The Coronavirus: Biopolitics and the Rise of ‘Anthropocene Authoritarianism’

If the lesson of the global response to the Coronavirus is that humanity itself is the problem, then Anthropocene Authoritarianism looks set to pose a larger long-term challenge to our ways of life than the virus itself. With politics suspended, societies under lockdown, parliaments closed and States of Emergency in force globally (Runciman, 2020), many commentators have turned to Foucauldian-inspired understandings of biopolitics and population control to analyze contemporary events (Horvat, 2020; Agamben, 2020a; Demetri, 2020; Singh, 2020; Sotiris, 2020). Biopolitics has become a key concept in critical discourses of security governance in the last two decades (Rose, 2007; Esposito, 2008; Dillon, 2015). Deriving from the work of Foucault, at the heart of biopolitical thought is the relationship of politics to life as both the basis of governance and as an object to be secured (Foucault, 2007; 2008). For Foucault, ‘life’ was a way of articulating an ‘outside’ to the human world of politics, an outside that appeared natural but was, in fact, a malleable construct (Lemke, 2011)

Coronavirus and the End of Resilience

Resilience appears to be the key policy buzzword of our times. International organizations, as diverse as the United Nations and the European Union, have now adopted resilience strategies across various policy areas – highlighted by the UN’s risk and resilience framework for its 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development (UN, 2017), the EU Action Plan for Resilience (European Commission, 2013), the European Union Global Strategy (EU, 2016) and other policy documents. This short piece argues that global responses to the Coronavirus appear to demonstrate that policy discourses of resilience may be one (so far, unremarked) casualty of the Coronavirus outbreak. ‘Keeping Calm and Carrying On’ is not an option. Acting normally, not panicking, not overreacting, is seen as dangerous and hubristic (Taleb et al, 2020). Being resilient will make the problems worse. Being resilient will make the virus spread. Better to close, to cancel, to restrict now, rather than to regret later

Intervention and Statebuilding beyond the Human: From the ‘Black Box’ to the ‘Great Outdoors’

This article analyses intervention and statebuilding as shifting towards a posthuman discursive regime. It seeks to explore how the shift to ‘bottom-up’ or post-liberal approaches has evolved into a focus upon epistemological barriers to intervention and an appreciation of complexity. It attempts to describe a process of reflection upon intervention as a policy practice, whereby the need to focus on local context and relations, in order to take problems seriously, begins to further undermine confidence in the Western episteme. In other words, the ‘bottom-up’ approach, rather than resolving the crisis of policy practices of intervention, seems to further intensify it. It is argued that the way out of this crisis seems to be found in the rejection of the aspiration to know from a position of a ‘problem-solving’ external authority and instead to learn from the opportunities opened up through the practices of intervention. However, what is learnt does not seem to be able to fit into traditional modes and categories of expertise

Opportunities and Challenges: The Caribbean Involvement in the Free Trade Area of the Americas

This Article will examine the region\u27s participation in the process leading to the establishment of the FTAA, and the benefits and challenges associated with its involvement in this hemispheric undertaking. Part One of the Article sets out the rationale for the establishment of the FTAA and the structure of the negotiations. The section also identifies some elements of the unique nature of the proposed grouping. Part Two discusses the challenges facing Caribbean countries as they participate in multilateral trade negotiations, including the FTAA. In Part Three, the Article critically reviews the early stages of the integration process in the Caribbean and examines the most recent developments in the process, particularly in the context of the process of globalization and liberalization. This is followed by Part Four, which discusses the Caribbean\u27s participation in the FTAA

Opportunities and Challenges: The Caribbean Involvement in Free Trade Area ofthe Americas

This Article will examine the region\u27s participation in the process leading to the establishment of the FTAA, and the benefits and challenges associated with its involvement in this hemispheric undertaking. Part One of the Article sets out the rationale for the establishment of the FTAA and the structure of the negotiations. The section also identifies some elements of the unique nature of the proposed grouping. Part Two discusses the challenges facing Caribbean countries as they participate in multilateral trade negotiations, including the FTAA. In Part Three, the Article critically reviews the early stages of the integration process in the Caribbean and examines the most recent developments in the process, particularly in the context of the process of globalization and liberalization. This is followed by Part Four, which discusses the Caribbean\u27s participation in the FTAA

Individual-Level Determinants of the Propensity to Shirk

Employee shirking, where workers give less than full effort on the job, has typically been investigated as a construct subject to group and organization-level influences. Neglected are individual differences that might explain why individuals in the same organization or work-group might shirk. The present study sought to address these limitations by investigating subjective well-being (a dispositional construct), job satisfaction, as well as other individual-level determinants of shirking behavior. Results identified several individual-level determinants of shirking. Implications of the results are discussed

Psychoanalyzing Nature, Dark Ground of Spirit

The ontological paradigms of Schelling and the late Merleau-Ponty bear striking resemblances to Spinoza’s ontology. Both were developed in response to transcendental models of a Cartesian mold, resisting tendencies to exalt the human ego to the neglect or the detriment of the more-than-human world. As such, thinkers with environmental concerns have sought to derive favorable ethical prescriptions on their basis. We begin by discerning a deadlock between two such thinkers: Ted Toadvine and Sean McGrath. With ecological responsibility in mind, both actually resist Spinozist reduction of the human being to the status of a mere mode among modes. But despite having the same general aim, they end up endorsing contrary practical conclusions. Our objective is to pinpoint the reasons behind this deadlock, indicative of two strands of post-Spinozist environmental thought which stand in tension, and to begin to propose an integrative way forward. The ethical weight afforded by Toadvine to the notion of resistance in the work of the late Merleau-Ponty, namely nature’s resistance to harmonizing, unifying pretensions, invites inquiry into two Merleau-Pontean notions he does not address: the barbarian principle, and the proposal to “Do a Psychoanalysis of Nature.” We trace these to their origins in the works of Schelling’s middle period, arguing that the Schellingian location of resistance in Spirit’s dark ground—alternately conceived as primordial Dionysiac madness, bottled-up within the substratum of consciousness—lends to an understanding of the human, and human responsibility, that harbors favorable implications for environmental ethics

Solvent coarse-graining and the string method applied to the hydrophobic collapse of a hydrated chain

Using computer simulations of over 100,000 atoms, the mechanism for the hydrophobic collapse of an idealized hydrated chain is obtained. This is done by coarse-graining the atomistic water molecule positions over 129,000 collective variables that represent the water density field and then using the string method in these variables to compute the minimum free energy pathway (MFEP) for the collapsing chain. The dynamical relevance of the MFEP (i.e. its coincidence with the mechanism of collapse) is validated a posteriori using conventional molecular dynamics trajectories. Analysis of the MFEP provides atomistic confirmation for the mechanism of hydrophobic collapse proposed by ten Wolde and Chandler. In particular, it is shown that lengthscale-dependent hydrophobic dewetting is the rate-limiting step in the hydrophobic collapse of the considered chain.Comment: 11 pages, 7 figures, including supporting informatio

Pursuit on a Graph Using Partial Information

The optimal control of a "blind" pursuer searching for an evader moving on a road network and heading at a known speed toward a set of goal vertices is considered. To aid the "blind" pursuer, certain roads in the network have been instrumented with Unattended Ground Sensors (UGSs) that detect the evader's passage. When the pursuer arrives at an instrumented node, the UGS therein informs the pursuer if and when the evader visited the node. The pursuer's motion is not restricted to the road network. In addition, the pursuer can choose to wait/loiter for an arbitrary time at any UGS location/node. At time 0, the evader passes by an entry node on his way towards one of the exit nodes. The pursuer also arrives at this entry node after some delay and is thus informed about the presence of the intruder/evader in the network, whereupon the chase is on - the pursuer is tasked with capturing the evader. Because the pursuer is "blind", capture entails the pursuer and evader being collocated at an UGS location. If this happens, the UGS is triggered and this information is instantaneously relayed to the pursuer, thereby enabling capture. On the other hand, if the evader reaches one of the exit nodes without being captured, he is deemed to have escaped. We provide an algorithm that computes the maximum initial delay at the entry node for which capture is guaranteed. The algorithm also returns the corresponding optimal pursuit policy

Measuring the Value of Ingredient Brand Equity at Multiple Stages in the Supply Chain: a Component Supplier's Perspective

The goal of this article is to conceptualize the Ingredient Branding strategy and propose tools for measuring value derived from brand equity at the component supplier’s perspective. We demonstrate how brand equity occurs and how it can be measured at three marketing stages: B2B, B2C and B2B2C.This paper characterizes different stages in the Ingredient Branding strategy. Furthermore, the paper provides a different measurement method for each stage, and highlights in the end, an overall view of all participants in the Ingredient Branding value chain. We show fi rst that measuring brand equity at the end user stage alone is not as useful as measuring brand equity at multiple stages of the value chain. The complexity associated with an Ingredient Branding strategy makes it a multi-stage branding and marketing effort. Therefore, various data and measurement tools are needed to meet the needs of marketing managers and scholars focused on brand strategies for differing stages of the value chain. We demons rate that existing brand measurement methods can be modified to analyze multi-stage, interrelated exchanges. The paper extends existing brand measurements to capture the value of an Ingredient Brand both qualitatively and quantitatively, at multiple stages of the value chain.Ingredient Branding, brand measurement, value chain.