Safe spaces for dykes in danger? Refugee law's production of the vulnerable lesbian subject

Book synopsis: The question of how to conceptualize the relationships between governments and the everyday lives of women has long been the focus of attention among feminists. Feminist scholarship critiques women?s lives, experiences and gender inequality in a variety of contexts. In this age of increased internationalism, we are witness to government actor?s attempts to use women?s alleged `vulnerability? to justify its humanitarian interventions. Regulating the International Movement of Women interrogates western government?s uses of discourses of human vulnerability as a tool to regulate non-western women?s migration. In this collection of provocatively argued essays, the contributors wish to reclaim the concept of racialised and gendered vulnerability, from its under theorized, and thus, ambiguous location in feminist?s theory, in a variety of methodological and geographical contexts. The book addresses the human geographer, the socio-legal and critical scholar, the sociologist, the cultural, postcolonial and political theorists and practitioners. This unique text will be of value to academics, postgraduate and research students of any of the above disciplines, as well as practitioners interested in theoretical and empirical discussions of the state, normativity and the regulation of women `s cross-border mobility

The Promise at Hand

Based on a former RWJF vice president's seminar, gives an overview of the history and role of foundations in U.S. society, their uncertain status as social institutions, and their regulatory history. Urges foundations to see themselves as a public trust

Bringing the outside(r) in: Law’s appropriation of subversive identities

This article explores some of the ways in which law appropriates subversive identities. Drawing on work from geographical, feminist and critical race approaches to property, I put forward an understanding of property as a relation of belonging ‘held up’ by space. Building on this understanding, I argue that identity can operate as property in the same way that land and material objects can, and that law appropriates subversive identities by bringing them into its hegemonic space of recognition and regulation. Law’s appropriations have a range of effects on both the individual subjects directly involved in legal proceedings and the broader spaces in and through which those subjects forge their identities. Specifically this article explores the appropriation of gay and lesbian identities in the context of immigration law, and of aboriginal identities in the context of Australia’s Northern Territory National Emergency Response Act 2007 (Cth) (NTNERA)

The Urban Crimnal Justice System: A Case of Fairness

This short essay contains the presiding judges recollections of the case People v. Robles as a way to discuss public perception of fairness in the criminal justice system

Access to Specific Provision Employer-Provided Benefits: New Estimates

[Excerpt] Many employers offer some type of health or retirement package, but their provisions vary considerably from employer to employer. Knowing the details of the types of coverage available affords a better understanding of benefits in the workplace. For example, health plans may be prepaid (health maintenance organizations, or HMOs) or fee for service (such as preferred provider organizations, or PPOs), and may or may not offer dental coverage. Defined contribution plans may be structured around company matches on employer contributions or may consist of non-elective employer contributions alone. The Bureau of Labor Statistics refers to these details as plan provisions. This Beyond the Numbers article describes the prevalence with which people working for private employers in the United States are given the opportunity to enroll in health and retirement plans with various provisions—the extent to which they have access to those provisions. But note: just because a worker has access to a given plan does not mean that he or she participates in the plan. Once given access, the worker often must affirmatively enroll in the plan in order to be counted as a participant (and to receive and enjoy the plan’s benefits laid out in its provisions). The rate at which workers enroll in plans to which they are given access is known as the takeup rate. Often, the takeup rate for a plan is less than 100 percent, perhaps because enrolling in the plan requires that the worker incur some cost or because the worker also has access to several alternative plans. As a result, the participation rate—the extent to which workers in the economy participate in plans—is often lower than the corresponding access rate. The analysis that follows explores this dynamic by presenting participation and takeup rates for plan provisions alongside the access rate