The politics of evidence: ‘Doing nothing’ about LGBT health inequities by the WHO

How is ‘nothing’ produced and justified, and how is it functioning? Here, I will take a multilateral debate in the World Health Organisation (WHO) over the issues regarding health inequities experienced by sexual and gender minorities as an example. This article asks what national delegates really mean when they blame on the lack of evidence? Observing the debates in the WHO and elsewhere, what certain national governments have been doing is to avoid – by not making anything happen – a potential formulation of future international pressure through global health policymaking and its normative discourse. Through deconstructing the discourse of a ‘lack of evidence’, I identify the socio-political functions of ignorance and ignoring. That is, they did nothing, not because they didn’t understand and care. Quite on the contrary, it was because they cared and knew too well that health is always political, and yet, it is not just the politics concerning knowledge production and media representation; it is also international politics

Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV) of Public Private Partnership Projects in Asia and Mediterranean Middle East: Trends and Techniques

One of the main reasons for the success of public private partnership (PPP) projects is the creation of a separate commercial venture named “Special Purpose Vehicle” (SPV). SPV provides a good framework for raising funds, linking participants legally and assuring supply, production and marketing of products. SPV brings together various parties like lenders, financial institutions, public sector and export credit agencies, suppliers and off-takers. There is often a lack of precedents to identify attributes of a SPV and the process is further hampered by undeveloped financial and legal structures of a country. Thus, there is a need to establish clear attributes for a SPV to raise the funding options of PPPs. In search of these essential attributes, six PPP projects in Asia and Mediterranean Middle East are examined in this paper. Three are independent power producers (IPP), one each from India, Pakistan and China, and three are desalination Projects, one each from Israel, Singapore and Algeria. The evidence shows that not only are there common trends and techniques that are used for SPV development but also some unique features to overcome financial and legal hurdles. The evidence also gives insights for using SPV to improve financing of PPP projects.- special purpose vehicle, public-private partnership, project finance

Decolonising and queering praxis: the unanswerable questions for ‘Queer Asia'

What does it mean by putting ‘Queer’ and ‘Asia’ together? This question –complicated by several concepts – arose many times at occasions of the Queer Asia 2017. Left with series of unanswerable questions, such as the presumption of nation/state, the discontent of sexual/national modernity, and the making of counterpublics, Queer Asia posts challenges for both queer theory and postcolonialism. The Conference participants have reified and (hopefully) resisted the White settler’s dilemma of desiring modernity without the West that has haunted most parts of the world in all aspects, needless to say the production and operationalisation of gender equality, sexual rights and all sorts of queer knowledge. This article, ruminating upon certain observations, reflects the ambivalences and intensions between people of diverse perceptions of modernisation and normalisation for or against queer existence. By elaborating on three main series of debates, I consider the importance of destabilising, by repeatedly questioning, the ‘concepts’ we are familiar with, although the ‘decolonial queer praxis’ is rather traumatising than entertaining

LGBT rights versus Asian values: de/re-constructing the universality of human rights

Law, especially from the international human rights regime, is a direct reference on which minority groups rely when it comes to ‘non-discrimination’. Drawing upon LGBT rights in Taiwan, as well as Hong Kong and Singapore, this article – through an application of K.H. Chen’s (2010) Asia as Method – critically reviews how global LGBT politics interact with local societies influenced by Confucianism. Along a perpetual competition between the universalism and cultural relativism of human rights, this article not only identifies the pitfalls of ‘Asian values’ from a cosmopolitan perspective but also contributes to a queered approach to human rights-holders against homonationalism

Undoing sovereignty/identity, queering the ‘international’: the politics of law

Recently the Yogyakarta Principles have celebrated their tenth anniversary; there has been widening acceptance across international organisations and increasingly corresponding state practices, and still, there is a need for a wider appreciation of such norms. It is argued here, simultaneously, it is necessary for queer methodology and critique to intervene in this developing field in both law and politics in order to relax the policing of identity upon a nationalised as well as gendered and sexualised body. Queer international law – echoing the advocacy of queer International Relations – targets the heteronormative idea of state sovereignty that is in itself patriarchal and paternalistic in normalising, or even discarding, the undesirable citizens. This essay, from the perspective that international law is a historical product reflecting the competition between powers at both domestic and international levels, attempts to draw attention to the importance of raising queer polyvocality in reframing the idea of the law of and between nation/states

The demagogies of ‘Lack’: The WHO’s ambivalence to the right to health of LGBT people

In May 2013, the World Health Organization (WHO) Secretariat produced its first-ever report regarding health issues related to lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) persons in preparation for an agenda item of the 2013 WHO Executive Board (EB) meeting. The debate resulted in the removal of the item from the adopted agenda. Since then, LBGT health has never been brought up again. Drawing on the debate, there are three ‘lacks’ causing the deadlock in the WHO: (1) the lack of consensus between universalists and cultural relativists on implementing the right to health, (2) the lack of capacity of the WHO in addressing political controversies, and (3) the lack of evidence thwarting the claim for health justice for LGBT people. However, in this paper, I argue that it is the lack of globalism, in contrast to internationalism, that prevents the WHO from achieving the health-for-all goal. While the EB is authorized to determine the global health policy agenda by the WHO Constitution, its prioritization of national interests has made human rights protection rhetorical rather than obligatory. Combating such institutional obstacles to LGBT health, I conclude that it is urgent to promote the people-centered approach to global health governance by accommodating the ‘polyvocality’ of civil societies

Communicating Climate Change In Internet Discussion Fora: Processes and Implications

Communicating climate change issues in the Internet era requires new strategies that incorporate online communication. The rapid growth of new media and widespread use of the internet has marked everyday lifestyles in modern society. Information on a wide range of social issues, including climate change, is disseminated and debated through online discussions in internet fora. In this research, communication on internet fora and other potential forms of online social interaction are explored, to identify ways to enhance climate change communication on the Internet. The thesis raises three research questions to explore the communication context of internet fora discussion, namely: what are characteristics of the communication process on internet fora? Who is involved in the communication process? What influences do these online communication activities have on users’ everyday activities? The research applies a mixed-methods approach of analysing the usage of Internet fora and the contents of fora communication activities to explore these questions. This includes qualitative reviews of topic-thread discussions to reveal users’ roles in discussions, as well as surveys of fora users. It is argued that with increasing levels of interaction among communicators (people who post or reply to articles in order to express or respond ideas) on internet fora, these communicators are mobilised to join the online discussion process, competing for opinion leadership. The online discussions further contribute to the formation of opinions on climate change, as climate change and related issues are discussed The thesis thereby aims to contribute to the development of effective approaches for opinion formation and climate change communication online, and to encourage individuals to discuss changing behaviour patterns and public engagement of greenhouse gas reduction actions