Ideology, Hegemony, Discourse: A Critical Review of Theories of Knowledge and Power

For over a century, social theorists have attempted to explain why those who lack economic power consent to hierarchies of social and political power. They have used ideology, hegemony and discourse as key concepts to explain the intersections between the social production of knowledge and the perpetuation of power relations. The Marxist concept of ideology describes how the dominant ideas within a given society reflect the interests of a ruling economic class. In this paper, I trace the movement from this concept of ideology to models of hegemony and discourse. I then trace a second set of ruptures in theories of ideology, hegemony and discourse. Marx and others link ideology to a vision of society dominated by economic class as a field of social power. However, theorists of gender and race have questioned the place of class as the locus of power. I conclude by arguing that key theorists of gender and race Hall, Smith, hooks and Haraway offer a more complex understanding of how our consent to networks of power is produced within contemporary capitalist societies. This argument has important implications for theory and practice directed at destabilizing our consent to power

Public Engagement in Climate Communication on China’s Weibo: Network Structure and Information Flows

This article provides an empirical study of public engagement with climate change discourse in China by analysing how Chinese publics participate in the public discussion around two Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change reports and how individual users interact with state and elite actors on the pre-eminent Chinese microblogging platform Weibo. Using social network analysis methods and a temporal comparison, we examine the structure of climate communication networks, the direction of information flows among multiple types of Weibo users, and the changes in information diffusion patterns between the pre- and post-Paris periods. Our results show there is an increasing yet constrained form of public engagement in climate communication on Weibo alongside China’s pro-environmental transition in recent years. We find an expansion of public engagement as shown by individual users’ increasing influence in communication networks and the diversification of frames associated with climate change discourse. However, we also find three restrictive interaction tendencies that limit Weibo’s potential to facilitate multi-directional communication and open public deliberation of climate change, including the decline of mutually balanced dialogic interactions, the lack of bottom-up information flows, and the reinforcement of homophily tendencies amongst eco-insiders and governmental users. These findings highlight the coexistence of both opportunities and constraints of Weibo being a venue for public engagement with climate communication and as a forum for a new climate politics and citizen participation in China

Mechanically bonded macromolecules

Mechanically bonded macromolecules constitute a class of challenging synthetic targets in polymer science. The controllable intramolecular motions of mechanical bonds, in combination with the processability and useful physical and mechanical properties of macromolecules, ultimately ensure their potential for applications in materials science, nanotechnology and medicine. This tutorial review describes the syntheses and properties of a library of diverse mechanically bonded macromolecules, which covers (i) main-chain, side-chain, bridged, and pendant oligo/polycatenanes, (ii) main-chain oligo/polyrotaxanes, (iii) poly[c2]daisy chains, and finally (iv) mechanically interlocked dendrimers. A variety of highly efficient synthetic protocols—including template-directed assembly, step-growth polymerisation, quantitative conjugation, etc.—were employed in the construction of these mechanically interlocked architectures. Some of these structures, i.e., side-chain polycatenanes and poly[c2]daisy chains, undergo controllable molecular switching in a manner similar to their small molecular counterparts. The challenges posed by the syntheses of polycatenanes and polyrotaxanes with high molecular weights are contemplated

You can easily feel like a nobody: an interpretative phenomenological analysis of the lived experiences of 12 Chinese post-graduate students in higher education in the United Kingdom

Higher education in the UK has been transformed in diverse and far-reaching ways in recent decades, most notably through the internationalisation of the sector. Internationalisation has brought about many opportunities for states, institutions and individuals, but also raised concurrent challenges for all. Differences in approaches to knowledge and scholarship – cultures of learning ¬– have led international students, and post-graduate students from mainland China in particular, to be commonly conceptualised as deficient when they rub up against different practices in the UK. This thesis explores the experiences of 12 mainland Chinese post-graduate students across three higher education institutions in the UK. Data was generated through in-depth, focussed interviews, with the analysis drawing on the principles of Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis to generate a thematic, idiographic account of the participants’ lifeworlds. The interviews indicated that any satisfying outcomes of the participants’ sojourns were tempered by significant challenges, namely: establishing meaningful relationships with tutors and other students; feeling isolated, lonely and marginalised; struggling with emotional wellbeing; adjusting to new pedagogical practices and struggling with curricular content. In addition, transitioning to post-graduate study, and tense relationships between students from mainland China and those from Hong Kong and Taiwan, emerged as unexpected aspects of their lifeworlds. Given the range of challenges experienced by this cohort, this thesis draws on the emancipatory stances of neo-Marxism and critical transformative pedagogy to trouble current discourses. It militates for a reframing of the ways in which Chinese post-graduate students are conceptualised in higher education in the UK, which necessitates greater recognition and appreciation of the pluralithic approaches to knowledge and scholarship which are present in university classrooms. As this is a professional doctorate, suggestions for adjusting classroom practices, curricular content and institutional approaches are made, and I call for a deeper understanding of cultures of learning in university settings, for the benefit of all

Actors and justifications in media debates on Arctic climate change in Finland and Canada : A network approach

In this paper, we examine the centrality of policy actors and moral justifications in media debates on Arctic climate change in Finland and Canada from 2011?2015. We take a network approach on the media debates by analysing relations between the actors and justifications, using discourse network analysis on a dataset of 745 statements from four newspapers. We find that in both countries, governments and universities are the most central actors, whereas business actors are the least central. Justifications that value environmental sustainability and scientific knowledge are most central and used across actor types. However, ecological justifications are sometimes in conflict with market justifications. Government actors emphasize new economic possibilities in the Arctic whereas environmental organizations demand greater protection of the vulnerable Arctic. Ecological justifications and justifications that value international cooperation are more central in the Finnish debate, whereas justifications valuing sustainability and science, as well as those valuing national sovereignty, are more central in the Canadian debate. We conclude that in addition to the centrality of specific policy actors in media debates, the use of different types of moral justifications also reflects political power in the media sphere.Peer reviewe

Do neighbourhood environmental perceptions affect practices?

In this paper, we examine how environmental practices related to public transit and urban green space use are influenced by perceptions of local level environmental change, neighbourhood inhabitation, and socio-demographic factors. The analysis shows that perceptions of change and neighbourhood inhabitation offer better explanations for changing local environmental practices than socio-demographic orientations. We contribute to social practice theory by drawing attention to the interplay of environmental perceptions and neighbourhood inhabitation as factors that facilitate changing environmental practices. By gaining insight into the relationship between perceptions of change and environmental practices, we thereby learn how sustainability goals, such as those embodied by SDG11, can be translated into social practices at the community level.Dans cet article, nous examinons comment les pratiques environnementales liées au transport en commun et à l’utilisation des espaces verts urbains sont influencées par les perceptions du changement environnemental au niveau local, l’habitation des quartiers et les facteurs sociodémographiques. L’analyse montre que les perceptions du changement et de l’habitat du quartier offrent de meilleures explications pour l’évolution des pratiques environnementales locales que les orientations sociodémographiques. Nous contribuons è la théorie de la pratique sociale en attirant l’attention sur l’interaction des perceptions environnementales et de l’habitation du quartier en tant que facteurs qui facilitent l’évolution des pratiques environnementales. En acquérant un aperçu de la relation entre les perceptions du changement et les pratiques environnementales, nous apprenons ainsi comment les objectifs de durabilité, tels que ceux incarnées par ODD (Agenda 2030 du développement durable), peuvent être traduits en pratiques sociales au niveau communautaire

Media, politics, and climate change : the ASA Task Force report and beyond

This review essay focuses on the American Sociological Association (ASA) Task Force on Sociology and Global Climate Change final report, Climate Change and Society: Sociological Perspectives. We take the report as a jumping off point to provide an overview of research on climate change in the media sphere and in the political sphere. The political sphere and the media sphere are key sites for the politics of climate change, where the meaning of the causes and consequences of climate change, as well as policy responses for mitigation and adaptation, are contested and negotiated among policy makers, corporate interests, environmental scientists, environmental movements and counter-movements. While there are substantial bodies of research on climate change within both the political and media spheres, less research specifically addresses how the social dynamics of one of these spheres shapes social interaction in the other sphere. Insights into the relationships between these spheres are suggested by the ASA Task Force report, but this area is under examined in current research. As such, we argue that there is a need for more research that bridges policy-oriented and media-oriented perspectives on climate change.Peer reviewe

The political and social construction of work in north eastern engineering and shipbuilding, 1880-191820

For fifty years or so at the end of the 19th century the North East of England was an engineering and shipbuilding powerhouse, and a huge mining area. A fast growing population with concomitant infrastructure developments reflected the resulting demand for labour. Yet by 1932 one of the exemplars of this success, Jarrow, was in such dire economic straights that it was described as a “workhouse without walls”.1 The causes of this precipitous decline have been debated, at least in general terms, by historians for years. Was it the failure of owners to adopt more modern management practices, the alleged refusal of the City of London to invest in the UK when they could generate better returns abroad, or a gradual institutional sclerosis paralysing the ability of business to adapt to changed circumstances? This PhD looks at the rise and decline of NE engineering and shipbuilding, focusing on communities rather than class, and looking at what bound them together as well as what kept them apart. This though is not a family history. Through an examination of the political and social construction of work, including case studies of specific workplaces, as well as the ways in which the communities lived, it attempts to provide a more detailed look at ways in which the many thousands of individual choices and decisions made by those community members, which whilst in their own context were rational, in the broader sweep of history created the conditions for long term decline

Media Coverage and Perceived Policy Influence of Environmental Actors: Good Strategy or Pyrrhic Victory?

In this article we analyze how media coverage for environmental actors (individual environmental activists and environmental movement organizations) is associated with their perceived policy influence in Canadian climate change policy networks. We conceptualize media coverage as the total number of media mentions an actor received in Canada’s two main national newspapers—the Globe and Mail and National Post. We conceptualize perceived policy influence as the total number of times an actor was nominated by other actors in a policy network as being perceived to be influential in domestic climate change policy making in Canada. Literature from the field of social movements, agenda setting, and policy networks suggests that environmental actors who garner more media coverage should be perceived as more influential in policy networks than actors who garner less coverage. We assess support for this main hypothesis in two ways. First, we analyze how actor attributes (such as the type of actor) are associated with the amount of media coverage an actor receives. Second, we evaluate whether being an environmental actor shapes the association between media coverage and perceived policy influence. We find a negative association between media coverage and perceived policy influence for individual activists, but not for environmental movement organizations. This case raises fundamental theoretical questions about the nature of relations between media and policy spheres, and the efficacy of media for signaling and mobilizing policy influence

Towards socially sustainable renewable energy projects through involvement of local communities:Normative aspects and practices on the ground

In Chapter 9, Karin Buhmann and her colleagues examine social implication of how climate change has spurred projects in Arctic countries to shift to low-carbon renewable energy sources. Several of these projects have been met by protests by local communities including Indigenous groups concerned with environmental and social impacts. These tensions underscore the need for stronger and meaningful involvement of communities and Indigenous groups and peoples in impact assessments and consultation processes in order to identify and address concerns from the local perspective. Based on cases from Sápmi, Greenland and Canada this chapter shows that renewable energy projects can have perversely negative impacts on community health and safety as well as the traditions and income-generating activities of Arctic Indigenous groups. The authors argue that the need for energy justice highlights the importance of approaching climate change responses and renewable energy transitions in ways that adequately address local concerns, needs and rights in a manner that is meaningful to those who may be adversely affected.Peer reviewe