Rethinking about Civilizations: The Politics of Migration in a New Climate

Abstract

In this paper, I will lay out some useful conceptual/theoretical markets that will help us to understand, and resolve, significant political challenges to ‘action’ on climate change migration. Thus, while this paper is concerned with climate change and migration responses, it is also concerned with understanding how we understand migration in the context of climate change, and how climate change forces a radical shift in such understandings. To do so, I pick up on the work of Robert W. Cox and push it in a different direction. In particular, I am interested in his work on civilizations, and how this civilizational account of world politics opens up space for thinking about climate change broadly, and climate change migration specifically. I argue that Cox’s account of ‘inter-civilizational’ politics helps us to solve a pressing analytical problem: how to rethink the coordinates of contemporary cosmopolitics in the ‘Anthropocene’, and reconsider the frames of analysis that we adopt to understand and respond to climate change migration. I demonstrate this by considering two distinctly different ‘civilizational’ accounts of migration and mobility in the Asia-Pacific/Oceania region (one territorial and the other maritime), and consider how these might reveal an important source of future change. By sketching out this approach, my intention is to mobilize the resources offered by Cox in order to further his project of envisaging alternative world orders, and post-hegemonic political relations therein.     

Bureaucratic manoeuvres and the local politics of climate change mitigation in China and India

This article explores how strategies of thinking and working politically are used by agencies within developing country governments to influence wider government agendas. It uses research on climate change mitigation in China and India to explore how government agencies seek to overcome challenges of limited capacity and competing priorities by bundling climate change together with more immediate priorities and thereby developing a coalition with an interest in achieving these objectives. The article is based on interviews conducted in China and India, as well as analysis of themes covered in the growing body of literature on the domestic politics of climate change mitigation. In both countries we found that pragmatic approaches leveraging what already exists made significant progress in putting energy efficiency on the agenda, strengthening institutional presence (in India) and delivering improvements in energy efficiency (in China). Yet, we also found that the use of these tactics had significant limitations. While there was probably no other way that the policy space given to climate change mitigation could have increased so rapidly, there are significant side effects that arise as a result of the traction gained by these initial policy approaches. While bundling raised the profile of energy efficiency, it also created perverse incentives that highlight the need to consider the long‐term effect on the interests, capacity and sustainability of informal coalitions. We highlight the need to take account of both the short‐ and long‐term effects of thinking and working politically, and the challenges of doing so when the outcomes are unpredictable and inherently difficult to assess.     

The political economy of financial inclusion: tailoring donor policy to fit

Financial inclusion has recently become a globally acclaimed policy objective. This provokes the need to review policy in this sector, particularly in light of the tensions that arise between donor approaches founded on market modernism and governments with more activist leanings. This is done here in the context of efforts to move donor development policy beyond ‘best practice’ institutional blue‐prints to those which are ‘good enough’, which seek to understand underlying political economy dynamics in order to find space to engage with governments. In doing so, it is argued that there is scope for ‘working with the grain’ and harnessing the political economy of government policy in order to produce financial inclusion outcomes.     

How Unpopular Policies are Made: Examples from South Africa,Singapore and Bangladesh

In this article we contribute to the emerging knowledge on migration policy‐making in two ways. Firstly, we address the relative lack of research on the gendered nature of migration policy‐making. Secondly we contribute to understanding migration policymaking in postcolonial contexts. Based on case studies from Bangladesh, South Africa, and Singapore, we trace the drivers of policy change in these contexts and how the gendered vulnerability of the intended beneficiaries impacted the policy process. We found that there were four main drivers of migration policy‐making in each of the countries. They were: the role‐players in the policy change process, the debates that shaped the policy change, the research involved, and the political context in which the policy change took place. While our research drew on existing policy frameworks, it also showed that policy development is shaped by complex socio‐political conditions.     

The framing of return from above and below in Ecuadorian migration: a project,a myth,or a political device?

Although return migration is a significant topic in current policy, the competing interests of sending and destination countries in promoting it and the prospects of making return strategies ‘from above’ a viable and desirable option for migrants are relatively neglected topics. In this article, I explore the distinct agendas, meanings and expectations underlying the prospects of return migration from Ecuador to Italy. I approach this recent migration flow through ethnography and an institutional analysis of the policy strategies and discourses emerging in the source country. The Ecuadorian government has recently developed a Plan Retorno aimed at facilitating emigrants’ return and economic reintegration. The narratives of Ecuadorian migrants generally reveal a deep‐rooted expectation to return home. While initially hoping to return home ‘soon’, however, migrants systematically tend to postpone their homecoming. When it does take place in the short term, it is likely to be through migration ‘failure’ rather than an actual accomplishment of their earlier objectives. Given the distinct interests and expectations driving them, it is possible to assess the relationship between the two approaches to return. I conclude that return migration, irrespective of its actual accomplishment, is relevant to a better understanding of emigrant policies and of immigrant life trajectories overseas.     

Labour Migration Policy in Russia: Considerations on Governmentality

The authors argue that Russian migration policy reflects the functioning of contemporary Russia's entire bureaucratic machine. The bureaucracy's Soviet‐era governance techniques on the one hand and the material interests of particular pressure groups on the other, shape the manipulation of immigration regulation that has occurred since the early 2000s. Therefore, attempts to liberalize migration regulation, i.e., to simplify the legalization of foreign workers, have always been incoherent, accompanied by reservations and limitations. Additionally, Russian actions are riddled with conflict between ‘geopolitical’ and domestic policy rationales. The authorities’ occasional attempts to use immigration regulation as a foreign policy tool acquire primarily symbolic value in the ‘domestic political market’ rather than serving any instrumental purpose. The effort to enhance Russian influence in the post‐Soviet space through the ‘reintegration project’ (Eurasian Economic Union) collides with the goal of national labour market protection, since integration entails the removal of barriers to labour movement.     

The transnational politics of the Tomato King: meaning and impact

Abstract In this article we deploy transnational ethnography to explore the transnational electoral politics by which Andrés Bermúdez, a successful tomato grower and labour contractor from Winters, California, who came to be called ‘the Tomato King’, was elected mayor of the municipality of Jerez in the Mexican state of Zacatecas. We seek to explain the meaning of his transnational electoral victory and its impact on the role of ‘the migrant’ as a new social actor in Mexican political development. We thus situate the Bermudista phenomenon in the context of the literature on migrant transnational politics. We hope to move the literature on migrant political transnationalism forward by advancing an agency‐oriented perspective that incorporates both the politics of representation of ‘el migrante’ in transnational electoral campaigns and the emerging dynamics of transnational coalition politics. Our approach underlines the need to carefully historicize the relationship between transnationalism and citizenship ‐ namely, to map the contingency and agency underlying the changing practices of states, migrants, and transnational institutional networks vis‐à‐vis questions of transnational citizenship. This is best done by paying close attention to the actual social and political practices whereby human agents pursue historically specific political projects that extend the practices of citizenship across borders.     

The People's Budget? Politics,Participation and Pro‐poor Policy

Recent moves towards ‘participatory’ budgeting have raised hopes and expectations that spending and revenue generation can be made more pro‐poor if informed citizens and their non‐traditional political organizations participate directly in budgeting decisions. This article reviews experiences of participatory budgeting and pro‐poor policy‐making in Brazil, Ireland, Chile, Mauritius, and Costa Rica. It draws attention to several important issues: Who participates? What kind of institutional framework is necessary? What happened to the revenue‐generation side of pro‐poor budgeting? It points out that making spending and taxation more ‘pro‐poor’ has historically depended on pro‐poor political parties gaining power.     

Labor‐Environmental Coalition Formation: Framing and the Right to Know1

This article examines the formation of a cross‐movement coalition between elements of the labor and environmental movements in New Jersey. We explain the successful formation and initial political campaign of the New Jersey Work Environment Council with an expansion of the theoretical perspective of frame analysis. We propose a model of a coalition collective action frame that offers several important insights into the active role coalition actors play in the construction of a common frame uniting union and environmental activists. Using qualitative data gathered from interviews, observations, and document analyses of two major campaigns, we argue that the coalition frame allowed new political opportunities to be created, leading to the establishment of the most sweeping right‐to‐know laws in the United States. We conclude the discussion of coalition framing by examining political constraints on the framing possibilities of coalitions, specifically by exploring how the discursive shift from the right to know to the right to act failed to expand the influence of the cross‐movement coalition as originally expected by its members.     

Supporting public financial management in conflict‐affected situations: Adapting to change in the Occupied Palestinian Territories

This article traces the introduction of public financial management (PFM) processes and systems in the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPTs) since they came under the control of the Palestinian Authority (PA). A number of factors combined make for an extremely challenging context for external actors to catalyse change: non‐existent formal central government functions at the time the PA was established, major restrictions in the movement of goods and people, ill‐designed donor budget support and a very asymmetric distribution of power that favours the status quo. An unelected government, donor‐dependency and a suffocating and chronic (yet low‐level) conflict are increasingly de‐incentivizing long‐term institutional reform. Such a complex problem requires multi‐faceted solutions. This article describes a dual delivery model adopted by the Palestinian Governance Facility (PGF) encompassing adaptive interventions that support longer‐term PFM improvements combined with the introduction of a selective workstream targeting service delivery. This focuses on the management of external medical referrals, which emerged as a political problem. A flexible development assistance delivery model can allow reform areas not anticipated at project design to be tackled as they emerge on the political agenda and open the space for political capital. A constant examination of contextual issues and re‐programming of project activities are offering lessons from which to learn and adapt. The ideal coalition involves flexible, aligned donors and relevant “institutional entrepreneurs” from within local organizations, with direct access to politicians. If high‐level government buy‐in falters, a coalition of technocrats may help construct and broker problems from which to gain political access.     

The persistence of cliques in the post‐communist state. The case of deniability in drug reimbursement policy in Poland

This article explores a key question in political sociology: Can post‐communist policy‐making be described with classical theories of the Western state or do we need a theory of the specificity of the post‐communist state? In so doing, we consider Janine Wedel's clique theory, concerned with informal social actors and processes in post‐communist transition. We conducted a case study of drug reimbursement policy in Poland, using 109 stakeholder interviews, official documents and media coverage. Drawing on ‘sensitizing concepts’ from Wedel's theory, especially the notion of ‘deniability’, we developed an explanation of why Poland's reimbursement policy combined suboptimal outcomes, procedural irregularities with limited accountability of key stakeholders. We argue that deniability was created through four main mechanisms: (1) blurred boundaries between different types of state authority allowing for the dispersion of blame for controversial policy decisions; (2) bridging different sectors by ‘institutional nomads’, who often escaped existing conflicts of interest regulations; (3) institutional nomads’ ‘flexible’ methods of influence premised on managing roles and representations; and (4) coordination of resources and influence by elite cliques monopolizing exclusive policy expertise. Overall, the greatest power over drug reimbursement was often associated with lowest accountability. We suggest, therefore, that the clique theory can be generalized from its home domain of explanation in foreign aid and privatizations to more technologically advanced policies in Poland and other post‐communist countries. This conclusion is not identical, however, with arguing the uniqueness of the post‐communist state. Rather, we show potential for using Wedel's account to analyse policy‐making in Western democracies and indicate scope for its possible integration with the classical theories of the state.     

Gender Mainstreaming versus Diversity Mainstreaming: Methodology as Emancipatory Politics

This article examines the question of whether and how the intersectional oppression of sexism and racism can be challenged by government policy. It draws on a case study of an Indigenous policy strategy in Australia to argue that, in contrast to concerns expressed by feminist policymakers, gender equality is not inevitably neglected when the target for remedial action is institutional racism. Our study suggests that successful action on Indigenous emancipation necessarily mobilizes a methodology for moving past one‐dimensional category distinctions. Therefore, focusing on the task of translating declared policy goals into action can provide a way out of the impasse over whether ‘diversity’ or ‘gender’ is the better vehicle for mainstreaming equity policy. To develop its case, the article draws conclusions about the politics of methodology from gender mainstreaming debates, intersectionality theory and institutional ethnography, then uses our conclusions to analyze the political and methodological effectiveness of the Indigenous policy strategy.     

Politics,Plurality and Problemsheds: A Strategic Approach for Reform of Agricultural Water Resources Management

Starting from the assessment that past efforts at reform in agricultural water management in developing countries have achieved very little, this article argues that a fundamental change is required in the approach to policy and institutional transformation if the present deadlock in the internalisation of ecological sustainability, human development/poverty alleviation and democratic governance into the ‘core business’ of water bureaucracies is to be overcome. ‘Social engineering’ approaches need to be replaced by ‘strategic action’ approaches that acknowledge the inherently political character and the plurality of actors, institutions and objectives of water management — a perspective operationalised here around the notions of ‘problemshed’ and ‘issue network’.     

Climate‐influenced migration in Bangladesh: The need for a policy realignment

Recent research into migration in Bangladesh has highlighted that people migrate for better livelihoods, not necessarily in response to climatic stresses and shocks. If facilitated appropriately, internal and international migration can help build adaptive capacity to future environmental and climatic hazards. In this framing, migration happens in the context of a growing city‐centred economy that promotes remittances to villages. However, a textual analysis of current and recent policies concerning climate change, development and poverty alleviation, and disaster management shows that the economic and adaptive roles of internal migration are often not included in policy framing. We argue that if migration works as a positive step towards adaptation, then the key challenge is to align the policies with this new understanding.     

Governance for reconstruction in Africa: challenges for policy communities and coalitions

This article seeks to advance analyses and responses to conflict prevention and reconstruction in Africa that go beyond state‐centric perspectives to include a range of non‐state players. Drawing on examples from both Uganda and Canada, it focuses on the activities of NGOs that have ‘partnered’ with state‐based actors in various peacekeeping and peace‐building operations as well as on the increasingly important role played by think‐tanks. The latter have emerged in Africa as major contributors to the proliferating literature on the political economy of violence, an approach that recognizes that African conflict reflects imperatives of production and consumption in relations that juxtapose Africa’s political institutions and cultures with international and global political economies. The article argues that novel forms of ‘security communities’ are emerging from the non‐state/state/international partnerships and coalitions that have developed around contemporary issues like ‘blood’ diamonds, small arms, debt and HIV/AIDS, thus drawing attention to connections between conflict and development.     

'The longest road to equality': The Politics of Institutional Desegregation Under Truman

Abstract This paper addresses two questions. First, how did selected public institutions (principally the Armed Services and US Civil Service Commission) sustain segregationist values and assumptions? Second, how did President Truman tackle institutional segregation given the political support for this system in Congress and the Democratic party before the 1950s? I draw upon the ‘new institutional’ framework to analyse the role of public sector organisations in maintaining institutional segregation. I reject the new institutional thesis that such institutions are relatively autonomous because this claim neglects their political support and political origins, and the extent to which the values and assumptions they embody are protected politically. I argue that the national political coalition underpinning segregation explains why Truman relied upon executive action to effect institutional desegregation. Archival material from the investigative committees Truman established is marshalled to support these arguments.     

Displacement,integration and identity in the postcolonial world

Defining the relationship between displaced populations and the nation state is a fraught historical process. The Partition of India in 1947 provides a compelling example, yet markedly little attention has been paid to the refugee communities produced. Using the case of the displaced ‘Urdu-speaking minority’ in Bangladesh, this article considers what contemporary discourses of identity and integration reveal about the nature and boundaries of the nation state. It reveals that the language of ‘integration’ is embedded in colonial narratives of ‘population’ versus ‘people-nation’ which structure exclusion not only through language and ethnicity, but poverty and social space. It also shows how colonial and postcolonial registers transect and overlap as colonial constructions of ‘modernity’ and ‘progress’ fold into religious discourses of ‘pollution’ and ‘purity’. The voices of minorities navigating claims to belonging through these discourses shed light on a ‘nation-in-formation’: the shifting landscape of national belonging and the complicated accommodations required.     

Transaction Costs and Coalition Stability under Majority Rule

Government program allocations are more stable and more equally shared than theory predicts. Although various explanations have been offered, we emphasize the high transaction costs of political negotiations and coalition enforcement. Cycling predictions ignore the cost to politicians of repeatedly forming coalitions and neglect the opportunity costs of failed coalitions and the loss of related government programs that bring valuable constituent benefits. Because of these costs, Congress relies on coalitions larger than the minimum necessary to enact a program, adopts relatively egalitarian programmatic sharing rules, and resists efforts to change those allocations. To illustrate we analyze the Federal Highway Trust Fund.