We Proudly Present: The Launch of Our Book!

April 30, 2013 in Meta, Uncategorized | Tags: , , , | by | Leave a comment

gxb-cover-klein

Governance crosses and blurs borders: disciplinary, geographical, thematic, conceptual. This collection of 127 articles from fourteen different authors assembles incisive contributions on a variety of urgent questions of our age. What is global and what is local in contemporary capitalism? What makes markets tick? How can we regulate finance? Who owns knowledge? What makes expertise? How can we protect the environment and fight poverty? And many more. Structured around different themes, the book invites readers to browse and delve deeper into the issues researched and analyzed over the course of four years on the governance across borders blog.

For more information and free full-text download visit the blogbook page.

The “invisible epidemic” (2): To be, or not to be (on the MDGs), that is the question

June 18, 2013 in Development, Global Health Governance | Tags: , , , , , , , | by | Leave a comment

Thirteen years ago the largest-ever gathering of world leaders took place on 8 September 2000 at the United Nations (UN) General Assembly in New York, where the UN Millennium Declaration was made. The Declaration was the most supported, ambitious and specific list of global development goals agreed upon to date, and established a list of commitments to reduce extreme poverty by 2015 which became known as the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

The Millennium Development Goals set in 2000

Source: United Nations

The MDGs were significant for global development cooperation due to their ability to stimulate global support, specifically financial resources. Many aid agencies and donors used them to direct their funding projects, and several governments also largely founded their health strategies upon them to receive external funding, which could comprise over 50 per cent of the state’s health budget. The MDGs thereby created a specific global development agenda, which some critics however now argue was not entirely in tune with the real needs of development of low- and middle-income countries. For example, proponents of a greater focus on non-communicable diseases (NCD) criticise that despite NCDs are now the leading cause of death worldwide, they did not receive a single mention in the 2000 MDGs.

Bordercrossing CfP: “Religion and Environment”

June 11, 2013 in Bordercrossing News, Miscellaneous Governance Issues, Religion, Uncategorized | Tags: , | by | Leave a comment

The open-access, peer-reviewed Journal of the Sociology and Theory of Religion asks for contributions for the first issue in 2014. The call aims at papers dealing with religion, environment, diversity and/or justice based on comparative, empirical research.

The papers can be submitted until October 1, 2013, to the special editor Michael Agliardo, SJ, Ph.D. The journal is published in English, Spanish and Chinese.

(Jiska)

The Importance of Communication Channels for the Identity of Anonymous

June 5, 2013 in Miscellaneous Governance Issues | Tags: , , , | by | Leave a comment

In about two weeks I will attend the 63rd Annual Conference of the International Communication Association to present a paper on the organizational identity of the hacker collective “Anonymous” (see also “Anonymous’ Boundaries: Expelling by Exposing“), which I have written together with Dennis Schoeneborn. The key the empirical puzzle in this case is how the organizational identity of Anonymous is constructed given the fact that individual membership is largely invisible.

gxb-logo-youranonnews

Logo of YourAnonNews on Twitter

One of our findings is that Anonymous largely relies on the credibility of communication channels as a functional equivalent and substitute to member-based identity formation. Several Twitter accounts, Facebook pages or Tumblr blogs are controlled by members of Anonymous (“Anons”). Some of these accounts such as the YourAnonNews with over 1.1 million followers on Twitter or the OffiziellAnonymous Facebook page with over 1.2 million fans are able to reach large audiences.

The credibility of these communication channels depends on their respective communication history. Those accounts that have accurately announced – if not initiated – Anonymous activities gain credibility and thus the power to speak more or less on behalf of Anonymous.

The centrality of credible communication channels for the identity of Anonymous has recently been underscored by the first Anonymous crowdfunding campaign on Indiegogo. The goal of the initiative: fund a new home for the communication channel YourAnonNews (YAN), which is currently hosted at Tumblr: Read the rest of this entry »

Bordercrossing CfP: “(Re)thinking Global Connectedness”

June 1, 2013 in Bordercrossing News | Tags: , , , | by | Leave a comment

At the beginning of this year, the Texas A&M University at Qatar held the First Liberal Arts International Conference to exchange ideas on the “Ethical Engagement with Globalization, Citizenship and Multiculturalism”. Now, the call for the second round is published. Scholars from a wide range of disciplines are invited to “(Re)think[..] Global Connectedness” through “Critical Perspectives on Globalization”.

Read the rest of this entry »

The Art of Pointless and Misleading Microcredit Impact Evaluations

May 29, 2013 in Development, Labour markets and employment, Microfinance | Tags: , , , , , , , , | by | 2 comments

This guest post is provided by Milford Bateman who is a Visiting Professor of Economics at Juraj Dobrila University of Pula in Croatia and a development consultant. He recently accepted a two-month position as Distinguished Visiting Professor of Development Studies at St Mary’s University in Nova Scotia, Canada, to be taken up in late 2013.

Four of the most high-profile research teams have in recent months released papers summarising the results of multi-year projects that aimed to assess the impact of microcredit. All of these projects claim to have found some small residual value in the increasingly de-bunked concept of microcredit which, the authors quickly go on to say, suggests to them that it is too early to agree with the growing number of nay-sayers and abandon the microcredit model in favour of other local development models.  The four papers I refer to are:

Dazzling econometrics and pioneering impact methodologies aside, the most important thing these four papers all have in common is actually something else: they all go to great lengths to avoid exploring the most awkward downside issues that lie at the heart of microcredit and, to do so, they choose to deploy some faulty logic along the way. Read the rest of this entry »

The “invisible epidemic”: non-communicable diseases

May 29, 2013 in Development, Global Health Governance | Tags: , , , , | by | 4 comments

Historically, infectious diseases such as HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria have been at the center of global health initiatives, as they easily spread across national borders and threatened the lives of millions of people in low- and middle-income countries with under-developed health care systems. Yet as the world celebrates its progress on the reduction of infectious diseases, the globalisation of unhealthy lifestyles, rapid and unplanned urbanisation, and liberal market forces have propelled a possibly greater threat to the health and development of the Global South, organisations like the World Health Organisation (WHO) fear. This threat is often referred to as “the invisible epidemic” of non-communicable diseases (NCDs), yet strategies on how to overcome them still remain unclear.

WHO 2008-2013 Action Plan for the Global Strategy for the Prevention and Control of Noncommunicable Diseases

Causes and effects of non-communicable diseases

Source: World Health Organization

This blog entry is the first in a series of contributions exploring the rise of NCDs as a major health and development issue in low- and middle-income countries. The aim is to present and discuss evidence of the leading actors who are increasingly seeing NCDs not only as a challenge for developing countries, but also as an issue of transnational health governance that cannot be resolved at the national level alone. Read the rest of this entry »

Bordercrossing CfP: Co:llaboratory Initiative “Globalization and Internet”

May 28, 2013 in Bordercrossing News | Tags: , , , | by | Leave a comment

The self-declared “open expert platform, internet policy incubator and multi-stakeholder think tank” co:llaboratory, which is mainly funded by Google Germany, has just announced the call for participation for its 9th initiative “Globalization and Internet” (German). Some of the issues such as the negotiations for the TAFTA treaty relate to several of the topics discussed on our blog such as intellectual property rights regulation. The Call  mentions three main fields of interest under the general theme:

  1. The genesis and interpretation of international treaties
  2. Consumer protection and civil society participation.
  3. Borders within the internet as barriers to globalization

Online applications are possible by June 26, 2013; basic understanding of German is probably necessary.

 

US Supreme Court rules for Monsanto in seed replication dispute

May 21, 2013 in Governance of markets, Patent law | Tags: , , | by | 7 comments

Indiana farmer Vernon Bowman wears Monsanto cap: irony or admiration?
Photo by Dan Charles, NPR
 

The man in the picture above is a self-proclaimed fan of Monsanto Company’s genetically engineered soybeans. In fact, every year until 2007 Vernon Hugh Bowman – a 75-year-old farmer from Indiana – purchased Monsanto’s Roundup-Ready soy seeds (RR) from a licensed retailer in order to plant his crop of soy. RR is a type of genetically modified seed that has in-plant resistance to glyphosate, the active ingredient in Monsanto’s Roundup herbicides. This means RR soy crops can be sprayed with Roundup weed-killers without any damage being done to the soy.

But despite his loyalty and admiration, in 2007 Bowman was sued by Monsanto for patent infringement, and the farmer has taken on a legal dispute that recently reached the U.S. Supreme Court. The case revolves around whether Monsanto’s patent over RR soybeans grants it control over the reproduction of second-generation seeds. But from a broader perspective it raises the question of what institutional framework is most desirable for regulating the scope of patent rights and points to the tension between protecting competitive markets and promoting innovation through patents. Moreover, it brings to the public sphere discussions concerning transformations of the farming sector resulting from the privatization of its basic input – seeds. Read the rest of this entry »

Bordercrossing Event: Workshop on “Mobility and Civil Society”

May 10, 2013 in Bordercrossing News, Labour markets and employment, Labour Standards, Transnational Studies | Tags: , , , , , | by | Leave a comment

It is a sad occasion which currently reminds us of questions about large-distance solidarity, transnational communities and commitment – topics which the workshop Mobility and Civil Society: How Social Commitment Takes Place addresses at the University Freiburg, Germany, in December.

During the last weeks, the second largest industrial tragedy in history has raised public awareness and debate about global inequality of international labor protection once again. The Rana Plaza complex close to Dhaka, Bangladesh, collapsed on April 24. As the rescue work around the former Tung Hai garment factory is still not completed, the reported death toll moves up to around a thousand people. Yesterday, eight people died in another fire in a garment factory in Dhaka.

Read the rest of this entry »

The Return of the Church: How permanent austerity may bring back religion

May 2, 2013 in Religion | Tags: , , , , , , , , | by | Leave a comment

On the night of the December 14, 2012, a 25 year old woman was sedated with date rape drugs in Cologne, Germany, and subsequently raped. When the police and medical authorities took her for medical checkup and evidence collection, two hospitals refused to treat her and prescribe emergency contraception.  Both hospitals were run by the Catholic Church. The doctors told the woman that emergency contraception was not in line with the worldview of their employer. Media reported that the doctors feared to lose their jobs.

The incidence was only picked up a couple of months later by the press; however it provoked harsh public criticism against the Catholic Church. The negative publicity fell on fruitful ground. Earlier in the same year there had been an intense media discourse about alleged inappropriate behavior of Catholic welfare providers. A female manager of a Catholic day care facility had been fired after the woman had divorced and moved in with a new partner.  The church argued that “not keeping faith ’til death” was incompatible with the Catholic worldview and hence the woman had to go. The press dug out similar cases where Catholic welfare providers had decided not to employ or to fire people due to their homosexuality or because they had divorced.

The German public was puzzled: how could it be that in a society  in which regular churchgoers barely make up more than 10 percent of the West and 3 percent of the East German electorate, the Church maintains such a strong normative grip on society?

Read the rest of this entry »

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