Disentangling HIV and AIDS Stigma in Ethiopia,Tanzania and Zambia

The International Center for Research on Women (ICRW), in partnership with organizations in Ethiopia, Tanzania, and Zambia, led a study of HIV and AIDS-related stigma and discrimination in these three countries. This project, conducted from April 2001 to September 2003, unraveled the complexities around stigma by investigating the causes, manifestations and consequences of HIV and AIDS-related stigma and discrimination in sub-Saharan Africa. It then uses this analysis to suggest program interventions. Structured text analysis of 730 qualitative transcripts (650 interviews and 80 focus group discussions) and quantitative analysis of 400 survey respondents from rural and urban areas in these countries revealed the following main insights about the causes, context, experience and consequences of stigma: The main causes of stigma relate to incomplete knowledge, fears of death and disease, sexual norms and a lack of recognition of stigma. Insufficient and inaccurate knowledge combines with fears of death and disease to perpetuate beliefs in casual transmission and, thereby, avoidance of those with HIV. The knowledge that HIV can be transmitted sexually combines with an association of HIV with socially “improper” sex, such that people with HIV are stigmatized for their perceived immoral behavior. Finally, people often do not recognize that their words or actions are stigmatizing. Socio-economic status, age and gender all influence the experience of stigma. The poor are blamed less for their infection than the rich, yet they face greater stigma because they have fewer resources to hide an HIV-positive status. Youth are blamed in all three countries for spreading HIV through what is perceived as their highly risky sexual behavior. While both men and women are stigmatized for breaking sexual norms, gender-based power results in women being blamed more easily. At the same time, the consequences of HIV infection, disclosure, stigma and the burden of care are higher for women than for men. People living with HIV and AIDS face physical and social isolation from family, friends, and community; gossip, name-calling and voyeurism; and a loss of rights, decision-making power and access to resources and livelihoods. People with HIV internalize these experiences and consequently feel guilty, ashamed and inferior. They may, as a result, isolate themselves and lose hope. Those associated with people with HIV and AIDS, especially family members, friends and caregivers, face many of these same experiences in the form of secondary stigma. People living with HIV and AIDS and their families develop various strategies to cope with stigma. Decisions around disclosure depend on whether or not disclosing would help to cope (through care) or make the situation worse (through added stigma). Some cope by participating in networks of people with HIV and actively working in the field of HIV or by confronting stigma in their communities. Others look for alternative explanations for HIV besides sexual transmission and seek comfort, often turning to religion to do so. Stigma impedes various programmatic efforts. Testing, disclosure, prevention and care and support for people with HIV are advocated, but are impeded by stigma. Testing and disclosure are recognized as difficult because of stigma, and prevention is hampered because preventive methods such as condom use or discussing safe sex are considered indications of HIV infection or immoral behaviors and are thus stigmatized. Available care and support are accompanied by judgmental attitudes and isolating behavior, which can result in people with HIV delaying care until absolutely necessary. There are also many positive aspects of the way people deal with HIV and stigma. People express good intentions to not stigmatize those with HIV. Many recognize that their limited knowledge has a role in perpetuating stigma and are keen to learn more. Families, religious organizations and communities provide care, empathy and support for people with HIV and AIDS. Finally, people with HIV themselves overcome the stigma they face to challenge stigmatizing social norms. Our study points to five critical elements that programs aiming to tackle stigma need to address: Create greater recognition of stigma and discrimination. Foster in-depth, applied knowledge about all aspects of HIV and AIDS through a participatory and interactive process. Provide safe spaces to discuss the values and beliefs about sex, morality and death that underlie stigma. Find common language to talk about stigma. Ensure a central, contextually-appropriate and ethically-responsible role for people with HIV and AIDS While all individuals and groups have a role in reducing stigma, policymakers and programmers can start with certain key groups that our study suggests are a priority: Families caring for people living with HIV and AIDS: programs can help families both to cope with the burden of care and also to recognize and modify their own stigmatizing behavior. NGOs and other community-based organizations: NGOs can train their own staff to recognize and deal with stigma, incorporate ways to reduce stigma in all activities, and critically examine their communication methods and materials. Religious and faith-based organizations: these can be supportive of people living with HIV and AIDS in their role as religious leaders and can incorporate ways to reduce stigma in their community service activitie

The Rights of Others: Legal Claims and Immigration Outside the Law

This Article analyzes the rights of unauthorized migrants and elucidates how these noncitizens are incompletely but importantly integrated into the U.S. legal system. I examine four topics: (1) state and local laws targeting unauthorized migrants, (2) workplace rights and remedies, (3) suppression of evidence from an unlawful search or seizure, and (4) the right to effective counsel in immigration court. These four inquiries show how unauthorized migrants though unable to assert individual rights as directly as U.S. citizens in the same circumstances can nevertheless assert rights indirectly and obliquely by making transsubstantive arguments that fall into five general patterns. The first is an institutional competence argument that the wrong decisionmaker acted. The second is an argument that an unauthorized migrant was wronged by a comparatively culpable person. The third is a citizen proxy argument that sustaining an unauthorized migrant\u27s claim will protect a U.S. citizen or lawful permanent resident. The fourth is that an unauthorized migrant may be unable to challenge the substance of a decision, yet may mount a successful procedural surrogate challenge to the way that decision was reached. The fifth is a phantom norm argument that, even if a government action withstands constitutional challenge, it violates a statute or regulation. These patterns illustrate how typical doctrinal relationships and litigation strategies-for example, choosing between equal protection and preemption arguments, or between seeking redress for harms to individuals and harms to groups-shift significantly for unauthorized migrants. These patterns of oblique rights reflect a pervasive national ambivalence about immigration outside the law

Diversity As A Trade Secret

When we think of trade secrets, we often think of famous examples such as the Coca-Cola formula, Google’s algorithm, or McDonald’s special sauce used on the Big Mac. However, companies have increasingly made the novel argument that diversity data and strategies are protected trade secrets. This may sound like an unusual, even suspicious, legal argument. Many of the industries that dominate the economy in wealth, status, and power continue to struggle with a lack of diversity. Various stakeholders have mobilized to improve access and equity, but there is an information asymmetry that makes this pursuit daunting. When potential plaintiffs and other diversity advocates request workforce statistics and related employment information, many companies have responded with virulent attempts to maintain secrecy, including the use of trade secret protection. In this Article, I use the technology industry as an example to examine the trending legal argument of treating diversity as a trade secret. I discuss how companies can use this tactic to hide gender and race disparities and interfere with the advancement of civil rights law and workplace equity. I argue that instead of permitting companies to hide information, we should treat diversity data and strategies as public resources. This type of open model will advance the goals of equal opportunity law by raising awareness of inequalities and opportunities, motivating employers to invest in effective practices, facilitating collaboration on diversity goals, fostering innovation, and increasing accountability for action and progress

Corporate Crimmigration

Immigration laws are not just criminally enforced against individuals, but also corporations. For individuals, “crimmigration” is pervasive, as federal immigration prosecutions are a mass phenomenon. More than a third of the federal criminal docket — nearly 40,000 cases each year — consists of prosecutions of persons charged with violations of immigration rules. In contrast, prosecutors rarely charge corporations, which are required to verify citizenship status of employees. This Article sheds light on this unexplored area of corporate criminal law, including by presenting new empirical data. In the early 2000s, corporate immigration enforcement for the first time increased in prominence. During the Obama Administration, this trend accelerated, with a total of 101 corporate immigration prosecutions brought, and record penalties imposed. Under the Trump Administration so far, however, there have been just six corporate immigration prosecutions, and the only large cases have been legacy matters from the prior Administration. This Article does not suggest that workplace immigration screening and enforcement, much less criminal enforcement, is desirable. Instead, this Article explores how corporate charging dynamics may exacerbate tensions inherent in criminalizing immigration in the workplace. This Article contrasts the mass prosecution of individuals, under strict zero-tolerance rules, with the leniency-oriented approach towards firms that carefully considers collateral consequences, to shed light on internally conflicted federal policy at the intersection of corporate and immigration law. Now that the federal criminal dockets have become dominated by immigration enforcement, the problem of “corporate crimmigration” deserves urgent more attention

An Investigation of Fraud in Nonprofit Organizations: Occurrences and Deterrents

Losses due to fraudulent activities are particularly troublesome in the nonprofit sector because they directly reduce resources available to address tax-exempt purposes. The ensuing bad publicity may also reduce contributions and grants in subsequent periods. This paper uses data provided by Certified Fraud Examiners to report on the types of fraud they identified in nonprofit organizations and the characteristics of both the victims and the perpetrators of the fraudulent activities. Based on the analysis of the data, the authors suggest ways that fraud losses can be prevented or mitigated. In particular, governing boards are urged to consider important controls in addition to the annual financial statement audit.This publication is Hauser Center Working Paper No. 35. The Hauser Center Working Paper Series was launched during the summer of 2000. The Series enables the Hauser Center to share with a broad audience important works-in-progress written by Hauser Center scholars and researchers

Huella en Internet en la Web 3.0: Uso de redes sociales en el reclutamiento

Social media plays important role in many aspects of organizational life, and have become increasingly important in recruitment decisions. The purpose of this study is to understand the key issues in the use of digital footprint in recruitment, by using theme analysis as the research method, 10 managers of human resource department at Iranian banks who were responsible for recruiting of employees were interviewed. Nine themes emerged from the analysis: (a) Digital footprint usage enhances the complexity of employment processes, (b) The use of digital footprint in employment processes leads to the optimization and acquiring visions with regard to job applicants, (c) The impact and significant positive role of social media on maintaining employees, (d) Connecting networks available on social media lead to detection of reciprocal opportunities and bridging among job applicants and employers, (e) The role and desired implication of social media in post-employment processes, (f) The need for updating the knowledge of HR managers with respect to the continuous changes in environmental conditions , (g) The necessity of offering an opportunity to job applicants in high level posts within an organization to explain the negative results of information collected from applicant’s digital footprint on cyber space, (h) The need for measuring the accuracy of information collected from social media, (i) The necessity of educating, culture-building and creating the essential infrastructures for social media use in the society and among employees. The results of this study provide insight to effects of digital footprints on recruitment decisions, reduction of disciplinary actions and firing of employeesLos medios sociales desempeñan un papel importante en muchos aspectos de la vida organizacional y se han vuelto cada vez más importantes en las decisiones de reclutamiento de personal. El propósito de este estudio es comprender los asuntis clave en el uso de la huella en Internet en el proceso de reclutamiento, mediante el análisis del tema como método de investigación, se entrevistaron 10 gerentes del departamento de recursos humanos de bancos iraníes que fueron responsables del reclutamiento de empleados. Nueve temas surgieron del análisis: (a) el uso de la huella en Internet aumenta la complejidad de los procesos de empleo; (b) el uso de la huella en Internet en los procesos de empleo conduce a la optimización y la adquisición de visiones con respecto a los solicitantes de empleo; (c) el impacto y el importante papel positivo de las redes sociales en el mantenimiento de los empleados; (d) la conexión de las redes disponibles en las redes sociales conduce a la detección de oportunidades recíprocas y a la construcción de puentes entre los solicitantes de empleo y los empleadores; (e) la función y la implicación deseada de las redes sociales en los procesos posteriores al empleo; (f) la necesidad de actualizar el conocimiento de los gerentes de recursos humanos con respecto a los cambios continuos en las condiciones ambientales; (g) la necesidad de ofrecer una oportunidad a los solicitantes de empleo en puestos de alto nivel dentro de una organización para explicar los resultados negativos de la información recopilada a través de la huella en Internet del solicitante en el ciberespacio; (h) la necesidad de medir la precisión de la información recopilada de las redes sociales; (i) la necesidad de educar, construir cultura y crear las infraestructuras esenciales para el uso de las redes sociales en la sociedad y entre los empleados. Los resultados de este estudio proporcionan información sobre los efectos de las huellas en Internet en las decisiones de reclutamiento, la reducción de las medidas disciplinarias y el despido de empleados

Social Media Transformation of Human Resource Management

Social media is rapidly transforming the way individuals interact in the real world day by day in the workforce. This research focuses on how social media effects human resource management (HRM) in areas of recruitment, selection, retention, and termination. Through a SurveyMonkey information was gathered from human resource professionals primarily in the southeastern region and throughout the United States. Human resource managers where asked about the advantages and disadvantages of using social media such as Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter in areas of recruitment, selection, and termination. The results, illustrated that there were many advantages when using social media sites in HRM such as employee recognition, wider and diverse applicant pools, and internal organization communication. However, the results revealed that there were also several disadvantages of using social media sites such as lawsuits, discrimination issues, and wrongful termination. In the end, this paper discussed the importance of organizational policies effectively governing employees’ use of social media sites in order to highlight more advantages and reduce negative effects

Common sense common safety

"A report by Lord Young of Graffham to the Prime Minister following a Whitehall‑wide review of the operation of health and safety laws and the growth of the compensation culture" - Cover