Torture Approval in Comparative Perspective

Torture is (almost) universally condemned as barbaric and ineffective, yet it persists in the modern world. What factors influence levels of support for torture? Public opinion data from 31 countries in 2006 and 2008 (a total of 44 country-years) are used to test three hypotheses related to the acceptability of torture. The findings, first, show that outright majorities in 31 country-years reject the use of torture. Multiple regression results show that countries with high per capita income and low domestic repression are less likely to support torture. Constraints on the executive have no significant effect on public opinion on torture

Féminisme et différence : les dangers d’écrire en tant que femme sur les femmes en Algérie

Le désir de démanteler l’ordre existant et de le reconstruire pour le faire correspondre à ses propres besoins est au cœur du projet féministe, en Orient comme en Occident. Ce désir est parfaitement exprimé par le cri d’Omar Khayyam : Ah l’amour ! Puissions-nous conspirer avec le Destin Pour comprendre la marche de ce triste monde, Nous le réduirions en poussière – pour alors Le refaire, selon les désirs de notre cœur. Cependant, les féministes, orientales et occidentales, ne sont pas unanim..

Samudayik Shakti: working-class feminism and social organisation in Subhash Camp, New Delhi

This article illustrates the intersections between architecture and agency in Subhash Camp, a squatter settlement in New Delhi, by ‘situating activism in place’. It highlights the significance of place in social action by examining the architecture of everyday places- the house, the street and the square - as the sites of both individual transformations and collective consciousness. Through observations of the activities of and interviews with members of Samudayik Shakti, a women’s organisation and a men’s panchayat, this article highlights a number of related processes in Subhash Camp: how different women experienced different places through everyday spatial practices; how the spatial practices in these places were shaped by different social structures at different scales, from the family to the state; how the architecture of these places was significant both as sites of control and of emancipation of women’s bodies; and how this dynamic contributed to the making of social action in Subhash Camp