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The literature on repression in social movement studies focuses mainly on protest behavior and neglects other aspects of activism. This paper expands this literature by looking at how surveillance as a covert form of repression affects organizational practices in social movements. The secessionist mobilizations around the 1 October 2017 referendum in Catalonia serve as a case study to explore this question. Semi-structured interviews with organizers from the Catalan independence movement were used to identify two surveillance threats. Organizers feared the monitoring of their digital communication and the infiltration of their assemblies. They responded to these threats with five moves of counter-surveillant organizing: encryption, face-to-face communication, analogizing meetings, committee decision making, and closingoff assemblies. How organizers perceived surveillance and responded was closely connected to the cyclical dynamics of contention over time. The five moves allowed the movement to resist surveillance at least in the short term without moderating their claims or going underground. However, they were also harmful to the Catalan independence movement's organizing culture based on inclusivity and horizontality. These findings suggest that the consequences of repression for social movements go well beyond protest behavior and have a profound impact on their organizational practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Nationalism in Asia and Africa is generally understood as a modern secular movement for independence. However, this idea is contestable. Analysing nationalism in India and the Sudan, this paper argues that nationalist movements there actually had their origins in Islamic religious resistance against the British colonial rule preceding the development of secular nationalism. Depending on political development following the colonial advancement, the secular elite‐led nationalism also largely fostered religious communal nationalism in India and the Sudan. This substantiates the argument that religion never ceased to play the most central role in the nationalist movements in India and the Sudan. Following an inter‐continental approach to study nationalism, this article explores exclusively the connection between religion and the first ever generic nationalist movements in the context of colonialism in India and the Sudan. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Are secessionisms from and within the EU comparable? What motivates them and to what extent do they pose similar challenges to EU territorial governance? This article addresses these questions by comparing the framing of the British Leave campaign and the Catalan independence movement. Drawing on the FraTerr database and method, the analysis suggests that secessionism from the EU and secessionism within the EU are different political phenomena despite sharing an emphasis on sovereignty and the common goal of breaking-up from an existing polity. Secessionism from the EU is primarily a call for the recovery of lost sovereignty and of classical functions of the state such as border control. Secessionism within the EU invokes sovereignty as the right to external self-determination and adds narratives around a better future and greater democratic quality and social justice. These two types of secessionism pose different challenges to EU territorial governance because the first entails a full rejection of the European project while the latter calls for a review of European multi-level governance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While the post-9/11 event has animated how state actors frame terrorism, contemporary studies have failed to address the politics inherent in proscribing, repressing, and labeling separatist movements as terrorists. This paper explores the politics of framing terrorism using the contemporary self-determination struggles advanced by the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) and the Yoruba Nation's freedom frontiers. The study proposes a United Nations-coordinated global framework for regulating and evaluating states' activities in identifying specific groups as terrorists. Taking such a stance would prevent aggrieved agitators from being persecuted by the state in the name of terror. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents the topic of borders in the international system of the 21st century, highlighting their importance in the creation and development of nation-states and in international relations. It also mentions exceptions to state sovereignty, such as Antarctica and international waters. The article is divided into three sections that analyze borders from different perspectives, such as regionalism and border control in relation to international migration. Additionally, other topics are mentioned, such as the impact of climate change on maritime delimitations in the Arctic, China's territorial disputes in the South China Sea, border disputes between India and China, hybrid governance in the border area between Colombia, Brazil, and Peru, and the secessionist movement of contemporary maroons in Jamaica and its relationship with the Jamaican state. [Extracted from the article]

For two weeks in May 2024, protests by pro-independence indigenous Kanaks in the French Pacific territory of New Caledonia erupted into a wave of rioting; erection of barricades; and burning of factories, shops and homes with thde deaths of seven people--five Melanesians and two gendarmes. Since the late 1980s the Kanak independence movement had been consistently engaging with the 1988 Matignon then 1998 Nouméa Accords with Paris in an evolving process as part of their struggle for self-determination. The Nouméa Accord set out a framework for transferring power to the people of New Caledonia, through a series of three referenda. However, after France moved to unilaterally break with the Accords and declare independence as being off the table that the country returned to a state of unrest. This article recalls the influence of one of the leaders of the 1980s upheaval, Éloi Machoro. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Copyright of Virtual Archaeology Review is the property of Virtual Archaeology Review and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Canadian Journal of Latin American & Caribbean Studies (Routledge) is the property of Routledge and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Since Nigeria’s return to democratic governance in 1999, there have been renewed calls―predominantly amongst ethnic Igbos in southeast Nigeria―for the restoration of the defunct secessionist state of Biafra. The resurgent Biafran separatism has been explored through the prisms of relative marginalisation and material deprivation. However, some scholars have drifted away from dominant discussions on the rationale behind the re‐emergence of the secessionist agitations and instead focused on the myriad media that Biafran separatist movements utilise to make claims of self‐determination for Igbos. These scholars―typically linguists―invariably explore online activism by resorting to meticulous analysis of the discourses of pro‐Biafra separatists on the Internet. Whilst such robust discourse analyses of separatists’ speeches shed light on the discursive dynamics of Biafran separatism in contemporary Nigeria, they do not underscore the varied repertoires of collective action of Biafran separatists beyond Internet activism. This article fills this gap in the scholarly literature on resurgent Biafran separatism in democratic Nigeria. Drawing on the American sociologist Charles Tilly’s analytical framework of contentious contention and focusing on the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB)―a transnational separatist movement―I argue that the various online and offline activities of Biafran separatists in the southeastern region be construed as repertoires of contention geared toward contesting the sovereignty of the Nigerian state in order to restore the short‐lived secessionist Biafran state. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It analyses the historical, institutional, and political framework of the initial situation which, throughout the 19th century, developed on the island of Cuba as a scenario for the formation of the independence movement. At the same time, some considerations are offered on the Monroe Doctrine and on the vision that the United States had of the relationship with the American territories in general and with the island of Cuba in particular. Finally, some information is offered on the debates surrounding the granting of autonomy to Cuba. It highlights the deficient and late application of this measure, which could no longer resolve the inevitable consequence of its independence, which, in any case, was supported by its northern neighbor. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Existing works on the sources of secessionist agitations in postcolonial Africa tend to be methodologically nationalist but also circumvent the diasporic dimension. Particularly, the resurgent ethnic separatism amongst Igbos in southeastern Nigeria has been predominantly analysed from the theoretical standpoints of relative marginalisation and material deprivation that focus on domestic politics in post-war Nigeria. We broaden this literature by underscoring the diasporic dimension of this secessionist conflict. Drawing on the literature on diaspora nationalism with a focus on the case of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB)—a transnational separatist movement—we reveal evidence showing how the Igbo diaspora instigate and exacerbate separatist tensions in the homeland by reviving collective memories of the macabre Nigeria-Biafra war (1967–1970) and reimagining alternative political futures for ethnic Igbos devoid of the state's grand narratives of nationhood. We contend that the diasporic dimension is profoundly critical to comprehending separatist agitations in southeastern Nigeria with implications for wider postcolonial African contexts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since 2010 the Catalan secessionist movement has been reported on extensively in the global media. Beginning with the 2010 demonstrations against the decision of the Spanish Constitutional Court to reject a new Catalan statute of autonomy, and covering subsequent events such as the unofficial self-determination referendum in 2017, the trial and imprisonment of Catalan political leaders, and the violent protests against the verdicts; the events in the region have all featured heavily on the front pages of the international press. This study analyzes how US and UK newspapers have covered the Catalan independence movement during the period from 2010 to 2019. To do so, this study focuses on two US newspapers (The New York Times and The Washington Post) and two from the UK newspapers (The Daily Telegraph and The Guardian) and observes how the positions of the Spanish and Catalan governments are represented through the analysis of the frames used to construct the newspapers' coverage, as well as the overall tone and the sources used by the journalists. To detect the dominant framework, a framing analysis is undertaken from a communicative and deductive perspective, applying Semetko and Valkenburg's classification. In-depth interviews are also conducted with the newspapers' Spanish-based foreign correspondents which allows the analysis to include the correspondents' views on the difficulties faced by them during their time spent while covering the conflict. The study's primary conclusion is that the international press downplays the significant role played by social movements and civil society in the secession movement, with a strong preference shown by journalists to rely on representatives of official sources as the most valid spokespersons for the movement. Secondly, the study finds that media attention follows closely the flash-points of the conflict with more coverage appearing at the moments of greater political tension between the Spanish and Catalan governments. This suggests that civil society mobilizations attract less interest from the media that instead prefers to focus on developments in the political sphere. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article offers a critique of the 'decentred state' and the working of the devolved Scottish Parliament in its legislative and political relations with the UK Parliament. It argues that analysis of relations between the devolved Scottish Parliament and the UK Parliament, requires examination of both the political culture and political narratives surrounding constitutional governance and the future of the domestic UK union. Both play a pivotal role in shaping interparliamentary relations in the devolved UK. The paper draws on empirical research from two projects that used both documentary analysis of parliamentary sources and interviews with 35 parliamentarians and officials as a Commons Academic Fellow 2016–2021 and Scottish Parliament Academic Fellow 2022–2023. Both the political narrative and culture of interparliamentary relations between the UK Parliament and Scottish Parliament have been impacted arguably even more by the outcome of the 2016 UK EU Referendum than by the 2014 Scottish Independence Referendum. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Chinese Christian church was accused of colluding with Western imperialism, and this led to the anti-Christian movement. The Chinese church responded by accelerating a movement of church independence. Discussions of this movement have often been incorporated into a discourse of aggression and resistance between East and West. Such discussions obscure the differences between individuals and the plurality of thought in the Chinese church. Based on the textual analysis of his writings, the article aims to reveal previously overlooked details within Jia Yuming's justification of the independence movement by. On the one hand, Jia responded to nationalism by pointing out the ethnic and national identities and obligations of Christians. On the other hand, he avoided conflict with the Western missions in the process of independence, thus taking the church's independence out of the context of East–West confrontation. Finally, he reconciled the conflict between national identity and the Western image with the ecumenical values of Christ and the Christian reformation of society, unifying both sides with ultimate spirituality. His justification draws attention to an attuned theological path of thought in the process of indigenization of the Chinese church. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Revista Catalana de Dret Públic is the property of Revista Catalana de Dret Public and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Revista Catalana de Dret Públic is the property of Revista Catalana de Dret Public and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This paper employs postcolonial criticism to examine the roles of leaders of independence movements in the decolonization process. The objective is to ascertain the extent to which the policies of the colonial period are reflected in the leadership understanding and roles of the administrative culture in colonist-colony-colonized relations and to what extent the policies of the colonial period are related to recolonization. This paper examines how the dominant themes of the debates during the colonial period were reflected in the attitudes and policies of the post-independence leaders. In conclusion, this study asserts that a comparable experience in the process of re-colonization is reflected in the dominance of certain policies and debates surrounding nationalization, despite the movements of independence that originated against the colonists. In this regard, the article compares the leaders of Botswana and Zimbabwe, two neighboring countries with similar historical backgrounds but disparate experiences. This comparison, based on postcolonial criticism, has revealed that although the decolonization process has been experienced, it offers examples of leadership, one positive and the other negative, as a continuation of re-colonialism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During the Korean War, major powers such as the United States, Soviet Union, and China were solely driven by their own security interests. Consequently, their policies towards the crisis prioritized their own security and power maximization, leading to their alignment with one side and intensifying the conflict. While the United States sided with the South, China and the Soviet Union sided with the North. In contrast, India took a unique approach during the Korean War. India, which was heavily involved in the crisis as a proactive peacemaker, adopted a stance based on morality, neutrality, and favorability towards the Korean people. This approach was very different from the major powers who were focused on their security and power interests. The question that arises is: why did India take a different stance than other major powers? What explains India’s role as a peacemaker that focused on morality and neutrality in the Korean War when other major powers were focused on power and security maximization? To answer these questions, I draw on the existing literature that suggests the ideas generated domestically can profoundly impact foreign policy. Based on this, I argue that India’s active role in seeking peace during the Korean War and its unique approach to resolving the Korean crisis was largely influenced by principled ideas such as non-interference, neutrality, rejection of power politics, and Asian unity rooted in its historical experience during the independence movement. To evaluate my argument, I employ four case studies related to India’s involvement in the Korean War and demonstrate how the principled ideas discussed above influenced India’s active but neutral and unbiased peacemaking role in resolving the Korean question at a time when major powers’ security maximization actions were intensifying the crisis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research aims to analyze collaborative governance in the implementation of the South Sumatera Movement for Independent Food Program in the South Sumatera Province. This research focuses on the management and utilization of assets of the General Bureau of South Sumatera Province, which is analyzed through the collaborative process adopted from the Ring and Van de Ven theory (1994). The collaboration process includes the negotiation process between the actors involved, the joint commitment to collaborate, the implementation of collaboration according to agreement, and the assessment of the entire collaborating process in the implementation of the South Sumatera Independent Food Movement Program in the ideal South Sumatera Province. Data collection techniques used include interviews, observations, and documentation. Data analysis techniques used interactive models, that is, condensation, data presentation, and conclusion drawings. The results of the research showed that the implementation of the GSMP in South Sumatera faced several obstacles in the field, among others--beneficiaries are still focused on the main activity of obtaining income, so the aid received has not been optimally utilized. The assistance provided has not been fully adapted to the field conditions and the skills of the beneficiaries at each location. Implementation of the South Sumatera Movement for Food Independence in the South Sumatera Province requires synergistic, coordinated, and collaborative cooperation between the actors involved - government, private/business, colleges, the public, and mass media. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Darwinism and evolutionary theory have a bad track record in political theory, given their entanglements with fin-de-siècle militarist imperialisms, racialized hierarchies, and eugenic reformism. In colonial contexts, however, Darwinism had an entirely different afterlife as anticolonialists marshaled evolutionist frameworks to contest the parameters of colonial rule. This article exhumes just such an evolutionary anticolonialism in the political thought of Aurobindo Ghose, radical firebrand of the early Indian independence movement. I argue that Ghose drew on a nuanced reform Darwinism to criticize British imperialism and advance an alternative grounded in the Indian polity's mutualism. Evolutionism formed a conceptual ecosystem framing his understanding of progress—national, civilizational, and spiritual—and reformulating the temporal and conceptual coordinates of the liberal empire he resisted. The article thus exposes the constructiveness of anticolonial politics, the hybridity of South Asian intellectual history, and the surprising critical potential of Darwinism in colonial settings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper estimates levels of prejudice in Scotland with data from the 2021 Scottish Election Survey. It examines both direct and indirect indicators of prejudice to discover that somewhere between 15 and 20 percent of respondents indicate prejudicial feelings towards immigrants. Comparisons with results from other surveys in the UK and abroad suggest lower rates of prejudice in Scotland, and declining rates of prejudice over time. Empirical comparisons reveal direct and indirect prejudice to be closely related in Scotland, and regression analysis discovers common determinants of directly and indirectly prejudicial feelings. Political positions, such as ideological conservativism, identifying as a Remainer in the Brexit debate, and support for Scottish independence are important determinants across indicators of prejudice, and the strength of these political indicators demonstrates how Scottish political culture has been linked to minority politics in such a way as to re-draw social boundaries around expressions of prejudice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article uses the deliberations of the Museums Association of Pakistan to demonstrate the collaborative and multidisciplinary nature of national history-writing that took place in the wake of Pakistan's independence from British colonial rule. It repositions museums as an important stage on which new national narratives—and, by extension, new South Asian histories—were generated, rather than their being mere showcases for histories scripted elsewhere or being dismissed as colonial relics. It also draws attention to the individuals and the networks that shaped these histories, widening the net to include more than elite politicians and grand narratives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Scholars generally argue that nationalism and secessionism pose important dilemmas for national, regional and global order. Yet, there is inadequate discussion on the varied contexts of nationalist secessionist movements and how they influence or are influenced by domestic and global forces. Addressing this concern, this article undertakes a three‐case comparison of the Western Togoland separatist movement in Ghana, Southwest and Northwest (Anglophone) Cameroon's secessionist movement and the movement for independent Catalonia in Spain. These dissimilar cases—both from Global South and North—enable a broader examination of how themes such as political history, state capacity and regional/continental organisations affect nationalist‐induced secessionist movements and the measures to address them. Using a thematic comparative approach, this article examines the relevant literature on secessionism, nationalism, regionalism and cognate fields to demonstrate that the dynamics and consequence of secessionist movements depend largely on four interwoven factors: (a) the internal organisation and support for the nationalists' course, (b) state capacity to handle uprisings, (c) political conditions and conflict context of neighbouring countries and (d) interest and (re)actions of regional bodies and international allies. The comparative approach thus offers nuance, illustrating the critical angles of variations and intersections in secessionist movements and the effect on global order. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, Amazon imagery serves as a case study for the complicated relationship of lesbian separatist movements of the 1970s and the classical Greek tradition. I consider how the use of mythological figures allowed lesbian feminists to rewrite and subvert dominant patriarchal narratives in ways that furthered their revolutionary projects. I argue that the nature of mythology is fundamentally fluid, collaborative, and open to queer reinterpretations and appropriations in ways that are rich with symbolic potential. Furthermore, the creation of separatist communities approximates an act of nation-building, and it is useful to consider other attempts to construct and theorize nations, ranging from Homi Bhabha on post-/anticolonial resistance to Berlant and Freeman on Queer Nationality. In particular, when considering a lesbian movement, we should remember that queer theory is messy because queerness itself is messy and resists boundaries and classification. Furthermore, what Ward frames as "dyke methods" (or dyke-centric queer methods) insist on categories that are fluid, messy, and shifting in their classifications and drawn toward as-yet-unknown queer possibilities. To study lesbian separatists with dyke methods is to embark on "an antiessentialist and interdisciplinary project" without necessarily "making a commitment to balanced ideas" (pp. 82–83). It is my hope that a messy, queer analysis of Amazonian symbolism in the construction of a lesbian nationalism will ultimately offer intriguing, if at times contradictory, possibilities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While earlier studies have concentrated on the political and historical dynamics of the Cameroon Ambazonian separatist conflict, there is little knowledge on the effects of the conflict in Anglophone regions on Cameroonian refugees in Nigeria. The study used the mixed method to show how decades of Cameroon's repressive governance system that favors Francophone Cameroonians against Anglophone Cameroonians accounts for the Ambazonian separatist movement, forcing Cameroonians into migration and generating humanitarian crisis for Cameroonian refugees in Nigeria. It recommends that the intervention of the United Nations is capable of mitigating the conflict and preventing the humanitarian consequences in Nigeria. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the idea that poetry possesses a wisdom beyond the poet's control, challenging the notion of complete authorial authority. It explores how poets initially seek to express themselves through their work but eventually learn to surrender to the poem's inherent autonomy, emphasizing the importance of deep listening, relinquishing control, and employing craft elements like rhythm to shape the poem's emergence.

Scottish independence is a matter for debate, not only in Scotland and elsewhere in the UK, but also in the Scottish diaspora. Their views have rarely been sought, yet they will have a view on the constitutional future of their homeland. This paper draws on research on attitudes to independence within the diaspora, and concludes that individuals in North America generally favour independence more than those in England. But attitudes are changing, partly because of Brexit, and partly related to the UK Conservative government, which is seen as not reflecting Scottish views and values. Independence is now considered more positively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Chan-bul-ga (찬불가, 讚佛歌), which in English means 'songs in praise of the Buddha', refers to a style of Korean Buddhist hymn that emerged during the modernization of Korean Buddhism. Buddhist hymns—which can be considered to be based on Christian hymns—are characterized by the fact that they can be easily learned by the general public so that they can easily participate in Buddhist rituals together, unlike the existing Korean Buddhist musical styles of 'Beom-pae (범패, 梵唄)' and 'Hwa-cheong (화청, 和請)'. The monk Baek Yong-sung (1864–1940), who embraced the function and effectiveness of these new religious music styles as one of his methods of propagation, participated in the independence movement after the 1910 Korea–Japan Annexation Treaty, and he led both the public enlightenment movement and the spread of Buddhism by creating Buddhist hymns. The present study seeks to examine Baek Yong-sung's social activities and the context in which modern Buddhist hymns emerged. This study also explores the religious, social, and musical meanings of Buddhist hymns while focusing on his works 'Wang-seng-ga (왕생가)' and 'Se-gye-gi-si-ga (세계기시가)'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How should democratic states approach and respond to secessionist movements using tactics contrary to the constitution to achieve their goals? What is the role of international human rights mechanisms in these processes? This article sheds light on these questions by examining how the UN Human Rights Committee approached and assessed two complaints that came before it in the wake of the Catalan Declaration of Independence in 2017. The aim is to discuss the Committee's examination of the merits in the two cases and the procedural hurdles faced. Specifically, it will analyse the effects of examining the merits in hindsight and the extent to which this perspective may have influenced its views. It will further reflect on the potential costs of acting with procedural flexibility towards the two complaints which, while driven by a sense of urgency, did not meet the threshold for irreparable harm. It is concluded that, while a protective stance towards petitioners is the bedrock of its mandate related to individual complaints, acting with such degree of flexibility risks undermining its procedural effectiveness and the integrity of its individual complaint procedure. It also made it come too close to act as a fourth instance in relation to facts that had already been examined by domestic courts by the time of its assessment. At the same time, it did not challenge Spain's rule of law approach as such. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article briefly identifies the aspects of public international law related to the Catalan secession process, bearing in mind that Spain is a constitutional social and democratic state governed by the rule of law and a member of both the European Union (EU) and the Council of Europe (CoE). Over 6 years ago, on 27 October 2017, the regional Catalan Parliament proclaimed the independence of the Autonomous Community of Catalonia. From the start, the most recondite stratum of the Catalan pro-independence strategy has consistently invoked international law considerations with no real basis. Here we explain why. First, given the function of state sovereignty (today humanized and, in the context of the EU and CoE, democratized), under international law, these events can only be classified as a secession process (stricto sensu), that is, a revolutionary act in the constitutional order of the state of Spain with undertones that are far from peaceful. Second, we address the facet of the Catalan pro-secession strategy – typical of populist policies today – consisting of abusing terms and concepts, a language policy that, in our view, was and still is intended to win the minds of both the Catalan population and any other uninformed external observers. Finally, we examine how statehood is acquired under international law and its relationship to the 2017 declaration of Catalan independence and the present-day situation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the phenomenon of the "populism of the privileged", whereby relatively privileged groups articulate populism to legitimize and enhance their positions of domination. Despite the growing literature on populism, few studies have attended to this counterintuitive construction of "the people" as an underdog struggling against a power bloc from a position of relative privilege. By examining the Catalan independence movement during the 2010s, this study draws on discourse theory to conceptualize the "populism of the privileged" and explore how various dimensions of sociological privilege are used to legitimize and reinforce dominant positions within Catalonia and Spain by means of populist politics. Finally, the article engages with the implications of the "populism of the privileged" in terms of inter-group relations, political integration, and the democratic principle of equality. By offering a nuanced analysis of this underexplored phenomenon, this article contributes to the growing literature on populism and provides insights into the complex relationship between populism, privilege, and power. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

At sixty years, the Biafran movement has evolved, with actors and narratives shaped by new demographics, discourse modalities, and ideologies. While its most compelling leaders – Ojukwu and Kanu — share a secessionist goal, Kanu's rhetoric is widely perceived as diverging from his forebear's. With frameworks in discourse studies, I explore wide-ranging topoi of legitimation in Ojukwu's chronicles of the Nigeria-Biafra war, and a corpus ofliberationist narratives by Kanu, leader of the present-day IPOB. I show that the resurged movement remains a clone of the old, united by insurrectionism and the various propagandist tools that have become indexical of the secessionist struggle. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Discussion of learner autonomy has often been led by educationalists and policy makers. How do learners interpret the notion? This question, as well as addressing how students’ understandings compared to those of their instructors’ were the questions that the research sought to answer. The research undertook to explore the notion of the autonomous learner as understood by 115 students and 49 instructors at a select French higher education engineering school. Data was collected using open-ended questions and analysed using triangulation to reduce systemic bias via multiple qualitative data analysis methods. Four themes emerged from the analysis. Analyses pointed to similarities and to differences in the ways students and instructors understood the meaning of learner autonomy. Divergent perspectives that students and instructors had revealed that students were more concerned with their ability to compose their curricular programme and choose means to attain objectives. Instructors, on the other hand, were concerned with students’ course subject ownership. Recommendations to bridge understandings and help form a shared vision of goals when speaking of learner autonomy are presented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Meaningful participation of Indigenous youth is embedded in the broader historical context of consultations with Indigenous peoples in Canada that have often reproduced colonial power dynamics. This article describes an Indigenous-driven consultation in Quebec that provided culturally responsive spaces where youth defined priorities. The consultative formats undertaken by four Indigenous organizations involved (a) engaging and representing youth's diverse realities, (b) reappropriation of process, (c) supporting youth voices and identities, and (d) multilevel impacts. Appropriate and inclusive approaches to consultation support meaningful youth participation, sense of identity and belonging, and autonomy. These innovative practices demonstrate how Indigenous youth reclaim marginalized political spaces. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During the late 1950s, prompted by the US State Department, an interracial group of national leaders of women's organizations in the United States formed the African Women's Committee to reach out to their African counterparts in the wake of successful independence movements throughout the continent. After consulting with numerous African women and leading experts on Africa, the committee initiated a program that brought groups of African women to the United States for short training programs designed to strengthen their leadership skills through both coursework and immersion in women's organizations. This article examines the assumptions both groups of women brought to their interactions and the ways the program changed during this period as a response to racist encounters in the US, new teachers in the classes and African women's evaluations of their experiences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Why do some countries escape the political resource curse while others do not? Most scholars argue that avoiding the claimed anti-democratic effects of natural resources, especially oil, largely depends on the quality of pre-existing political institutions and/or the effectiveness of contemporary resource management institutions. Drawing on the most-likely case of Timor-Leste, one of the world's most oil-dependent countries that nevertheless successfully consolidated democracy, we challenge these dominant theories and highlight new important factors to consider. We show that Timor-Leste did not avoid the curse because of good pre-existing political institutions, good natural resource governance institutions, or an otherwise favorable environment for democracy. Instead, we find that the ideological beliefs of major political actors, their strong popular legitimacy, the absence of a hegemonic actor among them, as well as the approaches of external actors, have produced a consolidated democracy despite strong incentives for the development of authoritarianism. These findings highlight the importance of ideology and agency, of the composition of independence movements, and of constructive international engagement, in particular at critical historical junctures. In short, even countries facing serious political and economic challenges can avoid the political resource curse, and both scholars and policymakers should consider a broader approach to the phenomenon. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Establishing government agencies outside ministerial departments is frequently justified by a need to safeguard agency autonomy. In addition to 'formal agencification', that is, erecting formal barriers between agencies and ministries, agencies are also frequently (re)located physically distant from ministries to both signal and strengthen agency autonomy. However, we know little of the effects of physical location and distance on agency autonomy. Using two large surveys from 2006 and 2016, this study examines how geographical location and distance affect agency autonomy. Our study establishes that agency autonomy is only weakly associated with physical location and distance, and is much less important than political salience. Whereas a conventional claim is that agency autonomy may be strengthened by physically (re)locating agencies at arm's length distance from the core executive, our study suggests that physical (re)location represents an in effective administrative policy design-tool when applied to agency autonomy. Points for practitioners: Physical distance between agencies and parent ministries is only remotely associated with agency autonomy. Physical location thus represents an ineffective design-tool if the purpose is to increase agency autonomy [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Schools around the world are diverse and there are a variety of progressivist initiatives in place that aim to promote quality and equitable pedagogy and overcome formalist paradigms. Country contexts present different challenges based on factors such as the type of governance, teachers' autonomy, and pedagogical cultures. Most critical, however, is the unequal distribution of leadership opportunities. Beyond conflicting or contrived possibilities in school leadership arrangements and cultures, it should be recognized that certain contexts lack effective leadership as an organizational quality. Nevertheless, school principals are able to create coherent environments, offering space for debate and clarification of what equity and equality mean in terms of curriculum delivery, as well as supporting school-level structural facilitations and adaptations. This is a conceptual paper, at the crossroads of different research strands. It focuses on governance mechanisms and leadership tasks and skills in pedagogical and organizational school cultures. It argues that well-articulated school organization is needed, not only in terms of autonomy, but also with the possibility to collaborate, develop professionally, and engage locally in order to achieve equitable student-oriented teaching. The aim is to investigate the feasibility of supporting personalized and adaptive teaching strategies at the school level, in a variety of country contexts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research investigates the influence of the whole school approach (WSA) on the education for sustainable development (ESD) practices of teachers in Japan. We focus on understanding how school organizations that facilitate WSA influence teachers' ESD practices in a multifaceted and hierarchical manner. The multilevel analysis, which targeted 683 elementary and middle school teachers in ESD-promoting schools, revealed that the actual working environment may be more important than the school's management system for helping individual teachers implement ESD, and that school-level WSA made a clear contribution to promoting ESD. The research suggests the importance of establishing the environmental conditions, such as the school board and principals' guarantee of basic conditions (e.g., working hours, teaching materials, and an environment where teachers can exercise ownership), so that teachers who are interested in ESD practice can feel secure and assume ownership of ESD activities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents an interview with Aisha Shillingford, exploring her multidisciplinary artistic approach and her depiction of the afterlife as a journey of the soul. Shillingford integrates diverse cultural references into her artwork to invite viewers to decipher its narrative elements, aiming to create images that evoke desires for autonomy and collective freedom among Black people while challenging conventional notions of beauty and access.

Despite the acceptance by African states of the principle of respect for post‑colonial borders (adopted at the Organisation of African Unity in 1964), the post-colonial period saw more than a dozen cases of separatist movements forming in Africa, seeking to create new states. In two cases, this resulted in a real change of borders – in 1993, Eritrea was created through secession from Ethiopia, and in 2011, the southern provinces of Sudan proclaimed the creation of South Sudan. Effectively, though without international legal recognition, there is Somaliland, which in 1991 proclaimed independence in the northern part of Somalia. In addition, separatist movements have occurred in the Democratic Republic of Congo (Katanga and Kasai), Nigeria (Biafra), Tanzania (Zanzibar), Cameroon (Ambazonia), Angola (Cabinda), Senegal (Casamance), Mali (Azawad). Among the causes of each of Africa’s separatisms is a confluence of local factors of a political, ethnic or economic nature. Multi-ethnicity and multiculturalism (resulting from the artificial nature of borders), low levels of socioeconomic development and dysfunctional states generate contradictions, leading to disturbances in the stability of individual countries, and their manifestation sometimes becomes the aspirations of certain social groups to achieve – in the absence of states effectively performing their functions – political independence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In India, there are diverse groups of races- the Mongoloid, the Austric, the Aryans, and the Dravidian. North-eastern India has had different ethnic communities for a very long time. It is recognized as a diverse place of multiethnic states. Each social group has its own definite culture, languages, and customs. As such, in North-eastern States, since Independence, Indian politics has faced ethnic -conflict and inter-ethnic mobility. Most ethnic societies have experienced political articulation in the line of ethnicity. The Bodos of Assam had struggled to attain autonomy. So keeping in view such a scenario of a sociopolitical situation, this work will focus on the causes of identity assertion and analyze the phases of the Bodo ethnic movement for self-determination. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]