Carl Andresen (1909-1985) – ein protestantischer Kirchenhistoriker in seiner Zeit
Journal Name: Volume: 16Issue: 1Pages: 25-40
Archiv für Februar 2013
Berlin, 1929-1932: Eine autobiographische Skizze von Carl Andresen
Journal Name: Volume: 16Issue: 1Pages: 11-24
Editorial / Einleitung
Journal Name: Volume: 16Issue: 1Pages: 3-10
Masthead
Journal Name: Volume: 16Issue: 1Pages: i-ii
The democratic deficit of transnational environmental activism: a case study of e-waste governance in India
The literature on transnational activism often associates environmental NGOs with democratic legitimacy, grassroots representation and environmental justice. Authors employ case studies to demonstrate how engaging in transnational networks increases the political agency of environmental NGOs. Yet, there is a tendency mostly to select successful cases. In this article, I investigate the political activities of the environmental NGO, Toxics Link, surrounding the recycling of electronic waste in India. Based on qualitative research, this study shows how the political incorporation of Toxics Link in transnational advocacy networks and domestic governance networks constrains their political agency. The structural exclusion of e-waste labourers from Indian policy negotiations negates the discursive claims of legitimacy, representation and justice. These incorporation processes create a democratic deficit. I use the insights gained from this case study to provide a critical assessment of theories of transnational environmental activism.
A stranger at ‘home’: interactions between transnational return visits and integration for Afghan-American professionals
In this article, I explore the interactions between transnational activities (in the form of return visits) and integration, for Afghan refugees living in the USA. Based on ethnographic fieldwork in California and Kabul, I look at why return visits take place and the difficult experiences Afghan-Americans had of being a stranger in what might they might otherwise consider their ‘home’. I argue that return visits can serve as a transnational strategy to help integration in California through, for example, the investment of ‘reverse’ remittances. In doing so, I highlight the importance of multi-directional transnational flows, particularly those from Afghanistan to the USA.
‘Shades of grey’: the World Bank, knowledge networks and linked ecologies of academic engagement
The Global Development Network (GDN) and the Researchers Alliance for Development (RAD) are networks linking the professional ecology of the World Bank to the diverse research ecologies of universities and think-tanks. These ‘knowledge networks’ can entangle research environments extensively with policy communities and the institutional interests of powerful organizations. Connecting different professional ecologies via networks creates complex sets of relationships between researchers and policy makers. The ‘grey areas’ of professional overlap highlight the ‘co-production’ of (social) science in development policy. The author based her analysis of the dual dynamics of network autonomy and co-option on participant observation of GDN and RAD as a past member of the governing bodies of both networks.
Home, city and diaspora: Anglo–Indian and Chinese attachments to Calcutta
This article is about the city as home for people living in diaspora. We develop two key areas of debate. First, in contrast to research that explores diasporic homes in relation to domestic homemaking and/or the nation as home or ‘homeland’, we consider the city as home in diaspora. Second, building on research on transnational urbanism, translocality and the importance of the ‘city scale’ in migration studies, we argue that the city is a distinctive location of diasporic dwelling, belonging and attachment. Drawing on interviews with Anglo–Indian and Chinese Calcuttans who live in London and Toronto, we develop the idea of ‘diaspora cities’ to explore the importance of the city as home rather than the nation as ‘homeland’ for many people living in diaspora. This leads to an understanding of the importance of migration and diaspora within cities of departure as well as resettlement, and contributes a distinctively diasporic focus to broader work on comparative urbanism.
Religious transnationalism, development and the construction of religious boundaries: the case of the Dera Sachkhand Ballan and the Ravidass Dharm
In this article, I examine the general assumption that transnationalism is creating new divisions and iniquitous social hierarchies. For caste-based religious centres like the Dera Sachkhand Ballan (DSB), which is engaged in modes of subaltern religiosity among Ravidassias, transnationalism can be a powerful agent of religious and social change. By nurturing transnational networks, especially in the United Kingdom, the DSB has now emerged as the main driver of Ravidassia identity in Punjab. The material support of overseas followers has made this achievement possible for religious and social institutions in Punjab, and has enabled overseas Ravidassias to demonstrate to higher castes a sense of collective achievement. Transnationalism is thus central to the process of differentiating between the followers of the DSB and Sikhism. It also provided critical support for the birth of a new religion in 2010, the Ravidass Dharm.
Cosmopolitanization in action: connecting scales in international environmental organizations
In this article we analyse how professionals in two international environmental organizations (IEOs) concerned with biodiversity act as ‘entrepreneurs of cosmopolitanization’ by establishing connections between the various scales they mobilize in their daily work. Drawing on an empirical survey, we show that these professionals mobilize a range of activities to meet a twofold requirement. The first requirement is for universality, which corresponds to their status, their determination to adopt a scientific approach and to the scale at which they initially defined the problem of biodiversity loss. The second requirement is to embed in specific contexts. Tension between these two types of requirement is inevitable. It is inherent in the cosmopolitan perspective and leads to contextual arrangements between the global approach to environmental problems and the forging of alliances with national, regional or local institutions and actors, according to opportunities and requirements. Connecting the various scales of environmental action unavoidably remains a partially achieved objective.