Underneath we’re angry: feminism and media politics in Britain in the late 1970s and early 1980s

In the late 1970s, a billboard advertisement for Gigi underwear was installed at street level in various British cities. It depicted a woman in a trench coat walking on the street at night and looking defiantly at the camera. A second image portrays her unbuttoning her coat and revealing her underwear. A caption reads “Underneath they’re all Lovable.” This billboard evoked a wave of feminist opposition exemplified by Rosalind Coward’s essay “Underneath we’re angry” attacking the Gigi advertisement for being an invitation to rape women as well as photographic works by The Polysnappers condemning the ad. This article contextualizes the passionate resistance to the Gigi advert within the time’s feminist debates, which characterized media images as oppressive towards women, the discourse around the ideological functioning of advertisements, debates on “the sexual politics of representation,” the political role of photography, social historical events, and the political significance of the street.     

Immigrants in the UK and in West Germany –Relative income position,income portfolio,and redistribution effects

Based on data from the BHPS and the SOEP, we analyse the economic performance of various ethnic groups in the UK and West Germany, as well as the effects of income redistribution on these populations. Taking the indigenous population of each country as the reference category, we find that, as a whole, the non-indigenous population in the UK fares much better than the immigrant population in Germany. However, the range of economic performance across different ethnic groups in the UK is much larger than that in Germany. The German corporatist welfare system is characterised by much stronger redistribution effects than the liberal UK one. Consequently, the relatively low-performing immigrant population in Germany profits more from the redistribution system than immigrants with similar socio-economic attributes in the UK.All correspondence to Felix Büchel. Responsible editor: Christoph M. Schmidt     

Predicting the Trend of Well-Being in Germany: How Much Do Comparisons, Adaptation and Sociability Matter?

Using longitudinal data from the German Socio-Economic Panel, we estimate the variation of subjective well-being experienced by Germans over the last two decades testing the role of some of the major correlates of people’s well-being. Our results suggest that the variation of Germans’ well-being between 1996 and 2007 is well predicted by changes over time of income, demographics and social capital. The increase in social capital predicts the largest positive change in subjective well-being. Income growth, also predicts a substantial change in subjective well-being, but it is compensated for about three fourths by the joint negative predictions due to income comparison and income adaptation. Finally, we find that aging of the population predicts the largest negative change in subjective well-being. This result appears to hinge on the large loss of satisfaction experienced by individuals in old age.     

How important is the family? Evidence from sibling correlations in permanent earnings in the USA, Germany, and Denmark

This paper is the first to analyze the impact of family background on permanent earnings based on sibling correlations in Germany and to provide a cross-country comparison of Germany, Denmark, and USA. The main findings are that family and community background has a stronger influence on permanent earnings in Germany than in Denmark, and a comparable influence is found in USA. This holds true for both male and female siblings. A deeper analysis of Germany shows that family background also plays an important role in explaining variations in family income, wages, education, and risk attitudes.     

Critical feminist hope: the encounter of neoliberalism and popular feminism in WWE 24: Women’s Evolution

Scholarship has pointed to contemporary feminism’s popularity and cultural “luminosity.” While this research has highlighted the limitations of feminist politics in a context of neoliberal individualism, this paper seeks to ask what possibilities for critiques and transformation of gender inequalities might be enabled by feminism’s visibility in neoliberalism. Using a framework of critical feminist hope, we highlight that capitalism’s embrace of feminism inarguably limits its political scope, but it may also open up opportunities for new forms of representation. To illustrate this, the paper analyses WWE 24: Women’s Evolution, a “brandcasting” documentary made to mark the rebrand of the sport entertainment promotion’s women’s division in 2016. While never naming it directly, the documentary draws heavily upon the signifiers of popular feminism. Although this mobilisation is often highly limited, a critically hopeful feminist reading allows us to move beyond dismissing this text as an example of feminism’s “co-optation” by neoliberalism. We highlight the documentary’s scathing critique of past failings in the representation and treatment of women performers, and, more importantly, the way feminism is used to make the case for corporate re-structure and change.     

Sex/love skirmishes: “swinging,” “polyamory,” and the politics of naming

The contested definitions of “swinging” and “polyamory” reveal profound inconsistencies in the logics of sex, love, commitment, and coupledom. In this article, I use a number of non-monogamy blogs and online glossaries as examples of the way these two words are often deployed against each other in an effort to position the speaker in relation to mononormative practices of sex and love. Leaving aside questions of the accuracy of particular definitions, I map a range of definitions against two existing scholarly/activist tools for describing relationship styles, specifically Gayle Rubin’s “Charmed Circle” and Meg-John Barker’s sex/love continuums. This exercise is doubly fruitful: first, the tools reveal the political stakes of the definitional debates; second, the definitions demonstrate that the distinctions we commonly use to distinguish between types of relationships—including types of non-monogamous relationships—in fact rely on mononormative assumptions about sex, love, and friendship. If “mononormativity” is defined as the system of ideas, institutions, and practical orientations that provide the backdrop against which the idea of monogamy as coherent, common, natural, and right congeals, the sex/love skirmishes of “swinging” and “polyamory” remind us that its logics are both pervasive and deeply fractured.     

Self-Reported Satisfaction and the Economic Crisis of 2007–2010: Or How People in the UK and Germany Perceive a Severe Cyclical Downturn

Self-reported satisfaction measures respond to a great variety of socio-demographic characteristics as well as the job and living environment. In this paper we ask whether the recent financial market crisis has caused a deterioration of satisfaction not only for the unemployed but also for those out of the labour force and especially those in employment. The focus of our analyses is on the pattern of life, job and health satisfaction over time and the influence of unemployment rates, inflation rates and GDP growth. We compare the UK and Germany, two countries with different employment protection regulations and different consequences of the crisis for the labour market. For our analysis we use data from the German Socio-Economic Panel and the British Household Panel Study for the period 1996–2010 and supplement this with annual information on macroeconomic indicators. We estimate Ordered Logit and OLS models, both with individual fixed effects. We find some limited psychological costs with respect to self-reported life satisfaction in the crisis years, and a considerable impact of regional and national unemployment rates. Looking at job and health satisfaction we get similar though somewhat weaker results.     

“I Am…”: Caitlyn Jenner,Jazz Jennings and the cultural politics of transgender celebrity

In the twenty-first century, the visibility of transgender celebrities appears greater than ever. Whilst scholarly work has analysed, and continues to analyse, representations of trans celebrities, this research has largely approached these figures as significant because they make transgender visible, rather than because of the more specific fact that they are celebrities. This article interrogates the role of discourses and tropes of celebrity itself in enabling particular incarnations of trans subjectivity to become intelligible within popular culture. Focusing upon the examples of Caitlyn Jenner and Jazz Jennings, two of the most widely circulated trans celebrities in the contemporary moment, I argue that the tropes of authenticity, self-reflexivity, self-revelation and manufacture central to celebrity culture, have functioned as core discursive frameworks through which Jenner and Jennings’ transgender identities have been rationalised within the popular media. In becoming legible as transgender through celebrity, I argue that Jenner and Jennings’ media narratives have worked to confer recognisability to a highly limited model of transgender life, fraught with exclusions around race and gender normativity.     

The Ratio of the Elderly to the Working-age Population in Japan,Singapore and Thailand

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Stopping the ‘War on the Car’: Neoliberalism,Fordism, and the Politics of Automobility in Toronto

Abstract

This article interrogates the politics of automobility in Toronto under the regime of mayor Rob Ford, who came to power in 2010 promising to ‘stop the war on the car.’ The election of Ford, and the thrust of his subsequent agenda, came as a surprise to many in the city, due to Toronto’s reputation as a cosmopolitan diverse transit-friendly global city. The Toronto case study allows for the analysis of the relationships between Fordism, automobility, and the politics and rationalities of neoliberalism. Instead of seeing neoliberalism as something external or imposed, its contested politics are rooted in diverging social and economic interests directly derived from Fordism and the system of automobility, with opposing political-economic factions both drawing on different elements of neoliberalism. Authoritarian populist neoliberal regimes like the Ford administration in Toronto, and the roll-back austerity they promote, are not antithetical to automobile Fordism, but on the contrary represent an attempt to protect and reinvigorate it in the face of the forces of de-industrialization and financialization. As such they receive their support from social groups irrevocably invested in the continuation, and irrationalities, of the Fordist system of automobility. This has implications for how the politics of neoliberalism might unfold in the future.     

“You Bring Great Masculinity and Truth”: Sexuality,whiteness, and the regulation of the male body in motion

This study contributes to analyses of how heterosexuality and whiteness work together in the embodied social practice of dance and the representational realm of television. It does so by attempting to destabilize theories of sexual difference dependent upon the concept of a stable, “natural,” and unitary body by highlighting the representational work that underpins heteronormative (white) masculinity within the first season of the syndicated reality dance television series So You Think You Can Dance Canada. The paper argues that though the presence of male dancers in the (often feminized) representational realm has the potential to challenge simple heteronormative dichotomies of masculine/feminine, reality dance television in this case plays with, yet ultimately reaffirms, heteronormative masculinity and does so relationally, through the juxtaposition of racialized male and female dance contestants over the span of a series. While it is not surprising that a reality show depends heavily upon heteronormative stereotypes, these discursive mechanisms are rendered invisible, in this case, when couched in a discourse of authenticity, technical ability, and dance aesthetics, resonating beyond the context of television, into the ways we think about dance practice.     

Migration and Health Selectivity in the Context of Internal Migration in China, 1997–2009

Using data from the 1997?C2009 waves of the China Health and Nutrition Survey, we examine the ??healthy migrant hypothesis?? in a setting where internal migrants face significant barriers to movement. Going beyond much of the existing literature in the Chinese context, we use an appropriate comparison between migrants and non-migrants at origin, using detailed health measures, and data spanning a wider geographic and temporal extent than had been previously considered. Consistent with research from both international migration contexts and other internal migration settings, we find that migrants are positively selected on the basis of health, although the relationship between health and migration diminishes across time. The strongest evidence for health selection comes from a subjective self-reported health measure, although we also find evidence for selection against those experiencing acute health conditions. We speculate that the across-time differentiation may be caused by the rapid social, economic and policy changes in China??s economic reform era. Thus, we suggest that migration scholars should consider the changing macro context when theorizing about selection factors.     

Inequality Between Whom? Patterns,Trends, and Implications of Horizontal Inequality in the Philippines

Social Indicators Research - An overall decline in inequality within a country, when assessed using national-level measures, can evidently obscure important variation in inequality at the...     

Determinants of morbidity and disability trends in the united states, 1958–77

Macrodynamic structural-equation models are presented that show how changes in annual levels of aggregate indexes of several morbidity and disability conditions for the United States over the years 1958 to 1977 affect each other and are affected by other aggregate demographic and socioeconomic changes. After reviewing the record of annual changes in these indexes based on data from the National Health Interview Survey, patterns of temporal covariation in the time series are discussed and some tentative structural-equation models are constructed to account for their behavior. Statistically, the analyses reveal considerable variation in levels of year-to-year variance explained for these indexes-from 35 percent explained for days of school loss to 97 percent for all acute conditions. Substantive findings imply that a decreasing proportion of preschool children in the population contributes to a decline in the incidence of infective and parasitic diseases, and an increasing proportion of the population at the older ages results in increases in the prevalence of chronic conditions, days of bed disability, and days of restricted activity. Further, increases in economic prosperity lead to an increase in the incidence of injuries and a decrease in the incidence of viral conditions, while higher levels of unemployment produce more injuries and restricted activity days. These inferences corroborate, for the most part, results of prior studies that have been restricted to crosssectional analyses. In addition, however, they provide a basis for making explicit quantitative projections of future levels of morbidity and disability in the American population on the basis of exogenous demographic and socioeconomic conditions.     

The Impact of Sense of Community in the School,Social Skills,and Exposure to Aggression and Victimization on Students’ Well-Being

Research suggests that sense of community in the school is a promising construct in terms of its ability to promote students’ well-being. However, mechanisms behind and the potential benefits of school sense of community have not been studied in detail. This cross-sectional study tested a model which examined the role of sense of community in the school, social skills, exposure to aggression, and victimization in shaping students’ well-being. The sample consisted of 1076 students from 22 public middle schools and 724 students from 22 public high schools located in the Italian Region of Liguria. Using a Bayesian estimation for a structural equation model, results showed that sense of community in the school directly predicted students’ social skills, exposure to aggression, and well-being and, indirectly (through social skills and exposure to aggression), victimization. In addition, we found that social skills were related to victimization. Finally, results showed that victimization was predicted by exposure to aggression and predicted well-being. The current study suggests that sense of community in the school and social skills are key variables for interventions that aim to prevent aggressive behaviors at school and to increase students’ well-being.     

Up and on or down and out? Gender, immigration and the consequences of temporary employment in Canada

What happens to temporary workers when their jobs end? Is temporary employment a fleeting way station to a better job, or does it herald an ongoing cycle of precariousness? What are the implications of temporary employment dynamics for broader patterns of inequality in labour markets? European researchers have focused increasing attention on these issues in the context of concern about the relationship between inequality and insecurity in labour markets with strong regulatory protections for insiders. However, research on the outcomes of temporary employment in the less regulated labour markets of North America remains limited. This paper draws on rich representative panel data from Statistics Canada's Survey of Labour and Income Dynamics (SLID) and competing risks Cox regression to assess the outcomes and dynamics of temporary employment in this understudied context. Key contributions include more precise estimates of transitions, consideration of multiple theoretically relevant outcomes (permanent jobs; new temporary jobs; and periods of unemployment and labour force withdrawal), and situation of the effect of gender and immigration status on temporary employment transitions in the context of the dynamics of permanent jobs. Findings present a more pessimistic picture of overall temporary job outcomes than prior research but suggest that the dynamics of temporary work do not magnify inequalities of gender and immigration status.     

Rural–urban migration, agrarian change, and the environment in Kenya: a critical review of the literature

The nexus between migration dynamics and environmental change has drawn the attention of many researchers in the recent past. While the majority of studies focus on the impact of the environment on migration decisions, less emphasis has been placed on the feedback effect of migration on the environment in rural sending areas. This article provides a critical review of this relationship by focusing on the rich literature on rural–urban migration of smallholder households in Kenya and its effects on rural environments. The article argues that there are distinct relations between migration, agricultural change and the environment. These are mediated in varying degrees by flows of remittances, loss of labor, socioeconomic stratification, gender dynamics, and cultural factors. Overly generalizing assumptions about these relations, however, fail to grasp their complexity. We propose employing a translocal perspective to enrich future analysis and enhance the understanding of migration–environmental interactions.     

Li Bin： Learn and Implement in Earnest the Fundamentals of the Recently Concluded Annual Sessions of the NPC and CPPCC,and Carry out Population and Family Planning Work in a Down-to-earth Manner（Excerpt）

Li Bin, Minister of the National Population and Family Planning Commission, recently pointed out that the most important action we can take to implement the basic ideas of the recently concluded annual sessions of NPC and CPPCC is to carry out population and family planning work in 2008 in a down-to-earth manner according to the deployment and requirements of Premier Wen Jiabao＇s Report on the Work of the Government,     

Differences in the Environmental,Social and Economic Development of Polish–Lithuanian Trans-Border Regions

Regional development is a complex process that can be analysed in various contexts, including environmental, social and economic factors. Variations in the levels of development are naturally observed across countries and regions, but they play a special role in trans-border regions. The aim of this study is to investigate differences in the level of development of two Polish voivodships (Warmia and Mazury, and Podlasie) and two Lithuanian counties (Marijampol? and Alytus) which are trans-border regions (NUTS 4 level). The study was conducted by analysing three subordinate criteria, namely environmental, social and economic factors, as well as the overall development of the evaluated regions with the use of the analytical hierarchy process and technique for order preference by similarity to ideal solution methods. The evaluated trans-border regions are characterised by a predominance of rural areas and considerable variations in development. The entire area is characterised by high natural value. This is an important observation because the condition of the natural environment is a key determinant of well-being, and it directly influences the quality of life. The analysis revealed considerable demographic problems, mainly in Lithuanian regions, resulting from low population growth and a negative net migration rate which influence population structure. Disproportions in regional development call for regional policies that are adapted to local needs and resources.