Global SocietyPub Date : 2022-04-03DOI: 10.1080/13600826.2021.2021153
J. Berten
{"title":"The Future as Epistemic Condition: How International Organisations Anticipate Futures of Social Policy","authors":"J. Berten","doi":"10.1080/13600826.2021.2021153","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/13600826.2021.2021153","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT The welfare state is increasingly challenged and threatened by futures, whose exact realisation remains largely uncertain. The article compares how the International Labour Organization (ILO), the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), and the World Bank anticipate and authorise “futures of work” in light of technological transformations and climate change. The article shows that IOs face epistemic constraints both in constructing problems and in designing social security policy proposals. Constraints rely on visions of possible and probable futures over which the IOs do not always have control. Anticipatory practices that enact future visions oscillate between concretely specifying future developments and narrative flexibility, which does not directly specify courses of action but impacts core logics behind policy proposals. Irrespective of IOs’ ideological differences, solutions to technological transformations focus on precaution, whereas solutions to climate change focus on preparation. While precaution allows for imagining possibilities, preparation stresses the urgency of issues.","PeriodicalId":46197,"journal":{"name":"Global Society","volume":"36 1","pages":"206 - 222"},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2022-04-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48213553","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Global SocietyPub Date : 2022-04-03DOI: 10.1080/13600826.2021.2021148
M. Campbell-Verduyn, M. Hütten
{"title":"Governing Techno-Futures: OECD Anticipation of Automation and the Multiplication of Managerialism","authors":"M. Campbell-Verduyn, M. Hütten","doi":"10.1080/13600826.2021.2021148","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/13600826.2021.2021148","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT How do international organisations (IOs) govern the present based on claims about the coming impacts of technological change? Drawing on primary documents and participant observation, this article traces how the Organisation of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) anticipates automation emanating from the growing integration of blockchain technologies in global governance. We find that promises of radical, rapid, and reckless automation advanced by promoters of Bitcoin and other ‘defiant’ applications of the technology are steered by this IO towards more incremental and carefully managed forms of automation. The OECD relies on two managerialist practices to anticipate “reckless automation” through the promotion of what we identify as “responsible disruption”. In combination, OECD practices of scenario building and shared orientation framework construction deepen and extend managerial forms of global governance today whose technocratic and expert-led nature limits democratic possibilities and perpetuates global inequalities.","PeriodicalId":46197,"journal":{"name":"Global Society","volume":"36 1","pages":"240 - 260"},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2022-04-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42647907","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Global SocietyPub Date : 2022-04-03DOI: 10.1080/13600826.2021.2021152
Matthias Kranke
{"title":"Tomorrow's Debt, Today's Duty: Debt Sustainability as Anticipatory Global Governance","authors":"Matthias Kranke","doi":"10.1080/13600826.2021.2021152","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/13600826.2021.2021152","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT Sovereign debt projections permeate international economic affairs. While concerns about debt sustainability motivate much policy analysis and commentary, this article unpacks the anticipatory practices through which (un)sustainable future debt is turned into a governance object in the first place. To this end, I examine the joint Debt Sustainability Analysis (DSA) of the International Monetary Fund (IMF or Fund) and the World Bank (or Bank). I empirically focus on the cases of Sudan and Somalia, both of which are low-income countries (LICs) classified as weak performers under the Fund-Bank Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) Initiative. Based on documentary evidence from twelve DSAs, I argue the IMF and World Bank's projections reflect a contractual understanding of debt, embrace economic growth as a panacea for chronic indebtedness and downplay structural constraints on debt sustainability. The resulting futures reveal some of the political choices inscribed in seemingly neutral instruments of anticipatory global governance.","PeriodicalId":46197,"journal":{"name":"Global Society","volume":"36 1","pages":"223 - 239"},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2022-04-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45483660","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Global SocietyPub Date : 2022-04-03DOI: 10.1080/13600826.2021.2021146
H. Hansen, Julie Uldam
{"title":"Assembling Transnational Policing: Europol’s Anticipatory Governance","authors":"H. Hansen, Julie Uldam","doi":"10.1080/13600826.2021.2021146","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/13600826.2021.2021146","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT Building on studies of transnational policing, security and digitization, we develop an assemblage-theoretical framework to explore perceptions of time in contemporary policing efforts. We use the concepts of techno imaginaries and policing assemblage to examine the articulation of temporality and multi-scalar connections between humans and non-humans in policing, which has become increasingly pluralised and digitised. We draw on documentary research on Europol to analyse anticipatory governance in transnational police work, including the linkages between humans and machines and identify a shift from post-crime towards pre-crime interventions. We critically discuss the significance of this shift for the character and robustness of expected future risks and threat assessments. Our reflections on the interplay between time and techno imaginaries contribute to critical analyses of the ways in which decision-making and interventions shape and are shaped by transnational assemblages in anticipatory governance.","PeriodicalId":46197,"journal":{"name":"Global Society","volume":"36 1","pages":"281 - 299"},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2022-04-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48259914","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Global SocietyPub Date : 2022-04-03DOI: 10.1080/13600826.2021.2021149
B. Prem
{"title":"Governing through Anticipatory Norms: How UNIDIR Constructs Knowledge about Autonomous Weapons Systems","authors":"B. Prem","doi":"10.1080/13600826.2021.2021149","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/13600826.2021.2021149","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT The need for normative change is rarely self-evident but requires the sustained efforts of actors to create a demand for action. With emerging technologies such as autonomous weapons systems (AWS), the challenge is even greater given the early stages of development and use of these systems. This places unusual demands on actors to present evidence for the nature, scale and severity of a problem. Suggesting that the epistemic bases of norm-building are poorly understood, the article introduces a practice-theoretical approach to cast light on how international organisations cope with the uncertainty surrounding AWS. The key claim is that the emergence of anticipatory norms depends upon forward-looking epistemic practices that produce knowledge about future governance objects and create a demand for preventive action. Analysing the role of the United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research (UNIDIR), I argue that attempts to de-science-fictionalise the issue rather than futuristic scenarios may proof integral to propel the emergence of anticipatory norms.","PeriodicalId":46197,"journal":{"name":"Global Society","volume":"36 1","pages":"261 - 280"},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2022-04-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43354369","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Global SocietyPub Date : 2022-04-03DOI: 10.1080/13600826.2021.2021151
S. Robertson
{"title":"Guardians of the Future: International Organisations, Anticipatory Governance and Education","authors":"S. Robertson","doi":"10.1080/13600826.2021.2021151","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/13600826.2021.2021151","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT This paper is a comparative analysis of the anticipatory practices deployed by two international organisations (IOs), UNESCO and the OECD, to govern education futures. I show how their coordination of education futures is mediated by: (1) their different histories, missions, resources and geo-political alliances; (2) use of different anticipatory practices; (3) ongoing tensions between the two organisations around who dominates future-making in education; and (4) the challenges to be negotiated when anticipated futures arrive as a problematic present. My argument develops around three moments of crisis as new arenas for what Ann Mische calls “hyper-projectivity” around futures. In each moment I explore the way UNESCO and the OECD engage in, and compete over, framing, shaping and materialising future presents. In doing so, they claim to be guardians of education futures.","PeriodicalId":46197,"journal":{"name":"Global Society","volume":"36 1","pages":"188 - 205"},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2022-04-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48573388","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Global SocietyPub Date : 2022-04-01DOI: 10.1080/13600826.2022.2052024
M. Haugaard
{"title":"Reverse Versus Radical Discourse: A Qualified Critique of Butler and Foucault, with an Alternative Interactive Theorisation","authors":"M. Haugaard","doi":"10.1080/13600826.2022.2052024","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/13600826.2022.2052024","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT This article explores the concept of reverse discourse, as suggested by Foucault and Butler. It is argued that Butler's concept of subject formation is overly determinist, as is Foucault's of discourse. Following Scott's critique, it is argued that there is a strong and a weak conceptualisation of dominant ideology. Discourses are in competition for authority, where dominant ideology is the discourse of more powerful decision-makers, while subaltern ideologies persist. This leads to a more interactive theory of structural constraint and the conditions of possibility for radical action. Social actors can change power relations by reproducing dominant discourses while reversing implied power-authority relations – reverse discourse. Alternatively, more radically, they can resist dominant ideology by attempting to build consensus around subaltern ideology, which is incommensurable with dominant ideology. Reverse discourse has the advantage over radical critique in that it reproduces the natural-order-of-things. However, it has the disadvantage of reproducing reifying norms.","PeriodicalId":46197,"journal":{"name":"Global Society","volume":"36 1","pages":"368 - 390"},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2022-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45411605","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Global SocietyPub Date : 2022-03-31DOI: 10.1080/13600826.2022.2056881
D. Kennedy, François Venne
{"title":"Return of the Amateurs? Comparing Grassroots and Professional Approaches to International Relief","authors":"D. Kennedy, François Venne","doi":"10.1080/13600826.2022.2056881","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/13600826.2022.2056881","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT International aid is increasingly the domain of professionals, particularly among large international nongovernmental organisations (INGOs), while amateur assistance is largely dismissed (or disparaged) by practitioners and academics. However, strong countervailing trends exist, especially in the United States, with 10,000 grassroots INGOs (GINGOs) established since the 1990s. We explore the positioning of amateur organisations in a professionalising field. We ask: To what extent do GINGOs conform with or challenge professional practices in international aid? We investigate this question through a comparative content analysis of the websites of 60 GINGOs active in Haiti and 8 large, professional INGOs. Our research affirms the differences between professional and amateur organisations in areas of public presentation and financial transparency, but also reveals unexpected areas of convergence, especially among a subset of professionally-presenting GINGOs. In addition, we find that despite stated INGO commitments to beneficiary empowerment, amateurs were comparatively more consistently rights-based in their communications.","PeriodicalId":46197,"journal":{"name":"Global Society","volume":"37 1","pages":"266 - 291"},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2022-03-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49015429","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Global SocietyPub Date : 2022-03-28DOI: 10.1080/13600826.2022.2052020
Mona Lilja
{"title":"Theorising Resistance Formations: Reverse Discourses, Spatial Resistance and Networked Dissent","authors":"Mona Lilja","doi":"10.1080/13600826.2022.2052020","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/13600826.2022.2052020","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT By merging the concepts of “formations” and “resistance”, this paper presents a conceptual map of how to “read” resistance movements, which are composed of individual resistance and collective action. I suggest that reverse discourse could be interpreted as one specific resistance formation, by denoting how subjects (re)articulate and re-present themselves and the figure they are expected to assume; it is a negotiation of defined and delimited identities positions. The framing of reverse discourse as a particular resistance formation, with its specific deposits, makes sense when contrasting it with other movements of resistance. By comparing different formations of resistance – such as reverse discourse, spatial resistance or networked dissent – this paper displays how and why specific mobilisations unfold; both particular and more universal features come to light when contrasting the topographies of different resistance formations.","PeriodicalId":46197,"journal":{"name":"Global Society","volume":"36 1","pages":"309 - 329"},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2022-03-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44754294","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Global SocietyPub Date : 2022-03-26DOI: 10.1080/13600826.2022.2052021
Ann E. Towns
{"title":"WAW, No Women? Foucault’s Reverse Discourse and Gendered Subjects in Diplomatic Networks","authors":"Ann E. Towns","doi":"10.1080/13600826.2022.2052021","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/13600826.2022.2052021","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT This study has two aims. Empirically, it examines women ambassador networks, hitherto overlooked in diplomacy scholarship. Such women-only networks are fascinating, as they cut across state-based alignments that typically shape diplomatic networks. Using Women Ambassadors of Warsaw (WAW) as a case, the analysis is based on interviews with its members in 2020. Theoretically, the aim is to draw on Michel Foucault’s notion of “reverse discourse” to build upon but trouble prior attempts to theorise the place of women and femininities in diplomacy. Rather than coherent scripts or stable roles, I argue, “women” are better conceived as a discursive subject position that is unstable, contradictory and reversing. Indeed, the members of WAW articulate surprisingly shifting and contradictory claims about women and the rationales of a women-only diplomatic network. Reverse discourse provides leverage for understanding these shifts, the article contends, but the analysis also shows the difficulties in reversing fragmented discourse.","PeriodicalId":46197,"journal":{"name":"Global Society","volume":"36 1","pages":"347 - 367"},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2022-03-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47055213","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}