about the same topic, increasing the potential for the
accumulation of knowledge through linking several case studies that all use the
same framework.
5.10 In the
analysis of local disputes, we observed claims that combined orders of worth
into more or less firm couplings. The couplings were combinations of
justifications that did not alter the orders of worth, like in a compromise, or
test their interjacent superiority, like in a denunciation-type combination.
Citizen claim makers' use of coupling justifications was more frequent than
city representatives'.
5.11 In the
Finnish case, citizen claim makers justified their claims with a
civic-industrial and/or market coupling so commonly that this combination rose
to symbolize the ensemble of their claims. These couplings followed a fairly
similar pattern in which the claim was justified with a coupling of
justifications grounded, on the one hand, on laws and contracts, and on the
other hand, on efficiency and quality and/or economy and savings. Civic justifications
used by citizens seem 'natural': for example, in the case of a local tenant
association demanding that the city should not change the code of tenement
blocks because it would hamper resident democracy. In contrast, the frequent
coupling of civic justifications with industrial and market ones raises the
question whether this coupling is due to strategic necessity. The association
also argued that a change in the code would hamper the efficient maintenance of
the houses (industrial), and that resident democracy produces notable savings
for the city in lower repair and maintenance costs (market). This form of
coupling was recurrent in Finnish local disputes: citizens rarely justified
their claims exclusively in terms of democracy, law or their rights as
citizens, but almost always coupled their arguments with other types of worth,
usually industrial or market.
5.12 Locating
and interpreting the couplings helped us examine the question of power
relations in the disputes. In Finland and France, the most recurrently deployed
ways of justifying reflected not only cultural meaningfulness but also a degree
of coercion, especially for the citizen claim makers who often had to settle
for the terms of dispute – the orders of worth – set by the opposing party. Premises
of justification theory include that everyone possesses the 'critical capacity'
to use the orders of worth to justify claims, and that the orders are equal in
the sense that claims invoking one order of worth are, in principle, as strong
as those invoking any of the others. Our empirical analyses of public disputes
raise the following question: how can these premises be fulfilled in empirical
situations where the parties of the dispute are not equal in scope, resources
or power potential? Another example from the Finnish data, with a citizen group
justifying their claim with an industrial-market coupling, illustrates the
question: 'The inhabitants of Viherlaakso state that the district
library has to be preserved, because its annual costs are not high, and its
discontinuation would not bring the city big savings' (HS May 24, 2005).
5.13 The
inhabitants' coupling of justifications to defend their library is startling.
One can easily think of justifications based on civic worth in defence of a
library, but instead, the inhabitants relied on the industrial worth to exhibit
their expertise regarding the annual expenditure of public libraries and the
scale of the city's budget, while also reinforcing their claim with the cold
market fact that closing down the library would not amount to notable savings.
In this coupled justification the power relations seem to affect the citizen
claim makers: they operate within an agenda set by power holders.
5.14 In the
French data, in contrast, justifications that seemed constrained appeared
within the civic worth. Recurrently, a city representative would justify
her/his position based on the principles of participatory democracy. The
citizens opposing the claim then presented another civic justification –
instead of, for example, uttering an industrial argument that the procedures of
participatory democracy were dysfunctional. In Finland, the common ground
seemed to be set by the bureaucratic rule of a political culture where citizens
are not easily given the role of political actors, whereas in France, the rigid
political hierarchy underlying the Republican rhetoric of egalitarian politics
resulted in a somewhat uneasy coerciveness of the civic order of worth. As
these examples illustrate, analysing different combinations of orders of worth
and tracing recurrent features in these combinations makes it possible to
develop the capacity of justification theory to take into account context
specific power relations, and to shed light on how politicization processes
occur, succeed, and fail. Understanding of the latter is of crucial importance
in examining democratization and also multiple current challenges in 'old'
democracies (see Luhtakallio 2012).
Conclusions
6.1 this
article with the conviction that the best way to present a research method is
to show how it works. Hence, we introduced the JA by presenting its use in two
empirical studies, highlighting the different possibilities of data, scope and
measure of analysis, as well as the axes of interpretation the method opens.
Analyzing the globalization debate in Finland, we argued that arguments are
more likely to become successful in the public sphere if they are supported by
a broad set of justifications, appealing to a wide range of potential allies
and accepted, to some extent, by potential opponents. Comparing Finnish and
French local disputes, we found that in the former, both citizens and the
decision makers resort to industrial justifications, emphasizing efficiency and
expertise. In the latter, the civic worth provides a similar 'common ground'
for justifying public claims, emphasizing civil rights, deliberative procedures
and solidarity.
6.2 We have
presented Boltanski and Thévenot's classification of seven orders of worth as
one possible way of recognizing and understanding the moral dimension of
conflicts in the public sphere – often left in the margins by conventional
approaches to the study of framing. There is, of course, no reason to assume
that the number of relevant categories should be limited to seven. Furthermore,
as we have noted, it is important to proceed with caution with regard to the
sensitivity of the framework towards non-Western cultural traits.
6.3 This
categorization, however, does have roots running through Western moral
philosophy and is, consequently, widely recognized and utilized by a range of
political actors across different settings. This, we have argued, makes the
framework particularly suitable for comparisons between different debates, time
periods and national contexts. If, on the one hand, systematic differences are
found in the use of justifications across different debates within the same
national context, relatively robust conclusions about persistent traits of
political culture in that context can be drawn. If, on the other hand, ways of
justifying arguments are found that form common ground across national
political cultures, this opens the way to better understanding the
possibilities of global public deliberation.
The term Human Security
was first popularized by the United Nations Development Program in the early
1990s. It emerged in the post-Cold War era as a way to link various
humanitarian, economic, and social issues in order to alleviate human suffering
and assure security.
The issues Human Security
addresses include, but are not limited to, the following:
• Organized Crime and
Criminal Violence
• Human Rights and Good
Governance
• Armed Conflict and
Intervention
• Genocide and Mass Crimes
• Health and Development
• Resources and
Environment
Human Security focuses
primarily on protecting people while promoting peace and assuring sustainable
continuous development. It emphasizes aiding individuals by using a
people-centered approach for resolving inequalities that affect security. One
of the major failings of Human Security, according to its critics, is that it
is too all encompassing and that it fails to achieve its ambitious goals for
improving the human condition. Still, the relevance of this concept for
addressing the world’s most pressing issues seems clear. Security has gone
global. It is no longer simply related to the security of nation states. The
security of the individual now directly impacts the security of the state and vice
versa.
In describing what Human
Security is, former Secretary General of the United Nations Kofi Annan writes
in the Foreword to Human Security and the New Diplomacy:
“During the cold war,
security tended to be defined almost entirely in terms of military might and
the balance of terror. Today, we know that ‘security’ means far more than the
absence of conflict. We also have a greater appreciation for nonmilitary
sources of conflict. We know that lasting peace requires a broader vision
encompassing areas such as education and health, democracy and human rights,
protection against environmental degradation, and the proliferation of deadly
weapons. We know that we cannot be secure amidst starvation, that we cannot
build peace without alleviating poverty, and that we cannot build freedom on
foundations of injustice. These pillars of what we now understand as the
people-centered concept of ‘human security’ are interrelated and mutually
reinforcing.”
The United Nations
Millennium Development Goals, passed in 2000, were one attempt to codify the
scope of Human Security and make it measurable. Now, Human Security has entered
the daily vocabulary of government officials, military and non-government
personnel, humanitarian aid workers, and policymakers. The relevance of
protecting human beings for international security has now been recognized, but
it is the implementation that is proving difficult.
Definitions of Human
Security United Nations Definitions Kofi Annan: “In the wake of these
conflicts, a new understanding of the concept of security is evolving. Once
synonymous with the defence of territory from external attack, the requirements
of security today have come to embrace the protection of communities and
individuals from internal violence. The need for a more human-centred approach
to security is reinforced by the continuing dangers that weapons of mass
destruction, most notably nuclear weapons, pose to humanity: their very name
reveals their scope and their intended objective, if they were ever used.”1 “We
must also broaden our view of what is meant by peace and security. Peace means
much more than the absence of war. Human security can no longer be understood
in purely military terms. Rather, it must encompass economic development,
social justice, environmental protection, democratization, disarmament, and
respect for human rights and the rule of law.”2 “The demands we face also
reflect a growing consensus that collective security can no longer be narrowly
defined as the absence of armed conflict, be it between or within States. Gross
abuses of human rights, the large-scale displacement of civilian populations,
international terrorism, the AIDS pandemic, drug and arms trafficking and
environmental disasters present a direct threat to human security, forcing us
to adopt a much more coordinated approach to a range of issues.”3 “Human
security, in its broadest sense, embraces far more than the absence of violent
conflict. It encompasses human rights, good governance, access to education and
health care and ensuring that each individual has opportunities and choices to
fulfill his or her potential. Every step in this direction is also a steep
towards reducing poverty, achieving economic growth and preventing conflict.
Freedom from want, freedom from fear, and the freedom of future generations to
inherit a healthy natural environment -- these are the interrelated building
blocks of human – and therefore national – security.”4
Sadako Ogata,
(former) United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees: “Several key elements
make up human security. A first essential element is the possibility for all
citizens to live in peace and security within their own borders. This implies
the capacity of states and citizens to prevent and resolve conflicts through
peaceful and nonviolent means and, after the conflict is over, the ability to
effectively carry out reconciliation efforts. A second element is that people
should enjoy without discrimination all rights and obligations - including
human, political, social, economic and cultural rights - that belonging to a
State implies. A third element is social inclusion - or having equal access to
the political, social and economic policy making processes, as well as to draw
equal benefits from them. A fourth element is that of the establishment of rule
of law and the independence of the justice system. Each individual in a society
should have the same rights and obligations and be subject to the same set of
rules. These basic elements which are predicated on the equality of all before
the law, effectively remove any risk of arbitrariness which so often manifests
itself in discrimination, abuse or oppression.”5 “Threats to human security are
varied – political and military, but also social, economic and environmental. A
wide array of factors contribute to making people feel insecure, from the
laying of landmines and the proliferation of small arms, to transnational
threats such as drugs trafficking, to the spread of HIV. Once again, therefore,
let me speak of human insecurity from my perspective. Refugees flee conflicts.
One of the main factors of human insecurity is precisely the lack of effective
political and security mechanisms to address conflicts.”6 Ramesh Thakur, Vice
Rector, Peace and Security, United Nations University: “Human security refers
to the quality of life of the people of a society or polity. Anything which
degrades their quality of life – demographic pressures, diminished access to or
stock or resources, and so on – is a security threat. Conversely, anything
which can upgrade their quality of life – economic growth, improved access to
resources, social and political empowerment, and so on – is an enhancement of
human security.”7
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