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Although Morocco was not fully colonised until 1912, the second half of the nineteenth century saw significant changes in the country’s politics, culture, and economy as European colonial powers intensified competition for control of the southern shore of the western Mediterranean. This essay examines the British conceptualisation of social, economic, fiscal, and military reforms that precolonial Morocco tried and/or was wreaked to implement under the auspices of the British. The rhetoric of reform and rescue served as the British Empire’s civilising mission and was complementary to the discourse on supremacy and hegemony. This rhetoric fed into a larger colonial project of domination but also served a more surreptitious purpose of self-fashioning and self-legitimisation. British envoys, officials, and travel writers, the most prominent of whom are John Drummond Hay, Arthur Leared, Walter Burton Harris, Hugh Stutfield, and Budgett Meakin, treated the reform and rescue of Pre-protectorate Morocco as a peculiar and bounden duty of the white race. This essay revisits the representational strategies these writers deployed in their accounts and how they propagated the premise that the implementation of these reforms would enable Morocco to be transformed from a fragmented ‘Sharifian Dominion’ replete with bureaucratisation, embezzlement, and decay into a modern state. In this sense, this essay traces the reciprocal relationships between writing, policy making, capitalism, modernity and the broader European colonialist discourse and zeitgeist of this period. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While it is generally admitted that governments in most democracies make extensive use of public opinion research, we do not know much about the way they mobilize this resource. When and why do they want to learn about public opinion? What determines differences in the intensity of government polling over the electoral cycle? Are government opinion polls primarily a tool for testing the reception of government proposals or for learning more about issues that are important to citizens? And what does this tell us about the way political representation works? Understanding governments as actors in the production of public opinion, not just as passive consumers, our focus is on polls commissioned directly by governments. We argue that government polls can help us to better understand how contemporary political representation works since they can play an important role as ‘update instrument’ in anticipatory representation or as a decision‐making aid in promissory representation. By studying government polls as dependent variable, we develop an innovative research design and systematically analyse the factors that explain whether the intensity of government polling (the number of questions asked) varies across different stages of the electoral cycle and whether the issues they ask about correspond more to the government's priorities or those of the public. We present evidence from Germany, mobilizing an original database of all survey questions directly commissioned by the German government during the 18th and 19th legislative periods (2013–2021). Our findings help to better understand the factors that determine the intensity of government polling at different moments of the electoral cycle and to identify the different logic of representation behind this activity. The transition from the post‐election period to the routine period and from the routine period to the pre‐election period correspond to turning points in the German government's use of this instrument. While we could not observe any direct effects of the electoral cycle on the intensity of government polling, the interplay between the former and different types of policy issues proves to be insightful. The government commissions significantly more survey questions on government priorities during the first 3 months in office than during routine times and significantly more survey questions on salient issues as federal elections approach. Moreover, we show that governments commission fewer questions on issues they ‘own’, which points in the same direction as previous studies showing that governments are less interested in public opinion on these issues. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While the topic of migrant representation in media discourse has been extensively researched, a significant portion of scholarly attention is concentrated on Western media. This focus leaves a considerable gap in the study of media representations in transitional countries, particularly North African nations like Tunisia. This topic assumes greater significance in light of the recent surge in xenophobia towards sub-Saharan African migrants in the country – a movement partly instigated by President Kais Saied's anti-immigrant rhetoric. Utilising Corpus-Assisted Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA), this paper examines the discursive representations of sub-Saharan African migrants in Tunisian written media discourse, focusing on the 2022 and 2023 anti-migrant wave in Tunisia under the presidency of Kais Saied. The research findings reveal that while a glimpse of a humanitarian discourse was evident, the majority of the discourse was characterised either by biased neutrality or explicit prejudice. The research indicates a predominantly negative representation, categorising migrants as invaders, security threats, economic burdens, and moral hazards. Significantly, much of the discourse echoes the political anti-immigrant policy, suggesting a potential media alignment with the emerging authoritarian tendencies in Tunisia. This alignment harbours damaging implications for the safety and well-being of the migrant community, as well as for the overall human rights and democratisation process in the country. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In response to biodiversity declines worldwide, over 190 nations committed to protect 30% of their lands and waters by 2030 (hereafter, 30×30). Systematic conservation planning and return on investment analysis can be helpful tools for determining where protection efforts could deliver the most efficient and effective reserve design, and supporting decision‐making when trade‐offs among objectives are required. Here, we propose a framework for efficient “30×30” implementation and apply it to the state of California (USA). Because conservation of a region's full suite of biodiversity is the primary objective of the global initiative, we prioritized representation in our analysis. We used Zonation to identify networks that close the gap in representation of major habitat types in California's protected area network and that also conserve the places important for biodiversity or climate change mitigation. We identified networks that are efficient relative to metrics likely to be important in implementation including land acquisition cost, number of transactions, and conservation benefit per hectare, and we illustrate not only trade‐offs associated with these metrics but also differences in the co‐benefits achieved. Five of the eight major habitat types in California are not currently protected at a 30% level statewide, and if representation was achieved solely through private land acquisition, targets could be met for as little as $5.84 billion, with as few as 364 transactions, or with 2.18 million additional conserved hectares. Implementation of 30×30 will likely require more flexibility than a single network design. A “no regrets” action would be to protect properties that were prioritized across all networks and additional implementation should include properties with characteristics of any of the individual networks. Our analytical framework and implementation guidance can be applied to other geographies and jurisdictions to increase the likelihood of both meeting 30×30 targets and delivering the conservation benefits they aim to secure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The translation of Familiar Stranger by Stuart Hall into German was a particular challenge, especially with regard to the concept of race. Hall uses the term ‘race’ to fan out the countless cultural meanings, which are not covered by a homogeneous theoretical conception of race. The result is the ambivalent articulation of race – as well as of colour – which unites racist as well as emancipatory meanings in the same term. This ambivalent chain of meanings has no equivalent in the German language, as the conceptual history of race cannot be detached from the context of German fascism, either theoretically or in everyday language. Another requirement was the translation of gender, not because Hall problematizes this, but because the German language is a deeply rooted genus-typifying language. With some examples of translation, we want to show how we have tried, to consciously act in the space of the displacement of culture, to recognize the specific situatedness of the heterogeneous representations that Hall talks about in Familiar Stranger, and not to unify them in favour of a homogeneous German textuality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study has two aims. First, it tests the psychometric properties of the Social Justice Scale in eight Spanish-speaking Latin American countries (Argentina, Bolivia, Paraguay, Colombia, Uruguay, México, Venezuela and Honduras). Second, this study analyzes the relations and cultural differences between the dimensions of social justice with blatant and subtle prejudice towards poor people. These objectives are particularly interesting given the need for transcultural tools to evaluate social justice and the impact that it has on different variables. A sample of 4,130 adults from eight Latin-American countries who were 18 to 80 years (M = 46.89 years, SD = 15.23; 57.4% female) was selected by convenience sampling. The psychometric properties of the Social Justice Scale were adequate. Moreover, the three correlated dimensions model showed a major fit than the unidimensional model. According to the results of this study, the implementation of the scale in the Latin American context is adequate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the domain of object detection, the performance of a detector depend heavily on the quality of features extracted by the backbone network. Extraordinary feature representation has significantly improved the performance of the detector. As we all know, proposing a novel backbone structure requires meticulous structural design, a wealth of expert experience and tricks, and consumes a lot of computing resources. Therefore, it is meaningful to effectively leveraging the existing pre-trained backbones and maximize their performance to improve the accuracy of object detection. In this paper, we propose a novel Feature-enhanced Composite Backbone Network to improve the feature representation capability of the backbone, which called FECNet, equipped with Proportional Feature Fusion Module(PFF) and Multi-Granularity Information Aggregation and Interaction Method(MIAM). In particular, FECNet combines the existing backbones, which are connected by PFF, and FECNet pays more attention to extracting the discriminative features related to the object that are suitable for classification and the edge information suitable for bounding box regression through MIAM. Experiments show that FECNet is easily integrated into mainstream detectors and improve their performances. On the COCO 2017 dataset, employing ResNet50 as the foundational backbone, our approach attains a notable 3 percent increment in performance within the Fast R-CNN framework. Simultaneously, our method yields 2.1 percent enhancement when applied to the ResNet101 + Cascade R-CNN. And it's worth noting that applying our approach on the backbone swin transformer which is based on the trasformer structure gets an increase of more than 2 percent. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Summary In an attempt to address the large inequities faced by the plant biology communities from the Global South (i.e. countries located around the tropics and the Southern Hemisphere) at international conferences, this Viewpoint is the reflexive thinking arising from the concurrent session titled ‘Arabidopsis and its translational research in the Global South’ organized at the International Conference of Arabidopsis Research 2023 (ICAR 2023) in Chiba, Japan in June 2023. Here, we highlight the main obstacles plant biology communities in the Global South face in terms of knowledge production, as measured by the unequal production and citation of publications, investigating and advancing local plant genomics and biodiversity, combating disparities in gender and diversity, and current initiatives to break isolation of scientists. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Zhao Chuan’s play World Factory continuously introduces reality into the theatre by resorting to the creative techniques of documentary theatre, epic theatre, and theatre of the oppressed in left-wing theatre, thus constituting a blurred boundary between the reality and the representation, and also forming a mode of discussion of social issues in theatre. The tension between reality and representation allows Zhao Chuan’s theatrical production to be understood not only as aesthetic theatre but also as social theatre. With the help of sociological methods, Zhao Chuan’s social theatre creates a “theatrical public sphere,” and the reality of this sphere constitutes a Habermasian place of prudent and equal public opinion. At the same time, the representation of the theatrical public sphere creates the emotional space of physical presence. It imaginatively constructs another reality, and its representation quality can avoid the direct criticism of the reality, which makes the relatively free public sphere speech possible. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study analyzes the outcomes of a service-learning course where Latinas in a higher education setting created a 16-page children's book for at-risk students as part of their education coursework in a regional public Hispanic-serving institution (HSI). There is a well-documented lack of Latina/o/x representation in children's literature, which has impacts on literacy gaps and student confidence, but little research on the potential of creating children's literature as a means to bridge divides. A series of qualitative focus groups at an HSI in a U.S.–Mexico border community were utilized to define the process of mirror making. Mirror making occurs when students draw from their own literacy journeys as the basis for writing while attempting to represent the experiences of emerging readers. As such, the process of mirror making represents a way of narrativizing sociopolitical issues of language, gender, and family that are relevant to their formative experiences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Climate institutions such as the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), with its expert panel the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), and the European Union, as well as national and local authorities in various sectors (such as transport, industry, energy, and agriculture), play a central role in developing and enacting climate strategies. Climate institutions, particularly in the Global North, have however been slow in their recognition of gender and other climate-relevant social aspects. With the help of feminist institutionalism, we analyze the contemporary climate regime and how it deals with gender and social differences, asking how climate institutions, originating in the Global North, organize bodies and institutionalize gender norms and relations. The main aim is to highlight existing institutional inertia and obstacles to transformative institutional practices that are needed for just and inclusive climate policies. The article is conceptual with examples drawn from institutional literature as well as empirical research on the United Nations, the European Union, and states in the Global North. We conclude that there is an increasing recognition of the gendered effects of climate change particularly in terms of the need for diverse representation in decision making. Institutional inertia, in particular path-dependent policy-making in climate institutions, however makes gender often invisible or associated with women only and therefore remains a major obstacle for the realization of inclusive and equal climate policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This essay considers a painting from Rene Magritte, The Treachery of Images, also known as "This is not a pipe," the translation of the prominent statement Ceci n'est pas une pipe in the painting, which Barbara Buttenfield had prominently placed in her University of Buffalo office. It is an iconic and surrealistic twentieth century artwork (with a second version), widely copied and readily available online. Its visual juxtaposition of a textual element and detailed realist painting of a classical smoker's pipe can quickly become more than a surrealistic play with words and images and poignantly stimulates associations and disconnections between image and object, text and object, and text and image. Viewers can also see a relevance of this painting to a number of representational issues involving images and maps. However, I want to focus in this essay on just two questions: 1) why do people affirm the connections between graphical map images and graphics in light of a fundamental disconnection between map and the represented territory or objects and 2) how do people still find sense in maps after we acknowledge the limits of any sense of correspondence between map image and experienced geography? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: To characterize the trends in female representation in the endourology fellowship match compared with the urology residency match. Materials and Methods: Available deidentified match data from 2017 to 2022 was obtained from the American Urological Association and Endourology Society annual census data. We evaluated gender-specific participation in the urology residency and endourology fellowship match and compared differences in the trends over the last 6 years. Results: Between the years 2017 and 2021, there were a total of 313 applicants for a fellowship in endourology, and of those, only 8.6% were women. In that same time period, a significantly larger number of women (27.1%) participated in the urology residency match (p = 0.0002). When specifically examining the endourology applicant trend, there is no significant increase in participation (R = 0.7, p = 0.35) between 2017 and 2021, as compared with the significant increase in total number of applicants (R = 7.1, p = 0.04). However, in the urology match, there has been a constant and significant increase in both female (R = 13.7, p = 0.03) and total applicants (R = 27, p = 0.04) between 2017 and 2022. Conclusions: Although there has been an overall increase in the number of applicants to urology, the number of women in endourology fellowship has not increased at a commensurate rate. In light of these findings, it is the responsibility of the endourology community to identify social and systemic barriers for women in this field and advocate for change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research on the underrepresentation of youth in parliaments has rarely focused on political parties. This is surprising as parties are central in the selection of candidates and therefore should play an important role in determining the demographic composition of elected politicians. We created a data set of party parliamentary groups between 2017 and 2020 and conducted a linear regression as well as a fuzzy set QCA. Building upon previous literature, we expected the share of young Members of Parliament (MPs) to be higher under the following conditions: a low/high GDP per capita, a proportional representation electoral system, decentralized nomination processes, strong party youth organizations, an inclusive party ideology and young party structures. Our research support previous findings that electoral systems matter. Furthermore, our results indicate that whilst ideology might be a significant factor by itself, it becomes influential especially in combination with PR systems. The role of strong youth organizations, decentralized selectorates and party age seem to be highly context-dependent and more ambivalent. In summary, there is no singular condition under which we observe adequate youth representation, but rather different configurations of conditions. By applying the newest guidelines on good practices in QCA research, we present one of the first applications of these techniques in party and representation research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

L'article fait le point sur une nouvelle conceptualisation de l'attachement, qui n'est plus envisagé comme un trait général de la personne, mais comme un fonctionnement à la fois comportemental et représentationnel spécifique à chaque relation, selon plusieurs continuums (sécurité, inhibition, hyperactivation, désorganisation du système d'attachement). La notion de « modèles multiples » et ses liens avec l'attachement désorganisé sont discutés ; l'auteure propose de distinguer les cas où il existe des représentations contradictoires concernant un même événement de ceux où un modèle spécifique pour différentes relations a été formé, le deuxième cas n'étant pas pathologique, à la différence du premier. Cette conception de l'attachement en permet une étude beaucoup plus fine, utile à la fois sur un plan clinique et pour la recherche. L'Attachment Multiple Model Interview (AMMI) est présenté, ainsi que l'usage qui peut en être fait dans la pratique et dans la recherche. Il devient possible de démêler la part relative de l'attachement à chaque personne, qu'il s'agisse de la mère, du père, d'une autre figure de soin (par exemple, chez les enfants placés ou chez les personnes âgées), d'un thérapeute ou encore d'un conjoint. Et outre le rôle spécifique de chacun et leurs effets cumulatifs, les interactions entre ces différents attachements peuvent elles aussi rendre compte de mécanismes de compensation (résilience) dans le développement psychologique de la personne. Les similitudes entre les relations (ou rigidité du fonctionnement), ainsi que les variations peuvent également être examinées. The article presents a new conceptualization of attachment – which is no longer envisaged as a general trait of the person but as relationship-specific behavioral and representational functioning – along several continua (security, deactivation, hyperactivation, and disorganization of the attachment system). The notion of 'multiple models' and its link with disorganized attachment are discussed. The author highlights the need to differentiate cases in which there are two contradictory representations of a same event from those in which distinct models exist for different relationships, the latter case – unlike the former – not being pathological. This conceptualization enables a finer examination of attachment processes in both practice and research. The Attachment Multiple Model Interview (AMMI) is presented with examples in clinical and research settings. It is now possible to disentangle the relative contribution of attachment to each figure whether with the mother, the father, another attachment figure (for example among placed children or among the elderly), a therapist, or a romantic partner. In addition to each one's specific role and their additive effects, the interaction effects of these different attachments can also account for counterbalancing mechanisms (resilience) in psychological development. Similarities across relationships (or rigid functioning) as well as variation can also be investigated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We develop a mathematical approach to formally proving that certain neural computations and representations exist based on patterns observed in an organism's behaviour. To illustrate, we provide a simple set of conditions under which an ant's ability to determine how far it is from its nest would logically imply neural structures isomorphic to the natural numbers ℕ. We generalise these results to arbitrary behaviours and representations and show what mathematical characterisation of neural computation and representation is simplest while being maximally predictive of behaviour. We develop this framework in detail using a path integration example, where an organism's ability to search for its nest in the correct location implies representational structures isomorphic to two‐dimensional coordinates under addition. We also study a system for processing anbn strings common in comparative work. Our approach provides an objective way to determine what theory of a physical system is best, addressing a fundamental challenge in neuroscientific inference. These results motivate considering which neurobiological structures have the requisite formal structure and are otherwise physically plausible given relevant physical considerations such as generalisability, information density, thermodynamic stability and energetic cost. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

I reply to comments on my book Perception (Routledge 2021) by Umrao Sethi, Jeff Speaks and Brian Cutter. Sethi objects to my representational view of perception on the ground that that having an experience of a color or shape can enable you to know what that color or shape is like only if it is actually present in the experience. Speaks has a very interesting discussion of my puzzle of the laws of appearance for the representational view. And Cutter asks what I have against 'neural sense datum theory'. In my responses, I try to take the discussion forward. At the end, I develop a new argument against reductive physicalist theories of sensible qualities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study explores the Arabesk films of Orhan Gencebay and their representation of masculinities. It compares their approach with that of other Yeşilçam melodramas within the productive years of the Turkish popular cinema between the late 1960s and 1980, focusing on the treatment of fallen women and men's corporeal performances in need of female approval. Gencebay's filmography presents an opportunity to decipher an indecisive, modernized and quasi-authentic masculinity constructed upon the moral dilemmas engendered by the absence of traditional village relations in an urban setting. Although Arabesk masculinities have a generally positive attitude toward fallen women and present a milder approach to tradition, they often fall back on patriarchal modes of thought by putting the emancipation of women down to men, thus finding common ground with other masculinities prone to violence in Turkish cinema of the period. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Populism comes in so many forms, both historically and in its contemporary manifestations, that we cannot assess its relationship with democratic institutions as if it were homogeneous. In this article, we reconnect with the history of the first movements that have called themselves populists and draw on an understanding of populism as an egalitarian impulse against oligarchic tendencies, centred on anti-elitism and the defense of a democratic common sense. This genetic approach goes against the dominant definitions which tend to overstretch its range of application while assuming a form of anti-pluralism as part of its common features. Then, we draw attention to the diversity of conceptions of democracy within populist thought and practices and show that the types of democratic institutions favoured by populist movements, and their attitudes towards intermediary bodies, are highly contextual. Finally, we argue that populism's inherent ambiguities shed some doubt on its capacity to respond to the current challenges faced by representative institutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research note uses a new and comprehensive data set of 22,333 municipal elected positions in 3,363 municipalities across Canada to provide a systematic analysis of women's presence in municipal office. Drawing on findings from cross-national research about women's representation in local governments, we examine whether district type, council size, urban setting, women's workforce participation, and degree of conservatism among voters account for variation in the proportion of women elected as councillors and mayors. We find support for most, but not all, of the relevant factors in previous studies. Urban municipalities and municipalities with at-large and hybrid elections are associated with larger proportions of women mayors and councillors. Ideology also matters: the proportion of women in municipal office is smaller in conservative municipalities. Finally, we find no evidence that council size or women's labor force participation is related to women's representation among mayors or councillors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Studies show that the extraordinary growth in campaign expenditures is fueled by a small, elite subset of the donor population that gives generously to candidates across the country. It is often assumed that the wealthy influence policy outcomes through such gifts to politicians; however, the representational benefits of giving to politicians out-of-state are unclear. What do donors gain legislatively when they give to legislators living out-of-state? I study the campaign financing of US senators over three decades (1989–2018) and find that senators receive the most money from out-of-state donors when they face reelection and risk losing. In this context, donors invest in the collective benefits of party representation when they give money to out-of-state senators. However, when giving to senators "off cycle," out-of-state donors behave as "consumers" who reward senators for the positions they have taken. Each bill sponsored by a senator when they are not up for reelection leads to a corresponding increase of about 1% in receipts from out-of-state donors. These results offer a more complete view of the legislative surrogacy that the wealthy receive when they give to politicians out-of-state and suggest possible links between campaign contributions and public policy outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this study, we ask how and why do Members of Parliament adopt different representational styles? Looking at MPs in four Westminster-style democracies, we identify differences between MPs and inductively explore influences on representational styles by first using participant observation to gain deep insights into the activities of a small sample of MPs and then by using semi-structured interviews from a larger sample to elucidate findings from the observations across states. Our primary focus is the method of connection between representative and citizen, as fostered by the representative while present in the constituency. Despite similar institutional and electoral contexts across countries, we find a significant variation that is influenced by both country-level and constituency-level factors. Findings suggest a continuum from highly service-oriented to highly symbolic-oriented styles, where MPs from the UK illustrate the former, and MPs from Canada illustrate the latter, though with further variation at the constituency level that is based, in part, upon both geography and demographics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Does good governance require citizens to be knowledgeable of basic facts and best policy ideas? Some scholars suggest that it does, and propose disenfranchising the most 'ignorant' voters. In contrast, we argue, political systems are complex systems inevitably exhibiting incomplete, imperfect and asymmetric information that is dynamically generated in society from actors with diverse life experiences, antagonistic interests and often profoundly dissonant views and values, generating radical uncertainty among political elites over the consequences of their decisions. Radical uncertainty, radical dissonance and power asymmetry are inescapable properties of politics. Good performance significantly depends on how political elites navigate through radical uncertainty to handle radical dissonance. Democracy, by offering citizens equal rights to participate in politics and talk freely, both enables and compels political actors to track social feedback regarding the effects of their decisions on a diverse public, and consider it in ways that mitigate these three problems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examines the micro-level foundations of how policy responsiveness may come about. Our study builds on the assumption that elected officials' information source use shapes their policy actions. We analyze the variation in information sources elected officials rely on for agenda-setting and policy formulation, distinguishing between public opinion sources, advocacy sources, and expert sources. Additionally, we examine how elected officials' public opinion sources vary across individuals, parties, and political systems. Based on a 2015 survey with 345 Members of Parliament in Belgium and Canada, the results indicate that the actions of elected representatives are more affected by public opinion sources like citizens and the mass media when they initially prioritize issues for policy action, while interest groups are prominent in both stages, and parties and expert sources are more used in the policy formulation phase. Furthermore, politicians in majoritarian systems, those belonging to the opposition and members of populist parties, tend to rely more on public opinion sources than their peers in proportional systems, those in the majority and non-populist parties. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drawing on data from four general elections between 2010 and 2019 this note shows that British MPs are increasingly likely to represent constituencies in the region of their birth. By 2019, more than half of British MPs were born in the region in which their constituency sat. We find clear partisan differences, but no overall gender divide. There is also a clear centre-periphery divide. The less local nature of the current older cohort in the Commons – the most likely to retire in the next few years – means that these trends should continue in the same direction in coming elections. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on visual analysis of the China Pictorial magazine in two historical periods (Mao and post-Mao), this article identifies six key themes of representing Africa in Chinese state media and finds a parallel between China's representation of Africa, Sino-African relations, and the shifting geopolitics. Different from Western stereotypes about Africa, China Pictorial constructs a romanticized image of Africa, which is interpreted through the concept of the "socialist gaze." Empirically, this article explains and historicizes how China Pictorial constructs meanings about Africa through its visual representational systems, shedding new light on China–Africa relations and the increasingly active South–South media flows. Theoretically, this article expands our understanding of media representation beyond the "colonial gaze." While the "socialist gaze" may function as a counter-representation to the "colonial gaze," it can also create new differences and stereotypes, thus enhancing power asymmetry between China and Africa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The central government has the primary responsibility for the protection of human rights. However, several factors such as decentralisation raise questions about the role of local authorities in this area. Our paper examines this issue through an interdisciplinary approach, combining international law and political sociology. Our focus lies on the case of France, the 'homeland' of human rights: do French local elected authorities always take human rights seriously? Our research design combines qualitative and quantitative methods. After providing a background of the international legal context, this paper will present the findings on human rights local perceptions and practices of elected representatives. Human rights' perceptions of these subnational political actors strongly depend on their educational qualifications and personal commitments. The same applies to the hierarchy that they draw between fundamental freedoms, social rights, and environmental rights. By contrast, local practices in favour of human rights vary most importantly according to the local authorities' status and demographic weight, rather than their political hue. When human and financial resources are scarce, the goodwill showcased by local elected representatives is not sufficient to foster the proper implementation of human rights. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The idea of Bangladesh nation and the 1971 War of Liberation has been a constant in Bangladeshi diasporas worldwide. This article attempts to find out how diasporic Bangladeshi populations in Britain memorialise Bangladesh's independence and the 1971 war and considers the work of these memories in connecting with the 'homeland' of the past and building new bridges to contemporary Bangladesh. Though this war has been a watershed moment in the history of Bangladesh, the impact of memories of 1971 on constructing the idea of Bangladesh in the Bangladeshi diaspora has not yet been rigorously studied. This article is a step to analyse the memorialising responses of the British Bangladeshi diaspora toward contemporary and historical notions of Bangladesh's independence and 1971. It investigates the commemoration and narrativisation of Bangladeshi independence in the British context as/through nostalgic memories and remembrances, as well as frames the possible future of such in these memorialisations of 1971. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores congruence in the wake of the crises. It analyses (1) shifts in parties' positions on multiple issue dimensions and (2) examines congruence between citizens and parliament in times of crisis. The article refers to three issue dimensions: left-right, migration and European integration. First, I hypothesise that shifts in party positions are more pronounced on newly contested issue dimensions, such as migration or European integration, than on the left-right dimension. Second, I argue that systemic congruence will increase over the course of time. Third, I posit that systemic congruence will increase particularly on newly contested issue dimensions, like migration and European integration. The study brings together a set of Western European countries: France, Germany, Great Britain, Spain and Sweden. The analysis is based on CHES- and ESS-data (2006–2018/2019) and explores congruence as a many-to-many relationship. In large part, the results confirm the hypotheses. First, party positions changed, and shifted particularly on the issue dimensions of European integration and migration. Second, systemic congruence increased in several cases. Third, the most profound changes are to be found on the issue dimension of European integration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article documents the creation and distribution of a new sample pack, Instruments INDIA, as an intervention against systemic orientalist practices observable within the marketing, branding and production of non-Western instrument sample packs. This intervention draws upon Edward Said's model of Orientalism and Stuart Hall's theories of representation, fortifying an interrogation of practices that misrepresent diverse sonic content, musicians and cultures in negative ways. The research brings into focus the influence digital samplers and early sample library CDs had in determining technical configurations and misrepresentation tendencies found within paratextual elements of contemporary sample packs. The article joins forces with a leading sample pack distributor, Loopmasters, to cultivate change via new policy documents and good practice principles. Attending to problematic representation issues at the start of the music production chain offers a strategy to scaffold and promote positive change throughout the production process and into other connected music industry areas, where influential language and imagery align sample content with music production goals and aspirations. The article offers a first-hand account of sample pack development in collaboration with musicians of Indian musical instruments, which provide a case study to better understand and inform more ethical commercial practices in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Machine learning (ML) applications in medical artificial intelligence (AI) systems have shifted from traditional and statistical methods to increasing application of deep learning models. This survey navigates the current landscape of multimodal ML, focusing on its profound impact on medical image analysis and clinical decision support systems. Emphasizing challenges and innovations in addressing multimodal representation, fusion, translation, alignment, and co-learning, the paper explores the transformative potential of multimodal models for clinical predictions. It also highlights the need for principled assessments and practical implementation of such models, bringing attention to the dynamics between decision support systems and healthcare providers and personnel. Despite advancements, challenges such as data biases and the scarcity of "big data" in many biomedical domains persist. We conclude with a discussion on principled innovation and collaborative efforts to further the mission of seamless integration of multimodal ML models into biomedical practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This empirical study investigates how "gender is done" within Swedish wildlife management by identifying prevailing gender norms, and how gender norms can be challenged from a norm-critical perspective, in order to promote women's participation. The basis for the study is an ongoing evaluation of the Swedish Hunters' Association training initiative to increase women's participation in moose management groups. Three main norm categories are identified: performance; social interaction; and hunting as a lifestyle. Recommendations for continued gender equality work include active leadership in gender equality issues, a review of potentially excluding structures, promoting female mentors and networks, and the use of formal and transparent recruitment procedures. An understanding of norms affecting women's participation (or nonparticipation) in wildlife management is fundamental to design effective training, recruitment and nomination strategies in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper evaluates the impact of the grant of the 'Scheduled Tribe' status to the Gujjars of Jammu and Kashmir. We interacted with community members in order to understand their views. The article is based on these responses, supplemented by inputs from published government reports and other secondary studies, and is an attempt to produce a nuanced understanding of the true import of reservation for the Gujjars. We seek to understand whether the affirmative action undertaken to protect the community has produced the desired level of shift in the community's marginal status in the erstwhile state of Jammu and Kashmir. The paper contends that the efficacy of affirmative action is not ensured by the duration of such measures, but by the presence of a robust political will to implement the same. In the case of the Gujjars, the success of these measures has been minimal on account of the tardy manner of enactment of the same. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this article is to examine the role played by organizational culture in young people's continuing underrepresentation in decision-making bodies, despite structural changes, in the context of Norwegian sport organizations. Data is based on a questionnaire centred on the experiences of young people in sport governance (n = 32 youth representatives) and semi-structured interviews with young (under 26 years) and older representatives of organizations affiliated with the Norwegian Olympic and Paralympic Committee and Confederations of Sports (n = 10). Findings show that Norwegian sport organizations foster a cultural understanding of young people which takes its structural expression in the separation of elements that are 'othering' the youth. Youth have also limited access to resources of power as a result of a lack of trust in older leaders. Prevailing culture mirrors an adult society in which young people need to upgrade their level of professionalism through education before they are invited to decision-making processes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Diversity, equity, inclusion, and representation in various sectors have garnered increasing attention in the past two decades, including healthcare. In this report we investigate representation of females and underrepresented minorities (URM) in the field of radiology and asses for significant growth trends in representation in residency training programs in the United States. De-identified trainee demographic information for active radiology trainees from 2016 to 2021 was queried using the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME), and new radiology trainees using the National Resident Matching Program (NRMP)'s Main Residency Match Data and Reports databooks. In 2021 females represented 26.7% of DR residency trainees and 22% of IR integrated trainees. In the same year URM trainees represented 11.3% of trainees and 8.7% of IR integrated trainees. From 2017 to 2021, diagnostic radiology had a compound average growth rate (CAGR) 1% (p <0.01) of female representation and 1.12% (p<0.01) of URM representation. This study quantifies female and underrepresented minority representation among radiology trainees for diagnostic radiology and radiology subspecialities, identifying modest uptrends in representation within both demographics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Conceptualising the youth representative as an institutional role, we explore the institutional shaping of youth representatives as change agents in the governance of sport organisations. Focusing on how these shaping conditions who the youth representative can be and what determines the scope of their role fulfilment, including the impact of their work on established institutional orders, allows us to examine the shaping of agency related to governance institutions. Data is drawn from a questionnaire centred on the experiences of young people in sport governance (n = 32) and semi-structured interviews with 10 representatives of organisations affiliated with the Norwegian Olympic and Paralympic Committee and Confederations of Sports. The role of the youth representatives is scripted in terms of who the representatives ought to be and what they ought to do. The scripting associated with the operationalisation of this ambition into role pre- and proscriptions stands in stark contrast to the ideal of youth representatives as agents of institutional change. Our study of the scripting of institutional roles has theoretical implications because it shows how normative typifications that link notions of actors with actorhood circumscribe institutional work pertaining to change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Wilfrid Sellars' denunciation of the Myth of the Given was meant to clarify, against empiricism, that perceptual episodes alone are insufficient to ground and justify perceptual knowledge. Sellars showed that in order to accomplish such epistemic tasks, more resources and capacities, such as those involved in using concepts, are needed. Perceptual knowledge belongs to the space of reasons and not to an independent realm of experience. Dan Hutto and Eric Myin have recently presented the Hard Problem of Content as an ensemble of reasons against naturalistic accounts of content. In a nutshell, it states that covariance relations—even though they are naturalistically acceptable explanatory resources—do not constitute content. The authors exploit this move in order to promote their preferred radical enactivist and anti-representationalist option, according to which, basic minds—the lower stratum of cognition—do not involve content. Although it is controversial to argue that the Hard Problem of Content effectively dismisses naturalistic theories of representation, a central aspect of it—the idea that information as covariance does not suffice to explain content—finds support among the defenders of classical cognitive representationalism, such as Marcin Miłkowski. This support—together with the acknowledgment this remark about covariance is a point already made by Sellars in his criticism of the Myth of the Given—has a number of interesting implications. Not only is it of interest for the debates about representationalism in cognitive science, where it can be understood as an anticipatory move, but it also offers some clues and insights for reconsidering some issues along Sellarsian lines—a conflation between two concepts of representation that is often assumed in cognitive science, a distinction between two types of relevant normativities, and a reconsideration of the naturalism involved in such explanations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes the media coverage of pay equity in women's tennis in three newspapers during the 1973 U.S. Open and 2007 Wimbledon tournaments, the first and last Grand Slams to offer equal pay. Through a feminist textual analysis of over 100 articles, this study shows that journalists portrayed the female athletes involved in the pay equity conversations in 2007 as empowered advocates, marking an important shift from the 'emotional' and 'demanding' descriptions reporters applied to women in 1973. This research ultimately explores the role that the media plays in reflecting and reproducing hegemonic norms around pay equity through representations of leading women athlete activists in the press. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The US federal bureaucracy contains 7 women's policy machineries: The White House Gender Policy Council, the Center for Women Veterans, the Defense Advisory Committee on Women in the Services, the Office of Global Women's Issues at the Department of State, the Office on Women's Health at the Department of Health and Human Services, the Office on Violence Against Women at the Department of Justice, and the Women's Bureau at the Department of Labor. Together these offices provide a broad, shared commitment to advancing women's interests, but they vary greatly in terms of their missions, activities, constituencies served, organizational structure, forms of authorization, and levels of collaboration with political actors inside and outside of government. Recognizing the variation in American women's policy machineries, this paper provides a proposed empirical framework for how scholars can begin to document the variation in American WPMs and analyze how effectively each WPM implements gender equality policies and empowers American women. The first section defines WPMs. The second section proposes the research question, data sources, and methods for a future study of American WPMs. The conclusion discusses the implications adding this proposed study to the broader comparative literature on WPMs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While transgender representation in media has improved in quantity over the last decade, the representation of transgender men in video games is still limited. In this work, I examine the character Tyler from the game Tell Me Why as a critical case study toward the representational adequacy of transgender people in video games. Through a focus on character design, narrative, paratexts, and game reception, I explore the ways Tyler is a more complex example of transgender representation. Additionally, I argue that the act of bringing transgender people into character creation results in a more complex representation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The given text is a list of references and citations for various academic articles and books related to the topic of property and representation. The articles and books cover a range of perspectives and topics, including the relationship between property and democracy, the role of corporations in society, and the concept of workplace democracy. The author, Rutger Claassen, is a professor of political philosophy and economic ethics at Utrecht University. [Extracted from the article]

While blue justice has gained traction, recognition and capability, which are necessary conditions for procedural and distributive justice, remain under-developed. We develop a four-dimensional blue justice framework that builds on recognition and capabilities to critically examine and advance justice in Poland's marine spatial planning (MSP). We find that misrecognition of differential identities and capacities scripted powerless stakeholders out of participation and reduced possibilities for fair distribution. Conversely, MSP regulation augmented the rights of powerful actors through granting de jure "objecting" rights to some, inviting only strategic sectors to agenda-setting fora and, limiting MSP communication to meeting legal requirements. Several stakeholders also see defence and wind energy as key winners of MSP. While society will benefit from national security and energy sufficiency, especially given Russia's increased weaponization of energy, many believe that financial profits from wind energy will accrue to developers. We offer governmental and planning measures to enhance capabilities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite efforts towards diversity, equity, and inclusion in higher education, systemic oppression persists. This study reflects on how initiatives intended to foster inclusion interact with existing exclusionary mechanisms, impeding progress in equity projects. Specifically, we investigate the visual representation of diversity as an inclusion initiative and explore how the new diversity discourse is assimilated into established organizational cultures through intersectional cognitive schemas that help reproduce class, gender, race and ableist relations. Using a gendered lens to analyse university brochure photographs from five universities in Belgium, we identify the distribution of embodied dominant expressions of masculinity and femininity among white and non-white individuals across different professions. Our findings reveal a hierarchy of inclusion based on intersectional cognitive schemas that place non-white individuals under white women and those under white men. These schemas include meritocratic beliefs regarding the required capacities for each profession, with non-white women emerging as the most disadvantaged. The findings suggest that diversity and inclusion initiatives require critical re-evaluation, taking into account the intersectional and systemic nature of oppression. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study analyzes whether the personality traits of Members of Parliament (MPs) affect their attitudes toward the representation of gender equality issues. Based on the Big Five personality traits, we argue that Openness to Experience and Conscientiousness shape MPs' positions toward gender equality policies through two different pathways. The first pathway proposes a direct connection. While Openness is expected to positively affect MPs' support for gender equality, Conscientiousness is assumed to have a negative impact. The second pathway runs indirectly, linking Openness and Conscientiousness to preferences toward gender equality through the effect of these personality traits on MPs' general ideological positions. Using data from a survey of elite politicians in Germany and Switzerland, the results of a causal mediation analysis show a positive direct effect of Openness that holds independent of a mediating influence of political ideology. The analysis deepens our understanding of gender equality legislation and the MPs engaging in it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Biodiversity research is essential for addressing the global biodiversity crisis, necessitating diverse participation and perspectives of researchers from a wide range of backgrounds. However, conservation faces a significant inclusivity problem because local expertise from biodiversity‐rich but economically disadvantaged regions is often underrepresented. This underrepresentation is driven by linguistic bias, undervalued contributions, parachute science practices, and capacity constraints. Although fragmented solutions exist, a unified multistakeholder approach is needed to address the interconnected and systemic conservation issues. We devised a holistic framework of collective responsibility across all research participants and tailored strategies that embrace diversity and dismantle systemic barriers to equitable collaboration. This framework delineates the diverse actors and practices required for promoting inclusivity in biodiversity research, assigning clear responsibilities to researchers, publishers, institutions, and funding bodies. Strategies for researchers include cultivating self‐awareness, expanding literature searches, fostering partnerships with local experts, and promoting knowledge exchange. For institutions, we recommend establishing specialized liaison roles, implementing equitable policies, allocating resources for diversity initiatives, and enhancing support for international researchers. Publishers can facilitate multilingual dissemination, remove financial barriers, establish inclusivity standards, and ensure equitable representation in peer review. Funders must remove systemic barriers, strengthen research networks, and prioritize equitable resource allocation. Implementing these stakeholder‐specific strategies can help dismantle deep‐rooted biases and structural inequities in biodiversity research, catalyzing a shift toward a more inclusive and representative model that amplifies diverse perspectives and maximizes collective knowledge for effective global conservation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Treating counter-disinformation activities as a discursive practice producing knowledge in specific cultural and historical contexts, this article brings a vital cultural studies perspective to an incipient Critical Disinformation Studies agenda. At the same time, it cautions against inadvertently aligning that agenda with the ‘bad faith’, right-wing populist critique of counter-disinformation practices, acknowledging their genuine potential to enhance democratic culture. It proceeds by interrogating the communicative strategies informing the proliferating Western counter-disinformation initiatives which have mushroomed in response to what is widely perceived to be one of democracy’s most potent threats, and which border on a ‘moral panic’ serving to conceal key ideological tensions. Grounded in Critical Discourse Analysis methods, a close reading of mission statements and related materials from the websites of four leading counter-disinformation units demonstrates how these texts interweave three functions – identity construction, performativity, and representation – to generate the overarching ‘discursive formation’ or ‘articulation’ constituting counter-disinformation as modern liberal democracy’s core, but also exposing its fault lines. Specifically, it shows that a failure to reconcile competing accounts of truth (as scientific rationality and normative value) indexes deeper contradictions pitting the liberal emphasis on individual freedom and capitalist efficiency against the democratic prioritizing of popular power, dispassionate observation against civic participation, and the promotion of transparency against the creeping power of surveillance. It concludes that the absolutist epistemology – a vestige of disinformation’s Cold War conceptual origins – designed to cover over these paradoxes masks the complex roles played by truth and deception in politics, thereby hindering the emergence of alternative, oppositional forms of knowledge capable of embracing truth in its radical contingency and plurality and facilitating democratic renewal. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Representation of the disabled community is often associated with negative stereotypes. This negative connotation, among others, includes the difficulty of having a perfect life, being considered a burden, not having opportunities for romantic relationships, and being dependent on others. In the Malaysian context, studies on the representation of disabilities through the media are still not extensive. The representation of these disabled is more prevalent on television programs. While in newspapers, the stereotype is maintained. At the same time, several locally produced films centered on this issue. Taking the problems mentioned as a basis, this study looks at the representation of the disabled in local films. This study uses a close reading method on 5 films which are Redha (Beautiful Pain) (2016), Pekak (2016), Guang (2018), MagiK (2023), and Abang Adik (2023). The findings reveal that while stereotypical representations persist, these films also highlight universal humanitarian issues and the talents and advantages of disabled characters. This new representation challenges existing stereotypes and offers a more nuanced view of disability. The study concludes that although there has been progress in portraying disabled characters in Malaysian films, further efforts are needed to ensure that media representations are inclusive and free from harmful stereotypes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The presence of men as Make Up Artists (MUAs) is often viewed negatively in Indonesian society, which tends to associate this profession with women. This study aims to analyze the representation of Bubah Alfian's masculinity as an MUA through his Instagram account. The research employs Norman Fairclough's Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) methodology to analyze 25 video reels uploaded by Bubah Alfian. Data collection techniques involve in-depth observation and textual and visual analysis of the video reels. The results show that Bubah Alfian successfully combines masculine and feminine elements in his identity as an MUA, challenging traditional gender stereotypes. These findings suggest that masculinity can be expressed more fluidly and flexibly through social media, particularly in professions typically associated with women. Additionally, the representation of masculinity displayed by Bubah Alfian offers new perspectives on how men in the beauty profession can leverage social media to craft a unique and authentic gender identity. This research makes significant contributions to the field of communication studies, particularly in the study of gender representation on social media, and demonstrates how social media can be used as a tool for social change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A close connection between public opinion and policy is considered a vital element of democracy. However, legislators cannot be responsive to all voters at all times with regard to the policies the latter favour. We argue that legislators use their speaking time in parliament to offer compensatory speech to their constituents who might oppose how they voted on a policy, in order to re‐establish themselves as responsive to the public's wishes. Leveraging the case of Brexit, we show that legislators pay more attention to constituents who might be dissatisfied with how they voted. Furthermore, their use of rhetorical responsiveness is contingent on the magnitude of the representational deficit they face vis‐à‐vis their constituency. Our findings attest to the central role of parliamentary speech in maintaining responsiveness. They also demonstrate that communicative responsiveness can substitute for policy responsiveness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How does political experience affect the issues that men and women politicians prioritize? Gender stereotypical expectations dictate that women focus more on traditionally "feminine" policy areas. While past findings broadly support this, they do not examine how policy priorities shift with increased experience. Focusing on the United Kingdom, I argue that gender differences in the extent to which politicians raise issues traditionally associated with women will be most pronounced among junior politicians who lack experience in the eyes of the public and their colleagues, but will decline with increased political experience. To test this, I study parliamentary debates between 1997 and 2019 and leverage novel quantitative text approaches to measure politicians' issue priorities. I show that, among junior politicians, women talk significantly more about "feminine" issues, however this gap decreases markedly with increased seniority. These findings have important implications for the representation of women's voices and perspectives within the policymaking process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]