Un-Veiling Women’s Rights in the ‘War on Terrorism’

This thesis consists of an introductory chapter and four self-contained papers on temporary work agenciesand the economic analysis of law. Paper [I] adds to the theoretical literature on the incentives of Temporary Work Agencies (TWAs). Using aprincipal-agent model with hidden action to model two main types of contracts between a TWA and a ClientFirm (CF), the TWA is shown to potentially act against the best interest of the CF when helping to fill avacant position. The results also suggest that the adverse effect of the incentive misalignment is larger whenthe worker is going to be leased instead of hired by the CF. However, this effect could potentially be offsetby introducing a sufficient level of competition among the TWAs. Paper [II] uses individual-level data on young adults to estimate how the probability of being employed inthe Swedish temporary agency sector is affected by whether a partner or other family member has experienceof temporary agency work. The results show a significant effect from all peer groups of a magnitude thatcorrespond to the other most influential control variables. We also find that this cohort of the agency sectorhas a relatively high education level compared to the regular sector, and that there are predominately menworking in thissector. Paper [III] analyses possible effects on total employment, and the distribution between agency work andregular contracts as a consequence of the implementation of the EU Temporary and Agency Workers Directive in Sweden. The analysis is based on changes in the compensation to agency workers in a calibratedextension of a Mortensen-Pissarides search model. Even though the results suggest a negative net effect ontotal employment, the implementation is shown to increase (utilitarian) welfare, and an increased transitionprobability from the agency sector into regular employment will increase welfare even further. Paper [IV] focuses on settlement probabilities for different types of representation within the Swedish LabourCourt. Empirical estimates on a set of unjust dismissal cases show that private representatives are generallyless likely to reach a settlement than their union counterparts. The settlement probabilities converge following court-mandated information disclosure, which suggests that information asymmetry is an importantfactor in explaining differences in settlement behaviour. Privately instigated negotiations are therefore ingeneral insufficient for making cases with non-union representation reach the same settlement rate as caseswith union representation

Law and the Sexual Subaltern: A Comparative Perspective

I am entering this conversation as a comparativist who wants to complicate the received wisdom about India in the West in regard to matters of sex, desire and the law. I want to address three issues:* First, how sex generally and alternative sexuality more specifically, are emerging as zones of contest in the legal arena and are simultaneously cast as cultural controversies in post-colonial India.* Second, I address how sexual subalterns, that is, gays, lesbians and sexworkers, are challenging dominant sexual and cultural norms.* And finally, I examine why a project of pleasure and desire is an important political goal in a post-colonial context

The Fundamentalist Face of Secularism and Its Impact on Women\u27s Rights in India, Joseph C. Hostetler-Baker & Hostetler Lecture

I am going to talk about three things today: The first is to give you a very brief account of the competing understandings of secularism that have emerged in India. I look at the model of secularism that is being promoted by the Hindu Right and the validation this has received from the electorate, but more importantly, the Supreme Court. Secondly, I will address why the wall of separation does not provide a way out of the crisis of secularism in India and how it has not solved the problem of majoritarianism even in the American context. And finally, how the Hindu Right\u27s agenda for women from the religious minority communities, is related to its secular project; a project that seeks the establishment of a Hindu State

Law and the Sexual Subaltern: A Comparative Perspective

I am entering this conversation as a comparativist who wants to complicate the received wisdom about India in the West in regard to matters of sex, desire and the law. I want to address three issues:* First, how sex generally and alternative sexuality more specifically, are emerging as zones of contest in the legal arena and are simultaneously cast as cultural controversies in post-colonial India.* Second, I address how sexual subalterns, that is, gays, lesbians and sexworkers, are challenging dominant sexual and cultural norms.* And finally, I examine why a project of pleasure and desire is an important political goal in a post-colonial context

Re-Orienting Law and Sexuality

This symposium issue of the Cleveland State Law Review emerges from the Reorienting Law and Sexuality Conference hosted by Cleveland-Marshall College of Law in October 1999. The symposium locates itself as a continuation of the discourse that surfaced in the American legal academy in 1979 with a symposium issue of the Hastings Law Review. It is a discourse that brings into sharp relief technologies of power and strategies of resistance that contend at all sites where law aims to regulate human sexuality. While the initiative of 1979 was further cultivated by other forums of knowledge production within the American legal academy, this symposium is unique in bringing together legal scholars, legal practitioners, social scientists, and activists to exchange views and experiences from their varied vantage points. Contributions to this issue represent the written part of this interdisciplinary dialogue