Motherhood in France: Towards a Queer Maternity?

Paragraph ◽  
2012 ◽  
Vol 35 (2) ◽  
pp. 254-264 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nina Power

This article examines the relationship between feminism, queer theory and the rise of popular debate over maternity and anti-maternity that has arisen in recent years in France. Through the image of ‘queer maternity’, that is to say, of women who question motherhood from the position of already having had children, the article tries to rethink the way in which feminism, queer theory and motherhood could be placed in relation to one another such that by questioning maternity, the symbolic order that places motherhood on the side of the state and futurity can itself be questioned as a whole. This has particular resonances in the French context where a discourse of ‘natural’ motherhood has come to dominate: the ‘queer’ mother who questions her maternal status is thus argued to represent a threat to the futurity of the family, the social contract and the existing order.

2019 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 140-166
Author(s):  
Eric Nsuh Zuhmboshi

Abstract The relationship that exists between the state and her citizens has been described by Jean Jacques Rousseau as “a social contract.” In this contractual agreement, citizens are bound to respect state authority while the state, in turn, has the bounden duty to protect her citizens and guide them in their aspirations. In fact, any state that does not perform this duty is guilty of violating the fundamental rights of her citizens. This, however, is not the case in most postcolonial societies where the citizens see the state as an aggressive apparatus against their wellbeing because the state is not fulfilling its own part of the social contract, which requires them to protect the citizens and guide them in their aspirations. This unfortunate situation has laid the foundation for protest and anti-establishment writings in post-colonial societies – especially in Africa. Since literature, as a semiotic resource, is coterminous with its socio-political context, this attitude of the state has drawn inimical criticism from key postcolonial African writers such as Chinua Achebe, Wole Soyinka, Ngugi wa Thiong’o, Mongo Beti, and Nadine Gordimer. Using Helon Habila’s Waiting for an Angel and John Nkemngong Nkengasong’s Across the Mongolo, this essay shows the relationship between state-terrorism and the traumatic conditions of the citizens in contemporary Africa. From the perspective of trauma theory, the essay defends the premise that the postcolonial subjects/characters, in the novels under study, are traumatized and depressed because of their continuous victimization by the state. Due to this state-imposed terror and hardship, the citizens are forced to indulge in political agitation, radicalism and violence in response to their destitute and impoverished conditions.


The two centuries after 1800 witnessed a series of sweeping changes in the way in which Britain was governed, the duties of the state, and its role in the wider world. Powerful processes—from the development of democracy to the changing nature of the social contract, war, and economic dislocation—have challenged, and at times threatened to overwhelm, both governors and governed. Such shifts have also posed problems for the historians who have researched and written about Britain’s past politics. This volume shows the ways in which political historians have responded, and provides a snapshot of a field which has long been at the forefront of conceptual and methodological innovation within historical studies. It comprises thirty-three thematic essays written by leading and emerging scholars in the field. Collectively, these essays assess and rethink the nature of modern British political history itself, and suggest avenues and questions for future research. The Oxford Handbook of Modern British Political History thus provides a unique resource for those who wish to understand Britain’s political past and a thought-provoking ‘long view’ for those interested in current political challenges.


Author(s):  
Mauro Sérgio Santos Da Silva ◽  
Marcio Danelon

*Doutorando em Educação pela Universidade Federal de Uberlândia (UFU). E-mail: [email protected]. * Doutor em Filosofia da Educação pela Universidade Estadual de Campinas (UNICAMP) e professor da Universidade Federal de Uberlândia (UFU).  E-mail: [email protected]. Rousseau e o espetáculo do paradoxo Resumo: O presente estudo discute a relação entre política e educação na obra de Jean-Jacques Rousseau a partir de autores que constituem a recepção crítica da obra do filósofo. A propósito, apresenta elementos da vida e da obra do autor genebrino. Expõe eixos fundamentais da ideia de contratualismo ou jusnaturalismo. Discorre acerca das teses de Rousseau atinentes à confluência entre Do Contrato Social (reflexão política) e o Emílio ou da Educação (reflexão educacional). Exibe a ideia de paradoxo da liberdade presente na teoria política de Rousseau. Aponta para os desdobramentos deste paradoxo na reflexão educacional do autor, especialmente nos dois primeiros livros do Emílio, pelo princípio de educação negativa. Palavras-chave: Educação. Liberdade. Paradoxo. Política. Rousseau. Rousseau and the paradox of the spectacle Abstract: The present study discusses the relationship between politics and education in the Jean-Jacques Rousseau’work from authors who constitute the critical reception of this philosopher's work. By the way, show elements of the life and work of the Genevan author. It exposes fundamental axes of the idea of contractualism or jusnaturalism. It discusses Rousseau's theses concerning the confluence between The Social Contract (political reflection) and Emílio or Education (educational reflection). It shows the idea of the paradox of freedom present in Rousseau's political theory. It points to the unfolding of this paradox in the educational reflection of this author, especially in the first two books of the Emílio, by the  negative education’principle. Keywords: Education. Freedom. Paradox. Politics. Rousseau.


Author(s):  
Susan B. Boyd

AbstractIn this article I argue that an analysis of “the State” is necessary in order to understand legal developments related to “family” that are relevant to efforts to combat the oppression of heterosexual women, as well as of lesbians and gay men. Drawing on recent debates concerning postmodernism and feminist theory, I review efforts to reconceptualize the nature of the state not as a monolithic institution, but rather as a set of arenas, or the site of various discursive formations. Because laws are generated from within, but are only part of, concentrated forms of state power, feminists and progressive groups that are engaging with law must retain an explicit analysis of the state. This analysis must be more nuanced and displaced than it has been in instrumentalist and structuralist accounts, in order to explore the ways in which feminists have influenced legal change and whether this influence is positive or negative for different groups. The limits on law's ability to fundamentally transform the social relations of oppression must however be recognized. In particular, the relationship between overall state trends—for example privatization—and trends specific to certain state arenas such as courts and legislatures—for example enhanced women's rights to men's property and increased legal recognition of same sex couples—must be traced in order to determine the political impact of seemingly progressive movements in areas related to “the family”.


Econometrica ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 88 (4) ◽  
pp. 1337-1343 ◽  
Author(s):  
Samuel Bowles

Treating civic preferences as endogenous and government policies and tax capacities as both an influence on and a consequence of their evolution is an important new strand of thinking to which Besley has contributed. I ask: Does his model provide a convincing explanation of the way that civic cultures and the expansion of the state evolved as a matter of historical fact? And I suggest a number of alternative modeling approaches that both would recognize that policy makers take account of the effects of their policy choices on preferences and, consistent with empirical observations, would support equilibria with culturally heterogeneous rather than homogeneous populations.


2009 ◽  
Vol 18 (2) ◽  
pp. 199-215 ◽  
Author(s):  
PEDRO RAMOS PINTO

AbstractThis article investigates the origins of modern citizenship in Portugal through the example of the historical construction of housing as a social right. It argues this process owes much to the centralisation and strengthening of the state undertaken by Salazar's ‘New State’ (1933–74), whose transformative project changed the nature of the relationship between the governing and the governed, making political claims based on social rights plausible. The ensuing political dynamic changed the nature of the social contract in Portugal, tying the legitimacy of the state to the provision of social rights, a factor which eventually contributed to the dictatorship's demise.


2019 ◽  
pp. 201-229
Author(s):  
Katie Jarvis

From 1791 to 1793 and again from 1795 to 1798, the deputies taxed work through occupational licenses called the patente. This chapter reveals how the revolutionaries refracted the relationship among work, property, and autonomous citizenship through this tax. To replace the revenue generated by guild fees, the deputies created graduated tax brackets to target the wealth generated by an individual’s occupation. By exchanging fees for permissions, the patente created a fiscal contract between citizens and the state that mirrored the social contract. Legislators assessed the patente according to criteria for full citizenship including independence and immobile property. From 1796 to 1798, the patente fashioned a type of economic citizenship not predicated on gender and enabled the Dames to form a fiscal contract with the nation, unlike all male wage laborers. In patente hearings before justices of the peace, the Dames articulated their trade as autonomous work. When the deputies reorganized taxes by familial unit and exempted food retailers in 1798, the Dames lost their licenses and fiscal autonomy. The Directory simultaneously reconsolidated political authority into male heads of households.


2020 ◽  
pp. 42-50
Author(s):  
Aygul Fazlyeva ◽  
Aliya Akhmetshina

Children, brought up in foster families, experience various problems (diffi culties in interpersonal relationships with parents, diffi culties in communicating with peers, emotional instability), which lead to confl icts, quarrels, running away from home, destructive phenomena, etc. One of the eff ective forms of working with children brought up in foster families is individual counselling. Individual counselling is used by various specialists (psychologists, educators, psychotherapists), where a special place is taken by a social educator. His or her activity involves the implementation of social-protective, preventive, educational, informational, advisory functions. In the process of organizing individual counseling, the social educator takes into account the social situation of the family and the child, personal characteristics, social conditions, social and cultural characteristics and the nature of the relationship with the social environment. To organize individual counseling, a social educator needs to master various and eff ective techniques, and take into account a number of recommendations. An analysis of the literature and practical socio-pedagogical experience led to an understanding of the insuffi cient degree of elaboration of this issue. The purpose of this article was the solution to this problem.


Author(s):  
Nancy M. Wingfield

This chapter explores a variety of issues central to the turn-of-the-century Austrian panic over trafficking. They include anti-Semitism, Jews as protagonists and victims, and mass migration in an urbanizing world, as well as why particular Austrian cities were associated with the trade in women. The chapter analyzes the government’s domestic and international efforts to combat trafficking, as well as the role bourgeois reform organizations played. It explores the relationship between the trafficker and the trafficked, arguing that these women and girls were not simply victims, but sometimes willing participants, or something in between, in order to sketch a more nuanced picture of turn-of-the-century “white slaving.” The term “trafficker” is employed to reflect the way sources (the state, journalists, reform groups) viewed the issue, not because it can be proved that the problem was as widespread as they claimed.


Author(s):  
Brittany Pearl Battle

This chapter examines the sociocognitive dimensions of cultural categorizations of deservingness. The social issue of poverty has been a persistent source of debate in the American system of policy development, influenced by conceptual distinctions between the “haves” and “have-nots,” “working moms” and “unemployed dads,” and the “deserving poor” and the “undeserving poor.” Although there is a wealth of literature discussing the ideological underpinnings of stratification systems, these discussions often focus on categorical distinctions between the poor and the nonpoor, with much less discussion of distinctions made among the poor. Moreover, while scholars of culture and policy have long referenced the importance of cultural categories of worthiness in policy development, the theoretical significance of these distinctions has been largely understudied. I expand the discourse on the relationship between cultural representations of worth and social welfare policy by exploring how these categories are conceptualized. Drawing on analytical tools from a sociology of perception framework, I create a model that examines deservingness along continuums of morality and eligibility to highlight the taken-for-granted cultural subtleties that shape perceptions of the poor. I focus on social filters created by norms of poverty, welfare, and the family to explore how the deserving are differentiated from the undeserving.


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