A genealogy of the disabled identity in relation to work and sexuality

That 'disability' has been central to the formation of the ideal liberal citizen in the modern era can be effectively illuminated by focusing on two prime modes of subjectification, work and sexuality. This paper seeks to demonstrate that a better understanding of their historical involvement in the creation of the disabled identity and their manifestation in recent times in the form of welfare reform and sexual rehabilitation can pave the way for the development of more effective pathways of liberation.

The purpose of history, guided by genealogy, is not to discover the roots of our identity but to commit itself to its dissipation. (Foucault, 1977a, p. 162)

     

Business games and implementation research

This paper reviews some recent research in OR implementation and suggests that a new approach is required, which will take fuller account of the perceptions of managers concerned with the problem. Research games in business settings seem to offer a means for such approach. Some lessons learned from a business game used in this way are described and their implications for modelbuilders are discussed.     

Survey of midwives’ perinatal mental health knowledge,confidence, attitudes and learning needs

Background

Midwives have a primary role in facilitating the first stage of perinatal mental health risk reduction through inquiring about perinatal mental health, identifying risk factors and current perinatal mental health problems, providing support or crisis intervention, referring for treatment and decreasing stigmatisation.

Refugee Women in Europe: Some Aspects of the Legal and Policy Dimensions

This article presents an overview of the legal and policy issues affecting refugee and asylum-seeking women in European host societies. First, it explores the unique types of persecution experienced by women and shows that the asylum determination process, along with the status of women relative to men, mitigates against the effective protection of women. The legal basis for asylum, the evidential requirements and the procedural norms all reduce the protection which is likely to be conferred upon asylum-seeking women. Second, the article provides an overview of responses to female refugees and asylum-seekers in European countries of asylum. Although there are differences between countries, there is also a large degree of uniformity. For example, there is a lack of recognition and understanding of the diversity and the range of experiences which refugees bring with them, including different social and cultural norms. Moreover, European policies do not provide special provisions to facilitate the settlement of refugee women and instead place barriers to their social and economic participation. Third, the article examines policies for family reunion in different countries and shows that such unfavourable and unsympathetic policies mitigate against the settlement of refugee women. Finally, the article argues that if refugee and asylum-seeking women are to have their cases recognized and to be successfully settled, then there needs to be a complete rethink of legislation and policy in Europe.     

Pathways to solutions

Problems may be viewed from many different angles and in many different ways. The order in which facts are collected, the attitudes of the people involved in the problem, the climate in which the problem finds itself to be, all play their parts in determining what the problem is perceived to be and how it is tackled. This paper reports on the several ways in which an apparently simple problem was approached and recognises that the process of solution which is adopted can dictate the eventual outcome and determine what the recommendations will be.     

Government,management and the environmental crisis

In case there should be any doubt that the human predicament will soon be a global crisis the reasons why this must be so are discussed. The increased use of resources and the growing dependence on a fuel-based technology are crisis enough, but to this is added the growing population of the part of the world less advanced in technology, where attitudes are different and cannot be changed to conform to the richer population's idea of what is what in the world.Most of our problems are created because the total effect of an operation is not properly considered when it is undertaken for the part that is wanted. Thus the rich countries have got themselves into a predicament the fault for which the poor see lying entirely with the rich, while the rich see the danger in the growing poor populations.The mechanism of evolution by selection from spontaneous variety must be followed because we cannot foresee needs. To keep the process healthy we must retain room for manoeuvre and choice and we must studiously avoid trying to operate monolithic technological ways of maintaining our society.Policies should seek to anticipate the imminent pressures of the future so as to retain freedom of movement, and the most obvious policy should be to make the price of fuel artificially high to conserve resources and stimulate the right kind of new technologies.     

Can welfare reform make disability disappear?

I argue here that, while welfare reform policy and the disability rights movement appear to share a common agenda based on the belief that disability is a social creation which can be remedied by way of increased access to employment and social resources, their world views and objectives could not be more at odds. By demonstrating how welfare reform policy makers have opportunistically appropriated the language which frames the disability rights movement and, in the style of Orwell's Newspeak, used it to conceal an agenda which actually aims for the reverse of what it promises, I seek to show that what is being promoted as a means for increased access to a better life for disabled people could be more aptly described as a gateway to poverty.     

13 When Group Identities Matter

Abstract

Performance appraisals are a critical part of organizational life, and bias in appraisals is consistently mentioned as a barrier to advancement for diverse workers. This chapter reviews the literature on rater bias in performance appraisals, defined as effects on performance ratings due to ratee category membership. We focus on the major theoretical frameworks (e.g., stereotype fit and relational demography) used in the study of bias, organizing the research findings by the four most commonly studied demographic categories: gender, race, age, and disability. The review allows better understanding of the gaps in our knowledge and identifies needed future research directions in this literature stream. We conclude the chapter with several concerns including a lack of empirical research testing propositions concerning the effect of organizational variables on bias.