Industrial relations reform in Britain since 1979

Important changes to British industrial relations law were undertaken by the Thatcher and Major governments. A succession of legislative measures narrowed the scope of labor union action in pursuit of a dispute, made unions financially responsible for torts committed by their members, removed government support for collective bargaining, abolished the closed shop, and reformed unions' internal structures. At least in part as a result of these measures, union density and the coverage of collective bargaining have fallen; strikes have become rare; and Britain’s productivity performance has improved. The unions and the Labour Party have largely become reconciled to measures which they initially fiercely opposed, and the influence of these reforms is likely to endure even though the Conservatives have lost office.     

The im/mobilities of ‘sometimes-migrating’ for abortion: Ireland to Great Britain

ABSTRACT

This paper furthers the concept of im/mobilities through an investigation of the reproductive mobilities of women migrating for abortion from Ireland (north and south) to Great Britain. Where more often the focus of reproductive mobilities concerns the movement of people and matter in order to reproduce, there is less (although some) attention to movement aligned with the prevention of reproduction. We consider the variegated im/mobilities of conception not brought to birth, in the frictional movement of people, things, ideologies and imaginations in staying with and moving beyond the dichotomy of mobility and immobility. We engage in transdisciplinary dialogue between mobilities and migration studies. Hence, underlying this exploration is the concept of the ‘sometimes-migrant’, used to challenge binary oppositions between mobility and immobility, broader conceptualisations of ‘migrants’ as ‘exceptional’, and more specifically the notion of travelling for abortion as ‘abortion-tourism’. We adopt the call to focus on different incarnations of the ‘sometimes-migrant’ in the form of women travelling temporarily across national borders of intermittent porosity in order to seek care that is not available in their own country. Intersections of migration and mobilities reveal the ways women are im/mobilised through geopolitical and cultural practices at local and global scales.     

Horse Races,Governance and the Chance to Fight: On the Formation of Organizational Agendas

We consider the formation of issues on the organizational agenda of a manufacturing firm. We find that the patterns of issue formation vary markedly and we develop an analytic framework to examine a number of emerging, potentially ambiguous issues. We emphasize the importance to the organization of perceptions of collective freedom to construct an issue, the role of issue labelling and perceptions of emerging consensus over the construction of an issue. Jointly, these considerations affect whether an issue gains salience on the agenda and whether it is resolved constructively.     

Comparative study of attitudes to religious groups in New Zealand reveals Muslim-specific prejudice

ABSTRACT

The March 15th terrorist attack started a national dialogue about prejudice in New Zealand. Previous research has investigated attitudes towards Muslims in comparison to ethnic minorities. However, presently, there are no nationally representative studies in New Zealand systematically comparing attitudes to Muslims with attitudes to other religious groups. Here, we present evidence from the New Zealand edition of the International Social Survey Programme module on religion, a national postal survey (N?=?1335) collected between September 2018 and February 2019. We assess perceived threat and negativity towards Christians, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, Jews, and Atheists. We find substantially greater perceived threat and negativity towards Muslims compared with other groups. In particular, older people, New Zealand Europeans, men, and those with more right-wing attitudes report greater threat and negativity towards Muslims. In line with previous studies, higher religious identification and higher education predict greater acceptance. Taken collectively, these results reveal that the Muslim Acceptance Gap in this country is substantial, and greater challenges for acceptance are evident among lower-educated, right-wing, older, secular, and male populations. The magnitude of this gap reveals a substantial challenge to the future of New Zealand where religious and secular people can live without evoking prejudice.     

The role of non-timber forest products in household coping strategies in South Africa: the influence of household wealth and gender

The prevalence and ranking of non-timber forest products (NTFPs) as safety-nets has been well discussed, but rarely quantified. We report on group discussions and household interviews in two South African villages to assess the frequency and nature of shocks and stresses over a 2-year period and the coping strategies employed, stratified by household wealth and gender of the de jure household head. Overall, kinship was the most widely adopted coping strategy, and NTFPs were the fifth most prevalent (employed by 70% of households). There were relatively few differences in the nature of shocks or responses between male- and female-headed households. Wealth influenced the experience of shocks or stresses as well as responses. Poorer households have fewer options with the increased use or sale of NTFPs being the second most commonly adopted strategy. Increased use and sale of NTFPs is a common manifestation of the safety-net function. To reconcile long-term economic development and biodiversity conservation, it is important to understand people??s use of natural resources and the factors that affect this use, including their responses to shocks and stresses.     

Woody plant species richness,composition and structure in urban sacred sites,Grahamstown, South Africa

Sacred sites are important not only for their traditional, spiritual or religious significance, but may also potentially be valuable for biodiversity conservation in human transformed landscapes. Yet, there has been little consideration of sacred sites in urban areas in this respect. Consequently, to better understand the ecosystem service and conservation value of urban sacred sites, inventories of their floral communities are needed. We examined the richness, composition and structure of the trees and shrubs in 35 urban churchyards and cemeteries in the City of Saints (Grahamstown). The combined area of urban sacred sites (38.7 ha) represented 2.2% of the city area and 13.6% of the public green space area. Species richness of woody plants was high, albeit dominated by non-native species. Levels of similarity among sites were low, indicating the effects of individual management regimens. There was no relationship between age of the site and measured attributes of the vegetation, nor were there any significant differences in vegetation among different religious denominations. However, the basal area and number of woody plants was significantly related to site size. These results indicate the significant heterogeneity of urban sacred sites as green spaces within the urban matrix. The significance of this heterogeneity in providing ecosystem services to users of sacred sites and the broader urban communities requires further investigation.     

Homestead greening is widespread amongst the urban poor in three medium-sized South African towns

Trees in urban areas are important sources of ecosystem services and benefits. In most towns the bulk of urban biodiversity, and trees specifically, are found in homestead gardens. But there is only limited understanding of the tree holdings in such gardens, and how they vary within and between towns, especially for developing countries where rapid urbanisation and high poverty influence the use of and reliance on land and local resources. We report on the nature of tree holdings in private gardens of poorer suburbs in three medium-sized towns along a gradient of decreasing mean annual rainfall in northern South Africa. A total of 3 217 trees were enumerated across 450 randomly selected homesteads. Most (90 %) households had at least one tree on their homestead, with an average of 7.7?±?6.1 trees. Most householders had planted the trees themselves. The density of trees declined along the moisture gradient. Within towns, tree density was positively related to garden size, which in turn was related to relative affluence and age of the suburb. Newer and poorer suburbs had the fewest trees per household. Sixty-two tree species were recorded, which were dominated by alien species, especially fruit trees. There was no relationship between the moisture gradient and tree species richness per household, but within towns there was a difference between suburbs, being lowest in the newest suburbs. Numbers of trees and species per household was positively related to age of the household head.     

Britain’s Labor Market Under the Blair Governments

Since the Labor Party returned to power in 1997, a substantial increase in employment regulation has occurred in the United Kingdom. Britain has enacted new laws on labor union recognition, introduced a national minimum wage, enhanced employment protection legislation, strengthened anti-discrimination legislation, and imposed many new obligations on employers. Employment regulation should not, however, be looked at in isolation. The potential for job loss implicit in some of the Blair administrations’ regulation has been offset by other factors which have broadly supported labor market flexibility. This does not mean that further regulation can be imposed with impunity. Although the UK labor market continues to perform better than those of the large continental European economies, its competitiveness may be slipping. When Mr. Blair retires, the prospects may deteriorate.

Children navigating rural poverty: Rural children's use of wild resources to counteract food insecurity in the Eastern Cape,South Africa

This paper analyzes the role of natural resources in the lives of rural children experiencing heightened vulnerability to poverty and the impact of HIV/AIDS, a subject that previously has been unexplored. The authors highlight wild-food use by rural children as a regular activity that supplements their domestic diets. Over the course of 18 months in the Eastern Cape of South Africa, the authors used a broad quantitative and qualitative methodology to explore the food acquisition and consumption patterns for 850 children. They found that the quality of children's domestic diets was, on average, 60% lower than the Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) guidelines. This occurred in a population where 62% of the children surveyed were supplementing their diets with wild foods; and 30% with over half their diet supplemented in this way. Significantly, dietary diversity increased by 13% when wild food supplementation occurred. Another result was the commercialization of wild foods (observed among 47% of the children), wherein significantly more vulnerable children sold these foods. Considering the heightened nutritional and energy needs of children, combined with the impact of poverty and HIV/AIDS on household food access, wild foods represent the last freely attainable food sources available to them.