Handbook of Social Justice in the Global South [1 ed.] 1803921145, 1803921153, 9781803921150, 9781803921143

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© Nikhil Deb, Manjusha Nair and Glenn W. Muschert 2025 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical or photocopying, recording, or otherwise without the prior permission of the publisher. Published by Edward Elgar Publishing Limited The Lypiatts 15 Lansdown Road Cheltenham Glos GL50 2JA UK Edward Elgar Publishing, Inc. William Pratt House 9 Dewey Court Northampton Massachusetts 01060 USA Authorised representative in the EU for GPSR queries only: Easy Access System Europe – Mustamäe tee 50, 10621 Tallinn, Estonia, [email protected] A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Control Number: 2024952761

This book is available electronically in the Sociology, Social Policy and Education subject collection https://doi​.org​/10​.4337​/9781803921150

ISBN 978 1 80392 114 3 (cased) ISBN 978 1 80392 115 0 (eBook)

Contents

List of contributors Foreword Sari Hanafi Preface: Setting the agenda for social justice in the Global South



viii xvii



xxx

PART I ​CONCEPTS AND HISTORY 1

Social justice in the Global South Nikhil Deb, Manjusha Nair and Glenn W. Muschert

2

2

The republics and social justice Robert K. Schaeffer

13

3

Everyday forms of resistance among olive-growing and shepherding communities in Palestine Juman Simaan

4

Social justice and the dynamics of land access and exclusion in Tanzania Francis Semwaza and Thomas A. Smucker

24 40

PART II ​GLOBAL SOUTH DISPARITIES 5

Prison environmental injustice in the Global South(s) Elisa Privitera and David N. Pellow

6

Ayah-intervened ageing and advocacy for a “knowledge from below” for old-age care in India Sayendri Panchadhyayi

58

82

7

Health communication and social justice: A Global South perspective Rati Kumar, Iccha Basnyat and Parameswari Mukherjee

101

8

Challenging hegemony Rohini Balram and Jorge Knijnik

118

9

Social (in)justice in Bangladesh in the context of globality Habibul Haque Khondker

133

10

The colonial project in Kenya’s “White Highlands” and the continuing devastation of pastoral livelihoods Mokua Ombati

v

145

vi  Handbook of social justice in the Global South PART III ​POLITICAL ECONOMY AND COMPARATIVE JUSTICE 11

Selective state intervention and uneven agrarian marketization in upland Laos 162 Lamphay Inthakoun

12

The hegemony of austerity Jon Shefner and Cory Blad

172

13

Social justice and social perception in Latin America and the Caribbean Kevin Nazar

188

14

Navigating Sharia with condemned bodies Nora Noralla

204

15

Ageing, disability, and social justice in Nigeria Ellis Onyedikachi George and Prince Chiagozie Ekoh

217

16

Women’s empowerment in APCNF Anvitha Ravipati

229

PART IV ​GEOGRAPHY OF INJUSTICE 17

Socio-economic impacts of involuntary return migration Sebak Kumar Saha and Rhidoy Ahmed

248

18

Health inequalities in Latin America Andrea Wendt, Luiza I. C. Ricardo and Giovanna Gatica-Domínguez

272

19

Decentering the white gaze in African filmscape Vieux Alassane Toure

287

20

Politicizing water governance and canal allocations Muhammad Arfan and Nabeel Ali Khan

303

21

Gender digital divide in India Payel Dutta and Arindam Das

320

22 Othered 333 Ankit PART V ​STRUGGLES FOR JUSTICE 23

From #PayUp to #PayYourWorkers Jason Rhodes and Shahidur Rahman

350

24

Untangling the gender-corruption nexus for social justice in the Global South 367 Kristy Kelly and Kejsi Ruka

Contents  vii 25

Making insurgent citizenship in India’s Bhil heartland Alf Gunvald Nilsen

388

26

Social justice and human dignity in the Global South Johnny Antonio Dávila

403

27

Dependency Theory today Álvaro Germán Torres Mora

415

28

Voice, positionality, and social justice in higher education Talia Esnard

431

PART VI ​THE PURSUIT OF SOCIAL JUSTICE 29

Social justice through economic democracy Jeová Torres Silva Junior and Jean-Louis Laville

445

30

International organisations and development Stephanie E. Trapnell

458

31

Analysing child labour through the lens of child hawkers Oluwaseun Olanrewaju

470

32

Social enterprises for transformative social justice and inclusion Noufal N., Biju A. V. Nair, Nithi Krishna P. P. and Nisha Sheen

484

33

Why is there a non-WhatsApp exodus in the Global South(s)? Sérgio Barbosa

500

34

Achieving social justice through constitutional change in Latin America Rodolfo López Moreno

512

Afterword to the Handbook of Social Justice in the Global South Paul K. Gellert



524

Index



529

Contributors

Rhidoy Ahmed is studying for an MSS in Sociology in the Department of Sociology at Shahjalal University of Science and Technology (SUST), Bangladesh. He received his BSS (Hons) in Sociology from the same institution. Ankit is a PhD student in Sociology at the University of Wrocław, Poland. His PhD research explores the pivotal life stage of emerging adults from cross-regional families in rural North India, examining whether their marriage, career, and community integration choices reinforce or reshape sociocultural norms by triangulating their voices with local narratives. His research interests include changing family structures and dynamics, marriage migration in South and East Asia, emerging adulthood, and socioeconomic effects on family formation and relationships. Muhammad Arfan works as a senior fellow in Research & Development at the Center for Climate and Environmental Research in Lahore. He received a PhD in Integrated Water Resources Management from the US-Pakistan Center for Advanced Studies in Water, with collaborative research at the University of Utah, USA, in August 2022. His research at the juncture of political sociology and environmental studies argues that dominant technical approaches to water management depoliticize development in Pakistan by obscuring class, caste, and gender power asymmetries. He has been involved with several rights-based organizations that focus on farm labor and women’s issues. He writes about water, climate, and community collective action. Rohini Balram is a Western Sydney University (Australia) researcher with the School of Education and Social Sciences. Rohini’s research projects center on gender, ethnicity, race, class, and other sociocultural issues surrounding sporting platforms, CALD communities, aging citizens, people with disabilities, refugees, and other minority or marginalized groups. Rohini completed a PhD at Western Sydney University in 2022, titled Indo-Fijian women as subversive bodies in Fiji’s sporting arenas: An arts-based study. Sérgio Barbosa is a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Geneva. Previously, he was a fellow at the Institute for Advanced Studies on Science, Technology and Society, Graz University of Technology, a Digital Humanism junior visiting fellow at the Institute for Human Sciences in Vienna, and a fellow at the Center for Advanced Internet Studies in Bochum, Germany. His research interests include digital activism, chat apps, digital literacy, and the Global South. His work has been published in peer-reviewed journals such as Mobile, Media & Communication, Political Studies Review, and First Monday, among others. Iccha Basnyat, Dr. is an Associate Professor in Global Health Communication in the Global Affairs Program and holds a joint appointment in the Department of Communication at George Mason University. Her primary area of research examines the intersections of gender, culture, and health inequalities in transnational contexts through an interdisciplinary approach. Specifically, she explores issues of structural limitations/access, structural violence, stigma, social support power, gender roles, race/class injustices, and inequalities surrounding the health and health risks of marginalized and vulnerable women. viii

Contributors  ix Cory Blad was most recently Professor of Sociology and Dean of the School of Liberal Arts at Manhattan College. His work focuses on the effects of market liberalization on inequalities, political legitimation, and nationalist politics. His previous work has focused on the role of nationalism in political legitimation strategies as well as the impacts of economic liberalization on social inequalities and political change. Arindam Das is currently Professor of English and serves as PhD Program Director and Program Director of MA Creative Writing at the Alliance School of Liberal Arts, Alliance University, Bangalore (India). He has over 21 years of experience in academia. Dr. Das’s expertise spans diverse domains, including cultural studies, postcolonial studies, critical organizational studies, consumer culture theory, critical communication studies, and critical AI studies. He has been an Australia-India Council Fellow with five Australian universities (2010–2011) and has published in journals like the Journal of Postcolonial Writing, the Journal of the European Association for Studies of Australia, Consumption, Markets & Culture, Sustainability, Journal of Advertising, Journal of Consumer Affairs, and Technovation, among others. He is also the co-editor of Postcolonial marketing communication: Images from the margin (Springer, 2024). Johnny Antonio Dávila is a fellow of the Global Justice Program (Yale University) and coordinator of Academics Stand Against Poverty (ASAP) Venezuela. He graduated as a lawyer from the University of the Andes (Venezuela), attended complementary studies in philosophy (Kleiner Magister) at the University of Tübingen (Germany), and holds a PhD in Philosophy from the University of Göttingen (Germany). His research interests lie in political philosophy (including issues of global justice), philosophy of law, and human rights. Nikhil Deb is Assistant Professor of Sociology at California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo. Prior to his current position, he held analogous roles at various institutions, including those in Bangladesh, his country of origin. His scholarly endeavors investigate how the transition to market liberalization in the Global South has impacted environmental and social challenges in marginalized areas, with particular attention to Bangladesh and India. His publications have appeared in several peer-reviewed journals and edited volumes. He is now working on two book manuscripts. Payel Dutta is Assistant Professor of Economics at Alliance University. She has submitted her PhD in digital divide and feminist economics. She has 16 years of teaching experience and specializes in macroeconomics (especially gender economics), international trade, and economic sociology. Prince Chiagozie Ekoh is a teaching fellow at the Department of Social Work, University of Nigeria, Nsukka. He has Master’s degrees in social work and gerontology and is currently a doctoral student at the Faculty of Social Work, University of Calgary. His areas of research interest are aging, migration, sexual minorities, and social work education. Talia Esnard is Senior Lecturer and a sociologist in the Department of Behavioral Science at the University of the West Indies. She has published in education and gender-specific journals and coauthored, co-edited, and sole-authored books on diversity, inclusion, mothering, leadership, entrepreneurship, and the tenure process. She also serves as a co-editor, associate editor, and reviewer on educational and sociological-related editorial boards within and beyond the Caribbean. Giovanna Gatica-Domínguez is a nutritionist from the University of San Carlos in Guatemala, who holds a Master’s degree in Epidemiology from the Federal University of Pelotas, Brazil,

x  Handbook of social justice in the Global South and a PhD in nutrition of populations from the National Institute of Public Health Mexico. She was a research student at the University of Michigan School of Public Health and Emory University and a postdoctoral researcher at the International Center for Health Equity, where she led the nutrition team and published several scientific articles on inequalities in nutrition. She performed as a nutritional data analyst at the Institute of Nutrition of Central America and Panama (INCAP) in collaboration with the University of Colorado. She currently works at the WHO/HQ in the Nutrition and Food Safety Monitoring Unit, where she is part of different working groups on global nutrition projects. Paul K. Gellert is Professor of Sociology and Director of Global Studies at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, USA. His comparative-historical research centers on the political economy of resource extraction and development in Indonesia, the Southeast Asia region, and the world. He has published articles in Globalizations, Sociology of Development, International Journal of Comparative Sociology, and Political Geography. He co-edited Ecologically unequal exchange – Environmental injustice in comparative and historical perspective (Palgrave MacMillan, 2019). Currently, he is conducting research on climate policy obstruction with support from the Climate Social Science Network, resulting in publications in PLOS Climate (2024) and chapters in the First global assessment of climate obstruction (Oxford University Press, forthcoming). Ellis Onyedikachi George is a social worker and researcher who currently works as a doctoral research fellow at the Centre of Diaconia and Professional Practice, VID Specialized University, Norway. Their doctoral project explores dementia and everyday citizenship in Nigeria, and their general research interests include disability studies, citizenship, and anti-oppressive social work, with the goal of highlighting African and Nigerian voices and perspectives. Sari Hanafi is Professor of Sociology, Director of the Center for Arab and Middle Eastern Studies, and Chair of the Islamic Studies program at the American University of Beirut. He was President of the International Sociological Association (2018–2023) and the editor of Idafat: The Arab Journal of Sociology (Arabic) (2017–2022). He recently co-authored/edited the Oxford handbook of the sociology of the Middle East, Knowledge production in the Arab world: The impossible promise (2015, Routledge), and Studying Islam in the Arab world: The rupture between religion and the social sciences (2023, Routledge). In 2022, he became a corresponding fellow of the British Academy (https://sites​.aub​.edu​.lb​/sarihanafi). Lamphay Inthakoun has been working in Laos on academic research and development projects for over 15 years. Her work focuses on forestry, agriculture, rural livelihoods, climate change, and land-use change issues. Born and raised in northern Laos, her research interests in upland livelihoods and the environment were piqued as an undergraduate student in the Faculty of Forestry at the National University of Laos. Later, she earned her Master’s degree in Development Studies at the Department of International Development, Community, and Environment (IDCE) at Clark University, USA, where she was exposed to critical theories of development and social change. She is currently enrolled in a PhD program in the School of Geography, Earth, and Atmospheric Sciences at the University of Melbourne. Her doctoral research examines the intersections between climate change policies and swidden cultivation in the uplands of Laos. Kristy Kelly is a sociologist who specializes in the politics of knowledge, transnational feminisms, gender mainstreaming, and gender and development in Southeast Asia. She is Associate Clinical Professor in the School of Education at Drexel University, Philadelphia, USA, and is

Contributors  xi affiliated with the Weatherhead East Asian Institute at Columbia University, New York City. She is a founding member and past co-president of the Society of Gender Professionals. Nabeel Ali Khan currently holds the position of Assistant Director (Water Management) at the Pakistan Council of Research in Water Resources. He graduated with a degree in civil engineering and completed his Master’s in Integrated Water Resources Management from Mehran University of Engineering and Technology Jamshoro in 2019. Nabeel also had the opportunity to be an exchange research scholar at Colorado State University in 2018. Passionate about water management, Nabeel utilizes GIS and remote-sensing tools to contribute to various agricultural and water management research areas. He is equally enthusiastic about data science, employing R and Python programming for comprehensive data analysis. Habibul Haque Khondker (PhD, Pittsburgh) is Professor at Zayed University, Abu Dhabi, UAE. Khondker has published in The British Journal of Sociology, International Sociology, Current Sociology, Sociology Compass, International Migration, Globalizations, South Asia, Armed Forces and Society, and others. Khondker co-authored with Bryan Turner, Globalization: East and West (Sage, 2010) (Translated into Turkish in 2019), co-edited with Olav Muurlink and Asif Bin Ali, The emergence of Bangladesh: Interdisciplinary perspectives (Palgrave Macmillan, 2022), co-edited with Jan Nederveen Pieterse and Haeran Lim, COVID-19 and governance (Routledge, 2021), co-edited with Jan Nederveen Pieterse, 21st Century globalization: Perspectives from the Gulf (I. B. Tauris, 2010), and with Goran Therborn, Asia and Europe in globalization (Brill, 2006). Dr. Jorge Knijnik is Associate Professor in the School of Education at Western Sydney University, Australia. He holds a PhD in Social Psychology from the Universidade de São Paulo (Brazil). Dr. Knijnik’s most recent books are Tales of South American football: Passion, glory, and revolution (Fair Play Publishing); Historias Australianas: Cultura, educação, e esporte do outro lado do mundo (Fontoura); Women’s football in Latin America: Social challenges and historical perspectives (Palgrave Macmillan); and The World Cup chronicles: 31 days that rocked Brazil (Fair Play Publishing). Nithi Krishna P. P. is a dedicated researcher specializing in commerce with a strong focus on qualitative research methods. With expertise in using MAXQDA, powerful software for qualitative data analysis, she excels in uncovering meaningful insights from complex data sets. Her work contributes to a deeper understanding of commerce and related fields. Her works have appeared in many peer-reviewed journals. Dr. Rati Kumar is an assistant professor in the Communication Department at San Diego State University. She is a critical health communication scholar with a focus on health inequities and culturally situated health interventions. Her work draws on the strand of “health in displacement,” conceptualizing displacement both as spatial displacement induced by voluntary and forced migratory processes, and as the meta-level systemic displacement of disenfranchised communities. Dr. Kumar’s recent scholarship focuses on refugees and migrant-workers, and in communities and families affected by mass incarceration. Jean-Louis Laville is Professor at the Conservatoire National des Arts et Métiers (Cnam, France), a researcher at the HT2S laboratory (Histoire des techno-sciences en société) and at IFRIS (Institut Francilien Recherche Innovation Société), an associate researcher at the Center de Recherche Interdisciplinaire Démocratie, Institutions et Subjectivités (CRIDIS, Belgium) and the Center for Research on Social Innovations (CRISES, Canada), and a member of the Karl

xii  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Polanyi Institute of Political Economy, the International Research Network in Social Enterprise, Social Entrepreneurship, Social and Solidarity Economy and Social Innovation (EMES), and the Network of Latin American Researchers on the Social and Solidarity Economy (RILESS). Álvaro Germán Torres Mora holds a Bachelor of Laws from the National University of Colombia and a Master’s degree in Development Studies from the University of Helsinki. Currently, he is a PhD candidate in Sociology, with a concentration in Political Economy, at the University of Tennessee, USA. Rodolfo López Moreno (PhD, University of California, Irvine) is a postdoctoral researcher at the Centre for Social Conflict and Cohesion Studies (COES) and an associate researcher at Universidad Diego Portales in Santiago, Chile. His research interests include political sociology, social movements, and political participation, examining the interaction between activists and political institutions. His current research focuses on the role of social movements in constitutional processes, based on the case of the Chilean Constitutional Convention. Dr. Parameswari Mukherjee is an assistant professor in the Department of Communication Studies, Metropolitan State University of Denver. Parameswari is a health and organizational communication scholar and draws on justice-oriented theoretical ideas such as necrocapitalism and the culture-centered approach to center the voices of community members affected by water insecurity. Her scholarship is published in various journals, including Health Communication, Human Communication Research, and Communication and Critical/Cultural Studies Journal.  lenn Muschert is a Professor of Sociology in the Department of Public Health & G Epidemiology at Khalifa University (‫)خليفة جامعة‬, Abu Dhabi, UAE. He previously served on the faculty at Miami University and Purdue University (USA) and was a visiting scholar at Erzincan University and Atatürk University (Turkey). His research focuses on digital divides, sustainable development, and resolving global social problems. He has published numerous scholarly volumes, peer-reviewed articles, and chapters in academic volumes in sociology, media studies, justice studies, and sustainable development. He serves as Secretary of the Society for the Study of Social Problems (SSSP). Noufal N. was a UGC JRF research scholar in the Department of Commerce, University of Kerala. His area of work focuses on social entrepreneurship and the impact assessment of social values. His work has appeared in the Journal of Business Strategy & Development. Biju A. V. Nair is Associate Professor at the Department of Commerce, School of Business Management & Legal Studies, University of Kerala. His research interests include personal finance, market microstructure, nudging and behavioral economics, the crypto market, machine learning in finance, greenwashing, green bonds, sustainability reporting, ESG, and surveillance capitalism. He is a research supervisor in the Faculty of Commerce and Faculty of Management at the University of Kerala. He received the best paper award from the IIM Nagpur conference in 2022 and serves as an editorial board member for Springer, Wiley, Inderscience, and IGI Global journals. His writing has appeared in the Journal of Behavioural and Experimental Finance, CSR and Environment Management, Employees Responsibilities and Rights Journal, Environmental Science and Pollution Research, Business Strategy and Development, Quality and Quantity, S N Business and Economics, Asia Pacific Journal of Finance Studies, Digital Finance, and the International Journal of Human Capital and Information Technology Professional (IJHCIT).

Contributors  xiii Manjusha Nair is Associate Professor of Sociology at George Mason University. She is the Director of the Global South Research Hub, the Associate Editor of Pacific Affairs for South Asia and the Himalayas, and a Justice 21 Committee member of the Society for the Study of Social Problems. Her research interests are Globalization and Change, Historical and Comparative Sociology, Political Economy, Critical Development Theory, Decolonizing Methods, Ethnography, India and Africa. Her award-winning book, Undervalued Dissent: Informal Workers’ Politics in India, published by SUNY Press in 2016, shows, systematically, how neoliberal globalization, mediated as market fundamentalism and right-wing politics in India, has weakened the ability of rural migrant workers to use democratic forms of contention. Currently, she is preparing a book manuscript entitled A Crisscross World: Africa, India, and the Indian Ocean Present, which looks at the flurry of movements between India and Africa across the Indian Ocean and the possibilities of cosmopolitan communities Kevin Nazar is a graduate lecturer and PhD candidate in the Department of Sociology at George Mason University. He received his Master’s degree in Political Science and Philosophy from Universidad Mayor de San Andres in Bolivia and has a graduate certificate in International Development from the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies. Prior to George Mason University, Kevin was a consultant for several United Nations agencies in Latin America. Alf Gunvald Nilsen is Director of the Centre for Asian Studies in Africa and Professor of Sociology at the University of Pretoria. His research focuses on the politics of development and democracy in the Global South. He is the author of Adivasis and the state: Subalternity and citizenship in India’s Bhil heartland (Cambridge University Press, 2018). Nora Noralla is an Egyptian trans woman who works as a human rights researcher and consultant. Her areas of expertise include sexual and bodily freedoms, as well as the intersection of sharia law and human rights. Currently, she serves as the executive director of the Cairo 52 Legal Research Institute. Nora Noralla holds a Master’s degree in International Human Rights Law from Central European University, Vienna. She has authored numerous papers, analyses, and reports including, “Gender trouble in the land of the Nile: Transgender identities, the judiciary, and Islam in Egypt” and “ElKarakhana: A history of sex work in modern Egypt between legalization and criminalization.” Oluwaseun Olanrewaju holds an LLB from Lagos State University and an MSc in Politics and International Relations from the University of East London. He has presented papers around the world and is a researcher who coordinates the activities of the West Africa chapter of the international NGO, Academics Stand Against Poverty (ASAP). Mokua Ombati is a hands-on research anthropologist currently researching the life experiences of Indigenous communities and the place of culture in the adaptation process of African migrants in North America. He has substantial research and publication experience with renowned international publishers, including Africa Development, the longest-standing Africa-based social science journal, published by CODESRIA, the apex pioneer independent Pan-African social sciences research organization on the African continent. His other research is published by Springer Nature, the second-largest global scientific academic publisher, and by Cambridge Scholars Publishing. A global scholar, Mokua has facilitated, convened, and presented at scientific gatherings, and been actively involved in research, training, and scholarly partnerships and collaborations locally, regionally, and across the globe from Africa to Europe, Asia, North America, and the Arab subcontinent.

xiv  Handbook of social justice in the Global South He has been involved in local and international research and training, partnerships, and collaborations. He focuses on themes including African Indigenous knowledge systems, gender, peace and development, security and nonviolence, urban resiliencies, children and youth, education, participatory democracy, and climate change adaptation, all from a sociocultural epistemology. Sayendri Panchadhyayi is a sociologist, and an assistant professor in the School of Liberal Arts and Sciences, RV University, Bangalore, India. She holds an honorary appointment as an Associate at the Centre for Care, attached to the University of Sheffield. Her research lies at the intersections of critical gerontology, medical anthropology, sociology of care and life course, death and bereavement, and feminist STS. She has publications with Taylor & Francis, Penguin India, Anthropology & Aging, Springer, and has forthcoming publications with Penguin Random House India and Routledge in the pipeline. David N. Pellow is Dehlsen Chair and Distinguished Professor of Environmental Studies and Director of the Global Environmental Justice Project at the University of California, Santa Barbara, where he teaches courses on social change movements, environmental justice, humananimal conflicts, sustainability, and social inequality. His books include: What is critical environmental justice? (Polity, 2017); Total liberation: The power and promise of animal rights and the Radical Earth movement (University of Minnesota Press, 2014); The slums of Aspen: Immigrants vs. the environment in America’s Eden (with Lisa Sun-Hee Park, NYU Press, 2013); Resisting global toxics: Transnational movements for environmental justice (MIT Press, 2007); The Silicon Valley of dreams: Environmental injustice, immigrant workers, and the high-tech global economy (with Lisa Sun-Hee Park. NYU Press, 2002); and Garbage wars: The struggle for environmental justice in Chicago (MIT Press, 2004). His work has been reviewed, referenced, or quoted in the L.A. Times, the New York Times, NPR, the Chicago Tribune, the Denver Post, and Mother Jones. He has served on the Boards of Directors for the Community Environmental Council, the Global Action Research Center, Greenpeace USA, International Rivers, and the Fund for Santa Barbara. Elisa Privitera is a postdoctoral researcher in the Urban Just Transitions cluster at the University of Toronto, Scarborough, Canada. She co-leads the Listening Project, a community-based research initiative aimed at collaborating with community partners to understand and envision equitable transitions. With a background in building engineering and architecture, Elisa specializes in urban planning. However, her research interests extend beyond disciplinary boundaries, encompassing environmental justice, environmental humanities, and political ecology studies. Elisa earned her PhD in Urban and Environmental Planning and Design from the University of Catania, Italy, focusing on small data and risk landscapes. Elisa has extensive experience as both a researcher and practitioner in environmental and spatial justice in Italy, Canada, California, and Sweden. She has received several grants, including a Fulbright scholarship that supported her visiting period at the University of California, Santa Barbara. During this time, she contributed to the Prison Environmental Justice Project led by Professor David N. Pellow. Elisa has also served on the coordination team of the AESOP Young Academics Network. Currently, she is a member of the editorial team of plaNext – Next Generation Planning, a young researcherled journal, and of the radical environmental humanities collective of the newly established journal, Resistance: A Journal of Radical Environmental Humanities. Shahidur Rahman is Professor of Sociology in the Department of Economics and Social Sciences at Brac University in Dhaka, Bangladesh. He is the author of The Bangladesh garment industry and the global supply chain: Choices and constraints of management.

Contributors  xv Anvitha Ravipati is a PhD student in sociology at Case Western Reserve University. She is interested in studying agroecological movements in South Asia, particularly APCNF in south India. She is a critical, feminist scholar who is interested in agrarian change, peasant studies and rural sociology. Jason Rhodes teaches in the Department of Geography and Anthropology at Kennesaw State University in Kennesaw, Georgia, USA. Luiza I. C. Ricardo holds a PhD in Epidemiology (2019), a Master’s degree in Physical Activity and Health (2014), and a Physical Education degree (2013) from the Federal University of Pelotas. She was a postdoctoral researcher at the International Center for Equity in Health (2019–2022) and currently works as a postdoctoral fellow at the MRC Epidemiology Unit, University of Cambridge (UK). Luiza’s main research areas are epidemiology, public health, health inequalities, physical activity, and accelerometry. Kejsi Ruka is an undergraduate student at Drexel University, Philadelphia, USA, majoring in Political Science and Global Studies. Originally from Albania, she researches how gender and corruption intersect at UN meetings and the role that training plays in combating corruption. Sebak Kumar Saha is Associate Professor in the Department of Sociology at Shahjalal University of Science and Technology (SUST), Bangladesh, where he also received his BSS (Hons) and MSS degrees in Sociology. His Graduate Diploma in Environmental Management and Development, Master of Environmental Management and Development, and PhD, were gained from the Australian National University (ANU), Canberra, Australia. His current research interests are social vulnerability and resilience, social capital and post-disaster response and recovery, post-disaster operations of government and NGOs, post-disaster housing assistance, disaster risk reduction, climate change adaptation, displacement and migration following extreme events, gender and disasters, coastal management, and environmental resource management. Francis Semwaza is a doctoral student in cultural anthropology at the University of Florida. His research addresses issues at the intersections of human rights, politics, and development processes in Southern Africa. Dr. Robert K. Schaeffer taught sociology at San Jose State, Kansas State University, and California Polytechnic State University in San Luis Obispo. He has published books on partition, democratization, globalization, China, feminism, and social movements from a global perspective. Dr. Schaeffer was Professor Emeritus of Sociology, Kansas State University and Professor Emeritus of Sociology, Cal Poly. Nisha Sheen is a faculty member at the School of Interdisciplinary Studies at St. Lawrence College, Ontario, Canada. As an educator and researcher, she has contributed to academia with multidisciplinary research projects, collaborations, presentations, and publications. Her areas of interest include gerontology, child development, nutrition, palliative care, and communication studies. She is an active community volunteer, supporting and advocating for the rights of vulnerable populations. She serves as an editorial board member for Springer and IGI Global journals. Jon Shefner is Herbert Family Professor of Excellence at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, USA. His work currently focuses on the potential for equitable economic development amid a green transition, prioritizing the roles played by organized labor and community organizations. In addition, Shefner has written widely on political change in response to neoliberalism.

xvi  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Jeová Torres Silva Junior is Professor at the Center for Applied Social Sciences (CCSA) of the Federal University of Cariri (UFCA, Brazil). He is a researcher at the Interdisciplinary Laboratory for Social Management Studies (LIEGS/UFCA). Assistant professor ATER at the Institut d'Administration des Entreprises - IAE/Université de Poitiers (France), and a researcher at the CEntre de REcherche en GEstion (CEREGE – UR 13564/Université de Poitiers). He is also a professor at the Master in Development and Social Management of the Federal University of Bahia (PDGS/UFBA, Brazil). Additionally, he is a member of the Brazilian Academy of Management (ANPAD), the International Research Network in Social Enterprise, Social Entrepreneurship, Social and Solidarity Economy and Social Innovation (EMES), the International Political Science Association (IPSA), and the Association Internationale des Sociologues de Langue Française (AISLF). Juman Simaan is Associate Professor of occupational therapy at Edinburgh Napier University. He is interested in learning about the daily lives of communities in the Global South and how they theorize and apply them to resist social injustices. Dr. Simaan’s research and scholarship focuses on decolonizing Western-centric ways of knowing and doing to make occupational therapy, occupational science, and other health and social science disciplines concerned with humans’ meaningful daily activities more inclusive and helpful to all communities. Thomas A. Smucker is Associate Professor of Geography at Ohio University, USA. He specializes in environment-development interactions and livelihood change in rural East Africa. His research addresses differential rural vulnerability and adaptive capacity to climate change as shaped by political-ecological and institutional factors. He serves on the editorial board of the Tanzania Journal of Development Studies. Vieux Alassane Toure is an instructor in the Linguistics Department and an affiliate with the Center for African Studies at the University of Illinois, USA. He is the Wolof Program Director. Before his current role, he held a position as an English instructor at Dakar American University of Science and Technology (DAUST). He was previously an instructor with a joint appointment between AAAS and MCL at the University of Kentucky, USA. His research interests include global and contemporary Africas, African and Afro-diasporic literatures, cultures, and philosophies, African cinema, and post-colonial/decolonial theories. Stephanie E. Trapnell is a global sociologist and practitioner-scholar working at the intersection of development and democracy, with a specific focus on decolonization, transnational movements, and quantification/knowledge production. Her policy work is focused on public sector governance and democratic processes, with recent projects in defense and security, information and open data, and anti-corruption. For the past 15 years, she has specialized in conducting and distilling research into policy insights for more effective and equitable systems. Stephanie is an affiliate faculty member at George Mason University, where she obtained her PhD in Sociology. Andrea Wendt holds MSc and PhD degrees in Epidemiology from the Federal University of Pelotas, Brazil. Her doctoral research focused on physical activity and sleep outcomes. Andrea’s main interests in research include objective measurements of physical behavior and health inequalities. She has experience using secondary data from national surveys and holds a postdoctoral position at the International Center for Equity in Health. She is a permanent professor in the Graduate Program in Health Technology at the Pontifical Catholic University of Paraná, Brazil.

Foreword Sari Hanafi

If I summarize the mission of the social sciences in general, and particularly sociology, in one sentence, they are supposed to defend social justice. Whether they are grounded in Marxism or liberalism, social justice is a central theme, even if it is understood in different ways. If social justice is the answer to inequality, which version of social justice is the right one? Kiran Odhav and Jayanathan Govender (2023) distinguish between three dimensions of inequality: “Historical inequality is determined by inheritance, wealth transfers and family prestige. Normative inequality is related to race, class and gender. Structural inequality is framed by access to freedom, agency and distribution of rights, political power, public goods and services, financial services and public participation” (p. 350). Each school of thought puts specific weight on each dimension. As this volume concerns social justice in the Global South, an additional complication arises: How much can this theme be conceptualized as universal (in its outline) versus contextual? This issue is highly debatable. We present a fantastic volume in which the editors, Nikhil Deb, Manjusha Nair, and Glenn W. Muschert, seek to unfold the complexity of this debate by distilling some features of social justice in the Global South and, at the same time, showing how the transnational structure of neoliberalism still influences this topic not only in the Global South but also in the Global North. The book also attempts to reconcile the tension between the particulars of cultural values and the hope of engendering a more universal conversation at the international level. The book is composed of seven parts, which deal with the conceptualization of social justice, with subthemes related to the Global South. We focus mainly on the disparities between the countries of the Global South and how social and political conflicts shape the pursuit of social justice. Some case studies regarding Latin America, Asia, and Africa have compelling chapters on local perspectives on the COVID-19 pandemic. In this Foreword, I would like to contribute to a current assessment of the conceptualization of social justice in liberal thought with a socialist tone. To echo Daniel Bell,1 I define myself as liberal in politics, socialist in economics, and conservative in culture.2 As my sociological approach does not compartmentalize each sphere and, in the footsteps of Borut Rončević (2024), I adopt the Cultural Political Economy (CPE) approach that seeks to understand the dynamic interplay between culture, politics, and the economy and invites us to take seriously not only the political sciences but also how discourse matters, whether the social sciences influence society or how culture and media impact these sciences. In a previous work (Hanafi, 2023), I raised whether social sciences and sociology’s response to pathologies of late modernity, particularly social injustice, is adequate. My answer is: No! Indeed, these sciences’ response respects classical liberalism (freedoms, equality, individual rights, private property) but without being politically liberal (in the Rawlsian meaning of political liberalism that calls for a unified conception of distributive justice in each society while keeping the plurality of the conceptions of the good). I call this combination symbolic liberalism (SL). The SL project distorts the definition of justice by deflating the concept of xvii

xviii  Handbook of social justice in the Global South social justice, inflating the universality of human rights, and imposing a hegemonic conception of the good, often packaged as an inherent part of the conception of justice.

SOCIAL JUSTICE IN THE AGE OF SL The following analysis faces unresolved issues and tensions caused by the SL project, specifically distorting some important aspects of social justice in at least six main areas: first, symbolic capitalism and the cultural left cannot fix social justice; second, intersectional analysis is skewed; third, the neoliberal recipe for environmental and climate justice does not work; fourth, there is no social justice outside and below the nation-state; fifth, there is no social justice with an economy that is not connected to society; and finally, the idea that human rights are universal is overblown.

SYMBOLIC CAPITALISM AND THE CULTURAL LEFT CANNOT REDRESS SOCIAL JUSTICE Symbolic Liberals (SLs) have power as they are part of “symbolic capitalism” and are actors in a polarized society. The African-American sociologist Musa Al-Gharbi (2024) defines symbolic capitalism as “a new class of social elites who have not attained their social position by owning material assets, nor by developing or trading material goods or services. Instead, they traffic in symbols and rhetoric, images and narratives, data and analysis, ideas and abstractions.” He offers some thoughts on the American context: Despite their expressed commitments to egalitarianism, ... [symbolic capitalists’] idiosyncratic lifestyles are fundamentally premised on exclusion, exploitation, and condescension. The communities they live in and the institutions they dominate are among the most unequal in American society. That is, … [they] are among the primary beneficiaries of the very inequalities they condemn – including … racialized and gendered inequalities. And we are not just passive beneficiaries. We are active participants in exploiting and reproducing states of affairs we expressly condemn.

Thus, it is difficult for those symbolic capitalists to preach social justice. This elite uses symbolic politics, conceptualized as driven primarily by emotions and intuitions. Ideological beliefs, normative values, and prejudice are the actors’ predispositions that shape emotions. In war, belligerents use emotional rhetoric very strongly, not to appeal rationally to followers’ interests but to appeal emotionally to predispositions (Kaufman, 2017; Illouz, 2022). In the framework of symbolic politics, in times of peace, emotions provoke agreement among followers. Moreover, in both contexts, those symbolic capitalists play a significant role in increasing the polarization of society. The broader issues of economic inequality and social justice are lost. SLs can be found among the Left (but not exclusively), particularly when it overstates identity politics based on cultural differences. This cultural Left cannot create a unified vision that can appeal to a broad range of people. In The death of the Left: Why we must begin from the beginning again, Simon Winlow and Steve Hall (2022) identify the root causes of the Left’s maladies in how new cultural obsessions displaced core unifying principles such as social class struggles. The Left, more than the Right, formulates policies “strictly as a means of gaining votes” rather

Foreword  xix than seeking to gain votes “in order to carry out certain preconceived policies.” As a result, voters start looking for alternatives among competing groups that use the same tactics, and the electorate becomes polarized (Downs, 1957). Elections become arenas of competing groups disconnected from the issues related to social structures, reflecting individual choices. An apt example of the effects of such political change is the transformation of the Socialist Party in France, which changed from a strongly ideological party to a “party of elected people” and not a party of militants (Lefebvre & Sawicki, 2006). Milbank and Pabst (2016), in their criticism of current liberalism, warn us more about this dissociation between politics and ethics that marks the unnecessary victory of vice over virtue – selfishness, greed, suspicion, trust, and coercion over common benefit, generosity, a measure of trust, and persuasive power.

DISTORTION OF INTERSECTIONAL ANALYSIS As I mentioned, socioeconomic inequalities are often considered the primary negations of social justice because their three dimensions (historical, normative, and structural) are entangled. However, SLs are less interested in historical inequality than in defending the normative, where the question of group rights prevails. Studying the themes researched in the Arab world, Arab SLs are not interested in social justice or poverty (unless they simply map and locate it geographically for quick interventions) (Hanafi, 2020). Some criticize the downplaying of class analysis at the nation-state and global levels (Hamouchene & Sandwell, 2023, p. 12), something that the present volume takes seriously while also showing particular interest in historical inequality and class structures (e.g., in the volume, the contribution of Alf Gunvald Nilsen and Francis Semwaza). Of course, I understand the definition of social class according to the CPE approach, so that the working class will be defined not in a classical Marxist sense but as restricted volumes of economic, cultural, and social capital forms. A more substantial commitment to social class analysis (or, at the very least, to the historical economic causes of social exclusion) and giving it the dominant position in any intersectional analysis is necessary for social justice rehabilitation. Of course, this will be context-sensitive, but I would say one should not lose sight of the fact that race, ethnicity, gender, religion, and sexuality complement an analysis of social class and not the other way around. While the issue of fair intersectional wealth redistribution is an essential theme for all societies, the problem of producing wealth is particularly salient for the Global South. Today, themes such as unemployment and economic productivity are much more at stake in the Global South than in the Global North.

NEOLIBERAL RECIPE FOR ENVIRONMENTAL AND CLIMATE JUSTICE Today’s unprecedented global ecological crisis is closely related to the irrational use of the earth’s resources. Hence, the ontology and epistemology on which the rational worldview rests have been questioned. For instance, the Australian philosopher Val Plumwood (2001) contends that an ecological crisis is a crisis or failure of reason and culture that makes humans unable to adapt to the limits of the earth and other kinds of life. In this time of the Anthropocene, we cannot conceive of a society without its relation to nature; society is indeed society-nature. To

xx  Handbook of social justice in the Global South echo Frank Adloff (2023), I raise the question of whether sociology can afford to deal only with relations between humans. This epistemological choice is no longer tenable, and a multispecies theory of Marcel Mauss’ gift relationship is needed. The struggle for the environment and against global warming is inseparable from our choice of the conception of social justice, particularly in its relation to political economy and the nature of our desired economic system. There is an acute crisis of rapid growth that was expressed very clearly by the former President of the United States, Ronald Reagan, when he said, “[t]here are no such things as limits to growth, because there are no limits to the human capacity for intelligence, imagination, and wonder.”3 For the American economist James Galbraith and the German sociologist Klaus Dörre (2019), this growth was based on the assumption regarding the long-term stability of the fixed costs of raw materials and energy. When this was no longer the case, financial speculation intensified, and profits shrank. It generated distributional conflicts between workers, management, owners, and tax authorities. In addition, the cost of climate change is high, as the massive reductions in carbon emissions will make many consumption-based business activities unprofitable. Considering this, Dörre suggests “a consciously slow-growing new economy that incorporates the biophysical foundations of economics into its functioning mechanisms.” We must also consider the serious social effects of digitalized forms of labor and the trend of replacing labor with automation. Even if digital labor partially reduces unemployment, the lack of social protection for digital laborers would tremendously affect future generations. As part of the conception of justice, we must move to a slow-growth economy and its corollaries (including the need for cheap and low-carbon public transportation, seeing public services as investments rather than liabilities, and increasing the security of labor markets). Buen vivir (“good living” or “well living”), as Eduardo Gudynas conceptualizes it, is harmony between human beings and between human beings and nature, which is very important in establishing the sense of the common. If, in political liberalism, society should reach a consensus over the conception of justice, it allows plurality in the conception of the good. However, part of the latter is to allow people to conceive their choices to consume whatever they want as long as they do not harm themselves or others. Nevertheless, we have so much evidence today of how consumerism harms the environment. What should be important now is how to rehabilitate the question of shared space and impede what hinders the sustainability of our development projects, such as excessive carbon footprints and consumerism. For instance, what I consume for dress, food, and travel should not be simply part of the conception of the good. Instead, they should be moved up to be regimented (through public awareness and taxation) to be under the eye of environmental justice, thus the conception of justice. The creed of human consumerism is depleting resources that our earth cannot renew, and the COVID-19 virus is but one (albeit significant) episode of this consumerism. As we know, this virus is transmitted from non-domesticated animals (like civets, pangolins, and bats) to humans through the consumption of these animals. Are they really so tasty? Bourdieu would consider this a sign of social class distinction, pointing to the significant amount of unnecessary and luxury objects consumed by the middle and lower-middle classes. There is a known joke in Lebanon about the middle-class individual who “buys a gift they do not like, with money they do not have, to give it to another who hates it.” Unfortunately, this joke reflects much of the truth about how many people in this class behave globally. For many Lebanese, a vacation becomes synonymous with traveling abroad. As the French sociologist

Foreword  xxi Rigas Arvanitis put it, the mythological access to happiness causes this voracious consumerism, which ultimately acts as a potent accelerator for more illnesses, epidemics, fatalities, and natural disasters. The American sociologist and environmental historian Jason Moore proposes the Capitalocene as a kind of critical provocation to the sensibility of the Anthropocene. For him, capitalism is organizing nature as a whole; it is world ecology that joins the accumulation of capital, the pursuit of power, and the co-production of nature in successive historical configurations (Moore, 2016). Today, global warming makes both the Global South and the Global North highly entangled. Even though historically the Global North was the driving force behind global carbon emissions, in our “carbon society” (Wagner, 2024) both the Global South and the Global North are responsible. In 2022, global carbon emissions per capita worldwide were 6.5 tons, and while the United States, Australia, and Canada continue to emit 15 tons per person, China has exceeded the world average with an emission rate of 8 tons per person.4 Thus, any reflection about environmental justice should address this entanglement and how the Global North today continues its extractivism even when it looks for green energy. While one should address the neo-colonial effect of this extractivism in the Global South, one should also look at how the Global South harms itself without serious policy and public awareness about the dangers of consumerism. The good news today comes from social movements that increasingly take the question of environmental justice seriously and articulate different sites of struggle (Pleyers, 2024; Burawoy, 2000). From feminist and indigenous perspectives to regional and national programs, movements are advancing their definitions of justice and just transition in diverse contexts. An example of an intersectional approach is the outcome of a meeting of environmental justice and labor movements from three continents held in Amsterdam in 2019. They identified the critical characteristics of just transition: “(1) just transition looks different in different places; (2) just transition is a class issue; (3) just transition is a gender issue; (4) just transition is an anti-racist framework; (5) just transition is about more than just climate; and (6) just transition is about democracy” (Hamouchene & Sandwell, 2023, p. 12). Combining these six characteristics is crucial for understanding environmental justice and the critical sustainable development project necessary for realizing social justice. Many examples can be highlighted that frame development within the state modernization paradigm. Let us bring two examples of land issues to the heart of environmental justice. In this volume, Mokua Ombati shows us how the colonial project in Kenya forced the idea of privatizing land and pushed for the reforming of pastoral lands. The theory behind that is “the ‘tragedy of the commons’ in which superiority of private property is promoted while common ownership is castigated as a ‘tragedy’ inevitably leading to inefficient use, misuse, overuse, and underuse.” It is time to stop seeing pastoralism as an old, useless, and environmentally harmful way of life. Instead, we should see it as “progressive and modern,” and we should change policies and land tenure systems for pastoralists in order to lessen the negative effects of the “commons.” Also, Francis Semwaza, in this volume, shows us how neoliberal development in Tanzania produces poverty. For him, “framings of social justice are deeply entwined with wider questions about agrarian change and the state’s role in seeking to transform rural communities.” For him, the Tanzania case provides examples of both an attempt at top-down statist planning that “sought to rework land access alongside a range of rural services as well as a subsequent reversal that reframed social justice around individual land rights.” More generally, if a state modernization project is unaccompanied by a transformation vision from the local

xxii  Handbook of social justice in the Global South community and civil society, there is no way to bring sustainable development, mutual trust, social love, and conviviality, so necessary as the glue that holds societies together. While, in all countries, numerous talks, plans, and policies are about the transition to green energy, many studies show how the neoliberal agenda (driven by states, international financial institutions, multinational corporations, or banks) failed to realize climate justice and what was represented as “green economy” and “sustainable development” as a new paradigm. They are an extension of the existing logic of capital accumulation, commodification, and financialization, including that of the natural world (Hamouchene & Sandwell, 2023). Under the directive of international financial institutions, energy state enterprises are dismantled. The whole energy sector is privatized and often under the control of foreign transnational companies and, as in the case of Morocco, “a local ruling elite that is free to plunder the state and generate as much profit as it wishes, within a culture of authoritarianism and nepotism” (Moustakbal, 2023, p. 223). I fully agree with the Moroccan scholar Jawad Moustakbal’s observation about the Moroccan case, which points out that “the debt system and public-private partnerships (PPPs) are a major obstacle to any model of popular sovereignty, including energy sovereignty. A just energy transition requires the local population’s sovereignty at every stage of the production process: design, implementation, operation, storage, and distribution.” For him, “the energy sector must be considered a public service, co-managed by the workers involved and the local populations who agree to share part of their territories (land, water, forests, etc.) for the collective interest” (Moustakbal, 2023, p. 223). This point means there is no universal recipe for development but various recipes related to how society and social movements debate and negotiate their conception of sustainable development. Otherwise, growth will continue to benefit the ruling and oligarchic classes. Scholars from Latin America have developed the “Dependency Theory,” which has “discredited that all countries have to transit the same paths to achieve development... and debunked the myth of cultural backwardness and protectionism as causes of underdevelopment. The implementation of unregulated open markets has failed to boost economic development in poor regions. Instead, examples such as the Asian tigers prove heavy state intervention is critical for economic growth” (Álvaro Germán Torres Mora in this volume; also the contribution of Sayendri Panchadhyayi about the importance of local knowledge and knowledge from below).

ABSENCE OF SOCIAL JUSTICE BEYOND AND BELOW THE NATION-STATE SLs, as symbolic capitalists, have shown little interest in global issues such as world poverty and the unjust dynamics in the global economy. Social justice is often conceived within the confines of the nation-state. One should admit the limitations of many liberal scholars who rarely think about global solidarity; even historically, classical liberals did not denounce colonialism, and sometimes even praised it. Thus, the distributive justice paradigm rarely addresses its effects on diverse populations and transnational economies. In the last two decades, some southern countries have entered into global solidarity much more than those from the Global North in terms of receiving refugees, international aid, and South-South economic investments. Today, we have more flagrant cases of the solidarity of the Global South against

Foreword  xxiii the Palestinian people than from the Global North, where many liberal democratic countries are sending arms to the Israeli genocidal war on Gaza. This lack of Global North solidarity became crystal clear during the COVID-19 pandemic, when the world was genuinely interconnected, transforming the image of a global village from a metaphor to a reality, but without generating more global solidarity and more humanistic globalization. Achieving that requires multi-scale conceptualization. Symbolic liberals perceive the world in terms of relationships that begin from the most distant and move inward. Some of them perceive social inequality, for instance, as a significant global phenomenon of exploitation whose relationship can be traced to imperialism and colonialism. Others confine their sight to the big cities where they live. Both abstractly address the suffering of the affected and oppressed. Contrary to this, some grassroots social movements (including religious and conservative ones) view relationships as beginning from a close point and moving to the most distant. They believe in community work as well as family and neighborhood relationships. For instance, faith-based organizations in Lebanon are currently the most proactive NGOs dealing with families who lost their jobs during COVID-19 and the current economic crisis. Other civil movements (involving issues of ethnicity, gender, sexuality, etc.) frequently have their roots in local conflicts that use the universalist human rights doctrine as a weapon. However, for Richard Rorty (1999) and Fraser, this “cultural left,” while advancing a cultural agenda of pluralism, may be minimal in their struggle for social class justice. One can also agree with Nancy Fraser (2012), who considers the issue of social class and sees sharing wealth as a value that is in opposition to the meritocratic equality that some mainstream feminist movements have adopted. From Rorty and Fraser, I conclude that working with a specific community is insufficient to work with a community tout court. We social researchers need to reinvent how it has traditionally commanded its approach (from the outward-in or the inward-out) to create methods that use multi-scale approaches: rethinking the importance of the family and community, the ethics of love, hospitality, and caring, and then scaling up to the level of the nation-state and humanity as a whole. Eric Macé (2020) conceives of this multi-scale approach, moving solidarity away from the single level: the society, à la Durkheim. Instead, he draws attention to the levels of social relationships and the social actors within these relationships who are involved in establishing networks and classifying how they organize, including the solidarity that exists at different levels, all of which is dictated by the (ephemeral or stable) logic of these actors and their specific social groups. This “augmented sociology” seeks to eliminate the paradigm of dominance5 and replace it with that of power (being robust or vulnerable). I believe it is vital for Macé and social scientists to apply this methodology to challenge the notion of society in the Global North. However, for the Global South, meaningful solidarity also requires including society at all levels, such as nationalist movements struggling to establish national liberation, democratic societies, and state-building.

SOCIAL JUSTICE WITH A SOCIALLY DISEMBEDDED ECONOMY SLs conceive social justice in the disconnection between the social and the economic. In line with the CPE approach, social justice can only be entirely conceived when considering what Karl Polanyi says. Therefore, in order to exchange, our social sciences should seriously

xxiv  Handbook of social justice in the Global South rethink these three concepts because the market (a place of exchange) requires state control and is called social embeddedness. Polanyi introduced three forms of integrating society into the economy: exchange, redistribution, and reciprocity. The market (as a place of exchange) needs to be under state control and moralized by civil society against all forms of speculation. Our social sciences should seriously rethink these three terms. Redistribution cannot be done without taking significant measures to prevent the concentration of wealth in a minority of companies in each sector,6 without establishing heavy taxation on high levels of capital and wealth (Piketty, 2014) and moving to a slow-growth economy. It is interesting in this regard to see similar problems, with different degrees, in the Global South and the Global North. For instance, Louis Chauvel’s (2023) sociology of social stratification, where “occupational classes” based on jobs cannot be understood without a context of wealth-based domination in the West, resonates with Chunling Li’s (2023) analysis of the weatherization, driven by housing wealth inequality in China despite the importance of the rural population in this country compared to Western countries. I found it very refreshing that this comparativist approach took on a new impetus with the emergence of many works (by post-western sociologies)7 on the sociology of BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa) and newly joined countries: Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates, where new East-South assemblages have been established outside the classical dichotomy of NorthSouth. (See, for instance, P. Li et al., 2013). Concerning the third form of integrating society into the economy, reciprocity, it will only have meaning if it is armed with a utopia, or “real utopias,” as Erik Olin Wright (2010) would put it, that, even if it is not fully realizable, will direct our actions and social movements. This volume brings some hope with some case studies, such as that of Jason Rhodes and Shahidur Rahman, who observe how a global coalition of garment workers, factory owners, researchers, and activists challenged that sense of powerlessness in the face of industry power and abusive conditions with a historic #PayUp campaign. This campaign succeeded in launching a global conversation about brand responsibility for working conditions in their supply chains. There is no ethical life without utopia, and the difference between clerical preaching and a sociologist’s utopia is that the latter does not necessarily denounce the anti-utopian vision of others and may even seek to work with them. This sociology of reciprocity should thus appreciate and further the Maussian gift relationship and the moral obligation connecting the social sciences to moral philosophy. It is important to rethink the construction of otherness regarding who is perceived as the adversary, why that may be, and how we care about “the Other.” Here, ethical discussion could tame the pursuit of our self-interest and enhance social love and solidarity. This is the sense of Paul Ricoeur’s aphorism, “the aim of living the good life with and for others in just institutions,” where, in other words, the ethics of love, hospitality, care, and solicitude with and for others may be included in institutional frameworks to ensure and reinforce social justice and democracy. This point is in line with Alain Caillé (2008), Frédéric Vandenberghe (2018), and many other anti-utilitarian scholars, who have proposed different manifestos calling for “convivialism” as the successor to the secular ideologies of communism, socialism, and anarchism. This is a call to think of responsibility before freedom (see Zhao, Forthcoming; Nassar, 2003) and how to foster and encourage meaningful relationships with our “other” fellow human and non-human beings. Sociology should go back to these and other salient insights of philosophers such as Emmanuel Levinas (2000), who simply and astutely explained, “avant cogito, il y a bonjour” (before cogito, there is “hello”).

Foreword  xxv

INFLATION OF UNIVERSALITY OF HUMAN RIGHTS AND DISENTANGLING IT FROM THE GLOBAL NORTH A rights-based approach to social problems can generate beneficial results, particularly in mediating conflicts between allocating resources that enable freedom and ameliorating the consequences of relative powerlessness and deprivation. It shields against pauperization and powerlessness, torture and tyranny, deprivation and destitution. However, SLs stress “identities” as the locus of rights or defend individualistic choices, both assumed to be universal. Despite the fragmentation of identities under subculture politics, SLs consider their conception of the good above all conceptions and enforce it on society by extending norms and deculturizing them. However, simultaneously, their conceptions are too insular and self-referential to be connected to the broader public and mainstream culture. They are afraid to put some sensitive issues into debate. Their background concepts are “what if?” What if the enemy of liberty would benefit from liberty and reject it? What if the Islamists gain power? What if... Let us pause and reflect on two issues here: the universality of human rights and identity politics. Concerning the first, the most important universal values documented with the most significant global consensus are those described in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. This Declaration was understood not as a constellation of abstract concepts but as a set of concrete legal axioms and “one size fits all” concepts. Specific cultures were not considered to have a part in defining any of these concepts, nor could these principles suffer from adaptations to local conditions. Our late modernity has emphasized formal legality rather than more subtle moral judgments. By separating the legal norms from actual living conditions, these concepts become formal, and in this legalistic approach, human rights become a tool for both the weak and the powerful. Rights are brandished as weapons – to use the title of Clifford Bob’s (2019) excellent book – and camouflage strategies designed to cover up ulterior motives that further marginalize religious or ethnic minorities (when, for example, calling for national liberation for Palestinians is seen as antisemitic) and deprive vulnerable populations of social services (denial of public schooling for veiled students in France and Quebec.)8 In the same vein, Azmi Bishara (2023) argues that personal liberties as fundamental human and civil rights in parts of Western societies triggered the wish to impose them on societies that still live under authoritarian regimes, which functions as a defense from cynicism and nihilism under authoritarianism and can be seen as practicing paternalism that can deteriorate into cultural imperialism. Today, we witness much politicization and ideologisation of some aspects of human rights. Abdelwhab El-Affendi (2024) shows how the field of Genocide Studies was struck by increasing polarization and partisanship while many democratic countries simultaneously assumed the roles of participants and deniers. For him, this constitutes a severe blow to the whole endeavor of genocide prevention.

CONCLUSION As the authors who contributed to this volume demonstrate, the battle for social justice will continue. They provide accounts of the diverse, ongoing, and complex struggles for social justice across the Global South.

xxvi  Handbook of social justice in the Global South I grew up and still live in the Arab world, a region afflicted with longstanding brutalizing authoritarian and colonial regimes where torture, political kidnapping, assassination, and dispossession are widespread. How does one deal with a situation where authoritarian regimes have created cultural hegemony and ideologically brainwashed a large section of the people into believing in the virtue of authoritarianism to bring stability? How does one deal with the Arab-Israeli conflict when some Israelis, siblings of Holocaust survivors, become colonial settlers who confiscate the land from Palestinians? Can we have historical, restorative justice without the broader, pluralistic mechanisms of transitional justice? While searching for social and political justice, all these questions do not have a simple answer but show the necessity of combining the struggle for a (liberal) democratic society, social justice for all (locally and globally), and a sense of solidarity that mobilizes communities from below (and this is why I think the dialogical liberal project should balance between the individual and the collective). If liberal democracy is indispensable for social justice, we witness significant setbacks in many societies. As Robert Schaeffer reminds us in this volume, former Soviet elites captured power and (re)established dictatorships through “Color Revolutions” (Orange in Ukraine, Rose in Georgia, Tulip in Kyrgyzstan, Grape in Moldova, Jeans in Belarus, and Velvet in Armenia). In the Arab world, the Arab Spring (hopefully temporarily) failed politically (but not cognitively) because of the counterrevolutions (Hanafi, 2020) No social justice is possible without addressing authoritarianism and analyzing it as a (neo/post) colonial phenomenon closely related to the multiplicity of regional empires and highly polarized local elite formations that mistrust each other. In the Arab World, Kim Ghattas (2020) eloquently analyzes such local and regional dynamics in her book Black wave (particularly regarding the role of Iran, Israel, and Saudi Arabia). In my conception of global sociology (Hanafi, 2019), I defined liberal democracy as a universal political regime. However, I argued that it is not a model to be exported, nor a concept with telos, but rather a historical experience that could be traced back to the French Revolution, the 1980s in Latin America, the 1990s in Eastern and Central Europe, and finally the 2010s in some countries in the Arab World. It is indeed a collective historical learning process. What is universal is an imaginary desire for democracy, whose traces are in the slogans raised by Arab demonstrators demanding liberty, justice, and dignity. I am ready to see whether one of the countries in the BRICS is ready to provide an improved system of liberal democracy, which is already in crisis not only because of rising populism but also because of inequalities. Moving one man, one vote in politics to the economic sphere (vote in corporate enterprises and public institutions) is what Thomas Piketty (2020) referred to as “participatory socialism,” which should improve it. This extends my call for a dialogical liberal project to all spheres. Is China a potential candidate for developing into an intelligent democracy according to the Chinese philosopher Tingyang Zhao’s (forthcoming) definition? China has successfully lifted 800 million Chinese people from poverty, representing 75 percent of the global poverty reduction level (Odhav & Govender, 2023, p. 349). However, I am not sure its system allows for pluralistic conceptions of the good life, and the same is true for Russia. Mikhail Chernysh and Valeriy Mansurov (2023) admit that social justice issues must find support in the principles of democracy. Thus, the issue at stake is how to account for the importance of liberal democracy without falling into the trap of modernization theory and how this theory sees only one path to reach modernity. This multi-scale approach requires reconnecting the economic to the social and connecting these to the political and cultural. Neoliberal and speculative capitalism are not just about

Foreword  xxvii economics; they are also a system of power and of culture, and these interrelations mean that even democratic systems are not always successful in preventing collusion between political and economic elites or the domination of wealthy lobbies (Pleyers, 2020).9 Democracy cannot be discussed outside the issue of the type of development we want (Nassar, 2017). In the footsteps of Erik Olin Wright, Michael Burawoy (2021) once wrote that one of the tasks of sociology today is to advance utopian visions, and this is not an easy task in times when the idea of socialism has been discredited. If the ethical turn of sociology is already there, we need to reinforce it by explicitly proposing normative methods, presuppositions, and commitments. Regarding commitments, it is essential to view moral commitments, live up to them, and actively support civil society and social movements. In addition, this volume, through its chapters, generally initiated a deeper discussion of what social justice means in the context of the Global South and quite achieved its goal. Hopefully, this will guide and galvanize more reflection and actions for mitigating inequality and for transformative civil society and grassroots-led change in the Global South.

NOTES 1. https://spia​.princeton​.edu​/news​/qa​-defining​-age​-daniel​-bell 2. By conservative in culture, I mean not to defend tradition and reify culture but to be careful about how I read manifestations of social changes. In brief, there is neither fetishism for tradition nor social change. 3. https://www​.cato​.org ​/publications ​/commentary​/earths​-resources​-are​-limited​-human​ -ingenuity​-infinite 4. https://www​.statista​.com​/statistics​/271748​/the​-largest​-emitters​-of​-co2​-in​-the​-world/ 5. Domination can come from the notion of society as a necessary and functional dominant structure, from the ideology of dominants (ruling classes for Marxism), from modernity as domination (Max Weber, but also to some extent Michel Foucault), or, finally, from the subalterns who believe that their resistance can be simply marginal (creating some spaces of autonomy) (Macé, 2020). 6. According to Geoffrey Pleyers (2020), the “top 1%” and global corporations have major political power at the national and global scale. 7. See Roulleau-Berger et al. (2023). 8. I know I am simplifying the debate here. For a deeper analysis of the question of the veil in France, see Kchaou (2023). 9. For more criticism of the current liberal democracy, see Michael Burawoy’s (2005) analysis of how it has propelled third-wave marketization with its attendant precarity, exclusion, and inequality.

REFERENCES Adloff, F. (2023). Ontology, conviviality, and symbiosis: Are there gifts of nature? MAUSS International, 3(1): 154–175. Al-Gharbi, M. (2024). We have never been woke: The cultural contradictions of the new elite. Princeton University Press. Bishara, A. (2023). “On political culture and democratic transition.” Presented at the Winter School, Doha, Qatar. Bob, C. (2019). Rights as weapons: Instruments of conflict, tools of power. Princeton University Press.

xxviii  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Burawoy, M. (2000). Introduction: Reaching for the global. In M. Burawoy et al. (Eds.), Global ethnography: Forces, connections, & imaginations (pp. 1–12). University of California Press. Burawoy, M. (2005). For public sociology. American Sociological Review, 70(1), 4–28. Burawoy, M. (2021). Public sociology: Between Utopia and anti-Utopia. Polity. Caillé, A. (2008). Beyond self-interest (An anti-utilitarian theory of action I). Revue du MAUSS, 31(1), 175–200. Chauvel, L. (2023). Squeezing the Western middle class: Precarization, uncertainty, and tensions of median socioeconomic groups in the Global North. In L. Roulleau-Berger, P. Li, S. K. Kim, and S. Yasawa (Eds.), Handbook of post-Western sociology: From East Asia to Europe (pp. 495–509). Brill Academic. Chernysh, M. F., & Mansurov, V. A. (2023). Social justice in changing societies. In K. Odhav & J. Govender (Eds.), Handbook on sociology of inequalities in BRICS countries (pp. 123–155). Frontpage Publications. Downs, A. (1957). An economic theory of political action in a democracy. Journal of Political Economy, 65(2), 135–150. El-Affendi, A. (2024). Gaza and the dilemmas of genocide scholars. Al Jazeera (blog). https://www​ .aljazeera​.com ​/opinions​/2024​/2​/3​/gaza​-and​-the​-dilemmas​-of​-genocide​-scholars. Fraser, N. (2012). Feminism, capitalism, and the cunning of history: An introduction. https://halshs​ .archives​-ouvertes​.fr​/ halshs​- 00725055​/document Galbraith, J. K., & Dörre, K. (2019). The choke-chain effect: Capitalism beyond rapid growth.” Global Dialogue. http://globaldialogue​.isa​-sociology​.org​/the​-choke​-chain​-effect​-capitalism​-beyond​-rapid​ -growth/ Ghattas, K. (2020). Black wave: Saudi Arabia, Iran, and the forty-year rivalry that unraveled culture, religion, and collective memory in the Middle East. Henry Holt and Co. Hamouchene, H., & Sandwell, K. (2023). Introduction. Just in time: The urgent need for a just transition in the Arab Region. In H. Hamouchene and K. Sandwell, Dismantling green colonialism: Energy and climate justice in the Arab region (1st ed., pp. 1–25). Pluto Press. Hanafi, S. (2019). Global sociology revisited: Toward new directions. Current Sociology, 68(1), 3–21. Hanafi, S. (2020). A cognitive Arab uprising? Paradigm shifts in Arab social sciences. In A. Salvatore, S. Hanafi, & K. Obuse (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of the sociology of the Middle East. Oxford University Press. Hanafi, S. (2023). Toward a dialogical sociology: Presidential address – XX ISA World Congress of Sociology 2023. International Sociology, 39(1). Illouz, E. (2022). Les Émotions contre la démocratie. Premier Parallèle. Kaufman, S. J. (2017). Symbolic politics as international relations theory. In The Oxford research encyclopedia of politics. Oxford University Press. https://doi​.org​/10​.1093​/acrefore​/9780190228637​ .013​.323. Kchaou, M. (2023). Liberalism and freedom of expression: The philosophical background of a legal and political debate. Tabayyun, 11(43), 13–35 (in Arabic). Lefebvre, R., & Sawicki, F. (2006). La société des socialistes: Le PS aujourd’hui. Editions du Croquant. Levinas, E. (2000). Alterity and transcendence (Michael B. Smith, Trans.) Columbia University Press. Li, C. (2023). Wealthization and housing wealth inequality in China. In L. Roulleau-Berger, P. Li, S. K. Kim, & S. Yasawa, Handbook of post-Western sociology: From East Asia to Europe (pp. 487–494). Brill Academic. Li, P., Gorshkov, M. K., & Scalon, C. (Eds.) (2013). Handbook on social stratification in the BRIC countries: Change and perspective (1st ed.). World Scientific Publishing Company. Macé, É. (2020). Après la société. Manuel de sociologie augmentée. Le Bord de l’Eau. Milbank, J., & Pabst, A. (2016). The politics of virtue: Post-liberalism and the human future. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. Moore, J. W. (2016). Anthropocene or Capitalocene? Nature, history, and the crisis of capitalism. In Anthropocene or Capitalocene? (pp. 3–15). PM Press/Kairos. Moustakbal, J. (2023). The Moroccan energy sector: A permanent dependence. In K. Sandwell & H. Hamouchene (Eds.), Dismantling green colonialism: Energy and climate justice in the Arab region (1st ed., pp. 220–231). Pluto Press. Nassar, N. (2003). Freedom gate: When being is doing. Dar al-Tali’a.

Foreword  xxix Nassar, N. (2017). Democracy and ideological conflict. Arab Network for Research and Publishing. Odhav, K., & Govender, J. (2023). Conclusion. In Handbook on Sociology of Inequalities in BRICS Countries (pp. 345–352). Frontpage Publications. Piketty, T. (2014). Capital in the twenty-first century (1st ed., A. Goldhammer, Trans.) Belknap Press. Piketty, T. (2020). Capital and ideology. Belknap Press. Pleyers, G. (2020, February 21). Interconnected challenges of the 21st century. Global Dialogue.​http:/​/ globaldialogue​.isa​-sociology​.org​/interconnected​-challenges​-of​-the​-21​st​-century/ Pleyers, G. (2024). For a global sociology of social movements. Beyond methodological globalism and extractivism. Globalizations, 21(1), 183–195. Plumwood, V. (2001). Environmental culture: The ecological crisis of reason (1st ed.).. Routledge. Polanyi, K. (1983). La grande transformation: Aux origines politiques et économiques de notre temps (1st ed. 1944). Gallimard. Rončević, B. (2024). Sociologies in post-Socialist transformations in Central and Eastern Europe: Towards a conceptual and analytical framework. In B. Rončević, Sociology in Eastern Europe. Springer. Rorty, R. (1999). Achieving our country: Leftist thought in twentieth-century America. Harvard University Press. Roulleau-Berger, L., Li, P., Kim, S. K., & Yasawa, S. (Eds.) (2023). Handbook of post-Western sociology: From East Asia to Europe. Brill Academic. Vandenberghe, F. (2018). Sociology as practical philosophy and moral science. Theory, Culture & Society, 35(3), 77–97. Wagner, P. (2024). Carbon societies: The social logic of fossil fuels (1st ed.). Polity. Winlow, S. & Hall, S. (2022). The death of the Left: Why we must begin from the beginning again (1st ed.). Policy Press. Wright, E. O. (2010). Envisioning real utopias. Verso. Zhao, T. (2024). Tianxia system and smart democracy: An interview with Zhao Tingyan. Global Dialogue.

Preface: Setting the agenda for social justice in the Global South

A JOURNEY BEYOND BORDERS Dear Readers, As we embark on this intellectual journey, we find ourselves at the intersection of two compelling narratives: the Global South and social justice. These intersect, intertwine, and resonate across continents, cultures, and communities. Our objective? To delve into the depths, sort out the complexities, and show the way toward a world with greater equity.

THE PURPOSE AND SCOPE Why this volume? Why now? The answers to these questions echo throughout the following pages. We aim to establish a bold and uncompromising agenda for social justice research, praxis, and discourse in the Global South. We are on the cusp of change at the intersection of theory and practice, scholarship, and lived experience. Here, our goals are twofold: analysis and catalysis. The rallying cry of social justice requires our focus. It calls on us to speak out against oppressive structures, address systemic injustices, and elevate the voices of the marginalized. But even so, how do we make these lofty dreams a reality? How can we close the gaps between universal values, regional conflicts, and local struggles? In its myriad forms, social justice is an urgent call to action in and on behalf of the Global South. In this place, pasts intersect and the future unfolds. It is the activist defending ancestral lands, the urban youth reclaiming public spaces for expression, the women organizing against gender-based violence, the farmer adjusting to the grip of climate change, and the scholar challenging Eurocentric paradigms and amplifying silenced narratives.

CONTRIBUTORS: VOICES FROM EVERY HORIZON Our contributors combine to form a brilliant constellation. They hail from diverse corners of the academy, each bearing unique gifts. Some are seasoned scholars whose names are already etched into the research annals. Others are emerging voices whose passions are sparking new ideas. They are all bound together by the belief that knowledge is a necessary force for change and by a shared commitment to justice. Their backgrounds are as rich and varied as the landscapes they traverse. Some were born under the equatorial sun and their childhood memories are woven into the fabric of the Global South. Others arrived as curious wanderers, drawn by the allure of vibrant cultures and untold stories. Together, their voices create a symphony blending perspectives, methodologies, and visions. xxx

Preface  xxxi In these pages, dear Reader, you will meet the anthropologist who danced with Indigenous elders, the economist who mapped informal markets, the poet who weaves verses from refugee testimonies, and the historian who investigates colonial legacies. Each voice adds a brushstroke to our canvas, forming a portrait of resilience, struggle, and hope.

THE AUDIENCE: A GLOBAL CONVERSATION To whom do we extend this invitation? To you, dear Reader: This volume is for you, whether you are a seasoned academic studying footnotes or a student taking notes in the margins. The contributions cross boundaries and disciplines, inviting policymakers, activists, and practitioners to join the discussion. It invites the curious, the critical, and the compassionate. Consider a virtual roundtable in which scholars from Lagos, Lima, and Lahore exchange ideas with policymakers in New Delhi and artists in Cape Town. Imagine a dialogue that connects ivory towers and community centers, where theory informs practice and practice enriches theory. Consider a ripple effect that reaches classrooms, courtrooms, and kitchens alike. These are the contexts in which we envision our readers.

NAVIGATING THE TERRAIN The volume unfolds across thematic landscapes. We travel through a changing world, from economic justice to environmental resilience, human rights to Indigenous knowledge. Each chapter serves as a compass, pointing us toward solutions, raising questions, and encouraging us to keep going. In the bustling markets, we explore microfinance’s impact on entrepreneurs. In the slums, we see the dance of resistance. In the rural villages, we grapple with climate-induced displacement. In the corridors of power, we challenge policies that perpetuate inequality.

WHAT SETS US APART What makes this volume stand out? It’s not just the rigor of the research or the excellent writing. It’s the pulse that resonates within these pages. It’s a commitment to praxis, believing that theory without action is impotent. It’s the recognition that social justice is not an abstract concept; it’s the daily struggle for life, dignity, equality, and voice.

A PERSONAL NOTE As editors, we’ve walked some of these paths. We have listened to activists’ whispers in bustling markets, struggled to find hope among despairing victims, witnessed the resilience of communities rebuilding after disaster, and wrestled with the weight of academic responsibility. We hope this volume will serve as a guide in the darkness and a compass in the storm.

xxxii  Handbook of social justice in the Global South

LET THE CONVERSATION CONTINUE We aim to set an agenda for social justice and the Global South. Your role is to carry it forward. As a result, we invite you to engage, challenge, and expand on the ideas presented in this volume. Dear Reader, please turn the page. May 22, 2024 Nikhil Deb, San Luis Obispo, California, USA Manjusha Nair, Fairfax, Virginia, USA Glenn W. Muschert, Qız Qalası, Baku, Azerbaijan

1. Social justice in the Global South Revitalizing fundamental questions Nikhil Deb, Manjusha Nair, and Glenn W. Muschert

1.1 INTRODUCTION Is the neoliberal era nearing its denouement? Is the crisis neoliberalism engendered conditioning the potential for a new, just future? Has the coronavirus pandemic altered the trajectory of business-as-usual activities? The answer to these questions is “maybe not,” which makes it more difficult than ever to speak about justice in predictable terms. This difficulty, however, underscores the urgency of discussing it. Few concepts rival justice in terms of interdisciplinary depth, and while justice is a recurring theme in this volume, we take a broader approach by incorporating it into a diverse range of literature covering numerous topics. A volume on such a big idea, however comprehensive it may appear, is not exhaustive. We aim to advance intellectual discourse, debates, and policy insights surrounding social justice in the Global South. Our decision to employ the term “Global South” stems from a preoccupation with social justice in a region encompassing over 85 percent of the world’s populace. Eduardo Galeano (1997), in his Open veins of Latin America, astutely observed that the division of labor among nations leads to some specializing in winning while others specialize in losing. The term “Global South,” which we use in both cartographical and epistemological senses, transcends mere geopolitical representations to encompass counter-hegemonic imaginaries of solidarity and resistance. While colonial violence in material, epistemological, and subjective terms is well documented (Du Bois, 1996 [1903]; Fanon, 1963; Memmi, 1967), resistance was also an integral part: the anti-colonial struggle, as seen in Palestine today, was reflected in Algeria during the French occupation, which faced significant violence (Fanon, 1963), as well as in the Portuguese African colonies and French Indochina. Marx prefigured this in his 1871 pamphlet, The Civil War in France, stating that the “civilization and justice” of the bourgeois order are starkly revealed when its “slaves and drudges” rise up against their masters. These battles for justice persist in many parts of the world today. The term Global South epitomizes the periphery of the global order. We commence this opening chapter with an exegesis of this term, subsequently engaging in a reinvigoration of fundamental inquiries concerning justice.

1.2 WHAT IS THE GLOBAL SOUTH? The “Global South” is a fluid, boundary-defying term. Its uses vary from geopolitical representations of the world political order to counter-hegemonic imaginaries of solidarity and resistance. The Global South has come to represent those spaces and people, cartographically and epistemologically, that are on the periphery of the world social order through the history 2

Social justice in the Global South  3 of post-sixteenth-century global capitalism, colonialism, and empire. In this handbook, we think of the Global South as the location of shared experiences of being on the periphery of the world order that creates comparable and parallel narratives of social problems. The Global South is also a site of context-generated knowledge creation through concepts and theories from lived experiences. In the following, we review a few contexts in which the term Global South has evolved in scholarship and activism. 1.2.1 Global South in the World Order As a geopolitical expression, the term Global South came to represent what was until then the “third world” at the end of the Cold War, when the division of the world into first, second, and third lost its significance (Saull, 2005). The Global North and South represented the asymmetrical power among world nations depending on their cartographical locations in the respective hemispheres. The distinction was only an imaginary geopolitical representation that violated world geography, since Australia, part of the Global North, is in the Southern Hemisphere, while India and China are in the Northern Hemisphere. The Global South (and Global North) also represented a world no longer divided by political ideologies but interconnected and “leveled” through the “flows” characterizing neoliberal globalization. This interconnectedness necessitated new philosophical paradigms, concepts, and theories such as scapes (Appadurai, 1996), time-space compression (Harvey, 1990), and cosmopolitanism (Appiah, 2006). Global South replaced the terms “third world” and “underdeveloped” in development projects that had hierarchically arranged countries on the ladder of linear “progress” post-World War II and embarked on “lifting the poor up” through numerous measures that aimed to transform the everyday lives of people around the world (Escobar, 2011). The Global South has become a common-sense term around which the United Nations organizes its statistical data (Hollington et al., 2015). The Independent Commission on International Development Issues’ 1980 report (Brandt, 1980) noted the North and South’s association with “rich” and “poor” and “developed” and “underdeveloped” conditions. Those in the Global South continued to become the targets of massive developmental interventions by neoliberal financial and developmental organizations such as the World Bank, mainly from the North, for the alleviation of economic misery now through market-oriented measures (Roy et al., 2016). Neoliberal globalization and structural adjustment programs, along with climate change and the COVID-19 pandemic, have rendered the lives of many in the Global South more vulnerable than before. In what might alternatively be termed a “global land grab,” investors have dispossessed farmers of their livelihoods to convert them to speculative and shady real estate ventures (McMichael, 2013). By stealing land from low-key, sustainable growers who have been an essential link in the food chain, these land grabs exacerbate the food crisis in the Global South (McMichael, 2011). The expansion of cities on village land has uprooted tens of millions of rural residents, leaving many unable to return home (Henriques 2008;Chan et al., 2019). Compelled by agrarian misery and rural crises, those who migrate to the peripheries of cities or cross borders live under cruel regimes. The COVID-19 pandemic impacted economically fragile people, undoing years of work in healthcare improvements and access (Chowdhury & Jomo, 2020). Climate change disproportionately affects those in the Global South who have not historically contributed to fossil fuel burning and greenhouse gas emissions. The extreme weather events and increasing sea levels as a result of climate change affect women more: women in Bangladesh did not leave their homes during floods because

4  Handbook of social justice in the Global South they could not swim, their clothing restricted their movements, and they feared sexual abuse (Rashid, 2000). Climate change – as well as the development interventions in its name – has worsened social and economic inequality, making it more difficult for people in the Global South to escape poverty. 1.2.2 Global South as Resistance Against the static conception of a poor, chaotic, and conflict-ridden world, the Global South represents a challenge to the domination of Euro-American centrist doctrines and ideologies of power. Dependency theorists traced the causes of underdevelopment in Africa, Asia, and Latin America to capitalism and colonialism (Amin, 1974; Galeano, 1997; Rodney, 2018 [1972]). Underdevelopment is a state involving aggressive exploitation of resources, one that operates to the detriment of the poorer states where those resources lie, but in a way that favors dominating states. Their forced integration into the European economic system limited their options to produce raw materials or act as suppliers of cheap labor; they were not allowed to market their resources in a way that would have put them in direct competition with the powerful states. Their legacies continue to reorganize social life in the peripheries through American imperialist hegemony and contemporary neoliberalism. Kwame Nkrumah discusses how neocolonialism continues to determine African futures after the said façade of political independence from the colonial yoke, where foreign capital is used for resource extraction rather than for the development of the colonies (Nkrumah, 1965). The experience of shared suffering under colonialism and capitalism has led to the political imaginations of solidarity in the Global South in the past. The kinship, through the Bandung Conference, the non-aligned movement, and the tricontinental solidarity networks (Prashad, 2002; Mahler, 2018), created political spaces for anticolonial and anti-apartheid resistance and imagined a collective future imbued with postcolonial camaraderie. In that regard, the Global South has also been a site of resistance to the world’s hegemonic order. Though these emancipatory visions never materialized, they still offer hope for a world where South-South dialogues will create unexpected connections and possibilities for solidarity. It still encourages the reexamination of the international system’s intellectual, political, and moral underpinnings and, hence, is a complex, multifaceted movement with numerous self-selected caretakers rather than a central structure (Grovogui, 2011). 1.2.3 Global South and Knowledge Production Epistemological interventions in social science disciplines assert the need for theories, concepts, and methodologies to understand the lived experiences of the Global South. Social science has historically intertwined with projects of power and dominance. Although initially introduced as an academic and practical solution to human suffering, sociology has established itself as a distinguished field of knowledge. The construction of the “other,” which has been fundamentally constitutive of modernity and colonialism, has shaped the emergence and development of sociology and anthropology. The conditions of life vary between the Global South and North, and Northern explanations are neither relevant nor appropriate for making sense of Southern lives. Criticizing Eurocentrism in sociological theory, many point to neglected voices from the Global South that should be central to sociological analysis (Alatas & Sinha, 2017; Connell,

Social justice in the Global South  5 2020), often produced under oppression and marginalization under colonialism. Apart from that, the Northern conceptions of the South that predominate in writings evolve from the context of colonialism and imperialism. Hence, Southern theories are counterhegemonic projects. Theories and concepts from the Global South often celebrate a plurality of traditions rather than a singular story and consider the West-centric ways of knowing just one among many. For example, Akiwowo highlighted Nigerian social contexts by presenting the Asuwada Theory of Sociation as a contextual episteme to explain African social experience (Akiwowo, 1986). The idea seeks explicitly to offer an indigenous justification for the social relationships between Yorubas and other Africans. Its concepts attempt to draw attention to social animals’ situational advantages, which promote social survival and community growth and integration. This idea states that the ability of Africans, and Yoruba people specifically, to associate or coexist is crucial to the local social structure because it enables individuals to internalize and adequately reflect socially acceptable principles of community survival and development (Makinde, 1988). Chen Kuan-Hsing, in his book Asia as method, asked that research on Asia forsake its incapacitating obsession with the West, which has been rendered historicity: the rest has always had to play catch-up with the institutions, subjecthood, knowledge, and ways of existing and experiencing life (Chen, 2010). To counter this, Chen insists that researchers start inter-referencing Asia, using Asian standards and standpoints. This inter-referencing of Asia shifts the frame of comparison to a temporally coeval, horizontal plane between locations in Asia, in contrast with the temporally and historically unequal comparison of Europe and Asia, which is still relevant. The ethics and practice of inter-referencing are not necessarily tied to the geographical reach of Asia but to decolonial projects elsewhere in the world. Before describing the organization of this volume, we aim to underscore a nuanced and relational understanding of social justice in the Global South, highlighting several fundamental questions at the end.

1.3 CONTEMPLATING JUSTICE A focus on social justice has been a core concern throughout human history, dating back to ancient philosophers who grappled with the intricacies of societal structures. Philosophers from diverse cultural backgrounds have put forth a multitude of conceptions regarding justice. For instance, in classical Indian philosophies such as Charvaka, Hinduism, and Buddhism, justice emphasizes the importance of virtuous harmony within society. Similarly, in his renowned work, The republic, Plato proposed comparable ideas concerning justice. However, some of these ideas are considered classist by contemporary standards due to their reflection of the hierarchical class systems of that era. Over centuries, the modern discourse on pushing for a social justice perspective to alleviate poverty has long been a central tenet of development thinking. At the same time, the pernicious and racist rationale of development intervention in the Global South has persisted from the colonial era (Achebe, 2006; Memmi, 1967) to contemporary aid policies (Evans, 1979; George 2019; Strange, 1992; Soederberg, 2014) and the global neoliberal paradigm (Andrade, 2022; Deb, 2023, 2024; Gellert, 2019), causing the uneven transformation of society in Asia, Africa, and many other regions (Carroll & Jarvis, 2017; Nkrumah, 1965). In the present day, with climate change and other environmental challenges taking precedence in global discussions, there is a renewed and heightened global interest in the concept of justice, reflecting an

6  Handbook of social justice in the Global South evolving understanding of societal equity and environmental responsibility. In the face of the climate crisis and the recent pandemic, many paradigmatic alternatives to the conventional market-focused model are emerging, such as experimentation with universal basic income, the popularity of the de-growth economic model, and the global Green New Deal. While this resurgence has sparked enthusiasm, it has also led to a loss of conceptual clarity and, to some extent, practical credibility. What does it mean when we talk about justice? How do we incorporate it into research? And what are its practical implications? Although this volume may not directly answer these questions, it raises them to expand the debate. 1.3.1 A Political-Economic History Social justice has been a pivotal element across various disciplines, gaining particular prominence since the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries. Despite its current widespread use, especially in addressing global challenges such as racism, sexism, and the climate crisis, justice has a rich history that has profoundly shaped both scholarly discourse and practical applications. While Marx’s writings are infrequently referenced in discussions of social justice, his political-economic analysis of capitalism permeates social justice studies. Marx (1932) criticizes the Hegelian and idealist notion of justice in his Economic and philosophical manuscript and The German ideology. He delves into this topic notably in his “1864 inaugural address of the Working men’s international association,” where he discusses socialism and justice, stating, “Where the class struggle is pushed aside as a disagreeable ‘coarse’ phenomenon, nothing remains as a basis for socialism but ‘true love of humanity’ and empty phraseology about ‘justice.’” (See Tucker, 1978, p. 554). His critique extends beyond distributive justice in socialist thought. Furthermore, Marx critically engages with this theme in The Civil War in France, stating that “this [bourgeois] civilisation and justice stand forth as undisguised savagery and lawless revenge.” Furthermore, Karl Polanyi (1944), known for his rigorous critique of how the market subordinates society and triggers movements for social protection, provides a nuanced understanding of social justice across disciplines. Although rarely acknowledged as such, Polanyi’s works have a fundamental justice framework that draws on societal opposition to the market colonization of labor and land. Furthermore, numerous influential figures from the Global South, including feminist thinkers, have contributed significantly to a relational understanding of justice. For instance, Begum Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain, a Bangladeshi feminist scholar, presents in her 1905 book, Sultana’s dream, a feminist utopia where women have complete control while men are marginalized, offering a reverse image of purdah. This patriarchal practice segregates women from public spaces in conservative societies. Such perspectives, however, are often marginalized in dominant intellectual discourse. With the rise of modernization theory in shaping development discourse following the US model as the goal (Rostow, 1960), the notion of a singular approach to a diverse and complex world became entrenched. Such a singular vision of creating a world in Eurocentric ways leads to numerous social, economic, and environmental crises all over the world. Despite these crises, mainstream economists increasingly influenced public policy, leading to a shift where justice eventually became synonymous with market freedom. Anticolonial scholars were not limited to indicting European colonialism; some of them also offered a manifesto of liberation. In The wretched of the earth, Fanon (2004 [1963]) criticizes how Europe has inflicted harm “in the heart of man,” tearing apart man’s ability to

Social justice in the Global South  7 “function” and crumbling their “unity.” He also warns against imitating the European framework of justice, which he describes as “almost an obscene caricature.” Instead of respecting and developing an alternative, the colonial division of labor and injustice were perpetuated in the global South (Davis, 2001). The United States, following decolonization, took the lead in development programs. In contrast, in collaboration with the national governments of postcolonial nations, various international governmental institutions such as the World Bank, the IMF, and multilateral development agencies implemented top-down, hegemonic policies where economics dictated the direction. Later, alternative and grounded perspectives were marginalized during the corporate-led neoliberal period – once again promoted with the discourse of freedom and rights (Harvey, 2005; Perrons, 2004). This marginalization, with the rules of the WTO, permeates institutions that represent the interests of the Global North (Adams, 1993). The earlier version of the United Nations’ Millennium Development Goals and even the Sustainable Development Goals reflected similar ideals regarding sustainability, presenting the achievement of ecological balance as contingent upon economic growth. In this context, radical Marxists made significant challenges to the economic structures of capitalism but struggled, with some exceptions, to fully understand the complex contextual realities at the grassroots level. Scholars from diverse disciplines, including geography, sociology, and anthropology, have contributed significantly to competing, transformative, and emancipatory notions of justice (Chambers, 1983; Watts, 1983). Some, surprisingly, have come from economics. 1.3.2 Variations within Economics Simultaneously, various critical and holistic approaches to social justice are resurgent, challenging previously dominant perspectives on justice. From the late twentieth century to the early twenty-first century, we observe a mounting critique of the Washington consensus, even within the realms of economics, especially after the 2008 financial crisis (see, for example, Cohen, 2019). Others have also taken a meticulous approach to addressing the issue of poverty (Banerjee & Duflo, 2011; Sen, 1999; Stiglitz, 2019). Amartya Sen has emphasized specifically the concept of justice, initially in his Nobelwinning 1999 book, Development and freedom, and subsequently in his 2011 book, The idea of justice. In the latter, he delved into the philosophical history of this notion (Sen 2011). As he rightly shows, utilitarianism, a branch of economics dedicated to ethical analysis, has long been the dominant notion of justice in Western thought. Eventually, scholars, including Sen, rejected all three pillars of utilitarianism: act consequentialism, welfarism, and sum ranking. Sen (1999) disagrees with (a) act consequentialism, which says that people should think about more than just outcomes when deciding what to do; (b) welfarism, which says that actions should only be judged by how well they make people feel; and (c) sum ranking, which tries to get the most overall welfare without thinking about how it should be shared, as differences often arise while ignoring particular needs. Sen (1999), who often invokes Karl Marx, and sometimes in total contradiction, offers an essential perspective on justice, taking a holistic and open approach to the analysis of the quality of life and arguing that traditional theories of justice are too narrowly focused and inadequately capture the complexity of justice. He presents a perspective on justice through what he (1999) calls the “capability approach.” Sen argues that a myopic focus on subjective

8  Handbook of social justice in the Global South utility neglects essential aspects such as individual agency, fairness, and the impact of adaptive preference. Sen’s perspective on justice emphasizes the bigger picture in evaluating one’s well-being, not strictly how material goods, for example, translate to well-being. Prioritizing the word equity over equality, Sen argues that resources alone cannot lead to equality, regardless of the effectiveness of those resources. The resources might be suitable for solid wellbeing, but they alone cannot predict or constitute “a good life.” This inequity persists because the condition negates the differences between people and the circumstances that might prevent them from having as much success as someone who technically has the same access to resources. Sen’s concept and understanding of well-being stress the individual differences between us. In saying so, Sen challenges Rawls’ (1971) concept of justice, which relies upon a single collection of principles underpinning our institutions to support a functioning society. Sen emphasizes the need to focus on the relationship between resources and people rather than fetishizing resources as the embodiment of advantage. Sen criticizes Rawls’ “transcendental institutionalism” and argues that searching for a single set of just principles to design just institutions is impractical and fraught with problems of feasibility and redundancy. In sum, Rawls’s theory of justice emphasizes fairness, while Sen approaches justice from the perspective of capacity, emphasizing the importance of individual capabilities and freedoms. Building on Sen’s (1990) work, scholarship has expanded on environmental entitlements (Leach et al., 1997; Okereke, 2006). For example, Tony Bebbington (1999) developed a framework centered on capitals and capabilities to examine rural poverty. Additionally, a significant discourse on environmental entitlements holds considerable relevance today. This discussion critiques the development paradigm based on growth and underscores the mediating factors that influence resource accessibility. While such notions diversify the justice framework, situating our discussion in the broader literature on political economy, the Global South, poverty, and development, we will return to address some fundamental questions of justice in the Global South in the concluding section of this introductory chapter.

1.4 REVITALIZING FUNDAMENTAL QUESTIONS Bringing power and politics into focus has never been more crucial. In the influential book, On the political, Chantal Mouffe (2005) argues that merely relying on participatory and deliberative democracy, often seen as a guise for neoliberalism and a means to overlook global injustices, is overly simplistic and ineffective. These approaches contribute to many of the world’s challenges, fueling right-wing populism and depoliticization (Swyngedouw, 2010). We advocate for a nuanced, relational approach to justice in the Global South. First, a fundamental question requiring rejuvenation to uphold social justice is: Who benefits and who suffers? Whose interests dominate existing institutional frameworks and policy agendas? Moreover, who remains unrecognized? In this regard, justice connects with empowerment and recognition (Fraser & Honneth, 2003). Many proposed solutions to improve human and environmental conditions may, ironically, harm those most in need. External interest-driven passivity has been detrimental. Instead, we need context-specific insights grounded in social and historical realities to counteract capital’s encroachment into marginalized communities, preventing the commodification and financialization of resources. Social

Social justice in the Global South  9 justice concerns must be interwoven with broader political-economic questions while grounding them in a context-specific, local, and micro-level understanding. Second, this approach implies multiplicity and diversity within the framework, emphasizing the necessity of addressing complexities to understand social justice comprehensively (Scoones 2015). Unlike neoliberal models that individualize problems, this approach focuses on individuals from the perspective mentioned earlier. Moreover, it urges us to steer clear of homogenizing and universalizing tendencies in our multifaceted world, which conventional paradigms have always tended to do. Our life experiences vary widely, shaping both our identities and actions. While larger forces shape our world, our daily politics intertwine with specificities and numerous particulars. Integrating micro-level realities with institutional frameworks and the very concept of social justice will enhance our analytical depth. The third aspect to consider revolves around questions such as: Who creates knowledge? Who spreads it? Whose knowledge holds significance? While framing social justice within frameworks is crucial, equal attention must be paid to the institutions and entities responsible for generating and disseminating knowledge (Jasanoff, 2004; Long & Long, 1992). Historically, Indigenous knowledge has been dismissed as antiquated and irrelevant. However, with a growing recognition of the value of diverse knowledge systems, dominant institutions often co-opt rather than integrate such insights into policy frameworks. We are not claiming that indigenous people or locals are inherently stewards of social justice. However, we contend that the politics of knowledge significantly influence how we conceptualize and define social justice. Simply narrowing justice down to quantifiable measures proves futile, as it has in the past in disciplines like economics (Raworth, 2017; Simms, 2019). Instead, the discourse on justice should encompass a spectrum of knowledge forms and diverse epistemological perspectives. Central to this discussion is including marginalized voices (Martinez-Alier, 2002), whose viewpoints and concerns are often overlooked (Adnan & Dastidar, 2011). Furthermore, social justice must also extend its considerations to future generations, a facet intricately linked to broader questions concerning our relationship with the extra-human world. Finally, the imperative to incorporate ecological dimensions into discussions of social justice is undeniable, given the intricate interplay between these domains. The current environmental and climate crisis era emphasizes how crucial it is to comprehend social justice issues and how ecological factors influence them. This nexus has long been recognized in scholarly and intellectual circles, reflecting a deep-seated awareness of ecology’s profound influence over political and societal dynamics. Given that ecological limitations shape our capacities and boundaries, social justice frameworks must remain responsive to changing environmental conditions. This awareness becomes particularly salient amidst the prevalence of technocratic approaches dominating environmental policy discourse. It is incumbent upon scholarly endeavors to illuminate how ecological considerations contribute to shaping narratives of social justice and perpetuate harm, impacting communities affected directly by environmental degradation. Central to this discussion is the acknowledgment of the need for a nuanced, global perspective that integrates political and ecological dimensions. Such an approach should encompass a range of factors, including localized struggles, resistance movements, and the broader geopolitical landscape. By embracing this holistic view, academic discourse can contribute meaningfully to advancing a comprehensive understanding of the intricate connections between ecology and social justice, paving the way for informed and effective policy interventions.

10  Handbook of social justice in the Global South In this handbook, we draw on inclusionary practices to give voice to Global South scholars located in the Global South, along with those privileged to be trained in Euro-American academic writing, to create balanced relationships in global knowledge production (Kloß, 2017). We showcase the voices of scholars from the Global South and Global South scholars located in the Global North, who have created a “third space,” drawing on their own experiences of marginalization, vulnerability, racialization, and violence (Martin et al., 2018). We think of the Global South as sites of resistance, places of belonging, and multiple lenses through which to view the world. Finally, we think of the Global South as a space of resistance to the hegemony of global capitalism and to reimagine transformative futures for a just world community. Understanding social justice comprehensively is crucial. Although categorization and grouping can be useful, they can also limit our understanding of how a single aspect of justice – highlighting the major shortcomings of the conventional development model that aimed for a unified world centered around high mass consumption – can vary significantly across different regions. This volume reflects such diverse voices.

REFERENCES Achebe, C. (2006). Things fall apart. London: Heinemann. Adams, N. A. (1993). Worlds apart: The North South divide and the international system. Zed. Adnan, S., & Dastidar, R. (2011). Alienation of the lands of Indigenous peoples. International Work Group for Indigenous Affairs. Akiwowo, A. A. (1986). Contributions to the sociology of knowledge from an African oral poetry. International Sociology, 1(4), 343–358. Alatas, S. F., & Sinha, V. (2017). Sociological theory beyond the canon. Springer. Amin, S. (1974). Accumulation and development: A theoretical model. Review of African Political Economy, 1(1), 9–26. Andrade, D. (2022). Neoliberal extractivism: Brazil in the twenty-first century. The Journal of Peasant Studies, 49(4), 793–816. https://doi​.org​/10​.1080​/03066150​.2022​.2030314 Appadurai, A. (1996). Modernity at large: Cultural dimensions of globalization (Vol. 1). University of Minnesota Press. Appiah, K. A. (2006). Cosmopolitanism. Ethics in a world of strangers. Penguin Books. Banerjee, A. V., & Duflo, E. (2011). Poor economics: A radical rethinking of the way to fight global poverty. Public Affairs. Bebbington, A. (1999). Capitals and capabilities: A framework for analyzing peasant viability, rural livelihoods and poverty. World Development, 27(12), 2021–2044. Brandt, W. (1980). North-South: A programme for survival; report of the Independent Commission on International Development Issues. MIT Press. Carroll, T., & Jarvis, D. S. (Eds.). (2017). Asia after the developmental state: Disembedding autonomy. Cambridge University Press. Chambers, R. (1983). Rural development: putting the last first. London: Longman. Chan, J., Nair, M., & Rhomberg, C. (2019). Precarization and labor resistance: Canada, the USA, India and China. Critical Sociology, 45(4–5), 469–483. Chen, K. H. (2010). Asia as method: Toward deimperialization. Duke University Press. Chowdhury, A. Z., & Jomo, K. S. (2020). Responding to the COVID-19 pandemic in developing countries: Lessons from selected countries of the global south. Development, 63(2), 162–171. Cohen, J. (Ed.). (2019, July 29). Economics after neoliberalism. Boston Review. Connell, R. (2020). Southern theory: The global dynamics of knowledge in social science. Routledge. Davis, M. (2001). Late Victorian holocausts: El Niño famines and the making of the third world. London: Verso Books. Deb, N. (2023). Slow violence and the gas peedit in neoliberal India. Social Problems, 70(4), 1085–1103.

Social justice in the Global South  11 Deb, N. (2024). The path to neoliberalism: Investigating Bangladesh’s political and economic transformation. In S. Rahman and M. M. Kamal (Eds.), Social transformation in Bangladesh: Pathways, challenges and the way forward. Routledge. Du Bois, W. E. B. (1996 [1903]). Souls of Black folk. Dover Publications. Escobar, A. (2011). Encountering development: The making and unmaking of the Third World (Vol. 1). Princeton University Press. Evans, P. B. (1979). Dependent development: the alliance of multinational, state, and local capital in Brazil. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Fanon, F. (2004 [1963]). The wretched of the earth. Grove Press. Fraser, N., & Honneth, A. (2003). Redistribution or recognition? A political-philosophical exchange. Verso. Galeano, E. (1997). Open veins of Latin America. Monthly Review Press. Gellert, P. K. (2019). Neoliberalism and altered state developmentalism in the twenty-first century extractive regime of Indonesia. Globalizations, 16(6), 894–918. George, S. (2019). The debt boomerang. Routledge. Grovogui, S. (2011). A revolution nonetheless: The Global South in international relations. The Global South, 5(1), 175–190. Harvey, D. (1990). The condition of postmodernity: An enquiry into the origins of cultural change. Blackwell. Harvey, D. (2005). A brief history of neoliberalism. London: Oxford University Press. Henriques, D. B. (2008). Food is gold, so billions invested in farming. New York Times, 5. Hollington, A., Salverda, T., Schwarz, T., & Tappe, O. (2015). Concepts of the Global South. Köln: Global South Studies Center Cologne. Jasanoff, S. (2004). States of knowledge: The co-production of science and the social order. Routledge. Kloß, S. T. (2017). The Global South as subversive practice: Challenges and potentials of a heuristic concept. Global South, 11(2), 1–17. Leach, M., Mearns, R., & Scoones, I. (1997). Environmental entitlements: A framework for understanding the institutional dynamics of environmental change (Vol. 359). Institute of Development Studies, University of Sussex, Brighton. Long, N., & Long, A. (1992). Battlefields of knowledge: The interlocking of theory and practice in social research and development. Routledge. Mahler, A. G. (2018). From the tricontinental to the Global South: Race, radicalism, and transnational solidarity. Duke University Press. Makinde, M. A. (1988). Asuwada principle: An analysis of Akiwowo’s contributions to the sociology of knowledge from an African perspective. International Sociology, 3(1), 61–76. Martin, S. B., & Dandekar, D. (2022). Global South scholars in the Western academy. Routledge. Martinez-Alier, J. (2002). The environmentalism of the poor: A study of the ecological conflicts and valuation. Edward Elgar Publishing. Marx, K. (1973[1857–1858]). Grundrisse: Foundation to the critique of political economy. (M. Nicolaus, Trans.). Penguin. Martin, M., Reilly, M., & Williamson, R. (2018). Global South and Global North: Scholarship, intersectionality, and third space thinking. Journal of Global Social Work Practice, 3(1), 25-40. Marx, K. (1932). Economic and philosophic manuscripts. In The Marx-Engels reader, edited by Tucker. NY: WW Norton. McMichael, P. (2011). Food system sustainability: Questions of environmental governance in the new world (dis) order. Global Environmental Change, 21(3), 804–812. McMichael, P. (2013). The land grab and corporate food regime restructuring. In The new enclosures: Critical perspectives on corporate land deals (pp. 63–83). Routledge. Memmi, A. (1967). The colonizer and the colonized. Beacon Press. Mouffe, C. (2005). On the political. Routledge. Nkrumah, K. (1965). Neo-colonialism. Nelson. Okereke, C. (2006). Global environmental sustainability: Intragenerational equity and conceptions of justice in multilateral environmental regimes. Geoforum, 37(5), 725–738. https://doi​.org​/10​.1016​/j​ .geoforum​.2005​.10​.005

12  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Perrons, D. (2004). Globalization & social change: People and places in divided world. London: Routledge. Polanyi, K. (1944). The great transformation: The political and economic origins of our time, Boston, MA: Beacon Press. Prashad, V. (2002). Everybody was kung fu fighting: Afro-Asian connections and the myth of cultural purity. Beacon Press. Rashid, S. F. (2000). The urban poor in Dhaka City: Their struggles and coping strategies during the floods of 1998. Disasters, 24(3), 240–253. Rawls, J. (2009 [1971]). A theory of justice. Harvard University Press. Raworth, K. (2017). Doughnut economics: Seven ways to think like a 21st-century economist. Chelsea Green Publishing. Rodney, W. (2018 [1972]). How Europe underdeveloped Africa. Verso Books. Rostow, W.W. (1960). The stages of economic growth. UK: Cambridge University Press. Roy, A., Negrón-Gonzales, G., Opoku-Agyemang, K., & Talwalker, C. (2016). Encountering poverty: Thinking and acting in an unequal world. University of California Press. Saull, R. (2005). Locating the Global South in the theorisation of the Cold War: Capitalist development, social revolution, and geopolitical conflict. Third World Quarterly, 26(2), 253–281. Scoones, I. (2015). Sustainable livelihoods and rural development. Practical Action Publishing. Sen, A. (1990). Poverty and famines: An essay on entitlement and deprivation. India: Oxford University Press. Sen, A. (1999). Development as freedom. Oxford University Press. Sen, A. (2011). The idea of justice. Harvard University Press. Simms, A. (2019, August 3). Economics is a failing discipline doing great harm – so let’s rethink it. The Guardian. Soederberg, S. (2014). Debtfare states and the poverty industry: Money, discipline and the surplus population. Routledge. Stiglitz, J. E. (2019, November 24). It’s time to retire metrics like GDP. They don’t measure everything that matters. The Guardian. Strange, S. (1992). States and markets. United Kingdom: Bloomsbury Academic. Swyngedouw, E. (2010). Apocalypse forever? Theory, Culture & Society, 27(2–3), 213–232. Tucker, R. C. (1978). The Marx-Engels reader. Norton. Watts, M. (1983). Silent violence: Food, famine and peasantry in Northern Nigeria. Berkeley: University of California Press.

2. The republics and social justice Robert K. Schaeffer

2.1 INTRODUCTION Two hundred years ago, colonized peoples in the Americas organized social movements to fight for their independence from European empires and create constitutional governments based on popular sovereignty in “Republics,” states based on the rule of law, not on the arbitrary authority of dynastic rulers. The idea of liberty, equality, fraternity, and social justice then spread across the Global South and around the world. But the struggle for self-determination in the republics encountered three serious problems. First, imperial dynastic states fought bitterly to suppress republican revolutions and extend colonialism, and anti-republican fascist states fought to create vast new empires based on racialized, exterminationist hierarchies. Second, political minorities in the new republics organized factions that seized power and then used their authority to rewrite constitutions, deny popular sovereignty, and establish dictatorships in many republics. Third, the architects of constitutional government awarded “citizenship” and the right to exercise popular sovereignty to small, elite minorities and assigned the vast majority to two subordinate groups: “denizens” who had some rights but could not vote; and “subjects” who were placed under the coercive control of public and private authorities. To address these problems, people in the Global South and around the world have engaged in three related struggles for social justice. They organized movements that fought to create republics, democratize the republics, and expand citizenship in the republics. But while their collective efforts over the last 200 years have expanded, enhanced, and deepened the meaning of social justice in the republics, their work is nowhere near complete, and struggles for these and other kinds of social justice are ongoing, as chapters in this volume demonstrate. To appreciate these developments and the role of social movements in shaping global social and political change, it is important to examine these three related struggles for social justice.

2.2 THE RISE OF THE REPUBLICS In 1800, there was only one republic. Today, the vast majority of the 194 states around the world are identified as republics. The struggle for independence in the republics began in the Americas, in the colonized periphery, the Global South. American revolutionaries in some British colonies won their independence and established a republic in the United States. French revolutionaries overthrew the monarchy and established a republic, but it was undone by Napoleon in 1799. Enslaved and Creole Haitians mounted a revolution, defeated invasions by French, Spanish, and British empires, and in 1804, “proclaimed the independence of Haiti, the second republic of the Western Hemisphere” (Ott, 1973, p. 182). Napoleon’s invasions of Spain and Portugal crippled dynastic authority in their American colonies. As one Mexican official explained, 13

14  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Napoleon’s invasions of Portugal and Spain “struck the first blow at the chains which bound the two worlds” (Waddell, 1987, p. 197). Colonized peoples seized the opportunity and organized republican movements that won their independence from Spain and Portugal across most of Latin America during the early to mid-1800s. Although Simon Bolivar and Jose de San Martin tried to unite separate independence movements and create a continental republic, regional movements refused and insisted on creating individual republics in Venezuela, Ecuador, Bolivia, and elsewhere. This led to a surge in the number of republics in the postcolonial Americas (Bushnell, 1987). In 1848, republican movements launched revolutions across Europe. But imperial authorities quickly crushed these spontaneous insurrections, often led by clandestine secret societies, and reestablished dynastic rule. The federal republic created in Switzerland was the only survivor. Republican activists in Europe responded to their defeat by organizing mass-based social movements and political parties that could wage the long-term, public campaigns needed to overthrow entrenched dynastic power. As Immanuel Wallerstein (Wallerstein, 2011, p. 161) has argued, republicans decided that “spontaneity was not enough. If one wanted to have a major impact, systematic and long-term organization was a pre-requisite.” Republican movements fighting for social justice in Europe and across the colonial world then began organizing along two lines in the second half of the nineteenth century. Some organized “nationalist” movements based on ethnic, linguistic, and religious identities, while others organized “socialist” movements based on class identities. In some colonies, these movements forged united fronts and fought together for independence; in others they competed for power on their own terms and fought separately. Still, they typically sent delegates to “Congresses” where they deliberated how best to fight for independence and “self-determination” (Schaeffer, 1990, p. 25). Republican movements also divided along tactical lines. Some adopted peaceful, non-violent, and electoral tactics, while others adopted violent tactics, mounting insurrections and waging guerrilla warfare. Nationalist movements in Ireland and socialists in Germany organized parties that entered parliament. Gandhi led the Indian National Congress and its Muslim League allies in non-violent protests and civil disobedience. At the same time, the nationalist Sinn Fein in Ireland and the Kuomintang in China launched rebellions, and the communist parties in China, Korea, and Vietnam waged guerrilla war against their adversaries, both foreign and domestic. Although nationalist and socialist movements made important headway in the late nineteenth century, they did not find success until World War I. Republican movements took advantage of the war between dynastic European empires to launch revolutions in Ireland (1916) and Russia (1917), both on the periphery of Europe, and create new republics. The wartime defeat of the German, Austro-Hungarian, and Ottoman empires resulted in the creation of a new set of republics across Europe, but it also redistributed Ottoman lands and German colonies to the victors, which led to the expansion of British, French, and Italian colonial empires. During the interwar period, republican movements in the colonies intensified their struggles for independence, but they faced fierce resistance from European empires and from new foes – anti-republican fascist and authoritarian states in Europe and Asia – that rejected the idea of popular sovereignty, constitutional government, and democracy. Portuguese dictator Dr. Antonio de Oliveira Salazar announced, “We are anti-parliamentarian, anti-democrats, anti-liberals” (Kay, 1970, p. 68). They assaulted republican movements and states in Europe and Asia, as well as old dynastic European empires, and fought to create race-based empires that colonized, enslaved, and murdered subject peoples.

The republics and social justice  15 In response to German, Italian, and Spanish invasions across Europe and Japanese invasions across Asia, republican states (the United States and Soviet Union) and independence movements in most colonies joined with dynastic European empires to battle Axis powers, and their collective efforts won World War II. Independence movements in India and Palestine played different roles: some joined Axis forces, some joined the Allies, and some sat the war out. During the war, U.S. and Soviet leaders vowed to dismantle the “colonial system,” which they argued was responsible for two world wars, and create a new interstate system composed of independent republics that would provide collective security and economic development for constituent states. U.S. policymakers argued that “victory must bring in its train the liberation of all peoples. … The age of imperialism has ended” (Russell, 1958, p. 83). To this end, U.S. and Soviet leaders created UN organizations to provide collective security and advance independence and self-government, not only in the former colonies of their German-ItalianJapanese adversaries but also in the colonies of their European allies, and together worked to promote decolonization and support republican independence movements in the Global South (Schaeffer, 2014, pp. 84–90). Although U.S. and Soviet relations deteriorated after the war ended – primarily because they disagreed about the specific boundaries of each other’s “spheres of influence” – they nonetheless agreed on the central features of the new republican interstate system and together promoted decolonization. Indeed, 26 countries in Africa and Asia gained their independence with U.S. and Soviet assistance between 1956 and 1960, during the height of the Cold War (Schaeffer, 1999a, p. 16). Still, decolonization was a difficult process. In some colonies, where separate independence movements competed for power, where superpowers could not agree on the borders of their respective spheres of influence, or where European powers could not effectively mediate between competing movements, the Great Powers decided to decolonize and divide power between competing movements and assign them to separate states. The partition of Korea, China, Vietnam, India, Palestine, and Germany created multiple republics but also contributed to a new and ongoing set of problems and conflicts: massive cross-border migrations, conflict and war, and superpower interventions (Schaeffer, 1990). Postwar decolonization was difficult too because European empires fought tenaciously to retain their colonies, leading to bitter wars in Vietnam, Indonesia, Kenya, and Algeria. However, in most cases, decolonization was peacefully accomplished. In the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s, the breakup of republican states in Cyprus, Pakistan, Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia, and the Soviet Union increased again the number of republics in the interstate system (Schaeffer, 1999a, 1999b, 2000). Today, most of the states in the interstate system describe themselves as “republics,” though what they mean by it differs in important ways. Republics often emphasize the character of the social movements that created them. Republics fashioned by nationalist movements identify themselves as a “Republic” without adjectives, republics with socialist roots call themselves a “People’s Republic” or a “Democratic Socialist Republic,” and republics with Muslim origins identify themselves as an “Islamic Republic.” But they all assert that their Republic is a constitutional government based on popular sovereignty. The rise of the republics was accompanied by the decline of dynastic empires and antirepublican states. The struggle for republics was a difficult, protracted, and often violent struggle. But it brought an end to dynastic and anti-republican empires that enslaved and

16  Handbook of social justice in the Global South murdered subject populations, allowed people to exercise their self-determination, and gave people the opportunity to struggle for social justice, which had more meaning in a republic that was based on the principle of the rule of law than it did in states where people were subject to arbitrary authorities who could exercise power without legal restraint. Although the rise of the republics resulted in the creation of constitutional governments based on popular sovereignty, people in the republics often found that their hard-won liberty could be seized by dictators who then compromised the meaning of liberty, popular sovereignty, and social justice.

2.3 DEMOCRATIZING THE REPUBLICS In the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, independence movements established republics across the Americas. But the architects of constitutional government worried that political factions – whom James Madison described as “a dangerous vice” – might seize power (Hamilton, Madison, & Jay, 1937, p. 62). To prevent this, they divided government and assigned different functions to the executive, judicial, and legislative branches, creating firewalls between them so that small political minorities could not easily monopolize power and seize government as a whole. Their fears were not misplaced. In many of the new republics, military leaders launched coups and leaders of political parties seized power, imposed martial law, and established dictatorships. They then rewrote constitutions, emasculated the judiciary, subdued the legislature, stripped citizens of any real voice, rigged elections, and abolished term limits, allowing dictators to become “presidents for life.” Between 1811 and 1989, “Latin American countries produced a total of 253 constitutions … or 12.6 per country on average. … Latin American constitutions were notoriously easy to change” (Billias, 2009, p. 112). To their discredit, U.S. leaders often encouraged, aided, or installed dictators in Latin American republics, using the Monroe Doctrine, which claimed that the U.S. government had a “right” to intervene in Latin America, as a pretext to support or install dictators in its “sphere of influence.” Although social movements sometimes ousted dictators, they frequently returned, and dictatorship became a characteristic feature of the republics in the Caribbean and Latin America. After World War II, the United States and the Soviet Union supported decolonization and republican independence movements across the Global South and collaborated through the United Nations to assist them. But they also competed for supporters during the Cold War and worked to defend their interests. So they encouraged, installed, and supported dictatorships in their separate spheres of influence. The United States supported regimes in Southern Europe, across Latin America, in East Asia, Southeast Asia, the Middle East, and Africa. The Soviet Union installed dictatorships in Eastern Europe and supported them in East and Southeast Asia, the Middle East, the Horn of Africa, and Cuba. As a result, the superpower republics compromised republican principles in lesser republics. This began to change in the 1970s and 1980s. Dictatorships fell first in the U.S. sphere, in Southern Europe (Greece, Spain, and Portugal), Latin America, and East Asia (South Korea, Taiwan, and the Philippines). They then collapsed in the Soviet sphere, first in Eastern Europe and then in the Soviet Union itself. During this period, the apartheid regime in South Africa surrendered power to the Black majority.

The republics and social justice  17 Dictators fell for different reasons (Schaeffer, 1997). Regional economic and debt crises played a major role in most countries, while defeat in war (Greek defeat in Cyprus, Portuguese defeat in its African colonies, Argentine defeat in the Falklands/Malvinas, Soviet defeat in Afghanistan) played a role in others. The death of dictators (Franco in Spain, Tito in Yugoslavia, and Brezhnev, Andropov, Chernenko in the Soviet Union) and the battles for succession that followed weakened or wrecked regimes’ authority in some states. The emergence of dissident and mass movements that challenged the regime (“People’s Power” in the Philippines, the minjung in South Korea, Solidarity in Poland, the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa, and massive migrations out of East Germany) played important roles in change, not only in their own countries but in others. Importantly, the withdrawal of superpower support for dictatorships in their spheres also played a crucial role. U.S. officials refused to aid troubled dictatorships in Greece, Argentina, and the Philippines (Tulchin, 1990; Schaeffer, 1997, p. 108–110). The withdrawal of U.S. support persuaded these and other regimes to negotiate settlements with their opponents that allowed them to withdraw from power before movements emerged to force them from power and take their lives for the crimes they had committed: waging “dirty” wars against civilian populations, kidnapping, torturing opponents, and pushing drugged prisoners out of airplanes into the Atlantic. In Argentina, General Iberico St. Jean had boasted of its dirty war, “First we will kill the subversives, then their sympathizers, then those who remain indifferent, and finally we’ll kill the timid” (McGuire, 1995, p. 183). In 1989, the Soviet Union announced that it had revoked the “Brezhnev Doctrine,” which had given it the “right” to intervene and protect dictatorships in Eastern Europe, and adopted the “Sinatra Doctrine,” so named because the singer had a song, “I Did It My Way,” which allowed “every country to decide in its own way, which [economic and political] road to take” (Dahrendorf, 1990, p. 16). The Soviet announcement persuaded dictators across Eastern Europe to cede power to dissidents and mass movements before they mobilized to take it from them. The transition from dictatorship to democracy in Eastern Europe was peacefully accomplished, except in Romania where the dictatorship tried and failed to defend the regime and in Yugoslavia, where the death of Tito led to battles of secession and wars in the constituent republics (Schaeffer, 2000). In the Soviet Union, an economic crisis, military defeat, an ongoing crisis of succession, and the (re)emergence of “nationalist” social movements in the constituent republics, which had the constitutional authority to exercise their self-determination, led both to democratization and division, resulting in the breakup of the state into 15 sovereign republics. In many of these, former Soviet elites captured power and (re)established dictatorships, though “Color Revolutions” (Orange in Ukraine, Rose in Georgia, Tulip in Kyrgyzstan, Grape in Moldova, Jeans in Belarus, and Velvet in Armenia) democratized some of them (Schaeffer, 2022, pp. 255–59). Democracy flourished briefly in Russia during the 1990s, but it was slowly throttled by Putin, who (re)established a dictatorship. Then in the 2010s, mass movements across North Africa and the Middle East organized to overthrow dictatorships and establish democratic governments during the Arab Spring (Noueihed & Warren, 2012). But some regimes successfully resisted change, and others (re) emerged to crush nascent democracies, an episode that recalls the collective failure of republican revolutions in 1848. Still, more than 30 republics democratized in the late twentieth century, a significant achievement in the ongoing struggle for social justice. Of course, China, the world’s largest

18  Handbook of social justice in the Global South republic, remains a dictatorship, Russia has rejoined it, and dictators survive in many republics around the world, as do dynastic and anti-republican regimes. Moreover, authoritarian movements contest for power in many republics and pose a threat to social justice and democracy in the Global North and the Global South (Schaeffer, 2022, pp. 212–17).

2.4 EXPANDING CITIZENSHIP The architects of the new republics worried about the dangers posed by factions of their own. But they also feared the multitude who might use the franchise to seize their property, abolish slavery, cancel debts, defy their authority, and assault their economic power and political privilege. So they divided civil society (much as they had divided government to protect it from faction) into discrete social and political hierarchies that would prevent them from making common cause. When they designed constitutional government, they defined “the people” who could exercise “popular sovereignty” quite narrowly, reserving the right to vote for a small minority. They then assigned the vast majority to two subordinate groups: denizens who had some rights but not the vote; and subjects without rights who were placed under the control of public or private authorities. Of course, people assigned to denizen and subject status in the United States and in republics around the world objected to their disenfranchisement and subordination and fought to claim the rights and privileges associated with citizenship. Their collective struggles for social justice expanded citizenries in the republics around the world during the next 200 years. Today, a majority of people in the republics claim citizenship, though in none of the republics has citizenship been extended to all its residents. There is greater equality, but inequality persists. In the United States, the architects of constitutional government awarded citizenship to adult, white, Protestant men with property. They rationalized this by arguing that they alone had the intellectual, moral, and physical capacity to exercise power responsibly, and that others lacked these capacities. In the case of adult white men without property, it was said that they lacked the ability to make decisions because they were subject to economic domination by landlords, employers, or lenders who might compel or purchase their votes. As a result, the architects extended the vote to only 10 percent of the population in 1800. The architects extended some non-voting rights to adult, white, Protestant men without property, to immigrants, women, and minors, creating a large body of “second-class citizens” or denizens, whose rights and pathways to citizenship varied. Some denizens might “move up” and claim citizenship, while others could not. Adult men without property might obtain sufficient wealth and property to become citizens, immigrant men might naturalize and, with sufficient wealth, claim citizenship, and young boys might claim citizenship once they became adults and obtained property. These pathways were closed to adult women and girls, even if they possessed wealth or obtained property. The architects also made large and diverse groups of people the subjects of public or private authorities, who could use violence to control them. Native Americans, male conscripts, soldiers and sailors, convicts, and people with mental disabilities or contagious diseases were made subjects and placed under the authority of state officials. Enslaved people were made the subjects of private authorities. The pathways to citizenship for subject populations were extremely narrow. Soldiers and sailors who completed their enlistments and convicts who served their sentences might regain

The republics and social justice  19 or obtain their citizenship, though the pathway for convicts narrowed as states adopted laws to “disenfranchise felons.” Enslaved people might escape to freedom or be given their freedom by enslavers, but the 1857 Dred Scott decision closed this pathway and denied citizenship to free Black men. No pathways existed for Native Americans. People with mental disabilities or contagious diseases found it difficult to find any pathway because they could be detained by civil authorities without due process or trial and held indefinitely, against their will, without legal recourse, and, in the case of women with mental disabilities, forcibly sterilized. The new republics across the Global South adopted the same approach, dividing “the People” into citizen, denizen, and subject hierarchies, though they assigned different socioeconomic groups to separate categories, assigned them different sets of rights, and created complex and differentiated hierarchies for immigrants and migrants, people of “mixed race” and “Creole” populations, expatriates and members of diaspora communities, members of religious minorities, LGBT people, people with mental or physical disabilities or contagious diseases, and minors. Of course, people assigned to denizen and subject populations objected to their assignments and fought for social justice (a wide range of rights), citizenship, and suffrage. In the United States, adult, white, Protestant men without property fought to change state voting laws and obtained citizenship in the early nineteenth century (Keyssar, 2009; Schaeffer, 2014, pp. 102). They met with success because many had served in the military, paid taxes, and, in the South, because they could be enlisted by enslavers to recapture and suppress enslaved people. During and after the Civil War, enslaved Black men won their freedom and citizenship, though the rise of Jim Crow laws effectively revoked their citizenship in the South for another century (Karst, 1989). Adult women fought a 70-year campaign for suffrage, winning in 1920, though Jim Crow laws denied the franchise to Black women (Kerber, 1998). Native Americans obtained citizenship in 1924, though they did not obtain comprehensive suffrage until 1948 (Griffith, 2022). During the interwar period, Black men and women who joined the “Great Migration” from the South to the North and West were able to obtain the citizenship denied to them in the South (Johnson & Campbell, 1981). After World War II, Black men and women in the South fought for their civil rights, which included a comprehensive set of rights in addition to the vote, and won them in 1964/65. Minors, who could serve in the military and drink but not vote, fought for civil rights, student rights, women’s rights, and against conscription during the Vietnam War. In 1971, minors won the right to vote at 18, which enfranchised 25 million youths , and in 1975 the government suspended conscription (Zon, 1972, pp. 170, 174). But while these struggles for social justice expanded citizenship, it was often a precarious status, which could also be revoked. Citizens whom the state regarded as threats to public safety or to public health sometimes found that their rights could be rescinded and they could be reduced to denizens or subjects. Thousands of immigrant dissidents and socialists, who were seen as a threat to public safety during the “Red Scare” after World War I, had their status as denizens revoked and were deported to their countries of origin (Murray, 1955). Japanese American citizens and residents were arrested and incarcerated in concentration camps during World War II (Daniels, 1993). Citizenship was restored to citizens during the war, but after the war, many denizens were deported to Japan (Schaeffer, 2014, pp. 118–20). Other rights given to citizens – the right to serve in the military or in government – were revoked for gays and lesbians during and after World War I (Canaday, 2009). Women’s right to abortion was revoked in 2022. This has been a

20  Handbook of social justice in the Global South common feature in other republics – the rights of Jews were revoked in Germany in the 1930s, and the rights of gays and lesbians in Uganda in 2022. The rights of citizens were also precarious for people seen as threats to public health. People who contracted leprosy were deported to leper colonies, and victims or carriers of typhoid, like “Typhoid Mary” Mallon, were interned for 25 years without due process or legal recourse (Leavitt, 1996). The Supreme Court justified this in 1905 when it ruled that “the liberty secured by the Constitution of the United States to every person … does not impart an absolute right to each person to be, in all times and in all circumstances, wholly free from restraint. There are manifold restraints to which every person is necessarily subject for the common good” (Leavitt, 1996, p. 78). Native Americans experienced the most egregious and prolonged loss of rights in the republic (Barsh & Henderson, 1980). Before the Revolution, Native Americans were treated as “sovereign nations” that made treaties with European nations. But their sovereign rights were revoked by the new republic, and Native Americans were reduced first to denizens and then to subjects, which resulted in their large-scale dispossession and removal to internment on “reservations” in the early nineteenth century. Although they regained many of their rights as citizens a century later, they never recovered their rights as sovereign nations. Struggles for social justice expanded citizenship and the rights associated with it in the United States, as they did in other republics around the world. Movements in Latin America and the Caribbean abolished slavery in the nineteenth century, won suffrage for women in the early twentieth century, civil rights for minorities and Indigenous peoples and minors in the mid-twentieth century, and rights for LGBT people in the early twenty-first century. Today, a majority of people living in the United States and in republics around the world claim citizenship. But millions of people still remain as denizens and subjects. Immigrants and minors are still denizens, though they have some pathways to citizenship. Incarcerated people, which include those convicted of crimes and those who are awaiting trial but cannot make bail, and people with mental disabilities and communicable diseases like Ebola are still subjects. So, while struggles for social justice in the republics have expanded citizenship and provided greater equality, inequality persists.

2.5 ECONOMIC STRUGGLES FOR SOCIAL JUSTICE The political struggles for social justice in the republics were animated by struggles for economic justice, an end to the economic systems and practices that exploited, immiserated, and impoverished people in the colonies and in the republics. The demands for independence and self-determination were fueled by struggles against colonialism and the exploitation of subject peoples. Enslaved, indentured, and wage workers, farmers, entrepreneurs, and landlords were disadvantaged, in different ways, by burdensome taxes, disadvantageous terms of trade, and lack of investment in infrastructure, education, and healthcare. These economic issues animated their struggles for political rights, and these diverse economic groups fought separately and sometimes together for independence and states of their own. In many republics, political elites established dictatorships that monopolized political power but also harnessed the economic power of the state to enrich themselves at public expense. Struggles against “corrupt” economic practices became part of the struggle against the brutal

The republics and social justice  21 political practices of dictatorships. In the late 1980s, for example, dictators in Latin America and Eastern Europe borrowed heavily and then raised taxes and cut wages and public benefits to repay the burdensome debts that elites had incurred when interest rates rose (Walton, 1989). People organized “debt-crisis riots” to demand an end to disadvantageous “structural adjustment programs,” igniting political protests that demanded an end to corrupt regimes. People in the republics fought to claim the political rights denied to them by the few. They also understood that their social-political assignments – as citizens, denizens, and subjects – assigned them to separate and disadvantageous economic roles, so they fought for political rights as a way to obtain economic justice. Obtaining political rights was often a precondition for making economic gains. The struggle by Black Americans for “civil rights” was designed not only to obtain political rights but also to improve the economic condition of Black Americans in the South and the North. Women’s suffrage made it possible to elect leaders who were persuaded to adopt economic policies on social security, unemployment insurance, the right to organize, and collective bargaining, that promoted economic justice for women, men, and households (Griffith, 2022, pp. 59–95). Many of the contributions in this volume examine the economic struggles for social justice across the Global South.

2.6 MOVEMENTS FOR SOCIAL JUSTICE Social justice movements fought to establish republics, democratize the republics, and expand citizenship in the republics, first in the Global South and then around the world. Because their work is still unfinished, movements for social justice will continue their diverse struggles for change. In general, social change has been shaped by “aspiring,” “altruistic,” and “restrictionist” social movements. “Aspiring” movements organized denizen and subject populations who were denied equality and social justice in the republics. They organized enslaved people who sought to win their freedom, women and men who wanted suffrage, workers who wanted the right to organize and bargain collectively, and ethnic, religious, and sexual minorities who wanted equal protection under the law. Their riots, rebellions, strikes, protests, and electoral campaigns shaped change from “below.” Aspiring movements were often joined by “altruistic” movements “from above,” by citizens and denizens who allied with or fought on behalf of denizen and subject populations, who lacked the resources or legal right to act effectively on their own behalf. Male citizens and denizen women fought for the abolition of slavery on behalf of enslaved subjects, male citizens supported and voted for women’s suffrage, and citizens worked on behalf of incarcerated inmates and abused children: in 1874, the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals in New York filed the first complaint against child abuse, arguing that the laws designed to prevent the mistreatment of animals should be extended to include abused children. Although altruistic movements are sometimes faulted because their privilege may prevent them from appreciating the real needs of subordinate groups or because they may seek to advance their own self-interest, they have nonetheless played an important role in shaping social change. It is important to recognize that demands for social justice, in all its forms, have been shaped by “restrictionist” social movements that seek to restrict citizenship and preserve the

22  Handbook of social justice in the Global South privileges citizens enjoy for themselves, and deny citizenship and social justice to denizen and subject populations. They fought to preserve slavery and, after it ended, to re-subjugate African Americans and deny them constitutionally guaranteed civil rights. They fought unions and collective bargaining, denying workers the protections afforded to corporations. They opposed women’s suffrage and, after it passed, denied women equal protection under the law and refused to pass the Equal Rights Amendment and recently revoked women’s right to abortion. They fought against social security and measures to help the “undeserving” poor because they did not want to provide for the welfare of others, though they welcomed public subsidies for farmers and homeowners and “deserving” citizens like themselves. They fought to restrict immigration, though they were the heirs of immigrants. They organized the KKK and the Tea Party, fascist and authoritarian movements, conservative religious movements, and political parties to restrict citizenship, arguing that subordinate groups lacked the ability and capacity to act responsibly. Their collective efforts have limited, compromised, and blunted the efforts of aspiring and altruistic movements and delayed the realization of social justice. Moreover, aspiring movements have sometimes adopted restrictionist views once they obtained their goals. Revolutionary movements established dictatorships after they assumed power. Some of the labor unions that won the right to organize and bargain collectively then reserved these rights for white male workers and denied them to women and minorities. Youth won suffrage at 18 but did not then seek to extend it to their younger brothers and sisters. Although aspiring and altruistic movements for social justice have made considerable progress, restrictionist movements have fought tenaciously against change, which means that the battle for social justice is nowhere near finished and will continue, as the authors who contributed to this volume will demonstrate. They will provide accounts of the diverse, ongoing, and complex struggles for social justice across the Global South.

REFERENCES Barsh, R. L., & Henderson, J. Y. (1980). The road: Indian tribes and political liberty. University of California Press. Billias, G. A. (2009). American constitutionalism around the world, 1776–1989: A global perspective. New York University Press. Bushnell, D. (1987). The independence of Spanish South America. In L. Bethell (Ed.), The independence of Latin America. Cambridge University Press. Canaday, M. (2009). The straight state: Sexuality and citizenship in twentieth century America. Princeton University Press. Dahrendorf, R. (1990). Reflections on the revolution in Europe. Times Books. Daniels, R. (1993). Prisoners without trial: Japanese Americans during World War II. Hill and Wang. Griffith, E. (2022). Formidable: American women and the fight for equality, 1920–2020. Pegasus Books. Hamilton, A., Madison, J., & Jay, J. (1937). The federalist: A commentary on the constitution of the United States. Tudor. Johnson, D. M., & Campbell, R. R. (1981). Black migration in America: A social demographic history. Duke University Press. Karst, K. (1989). Belonging to America: Equal citizenship and the constitution. Yale University Press. Kay, H. (1970). Salazar and modern Portugal. Hawthorn Press. Kerber, L. (1998). No constitutional right to be ladies: Women and the obligations of citizenship. Hill and Wang.

The republics and social justice  23 Keyssar, A. (2009). The right to vote: The contested history of democracy in the United States. Basic Books. Leavitt, J. W. (1996). Typhoid Mary: Captive to the public's health. Beacon. McGuire, J. W. (1995). Interim government and democratic consolidation: Argentina in comparative perspective. In Y. Shaim & J. Linz (Eds.), Between states: Interim governments and democratic transitions. Cambridge University Press. Murray, R. K. (1955). Red scare: A study in national hysteria, 1919–20. University of Minnesota Press. Noueihed, L., & Warren, A. (2012). The battle for the Arab Spring: Revolution, counter-revolution, and the making of a new era. Yale University Press. Ott, T. O. (1973). The Haitian revolution, 1789–1804. University of Tennessee Press. Russell, R. B. (1958). A history of the United Nations Charter: The role of the United States, 1940–45. Brookings Institution. Schaeffer, R. K. (1990). Warpaths: The politics of partition. Hill and Wang. Schaeffer, R. K. (1997). Power to the people: Democratization around the world. Westview. Schaeffer, R. K. (1999a). Severed states: Dilemmas of democracy in a divided world. Paradigm. Schaeffer, R. K. (1999b). Democratization and division in Czechoslovakia: Economic and ethnic politics. In K. Cordell (Ed.), Ethnicity and democratisation in the New Europe. Routledge. Schaeffer, R. K. (2000). Democratization, division and war in Yugoslavia: A comparative perspective. In M. Spencer (Ed.), The lessons of Yugoslavia. Research on Russia and Eastern Europe (Vol. 3). Elsevier. Schaeffer, R. K. (2014). Social movements and global social change: The rising tide. Rowman and Littlefield. Schaeffer, R. K. (2022). After globalization: Crisis and disintegration. Routledge. Tulchin, J. S. (1990). Argentina and the United States: A conflicted relationship. Twayne. Waddell, D. A. G. (1987). International politics and Latin American independence. In L. Bethell (Ed.), The independence of Latin America. Cambridge University Press. Wallerstein, I. (2011). The modern world-system IV: Centrist liberalism triumphant, 1789–1914. University of California Press. Walton, J. (1989). Debt, protest and the state in Latin America. In S. Eckstein (Ed.), Power and popular protest: Latin American social movements. University of California Press. Zon, M. G. (1972). The youth vote. In G. S. McClellan (Ed.), American youth in a changing culture. H. W. Wilson.

3. Everyday forms of resistance among olivegrowing and shepherding communities in Palestine Juman Simaan

3.1 INTRODUCTION Marwan1 and his family have been working the land and keeping sheep and goats for generations, like most of their fellow villagers living in the southern hills of Palestine. Since the ethnic cleansing of 1948, and more recently the military occupation of 1967 and the segregation of the 1990s and expansion of Israel’s colonies, their way of life has changed. However, Marwan’s family and other shepherds and farmers have persisted in living on their land and working it, and maintained their way of life. The daily activities relating to tending their land, trees, and animals have continued as a result of using resistive values they inherited from their ancestors, which they used to ensure their daily lifestyle could be preserved and, in some cases, flourish. Farmers and shepherds are considered the guardians of the land in Palestine (Hinytī, 2018); they have been resisting Israeli settler-colonialism, military occupation, and apartheid by going about their daily lives and employing creative means to allow them to continue performing their activities despite land confiscations, illegal colonies’ expansion on their land, the building of the separation wall, the imposition of fences, gates, checkpoints, and the violence against people, trees, and animals practised by Israel’s military and settler-colonialists (Simaan, 2017). Palestinians who work their land for their livelihood frame their daily occupations as acts of resistance. Their forms of daily resistance can provide alternatives to western concepts and practices related to social and occupational justice. This may be shared and exchanged with other Global South communities as a means to achieve daily justice and to expand “ecologies of knowledge” and praxis that transform people’s lives and circumstances and their communities (Santos, 2014). This chapter tells the stories of Marwan’s family and others, and their daily forms of resistance based on their communal way of life and values, which will be compared to other Global North and Global South knowledge and practices that contribute to social justice and the liberation of daily lives and communities. The chapter highlights three values: Sutra [protectiondignity], ‘Awna [cooperation-solidarity], and Sumud [steadfastness-resistance], upon which olive growers and shepherds base their resistive actions, and demonstrates these values in ethnographic materials gathered by the author. I will begin with an introduction to the constructs of daily activity (occupation) and the epistemologies of the South, which will frame the discussion that follows. Following the introduction, Palestine’s geopolitical context will be discussed, after which the study and its methodology on which this chapter is based, will be introduced, followed by its findings. The 24

Everyday forms of resistance  25 discussion section will come next, in which the findings of the study will be linked to relevant Global South concepts and practices, followed by a conclusion that will include the implications of this study for the praxis of social and occupational justice.

3.2 DAILY ACTIVITY In occupational science and occupational therapy, the concept of “occupation” refers to purposeful and meaningful daily activity,2 such as farming or shepherding. Daily occupations have been shown to maintain humans’ health, well-being, and quality of life (Wilcock & Hocking, 2015). Evidence to support this claim came from literature that lacked consideration of contextual conditions humans face that may limit their participation in everyday activities, such as environmental societal factors (Simaan, 2021). Eurocentric literature regarding daily occupations is also in need of more diverse Global South perspectives. The theory and models of practice relating to meaningful daily action take for granted western values, such as the value of individuals’ independence, and the prioritising of employment and generating income as key daily actions in which humans take part (Simaan, 2020). Moreover, theory relating to daily activities does not consider historical and global factors (e.g., colonisation, wars, natural disasters) in relation to what people do, how they do it, and why they do it (Simaan, 2021). These shortfalls were partly addressed by scholars who advocated for the social justice of individuals who were limited in their daily lives and activities as a result of living in situations of marginalisation due to socio-economic and political factors, and the built and natural environments where people live (Wilcock & Townsend, 2000). For example, prisoners and people seeking refuge were shown to experience occupational deprivation (referring to the deprivation of meaningful daily activity) due to reasons outside their control, such as the justice system or the host country’s immigration policy, which limit their access to employment or education (Whiteford, 2000). Occupational deprivation is a type of “occupational injustice” that affects people’s health and quality of life. Scholars viewed “occupational justice” as a type of social justice related to meaningful daily actions aiming to provide equitable opportunities for all to take part in what they need or wish to do (Wilcock & Townsend, 2000). Comparable to the critique of social justice, the term and practice of “occupational justice” have been questioned. Critics questioned the universalism assumed by the suggestion that everyone needs this generalised idea of occupational justice; the task of seeking people’s occupational justice within a global system of capitalism, racism, patriarchy, and colonialism will be impossible without eliminating these forces which dominate the daily lives of people in the Global South and North (Guajardo Córdoba, 2020).

3.3 THE EPISTEMOLOGIES OF THE SOUTH To decolonise the study of occupational and social justice, scholars should not only draw from “the work of non-western, colonized writers and intellectuals”, but more importantly, scholars should “reach beyond the academy to valorise the knowledges of the colonized – ways of thinking that colonizers tried to supress or destroy” (Alonso Bejarano et al., 2019, p. 21). Santos (2014, p. 15) described the “epistemologies of the South”, which emerged as a movement of thought and praxis from marginal communities’ resistance to injustices imposed on

26  Handbook of social justice in the Global South them by forces such as capitalism, colonialism, and patriarchy. These groups’ way of life and value systems offer alternative philosophies about the origins of knowledge created by the dominant western-centric ways of knowing in the world. Epistemologies of the South act at all levels of experience: the ethical, political, cultural, epistemological, and ontological (Santos, 2014). Epistemologies of the South originate from within colonised indigenous groups, minorities, peasants, women, and other social movements who are resisting a form of what Santos termed “epistemicide”, which he described as the destruction of means of interpreting human realities that did not suit “the dominant epistemological canon” (Santos, 2014, p. 238). The epistemologies of the South perspective assumes that there are “plural systems of knowledge” founded on a diversity of ways of explaining the world, including the hegemonic positivist scientific method (Santos, 2014, p. 199). This diverse collection of means of knowing is based on the belief that no one method of evaluating human experience in the world is complete, and that there is a need to create new hybrids of ways to make sense of the world. Positivist, neopositivist, and critical paradigms – based on western epistemologies – cannot fully explain the world, as “the understanding of the world by far exceeds the western understanding of the world” (Santos, 2014, p. 237). Some of those ways of knowing and doing that originate from Global South communities are relevant here, as they are comparable to the themes this chapter highlights from the daily lives of olive farmers and shepherds in Palestine. These knowledges include constructs such as Ubuntu, Pluriversality, Living Well, and Mutual Aid – all of which are concepts originating from the daily lives of people in the Global South and are paramount to achieving social and occupational justice for communities everywhere, as will be discussed in this chapter.

3.4 DECOLONIAL ETHNOGRAPHY As a Palestinian academic living in the United Kingdom, I wished to study the everyday lives of Palestinian communities, how they see daily activity, and what factors may influence the doing of this activity within the context of the military occupation of Palestinian land, the illegal colonies, and the apartheid imposed on people (Simaan, 2017, 2018). I wanted to contribute a Global South perspective to make the theory and practice concerning daily activities more inclusive to other worldviews and practices from outside the west, or in particular the anglophone world where most scholarship on this subject originated (Magalhães et al., 2018). The decolonial ethnographic study this chapter is based on has been ongoing since 2013 (Simaan, 2017, 2018). I have been conducting field visits to four main participant families who rely on working the land and looking after their animals for their livelihood, and have participated in their daily activities, observed, and learnt how and why they do them. I have conducted 13 semi-structured interviews with family members who grow olives and look after animals in the southern hills of Palestine. Information from the interviews and my observations were thematically analysed and shared with the participants to check for accuracy and to clarify my conceptual understanding of the themes that arose. Participants were central in co-developing these concepts that they use in their daily lives but might not have thought of them in relation to social and occupational justice. They helped me see them as ways of knowing and doing that can be translated and communicated to scholars and communities around the globe who are facing similar social and occupational injustice issues.

Everyday forms of resistance  27 Prior to introducing the findings of the study, it will be useful to touch briefly on the historical and socio-political factors that have interacted with the daily lives of olive farmers and shepherds, and to which they responded in their own ways of knowing and doing that enabled their daily lives and well-being to persevere.

3.5 PALESTINE’S GEOPOLITICAL CONTEXT Zionist settler-colonialism in Palestine began in the late nineteenth century when European Jewish communities started establishing colonies in the hope of founding an exclusive nation state for European Jews in a land already inhabited by Indigenous Palestinian communities of the Muslim, Christian, and Jewish faiths (Khalidi, 2020; Wolfe, 2006). This process accelerated during the British Mandate period after World War I and peaked in the late 1940s, culminating in the ethnic cleansing of more than 500 villages and the displacement of most of the Palestinian population in 1948 when the state of Israel was established (Khalidi, 2020). This process of ethnic displacement, termed Nakba (catastrophe) by Palestinians, continues to this day after the state of Israel consolidated its control over the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, and East Jerusalem in 1967 (Khalidi, 2020). Today, Israel controls the whole area between the Mediterranean Sea and the River Jordan, and has been enforcing what scholars and human rights organisations describe as an apartheid regime, a military occupation, and a siege over Palestinian communities (Al-Haq, 2020; B’tselem, 2021; Human Rights Watch, 2021). In practice, this regime means enforcing laws that legalise Jewish supremacy, discrimination against Palestinian citizens of Israel, restrictions on movement, land confiscation, and violence against Palestinians in the West Bank, and an almost total closure of the Gaza Strip from land, sea, and air (Adalah, 2011, 2020). These structural injustices affect every aspect of Palestinian lives; from the ability to travel, to the ability to work or live safely in one’s community. For example, since the 1990s, native communities of the West Bank saw hundreds of exclusive Jewish colonies, hundreds of checkpoints, the separation wall, and the zoning of areas encroaching on their villages, towns, and lands; these structures, amounting to war crimes under international law, aim to impose restrictions on working the land, access to land, and construction on land (International Committee of the Red Cross, 1949; The International Court of Justice, 2004; UNHRC, 2013). On October 7 2023, armed fighters from the Gaza Strip attempted to free territories occupied by Israel in 1948. Over a thousand armed and non-armed Israelis were killed and hundreds were taken hostage. Israel responded with an intense bombardment and the invasion of the Strip, which, as of December 2024, caused the death of more than 44 thousand, and displaced 1.9 million, Palestinian people, most of whom are civilians (OCHA, 2024). In July 2024, the Lancet reported that more than 8% of Gazans have lost their lives, and around 38% of the strip’s buildings have been destroyed and these, the report claims, are conservative estimates (Khatib et al., 2024). Additionally, since October 2023 and while the world focused its attention on the war on Gaza, 18 communities of shepherds have been forcibly displaced in the West Bank (B’Tselm, 2024). These oppressive structures and practices are clear examples of extreme social, political, and occupational injustices that aim to limit the daily lives of all Palestinians, including olive growers and shepherds, from whom I have been interested to learn how they see this situation

28  Handbook of social justice in the Global South affect their daily lives, and how they respond to it in a way that allows them to continue their way of life.

3.6 THE STUDY OF OLIVE GROWING AND SHEPHERDING AS DAILY ACTIVITIES Olive growing is a key daily activity for hundreds of thousands of families in Palestine (Oxfam, 2010; UNOCHAoPt, 2012). There are estimated to be 10 to 12 million olive trees in Palestine, providing food and income to those families (Oxfam, 2010). Olive cultivation carries socio-political and spiritual meanings rooted in a heritage that began in the Bronze Age. There is evidence that olives were first cultivated in this region of western Asia as part of a “Mediterranean economy”: this included terracing the hills to preserve rainwater and fertile soil, and producing olive oil in stone presses – practices that continue to this day (Thompson, 2000). Shepherding is another common way of life in Palestine, especially in the eastern parts of the occupied West Bank, where communities have been relying on livestock to generate their income and support their food sustenance for thousands of years (Hinytī, 2018). The identity of Palestinian shepherds is shaped by their daily activities, and it includes special social ties between shepherds to overcome Israel’s military occupation policies. Such a lifestyle fosters a sense of belonging to the land. The shepherd’s way of life has deep social, economic, and political implications. Most importantly, shepherds’ daily activities lead to a form of wellbeing, which is termed locally Rahet El bal. Farmers and shepherds are considered protectors of land in Palestine due to their lifestyle and dependence on the land for their livelihood. Israel often justifies the confiscation of land based on an old Ottoman law that allows the authorities to claim land that is deemed unworked for three years (Hinytī, 2018). Cultivating the land and finding grazing areas may prevent this, but Israeli authorities find other means to confiscate land or prevent locals from accessing land, such as closing off areas as firing zones or closed military zones (Hinytī, 2018). Olive farmers and shepherds adopt an “organic lifestyle of daily resistance” (Soliman, 2019) through collective acts that help them maintain their well-being, land, trees, animals, and way of life. Examples of such acts include finding alternative routes when access is restricted to their groves or grazing areas and replanting olive orchards after they have been uprooted by settlers or the authorities. These acts are rooted in communal values about daily living, community, and the environment. Olive growing and shepherding as ways of life and values, which will be discussed in the next section, are an example of an epistemological basis that can move the conceptualisation of social and occupational justice towards a more inclusive knowledge production and praxis to reflect a pluriversal world (Simaan, 2020). In other words, indigenous Palestinians and their land, subjected to the trauma of settler-colonialism, transform their daily occupations into acts of resistance, which, if used to provide alternatives to western concepts and practices related to social and occupational justice, have the potential to be shared and exchanged with other Global South countries as a means to achieve daily justice and to expand what Santos (2014) called “ecologies of knowledges” and praxis that transform people’s lives and circumstances and their communities.

Everyday forms of resistance  29

3.7 EVERYDAY FORMS OF RESISTANCE The stories of daily resistance by farmers and shepherds that I encountered are familiar to Marwan and his family. His grandfather sold a parcel of land to acquire a gun to join the fallahi (small-scale farmers, or peasants) rebellion of 1936 against British colonisation and Zionist plans to settle on indigenous Palestinian land. After the Nakba of 1948, Marwan’s grandfather returned to his village and maintained the semi-nomadic lifestyle of tending his herd in the hills during the spring and summer months and moving to the eastern and southern deserts during the winter. The family tended their groves of almonds, grapes, and olives, and the vegetable patches closer to their homes. The family sold their produce in Bethlehem and Al Quds (Jerusalem) markets. The 1990s Oslo accords that segregated the land and enforced checkpoints and restrictions on the movement of people had changed that lifestyle. An expansion of illegal colonies on Palestinian land and the building of a separation wall led to the confiscation of more land and to the separation of communities from each other and from their grazing and planting fields. What this meant for Marwan’s family is that their daily lives were restricted, and they had to adapt to grazing in nearby areas and to selling their produce to more local markets. They also had to supplement their income by working in other jobs. For example, after graduating from university in the early 2000s, Marwan sold watermelons to Palestinian workers queuing to cross the checkpoint between Al Quds and Bethlehem, which was placed to divide the two cities. The family is still dependent mainly on working the land and tending their animals for their own sustenance. In the local language, what this means is that they “are mastoreen” - the present-tense verb of the noun Sutra, which means protected and dignified (online interview, 30th June 2022). Sutra (protection) is the means through which people persevere in an activity to continue to provide for their physical and emotional needs. Actions motivated by Sutra provide income, shelter, food, and other basic needs including dignity and respect for the individuals and families. Abu Nedal, one of the olive farmers whom I befriended, once told me that “if you have an olive and a fig tree you are considered rich” (interview, 14th October 2014 in Bethlehem, Palestine), meaning that the labour you invest in your land will enable you to live in dignity and gain respect from the community. During an online interview in June 2022, and referring to Sutra, Marwan quoted a proverb: “the day you eat out of your own digging, your thoughts become yours”. This means that if you use your own labour for your subsistence, you do not need to rely on the charity of others, so you have an independent mind and action: you are self-determined. This self-determination ensures self-sufficiency, and socio-political protection, and in that way, Sutra is more than just doing activity to provide physical sustenance to which the western concept of “doing” or self-sufficiency might refer. ‘Awna is another traditional value I was told about and observed during my fieldwork. ‘Awna – originating from the verb in Arabic that means “to cooperate” – is the collaborative means through which olive growers and shepherds forge relationships with other humans in their families, villages, nation, and with global partners, as well as with the more-thanhumans (Abram, 1996) such as their animals, land, and trees. Palestinians have relied traditionally on a communal way of life to sustain their health, well-being, and their communities. The extended family and hamoula (clan) and village come first, then the local and national community come next in the order of relationships. Those communities also included mutuality with the more-than-humans. After the 1967 occupation, and specifically after the second intifada (uprising) of 2000, international solidarity and collaboration was introduced as a tool

30  Handbook of social justice in the Global South for daily resistance. Activists and volunteers joined farmers and shepherds from all over the world to express solidarity and be a protective presence on the land. About this concept and practice of ‘Awna, Marwan said: “when I finish my work it would be shameful if I go home without helping my neighbour finish his own work. This is esnaad (support). It means acting with your community members not because of charity but for mutuality. ‘Awna is a societal tradition meaning people are standing together in good and bad times” (online interview, 30th June 2022). Nedal, another participant in this study, told me that olive growing through the practice of ‘Awna “roots me in the land”. He continued: “there’s a relationship between us. If someone came and said for example, I want to plant a pine tree, I don’t have anything to do with pine” (interview, 21st February 2015 in Bethlehem, Palestine). The olive trees, compared to non-native trees such as the pine, are resilient species that live for hundreds if not thousands of years with little watering and maintenance. Unlike non-native pines that have been planted by European colonialists, olives attract wildlife and produce subsistence and meaning to communities. This relationship to land, trees, and local communities has recently expanded to include international groups and activists. Damir, another participant in this study, explained: “We felt we’re not alone. Solidarity with the Palestinian people is widening; these people go and tell [about Palestine] in a positive way, not the stereotypical picture I see in the news about Palestinians. I tell them about what happened to us. They experience Palestinian hospitality and give a different picture of our situation to the outside world”. (Interview, 11th February 2015 in Bethlehem, Palestine). ‘Awna was helpful to international activists I met. For example, Leah, a member of All That Left (ATL),3 a Jewish anti-(military) occupation group whom I met while working on an olive grove belonging to a farmer in the southern hills of Al Khalil (Hebron). She told me that learning about the practice of ‘Awna was “a helpful model to think about how communities living outside of the frame of nation-states think of their relationship to land as opposed to the settler-colonial model of control and exclusivism” (from a conversation held online, 16th November 2022). During that same online meeting, another activist saw his work with ATL as “a real communal support. It is radical care and resistance against the imperialism of the country I came from”. He was referring to the United States where he normally lives. Sumud – from the verb meaning to withstand – was the third concept I learnt about. Sumud, for farmers and shepherds, motivates actions that help them resist, persist, and persevere to counter social and political injustices. It allows them to hold onto their land, animals, trees, and their way of life despite the structural barriers they face when going about their daily lives. Sumud motivates actions such as reclaiming confiscated land, replanting uprooted groves, grazing animals in firing zones imposed on communal grazing fields, and using caves to shelter and store harvests and equipment – all of which I have observed in my yearly visits to the area since 2013. Marwan sees the Sumud of people in their land and their attachment to it “as a cornerstone” for them. He considers Sumud “a tool to resist the military occupation”. He said: “I work on my land no matter if it produces profit or loss. I maintain this sense of belonging because it came from my heritage. My land is my honour. I need to sacrifice for its sake” (online interview, 30th June 2022). His own way of sacrifice is his activism in the hills south of Al Khalil where people have been fighting their expulsion. He and a group of youths dig wells, build paths, and rehabilitate caves for shepherds and farmers despite the area being declared a “closed military zone”, risking arrest and violence from the army and settlers.

Everyday forms of resistance  31 Marwan, like many of the local people I met, acknowledged that the value and practice of Sumud is threatened not only by the military occupation but also by neoliberal values of consumerism. He said: The famer is placed between two fires: one is the attachment to the land and tradition and ways of life, and the other is the new mainstream that you must go to Israel to work or have a profession to bring back money and build your future. What we need is to maintain the organic Sumud. This kind of Sumud should also be outside of the official context. For example, in Msafer Yatta [the areas to the south of Al Khalil threatened with expulsion] you can’t reinforce the Sumud of the people there in the frame of Oslo. I will never be able to construct a path that leads to a specific hamlet because the Israelis will never let this happen under Oslo [referring to full control of land in this area by Israel and the rule banning new constructions granted under the Oslo agreements], but if you leave the fallah, he will grow on the land like the tree grows. He will reach his land no matter what. Because he was raised this way. You shouldn’t try and change the circumstance around him that will weaken his Sumud (online interview, 30th June 2022).

For Marwan, this organic Sumud grows from the depth of his belonging to the land, as opposed to the Sumud that might be performed by some as “poster farmers” for aid organisations who help with the supply of some animal feed or other material goods, which makes the shepherd or the farmer reliant on external sources to maintain their ways of life.

3.8 A TRIANGLE OF DAILY RESISTANCE For olive growers, shepherds, and their allies, Sutra, ‘Awna, and Sumud work together in a symbiotic relationship. They are interrelated motivators and guides to everyday activities of tending the land and animals. Abu Nedal recapped to me his understanding of those concepts: The word Sutra comes from the same root as the word used to mean a protector. Allah [God] is the protector. It also means dignity: if you grow olives you live in honour and dignity, and there is no need for you to rely on anyone. As the saying I told you about in the past goes, whoever has a fig and an olive tree is rich. I also told you about how my father used to take a bag of figs, olive oil and bread – all made of produce from his land – to the orchard, and that was all he needed to eat during the day. Another meaning for Sutra, which we acquired because of colonialism, is that growing olive trees protects the land from being stolen. Also, it gives you an identity and self-confidence: people respect the one who is mastour [the adjective form of Sutra], and whoever has olive trees approaches people with a raised head and pride. ‘Awna is one of the most important moral values we associate with olive farming. ‘Awna means unity, solidarity, empathy. You are with me in good and in bad times. We collaborate and exchange expertise, we help each other and share our skills and tools for work, and all of that without exchange of pay. People need each other, and ‘Awna for me is a moral behaviour, a value and a cultural heritage passed from previous generations. We have less of ‘Awna today for many reasons, the most important of which is that Israel has destroyed the farming sector. As for ‘Awna as a universal concept, and its relationship to solidarity, I can give an example of university students from Italy who visited us. They advocate for you, support you, empathise with you, so solidarity is wider than ‘Awna. ‘Awna needs solidarity, it is part of it. When people come to support you, they don’t only make a physical effort, but they also express their moral support for the farmers. Even some Israelis are in solidarity with us, they translate this into action in the different forms of solidarity, and one of them is ‘Awna or volunteering to work with us. ‘Awna is based on humane and ethical principles, and on respecting human rights. Sumud is about if I don’t have an olive tree, I don’t have a living. Sumud in life is steadfastness against the military occupation (interview, 27th March 2016 in Bethlehem, Palestine).

32  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Sutra-‘Awna-Sumud are a collection of resistive values and practices Abu Nedal employs to maintain his community’s social and political rights. Marwan described the relationship between them as a “triangle”: Sutra is a concept that fits well with people who live under the military occupation. The issue here is not how rich I am, but how much I need. All of us under the occupation are seeking our Sutra; there is no need to drive a car that is worth 100,000 shekels. This seeking of consumerism and wealth will change the pattern of ‘Awna and Sumud if your understanding of Sutra is changed. You live under the occupation you need to seek al taqashuf [living on the essentials] because if you drowned in consumerism, you will not have Sumud, there will not be resilience, your life becomes individualistic and the ‘Awna disappears. They work together; they are a triangle of resistance (online interview, 30th June 2022).

Source: Author.

Figure 3.1  Triangle of Everyday Forms of Resistance – ways of doing and knowing

Everyday forms of resistance  33 We may separate Sutra-‘Awna-Sumud for intellectual purposes, but in the real world, farmers mix and choose what they need to focus on from each of those values in order to achieve the task at hand. Land workers engage in daily activities for their families’ sustenance and wellbeing through picking olives and making oil and dairy products (Sutra), by cooperating with other family members and locals and internationals (‘Awna), who also support their engagement in resistive acts such as reclaiming land or going to the courts to challenge the “occupational injustice” practised against them, and to enable their and their community’s becoming and self-determination (Sumud). Abu Nedal, Marwan, and others have not only taught me how they perform the activities of olive growing and shepherding in the context of Israel’s settler-colonialism, but they also instructed me as to why they do it from a moral-ethical perspective. They also shed light on the more abstract meanings of these daily activities, through expressing a unique way of seeing and experiencing their world and reality, which in academic terms is called ontology. Moreover, they showed me a special way of knowing and theorising, which is often termed epistemology in intellectual circles, and depicted in Figure 3.1.​

3.9 DISCUSSION In this section, I will make links between Everyday Forms of Resistance and other forms of doing and knowing employed by other Global South communities to point to possible implications for their use in social science disciplines and among communities of praxis concerned with marginalised human groups living under adverse conditions caused by neo-liberal capitalism, colonialism, patriarchy, racism, and other contextual factors such as the human-made climate crisis.

3.10 EVERYDAY FORMS OF RESISTANCE AS AN ONTOLOGICAL AND EPISTEMOLOGICAL STANCE Sutra-‘Awna-Sumud are collectively termed Everyday Forms of Resistance – a term credited to J. C. Scott (1985). Everyday Forms of Resistance pose a challenge to knowledge founded on a conception of different identities for humans as individuals with separate agencies (separated from the environment and context they live in), which was conceived within an epistemology of imperialism (Said, 2000) that led scholars to ignore the risk of “epistemicide” of communal ways of knowing practised by Global South peoples (Santos, 2014). In contrast to such an “othering” interpretation of everyday realities by eurocentric scholarship, Palestinian land workers saw their realities as interconnected with their context. They conceived their families, land, trees, and animals, and local and global communities, not as binary features that can be separated, controlled, and quantified but instead as interlinked and in constant interaction with all those elements of their environment. This mutual connectedness led to their collective well-being and to their becoming (and dreams of becoming) more self-fulfilling and self-ruling.

34  Handbook of social justice in the Global South This way of interpreting their world included collective meanings they expressed through their daily lives and interconnectedness between the purposes they aimed to express in all spheres of their subjective experiences. Land workers wished to engage in tending the land and animals for physical, emotional, social, cultural, spiritual, and political roles. These levels of meaning were not isolated when they spoke about or engaged in actions related to farming or shepherding. They farmed olives and cared for their animals for multiple purposes and did not isolate those when engaging in the doing of olive growing; they interpreted the need to do activities relating to olive growing and shepherding as combining self- and community-care goals, as well as for recreational and productive aims. Everyday Forms of Resistance also demonstrated an epistemological position and were enacted through land workers’ daily occupations as ways of knowing and producing new knowledge. They were means that led to the development of new forms of relationships, knowledge, and skills which empowered them to maintain their and their communities’ well-being. Land-based workers enact Sutra-‘Awna-Sumud as a consciousness that enabled a helpful interpretation of their circumstances and contributed to the development of useful knowledge and skills: they learnt about their history and heritage, their natural environment, and their local and global contexts in order to orchestrate and harmonise all these elements for the benefit of individuals and communities, including the natural environment. This unique collective consciousness led them to be alert to the “occupational injustice” they experienced; and at the same time, they adopted these principles as means of doing (or intervening in the world), being (in the world), and knowing (about the world) to problem-solve and to challenge restrictions imposed on them, on their everyday activities, and on the expression of their unique means of knowing and believing (values).

3.11 PLURIVERSALITY In Decolonising methodology: Research and Indigenous peoples, Linda Tuhiwai Smith wrote: “Knowledge and the power to define what counts as real knowledge lie at the epistemic core of colonialism. The challenge […] is to simultaneously work with colonial and Indigenous concepts of knowledge, decentring one while centring the other” (Smith, 2022, p. xii). I foregrounded Everyday Forms of Resistance and compared it with other Global South concepts discussed in the literature that have been highlighted in other Indigenous contexts, such as Ubuntu – a communal practice employed by southern African peoples that was useful in combating colonisation and apartheid (Ramugondo & Kronenberg, 2015). This translation also highlighted that the western way is not the only universal truth and that there are many knowledges that necessitate highlighting in order to change the belief in this idea of universality that has been inflicted on us, Global South communities and scholars, as a result of hundreds of years of coloniality. Walter Mingolo borrowed the term “Pluriversal” from the “Zapatistas’ decolonial political vision of a world in which many worlds would coexist” (2018, ix). Ramón Grosfogul explained: A decolonial epistemic perspective requires a broader canon of thought than simply the western canon (including the left western canon) […] a truly universal decolonial perspective cannot be based on an abstract universal (one particular that raises itself as universal global design), but would

Everyday forms of resistance  35 have to be the result of the critical dialogue between diverse critical epistemic/ethical/political projects towards a pluriversal as oppose to a universal world […] decolonization of knowledge would require to take seriously the epistemic perspective/cosmologies/insights of critical thinkers from the Global South thinking from and with subalternized racial/ethnic/sexual spaces and bodies. (2011)

Mingolo and Grosfogul addressed the need to rearticulate universal categories of knowledge that were taken for granted as applicable to all humans. Smith (2022) questioned the binary of “human” versus “non-human”, or “nature”, which is a category created during the European Renaissance period; she linked the creation of the notion of “human” to the core of the colonial powers who separated humans from nature, which led to forms of exploitation, extraction, and oppressions imposed on those colonised Others who were described as less human and on natural resources, animals, lands, and plants – all of which were considered inferior to the Human race (in its European Christian conceptualisation) and therefore exploitable. What interest us here are categories created by western scholars that relate to people’s daily actions, such as occupational and social justice. Everyday Forms of Resistance as a consciousness are a tool to combat social and occupational injustices. This resistance is rooted in a way of understanding the world that is historical and contextual; it is a way of knowing that aims to resist systems of oppression, including universalistic ideas about the everyday life of colonised communities. It is a system of knowledge that does not separate people and their natural environments. Scholars and activists concerned with people’s daily actions as resistance to systemic injustices might wish to consider this and other articulations from the Global South if they truly wish to decolonise the constructs, theories, and models of practice on which they have been basing their work.

3.12 LIVING WELL One approach that can be adopted to achieve inclusive scholarship and practice that has been discussed in this chapter is “occupational justice”, which originated from a well-meaning but specific view of the world from a Global North perspective assumed to be universal. “Occupational justice” was described as a type of social justice related to meaningful everyday activity. The notion of social justice was highlighted in nineteenth-century Europe by Catholic priests who, as Smith (2022) noted, had a specific view of what the world they imposed on colonised communities through their education was supposed to be like: Christian Europeans were on a mission to “civilise” or make colonised communities more human through their missionary work and schools. In the 1970s, John Rawls – a scholar from the US liberal tradition – articulated a theory of justice within a view of the world founded on white patriarchal capitalist liberal ontology (Smith, 2022). Guajardo Córdoba (2020) pointed out that this idea of social justice, which was later adopted as “occupational justice” by occupational therapists and scientists, is a legacy of colonialism and does not apply well to communities resisting injustice because it doesn’t consider the abolishing of systems of oppression and the repatriation of land and resources. As an alternative to this view of the world, Santos (2014, pp. 2–6) published a Manifesto for Good Living, or Buen Vivir – a concept borrowed from the Quenchua Indigenous community’s conception of social emancipation. This document was created in the World Social Forum – a gathering of the world’s Indigenous, peasants, workers, and other Global South

36  Handbook of social justice in the Global South communities. They stated that they agreed on this manifesto “to care for those of us who lag behind and bring them back into the fight and to identify whoever keeps betraying us at the back and help us find out why”; they declared who they are: “We are the global South, that large set of creations and creatures that has been sacrificed to the infinite voracity of capitalism, colonialism, patriarchy and all their satellite-oppressions […].” The manifesto continues: “We are widely diverse human beings united by the idea that the understanding of the world is much larger than the western understanding of the world.” Another thing they all have in common is that “all have to fight against many obstacles in order to live with dignity”. This notion of Living Well is not founded on binaries between good and evil, human and non-human, or lord and master, or those who give and those who are receivers of aid. Living Well as illustrated in the lives of olive farmers and other Indigenous communities is founded on a morality of solidarity, as Abu Nedal told me. Or, in other words, Living Well is founded on the practice of Mutual Aid.

3.13 MUTUAL AID Mutual aid is based on ethical values and “principles of relationships, connections, reciprocity and accountability [which] are embedded in Indigenous understanding of ethics and knowledge and […] are foundational to decolonising theory and praxis” (Smith, 2022, p. xiii). Dean Spade (2020) described Mutual Aid in the context of the response to the COVID19 epidemic and the poor global and governmental responses to it, which led to huge gaps between how the Global North and Global South were treated. Dean described projects around the world in which people got together to enable the meeting of their basic needs, such bringing food to those who couldn’t leave their houses. Dean based his idea of Mutual Aid on the early-twentieth-century work of Russian anarchist geographer, Peter Kropotkin, in which he detailed his observations of the human and non-human nature of cooperation. Kropotkin argued that the belief in a competitive and destructive human nature (since Darwin and Freud) does not hold much truth when animals and people are observed everywhere to naturally cooperate. This led Kropotkin to theorise that people are born good, they are born to mutually aid each other, and that this is more prominent than our urge to be bad and competitive over food and other resources. As a practice founded on this view of humans and the relationships between them and their interconnected world, “Mutual aid is collective coordination to meet each other’s needs, usually from an awareness that the systems we have in place are not going to meet them […] those on the front line of a crisis have the best wisdom to solve problems, and that collective action is the way forward” (Spade, 2020, pp. 7, 13). In the context of injustices, Spade’s and other anarchists’ view of the world is based on the following argument: All the aspects of our lives – where we live and work, eat, entertain ourselves, get around, and get by are sites of injustice and potential resistance […] Activism and mutual aid shouldn’t feel like volunteering or like a hobby – it should feel like living in alignment with our hopes for the world and with our passion. (Spade, 2020, p. 27)

This view of reality, Spade continues, leads to “retaking control of our ways of sustaining life…” (2020, p. 32). An assessment of reality founded on the belief in Mutual Aid “directly

Everyday forms of resistance  37 confronts unjust systems and offer[s] alternatives” (2020, p. 35); it is a world “where we meet core human needs through systems that are based on principles of collective self-determination rather than coercion”, which most state institutions, NGOs, and aid organisations are built upon (2020, p. 39). Mutual Aid not only meets needs, it also raises awareness of injustice and leads to its resistance, or mobilises against it (Spade, 2020). Olive growers, shepherds, and their allies view their world as one that exists outside the state and globalised capitalist system – a system in which the Israeli colonising authorities are entrenched. Land workers’ view of reality is based on the instinct to mutually aid each other and on abolishing the binary between givers of aid and those who passively receive it – a view connected to the practicalities of decolonisation, which in this chapter not only refers to an abstract idea, or to merely adding research from the Global South to curricula, or even to rearticulations of theories and models of practice based on perspectives from the Global South. Sutra-‘Awna-Sumud as a moral and epistemological code supports the confronting of oppressive structures and leads to the liberation of people’s lifestyle, communities, and knowledge.

3.14 CONCLUSION I explored a collection of resistive and enabling values and practices I termed Everyday Forms of Resistance that demonstrate a holistic and multi-dimensional way of life, based on attachment to land and community, including the other-than-humans. Sutra-‘Awna-Sumud, as a unique collection of daily resistance means, is specific to the historical and global context of Palestine and aim to achieve people’s collective self-determination. Yet they can be comparable to other concepts and practices employed in the Global North and South. Palestinian olive growers’ and shepherds’ ways of life and values may join other Global South means to contribute to “ecologies of knowledges” and “pluriversal” practices – in which all of us, along with our diverse values and knowledges, can coexist – as decolonial scholars and activists have been calling for. Olive farmers’ and shepherds’ Everyday Forms of Resistance contribute a unique Palestinian ethical, practical, and epistemological means to achieving social and occupational justice and will act as one of many diverse ways that originated from the daily practices and heritages of groups in other parts of the world who rejected the universalisation of their ways of life and values, and promoted pluriversality instead. In addition, Sutra-‘Awna-Sumud might act as sisters to other communal values such as Ubuntu, the goal of Living Well, and the practice of Mutual Aid. This practical, ethical, and ontological-epistemological positioning within the epistemologies of the South can be adopted in social science disciplines and communities of praxis concerned with human and more-than-human well-being. I suggest that considering such means of interpreting the world and acting on it might inspire alternative ways to produce and apply knowledge concerning humans’ daily actions and values that might support them in confronting oppressive forces caused by the global capitalist system, patriarchy, racism, colonialism, and the climate crises. The epistemology of the South, including Palestinian Everyday Forms of Resistance, can frame research, scholarship, policy, and activism in situations in the world that increasingly require scholars, policymakers, and community workers to look beyond eurocentric means that have proven unable to address social injustice in isolation from other

38  Handbook of social justice in the Global South ways, in particular those that have been created by communities who are actively fighting for social justice in their daily lives.

NOTES 1. All names have been anonymised to protect participants and their families. 2. Occupation is defined in occupational therapy and occupational science as everything people do in their day to provide meaning, purpose, and to maintain their health, e.g., cooking, gardening (Wilcock & Hocking, 2015); it is to be differentiated in this chapter from the term “military occupation” . 3. https://www​.facebook​.com ​/All​That​sLef​tCol​lective/

REFERENCES Abram, D. (1996). The spell of the sensuous. Vintage Books. Adalah. (2011). The inequality report: The Palestinian Arab community in Israel. https://www​.adalah​ .org​/uploads​/oldfiles​/upfiles​/2011​/Adalah​_The​_Inequality​_Report​_ March​_2011​.pdf Adalah. (2020). Israel’s Jewish nation-state law. https://www​.adalah​.org​/en ​/content ​/view​/9569 Alonso Bejarano, C., López Juárez, L., Mijangos García, M. A., & Goldstein, D. M. (2019). Decolonizing ethnography: Undocumented immigrants and new directions in social science. Duke University Press. B'Tselem. (2021). A regime of Jewish supremacy from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea: This is apartheid. https://www​.btselem​.org​/publications​/fulltext ​/202101​_this​_is​_apartheid B’Tselem. (October 30, 2024). Forcible transfer of isolated Palestinian communities and families in Area C under cover of Gaza fighting. B’Tselem. Accessed November 29, 2024, https://www​.btselem​ .org​/settler​_violence​/20231019​_ forcible​_transfer​_of​_ isolated​_communities​_ and​_ families​_ in​_ area​ _c​_under​_the​_cover​_of​_gaza​_fighting Guajardo Córdoba, A. (2020). About new forms of colonization in occupational therapy: Reflections on the idea of occupational justice from a critical-political philosophy perspective. Cadernos Brasileiros de Terapia Ocupacional, 28(4). https://doi​.org​/10​.4322​/2526–8910.ctoARF2175 Hinytī, A. (2018). Al-tajammu’at al-badāwīyah fī wasat al-diffah al-gharbīyah [Bedouin communities in the middle of the West-Bank]. Institute of Palestine Studies. Human Rights Watch. (2021). A threshold crossed: Israeli authorities and the crime of apartheid and persecution. https://www​.hrw​.org​/report​/2021​/04​/27​/threshold​-crossed​/israeli​-authorities​-and​ -crimes​-apartheid​-and​-persecution International Committee of the Red Cross. (1949). Convention (I) for the amelioration of the condition of the wounded and sick in armed forces in the field. https://ihl​-databases​.icrc​.org​/applic​/ihl​/ihl​.nsf/ INTRO/365 International Court of Justice. (2004). Legal consequences of the construction of a wall in the occupied Palestinian territory. https://www​.icj​-cij​.org​/case​/131 Khalidi, R. (2020). The hundred years’ wars on Palestine: A history of settler colonial conquest and resistance. Profile Books. Khatib, R., McKee, M. and Yusuf, S. (2024). Counting the dead in Gaza: Difficult but essential. The Lancet 404, no. 10449 (2024): 237–238. Magalhães, L., Farias, L., & Malfitano, A. (2018). The development of occupational science outside the Anglophone sphere: Enacting global collaboration. Journal of Occupational Science, 26(2), 181– 192. https://doi​.org​/10​.1080​/14427591​.2018​.1530133 Mingolo, D. W. (2018). On plurivesality and multipolarity. In B. Reiter (Ed.), Constructing the pluriverse: The geopolitics of knowledge (pp. ix-xiv). https://www​.dukeupress​.edu​/Assets​/ PubMaterials​/978–1– 4780–0016–7​_601​.​pdf

Everyday forms of resistance  39 OCHA. (2024). “Home page”. OCHA, accessed December 20, 2024, https://www​.ochaopt​.org/. Oxfam. (2010). The road to olive farming: Challenges to developing the economy of olive oil in the West Bank. http://policy​-practice​.oxfam​.org​.uk ​/publications​/the​-road​-to​-olive​-farming​-challenge​-to​ -developing​-the​-economy​-of​-olive​-oil​-in​-t​-115032 Ramugondo, E. L., & Kronenberg, F. (2015). Explaining collective occupations from a human relations perspective: Bridging the individual-collective dichotomy. Journal of Occupational Science, 22(1), 3–16. https:// doi​.org/​10​.1080​/14427591​.2013​​.781920 Rawls, J. (1999) A theory of justice. The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. Said, E. W. (2000). Reflections on exile: & other literary & cultural essays. Granta. Santos, B. S. (2014). Epistemologies of the South: Justice against epistemicide. Routledge. Scott, J. C. (1985) Weapons of the weak: Everyday forms of peasant resistance. Yale University Press. Simaan, J. (2017). Olive growing in Palestine: A decolonial ethnographic study of daily-forms-ofresistance. Journal of Occupational Science, 24(4), 510–523. https://doi​.org​/10​.1080​/14427591​.2017​ .1378119 Simaan, J. (2018). Olive growing in Palestine: An everyday form of resistance [Unpublished doctoral dissertation]. Canterbury Christ Church University, Canterbury, UK. Simaan, J. (2020). Decolonising occupational science education through an activity learning activities based on a study from the Global South. Journal of Occupational Science, 27(3), 432–442. http://doi​ .org​/10​.1080​/14427591​.2020​.1780937 Simaan, J. (2021). A critical reflexion on two conceptual tools from a global south perspective. Canadian Journal of Occupational Therapy, 88(2). https://doi​.org​/10​.1177​/0008417421994372 Smith, L. T. (2022). Decolonizing methodology: Research and Indigenous peoples (3rd ed.). Bloomsbury. Soliman, M. (2019). Mobilization and demobilization of the Palestinian Society: Towards popular nonviolent resistance from 2004–2014 [Unpublished doctoral dissertation]. Coventry University, Coventry, UK. Spade, D. (2020). Mutual aid: Building solidarity during the crisis (and the next). Verso. Thompson, T. L. (2000). The Bible in history: How writers create a past. Pimlico. United Nations Human Rights Council. (2013). Report of the independent international fact-finding mission to investigate the implications of the Israeli settlements on the civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights of the Palestinian people throughout the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem. http://www​.ohchr​.org​/ Documents​/ HRBodies​/ HRCouncil​/ RegularSession​ /Session19​/ FFM​/ FFMSettlements​.pdf Whiteford, G. (2000). Occupational deprivation: Global challenge in the new millennium. British Journal of Occupational Therapy, 63(5), 200 ​-204.​https:/​/doi​.org​/10​.1177​/030802​26000630 Wilcock, A., & Hocking, C. (2015). An occupational perspective of health (3rd ed.). Slack. Wilcock A., & Townsend, E. (2000). Occupational terminology interactive dialogue: Occupational justice. Journal of Occupational Science, 7(2), 84–86. http://doi:10.1080/14427591.2000.9686470 Wolfe, P. (2006). Settler colonialism and the elimination of the native. Journal of Genocide Research, 8(4), 387–409. https://doi​.org​/10​.1080​/14623520601056240

4. Social justice and the dynamics of land access and exclusion in Tanzania From Ujamaa to neoliberalism Francis Semwaza and Thomas A. Smucker

4.1 INTRODUCTION To Tanzanian farmers and pastoralists, land represents an intersection of environmental, cultural, and economic concerns that are central to the livelihood and everyday social relations within rural communities across the country. While land mediates local relationships, it has also been the center of political attention both during Tanzania’s early post-colonial socialist period and after liberalization (Boone, 2014). This chapter examines the evolution of social justice concerns surrounding rural land access in Tanzania during two periods of relatively rapid policy formation: the first decade of independence leading up to Ujamaa collectivization and the period of reforms associated with liberalization in the 1990s. During these transitional periods and up to the present, the land question has been framed by scholars, social movement activists, and national leadership through competing notions of social justice that speak, alternately, to collective and individual notions of tenure security. These framings have mediated relationships among various communities as well as between local communities and the state. While considerable attention has been paid to Tanzania’s founding political ideology and the centrality of the land question therein, less attention has been paid to ways in which national development ideologies shaped the changing ethos of land access in diverse agrarian and pastoralist communities (but cf. Kimambo, 1991; Sheridan, 2004). Access to land is central to the lives and livelihoods of rural people in several respects. It is a critical foundation for access to food for those dependent on an “own production” entitlement (Rockson et al., 2013). It provides a foundation for diversifying rural livelihoods, even as interlinked processes of deagrarianization and depeasantization proceed (Bryceson, 1996, 2002). It also links to shared memories of the past and contributes to contemporary social standing within communities (Chung, 2019). The concern for justice in land access has been central to evolving approaches to tenure security. These include socialist notions of equity in protecting the most vulnerable from dispossession through consolidation, a core concern of the early post-colonial period. As neoliberal policy framings became more prominent in the 1980s and 1990s, positivist legal framings of social justice asserted contractual property rights for individuals as the key to “tenure security” for poor and marginal farmers in rural Tanzania. In this chapter, we explore these competing notions of social justice expressed in postcolonial debates around land access and exclusion in rural Tanzania. We begin by examining two important historical junctures during which the land question was central to a national discussion of social justice and development in the country. We then examine two recent cases of changing dynamics concerning land access and exclusion in practice: one involving massive foreign land acquisition and another involving changing patterns of land access among 40

Social justice and the dynamics of land access   41 pastoralists and recently arrived farmers. While the former happens in the Rufiji District in the Coast Region, the latter is in the dryland village of Kirya in the Mwanga District, Kilimanjaro Region. These current case studies demonstrate that underlying tensions present in the early periods of national policy change still exist despite fundamentally different ideological and policy contexts. This chapter emphasizes that for many countries in the Global South, framings of social justice are deeply entwined with wider questions about agrarian change and the state’s role in seeking to transform rural communities. The Tanzania case provides examples of both an attempt at high modernist planning that sought to rework land access alongside a range of rural services, as well as a subsequent reversal that reframed social justice around individual land rights. In addition to exploring the origins of contemporary land tenure challenges in Tanzania, which are of relevance to current policy debates, these Tanzania experiences may also be valuable in the search for development alternatives in other national contexts that center on social justice principles while avoiding the excesses of both top-down statist planning and neoliberal forms of development (Ibhawoh & Dibua, 2003).

4.2 NOTIONS OF SOCIAL JUSTICE IN EARLY POST-COLONIAL TANZANIA After independence, the land question in most African countries encompassed a concern for internal class relations that implicated different actors, ranging from peasant and workingclass Tanzanians to international and domestic capital, and the state and its institutions, now that the colonial metropoles had removed their absolute control over the territories. This led some states to redefine ownership by placing the entire national territory under the state as the sole owner and custodian. Doing so sought to generate solidarity among rural populations and garner their political support in the pursuit of nation-building efforts, including depoliticizing ethnicity since land claims in immediate post-independence Africa were tightly tied to ethnic geographies of belonging (Bandyopadhyay & Green, 2013; Chachage, 2010). In regard to Tanzania specifically, Askew (2006) writes, “For Nyerere, the material and social conditions of Tanganyika at the time of independence – specifically, its 120 ethnic groups kept underdeveloped and fractured by colonial divide-and-rule policies – required a form of socialism that would not exacerbate existing divisions but would instead cultivate national unity” (p. 18). Indeed, Nyerere sought to articulate a land tenure system that would avoid the systemic injustice of land consolidation under freehold tenure while eliminating what he saw as regressive aspects of customary tenure. Opening the door to freehold tenure, Nyerere (1966) feared, would reduce Tanzanians to tenants of foreign landlords or a small Tanganyikan landlord class. Nyerere saw no just means of adjudicating private property rights within the context of customary tenure relations that merely grant use rights. He argued that leasehold arrangements that require productive use as a condition of access would address both security of tenure issues and the dangers of land consolidation. Importantly, Nyerere (1966) hints that with land clearly identified as a national resource, notions of ethnic territory would dissolve such that “tomorrow one tribe will not be able to prevent another tribe from using land that is actually the property of the nation as a whole” (p. 58). Although Nyerere’s vision for land tenure arrangements contrasted sharply with those of the departing colonial government, the land administration of the postcolonial government

42  Handbook of social justice in the Global South remained centralized and authoritarian (Shivji, 1998a). This centralization resulted in renewed grievances, especially from those with vested interests in large-scale commercial agriculture. In Tanzania, this occurred under the collective villagization policy introduced in 1967 under the policy of socialism and self-reliance (Ibhawoh & Dibua, 2003). The exercise was accompanied by the nationalization of private property and the resettlement of people from their original locations to government-identified areas, with the rural sector “moving to the center stage” (Jennings, 2002, p. 510). While the bourgeois class pushed for private ownership of property in a move to regain their lost land and other nationalized investments, the state leaned toward creating an egalitarian agrarian society in times when the world operated between the forces of capitalism and antiimperialism. Tanzania’s revolutionary embrace of socialism was not informed by the existence of any major capitalist interests but only a small petty-bourgeois class comprising foreign and non-Indigenous groups created mainly during the country’s colonization (Gray, 2013). By capturing elements of customary land tenure and rejecting certain elements to ensure an ethos of equity in land holdings, Nyerere sought to create a society where people placed their faith in shared progress toward social development rather than individual accumulation. Protecting land from being privately owned by a few wealthy individuals against the majority of Tanzanians who still languished in poverty reflected the mitigation efforts against the workings of neo-colonial relations in the newly independent state. The socialist terrain served the purpose of creating and maintaining the national government’s legitimacy in a country where citizens’ expectations ran high following decolonization. It was upon these foundations that the collectivist villagization program Ujamaa became the embodiment of Nyerere’s deep concerns about rural stratification and his hopes for modernizing the rural sector with the government as the driver of change. Nyerere’s commitment to agrarian socialism was above all not meant to be an import, but instead one that reflected the specific conditions of Tanzanian political economy and cultural contexts. Ultimately, Nyerere believed that communal values of rural Tanzanian society were deeply ingrained in village and family life rather than a socialist consciousness that emerged through class struggle. Yet, Ujamaa ultimately sought to replace Tanzania’s diverse agrarian lifeways with strictly modernist planned villages that reflected a clear rejection of local knowledge and agrarian practices as adaptive systems to Tanzania’s rural environments. Not only would their physical displacement remove people from the landscapes that they and their forebears had managed, some for generations, but additionally, the newly created village system would leave little space for local knowledge and cultural practices, as the provision of services and land use would be ordered and managed by agricultural experts (Scott, 1998). Thus, emerged across rural Tanzania an ethos of opposition to this particular instance of centralized control and planning. Resistance to villagization was undoubtedly a reflection of people’s attachment to their home communities as well as a deep concern that the land to which they had access, often exclusively, would be subject to expropriation by the state. Despite its intentions of securing a central place for the rural peasantry in Tanzania’s national development, Ujamaa villagization operated mainly in a top-down fashion and was sometimes carried out through the forced resettlement of villagers to the designated locations (Scott, 1998). Coupled with other factors such as the weakness of the state which had just attained independence at the time, this orientation led to substantial resistance from rural communities themselves, and eventually, abandonment of the program.

Social justice and the dynamics of land access   43

4.3 SOCIAL JUSTICE DEBATES SURROUNDING NEW WAVE LAND TENURE POLICIES IN THE 1990s By the 1990s, arguments for liberalizing land tenure systems across the developing world were ascendant. This was particularly the case in African countries, which embarked on a new wave of land reform that reframed questions of social justice in land around individual tenure security (Manji, 2006). In 1991, President Ali Hassan Mwinyi appointed a Presidential Commission of Inquiry into Land Matters to examine and advise the government on reform options. In this section, we explore the position of the Commission and the content of reforms expressed in a series of land-related acts of parliament. In evaluating these reforms, we look at the forms of land injustice that persisted into the post-reform era, particularly international land grabs and conservation-induced displacement. As we proceed, we examine the current land regime as a product of both Tanzania’s general political and economic liberalization in the 1990s and the country’s resolve to address the previous legal deficiencies which resulted in a situation best described as lawlessness in the land ownership and land-related dispute settlement mechanisms. Similar cases have been reported in India (Levien, 2018) and Nepal (Paudel, 2016), among other areas, where attempts at “improving” land tenure security resulted in reduced participation of the supposed beneficiaries of the otherwise wellintentioned efforts. Tanzania’s land administration reflects a three-fold legacy: pre-colonial practices, colonial experience, and post-independence restructuring. The current land tenure regime retains some elements of customary law under which different ethnic communities managed their land prior to the year 1900 when colonial occupation officially kicked off with what is known as “effective occupation,” whereby each alien power sought to claim authority over colonial territory. The country also borrowed central land administration practices from the Germans and the British, who assumed that the land was not owned at the time of the colonial occupation to legitimize colonial land expropriation. Lastly, the government has blended these two experiences and coined a new land tenure policy in response to people’s needs and arising land conflicts that stem from the collective villagization process in the 1970s and 1980s (Mwapachu, 2005). Formally introduced in 1967 during the socialist experience, villagization can be said to have operated in a legal vacuum: although it involved mass relocations of people, neither land allocation for the villages nor land-related dispute mechanisms were regulated by the law (Coldham, 1995). On the surface level, Tanzania’s current land regime is commended as among the most comprehensive and elaborate in Africa (Locher, 2016). The current land tenure regulation results from extensive debates on finding better ways to administer land in a predominantly agrarian but rapidly liberalizing economy. One such example involved addressing problems that arose from land takeovers from villagers during villagization. As Coldham (1995) puts it, the question was “how to address and possibly incorporate pre-and post-villagization claims over land[.]” He continues that whatever the case, it was deemed prudent that “… land tenure could and should be handled administratively” (p. 229). As part of the solution, in 1991, President Ali Hassan Mwinyi formed the Commission of Inquiry into Land Matters, whose recommendations led to the legislation of Act No. 4 and Act No. 5, that is, the Land Act 1999 Cap 113 and Village Land Act 1999 Cap 114. These sister laws were passed the same day by the Tanzania Parliament, and their separation was determined by two factors: the length of the bill and the ambivalence that disturbed Tanzanian law and policymakers in their attempt

44  Handbook of social justice in the Global South to protect majority rights while attracting foreign direct investments (FDIs) into the country (Knight, 2010). The two laws are primarily responsible for governing contemporary land tenure in Tanzania. Under these laws, Tanzania maintains a radical title, in that all land is vested in the country’s President as its trustee.1 This translates into a situation whereby people can enjoy the use (usufruct) rights to land rather than claiming its full ownership, thus at least partially acknowledging Nyerere’s warnings about land consolidation under freehold tenure. Moreover, the laws provide land users with surface-use rights only while any of its underground wealth remains state property.2 It is also important to note the difficulty that most Tanzanians, including those entrusted with property allocation, may find in distinguishing between rights of use and possession. The regime also provides for 33, 66, or 99-year lease periods – investors are usually granted a 99-year title in deliberate attempts to optimize the investor’s profit-making potential. As explained in Section 20 of the Land Act 1999 and its subsections, foreigners cannot own land except for investment purposes. For investors to occupy and use land, the law also requires that they channel their intent to invest in land-related projects through the Tanzania Investment Centre (TIC). Interestingly, however, TIC is neither necessarily involved in the initial processes of land acquisition from the villages, nor is it required to consult any villagers or communities whose land would be taken away once such land is put in its hands to create derivative rights. This situation begs at least one question: Under what kind of ownership can a 99-year land lease be judged? Moreover, it questions the country’s ambitions to fully develop a freehold land tenure system while maintaining its commitment to protecting smallholders’ customary rights. To an ordinary citizen, the granting of a 99-year lease to investors amounts to selling the land and so contradicts the usufruct ownership story that is laid on paper and of which most Tanzanians are aware (Shivji, 1998b). Although this last concern is widely rumored among the elites and ordinary people in urban areas, the academic literature seems to overlook it. Others have critiqued the land reforms from a feminist perspective, arguing that the reforms were driven by a liberalizing logic that had already systematically undermined small-scale farmers and prioritized the needs of foreign-owned export-oriented agricultural interests (Mbilinyi & Shechambo, 2009). These critiques dovetail with earlier critiques of land tenure individualization in Kenya and other African countries that suggested that women’s customary access rights were undermined by a narrow focus on household tenure security, which most often resulted in singular property rights vested in male heads of household (Gray & Kevane, 1999; Mackenzie, 1993). Another critique of the law relates to the knowledge of land administration among Tanzanians and the potential for misdeeds resulting from the lack of public understanding of the legal arrangements regulating land access and ownership in the country. Different actors may not follow the law both because of ignorance of the law and the incentives to act dishonestly, such as the top-down approach to land grants (Kakai, 2012; Shivji, 1998b). Most local small-scale farmers who are non-residents of a particular village or community would occupy land without observing the six-month residence and land-development requirements after the acquisition, as the law requires. Moreover, the law forbids transferring over 20 hectares of village land to anyone alien to the locality. Consequently, bribes to village councils and respective leaders can become commonplace in attempts to acquire land within or beyond the legally specified amount a village could offer (Rwegasira, 2012). This practice, however, could signify an instance of the utmost violation of Tanzania’s land laws regarding land transactions involving Tanzanian nationals.

Social justice and the dynamics of land access   45 Even though these misdeeds in allocating land occur at different levels and specifically when land transactions between Tanzanian nationals are at stake, some obvious differences exist between the local and foreign land deals. While most domestic land transactions involve the acquisition of land in smaller amounts and may take place in village councils and assemblies or amongst village leaders and the prospective buyers, foreign land acquisition attracts more of a top-down approach from the ministerial level to villages since it usually involves larger amounts of land (Cotula, 2013; German et al., 2013). The difficulties in interpreting the laws and defining the boundaries between the two major pieces of land legislation produce complexities in how we understand Tanzania’s land regime. This fact is true for Tanzanians themselves and of less concern to foreigners. While the law prohibits foreign access and use of land, it grants the longest possible occupancy rights of up to 99 years and usually gives the entitled citizens the least possible occupancy span of up to 33 years. Moreover, data shows that the number of Tanzanians who legally own land through customary titles and the conventional right of occupancy stands at less than 30 percent (Mrindoko, 2012). In fact, even the Village Land Act 1999, which was meant to protect customary land ownership practices, is overwhelmed by its sister act, the Land Act 1999, by giving such discretionary powers to the Minister for Lands and Commissioner for Lands to override the villagers’ decisions and rule over issues related to compensation. With the diminishing agency at the local level, Shivji (1998a) argues that Tanzania’s current land regime builds upon its colonial experience: apart from removing freehold ownership, customary land ownership remains weak and at the mercy of the state and its actors. The Commissioner for Lands, for instance, can convert any village land into reserve land so that it can be prepared for investment purposes. It should further be noted that most rural dwellers are less informed of the law given the technicality of the language in which it is written. These contestations over land tenure derive their roots from Tanzania’s previous land practices during the colonial occupation and the years following independence (Shivji, 1998a). Before colonialism, land in the then Tanganyika and in most parts of Africa was owned communally under the custodianship of local community rulers. The rulers could not randomly sell or give it away; they regulated its distribution. The practice changed during alien occupation in the early nineteenth century when the primary mission became land expropriation. Through the German Crown Land Ordinance of 1900 and later the British Land Act of 1923, the colonizers managed to put the entire land in colonial Tanganyika into their hands. This practice was intended to simplify acquisition, or in other words, it was acquisition by deprivation. Such practice is known today as a radical title, through which land ownership is concentrated in the hands of the state. While the people vehemently resisted this land expropriation during colonial domination, it enjoyed much support in the post-independence era due to the overt differences and intentions between alien and domestic states. The common perception is that the postcolonial state protects the people while the colonial state exploited them. On the other hand, from the early days of independence through the 1980s, the ignorance of the Tanzanian central government regarding customary land tenure practices among its diverse communities, coupled with the socialist collective villagization program, which required the country’s scattered rural population to resettle in selected areas for the government to effectively provide them with social services, caused mayhem that forced the country to address the rising land-related disputes later in the 1990s (Ibhawoh & Dibua, 2003; Scott, 1998; Spalding, 1996). Under villagization, most rural dwellers had to forgo their farms and other assets and start afresh in their newly determined territories (URT, 1994). The villagers

46  Handbook of social justice in the Global South also resisted collective farming that the government had imposed on them for reasons stated as mitigating threats of food security, which by then were looming in a country whose population was much scattered and characterized by poor communication infrastructure. Drawing on empirical evidence, Manji (2001) argues that recent land reforms across several African countries are not effective in protecting smallholders from processes leading to land alienation and consolidation both in policy and implementation. For instance, the issuance of customary land titles under Tanzania’s Village Land Act 1999, for numerous reasons, has not been successful. The land transfer mechanism, especially in rural areas, presents its own challenges. This combination of problems and challenges culminates in a more complex situation that, if not addressed promptly, will deepen people’s desperation for food production sooner rather than later. Moreover, poverty continues to negatively affect the majority of Tanzanians, especially those with limited access to recourse. While fully resolving the legal and policy implementation loopholes would take longer and may prove to be complex, commitment to improving the living conditions of the majority agrarian citizens, and investing in a stepwise transition, seems more appropriate. 4.3.1 Post-Reform Land-Related Social Injustices Nearly two decades after the advent of the reforms, Bluwstein et al. (2018) found evidence that Manji’s concerns about land alienation under the new land tenure regime were well-founded. Bluwstein et al. (2018) examined several processes of land alienation that were receiving less research attention compared to international land grabs. The authors examined four primary drivers of land alienation among smallholder farmers and pastoralists, whereby land is made available for private investments in commercial agriculture, mining, and conservation uses. A common current cutting across these different drivers of alienation of village land (and its recategorization as general land) is the persistence of centralized control over the land use planning process, which often opens the doors for external actors to engage in the identification of “unused” resources for development or conservation. It is even more disturbing because of the state’s violence in carrying out its conservation missions and the defiance of the rule of law once the victims of its actions are granted justice in accordance with the law. Semwaza (2022) reports an incident in which the entire Nyamuma village was raided one night in 1999 and burnt down by Tanzanian Police, forcing people into internal displacement, allegedly for encroaching into the Serengeti National Park in the northwestern part of the country. The exercise was ordered and supervised by Mr. Pascal Mabiti, the Serengeti District Commissioner at the time. The aggrieved villagers took the matter to a quasi-judicial instrument, the Commission for Human Rights and Good Governance, which ruled in their favor and had the ruling registered with the High Court of Tanzania for enforcement. Despite these efforts, the government of Tanzania has not compensated the villagers for loss of property and has refused to abide by other requirements as ordered in the ruling without appealing to the highest court, the Court of Appeal, in case it is aggrieved by the ruling in question. The Nyamuma incident represents many others in Tanzania as well as other African countries and the developing world at large in which the victims are still pursuing justice against arbitrary evictions from areas they had inhabited for decades and have now been declared protected areas in the form of forest reserves and national parks, among others. Like other countries in East Africa, Tanzania has largely embraced positivist approaches in conservation while dismissing Indigenous knowledge regarding conservation. This approach

Social justice and the dynamics of land access   47 is informed by Western science, which discourages the coexistence of human and non-human species (animals and plants) in conservation areas (Mbaria & Ogada, 2017). Western science has established the belief that the two are mutually exclusive, arguing that human activities compromise the welfare of endangered wildlife and biological diversity (Dowie, 2009). On the other hand, human existence in controlled spaces has a long history, and there is evidence that such populations have contributed to the welfare of the reserves and helped fill the void regarding the meaning and significance of the conserved species or artifacts (Atalay, 2006). In fact, this human-wildlife coexistence can be a tourist attraction in itself. If this is the case, then our concern should be about bringing science and culture together for the betterment of the environment and the people who depend on it. Unfortunately, however, each side appears to take a polemical direction: while indigenous populations accuse Western science of having ulterior motives of “selling the resources to imperialists’, the modern conservation techniques see nothing good in Indigenous conservation efforts other than mere self-preservation. Despite both sides accusing each other of not doing good for the environment, the cultural side is even more stigmatized given its inability to quantify its achievements in sustaining the reserved areas and not damaging them. In the end, the government and Western science win while people and Indigenous conservation knowledge lose.

4.4 CONTEMPORARY DYNAMICS OF ACCESS AND EXCLUSION As the analysis above shows, land tenure dynamics in Tanzania have evolved over time, with both local and international factors contributing to equity and justice-related outcomes. Colonial impacts on the relegation of customary land tenure practices are evident across the changes adopted since independence, both during socialism and after neoliberalism. From operating in a legal vacuum during socialist villagization to neglecting the law in the politically and economically liberalized Tanzania, the country’s different phases of land administration seem to have in common an opacity that leaves rural communities feeling excluded from the legal logic on which it rests. The case studies below demonstrate how the top-down nature of Tanzania’s land regulations, the void in law, and the lack of enforcement of the existing policies and laws, result in malpractices in land acquisition both by foreign “investors” as well as by domestic actors in Rufiji, Coast region, and in Kirya, the Kilimanjaro area. They show how the land tenure system disadvantages the villagers whose land is taken away and compromises both food production and income generation. Due to their lack of voice and knowledge, villagers are prone to losing their land almost arbitrarily and without compensation. Similarly, the case studies further show that Tanzania’s existing land regime encourages rent-seeking and other misconduct on the part of the decision-makers when allocating pieces of land involving both domestic and foreign actors. 4.4.1 Dissecting the “Land Grab”: Rufiji’s Large-Scale Land Acquisitions This section discusses the social implications of large-scale land acquisitions based on field research. Data was collected using group discussions, individual interviews, and concurrent observation in the visited areas where large-scale agricultural investment was taking place. Our approach in both data collection and analysis relied upon learning from the communities in what Charmaz (2014) calls “grounded theory.” Learning from the researched phenomenon

48  Handbook of social justice in the Global South and from the studied population allows researchers to learn more about the multiple angles through which the problems can be understood and approached. The Rifiji case represents large-scale investment land acquisition practices, which draw our attention to the conflict between customary and statutory laws, and specifically between the Land Act 1999 and Village Land Act 1999 of the laws of Tanzania, and a few other investment-related laws as discussed above. The Land Act clearly states its superiority over the Village Land Act; in fact, it overwhelms the latter in both theory and practice. It overrides the Village Land Act in the event of any conflict of provisions regarding the two. However, despite its good intentions to protect the technically incapable rural dwellers from land-related investor deceptions, this superior act has some defects as it gives the Commissioner for Land, for instance, some arbitrary power to acquire land from rural communities. With the seemingly overt relegation of customary land rights in Tanzania’s current land regime, such powers, if misused, threaten the welfare of the majority of smallholders, and may consequently compromise food production and availability in the country. As a result, this alters the way people used to securely access and use land; it would increase poverty levels for the majority individuals whose livelihoods depend solely on agriculture. Occupying an area of 13,339 square kilometers – about 39 percent of the region’s total landmass (URT, 2007) – Rufiji is the largest of the six districts of Mkuranga, Kisarawe, Mafia, Bagamoyo, and Kibaha in Tanzania’s Coast Region. River Rufiji, which provides water for everyday use, agricultural activities, and other economic and livelihood endeavors, including fishing, has been the district’s major asset. The district’s poverty level stands at around 48 percent of 250,000 residents. Moreover, Rufiji has over 482,466 hectares of arable land on which residents predominantly grow maize and paddy (URT, 2007). The Rufiji delta is said to be the largest in Tanzania, potentially carrying over 60 percent of the country’s hydropower production (Mwalyosi, 1990). This resource endowment and its proximity to the country’s largest city, Dar es Salaam, make the district an attractive place for large-scale agricultural investments, making it vulnerable to resource conflicts if careful planning is not put in place. During the interviews, villagers shared their views on how important they thought land was to them in terms of food production and as a host to other necessities like water and medicinal plants. Despite their inability to engage in technical legal debates to defend their rights, the visited communities demonstrated an eagerness to participate in the investment land acquisition processes in their respective villages. The people’s inability to technically articulate what tenure security and insecurity mean does not erase their experiences of it; individuals can express their displeasures and point out anything that may seem abnormal to them without using complex jargon (Farley & Smith, 2013). Despite their desire to effectively take part in determining their fate, the difficulties in understanding land transfer matters sideline them from effective participation contrary to their wishes. This has been observed elsewhere where tensions exist regarding access to land and water resources among groups with varying interests (Locher, 2016). In addressing the villagers’ knowledge gap, study participants mentioned the role of land advocates and other activists who have been helping them to raise awareness regarding the consequences of land loss and with technical aspects such as litigation in landrelated disputes. Both group and individual interviews with villagers, company representatives, and district officials bridged the gap in the researchers’ knowledge about land-related disputes in Rufiji as there was enough flexibility and freedom for respondents to share. Apart from the lack of involvement of the villagers in land planning and decision-making regarding resource

Social justice and the dynamics of land access   49 allocation, the villagers aired their perceptions concerning large-scale land acquisitions and the impact on their livelihoods and communities at large. Villagers showed little support and expressed fears over large-scale farm investments based on their previous experiences with the attempted and actualized land-related investment deals in their communities. Their concerns can be grouped under the large umbrella that large-scale agricultural investments may pose a danger to their livelihoods at present and that of future generations. These fears are in line with the general understanding of sustainability that communities should command the available resources to support their livelihoods (Edwards, 2005). Put more concretely, the villagers were concerned about land scarcity in the long run and the monopoly of public water sources by investor companies once land is possessed by the companies. 4.4.2 A Deeper Insight: Property Loss, Compensation and Tenure Insecurity In all the visited areas, participants expressed dissatisfaction over the process of allocating land to investors and the compensation for the loss of their property. Reflecting on this, Utunge villagers vehemently objected in their village assembly to the move by the Swedish Ethanol Chemistry AB (SEKAB), now ECO Energy, which had mapped 19,000 hectares against the 1,000 hectares previously agreed upon in the village assembly in the presence of the investor. Moreover, one district land official reported that SEKAB informed the district that it had acquired a total of 24,000 hectares in the whole district against 9,000 hectares which the district had documented. In another event, Nyamwage villagers rejected compensation offered by the government for the loss of their land, taken by a Turkish company, Safe Agriculture (TZ) Limited. The village and district authorities confirmed that the company acquired over 3,000 hectares but managed to develop only 500 hectares in three years while villagers’ compensations remained unpaid. Despite the resistance, large-scale land acquisitions continue to take place due to legal inconsistencies and possible malpractices at different levels. Nearly all participants raised concerns over the 33- to 99-year land lease period that Tanzania’s land regime provides. While most villagers and urban dwellers live in squatter areas, the government gives investors the maximum lease period of 99 years to optimize their profit-making potential (German et al., 2013). Villagers also expressed their worries about their welfare in the long run regarding resources such as water for general use and land for food production. They opined that with population increase and increased investments going hand in hand, their children’s future becomes a serious concern. In the extreme case, some villagers even suggested ending relations with the investor companies for not seeing the benefits of such commitments. Although the companies claimed to contribute to the social progress of the areas where they had acquired land, from their experience, participants considered it a deception because the promises were mostly unwritten, and some companies could not even pay their casual laborers recruited from among the villagers for field clearing tasks on the companies’ newly acquired farms. In these deals, the villagers are in no position to effectively engage in meaningful negotiations with the companies and any government authorities beyond the village level. In one village, for example, respondents mentioned an incident where their village heads had to deliberate on land issues with lawyers representing the investors and district officials, and they were asked to provide the officials and company representatives with minutes of the meeting immediately after the meeting. Most villagers and their heads cannot match the competence of the officials and experts with whom they are negotiating. In one village, the people reported

50  Handbook of social justice in the Global South that at one point a company representative and one district official threatened the village authority that if they continued objecting to the proposed take-over, the government could still take it away without compensation. Thus, despite their efforts to actively participate in investment land allocation at the grassroots level, the process can become compromised by coercing them into agreeing to external proposals by non-village actors. Nearly all participants shared the opinion that the investment land acquisition processes negatively affected them in terms of agricultural production to cater to their immediate needs as well as the future of their children. In such conditions, land tenure security becomes an issue of great concern, as the practices go against the government’s resolve to protect smallholders' land rights and foster food production, as stated in the country’s land policy. Individuals can no longer perceive the presence of their rights to a piece of land on a continual basis nor have the ability to enjoy the yields of the capital invested in the land (Place et al., 1994). Small-scale farmers are hesitant to make any significant investment in the land for fear of losing it at any time and without compensation. In areas where alternative income-generating activities are scarce, this translates into subjecting the people to poverty at a time when the government and its development partners are fighting to reduce it. The situation calls for our attention to the imbalances between the Tanzania government’s commitment to attract large-scale agro-investors and its obligation to protect its people from becoming landless. Some of the factors for such local-investor conflicts include the spontaneity of the process of acquiring large tracts of land. Everything seems to be fast-tracked (Neville & Dauvergne, 2012), which leads to skipping some steps or allowing malpractices in a system already experiencing difficulties. The villager-investor tensions create a lose-lose situation in which investments stall while the villagers become insecure and live in economic misery. This may further contribute to the existing poverty levels. Although the fast-paced land acquisition processes are established and supported by the law, their ad hoc nature and orientation may seem to disrupt the desire for legal pluralism. In other words, the new wave of the land tenure regime in Tanzania, which sought to guarantee better protection to the country’s rural majorities whose land is owned according to their community values, has almost failed to deliver on the promise. Therefore, in the short term, the shambles in tenure security facing smallholder farmers in Tanzania could be partly addressed through a firm commitment to improving the living conditions of the people while working on the lengthy legal processes seeking to address the bigger challenges.

4.5 MEDIATING ACCESS BY LOCALS AND OUTSIDERS IN LOWLAND MWANGA DISTRICT A brief history of changing land use and access in the lowland village of Kirya in the Mwanga District demonstrates evolving notions of justice among different livelihood groups in rural Tanzania and the ways in which development priorities of external actors may override the livelihood security of a large section of the local community. An important subsequent development following the initial reform laws was the passage of the Land Use Planning Act (VLUP) of 2007, which establishes village councils’ central role as a planning authority while district councils serve to coordinate planning activities across villages and engagement with outside entities in the planning process. While VLUPs were intended to serve as a participatory platform to ensure planning that respected the complex rights of diverse resource users

Social justice and the dynamics of land access   51 at the local level, in practice, the planning process has most often been dependent on district financial and human resources with limited agency at the village level (Huggins, 2016). In some cases, the VLUP process has also been heavily shaped by external actors whose agendas – from enabling private commercial investment to wildlife conservation and infrastructural development – have tended to constrict community agency in land use planning (Engström et al., 2022). Kirya is a dryland village in Mwanga District characterized by striking contrasts in livelihood and land use practices. One sub-village, Emangulai B, is home primarily to Maasai pastoralists, though the majority of Maasai residents are engaged in non-farm activities or crop cultivation. Although pastoralism remains the foundation of Kirya Maasai livelihoods, diversification is longstanding, with horticulture and maize cultivation beginning soon after the construction of an initial irrigation canal in 1974, continuing to increase through subsequent development of irrigation infrastructure along the Ruvu/Pangani River that flows through the village from the Nyumba ya Mungu dam just a few kilometers upstream. Emangulai A, in contrast, is made up of people from 30 different ethnic groups in Tanzania and elsewhere in East Africa, but neighboring highland agricultural communities have contributed most to in-migration and settlement in and around Kirya’s irrigation scheme. Although some new arrivals still seek to petition for land allocation through the village council, most recognize that all irrigated land has been allocated and that rental of land is their only option for those who would seek to engage in rice or horticulture production in the scheme. Relations between Maasai and the farming population in Emangulai A have become strained over the last decade. Maasai grazing patterns have gradually adjusted to the expansion of irrigated cultivation into much of the riparian wetlands that used to provide important dry season forage in the past. Only a comparatively small section of riparian grazing land remains, and it is now informally reserved by the community as a calving area. As a result, dry season grazing has been relegated to the drier periphery of the village as well as, occasionally, to the edges of the irrigation zone. They are now more likely to engage in long-distance movements with cattle when local forage is inadequate. Some herders bring their livestock daily to access vegetation near irrigated crop fields before returning in the evenings. Inevitably, this leads to instances of livestock straying into farmers’ fields and damaging crops, thereby increasing tensions and resulting in cases brought before the village council, which both farmers and pastoralists seem unhappy with in terms of conflict mediation. Kirya has been engaged in a VLUP process for several years to identify and map the extent of areas in which cultivation, grazing, settlement, and future developments will be permitted within the village. This process will have a considerable influence over the future viability of pastoral livelihoods in the village. Maasai respondents observe that “locking in” current land use patterns is problematic given historical claims to land within the irrigation scheme as the long-term residents of the village. Furthermore, the VLUP process, with direction from the district government, has sought to accommodate further expansion of irrigated agriculture into the remaining riparian grazing areas near the Ruvu River. That the district government seeks to guide the VLUP process toward irrigation expansion in a dryland village comes as no surprise, as irrigation expansion is a major national development and climate change adaptation priority. However, such a development would have dire consequences for pastoralist livelihoods in the village and risks deepening tensions between farmers and herders related to livestock mobility in the vicinity of the irrigation scheme.

52  Handbook of social justice in the Global South For many Maasai, there are two social justice issues at stake. The first is the burden that pastoralists are asked to pay for the unquestioned expansion of irrigation into what have historically been important areas for grazing. The sense that VLUP has not seriously taken into consideration livestock access to riparian vegetation and water resources is widespread. Second, most Maasai residents would like irrigated agriculture to be part of a future diversified rural livelihood, but fear that new arrivals to the village will be those who are given access to new irrigated parcels by the village council once a scheme is complete, in violation of existing land law. Cutting across these two social justice concerns is the central notion expressed by rural Tanzanians to the Presidential Commission of Inquiry into Land Matters in 1991, namely hatushirikishwi or “we are not consulted.” There is a deep sense in which dependence on centralized resources and institutions greatly limits local autonomy in determining future land use at the village level and truncates processes through which different resource use needs could otherwise be openly discussed and transparently adjudicated.

4.6 CONCLUSIONS Land remains of critical importance to Tanzania’s enduring agrarian population, whose efforts determine the nation’s food security and the welfare of individual farmers. Villagers produce food for themselves and the country and sell part of their yields for income generation. In this regard, the farmers rely entirely on land for their subsistence, due to the lack of meaningful support for alternative income generation. Without enough alternative incomegenerating activities, smallholder agriculture becomes their only hope. As Shivji (1998b) suggests, in agrarian economies like Tanzania, land is the “lifeline” of the nation, forming the core of democracy. Owing to the lack of meaningful participation of villagers in land transfer processes globally, Sassen (2013) says that the neoliberal dream of better democratic practices that reemerged in the 1990s is now being disrupted. We make two recommendations essential to better tenure security for smallholder farmers in rural Tanzania: one relates to institutional strengthening, and the second relates to the inclusion method with which public participation in investment land deals should be encouraged. Gradual improvements in institutional functionality and infrastructural support would help promote the manner in which the state relates to its citizens (Evans, 1995). Our field experience suggests the need for increased government involvement in handling land matters in rural areas in a manner geared towards enabling greater citizen participation in negotiating land transfer deals for large-scale agro-investments. We appeal for a more elaborate land administration system and greater involvement of villagers since their ineffective participation in land transfer processes is a major concern (Cotula, 2013). Scholars have observed that, together with other factors such as improved technology, the security of land tenure increases agricultural production (Place et al., 1994; Maxwell & Wiebe, 1999). Therefore, a more inclusive approach in negotiating investment land transfers in Tanzania’s rural areas would guarantee farmers improved land tenure security, boost food production, and increase their incomes. Empowering local communities to protect their interests in small and large-scale land acquisition processes is absolutely necessary. German et al. (2013) report on the government’s attempt to balance the information it gives to the public regarding potential food security risks, and the benefits, such as employment opportunities, that foreign investments would likely bring. This balancing of information would enable Tanzania’s rural populace to make

Social justice and the dynamics of land access   53 informed decisions during investment-land negotiations, as they will have a fair understanding of how to approach the deals they are about to make. In keeping its promise to protect smallholder agriculture by ensuring the security of land tenure as spelled out in the goal of the country’s land policy (URT, 1997), the government is expected to stand by its majority small-scale farmers to ensure that any complexities or discrepancies regarding land management and leases are properly addressed. However, this latter suggestion depends on the goodwill of government officials working on the land question as well as sustained engagement to cultivate a sense of responsibility. This would significantly reduce the ongoing malpractices among government land management officials and consequently lower investors’ chances of maliciously overriding community decisions regarding land ownership question in a respective area. As mentioned in the Rufiji case above, the villager respondents acknowledged the role of non-governmental organizations in defending land rights for rural communities in all the visited areas. The non-governmental organizations (NGOs) helped not only in raising awareness but also with litigation in courts of law. This confirms much of the already stated developmental role that NGOs can play in resource-limited settings where market power seems to overwhelm states (Arenas et al., 2009). Raising land awareness remains a crucial task as domestic and external investment pressure still pours in. With the help of these organizations – whose approach can be described as confrontational in some ways, involving protests, boycotts, and civil suits when amicable communication fails – even the people’s complaints regarding compensation for loss of property may significantly decrease because the parties involved would fear facing a well-informed public. The elements discussed in the cases above (i.e., compensation, empowerment, and increased participation of local communities in land-related decision-making processes) are contingent upon granting enough time during the land acquisition process, especially regarding largescale farm investments. With a prolonged process, villagers will have enough time to discuss with their community authorities and seek help from different sources when necessary. Any higher authorities can duly scrutinize the proposed matter rather than rush into decisions as is currently the case (Locher et al., 2012). The same applies to small-scale acquisitions in the northern case of Kiria as we have discussed. Once the negotiations are conducted on relatively fair grounds and all the required assistance is given to the villagers to facilitate the land negotiation exercise, there will be fewer complaints from local communities than Tanzania is currently experiencing. In line with this idea of reducing clashes between rural communities on the one hand, and large-scale investors and the government on the other hand, one land official suggested that as the medium between villagers and investors, the government needs to appropriately acquire land judiciously and ahead of time so that the acquired land can be reserved for investment purposes. Such a land bank system, allegedly in place but remaining infeasible (German et al., 2013), would lower the existing tensions since there will be hope for increased peoples’ involvement and compensation issues would be handled ahead of time. The villagers’ increased participation aligns with the country’s poverty reduction efforts and will eventually address the developmental and statistical discrepancies between real observations and the content reported in books. Likewise, the companies will be more responsible to local communities as part of the mandatory and additional corporate social responsibility (CSR) that would consequently help develop the respective rural areas where investments are being made. In this manner, not only will rural populations be assured of security of land

54  Handbook of social justice in the Global South tenure and sustained agricultural growth, but it will also help the country mitigate any dangers of food insecurity and address poverty among its people.

NOTES 1. See Sections 3(1)(a) and 4(1) of the Land Act 1999 Cap 113 of the laws of Tanzania. 2. See the Land Registration Act Cap 334, Section 33(1)(2).

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Social justice and the dynamics of land access   55 Gray, H. (2013). Industrial policy and the political settlement in Tanzania: Aspects of continuity and change since independence. Review of African Political Economy, 40(136), 185–201. http://doi​.org​ /10​.1080​/03056244​.2013​.794725 Gray, L., & Kevane, M. (1999). Diminished access, diverted exclusion: Women and land tenure in subSaharan Africa. African Studies Review, 42(2), 15–39. http://doi​.org​/10​.2307​/525363 Huggins, C. (2016). Village land use planning and commercialization of land in Tanzania. LANDac Research Brief No. 1. Ibhawoh, B., & Dibua, J. I. (2003). Deconstructing Ujamaa: The legacy of Julius Nyerere in the quest for social and economic development in Africa. African Journal of Political Science, 8(1), 59–83. https://www​.jstor​.org​/stable​/23493341 Jennings, M. (2002). ‘Almost an Oxfam in itself’: Oxfam, Ujamaa and development in Tanzania. African Affairs, 101(405), 509–530. http://doi​.org​/10​.1093​/afraf​/101​.405​.509 Kakai, S. H. (2012). Government and land corruption in Benin. Land Deal Politics Initiative, Working Paper No. 12. Kimambo, I. N. (1991). Penetration & protest in Tanzania: The impact of the world economy on the Pare, 1860–1960. James Currey. Knight, R. S. (2010). Statutory recognition of customary land rights in Africa: An investigation into best practices for lawmaking and implementation. Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. Levien, M. (2018). Dispossession without development: Land grabs in neoliberal India. Oxford University Press. Locher, M. (2016). “How come others are selling our land?” Customary land rights and the complex process of land acquisition in Tanzania. Journal of Eastern African Studies, 10(3), 393–412. https:// doi​.org​/10​.1080​/17531055​.2016​.1250890 Locher, M., Steimann, B., & Raj Upreti, B. (2012). Land grabbing, investment principles and plural legal orders of land use. The Journal of Legal Pluralism and Unofficial Law, 44(65), 31–63. http:// doi​.org​/10​.1080​/07329113​.2012​.10756681 Mackenzie, F. (1993). “A piece of land never shrinks”: Reconceptualizing land tenure in a smallholding district, Kenya. In T. Bassett & D. Crummey (Eds.), Land in African Agrarian Systems (pp. 194– 221). University of Wisconsin Press. Manji, A. S. (2001). Land reform in the shadow of the state: The implementation of new land laws in SubSaharan Africa. Third World Quarterly, 22(3), 327–342. http://doi​.org​/10​.1080​/01436590120061633 Manji, A. S. (2006). The politics of land reform in Africa: From communal tenure to free markets. Zed Books. Maxwell, D., & Wiebe, K. (1999). Land tenure and food security: Exploring dynamic linkages. Development and Change, 30(4), 825–849. http://doi​.org​/10​.1111​/1467​-7660​.00139 Mbaria, J., & Ogada, M. (2017). The big conservation lie. Lens and Pens. Mbilinyi, M., & Shechambo, G. (2009). Struggles over land reform in Tanzania: Experiences of Tanzania Gender Networking Programme and Feminist Activist Coalition. Feminist Africa 12 Land, Labour and Gendered Livelihoods, 95–102. https://www​.jstor​.org​/stable​/48725914 Mrindoko, S. (2012, November 6). Slow issuance of land titles cripples farmers. DailyNews: Tanzania. https://allafrica​.com ​/stories​/201211060091​.html Mwalyosi, R. (1990). Resource potentials of the Rufiji River Basin, Tanzania. Ambio, 19(1), 16–20. http://www​.jstor​.org​/stable​/4313648 Mwapachu, J. (2005). Confronting new realities: Reflections on Tanzania’s radical transformation. E & D Limited. Neville, K. J., & Dauvergne, P. (2012). Biofuels and the politics of mapmaking. Political Geography, 31(5), 279–289. http://doi​.org​/10​.1016​/j​.polgeo​.2012​.03​.006 Nyerere, J. K. (1966). National property (Mali ya Taifa). Reprinted in Julius K. Nyerere, Freedom and unity/Uhuru na umoja: A selection from writings and speeches, 1952–1965. Oxford University Press. Paudel, D. (2016). Re-inventing the commons: Community forestry as accumulation without dispossession in Nepal. The Journal of Peasant Studies, 43(5), 989–1009. http://doi​.org​/10​.1080​ /03066150​.2015​.1130700

56  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Rockson, G., Bennett, R., & Groenendijk, L. (2013). Land administration for food security: A research synthesis. Land Use Policy, 32, 337–342. http://doi​.org​/10​.1016​/j​.landusepol​.2012​.11​.005 Place, F., Roth, M., & Hazell, P. (1994). Land tenure security and agricultural performance in Africa: Overview of research methodology. In J. Bruce & S. Adholia (Eds.), Searching for land tenure security in Africa (pp. 15–39). Kendall/Hunt Publishing Company. Rwegasira, A. (2012). Land as a human right: A history of land law and practice in Tanzania. Mkuki na Nyota. Sassen, S. (2013). Land grabs today: Feeding the disassembling of national territory. Globalizations, 10(1), 25–46. http://doi​.org​/10​.1080​/14747731​.2013​.760927 Scott, J. C. (1998). Seeing like a state: How certain schemes to improve the human condition have failed. Yale University Press. Semwaza, F. (2022). Conflicting identities and insecurities? Uncertainties about land rights in Tanzania and Ethiopia. In J. O. Asaka & A. A. Oluoko-Odingo (Eds.), Human security and sustainable development in East Africa (pp. 89–103). Routledge. http://doi​.org​/10​.4324​/9781003221081 Sheridan, M. J. (2004). The environmental consequences of independence and socialism in North Pare, Tanzania, 1961–88. The Journal of African History, 45, 81–102. http://doi​.org​/10​.1017​/ S0021853703008521 Shivji, I. G. (1998a). Contradictory perspectives on rights and justice in the context of land tenure reform in Tanzania. Tanzania Zamani, 4(1), 57–96. Shivji, I. G. (1998b). Not yet democracy: Reforming land tenure in Tanzania. HAKIARDHI and University of Dar es Salaam & UK Institute for Environment and Development. Spalding, N. (1996). The Tanzanian peasant and Ujamaa: A study in contradictions. Third World Quarterly, 17(1), 89–108. http://doi​.org​/10​.1080​/01436599650035798 United Republic of Tanzania. (1994). Report of the Presidential Commission of Inquiry into Land Matters: Land policy and land tenure structure. Ministry of Lands, Housing and Urban Development & The Scandinavian Institute of African Studies. United Republic of Tanzania. (1997). National land policy (2nd ed.). Ministry of Land and Human Settlements. United Republic of Tanzania. (2007). Coast region socio-economic profile. National Bureau of Statistics.

5. Prison environmental injustice in the Global South(s) Elisa Privitera and David N. Pellow

5.1 INTRODUCTION In this chapter, we articulate linkages among prisons, state violence, and environmental justice (EJ) with social theories from the Global South (GS). We offer theoretical and empirical evidence that demonstrate how the state is a major force of violence via the prison, particularly in the Global South and the South of the North, and how this violence increased during the COVID-19 pandemic. Contrary to popular wisdom and state-sponsored narratives concerning the justice aims of criminal legal systems, we argue that imprisonment is a form of direct oppression and repression. Moreover, we contend that incarceration can be framed as a form of environmental injustice because it involves violence directed at marginalised communities and results in bodily harms and threats to well-being from hazardous environmental conditions such as contaminated air, water, food, and much more. This argument builds on recent prison environmental justice studies that conclude that environmental injustice is a form of state violence because it results in “direct, immediate, and long-term physical, emotional, and spiritual harms that lead to suffering and premature death for the denizens of affected communities” (Kojola & Pellow, 2021, p. 101). We present two case studies that facilitate the application of these ideas, from Iran and Italy, where governments mete out abuse to prisoners and enforce violence against the citizenry. In the second section of this chapter, we discuss the literature on prisons as an example of eco-systemic injustice; in the third section, we explore how the scholarship on Global South (GS) theories, despite contributing to EJ studies with insightful reflections, has not yet paid attention to the carceral system through an environmental justice lens; the fourth and fifth sections feature case studies from Iran and Italy; and the final section provides a discussion and some final remarks on key concepts deriving from the interplay of the two cases with the literature review.

5.2 PRISONS AND ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE In recent years, scholars have extended the scope of EJ concerns from battles over toxic facilities in neighbourhoods and workplaces into struggles for human rights in carceral spaces that have been revealed to be toxic and unhealthy (Pellow et al., 2022). The literature on prison ecology or prison environmental justice (PEJ) struggles documents the fact that carceral institutions are often located adjacent to or atop hazardous waste sites, are places where water and air contamination are frequently severe, are locations where climate change-driven extreme weather events pose significant threats to the well-being of prisoners, and are spaces where prison labour generates, or is associated with, a number of environmental health risks 58

Prison environmental injustice in the Global South(s)  59 (Gribble & Pellow, 2022). Prisons, jails, and immigrant detention centres are also spaces where incarcerated persons are pushing for change, suing authorities, and engaging in protests in order to secure the right to healthy food (Pellow, 2021), adequate medical care (Pellow & Montague, 2022), safe temperatures, and other improvements in living conditions. In this vein, incarcerated persons have successfully prevented the construction of a power plant next to a Pennsylvania prison (Pellow, 2021); prevented the construction of what would have been the United States’ most expensive federal prison in the state of Kentucky; led hunger strikes to call attention to food injustices and the neglect of basic health protections during the COVID19 pandemic; and written media reports and produced poetry and visual art detailing these injustices and articulating visions of human rights and abolition. In other words, incarcerated persons have emerged as an important, but previously unrecognised, leadership cadre in the movement for EJ. The academic literature on PEJ struggles evolved in tandem with the grassroots communitybased EJ movement’s efforts to call attention to this problem. For example, activist groups like Mothers of East LA (MELA), Critical Resistance, the Silicon Valley Toxics Coalition, and the Campaign to Fight Toxic Prisons first documented the relationship between prisons, jails, and environmental conditions (in some cases as early as the 1980s), and scholars are now catching up to this realisation. Global anthropogenic climate change impacts the Global South, low-wealth, Indigenous, and people of colour communities first and foremost, with extreme weather events like floods, hurricanes, and droughts resulting in crop failures, hunger and famines, heat-related illness and death, the destruction of homes and communities, and widespread displacement and involuntary migration (Lipset 2013; Mehta et al. 2021; Nath & Behera, 2011; Whyte, 2020). And since economically, politically, and socially marginalised communities that are hit hardest by climate change have contributed the least to creating the problem (due to producing significantly lower greenhouse gas emissions), their status as populations on the frontlines of climate disruption gave rise to the term climate injustice and to the demand for climate justice – a vision of addressing the challenge of climate change while simultaneously alleviating its harmful effects on those communities (Ciplet et al., 2015; Mendez, 2020; Ranganathan & Bratman, 2019; Schlosberg & Collins, 2014). The ravages of climate change have even more intensely disproportionate impacts on incarcerated persons, who have little access to resources for escaping to safety during extreme weather events. For example, at least 23 prisoners have died of heat-related exposure in Texas prisons since 1998, and an estimated 75 per cent of that state’s carceral facilities lack air conditioning (McCullough, 2019). The prisoners at the Wallace Pack Unit joined a class action lawsuit to bring attention to this problem, which also shed light on the fact that the prison’s water system was contaminated with arsenic, which can lead to cancer, diabetes, and skin lesions, among other ailments (Clarke, 2018). In another infamous case of prison environmental injustice, in 1993, Joe Arpaio, the Sheriff of Maricopa County, Arizona, opened up an outdoor jail where he housed a majority Latinx population of incarcerated persons in what the media referred to as a “tent city” and which Arpaio himself called a “concentration camp”. Many observers were horrified by the combination of insufficient access to water and daytime heat indices that occasionally reached 140 degrees Fahrenheit (Chairez, 2017; Fernandez, 2017). These intersections of climate and/or environmental threats with the repression of marginalised communities constitute an injustice and a form of state violence.

60  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Struggles for EJ in residential communities worldwide have typically involved grassroots resistance against the location of toxic industrial facilities and demands for governmental and corporate action to address climate change, contaminated water, air, and soil. These concerns are amplified in prisons and jails because incarcerated persons have few, if any rights or resources to protect themselves against brutal and unhealthy conditions imposed upon them by state and corporate authorities operating carceral facilities. Despite these extraordinary challenges, incarcerated people are speaking out and working with supporters on the other side of the prison walls to create interventions for improving health conditions, recognising basic human rights, and for a fusion of abolition and environmental justice. Recent scholarship has deepened our understanding of the prison environmental justice struggles inside and outside jails, enriching the theoretical questions and frameworks, especially through several cases from the Global North, and only marginally from the Global South. Nevertheless, the Global North and the Global South have distinct political, social, and environmental dynamics, as the next section will detail.

5.3 SOCIO-ECOLOGICAL AND EPISTEMOLOGICAL INJUSTICE IN THE GLOBAL SOUTH(S) Socio-economic inequalities are thickly intertwined with socio-ecologically unjust dynamics because “the problems of environmental racism/inequality … are not fundamentally environmental issues” but “social problems” (Pellow, 2009, p. 3). Marco Armiero (2021) defines our present epoch as the Wasteocene because it is largely marked by unjust “wasting relationships” that turn the South of the world, conceptually and materially, into the dump of the global world. The sacrifice zones in the South, while containing communities that have become the socio-ecological dumps of someone else’s well-being,1 also frequently become the terrain of conflicts as well as of experiments of “commoning”2 and solidarity practices (Armiero, 2021 ). In the poorest Asian and Latin American countries, numerous grassroots environmental movements have emerged to address these forms of socio-ecological violence that tend to compromise their health and livelihoods. Renamed “environmentalism of the poor” (Guha & Martínez-Alier, 1997; Martínez-Alier, 2002), these southern movements are largely rooted in material struggles embedded within cultural identity, and they consist of conflicts over the everyday needs of people whose livelihoods are linked to the health of local ecosystems (Verhoeven, 2018). The scrutiny of the wasting relationships moulding the South-North geo-eco-political dynamic reveals that the reality is far more nuanced than this strict South-North divide. As a matter of fact, the concept of the GS introduces a post-national interpretation of the negative impacts of contemporary capitalist globalisation on spaces and peoples. By capturing a deterritorialised geography of capitalism’s externalities that goes beyond national and geographic borders , the Global South is a label that also regards subjugated peoples within the borders of wealthier countries, and vice versa. Therefore, the Global North may exist within poor countries, and the Global South can also exist within wealthy nations. We define “the South(s) of the North” as this ontological condition of socio-ecological injustice, which includes more than a mere geographical condition linked to the unfair distribution of burdens and benefits. The history of the Northern American EJ movement is emblematic of this southern condition embedded in the North. A major point of its origins

Prison environmental injustice in the Global South(s)  61 occurred in the 1980s when a protest took place against a hazardous waste landfill in Warren County, North Carolina.3 The grassroots mobilisation by residents emerged because the dump was located in a majority low-income African American community – a classic example of “systematic environmental racism” (Bryant, 1995, p. 6). Likewise, Native American populations have struggled and are still struggling against the environmental injustices and land dispossession perpetrated by North American governments in collaboration with extractivist transnational corporations. These aforementioned experiences confirm that the structural tensions and discontinuities within the North-South divide at the global level are reproduced in North America (both in the United States and in Canada) where the borders of the South nestled in the North have been drawn according to historical racial, ethnic, gender, and class eco-systemic injustice and violence. Albeit less sharply, a similar trend can be seen within Europe. In this regard, one must first acknowledge the Northern European “colonisation” of southern European institutions and economic systems. One example is represented by normative instruments developed by the European Union for the southern European countries following the 2008 global financial crisis. These responses combine austerity and deregulation policies aimed at a renewed and coherent deployment of neoliberal stances fomenting technical solutions instead of a search for a renewed socio-environmental balance within Europe (Tulumello et al., 2020). Secondly, according to Michael Redclift (2001), in many respects, northern Europe exhibits some of the same environmental concerns as the Global North (climate change, recycling, and concerns over nuclear energy), whereas southern Europe exhibits many of the same environmental concerns and discourses as those of the Global South (aridity, water shortages, land degradation, and forest erosion). Third, and consequently, this difference has generated a more “materialist” environmentalism in the south of Europe, also because protests may tend to remain at the local level as a reaction against a lack of sensitivity to environmentalist demands by the government (Eder & Kousis, 2001). Among southern European countries, Italy, and especially the south of Italy, exhibits some of the characteristics that reflect the South of the North. The perception of persistent backwardness of the southern Italian regions has its origins in the unification of Italy when the newly established parliamentary monarchy, run by a noble northern dynasty, favoured northern regions, initially by violently repressing an uprising of southern peasants demanding more equity and less taxation, and later by promoting welfarist policies toward the South, such as “Cassa del Mezzogiorno” (Fund for the South), and the unilateral imposition of oil and gas extraction and refining (Privitera et al., 2021). According to the mainstream narrative, the concentration of intense industrial activities would have generated multiscale cascade effects that, consequently, should have reduced the South-North income and wealth gap. To the contrary, these policies triggered a vicious cycle of corruption and clientelism, which in many cases strengthened the mafia system, contributing significantly to a series of public health and ecological disasters. Thus, the thorny “Southern Question” is rooted in the colonisation of southern Italy by northern Italian capitalists, and the attempt to address the North-South economic differential has been largely ineffective and harmful. Furthermore, the Global Souths hold and express a different view on the way to interpret and understand the socio-ecological relationships shaping our world. Since power regimes are also knowledge regimes, northern colonisation has been not only a geo-political and ecological project, but also an epistemological project. In this regard, in addition to a multi-scalar

62  Handbook of social justice in the Global South analysis (Pellow, 2016, 2017), critical environmental justice studies (CEJ) should consider a “multi-epistemological analysis” which embraces different ways of thinking. The GS theories help to intercept other forms of “conocer” (knowing) (De Sousa Santos, 2007; see also De Sousa Santos, 2014; De Sousa Santos & Meneses, 2020) and of conceiving the human-environment bonds. In this sense, the Souths are not only a geographical and ontological category, but also an epistemological one. Several scholars have produced invaluable work on the formulation of a “Global Southern theory” or “Southern thinking”. Raewyn Connell (1997) argues that “the only possible future for social science on a world scale involves a principle of unification” (Connell, 2007, p. 223) which connects “different formations of knowledge in the periphery with each other and with knowledge from the metropolises” (2007, p. 213). Alternatively, Vanessa Watson argues that acknowledging “conflicting rationalities” (Watson, 2003) and “deep differences” (Watson, 2006) is what actually allows “seeing from the South” (Watson, 2009, 2014). Her epistemological indication is searching for a “situated nature of knowledge” (Watson, 2009), rather than continuing to draw ideas and lessons primarily from the “best practices” coming from the Global North (see also Yiftachel, 2006). Similarly, in “Pathways to alternative epistemologies in Africa” (Adeshina et al., 2021), the authors discuss the potentially problematic aspects of universal knowledge claims and call for methodological responses grounded in the work of African theoreticians in order to rethink Africa’s contributions to and its place in the world. By rejecting universalist theories and best practices from the Global North, these scholars encourage an epistemological shift toward an inclusive approach that actively develops theoretical propositions based on realities and regional specificities of the southern context. The need for “resistant epistemologies” (Rivera, 2020) to Eurocentrist and racist epistemological dominance also permeates Indigenous scholars’ pleas to converge toward an “indigenous epistemology” (Royal, 2009; Hickey, 2020) having a relational orientation (Hester & Cheney, 2001) and a propensity for systems-level thinking (Goodchild, 2021), rather than Western rationality based mainly on dichotomous categories, such as human/non-humans or rationality/emotion or culture/nature. A related move can be found also in the Global North (Armiero, 2014), i.e., in the South of the North. For instance, the Italian sociologist Franco Cassano (2012) has envisioned the “pensiero meridiano” (Mediterranean thinking), which proposes to reverse the North-South relationship in order to not think of the South in light of modernity, but rather to think of modernity in light of the South, especially of the Mediterranean countries. In other words, by dismantling the “coloniality of power” (Quijano, 2000) and the “monoculture of knowing” (Shiva, 1993), GS studies promote the use of alternative sources for thinking about questions of value and rationality and to facilitate opportunities to question the power that produces socio-ecological inequalities. In summary, links between Southern theories and EJ struggles can be found in the southern environmentalist movements, as well as in the search for a southern way of thinking that aims to debunk the racialised, unjust, and colonial epistemologies that have dominated Northern epistemologies. Nevertheless, the category of the Souths of the North, and therefore, of the South as a plural concept including geographical, ontological, and epistemological aspects, has been less explored. Likewise, within GS studies, mere ancillary consideration has been given to the interplay between EJ studies and the struggle for human rights in the carceral systems, and even less so in the case of the South of the North. Namely, prison EJ studies have been a disruptive field of research but with a major focus on cases from the North and with only minimal engagement with GS studies and theories. Following the call from CEJ studies

Prison environmental injustice in the Global South(s)  63

Note: The shaded parts indicate the focus of this article aimed at filling the gap in the literature. Source: Authors.

Figure 5.1  Intersection between North-South theories and studies, Environmental Justice studies (EJ), Prison Environmental Justice studies (PEJ), and Prison Abolitionist studies (PA) to embrace multi-scalar, methodological and theoretical approaches (Pellow, 2016, 2017), we intend to fill these gaps in the literature regarding GS studies and EJ studies by analysing two case studies of prison environmental injustice taking place in the Global South of the world (Iran) and in the South of the North (south of Italy) (Figure 5.1.).​

5.4 STATE VIOLENCE AND ENVIRONMENTAL INJUSTICE IN AN IRANIAN PRISON Prisons are sites where a vast array of environmental justice concerns are a stark reality for incarcerated persons and their families. And while there has been emergent literature on this subject in recent years, it has been almost exclusively focused on carceral facilities in the

64  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Global North. The case presented here comes from the GS, which offers a window into how environmental justice politics are marked by a unique degree of brutality and an outsized disdain for human rights. This case of carceral environmental injustice also highlights the many ways in which gender plays a role in the perpetration of state violence against humans and more-than-just-humans. Qarchak prison is a women’s carceral facility located in Iran’s Tehran province. The facility holds some 2,000 women – a mix of social prisoners and political prisoners. The range, depth, and intensity of environmental justice threats at Qarchak are legendary and horrifying to even the most casual observer. These include: contaminated water, food unfit for human consumption, extreme heat and cold, sewage overflows, unhealthy air quality, chronic medical neglect, and much more. For all these reasons and more, Qarchak prison is regularly described by the international human rights community as one of the worst prisons in the world. 5.4.1 Air, Food and Water Narges Mohammadi and Alieh Motallebzadeh are both political prisoners being held at Qarchak. They wrote a joint open letter to their supporters referring to the facility as a “torture chamber” where: The prison water is salty, the drinking water is usually muddy, and sometimes there’s no drinking water at all. Those who can afford it buy mineral water at 4,000 tomans [$1] per bottle. Pregnant women and mothers, and the children in the mothers’ ward, don’t get nutritious food to eat or safe water to drink…. They hand out food for 80 people to wards holding more than 120. The food is low-quality as well. There’s no sign of meat unless an inspector from the Prisons Organization is visiting. On the pretext of coronavirus, Soghra Khodadadi, the chief warden, even banned charities from bringing us adequate food (Rezaei, 2022).

Mohammadi and Motallebzadeh’s letter speaks to a host of environmental injustices that reflect the power of the state over the bodily and mental well-being of incarcerated persons. Forcing prisoners to drink unclean water and providing them with inadequate and unhealthy food are clear violations of international human rights as well. The quality of the air in Qarchak prison is also notoriously poor, a problem with linkages to the plumbing and water delivery system. Taghi Rahmani is the husband of Narges Mohammadi and reported that his spouse had been hospitalised with a respiratory disorder caused by the unclean air at the prison. In response, Reporters Without Borders (RSF) issued a public condemnation of the prison and called for an immediate response from the United Nations High Commission for Human Rights (Rezaei, 2022). Mohammadi told Rahmani that “In Qarchak prison, we are denied the basic needs of a human being, namely the right to breathe clean air and drink potable water” (Reporters Without Borders, 2022). As we noted above, these problems are all interlinked. For example, in June 2022 the sewage system in the prison overflowed, covering the floors in many rooms across the prison wards (Rezaei, 2022). Numerous reports indicate that the prison has no air ventilation system, so the presence of sewage compounds the problem. Mohammadi and Motallebzadeh told their family members that the prison’s sewers emit “unbearably” nauseating odours as well as ammonia and gases that they believe produce respiratory ailments among the prisoners (Reporters Without Borders, n.d.). As political prisoner and attorney Nasrin Sotoudeh noted, “Since there is not a proper sewer for a prison of this size, a foul smell

Prison environmental injustice in the Global South(s)  65 permanently permeates the prison’s air… I always feel that my lungs are filled with the smell of sewage” (Khandan, 2021). 5.4.2 Medical (Anti)care as Institutional Gender Violence Every human being needs care at some point in their lives, whether for housing and shelter, food, medical assistance, or other material, biological, and social support. And while family, friends, and mutual aid networks are often present to offer these critical resources through what many feminist scholars call care work (Federici, 2012; Poo & Conrad, 2015; Tronto, 2012), unfortunately, states routinely ration and deny such support, particularly to marginalised populations – a practice known as anticare. There are few populations more despised by states than prisoners, and anticare is a common form of repression that states impose upon this group. In July 2020, Amnesty International reported that it had received numerous documents indicating the callous and deliberate neglect of prisoners throughout Iran’s carceral system during the COVID-19 pandemic. The documents consisted of five letters sent between February and July 2020 by officials from Iran’s Prisons Organization (which functions as part of the nation’s judiciary structure) addressed to Iran’s Ministry of Health, detailing major shortages of medical devices, disinfectant and personal protective equipment and imploring the government to provide those resources. One of the letters specifically requested N95 masks, latex gloves, hand sanitisers, disinfectants, protective goggles and gowns, air ventilation systems, and deinfestation machines. The letters also noted the urgent need for funding to purchase critical medical supplies like stethoscopes, pulse oximeters, thermometers, blood glucose monitors, blood pressure monitors, and defibrillators. The Ministry of Health declined to respond or act, thus ignoring this plea for basic health measures (Amnesty International, 2020). As with many other prisons around the world, numerous incarcerated persons at Qarchak contracted the COVID-19 virus. Prison authorities exacerbated the situation by keeping prisoners who were sick and those who were healthy in the same rooms, guaranteeing the further spread of the virus (NCRI Women’s Committee, 2020). Long before the COVID-19 pandemic, Amnesty International reported that doctors at the Qarchak prison were in the habit of dismissing prisoners’ complaints of pain and discomfort as “fake” and refusing to prescribe medication or carry out medical testing (Amnesty International, 2018b). Political prisoners Mohammadi and Motallebzadeh provided additional details about the state of medical care at the facility. In a letter they wrote: “The situation in the clinic is a disgrace” and “They inject an inmate on the same bed where earlier they put stitches on another with self-inflicted injuries, and whose blood has covered the bed” (Rezaei, 2022). The environmental injustices at Qarchak are exacerbated by the repressive apparatus directed at grassroots movements for social change, particularly as it concerns ethnic minorities and women. In 2018, at least 10 women from Iran’s Gonabadi Dervish community were incarcerated at Qarchak prison after they engaged in a peaceful protest in Tehran regarding the state’s persecution of that population. As a result of police and prison guard brutality, many of these prisoners suffered a range of injuries, which were compounded by pre-existing medical conditions, including asthma, diabetes, and high blood pressure. Prison authorities repeatedly declined to ensure that they were provided with proper medical care. Furthermore, there are reports that prison doctors perpetrated gendered and psychological harm against these prisoners “by exploiting cultural taboos around sexuality, asking the women intrusive

66  Handbook of social justice in the Global South questions about their sexual relations, such as whether they have ‘boyfriends’ or are ‘sleeping around with men’” (Amnesty International, 2018b). 5.4.3 Nonhuman Species The physical structure that is now the Qarchak prison was previously used as a livestock farm where chickens and cows were raised for slaughter. The afterlives of violence and killing directed at the nonhumans in this structure might be said to have indirectly influenced the current struggle over and against social death at Qarchak. Sociologist Avery Gordon (2008) argues that past or shadowy social forces can frequently shape contemporary life in more complicated ways than most social analysts presume. She contends that “haunting” is a manifestation of those historic forces and is “one way in which abusive systems of power make themselves known and their impacts felt in everyday life, especially when they are supposedly over and done with” (Gordon, 2008, p. xvi). The past violence perpetrated on the site that later became Qarchak prison would appear to be unresolved and reflects the intersections of species in this space of environmental justice struggle. Sadra Abdollahi is Alieh Motallebzadeh’s husband. He told Iran Wire that Qarchak “was first built as a cemetery, then a farm, so naturally, its facilities and infrastructure were not built for prisoners from the most difficult backgrounds in Iran. As a result, the conditions at Qarchak are not fit for human beings. They are keeping humans in the same, if modified, stalls” (Rezaei, 2022). Moreover, there are nonhuman beings alive and well both inside and outside the prison, representing both health risks and possibilities for positive multispecies interactions. Regarding the former, prisoners regularly encounter tarantulas in the prison yard (Rezaei, 2022) and the sewage overflow that occurred in June of 2022 attracted flies and other insects (NCRI Women’s Committee, 2022). Regarding the latter, on a visit to Qarchak to see his spouse, Nasrin Sotoudeh’s husband, Reza Khandan, recalled, “It is surrounded by camel and ostrich farms. The first time I drove to the prison, to my absolute surprise, I found camels roaming in the parking area” (Khandan, 2021). 5.4.4 Repression and Resistance On 7 February 2019, prisoners at Qarchak were protesting the lack of adequate medical treatment for one of their colleagues when the authorities launched a violent attack on them by severely beating and injuring prisoners and firing tear gas and pepper spray into the facility. The prison authorities also fired a water cannon into wards 1 and 2. Furthermore, the authorities cut off the electricity, gas, and water supply, and denied food to the incarcerated in order to punish those who revolted. These actions resulted in the death of a 20-day-old infant, a child who had been born in the prison (Amnesty International, 2018a; Human Rights Activists News Agency, 2020). Every day, the prisoners at Qarchak and their allies around the world resist the violent repression visited upon the residents of that facility, and, in so doing, they are on the front lines of the movement for human rights and environmental justice. In addition to demanding clean water, healthy and adequate food, proper medical care, and proper air ventilation, prisoners and their supporters are calling for the release of detainees and the shutting down of the prison itself. Echoing his spouse’s words and demands, Reza Khandan writes, “I call on the United Nations to conduct an independent investigation into all of Iran’s prisons, and for Qarchak

Prison environmental injustice in the Global South(s)  67 women’s prison to be immediately closed. The dignity, health and safety of women, children and families everywhere demands no less” (Khandan, 2021). When the Iranian government’s so-called “morality police” detained and murdered Mahsa Amini, an Iranian woman of Kurdish descent, for allegedly wearing her hijab improperly, a massive grassroots uprising took place, with thousands of Iranians calling for the regime’s downfall. Defying the government’s prohibition against street demonstrations, protesters inside Iran and around the world have popularised the slogan “Women, Freedom, Life”. As they have in the past, the Iranian state responded with brutal, lethal repression, resulting in hundreds of deaths, torture, imprisonment, and public executions of resisters (Reuters, 2022). The movement for gender justice and human rights in Iran is inextricably linked to the movement for prisoners’ rights and environmental justice.

5.5 ECO-SYSTEMIC VIOLENCE AND INJUSTICES IN AN ITALIAN JAIL DURING THE COVID-19 EMERGENCY 5.5.1 The Italian Prison System: An Environment in Permanent Crisis Paradoxically I believe that my pain is much more the son of what I have been rather than the man I am now. Today’s anger is the daughter of a childhood stolen from hatred. Childhood hatred is the father of today’s anger, son of the discomfort of my ancestors, great-grandson of the oppression that every system has projected onto them and onto every backdrop. They threw us to the bottom because we were fragile; they threw us to the bottom because we were weak; they threw us into a seabed and then convinced us that weakness was a shame. (...) Whoever threw us to the bottom was just more ruthless. Trying to be them is like being a slave who climbs the pyramid to cut off the heads of kings and then take possession of his slaves. Being like them is like being slaves incarcerating other slaves; being like them, for me, means being against nature. “Roses of Atakama”, an excerpt of poetry written by Edmond,4 ex-inmate of the prison of Rebibbia5.

The above-cited poem by a formerly incarcerated person powerfully articulates what many grassroots prisoner rights organisations have called attention to: the deeply entrenched crisis of the Italian prison system. For instance, the national prison overcrowding rate (114.5 per cent), the low percentage of inmates involved in professional rehabilitation programmes (around 20 per cent of the total), the low number of instructors per prisoner (around one instructor per 90 prisoners), and the excessive suicide rates, which in 2022 reached their highest level in recent decades (in Italy, 8.2 people per 100,000 inhabitants commit suicide per year, while in Italian prisons the rate is about 152 people for every 100,000), all reveal the structural violence of imprisonment. The social fabric of Italian prisons (Table 5.1) reveals significant inequalities inherent in the carceral system, in terms of disparity in the economic conditions of foreign and Italian

68  Handbook of social justice in the Global South citizens (Table 5.2), alongside the enduring gaps in life opportunities between the Global North and South (Table 5.3).​ It emerges that the percentage of imprisoned foreign people is considerably high in relation to the overall percentage of foreigners living in Italy, and that the percentage of foreigners is higher in Northern prisons than in Southern prisons.​ This table highlights the huge differences between the socioeconomic conditions of migrants and Italian citizens. The geographic roots of prison injustice are apparent when considering the countries of origin of most foreign prisoners (Table 5.3), mainly from Eastern Europe and the Maghreb. Both regions have suffered generations under Western colonisation and after independence became a theatre of an often bloody process of democratisation. As a result of recent deregulation and austerity policies (Tulumello et al., 2020), the Italian state has overseen a contraction of the welfare state and a corresponding rise in carceral solutions, which is particularly troubling for residents with major health challenges. For example, the overwhelming majority of the Italian prison population lives with some form of mental illness.6 In his medical penitentiary ethnography, Luca Sterchele (Sterchele, 2021) maintains that despite the common claim that the increase in mental illness in prisons is a consequence of the de-institutionalisation process, it is above all the ordinary functioning of the penitentiary institution that produces and fuels this suffering. Thus, a large portion of Italian prisoners are marginalised by virtue of being immigrants with various mental health challenges, which are exacerbated because the default response by prison authorities is to prescribe pharmacological therapies without careful attention to their side effects. All this further confirms that Italian prisons have become a social dump, an “outcast institution” (Verdolini, 2022) of already marginalised people whose right to health and well-being is routinely denied – i.e., a quintessential example of the Wasteocene (Privitera et al., 2024). Returning to the formerly incarcerated Edmond’s words: “They threw us into the bottom because we were fragile; they threw us into the bottom because we were weak”, a statement that dramatically expresses this systemic bias. Such ecosystemic violence can only generate more violence, as the events that occurred during the first phase of COVID-19 in the Santa Maria Capua Vetere (SMCV) jail7 demonstrate.

Table 5.1  Comparison of the social fabric: prison population in Italy vs. Italian population Population

Percentage of foreigners

Prison population

32–33%

Northern prisons

40–50% (average)

Southern prisons

20% (average)

Italian population

8.4%

Northern regions

84%

Southern regions

16%

Note: The data also include foreigners in the central regions. Source: Antigone (2021, 2022) for the data about the prison population; ISTAT - Italian National Institute of Statistics (2022b) for the data about the Italian population.

Prison environmental injustice in the Global South(s)  69

Table 5.2  Comparison of socio-economic conditions: migrant population vs. Italian population ​-

Foreigner population

Italian population

Percentage of absolute poverty

32.4%

7.7% (10% in the South)

Source: ISTAT - Italian National Institute of Statistics (2022a).

5.5.2 The Case of Santa Maria Capua Vetere Jail During the Pandemic Situated in the region of Campania in southern Italy, the Santa Maria Capua Vetere (SMCV) jail is an emblematic case of prison environmental injustice in the South of the North and reveals how the thick entanglement between ecosystemic and state violence in the Global South has been accentuated during the COVID-19 pandemic. SMCV jail is around 1,000 feet from an area with a long history of waste disposal practices and numerous legal conflicts and corruption scandals. Waste and wasting relationships are a (materially) burning and complex topic in this region. According to Armiero (2021, p. 31), for being in the Global North, Campania (and its capital Naples) is an “odd object” because it is an unusual combination of northern and southern development: Campania is neither modern nor poor enough to claim a definitive and exclusive identity, but “waste and dirtiness have always been crucial parts of such an uncertain identity”. Weak and often complicit public institutions have mismanaged public services, reduced spaces of democratic involvement, and allowed the Camorra (Neapolitan mafia) to insinuate itself across many business sectors, including waste disposal. Since the 1980s, the Camorra has been burning and/or burying hazardous waste, often mixed with urban waste. In 1994, criminal investigations revealed the inadequacy of the landfills operating in the region. With only a few functioning dumps, the waste started to overflow into the streets of Naples, inducing the national government to declare a state of waste management emergency. In the name of emergency, the state proposed building more waste disposal facilities, thus transforming subaltern communities into socioecological dumps where waste infrastructures are added to pre-existing contamination: waste layered upon waste. In fact, it was quite common for new landfills and other waste facilities

Table 5.3  Percentage distribution of foreign prisoners by country compared to total foreign prison population Country of origin of foreign prisoners

Percentage encompassing the entire foreign prison population

Morocco

16%

Romania

16%

Albania

14%

Tunisia

10%

Note: Percentage of foreign prisoners by country encompasses the entire foreign prison population. It is worth underlining that these percentages can change slightly day by day. Nevertheless, this chart still provides an overall view of the average presence of immigrants in Italian prisons in recent years. Source: Antigone (2021; 2022).

70  Handbook of social justice in the Global South to be built in close proximity to existing dumps or in areas already affected by contamination – an example of environmental injustice (Armiero & D’Alisa, 2012; Armiero & Fava, 2016; Iengo & Armiero, 2017). The Campania region turned into a “sacrifice zone” through which the state and corporations could make profits at the expense of already marginalised communities. The top-down emergency policies related to the regional plan for the disposal of urban solid waste included the reopening of obsolete landfills to accommodate the overflowing municipal solid waste and the realisation of seven waste-derived fuel facilities (from now on, termed “CDR”.)8 The CDRs mechanically separate municipal solid waste that cannot be recycled or composted, removing inert contaminants and then shredding and drying it before converting it into ecoballes9 to be sent to incinerators for energy production. Citizens and activists opposed the construction of the incinerators, with just one successfully built in 2009. The CDRs were then converted into waste shredding and screening facilities (from now on, termed “STIR”)10 where waste materials are shredded and screened for various purposes, such as recycling or disposal. The story of SMCV reflects the injustices derived from the dysfunctional waste management system noted above. SMCV became one of the theatres of the socio-environmental struggle over garbage in Campania, even assuming the name of “capital of munnezza”11 (rubbish). The patchwork of waste practices includes an ex-composting plant, a CDR converted into STIR, a series of landfills opened during the peak of the waste emergency, the so-called San Tammaro landfills, and several illegal and diffused dumps (Figure 5.2).​ The first waste facility was a composting plant that, despite its advanced technology for the time, operated for only a brief period in 1994 before being closed and dismantled. This decision stemmed from the prioritisation of other facilities under the waste emergency plan. Abandoned and situated on the outskirts of the town, the area quickly devolved into a makeshift dump where, for years, hazardous special waste was illegally stockpiled. Located 6.5 kilometres northwest of the former composting plant and the jail, the outdated landfills of San Tammaro12 were reopened to receive emergency urban solid waste from across Campania, totalling 1.2 million cubic metres. The long-term environmental impact of these landfills remains uncertain among both the public and the scientific community. Following numerous formal requests and protests, only recently does it seem that landfill mining recovery intervention may be starting (Buccella et al., 2018). In the early 2000s, adjacent to the former composting plant, a CDR was constructed in line with the waste emergency plan. Activists and opposition council members questioned the necessity of building a new facility from scratch when an existing composting plant could have been repurposed for this task. Around 2005, the CDR was converted into a STIR. The unilateral decision to open a STIR in SMCV raised a few concerns in the local community among residents and leaders who argued that the plant was unsuitable due to significant quantities of “emerging leachate", i.e., the liquid that originates mainly from the infiltration of water into the mass of waste or from its decomposition. A letter of complaint from the Scientific Committee of Legambiente (one of the main Italian environmentalist organisations) in 2007 tells of truckloads of tyres being buried underground on the site, of non-existent maintenance and cleaning, and of leachate “in the sun” scattered throughout the entire perimeter of the area. Despite requests by activists, the suspected pollution of the aquifer due to the landfilling of hazardous waste has never been an object of systematic analysis by the state. Finally, in 2008, anomalies in leachate leakage led to the implication of certain workers, resulting in the plant’s seizure and temporary management entrusted to an extraordinary commissioner, an

Figure 5.2  Map illustrating the location of SMCV

Notes: Area of detail, Campania and SMCV in Southern Italy (on the top left of the figure); the map depicts the landfills, the STIR, the ex-composting plant, the SMCV jail, and the town of SMCV (in the centre of the figure); zoom on the distance between the STIR, the ex-composting plant, and the SMCV jail (on the bottom left of the figure). Source: Reworked view from Google Earth, by Authors.

Prison environmental injustice in the Global South(s)  71

72  Handbook of social justice in the Global South army general. Following the inauguration of a new mayor in 2010, amidst heightened citizen protests, several inspections were finally conducted within the STIR. It was revealed that the plant’s biological filter had remained unchanged for years. The mayor, responding to citizens’ demands, initiated stricter controls over the STIR’s biological filters, which resulted in a modest enhancement in air quality. Despite these improvement interventions, over the years, many citizens have complained about the intolerable stench emanating from STIR, which regularly worsens with the summer heat. The peak of protests was reached in November 2018 and then in October 2019 after more than 10 days of stench due to a fire inside the STIR plant that released toxic dioxins and furans into the air (Gisec S.p.A., 2019). While local residents and community organisations took to the streets to demand clean and breathable air, the prisoners were not allowed a say in the matter directly. An example of the health and environmental consequences of being housed in close proximity to the waste disposal site is recorded during the scorching summer of 2014, when the president of the Commission for the Protection of the Rights of Prisoners13 requested the intervention of the director of the SMCV jail to alleviate the unbearable miasma emanating from the STIR, to which inmates were exposed daily. Following these appeals, the Italian Regional Environmental Protection Agency discovered approximately 3,000 tonnes of organic remains stored illegally in the STIR warehouses, likely the primary cause of the oppressive stench permeating the air. These incidents raised concerns about whether “a plant intended for waste processing has become a dump”14 whose stench worsened with the summer heat. This exemplifies how the unjust waste mismanagement and wasting relationships shaping the carceral system produce forms of slow violence (Nixon, 2011; Davies, 2022; Deb, 2021) that can be intercepted through the body, allowing the tracing of the sensorialscapes and smellscapes of injustice (Armiero & De Rosa, 2017). The SMCV jail reflects environmental injustice not only for its geographic position adjacent to a polluted area but also for a series of other features. According to a 2021 datasheet filled out by the social justice organisation Antigone,15 the structure has an overcrowding rate of 115.3 per cent (exceeding the already high national average of 114 per cent). In line with the trend of Italian prisons more generally, in the SMCV jail the percentage of foreign inmates is considerably high (around 20 per cent). The SMCV jail is often described by nongovernmental organisations that advocate for the rights of detainees as poorly maintained, unhygienic, and infested with insects, due to its proximity to rubbish-related facilities. In particular, the jail structure has a series of sanitary, hygienic, and environmental problems, such as the longstanding concern regarding its water supply, which was only addressed in 2022 when a water pipeline connecting the prison with the local water infrastructure was completed. Unfortunately, it was discovered that the water is non-potable because it contains ferrous materials and is turbid in colour. The drinking water used to be provided to each prisoner through the allocation of two bottles of one litre each per day. The cells are particularly asphyxial due to their small dimensions, accompanied by a lack of sufficient windows and most of the time scarcely equipped with even the most basic of furniture. In the SMCV jail facility, over time, these forms of daily punishment and austerity have taken a systemic and chronic shape, creating a routinely violent environment. These socio-environmental conditions contributed to a foundation of already stressful and conflict-ridden relationships between the persons incarcerated at SMCV and governmental authorities, which were amplified during the COVID-19 pandemic. In April 2020, a prisoner at SMCV tested positive for COVID-19, and a lockdown was enforced, which meant that prisoners could not meet with or speak to their loved ones. In an overcrowded jail where masks

Prison environmental injustice in the Global South(s)  73 and basic sanitisers were not yet sufficiently provided, panic quickly ensued, resulting in a riot. The incident was set into motion when a large group of inmates occupied the corridors at the end of the free-hour break, preventing the prison officers from entering. The rioters took over two wards normally kept under control by the penitentiary police. Several police patrols ran outside the prison, and a helicopter flew over the structure. According to prisoners and a grassroots advocacy association, well after the riot was over (more than an hour), about 200 prison police officers entered the prison to carry out a “special search” of the detainees involved in the riots. As an ex-inmate recalled: “We started a few riots when we were kept from talking to our families. We made some small protests, like knocking on the wall and making noise, etc. After the protests, we came back to our cells, cleaned everything, and went to bed. After an hour, God’s wrath happened! A madhouse sprang up! They massacred us.”16 One of the videos from the facility that was released to the public shows police dragging prisoners up and down the facility’s stairs. The prisoners were then forced to kneel before being struck with batons, and obliged to cross a corridor lined with police officers taking turns to beat the prisoners who were made to strip, and were beaten by guards who were unidentifiable because they were wearing their helmets. Brutality, dehumanisation, and humiliation were the keywords of what has become known as “the horrible massacre of the Holy Week” (Romano, 2022) (called Holy Week because it occurred during the week leading up to Easter Sunday). Numerous police actions during this incident reflect what Pellow (2016, 2017) calls the racial discourse of animality – language that dehumanises marginalised groups – evident in text messages exchanged between the perpetrators containing phrases such as, “We’ll kill them like veal calves” and “tame the beasts”. The state played an ambiguous role during this entire sequence of events, shifting from a narrative that all but ignored the riots and repression to the use of rhetoric, framing the police violence as the result of a few bad actors (see Privitera, 2022). This same rhetoric has been used during the ongoing legal trials against more than 100 agents of the state who were accused of perpetrating or enabling the violence. Among the cases within the ongoing trial, two stand as particularly emblematic: the case of Enzo Cacace and the case of Lamine Hakimi. Enzo was one of the first ex-inmates to denounce the brutality of the police during the riots. He died two years after he was released from prison and two and a half years after the “massacre of the Holy week” during which he was beaten despite being in a wheelchair. As stated by his family members, who joined the civil party in the ongoing trial: “He no longer felt like a dignified and respected person after being beaten by those who should have had to look after him. He told me that he couldn’t stand to live anymore because he had lost all his dignity. He sought death in his last moments. He prayed to die because he was tired.” The systemic prison violence produced indelible scars that altered the psychological well-being of the disabled ex-prisoner. As his son stated, “It is true that my father made a mistake, but he had the right to serve his sentence normally, not with the police who beat the prisoners. He had to pay but not with his life”.17 The lawyers of Lamine Hakimi are struggling to have his death recognised in the trial. Lamine was an Algerian migrant suffering from schizophrenia, who died at the age of 27 in May 2020 of cardiac arrest, resulting from acute pulmonary edema, caused by a large quantity of drugs (including opiates, neuroleptics, and benzodiazepines) taken “in rapid succession and without sanitary control”. The death occurred almost a month after the violent repression perpetrated by the prison officers against the prisoners. From the stories of other inmates, it seems that Lamine was beaten with particular brutality and then

74  Handbook of social justice in the Global South segregated in an isolation cell: a very severe torture for his pre-existing precarious health condition. Neither care nor attention was paid to Lamine’s desperate lamentations from his cell. The stories of Enzo and Lamine embed the environmental injustice and violence perpetrated against the weakest and most fragile: a violence carried out by the state through the way the carceral system is currently structured.

5.6 DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION This chapter affirms the scholarly relevance and urgency of building a dialogue between the extensive literature on environmental justice, prisons, and theories of Global South knowledge and politics. We explored how carceral institutions are frequently places where institutional violence and brutality reinforce a myriad of environmental injustices at the expense of some of the most marginalised communities. Prisons are sites of environmental injustice not only because they are often located on uninhabitable, toxic wastelands, but also because of the daily harmful conditions to which the inmates are exposed. We also explored how GS studies have engendered innovative reflections on the globally unjust relationships reinforcing already existing colonial, racist, and power imbalances between countries and regions. We also discussed how inequality has grown within countries so that the terms Global North and Global South refer, respectively, to richer or poorer communities that are found both within and between countries. Thus, the Global South is a plural concept that encompasses the South of the North. Going well beyond mere geographical considerations, GS theories call for decolonised and situated knowledge seeking to challenge the epistemological dominance of the North and to value a range of different systems of thinking. This chapter aims to stimulate an expansion of the understanding of the Prison Environmental Justice studies in the South, thus embracing the critical thinking coming from the GS theories and opening a path to future explorations on how a multi-epistemological analysis can support such an expansion. We argue that the intersection of these two fields can spawn new generative scholarship on prison environmental justice studies from a Global South(s) perspective that conceives of the carceral system as an emblematic example of those social and ecological injustices perpetrated throughout the world, inside and outside the prisons, as a consequence of a colonialist, racist, and repressive approach underpinning the North-South divide. We have done so through the presentation and comparison of two case studies from Iran and Italy. Both cases attest that prisons are sites of ecosystemic state violence. In the Iranian case, the current dictatorship employs prisons as a tool to affirm its misogynist and extremist power over the Iranian population in revolt, especially against rebellious women and ethnic minorities. The prisons, in this and many other cases, are the longa manus to quell any rebellion for civil and human rights, progress, and equality. By contrast, the Italian state plays a more ambiguous role than the Iranian one. The permanent crisis of the Italian prisons can be understood within the frame of a more general socio-economic and ecological crisis. In fact, the economic crisis has implied on one hand the increase of socioeconomic divides and poverty, and on the other hand the dismantling of the welfare state, leaving out a series of fragile sectors of society whose casualties are absorbed by the prison system. As a consequence, the prisons have gradually been converted into “outcast institutions” accommodating “redundant” and marginalised communities such as people addicted to drugs, migrants, and people with mental illnesses. Instead

Prison environmental injustice in the Global South(s)  75 of providing care and rehabilitation for these populations, the state targets them and uses the prisons as a way to segregate and punish them. During the “massacre of the Holy Week” in the SMCV jail, the responses from the state and police officers to the worries and requests by prisoners concerning the COVID-19 pandemic were delivered through the language and practice of repression. These realities reveal who has power over whom, and which lives and bodies can be beaten and humiliated: in line with the racial discourse of animality, prisoners are cast as deserving of violence that is usually directed (also discursively) at nonhumans. In both cases, the prisons are a theatre of environmental injustice. In the Iranian case, the terrible environmental conditions of jails are an added torture impacting political and social prisoners. In the Italian case, the SMCV jail is conceived as a socio-ecological dump located close to toxic and unhealthy facilities. The carceral system and the waste dump are already evidence of ongoing violence against the ecology and the humans on site (Bernd, 2017; Pellow et al., 2022; Kojola & Pellow, 2021). The exposure of inmates to environmental hazards is consistent with a conception of their lives as expendable. It is not by chance that prisons are frequently located in places considered neglected and marginal, such as peripheral areas or waste facilities (Moran, 2018). These unjust conditions have been further amplified and corroborated during the global COVID-19 pandemic. Both cases indicate that the ecosystemic violence inside and outside of prisons has increased during the pandemic, shedding light on the perverse effects of the punitive approach embedded in carceral institutions. If those events were extraordinary, it is, in fact the ordinariness of the prison system that allowed them to take place: the virus we should be concerned with was and is the virus of violence that upholds the carceral system. Finally, we invite scholars to rethink GS studies in relation to EJ studies, and vice versa, by illuminating the importance of carceral spaces as sites of EJ struggle and politics.

ATTRIBUTIONS This chapter is the fruit of a joint path and effort. However, section 5.1 is by David N. Pellow and Elisa Privitera; section 5.2 is by David N. Pellow; section 5.3 is by Elisa Privitera; section 5.4 is by David N. Pellow; section 5.5 is by Elisa Privitera, and section 5.6 is by David N. Pellow and Elisa Privitera. The work of revising the chapter was undertaken by all authors.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS We would like to thank Dr. Nikhil Deb for guidance and editing. Special thanks to Antigone Campania for its support in searching for environmental data regarding the jail of SMCV. Finally, we thank the US-Italy Fulbright Commission for supporting Elisa Privitera at the University of California Santa Barbara as a Fulbright – Falcone Foundation – NIAF fellow during the 2021–2022 academic year. Without such an academic exchange, this chapter would not have been possible.

76  Handbook of social justice in the Global South

NOTES 1. E-waste is one of the representative examples of the unjust socio-ecological interdependence and exploitation between Northern and Southern countries (Rodhain, 2018; OkaforYarwood & Adewumi, 2020). 2. “Commons” and “commoning” have similarities, but are two different concepts. “Commons” are cultural and natural resources accessible to all members of a society who, most of the time, self-organise in order to manage these resources. “Commoning” is a form of social practices and organisation through which common resources are (re)produced through acts of co-deciding, solidarity, and caring. As Armiero explains (2021, p. 11), “commoning is to (re)production through sharing as wasting is to extraction through othering … while wasting relationships are based on consuming and othering, that is, on sorting out what and who is waste, commoning practices are based on reproducing resources and communities”. 3. It is worth noting that EJ movements also originated around the same time, if not before in the Global South, although they were not labelled as such. For example, the Chipko movement in the central Himalaya region of India during the 1970s (see Guha, 2000). 4. Translation from Italian by Elisa Privitera. 5. www​.rivistaclandestino​.com 6. According to the “18th report on the conditions of detention” (Antigone, 2022), the average percentage of people detained “in psychiatric therapy”, i.e., who undergo therapy prescribed by a doctor on an ongoing basis, is 40.4 per cent of the total prison population. In other words, on average, 4 out of 10 prisoners in Italian prisons make regular use of psychotropic drugs. This large percentage is seen as a consequence of the abolition by law of judicial psychiatric hospitals (effective since 2015); i.e., the number of prisoners suffering from mental disorders is increasing because they can no longer enrol in asylum institutions. Nevertheless, Luca Sterchele's (2021) prison medical ethnography examines how the entire prison environment triggers an “imprisonment syndrome” with a consequent increase in psychological and psychiatric pathologies both during the detention phase and in the phase close to one’s release date. Such distress is corroborated by the increase in prison suicides. 7. In Italy, “jail” is translated as “casa circondariale” and “carcere” and indicates those institutions holding individuals who are awaiting trial or serving short-term sentences (less than five years); “prison” is translated as “casa di reclusione” and “prigione” and typically refers to a facility for individuals who are sentenced to serve long-term sentences (more than five years) and for more serious crimes. While in the Anglophone context, there is a clear distinction between the words “jail” and “prison”, the Italian terms “prigione” and “carcere” are often interchangeable. We have chosen to employ the term “jail” throughout this text to denote the carceral facility in SMCV. Although officially classified as a “casa circondariale”, it is frequently referred to as a “prison” in the international press and accommodates prisoners serving longer sentences. 8. Combustibile Derivato dai Rifiuti. 9. Ecoballes are large packages of uncompacted waste which in Campania are often packed incorrectly. 10. Stabilimento Tritovagliatura e Imballaggio Rifiuti. 11. See this citizen blog: https://rionesantandrea​.blogspot​.com​/search​?q​=capitale 12. In the east of San Tammaro landfills, there is another landfill, now closed, which was used in the early 1990s. 13. This commission was established in 2013 by the Board of the Criminal Chamber of Santa Maria Capua Vetere. The Criminal Chamber constitutes a free association between

Prison environmental injustice in the Global South(s)  77

14. 15. 16. 17.

lawyers operating mainly in the field of criminal law and procedure, and it intends to encourage collaboration with all other legal operators for the better functioning of criminal justice. It is a direct quotation from this article: https://cor​rier​edel​mezz​ogiorno​.corriere​.it​/caserta​ /notizie​/cronaca ​/2014​/11​-settembre​-2014​/miasmi​-stir​-la​-societa​-gisecla​-colpa​-rifiuti​-mal​ -differenziati​-230115344531​.shtml See https://docs​.google​.com​/spreadsheets​/d​/e​/2PACX​-1vT​BhTj​dqFn​M266​cNai​P9rC​ m9kx​foMi​QBxq​2w1g​tGxz2M31c_​_ iHescxtvu2BLKS5​-lUCi8HsEVWDKDL​/pubhtml​ ?gid​= 0​&single​=true The whole interview can be found at the following link: https://notizie​.virgilio​.it​/s​-maria​ -capua​-vetere​-ex​-detenuto​-sedia​-a​-rotelle​-testimonianza​-1489094. The translation of the excerpt from English to Italian was made by Elisa Privitera. Excerpts translated by Elisa Privitera from the following link: https://ristretti​.org​/santa​ -maria​-capua​-vetere​-e​-morto​-enzo​-ex​-detenuto​-in​-carrozzina​-che​-denuncio​-i​-pestaggi

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6. Ayah-intervened ageing and advocacy for a “knowledge from below” for old-age care in India Sayendri Panchadhyayi

6.1 INTRODUCTION Recalling her stint of providing advanced cancer care, Shoma, a careworker, states: The nature and intensity of suffering from cancer has varying effects on people and their lives. Once I attended to a breast cancer patient who could not move for 2 months; she developed bedsores due to an extended period of bed confinement. Contrary to this established logic, another factor that can trigger bedsores is poor cleaning of the excretory regions. To prevent this, hygiene supplies should be changed frequently. Secondly, a patient should be turned sides in an interval of at least 2 hours. Circumspection, promptness and presence of mind can mitigate the risk of bedsores.

Shoma’s view of the source of bedsores and measures to mitigate discomfort from turning into chronic pain is one of many instances of ayahs stepping up as active agents in intervening and planning home care for the elders. Although India is known for a relatively young demography, between 1961 and 2011, the structural composition underwent a drastic change (Rajan & Balagopal, 2017). The number of young-old has decreased, and the number of oldest-old has increased. From 2001 onwards, there has been a sharp growth in the number of older adults. The National Statistical Office’s (NSO) Elderly in India 2021 report projected an increase to 194 million by 2031 (Nahata, 2021). Increased life expectancy and lifespan (Lee, 2008) for many in their old age amounts to living with intensive care due to acute and chronic pathologies (Seymour, 2000). In response to this care conundrum, the World Health Organization (WHO) introduced the term “healthy ageing” to promote environments conducive to the well-being of older adults. As healthy ageing is closely tied with the density of social bonding within the family network, an upward trend in the international migration of adult children (Plackett, 2022) has caused concern. With the rise in dispersed families and atomisation, the long labour hours of the echo boomer generation (Dautzenberg et al., 2000), and translocal mobility or transnational living (Baldassar, 2008, 2016; Baldock, 2000), anticipation of such individualistic normative standards in the Global South looms large. These co-evolving streams spurred by neo-liberal globalisation pose challenges to adaptation to a changing social environment, finding means of continuity in a hybrid world, and rethinking newer prospects of arranging care (Lamb, 2009; Izuhara, 2010). A longer lifespan in the resource-scarce, low-to-middle-income (LMIC) countries of the Global South translates to managing within a healthcare system entangled with the old-age related chronic disease burden (Shetty, 2012). Projections suggest that the formal healthcare needs of older people in the Global South will not be adequately met. The National Policy on Older Persons in India is targeted towards a population below the poverty 82

Ayah-intervened ageing and advocacy  83 line, wherein middle-income families requiring assistance are not covered by the pension scheme. A paradigm shift in the retraction of the welfare state in the developing economies of the Global South ensues, causing impediments in access to minimum health standards, health disparity for the older populace, and cost escalation in medical care (Lloyd-Sherlock, 2002). Developing countries in the Global South assume family and women as the primary caregivers, confining carework within families, naturalising care work, and leading to the rollback of the welfare state through privatised schemes (Hochschild, 2003; Williams, 2012; Palriwala, 2019). These knotted vicissitudes have made studies and questions on alternative, extra-ageing care facilities and services more germane than ever. In the Indian and South Asian cultural repertoire, elder care is construed as divine worship (Vatuk, 1990), seva (Lamb, 2000), and respectful service (Lamb, 2007), critical to the functioning of family, an expression of filial piety, mutuality, moral indebtedness, duty towards elders, and a continuity of the values of adult children (Fine, 2015; Brijnath, 2012; Ugargol & Bailey, 2021). To eschew caregiving is to abdicate responsibility and transgress moral boundaries, signifying a failure of parents to correctly raise their children. Urban India is witnessing a shift from a family-centred, homebased intergenerational care idealised for ageing well, to outsourcing to ayahs, a local term in West Bengal (located in the eastern part of India) and several parts of India, used for paid female care workers attending to elders and children. Aligned with this background, the chapter deep-dives into ayah care work for elders in private homes, their deliberations and considerations at exigent hours, and proposes for leveraging their “healing labour”, and critical and sentient vantage.

6.2 LITERATURE REVIEW Established in the compendium of literature, ayahs were key to eighteenth-century British colonial domesticity (Banerjee, 2022). While cooking and cleaning were helmed by men, intimate corporeal labour like bathing and clothing was carried out by women. The term ayah stems from the Portuguese word “aia” referring to nursemaids, governesses, or tutors who shaped European imperial domesticity (Conway, 2016). They were responsible for the physical and emotional care of British children and women throughout the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries (Banerjee, 2022). These ayahs were of mixed race, including Christian converts, although Hindu and Muslim ayahs also existed (Chakraborty & Grover, 2022). Their employment in pre-colonial and colonial India signifies class and caste entanglements (Grover, 2018). Under such circumstances, outsourcing care labour and turning to paid care underpins these complexities (Grover, Chambers, & Jeffery, 2018). Today, the term ayah extends to female caregivers employed in the institutional settings of hospitals and nursing homes, carrying out residual care work under the supervision of trained nurses (Basu, 2020). In the 1930s, working-class women were excluded from employment in the agricultural and industrial sectors and instead entered domestic services (Banerjee, 2004). The influx of ayahs within public services and healthcare organisations is seen as a result of women’s participation in out-of-home employment (Basu, 2020). However, moving towards ayahs for elder care has similarities with Bengali urban middle-class households that rely on domestic workers (Ray, 2000). Around the 1990s, India saw a sharp rise in the domestic care economy characterised by its feminisation (Grover, Chambers, & Jeffery, 2018)

84  Handbook of social justice in the Global South that goes uncounted in GDP while the intimate tasks of care labour “slip out” and enter the market (Razavi & Staab, 2010). The kind of servitude that emerged in the wake of postcolonial modernity demonstrates a collusion between altruism, love, and care that drives women of the underclass from the Global South into the realm of affective labour, a continuation of the domestic sphere of women in the Global North (Ray, 2019). Paid domestic service reinforces and reproduces the asymmetries within society (Raghuram, 2001). Chakraborty and Grover (2022, p. 299) write that the “small community of colonial and contemporary white families in India employed and continue to employ specialized female caregivers familiar with western domestic practices, labelled as ‘ayahs’”. Further, the findings in this chapter suggest that female caregivers hired for elder care or childcare in West Bengal are referred to as ayahs irrespective of the ethnic identity of the employers. It is imperative to flag here that the ayahs interviewed for this study worked for middle-income, upwardly mobile, Banglaspeaking families. Ayahs are frequently pitched against nurses by both doctors and families of patients on the grounds of professionalism, skills, technical know-how, training, and medical expertise (Basu, 2020), and are pigeonholed as unskilled, incompetent, inferior, and dubious. Notwithstanding that nurses are relegated below doctors (Ehrenreich & English, 2010), nurses too have a “nursing elite” to strengthen occupational status through cultural capital or merit, and sharpen the boundaries against unqualified carers (Abbott 1998;Ray 2016, 2019, & 2020). This could be an offshoot of the four-fold metaparadigm of nursing that recognises nursing as a science and an art, fine-tuned through institutionalised, structured, and regimented training (Schim et al., 2007) deeming professional nursing as highly esteemed. Within institutional healthcare settings, ayahs are below the hierarchy of nurses, senior nurses, and nursing attendants (Basu, 2020). Although in hospitals, their responsibilities overlap with the junior nurses and trainees, ayahs are hired on a casual basis and are not recognized as employees, while junior and trainee nurses are at least part of the hierarchical structure, as found by Basu (2020). Ray (2016) locates the differentiation in the nursing profession within the larger debate of the casualisation of labour in the wake of liberalisation, wherein the minority elite healthcare workers and healthcare professionals are protected and the majority of healthcare workers at the pyramidal bottom are excluded from benefits, protection, and security. The nursing profession lies at the cusp of formalisation and informalisation, prestigious and dirty, and trained and untrained (Ray, 2019). The splintering in the nursing profession into the dichotomies of “prestigious” and “dirty” emerged due to the historically situated caste-class nexus of care work (Ray, 2020). The “professional projects” of nursing are couched in the gendered class formation that has allowed middle-class, upper-caste women in India to monopolise educational qualifications and skills. Despite such polemics and scepticism, ayahs have emerged as a lynchpin in the care network of older people. Their practices stem from observations and experiences amassed and expressed throughout the life course. Beyond the threshold of institutionalised, scientific, biomedical knowledge, a local vernacular knowledge system unique to their cultural world becomes a legitimate framework for developing a culture-sensitive care model. Care labour could produce distinct social relations that are normative and formative (Lynch et al., 2021). Home care work is relational as its temperaments and trajectories are contingent on the carer– care recipient dynamics; intimate high-dependency care impedes parity in the participation of women who are default carers, both in its paid and unpaid roles. Social justice and questions of equity are consequential not only for those doing the care work but also those receiving

Ayah-intervened ageing and advocacy  85 care – those with the most needs (Williams, 2012). In pace with the social justice framework, this chapter takes a stand for the visibility and inclusion of the ayahs, recognises and champions their contributions, and appeals for their appraisal as rights-bearing citizens. This is a departure from extant mainstream research on care labour that tends to decentre the care meted out to those in most need – the vulnerable older people in acute pain, chronic illness, and with mobility limitations. Echoing the argument of Puig de la Bellacasa (cited in Lynch et al., 2021), caring that evolves out of human dependencies and interdependencies is essential for human survival. Lynch et al. (2021) acknowledge the moral imperative, the exclusion and neglect of those from care, violence and violations committed in the guise of care, the affective relations of care work with its power, status, class and caste markings, and attest it as more than a socially-reproductive market-capitalist derivative. It is the essence of relational existence in an increasingly individualised world order. Care work is ethically informed, normatively driven, other-centred, and its intent is to collaborate with others in a non-alienable way. Care is a social good and a moral-ethical threshold to redistribute care responsibilities, and draw attention to social investment for reducing the disparities and inequities stemming from the macro-social processes and micro-capillaries of power (Held, 2004; Williams, 2012; Palriwala, 2019). Thinking of the best care practices that transcend human lives at the vulnerable junctures of the embodied self and the environment of care, a reaffirmation to human dependencies and interdependencies is congruent with care justice. The ontology of care justice, conforming to its relational essence of shared vulnerabilities and in its departure from the navel-gazing subject, ties up the loose ends by centring both the caregiver and the care recipient. The illness of an older person shifts and recalibrates the lives of people around them (Bury, 2001). There are many aspects to understanding illness, and its remedies are often made sense of through a local cultural framework (Kleinman, 2020) that underpins the sufferings and symptoms of a health condition experienced by the patient and the wider network. Human suffering is born out of culture and deepens with socio-structural factors (de Medeiros and Black, 2015). A culturally-aware framework can appreciate the locally embedded meanings of illness, the multiple channels through which illness and care exist, and the “microcontext of experience” (Kleinman, 1992). Relationship-centred care (Wu et al., 2020), culturally appropriate and affordable models of care (Brijnath, 2012), and integrated, person-centred care (Baru et al., 2010) are some recent suggestions for effective care. Cultural competence, embodying principles of patient-centred care, including empathy, responsiveness to patients, and exploration, is deemed as essential for healthcare (Betancourt, 2004). According to recent developments, there has been a rallying around patient-centred care (PCC), whereby patients and their needs are treated holistically and responsively, and valued in clinical decision-making (Delaney, 2018).

6.3 THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK Following the lineages of critical and cultural gerontological traditions, this chapter commits to mainstreaming an ayah-centred approach that merits primacy to the performative character of carework, the context and content of knowledge, and situatedness in reciprocal exchange. Through its critique of empirical positivism, biogerontology, and ageing as a project of “biopolitical governance” (Lamb, 2014), critical gerontologists advocate for a humanistic

86  Handbook of social justice in the Global South approach to the questions of ageing (Moody, 1992). With social justice at its heart, critical gerontology encapsulates power relations, asymmetries, the cultural context, and scrutinizes the processes of age and ageing. In line with the tenet of critical theory, and looking beyond medicalisation thesis and clinical-orientation in old-age, the emphasis here is on viewing the processes of ageing, the consequences of illness, and the mechanisms of care adopted by the ayahs. Bodies in the processes of ageing are discursively produced, and the reality of the body permeates into the analytic framework (Twigg, 2004). The concept of “below” here, much along the lines of Ryder (2015), captures the essence of ayahs as inferior, derivative, and secondary to their more sophisticated counterparts – the nurses. This results in their delegitimisation in the public discourse and popular imagination. While there is an overlap between the ayahs and the domestic workers in terms of work and status (Chaudhuri, 1994), together with the intimate tasks and the bodies of older people turning into the site of solicitude politics (Panchadhyayi, 2023), distinguishes ayah carework from its allied activities. Ayahs’ experiences offer insights on bodies in care, the location of the bodies under care, and the relationship between the carer (ayah) and the care recipients, resonating with Harding’s (1992) standpoint epistemology. Much like Harding’s appeal for starting with women’s experiences, this chapter begins with the experiences of ayahs in the production of knowledge on care for later-life adulthood. By acknowledging their responses and approaches as socially situated, it undergirds ayahs as important actors and stakeholders in old-age care, and places them at the forefront of knowledge generation. Through conscious deliberation of the knowledge claims of those who are epistemologically disadvantaged, there is a greater possibility of addressing questions to design a culturally-sensitive care model. Ayahs treat healing and well-being as a human practice and illness as an entangled lived experience , a radical alternative to the professionalised overtures of healthcare. The felt experience of illness is not entirely subjective; rather, it is situated in an interpersonal, mediating, intersubjective sphere of transactions, engagements, and communications. Suffering is part of the lived flow of interpersonal experience in “local moral worlds” (Kleinman, 1992). Drawing on this, the study acknowledges the formatting, rhetorical strategies, and idioms in ayah-centred care narratives to peruse the entwined social, psychological, physiological, and cultural factors in health and sickness.

6.4 METHODS Inductive, qualitative in-depth interviews (IDIs) were conducted with 30 ayahs (paid care workers) recruited through peer networks, domestic help, and the snowballing technique. Each interview lasted between 30 and 60 minutes. Case studies were conducted with 16 families with ayahs in service. Communication with older patients was based on (a) permission granted by the families and (b) older patients who could communicate and were willing to participate. Home-site micro-ethnography was conducted between November 2019 and March 2021, coinciding with the COVID-19 phase. Hence, contact with older adults in care was avoided or mediated through physical distancing in adherence to ethical protocols. Ayahs in charge of two-member, multi-generational, or single-member families with co-present family caregivers or potential family caregivers in translocal arrangements were recruited. The ayahs interviewed for this study, inadvertently, turned out to be women between the ages of 30 and 55, belonging to lower caste groups, locally referred to as chhotolok, a caste-laden slur.

Ayah-intervened ageing and advocacy  87 They reside in semi-urban locales and overgrown urban slums in rented residences in Kolkata in the eastern Indian state of West Bengal. All these ayahs were hired on a live-out arrangement, i.e., they commuted back and forth from their residence to that of their employers. The only exception was an elderly ayah who served as a live-in, full-time ayah. At the time of the interview, she was on leave and visiting her home. The ayahs are native Bangla speakers and conversed in Bangla. The researcher, also a native Bangla speaker, could probe the ayahs with cross-questions and clarifications. The ayahs were interviewed either in their homes or the home of their employing families. In the latter case, ayahs were monitored and, hence, they formed their responses carefully so as not to offend their employers. In contrast, ayahs in their home settings seemed more at ease, verbose, and open about their experiences. The overlap of the fieldwork timeline with the COVID-19 pandemic posed difficulties in accessing the the residential homes of the participants. It was the facilitators acting as contact points who intervened and explained the purpose, and it was the relational dynamics between the facilitator and the participants that made the ethnographic field visits and subsequent interviewing possible. Following a pilot family case study conducted between October 2019 and November 2019, a semi-structured questionnaire and an interview guide were prepared. The questions were centred around the nature of the illness of the older patients, steps taken by the ayahs to intervene and alleviate sufferings, their decisions on appropriate measures, the influences behind such decisions, whether they received support from family members while tending to the patients, and their motivation to provide care. Raw data were collected and transcribed verbatim in Bangla (the language in which the participants responded) and later translated into English with the aim of analysing the punctuation, pauses, refusal or avoidance of responses, and interruptions along with the one-to-one responses. Written transcripts were sifted through several times to identify the key themes, and audio transcripts were cross-checked to avoid confusion. Native terms used by the ayahs were kept intact to underscore how a set of vocabulary and terminology specific to the ayah sub-culture serves as a reference point for them to assess the veracity of illness, care, or patient. Timestamps were used in the verbatim transcripts to refer to the sample quotes and vignettes that aligned with the thematic cluster of the study. Data were analysed using Braun and Clarke’s (2006) six-step model of thematic analysis as the research concentrates on generating knowledge rooted in the everyday human experience. According to the authors, thematic analysis is useful for analysing a large set of qualitative research data through categorisation and identification of themes and sub-themes. Sample quotes and vignettes of care narratives re-posed in the localised context were selected to examine the modalities through which ayahs interpret and tackle illness and sufferings, and how these care responses can be optimally harnessed to design a culture-appropriate care model that espouses knowledge-from-below (see Tables 6.1 and 6.2 documenting selective quotes and terms, to peruse the ayah-centred approach). Ayahs enter care service through multiple routes. The first is through registered ayah care agencies or ayah centres that advertise nurses, ayahs, and domestic workers. These serve as supply chains in the allocation of ayahs to families and the circulation of labour. The second is through referrals from an ayah cohort, a paid domestic worker, or a paid cook. Third is through the referrals of families who had hired ayahs in the past and validated their service. The fourth mode of entry is through the role transition of an existing paid domestic worker to that of an ayah. While the first mode of entry is known as the “indirect” mode, as the ayah centres function as intermediaries, the last three are known as “direct” modes. In the case of

88  Handbook of social justice in the Global South recruitment through ayah centres, primary school education is the eligibility criterion. Those with nursing training are shown preference for managing older adults with complicated medical histories, including cancer, disabilities, and bedridden, which require assistive technology for daily activities. Ayah centres levy commission fees from the ayahs that range from 20 INR to 60 INR per day from their daily wage depending on the mandate of those agencies. The duration of work can be for 6, 8, 10, 12, or 24 hours. The remuneration of ayahs recruited through the ayah centres is dependent on the variables of (a) the degree and range of assistive care and (b) the distance commuted to reach the place of work. Those recruited through ayah care centres noted that their work is not permanent, as they move from one household to another with the demise or recuperation of a patient. This renders elderly carework particularly as fluid and precarious.

6.5 FINDINGS 6.5.1 Framing Old-Age: Competing Images and Processes of Ageing Clinical diagnosis is the medical reading of symptoms described by the patient through contextualisation articulated through illness narratives (Jutel, 2009). Through a doctor’s explanation of a disease, individuals seek ways to approach illness. For the ayahs, appropriateness and limits of care stem from the perception of old age in their communities and societies. This framework of reference is a combination of old age as a phase, age within the life course, and ageing as an interactional phenomenon between the biological, cultural, and social matrix, and intimacies familiar to their cultural realities. Behavioural patterns of the patients and symptoms of the disease evoke responses to manage the symptoms that attest to their belief about old age and the process of ageing. As observed by them, refusal to eat, and doing baena (pestering) and non-compliance to the instructions of the ayahs are common traits found among older people with illness. Take the example of Nirmala (27, hired through referral for attending an older woman with Parkinson’s Disease). “Immense effort is required to convince the older lady to have food”.

Some patients use refusal as a micro-resistance against the infantilisation of their selfhood. Moreover, it is a refusal to accept ayah-intervened care. Forbearance and unwavering effort come to their rescue. Nirmala relies on her soft skills such as the ability to convince and secure trust without resigning from her goal of feeding the patient. She straddles between the patient’s latching onto selfhood through resistance and her resolve to feed the patient through tactics like tuning in to music or videos, storytelling, and diverting their attention. There is a belief among the ayahs that older people, especially older men, show signs of physical intimacy and some end up touching the ayahs inappropriately. Such incidents are a testament to the powerlessness of ayahs and women within the matrix of caste-class-gender in highly informalized occupations, reeking of employee safety and security. Such untoward behaviour borders on taboo and can elicit stigma for the ayahs. To protect their personal integrity without offending the patient, as the latter may not have actual control over themselves, ayahs veer toward strengthening and reinforcing the boundaries. This is done through explaining to the patients that their relationships are marked by distance and their hiring is

Ayah-intervened ageing and advocacy  89 strictly for care. Nonetheless, they are aware of the corporeal marginality following age and illness onset. By that logic, there is a view that their gradual loss of health capital and debility cannot pose a “real” threat. In a bid to de-intensify the veracity of such escalations and rationalise the plausible reasons for inappropriate touching or sexual innuendo (however, this is not to undermine in any way the perils and precarities encompassing intimate labour for women with a history of caste-class oppression), at times they embrace a parental approach through temporally/perpetually juvenilizing the patient. This is due to the image of a child as mostly unable to fathom the caveats of social norms and requiring constant supervision, explanation, and molly coddling. Bodies turning cool and dry is another feature of old age. Lower resistance to cold and wrinkled skin reinforces this belief. The antidote to coolness involves seeking ways to induce warmth, such as through an oil massage to promote blood circulation and increase temperature. Acts of caressing and pressing the limbs serve as assurance, compassion, and empathy. Another strong view among them is letting go of maya in later-life, meaning detaching from the material world and aiming for mukti (liberation). This is consistent with Lamb’s (2000) ethnographic findings about Bangla society that detachment in the senior stage is a step in combatting the extension of the person and disassembling personhood. The objective is to aspire for moksha, a permanent release from transient materiality, worldly pleasures, or maya. Decentring through relocation either inside or outside the household (Lamb, 2000) (moving from the centre of activity or socialisation to inactivity) and severing ties is their projected symptom. With this transition from the centre to the periphery, elders move up in the hierarchy of junior-senior relations. Elders becoming quiescent, limiting interactions, and desocialising through cold responses are presumed to be decentring from activity and slackening the noose of maya. For ayahs, old age is a distinct phase, a discontinuity from the earlier chapters in the life course; this disengagement from worldly affairs ensues in chronic illness or advanced illness onset. This is reminiscent of life courses segmented into stages of generational ageing in India, characterised by changes in the family cycle (Vera-Sanso, 2004). Instead of treating this transition as pathological, they show empathy. They respect the boundaries and refrain from coercing their elderly patients to meander from this route. This consideration encourages the elders to trust the ayah, establish rapport, and value her presence, especially when she is on leave or decides to exit from her service. Symptoms of incontinence, uncontrollable bleeding, respiratory wheezes, mobility dysfunctions, or bedsores that aggravate bodily pain and suffering and spill over into social life are linked to kormofol – unscrupulous acts and profanity committed across the life course. Affliction, physiological incontinence, terminal illness, and bad death are part of atonement or retribution. Another view pertaining to old-age-related maladies is that these result from low-density intergenerational relations, degeneration of warm intimacy, or fractured ties with personal networks who could have alleviated and obviated sufferings through early interventions and affective dispositions. In times of crisis, it is the family that acts as an anchor as South Asian kinship norms articulate the obligations and responsibilities towards healthcare across the generations (Palriwala, 1994). As illness represents a crisis, intergenerational and intragenerational solidarity can preclude it from taking a catastrophic turn, at worst by the absence of co-present family caregivers. In a climate where care work is transferred to hired caregivers, ayahs invoke ideals, standards, and parameters of care embedded in reciprocity. This is their strength. The use of kinship terminologies in conversations with strangers is “brokering relationships” and “invoking bonds of reciprocity” (Brijnath, 2012). Such references strengthen the ayah-older person dyad as these terms

90  Handbook of social justice in the Global South

Table 6.1  What does it mean to care? Imaging and construction of old age

Symptoms ​

Symptom management ​

“Second” childhood ​

Refusal to eat, tantrums, disobedience/ non-compliance ​

Tactile-affective care, distraction, and endearing terms​

Trope of desexualisation/Celibacy of the elders

Inappropriate touching of the ayahs

Strengthening and reinforcing boundaries; parental approach

Cooling and drying of the body and hence yearning for ushnota (warmth)

Wrinkled skin, low body temperature, and crying as a cue

Increasing body care/touch as old bodies seek warmth; composite caregiving

Old age as the threshold to release maya, detach and let go ​

Quiescent, retreat and desocialise through cold response

Acknowledging transition and not invading the boundary​

Pain, malady and “bad death” linked to taboo behaviour in the life course and prayeschityo (atonement), low density of relation with the family network, and dent in care capital

Incontinence, bleeding due to cancer, paralysis, pressure sores ​

Assistive daily living (ADL); amelioration of intergenerational and interpersonal conflicts through talk; promptness (proactive) and equanimity (pause and ponder)​

are laden with commitment and responsibilities towards the person. The deification of older people in the Global South permeates the practices of care that involve deference rules. All these attest to the enduring significance of kinship and filiality in thinking of and articulating expectations of care in South Asia. See Table 6.1. 6.5.2 Illness and Dependency-Based Typologies of Elders The second thematic cluster is the standards and parameters determining the degree of labour, dependency of the elders, and the measures to prevent disruption in care and promote continuity. The early years of western gerontological scholarship, through the categories of wellelderly, somewhat impaired elderly, and frail elderly (Quadagno, 2013) forged a hierarchy of older people based on their functional health. On the other hand, to identify older patients in different degrees of dependency, stages of illness, and support services, ayahs have developed a workable vocabulary conceived out of their native language, local-moral settings of existence, and cultural scripts immanent to the ayah sub-cultures. Instead of a clinically approved framework for diagnosis, treatment, and remedy loaded with impenetrable techno-medical jargons only intelligible to trained medical specialists, these terminologies born out of everyday familiar speech allow the ayahs to transcend the predominant and esoteric boundaries of the professional sphere. It facilitates elder care and succour through sharing cues with their cohorts to signify the resources, availability and the nature of support, hours of commitment, and furnishing details pertaining to the entanglements, complexities, frontiers, and challenges

Ayah-intervened ageing and advocacy  91 of care in old-age. The moral social world, with its cultural orientations (Kleinman, 1992) and social processes, shapes the health and illness experiences of individuals (Casey, Proudfoot, & Corbally, 2016). A striking feature in the ayah sub-culture is the shared illness idioms (Kleinman, 2020) or shared vocabulary on the typology of older people based on the degree of dependency. The ayahs’ commonly used terms for older patients are: (a) haanta patient, (b) showa patient, (c) chagano patient, (d) bhalo patient, and (e) baje patient. Haanta or haantano (can walk) patients refer to those in need of partial ambulatory assistance for mobility or those who can walk without support or assistive devices such as a walker or walking stick. They are not fully dependent on a caregiver for their daily activities, especially body waste discharge. Due to their ability to perform non-assistive movement, ayahs need to remain alert to prevent injury from the risk of fall due to imbalance. As a result, they feel attending to such older people demands constantly being on guard and vigilant, which possibly offsets their preference for taking care of such a patient. A commonly used idiom by the ayahs is “chokhe chokhe rakha” (keeping an eye), which underpins the laborious alertness that no one prepares them for except for their cohorts. Showa (lying in bed) patients refers to bedridden patients who can barely get up without being hoisted and consequently have their activities confined to the bed. Such patients are dependent on ADLs (Activities of Daily Living) that include feeding, toileting, brushing teeth, combing hair, and all kinds of personal care tasks. For showa patients, waste discharge arrangements like a catheter and bedpan are installed adjacent to the bed, turning the home space into a quasi-nursing home characterised by assisted living. Showa patients may require feeding support with rice tubes, and ayahs adopt a restarined approach while feeding to prevent the risk of choking. Showa patients require medical contingencies like a bedpan, molly sheet, adult diapers, cotton, and gloves. The dependency of such patients necessitates intimate body care that may incur stigma for both the ayahs and the patients. Due to this, ayahs grapple with the dilemma between performing healing labour for well-being and the disgust of dealing with the waste elements of the human body. For the patients, such intimate body care dependence amounts to a loss of selfhood and stigma as one’s privacy is on display. This routinisation and normalisation push them to further demoralisation, detachment from the world around them, and to retreat within. The remuneration for attending to a showa patient is higher for those recruited through placement agencies. Chagano (hoisting) patients refers to patients who require assistance for hoisting and turning sides, and therefore are subsumed within assisted daily living (ADL). As the term suggests, handling chagano patients demands that the ayah has physical strength and vigour. The term bhalo (good) patient suggests that the person requires minimum effort for mobility support, is not a showa patient, concedes to the instructions of the ayahs, and displays no visible symptoms of senility. This is juxtaposed with a baje (bad or difficult) patient, which refers to someone who is intransigent, confrontational, difficult to manage, requires supervision, and is prone to ADL, or a showa patient with physiological incontinence. Ayahs have reported that dealing with older adults with dementia onset is difficult as they possess limited capacity to retrieve information, require repeated reminding, and behave erratically. Patients with advanced-stage cancer or a malignant disease are subsumed as baje, as caring for cancer patients amounts to end-of-life care. This categorisation enables an ayah to assess the degree of dependency, labour, and commitment required for the patients. However, through interaction with the patient and the personal network of caregivers of the older person, ayahs realise that relational dynamics within the web of caregivers converts to care capital in old age. Here,

92  Handbook of social justice in the Global South

Table 6.2  Assessment of dependency and degree of care Terminology in ayah subculture (native/vernacular terms)

Translation

Technical term and implication on labour

​ aanta H ​

​ alk around/capable of W moving around ​

​ upervision; partial ambulatory assistance; S move around with walking-assistance device; less physical rigour for the caregiver; low dependency​

​ howa S ​

​ edridden B ​

​ igh-complete dependence; assistance with H body waste discharge; expertise in installing urinary catheter and bedpan; bathing.​

​Chagano

​Needs to be lifted​

​Double-handed care

​Bhalo

​Good

​ oordination with family caregiver; physical C strength

​ aje/Kharap B ​

​ ad B ​

​ rone to bedsores; P absence of physiological incontinence; obedient; not senile; good death dementia onset; paroxysm; physically violent; verbally abusive; end-of-life care; cancer care; unbounded body/bodily disintegration​

care capital translates to the availability of caregivers in a crisis and the ability to harness the resources of the caregivers. See Table 6.2. 6.5.3 Changing Personhood, Disrupted Self, and Resistance A rudimentary challenge besetting the ayahs is a transitionof self experienced by an elder at the interface of illlness and coporeal disruption. As the elder teeters between the former self and the new self, ayahs need to facilitate care attenting to these changes. Patients may become difficult to manage, repeatedly escalate, and turn defiant to any form of affection and gesture. Dealing with such behaviour for a long-term may obviate ayahs from “patienter duty”, a term prevalent in their occupation and synonymous with old-age care. This in turn may make them opt for childcare. The presence of an ayah for affective care and the “absent presence” of family members through instrumental and managerial care is an emerging phenomenon in home-care units. Adaptation to an assigned ayah is temporally dependent for the elderly. However, an ayah who had transitioned from paid domestic help is often more readily accepted due to familiarity and proven credibility through a resume of long-term service. Byabohar-e, nijer jaegata toiri na korle, porer ta kora jae na, tai jonyo bole na jar bari duty korbo, se amar apon, abar nijer bari’r hole ashle se amar apon [It is important to embrace the patient’s family and project good behaviour. Both my family members and the patient’s family members are my own]. Komola (32, recruited through referral)

Ayah-intervened ageing and advocacy  93 The notion of “apon kore neowa” and “atwitiyota” recurred in several interviews with the ayahs. For the ayahs, it predicates intimate bonding and experiencing filiality. They ideate long-term quality care through re-establishing human contact, assuming the role of an ally as an elder experiences transition, and becoming privy to their repetitive illness narratives. As an elder writhes from chronic pain and succumbs to suffering, the embodied, physical copresence of the ayah as a companion in this trajectory of malaise and malady becomes salient. Besides the variables of respite, ambulatory, disability, end-of-life, and assistive care, an ayah is hired for companionship. Within their oral culture, it is defined as “shongo deowa” (providing companionship). Companionship in later-life care is a key element of healing labour. As feelings of loneliness, isolation, and devaluation worsen with home confinement and mobility limitations, ayahs emerge as reliable figures by offering a pathway to multi-sensorial caregiving. With suffering appearing increasingly individualised, leading to the disrupted self, ayahs represent a beacon of hope and collectivity. The presence of ayahs within the familiar and familial environment of home, along with co-family members, posits an expansion and consolidation of the care network and an extended community. Ayahs oscillate between the blurring boundaries of embodied pain experienced by the older adult and the latter’s interpretation of affliction. Suffering represents flickering hope for reconnecting with the past, the ancestral, and the childhood through revisiting the “desher bari” (ancestral home). This suggests the significance of the “cultural landscape”, spatiality in ageing, and home as a desirable “caring geography” (Carlander et al, 2011) of continuity, intimacy, and inclusion. It is conducive to ageing (Ratzan, 1980; Barrett, Hale, & Gauld, 2011). This to an extent explains the hesitancy of hospitalisation often is synonymous with alienation and distanciation (Boamah et al., 2021). Ayahs make sense of difficult behaviour of patients as related to their reticence over biological and functional ageing, and accepting the inevitability of the cycle of birth and death. Dependency in old age can reinforce ageism. A possibility of “double dependency” may emerge in old age – one is through disability and another is through dependency on the ayah who is not from one’s kin network. Whilst assisting older people with activities of daily living like feeding and release of body waste, ayahs become an embodied extension of the elders. For older people, this dependency is redolent of their irreversible and permanent patienthood status. At times this becomes their only, one-dimensional identity. As the multi-dimensional self of the older person recedes to the periphery, the major challenge for an ayah is to reintegrate their personhood without infantilisation and mollycoddling as it can provoke resistance. The defiance of older people to eat using their own hand as against the insistence of family members for assistive feeding undergirds the competing interests between the self and the others. With suffering, the body becomes a vehicle in perceiving the world (Csordas, 1994; Williams, 2003); dysfunctions of the body and visibility of its aspects can have a debasing effect on the self. In the case of double-handed care, an older person is hoisted from the bed and reclined on the bosom or the lap of the ayah for feeding. . Hoisting a patient with disability is a skill as negligence portends the risk of fatal injury. In urban India, the primary causes of death for older people are non-communicable diseases (NCDs) like stroke, cancer, diabetes, and heart diseases. The commonly identified diseases in old-age range from chronic lung disease, hypertension, asthma, diabetes, stroke, and depression (Baru et al, 2010). Attending to older people with diverse healthcare needs is tackled through on-site observation, hands-on experiential learning, instructions received from the family caregivers and family physician, an oral culture with their ayah cohorts, retrieving information from everyday life, and exigency-oriented responses. As intergenerational care in India is anchored

94  Handbook of social justice in the Global South in the episteme of seva and dharma (Lamb, 2000, 2009; Samanta, Chen, & Vanneman, 2015), doling out care to an ayah creates a predicament. Hence, non-compliance of an elder to ayah-intervened care can be read discontentment with this alternative and non-familial arrangement of care. Patients can hurl objects at the ayah, or throw food, or spill it on their body. While mental illness and dementia are stigmatised within Asian societies (DilworthAnderson, 2012), ayahs who have dealt with AD patients or were privy to this transition, and hence are prescient of the needs and peculiarities of such elders. Instead of pathologising difficult behaviour, they identify the impact of illness sprawling out to verbal and non-verbal expressions on their daily lives. Caregiving to an older person demands an in-depth understanding of the multiple and intersecting dimensions of ageing, such as (a) old-age as a separate phase in a person’s life course, with emergent changes which shape the self and social exchanges. Older people come to terms with the “boundary conditions” of experiencing ageing, which include failing memory, infirmity, and declining health (Lloyd, 2015); (b) old-age as a continuation rather than a disruption; (c) resilience against biological processes, general poor functioning, and social tropes that buttress ageism; (d) longing for human warmth as bodies grow cold, loneliness, shrinking personal networks, and empty nest syndrome; and (e) cultural canons of “age” and “ageing”. The competing, entangled, and intersecting dimensions of old age become even more complex with the onset of frailty. Older adults with symptoms of dementia or onset dementia tend to forget the activities of their daily itinerary. There are incidents of them forgetting about meal consumption and accusing the ayah of dereliction. This may embroil the ayah in a situation whereby their integrity comes under scrutiny. On her experience of attending to an older woman with Parkinson’s Disease (PD), Nirmala (29, recruited through referral) iterated that those expressions of anger served as a cue to feed her, upon finding a connection between anger and hunger in the case of the older lady whom she addressed as “dida” (a kinship term that refers to maternal grandmother in the Bangla language) 6.5.4 End-of-Life Care and Bereavement Assistance Fostering hope and reaffirming (Eliott & Olver, 2007) the stages of life in the face of decay can be draining. As the reality of decrepit dying sinks in, older people may retreat. They might display “oniha” (disinterest) in eating, bathing, or engaging in any activity connected to life and being. Awareness of impending death creates a “living-dying” existence (Riley, 1983). The person learns to cope with the epidemic of chronic loneliness, bereavement, and loss of identity. Social-emotional support for end-of-life care entails maintaining dignity and esteem till death. Death represents ambiguous loss (Boss, 2007, 2009). Copp (1997) found that nurses adopt a shared framework or “conceptual map” comprising shared meanings to engage with the needs of a dying patient. Nurses feel a moral obligation towards end-of-life care patients (King & Thomas, 2013). There is a tendency to sequester the dying in a different room of the house and get rid of the intimate belongings of bedding to escape the adversity posed by death. Attending to patients in the EOL (end-of-life) stage makes ayahs feel death is closer to home (Glaser & Strauss, 1965). To cope with the emotional toll of EOL care, ayahs may take a break from care before resuming their service in another household or they may switch to childcare. However, childcare brings its own challenges as the mothers wish to raise children based on their cultural standards and familial norms. As a result, ayahs struggle to conform to such expectations.

Ayah-intervened ageing and advocacy  95 Although ayahs with experience of EOL care patients appear more controlled in their emotions, as quasi-filiality and immersion intertwine in implementing care as “nijer moto” (the filial/the blood/the kin), a death following extreme suffering is poignant, as it is related to past malpractices or unethical approaches. Ayahs draw on the biography of older people and their actions across their life course and leverage their personal reflections in the face of nontraining. This is not to project professional nurses and ayahs as absolute, discrete categories without any convergence. Ayahs with long-term experience can anticipate death from the bodily signs. Communicating about impending death through these observations is not easy, as family members may not like the disclosure. This is despite the acceptance of human transience and decline as meaningful and normal in the cultural discourse (Lamb, 2014, 2015). The shock and emptiness that follow the death of a patient become a pull factor to retain the ayahs for bereavement support until the closure of mourning rituals of the deceased person. This hints at an underreported aspect of the ayah profile, which is to facilitate the bereavement process, and provide support through emotional labour and companionship to the family members.

6.6 CONCLUSION A social justice framework that dovetails the healthcare landscape, processual and social ageing through the life course, and discursive practices of care and labour is essential to address the ramifications of ageing in a changing and fragmented social environment of the Global South. The care justice principle, while acknowledging the rights of the care recipients and care workers, recognises care as the binding thread of social connections and social dynamics. Through ethnographic narratives and vignettes, the paper establishes ayahs as critical actors in elder care and caregivers alongside the mainstream, professional, and normative family networks. Steering clear of “ageing” as alarmist and a problem to be solved, and anti-decline and medicalisation overtures stemming from the Global North-centric discourses (Samanta, 2017, 2018), ayahs script a novel direction by refocusing on dynamic personhood, entwined living, and relationality at the cusp of recovery and decline. Loyal to the ontology of care justice, an ayah-centred approach is the holy grail to undoing the stereotyping and compartmentalisation of ayahs, moving towards a revisionist turn in home care, salvaging healthcare from the gatekeeping of medical care professionals, and recentring care as a relational activity. Care involves social relations, and ayahs spearheading care work refocus on such deep-rooted ontological standpoints of caring for and caring about elders as part of the ethical choreography and rights of the older people. Speciality-based medical training focuses on certain body parts rather than the wholepatient, holistic approach (Liaschenko et al., 2011). The expert regimes and proto-professionalisation increase the demand for professional services and bureaucratisation, and reduce individual initiative (Chatterji, 1998). Treading the lines between the efficiency of a professional nurse and the homeliness of a domestic worker, an ayah develops her own framework to foster well-being and derive purpose. A social justice approach further underpins care work as time-intensive with stages of planning, intervention, assessment, and implementation. Caregiving for older people within the precincts of private homes means experiencing intimate belonging. At the same time, home-site care can obfuscate or sharpen boundaries

96  Handbook of social justice in the Global South for the formal paid caregiver with the older person and their live-in family members, rendering it complicated, contentious, unsettling, and entangled. To create overlapping continuities with domestic chores and domestic cooking is reductive, simplistic, blinkered, and obtuse. An emphasis on anchoring family relations, consolidating the density of relations with the existing care network, and affectual labour to ensure an abundant supply of care and adequate support against degeneration is fulcrum to ayah-centred care. The undercurrent of this labour correlates with the cultural framework and the broader practices prevalent in the community. Ayahs view their labour as healing, spiritual, and transformational in promoting the well-being of patients in different stages of the life course, different stages of recovery, and dependencies. Caring for an elder in India lingers on the ideas of seva, that within the ayah sub-culture embodies altruism. Interestingly, ayahs perceive the idea of care, caring, and care labour as oriented towards the body as a whole, the family as a whole, and life in its entirety. Their interpretation and delivery of care are geared towards care justice or de-stigmatised and dignified ageing irrespective of the health condition of the elders. Seva here moves a step beyond harnessing feminine skill sets; for the ayahs it is rooted in the philosophy of healing, recuperation, service, reintegration, and interlocking ties. The transformational potential to make a difference in the life of a person in crisis is associated with punyarjon (virtuosity and righteousness). With care justice at its heart, the grounded, bottom-up, and anti-reductionist threshold departs from a “victimhood” representation prevalent in the surfeit of work. The emphasis on relationality in carework, a contrast to the separatist view of human individuals, prompts important questions of affective relations, performing affective care, and the asymmetries that emerge during the exchange and in its aftermath. Ayahs in this study, through their sentient and dynamic modalities, highlight the significance of caring for and caring about the elders as an ethical-moral imperative rather than a tangential pursuit. Hitherto, an ayah-centred approach (ACC) espouses integrating ayahs in pushing the frontiers of home-care, evinces alternative prospects of later-life planning consistent with the social justice paradigm that favours knowledge from below, and puts in place practices and strategies to resolve the care puzzle germane to the Global South. Lessons drawn from the ayahs can be momentous and enriching for the intersections of anthropology of care, ethnography of suffering, and cultural gerontology. Elder care can be salvaged from the trappings of the top-down Global Northcentric care narratives, can address ageing and care in the Global South as a locus amplified by institutional faultlines, re-establish the boundaries of informal care, and commit to a social justice approach in carework that is also geared towards caste justice.

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7. Health communication and social justice: A Global South perspective Rati Kumar, Iccha Basnyat and Parameswari Mukherjee

7.1 INTRODUCTION Health discourses are not value-neutral and often emphasize market-based solutions, obscure structural inequalities, and construct health as an individual “choice” of consumption (Dutta, 2015; Zoller, 2017). Thus, health interventions focused on the Global South have been narrowly concerned with effective health messages that would produce the desired behavioral outcomes in the target community as determined by the experts located in the West/North (Dutta, 2022). For example, Dutta and Basnyat (2008) investigated a participatory project in a USAID-sponsored radio drama in Nepal that promoted family planning and found the enlisting of participatory channels, such as creating women’s groups in the community to push the agenda that focused on individual behavior change around family planning practices that promoted a two-child limit, and in turn obscured structural health inequities such as access to healthcare faced by the community members. Dutta (2022) argues that the Global South occupies the position of marginalization in health interventions focused as development strategies generated from the Global North and directed at the Global South. Further, mainstream discourses on health have traditionally focused on the individual body, emphasizing individual-level behavior change while pushing environmental problems and structurally driven socioeconomic health issues as peripheral health experiences. For example, in a content analysis, Bhalla et al. (2019) examined news stories from three English newspapers in India for news coverage of Delhi air pollution between 2011 and 2016. The results from the study indicated that personal-level causal attributions to individual behavior or individual lifestyles, such as owning cars or personal auto emissions, were mentioned more frequently than societal-level causes, such as industrial emissions. These media narratives problematically shift the focus away from structural issues of resource depletion and capitalist responsibility, instead erecting fallacious arguments about the oversized role of individual behaviors in affecting environmental degradation and associated health concerns (Tesh, 1994). Conversely, the structural approach defines health as embedded within access to social, economic, and political resources (McKnight, 1988; Tesh, 1994) and prioritizes structural change as a means of reducing access inequities that increase disease susceptibility (Waitzkin, 1983). Within this discourse, Global South communities have historically suffered from the material and discursive violence of the mainstream Eurocentric structures of policymaking and knowledge creation – what de Sousa Santos (2014) terms the “cognitive injustice” of marginalizing knowledge and wisdom historically present in the Global South, including dismissing practices of solidarity as legitimate forms of participation in contrast to the primacy accorded to Western ideas of individualism, claims to an objective science, and knowledge ownership. For example, in dissecting the traditionally studied areas within the field of sociology, Krause (2016) describes the marginalization of Southern scholars due to a lack of academic capital 101

102  Handbook of social justice in the Global South resulting from inaccess to (what is traditionally upheld) model systems or subjects of study within Western academia (for instance, studying the city of Chicago within urban sociology). In setting up these disciplinary norms for what constitutes a relevant area of study, geographically and philosophically, neoliberal universities materially and communicatively exclude the Global South as a legitimate space of knowledge creation. These pre-established inequities then permeate think-tanks and institutions, generating research, policies, and development strategies on seemingly universal issues of health, migration, and environmental violations for global dissemination. Communication scholarship, too, has traditionally developed with a focus on Northern elitist assumptions of health as a development project within the Global South, bypassing the voices of the communities and reinforcing similar capitalist institutions of the North in developing and implementing public health communication strategies (Dutta, 2022). In this chapter, we trace erasures of the Global South health discourses within health communication and outline the emerging community-based, critical, and culturally centered scholarship drawing on environmental injustice and migration as examples. In so doing, we reiterate the importance of health justice that turns our attention to the health and lives of marginalized populations disproportionately impacted by injustices and inequalities.

7.2 GLOBAL SOUTH & HEALTH COMMUNICATION In tracing Global South definitions, Mahler (2017) notes that the foundations of the oft-used spatio-econo-political definition lie in West-centric politics of extraction, demarcating the Global South as a set of economically disadvantaged nations, primarily lands of brown and Black peoples. This broad definition, based on imperial logics defined by capitalist forces of the Global North, precludes any attention to the polylithic nature of the Global South as itself a space composed of privilege and marginality and is remiss in the examination of the role of capitalist imperialism in the creation of these spaces. In other words, Dutta (2022) argues that the Global South is both a cartographic and material signifier, referring to historically colonized spaces in the South and later sites of neocolonial interventions. In fact, substantive communication scholarship, specifically health communication scholarship, has emerged from studies carried out through development aid projects executed by the North onto the South (Dutta & Basu, 2018). Within these spaces, discourses about health emphasize market-based solutions, obscure structural inequalities, and construct health as an individual “choice” of consumption (Dutta, 2015; Zoller, 2017). We observe how the economic impetus of the earliest exclusionary definition of the Global South continues to manifest through sites of knowledge production, locating the emancipatory potential of critical scholarship as flowing primarily from the North to the South. For instance, Castro Torres and Alburez-Gutierrez (2022) in reviewing the phrasing of more than half a million social science research article titles, found that empirical articles written by authors affiliated with institutions of the Global North, using data from these countries, are less likely to include geographical references in their titles, creating a claim of universality on scholarship from Northern academic spaces and located in the North; conversely, they found that scholarship from authors affiliated with global South institutions and using evidence from global South countries tended to have names of these countries within the article’s title, suggesting the localized nature of its knowledge, diametrically opposite to the universal claims of Northern scholarship. Similar impulses have traditionally been the prejudiced touchstones of disciplines like communication, with scholars

Health communication and social justice  103 such as Dutta and Pal (2020) and a collective of Global South scholars such as Dutta et al. (2021) calling for an unlearning of the Western theoretical paradigm and imagining theorizing from authentic Global South spaces. For our purposes, we describe the global South as “extractive zones” (Gómez-Barris, 2017, p. 3), or “floating zones” (Dutta & Pal, 2020) both in the geographic North and South, erased from access to material and communicative resources, and find resonance in the Global South as deterritorialized zones across the world, occupied by people of color, suffering from imperial extractions based on White privilege. One such example is that of the vulnerable citizens of Flint, Michigan, in the United States, who have been navigating an ongoing crisis of contamination since 2014 when lead began leaching into the water supply. As a primarily Black community, with 40 percent of Flint residents living below the poverty line (Kennedy, 2016), it illustrates the capitalist demarcation of these “Global South” zones, even in the North. Extending the definition of the Global South as a space of extraction, scholars such as Dutta (2022), López (2007), and Prashad (2012) also locate the South as a space of resistance and transnational solidarity among political subjects who have suffered or are suffering from similar colonial and imperial subjugations. In communication studies, Dutta (2022), Dutta and Basu (2018), Dutta and Pal (2020), Dutta et al. (2021) elucidate ways in which we can move to recognize solidarities across marginalized communities and work actionably towards a practice of theorizing through a Global South lens, challenging the status quo of traditionally North/West-centric disciplines such as communication. Here, we align closely with the outlining of a transformation in the field of health communication, moving it away from its top-down transmission model of health information dissemination to passive subjects, instead incorporating narratives of cultural communities into decision-making around health. Despite billions of dollars being invested in health promotion efforts globally, health disparities continue to exist both in traditionally assigned Global South countries such as Bangladesh, China, India, and Nepal and in the North, such as within the United States and its capitalist allies of Canada, Japan, and Australia (Angdembe et al., 2019; Dutta, 2020; Chin et al., 2018; Guo, 2020; Hall & Crosby, 2020; Islam et al., 2020; Nakatani, 2019; Ronquillo, 2020; Shah, 2019), re-emphasizing the nature of Global South spaces as not only geographically bound locations but rather discursive spaces marked by unequal power relations.

7.3 APPROACHES IN HEALTH COMMUNICATION In this section, we provide an overview of the approaches used in health communication, making an argument for moving the discipline forward by centralizing a social justice perspective aimed at addressing health inequalities. This is particularly relevant, as much of the dominant literature and theoretical approaches have been anchored in the North/Western hegemonic notions of knowledge about health and erasing the South as sites of knowledge production (Dutta et al., 2021). Consequently, the implementation of health communication interventions as development strategies approaches the Global South sites of knowledge production as extractive zones where local spaces and knowledge are erased. Dutta (2022) argues that the knowledge systems from the South are largely erased and are marked as primitive and in need of Northern interventions. Mainstream development strategies are built from Western modernization theories that suggest local traditions prevent developing countries from leapfrogging towards modernity, and such communication efforts become tools to promote ideas,

104  Handbook of social justice in the Global South technological innovations, and behavior changes that would lead to the industrialization of traditional societies (Dagron & Tufte, 2006). 7.3.1 Individual Behavior Change Health communication campaigns have a long history of focusing on individual behaviors. Behavioral approaches to health promotion are rooted in social and cognitive psychology (Baum & Fisher, 2014) where individual rationality, such as perceived susceptibility, risk, self-efficacy, intentions, behaviors, attitudes/beliefs, and cues to action, have been the backbones of health promotion campaigns. Behavior change theories, such as health belief model (HBM), stages of change/transtheoretical model (TTM), social learning/cognitive theory, theory of reasoned action (TRA), theory of planned behavior (TPB), loss and gain framing, diffusion of innovation, and extended parallel process model (EPPM)/fear appeal, have been at the heart of many behavioral health promotion campaigns. For instance, Cornacchione and Smith (2012) note that TTM and message framing are the two most commonly used theoretical models in health communication for behavior change interventions. Similarly, Jones et al. (2015) note that HBM is one of the most widely applied theories of behavior change in health communication. More recently, Zhang et al. (2015) noted the extension of TPB to social networking sites that promote behavior change and health communication interventions. Similarly, Sundstrom (2015) noted that health communication researchers have always been interested in the diffusion of innovations to advance health information-seeking through different communication channels. Likewise, Lewis, Watson, and White (2013) noted that over two decades, EPPM has represented the most contemporary fear-based persuasion efforts in health communication campaigns. Behavior change-driven health promotion strategies operate in the information deficit model. Thus, health promotion campaigns are information-driven tools intended to persuade individuals to adopt and follow expert prescriptions for health behavior change. Dutta (2008, 2015) critiques this approach as being devoid of cultural context, with health promotion campaigns becoming a conduit for inducing pro-development individual behavior change based on a top-down flow of communication from the centers of authority to peripheral developing locations (i.e., Global South). Furthermore, Dutta (2015) argues that the traditional approach to health communication practice that places the expert as central to effective intervention treats “culture, as a passive placeholder of backward traits of traditionalism and as a relic of the past, [to be] targeted through communication interventions” (p. 126). 7.3.2 Entertainment-Education In the context of the Global South, Entertainment-Education (E-E) has been the predominant intervention framework for promoting individual behavior change as part of development strategies (Dutta & Basnyat, 2008). E-E is the process of intentionally placing educational content in entertainment messages in order to increase audience members’ knowledge about an educational issue, create favorable attitudes, and change overt behavior (Singhal & Rogers, 2002, 2012). E-E’s basic premise takes root in social learning theory, which asserts people learn by observing others’ actions and the benefits of those actions, in addition to their own experiences. Theoretically, E-E also takes root in individual cognitive and behavior change theory and focuses on the individual as the locus of change. However, its application extends

Health communication and social justice  105 to efforts of social change. Therefore, Singhal and Rogers (2002) discuss “collective efficacy” in their theorizing of E-E for social change at the community level. Based on Bandura’s work, Singhal and Rogers (2002) defined collective efficacy as “the degree to which people in a system believe they can organize and execute courses of action required to achieve collective goals” (p. 128). Although E-E programs emphasize both individual and collective efficacy, Singhal and Rogers (2002) note that the definition of E-E is “limited, in that it implies that individual-level behavior change is the main purpose of this communication strategy” (p. 127). Thus, E-E has been criticized for its emphasis on the cognitively rational individual removed from the discourse of the cultural context within which behaviors are situated (Dutta, 2006). Singhal and Rogers (2002, 2003) note that two sets of communication scholars were the nodes of theorizing and applying E-E interventions in the Global South. The first group of scholars were located at Johns Hopkins University. These scholars drove the international diffusion of E-E projects in Asia, Africa, and Latin America through Johns Hopkins University’s Center for Communication Programs (JHU/CCP). The second group, operating from the University of Southern California, the University of New Mexico, and Ohio University, also drove the international diffusion of E-E projects in Asia, Africa, and Latin America through Population Communications International (PCI), a non-governmental organization headquartered in New York City. Both US-based research and intervention programs on E-E were directed primarily at family planning programs in developing nations. Around the same time, E-E was becoming popularized through other international organizations such as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) work in Africa, the BBC World Service Trust’s work with the Indian government, and the Population Media Center, an NGO headquartered in Burlington, Vermont, which had E-E initiatives in Ethiopia, the Philippines, Sudan, and Swaziland. Dutta (2006) critiqued the location of E-E agendas in the landscape of Western hegemonic development politics, situated in the realm of powerful funding structures within the US, and equally powerful universities and civil society organizations located in the United States. In fact, scholars argue that health campaigns structured in Global South spaces through powerful institutions have the capacity to shape the contexts in which problems and solutions are determined through a one-way transmission of knowledge practiced paternalistically (Dutta, 2008; Dutta & Basnyat, 2008). Increasingly, the concept of culture was incorporated into development programs (Dutta, 2015) as a way to address the critique of expert-driven approaches characterized by the individual-focused, West-driven development paradigm. 7.3.3 Cultural Context The notion of culture as a focal point for effective health communication is best exemplified by two culture-based interventions: cultural sensitivity (CS) and the culture-centered approach (CCA). With the turn to culture as a part of development communication, CS became a strategy for tailoring interventions mapped to cultural characteristics. The CS approach is the extent to which the target population’s cultural characteristics, values, beliefs, experiences, norms, and behavioral patterns are incorporated in the design, delivery, and evaluation of targeted health promotion materials and programs (Resnicow et al., 2000). Furthermore, Resnicow et al. (2000) note that CS can be conceptualized as surface and deep structures. Surface-level structure “involves matching intervention materials and messages to observable social and behavioral characteristics of a target population” (p. 273), such as using pictures of

106  Handbook of social justice in the Global South people or familiar music, language, foods, brand names, or locations. Deep structure focuses on cultural, social, psychological, environmental, and historical dimensions of health behavior, such as “how members of the target population perceive the cause, course, and treatment of illnesses as well as perceptions regarding the determinants of specific health behaviors” (p. 274). Thus, Dutta (2007) argues that for a CS approach, the focus is simply on creating health messages by identifying and adapting to the “observable” characteristics of a culture, such as language, food, clothing, religion, locations, music, etc., in order to be most effective in the development of successful health messages. In other words, CS positions the role of the expert as essential in delivering knowledge in developing spaces and continues to focus on health messaging for behavior change rather than incorporating local voices and participation. This means that CS, when it locates the expert as the central part of program design and implementation, places the community and people as secondary and, as such, doesn’t respond to the broader structural features of inequality and marginalization. Dutta (2008) formalized the culture-centered approach (CCA) as an approach to health communication that aimed to “transform the global co-optation and erasure of subaltern communities” (Dutta, 2015, p. 131) in health communication. Thus, CCA takes root in subaltern theory, “which explores the absence and presence of the subaltern position from dominant spaces of knowledge” (Dutta, 2007, p. 310). Subaltern theory incorporates post-colonialism, which refers to the response and resistance to colonialism. Thus, CCA focuses on exploring the possibilities of fostering multiple pathways of health interventions rooted in culture by incorporating subaltern communities but situated within the historical social, political, economic, and cultural practices of colonialism. Dutta (2007, 2008) argues that the dominant development-focused health communication paradigm silences the voices of the Global South by excluding them from the problem definition and its subsequent intervention. Therefore, CCA positions individuals as fully involved in the health communication campaign intervention efforts, from the conceptualization stages of the problem definition to designing and implementing solutions that are meaningful for them (Dutta 2007, 2008). CCA values community members as equal contributors to the development project by centralizing the voices of cultural participants. Thus, the voices of the cultural participants become the focal point, and CCA provides an avenue to position marginalized voices within their cultural contexts by allowing the meanings to emerge from the participants (Dutta 2007, 2008). It is only through engagement in dialogue with the cultural insider that the local meanings of health can be articulated and understood (Dutta & Pal, 2010), and ultimately interventions are developed through this process of dialogue. CCA then also lays the foundation to build critical health communication work focused on addressing health inequities/inequalities. 7.3.4 Critical Health Communication Extant literature around critical health communication scholarship aimed at addressing health inequities/inequalities indicates how individuals residing in underserved communities, particularly in the Global South, are erased from communicative processes and discursive spaces by economically powerful actors and dominant social configurations located in the West, which (re)produce conditions of exploitation, exploitative relationships, and subalternity (Dutta, 2014; Dutta & Basu, 2018). Health inequities are structural in nature, which necessitates dialogically engaging with subaltern voices to bridge the gap between the health-rich and health poor (Dutta & Dutta,

Health communication and social justice  107 2013). For instance, Hernandez and Upton (2019) interrogated the racial and gender violence around the health of migrant Latin American women and children at the US-Mexico border and discussed the institutional and societal structures that reify health inequity. Thus, critical health communication scholars highlight that health proje​cts/c​ampai​gns/p​rogra​ms/ef​ forts​/inte​rvent​ions in subaltern spaces must foreground participant voices to galvanize social and political changes. For instance, using the framework of CCA, women farmers in India identified the public health concerns within the farming communities besides the primarily discussed suicides of agriculturalists. The local articulations helped foreground health meanings among the farming community, emphasizing the “embodied politics of change that is fundamentally tied to reworking the politics of food, agriculture, and the ecosystem” (Dutta et al., 2019, p. 12). Furthermore, pro-market neoliberal health policies perpetrate a gap between the rich and poor as transnational agencies “are allowed to pursue their own interests essentially unfettered by national or international state institutions” (Ganesh et al., 2005, p. 170). For instance, organizations such as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation implementing developmental and philanthropic projects such as Water Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) in South Asia use technocratic and technological values such as “getting new sanitation products” and selling “low-cost solutions” to communities in poverty, while doing little in terms of structural investments in health systems in low-income [Black and brown] countries (The Lancet, 2009). In consonance with this view, critical health communications scholars note that dominant funding agencies/global health organizations (such as the World Health Organization, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, UNICEF, and USAID) have failed to achieve collective participation by centering cultural context as a way of defining health priorities and potential health solutions because of the politically nondisruptive nature of the health interventions that ultimately remain a top-down linear modernist development model (Tesh, 1994; Zoller, 2010; Peterson & Lupton, 1996). Thus, theorizing health communication approaches and practices innovatively and inclusively is paramount to understanding and dismantling the hegemonic dominant power relationships at play in the marginalization of the Global South.

7.4 HEALTH (IN)JUSTICE IN THE GLOBAL SOUTH: MIGRATION AND ENVIRONMENTAL DISCOURSE In this section, we draw on case studies of environmental justice and migration from the Global South to illustrate material and discursive erasures, the significance of cultural context and dialogue in challenging the dominant North/West-driven paradigm, and strategizing a disciplinary move toward addressing health inequities that center the Global South. The disparities in discourse and scholarship surrounding issues of environmental justice and migration serve as reflections of broader material inequities in dominant spaces of policymaking, healthcare, and knowledge production. Thus, studying discursive erasures becomes not only about data making visible the unequal treatment and discrimination but also about laying bare the form of state/institutional violence inherent in these capitalist processes. The systemic violence perpetuates chronic or long-term physical, mental/emotional, and spiritual harms, resulting in premature death (or deaths that can be prevented) for the cultural members residing in contaminant-affected communities. This calls for interrogating the complex entanglement of

108  Handbook of social justice in the Global South histories of oppression and racial capitalism, settler colonialism, enslavement, racial privilege, and environmental injustice (Kojola & Pellow, 2021). Environmental Injustices. These North/South power differentials mar the lived health experiences of cultural communities at the periphery of the status quo. Various stakeholders seek to control and dominate natural resources and minoritized communities in pursuit of profit maximization (McIntyre-Brewer, 2019). In 1984, the Union Carbide pesticide plant in Bhopal, India, responsible for the world’s deadliest industrial accident (the Bhopal gas disaster) continues to impact the lives and health of the local communities (Bullard, 2002; Shiva & Shiva, 2020). Bullard (2002) elucidated, “It is not a coincidence that the only place in the United States where methyl isocyanate (MIC) was manufactured was at a Union Carbide plant in the predominantly African American town of Institute, West Virginia. In 1985, a gas leak from Institute’s Union Carbide plant sent 135 residents to the hospital” (p. 36). Moreover, Butt et al. (2019) note that between 2002 and 2017, 1,558 people in around 50 countries, particularly those residing in minoritized communities, were killed for protecting and defending their land, forests, water, and other natural resources from waste-generating factories and multinational companies. The authors indicated that the above-mentioned number of deaths is “more than double the number of the United Kingdom and Australian armed service people killed on active duty in war zones over the same period (n = 697) and almost half as many as the number of US soldiers killed in Iraq and Afghanistan since 2001 (n = 4,044)” (p. 742). These examples speak of how the communities at the margins globally are at the receiving end of the violence of toxic pollution due to economic and industrial growth and activity. The practice of corporations dumping toxic waste on lands where minoritized communities reside is not new nor exclusive to a certain geographic location. Governments across the globe continue to participate in environmental racism, which Chavis (1993) described as “racial discrimination in environmental policymaking, the enforcement of regulations and laws, the deliberate targeting of communities of color for toxic waste facilities, the official sanctioning of the life-threatening presence of poisons and pollutants in our [people of color] communities, and the history of excluding people of color from the leadership of the environmental movement” (cited in Pezzullo, 2003, p. 247). Similarly, environmental justice can be utilized for understanding contemporary toxic waste dumping in the global North, as “extractive zones” (Okafor-Yarwood et al., 2020). The 2019 Canadian documentary film, There’s Something in the Water, examines how contaminated water and toxic landfills led to elevated rates of cancer among First Nation and Black communities in the province of Nova Scotia, Canada. The film transcends the physical manifestations and tolls of the toxins and pollutants on the minoritized body and makes visible the intergenerational effects of environmental injustice. In one of the interviews/clips in the film, Michelle Francis-Denny, the granddaughter of a former Pictou Landing First Nation chief, narrates how the then local government officials lied to her grandfather to secure the consent and rights of Boat Harbor (an estuary), which was an important resource (used for fishing and hunting) for the Indigenous community. Later, the provincial government allowed a pulp and paper mill to dump toxic effluent into the estuary, turning Boat Harbor into a toxic site. Elucidating the toxic violence of settler colonialism, Francis-Denny narrated how her grandfather’s guilt over Boat Harbor was inherited by many in their family, most of whom are dead by suicide, cancer, alcoholism, or drug addiction. Similarly, highlighting the inequities of toxic violence in Global South countries, marginalized communities often occupy an intersection of erasures, such as community members living along the Cooum River in Chennai, India, who first suffered from the effects of industrial

Health communication and social justice  109 waste dumping and then forced displacement under the pretext of river restoration. Other Global South communities suffer the health effects of structural violations and environmental injustices, such as those in Thailand’s toxic hot spot Map Ta Phut Industrial Zone, Indigenous Ecuadorians suffering from their land’s contamination by Texaco Oil, and the residents of San Juan Ixhuatepec in the path of the PEMEX (Petróleos Mexicano’s) industrial explosion (Arturson, 1987), overall resulting in increased morbidity and mortality rates (Pellegrini et al., 2020; Zhongming et al., 2020) within these extractive zones. Migration. Displaced across or within national borders, migrants often occupy the margins, either as voluntary (for education or higher wage employment), forced (as with refugees and asylum seekers), or an overlooked category of reluctant migrants (such as low-wage labor forced out of the local labor market of their place of origin). Some migrants exist at the intersection of environmental injustices and forced migration, while others result of facing wars, political conflicts, and economic collapse in Global South countries due to North-aligned imperial policies. The International Organization for Migration (2020) estimates that globally, there are currently 272 million international migrants, 740 million internal migrants, including 150.3 million migrant workers, and 25.9 million forcibly displaced refugees. Not only is the material burden of this displacement borne by bodies of migrants from and within the Global South, but simultaneously, the narrative surrounding migration is co-opted by West-centric institutions where South-to-North migrations are positioned as the problem at hand while obfuscating the extractive role of Northern elites in precipitating their displacement. For example, migrant and seasonal farmworkers across the globe suffer from the effects of agrarian capitalism imposed by the food supply regimes of Northern elites (Rogaly, 2021) with the racialized exploitation of labor structurally innate to the inequitable accumulation of industrial capital (Manjapra, 2018). In the United States, the legacy of anti-Black racialized agricultural slavery within U.S. farmwork structures has metamorphosed into the exploitation of low-wage migrant labor from Central and South America in states such as California and Florida among others (Goldman et al., 2021; Sellers & Asbed, 2011) resulting in a deepening public health crisis within the population. In Europe, ethnographic scholars highlight the racialization, “refugeeization”, criminalization, deportability, and invisibility of sub-Saharan African migrants engaged in tomato-picking for Italian export (Melossi, 2021), and also explore the intensification of labor control amidst violations of the health rights of migrants within the U.K. horticulture industry (Rogaly, 2008). However, broadly, the political discourse surrounding migration ignores the study of SouthSouth migration, violations, and solidarities, with Southern elites erasing the material and discursive rights of cultural communities lying outside of the modernist development model. For example, within Asia, dominant political actors such as China, India, and America position the Rohingya genocide as an intractable issue rooted in Myanmar’s ethnic conflict. However, India and China refrain from intervening in meaningful ways in the region, as both continue vying for geographical access to the Rakhine region as a corridor for oil transportation, vested interests in the potential blue economy, and the oil and natural gas resources of the country (Taufiq, 2019). The United States, on matters of refugee resettlement, selectively chooses to deny refuge to this community (unlike others such as the Chin and Karen from Myanmar) on the basis of its Islamophobic domestic policies, with the State Department calling the Rohingya genocide a “regional issue” requiring a regional solution, despite a long U.S. history of military interventions on the Asian continent (Pennington, 2015). Other examples abound of the intertwined global cycle of migrant extraction and environmental injustices, such as the

110  Handbook of social justice in the Global South maquiladoras across the U.S.-Mexico border, where migrant bodies are exploited for development projects in the Global North (Ebner & Crossa, 2019), with the hazardous waste from these enterprises dumped in Southern zones with lax environmental protections, such as the industrial waste dumping in Mexicali (James & Meyers, 2018), further spurring on the migration of populations from these dangerous conditions. Whether in the arena of policymaking, medical research, or health communication research (until recently), there is predominantly a top-down perspective on policy debates surrounding migration and environmental harm, which continues to be filtered through the Northern lens and resides in Euro-Western institutions rooted in capitalist logic. For instance, in these narratives, migration, and particularly low-wage migration, is positioned as a problem of value-addition within the host country’s economy, either for or against, but always squarely weighing bodies based on their productivity within the labor market. Irrespective of the direction of debate, these push-pull narratives and classifications surrounding migration primarily locate the Global North as the subject (Khan et al., 2022; Khan, 2020; Mehta, 2019), erasing Southern voices and cultural ways of knowing from this discourse, and uncritically putting forth the positionality of the migrant body as bereft of agency. For instance, the current environmental activism movement is widely recognized as being rooted in whiteness to the exclusion of numerous indigenous environmental movements (Farand, 2020). Within mainstream medical and epidemiological scholarship, while there is a plethora of research documenting the health costs of environmental injustices and the structural exploitation of low-wage migrant workers, the response continues to adopt an epidemiological, individual behavior change-level intervention-based model. Such top-down interventions approach the Global South subject as bereft of agency, with their central arguments anchored in the business case for assimilation of marginalized communities as a pathway for improved standardization of existing healthcare systems. Extant research documents the poor health outcomes and occupational hazards of immigrant work, including, for instance, farmworkers who suffer from an increased risk of accidents, pesticide-related illnesses, musculoskeletal and soft-tissue disorders, dermatitis, noninfectious respiratory conditions, reproductive health problems, climate-caused illnesses, communicable diseases, bladder and kidney disorders, and eye and ear problems (Mobed et al., 1992; Moyce & Schenker, 2018). Similarly, forced migrants commonly suffer from respiratory, rheumatological, neurological, gastrointestinal, and dermatological conditions complicated by untreated tuberculosis, diabetes, high blood pressure, and cardiovascular disease, and have an even higher incidence of PTSD, anxiety, and depression (World Health Organization, 2022) arising from the violence of forced migration. Locating communicative erasure as a manifestation of systemic exclusion, CCA scholars have emphasized that it is not necessarily migration but relationships of power inherent in the “border imperialism” (Walia, 2013) of Northern elites, manifesting as employment and immigration infrastructures and state control, which exacerbate the lived experience of ill-health among migrant communities.

7.5 ONGOING AND FUTURE CRITICAL HEALTH COMMUNICATION RESEARCH Echoing broader global research trends and political discourse, historically, health communication has had sparse engagement with the Global South as a legitimate site of knowledge

Health communication and social justice  111 production, constructing the cultural knowledge of communities residing in these spaces as problematic barriers to be overcome in the quest for effective health communication interventions. In response to the predominant top-down models of health communication founded upon the Eurocentric/Western history of the field, scholarship centering cultural narratives of marginalized Southern communities is increasingly broadening the area of study of the discipline. Inspired by scholars such as Airhihenbuwa (1995), Dutta (2008) theorized the culturecentered approach, calling for a centralizing of culture in health knowledge co-creation with communities in “floating zones” of extraction within the Global South. Cultural knowledge systems, rather than being construed as a set of problematic variables through a biomedical lens, are conceptualized as organic, agentic ways of navigating one’s lived experiences of health at the margins by critical scholars focused on social justice. Only recently has the area of communication studies begun interrogating communicative and material issues around environmental injustices and migration primarily impacting the health and well-being of individuals residing in marginalized communities of the Global South (Mesmer et al., 2020; Zoller, 2012; Mukherjee & Sastry, 2020; Kumar, 2021). For instance, Mukherjee and Sastry (2020) illustrate how health is affected amidst agricultural landlessness in the context of groundwater contamination by arsenic in West Bengal, India. The study, focusing primarily on the rural landless agricultural workers in West Bengal – a selection of farmers who are referred to as the “poorest of the poor’’ and who “do most of the production work” (fao​.or​g, n.d., para. 20), indicates that the farmers residing in under-resourced areas not only lack access to safe water but also other basic health capacities (Dutta, 2008) such as nutritious food. Similarly, in their work with refugee communities, scholars have examined the differences between refugee articulations of health such as survival and holistic wellness, as opposed to the epidemiologically based definitions of health utilized by Western healthcare structures (Kumar & Jamil, 2020), centering lived health within the border imperialisms of neoliberal states. In ongoing work with Rohingya refugees in Cox’s Bazaar in Bangladesh, the largest Rohingya settlement in the world, Dutta and Rahman (2021) further draw connections between the use of identifiers such as “illegal” and “forcefully displaced” as opposed to “refugee” as a structural maneuver for denying basic health and human rights to this community. Some scholarship further includes a study of mental health communal coping strategies utilized by Palestinian refugees (Afifi et al., 2019), educational interventions for TB among resettled refugees and migrants (Wieland et al., 2013), and pesticide-use information among farmworkers in the United States (Parrott et al., 1999). On the whole, in the past decade, the work of critical health communication scholars has served as the primary highlighter of issues of health inequalities, environmental injustice, and migrant health from a Southern perspective. The culture-centered approach has emerged as a prominent critical framework for examining health in marginalized settings (Sastry et al., 2021). Critical scholars using CCA focus on the incorporation of cultural communities’ voices from these extractive zones into spaces of policymaking and academic knowledge production, constantly emphasizing communicative erasure as symptomatic of material erasures. These scholars have studied the narratives of care in an aging population affected by urban-rural migration in China (Sun & Dutta, 2016), food insecurity in Singapore (Tan et al., 2017), the establishment of a mutual support relationship between foreign domestic workers and caregivers for those with dementia in Singapore (Basnyat & Chang, 2017), the gendered precarity of female foreign domestic workers in Singapore juxtaposed with self-care as agency (Dutta et al., 2018), and the physical, psychological, and socioeconomic intersections of the lived

112  Handbook of social justice in the Global South health experiences of Bangladeshi migrant labor in the UAE (Kumar & Jamil, 2020). More recently, communication scholars (Mookerjee et al., 2021) have also examined the health experiences of internal migrants in India during the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as the exploitative model of dormitory housing for migrant workers in Singapore (Dutta & Rahman, 2022). Others have explored local meanings of reproductive health vis-a-vis family-planning interventions (Basnyat & Dutta, 2012; Basu & Dutta, 2008), structural determinants of health and HIV/AIDS among long-distance truck drivers (Sastry, 2016), community organizing and response to HIV/AIDS interventions among sex workers (de Souza, 2009), and influences on HIV/AIDS-related communication among men who have sex with men (Basu et al., 2016). Within the aforementioned and emerging critical-cultural scholarship in communication, especially health communication, researchers focus on the community members as agents enacting change within constraining and enabling structures and articulating meanings of health within their lived experiences of health. In contrast to the top-down, expert-driven communication interventions which sideline culture as a problematic variable to be overcome, critical-cultural scholars emphasize the role of culturally derived agentic practices such as religious adherence, spirituality, and maintenance of familial and communal ties as valuable resources within communities at the margins for navigating healthcare structures. Through such South-centric research, culture-centered scholars continue to make space for health justice, centering the global South within health communication and articulating the transformative potential of cultural knowledge as an agency when navigating disenfranchising state structures. Across the range of their work, they consistently highlight the role of structural oppressions within these Southern zones and centrally locate the culturally embedded health narratives of those marginalized by top-down North/West health communication scholarship, thereby demonstrating the possibilities of Southern cultural communities as spaces of agency and producers of knowledge located in the Global South.

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Health communication and social justice  115 Kennedy, M. (2016, April 20). Lead-laced water in Flint: A step-by-step look at the makings of a crisis. National Public Radio. https://www​.npr​.org​/sections​/thetwo​-way​/2016​/04​/20​/465545378​/ lead​-laced​ -water​-in​-flint​-a​-step​-by​-step​-look​-at​-the​-makings​-of​-a​-crisis Khan, T. (2020, March 2). The Global South must create a reverse narrative on migration – soon. The London School of Economics and Political Science Blog. https://blogs​.lse​.ac​.uk​/socialpolicy​/2020​ /03​/02​/the​-global​-south​-must​-create​-a​-reverse​-narrative​-on​-migration​-soon/ Khan, T., Abimbola, S., Kyobutungi, C., & Pai, M. (2022, June 10). How we classify countries and people – and why it matters. BMJ Global Health. https://doi​.org​/10​.1136​/ bmjgh​-2022–009704 Kim, H., & Stanley, B. L. (2022). Health justice. In E. Y. Ho, C. L. Bylund, J. C. M. van Weert, I. Basnyat, N. Bol, & M. Dean (Eds.), The international encyclopedia of health communication. Wiley Online Library. Kojola, E., & Pellow, D. N. (2021). New directions in environmental justice studies: Examining the state and violence. Environmental Politics, 30(1–2), 100–118. Krause, M. (2016). “Western hegemony” in the social sciences: Fields and model systems. The Sociological Review Monographs, 64, 194–211. https://doi​-org​.libproxy​.sdsu​.edu​/10​.1002​ /2059–7932.12008 Kumar, R. (2021). Refugee articulations of health: A culture-centered exploration of Burmese refugees’ resettlement in the United States. Health Communication, 36(6), 682–692. https://doi​.org​/10​.1080​ /10410236​.2020​.171203 Kumar, R., & Jamil, R. (2020). Labor, health and marginalization: A culture-centered analysis of the challenges of male Bangladeshi migrant workers in the Middle East. Qualitative Health Research, 30(11). https://doi​.org​/10​.1177​/1049732320922180 Lancet Editorial. (2009). What has the Gates Foundation done for global health? Lancet, 373 (9675), Article 1577. https://doi​.org​/10​.1016​/S0140​- 6736(09)60885-0 Lewis, I., Watson, B., & White, K. M. (2013). Extending the explanatory utility of the EPPM beyond fear-based persuasion. Health Communication, 28, 84–98. López, A. J. (2007). Introduction: The (post) global south. The Global South, 1–11. Mahler, A. G. (2017). Global South. In E. O’Brien (Ed.), Oxford bibliographies in literary and critical theory. Oxford University Press. Manjapra, K. (2018). Plantation dispossessions: The global travel of agricultural racial capitalism. In S. Beckert & C. Desan (Eds.), American capitalism: New histories (pp. 361–388). Columbia University Press. https://doi​.org​/10​.7312​/ beck18524–016 McIntyre-Brewer, M. S. (2019). Environmental racism throughout the history of economic globalization. AUC Geographica, 54(1), 105–113. https://doi​.org​/10​.14712​/23361980​.2019​.10 McKnight, J. (1988). Where can health communication be found? Journal of Applied Communication Research, 16(1), 39-43. Mesmer, K., Aniss, M., & Mitra, R. (2020). Naturalizing environmental injustice: How privileged residents make sense of Detroit’s water shutoffs. In C. Schmitt, C. S. Thomas, & T. R. Castor (Eds.), Water, rhetoric and social justice: A critical confluence (pp. 149–170). Lexington. Mobed, K., Gold, E. B., & Schenker, M. B. (1992). Occupational health problems among migrant and seasonal farm workers. Western Journal of Medicine, 157(3), 367. Mookerjee, D., Chakravarty, S., Roy, S., Tagat, A., & Mukherjee, S. (2021). A culture-centered approach to experiences of the coronavirus pandemic lockdown among internal migrants in India. The American Behavioral Scientist, 65(10), 1426–1444. https://doi​.org​/10​.1177​/00027642211000392 Moyce, S. C., & Schenker, M. (2018). Migrant workers and their occupational health and safety. Annual Review of Public Health, 39, 351–365. https://doi​.org​/10​.1146​/annurevpublhealth​- 040617–013714 Mukherjee, P., & Sastry, S. (2020). Problem definition and community participation in environmental health interventions: An exploratory study of groundwater arsenic remediation. Health Communication, 37(6), 717–725. https://doi​.org​/10​.1080​/10410236​.2020​.1864891 Nakatani, H. (2019). Population aging in Japan: Policy transformation, sustainable development goals, universal health coverage, and social determinates of health. Global Health & Medicine, 1(1), 3–10. https://doi​.org​/10​.35772​/ghm​.2019​.01011 Okafor-Yarwood, I., Kadagi, N. I., Miranda, N. A., Uku, J., Elegbede, I. O., & Adewumi, I. J. (2020). The blue economy–cultural livelihood–ecosystem conservation triangle: The African experience. Frontiers in Marine Science, 7, 586.

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8. Challenging hegemony Indo-Fijians, Roy Krishna, and the New Global South Masculinities Rohini Balram and Jorge Knijnik

8.1 INTRODUCTION Rugby is the dominant sports discourse and practice in Fiji. iTaukeis1 play it and it has a large fan following among all Fijians. In Fiji, hegemonic masculinity is fielded, reflected, and reproduced in rugby, and soccer is perceived as a softer and more feminised sport. Men from Indo-Fijian backgrounds and iTaukei represent club and national soccer teams, unlike rugby, which does not allow Indo-Fijians to play. A significant number of studies have been carried out in the field of Fiji rugby, investigating a series of social issues, including gender topics in this sport (Connell, 2018; Kanemasu & Molnar, 2013; 2017; Lakisa et al., 2020) and also race, ethnicity, and class issues about rugby and soccer in Fiji (James & Nadan, 2020; Sugden, 2021; Sugden et al., 2019). However, there is a dearth of literature regarding Fijian sporting celebrities who do not play rugby. Therefore, this study discusses the sporting career of (Indo) Fijian soccer-sporting icon Roy Krishna, who played in professional top leagues in Australia, New Zealand, India, and the Fijian national team (Cama, 2020). We want to draw attention to how young Indo-Fijian women perceive Krishna’s gender performances and the effects Krishna’s masculinity has on the development of various gender identities among Indo-Fijian youth. We also highlight how these gender identities intertwine with race discourses. Data for this study come from ethnographic fieldwork undertaken in Fiji over one year as part of the first author’s doctoral studies. Data collection methods comprised arts-based and visual research methods (poetry ethnographies and photo elicitation interviews) and were used to illuminate what gender and physicality in sports mean for young Indo-Fijian women in Fiji. During the fieldwork, our participants showed a lot of interaction and affection towards Krishna. The participants’ connection to this player and how his gender performances changed and challenged their gendered stories wove a new stream of data worth further investigation. As a result, we ask in this chapter: How do gender and racial hierarchies in Fiji affect Roy Krishna’s masculinity? How does his perceived masculinity impact Indo-Fijian sporting women?

8.2 HISTORY AND POSITIONALITY OF INDO-FIJIANS IN FIJI During the indenture period (1874–1916), some 60,965 Indian indentured labourers were brought to Fiji to work on sugarcane plantations (Ali, 2004; Lal, 1983). Despite the deteriorating caste system in Fiji and the Indian traditional practices and cultures, colonial powers alienated the Indians and natives, preventing the development of a multicultural identity. Moreover, 118

Challenging hegemony  119 native landowners did not renew Indo-Fijian farming land leases after the 2000 coup, fearing that the Indians who toiled on the land might claim ownership (Ali, 2004; Besnier et al., 2018; Lal, 1983; 2000). Therefore, many evicted farming families moved to squatter settlements in Suva to look for work (Besnier et al., 2018). British colonial agents introduced rugby to Fiji in the late nineteenth century to help divert iTaukeis from traditional, violent cultural practices (Presterudstuen, 2010). Rugby then played an essential part in boys’ formal education during the early decades of the twentieth century (Guinness & Besnier, 2016). However, Indo-Fijian boys were excluded from these schools and from rugby (Guinness & Besnier, 2016). The embodiment of nationalism through rugby defines Fiji as a nation belonging to the iTaukeis, which excludes the Indo-Fijians (Guinness & Besnier, 2016). Such exclusions impact the position of Indo-Fijian boys and men in the Fijian gender hierarchy (Sugden, 2020). Thus, the national sport of rugby excludes Indo-Fijians (men and women) and non-able-bodied and gender-non-conforming men of all ethnicities (Besnier et al., 2018). As for soccer, it is considered an Indo-Fijian men’s sport in Fiji, despite the men’s national team and club-level teams representing both Indo-Fijian and iTaukei men (Sugden, 2021). Rugby and the military have contributed to the ideas of racial hierarchy (Teaiwa, 2005), practices of racist exclusion (Kanemasu, 2018; Presterudstuen, 2010; Sugden et al., 2020), and racist violence via racial-based military coups (Naidu, 2008). Therefore, it is crucial to incorporate the various forms of racism that Indo-Fijians experience into the race discourse (Solorzano & Yosso, 2001) in order to examine Fijian masculinities. Despite all island nations undergoing colonialism, Fiji is the most militarised independent nation in the Pacific (Teaiwa, 2005). In Fiji, the military constitutes political power, has instigated two coups (in 1987 and 2006), ousted the democratically elected government, and has been implicated in terrorist acts against members of the Indo-Fijian community (Teaiwa, 2005). Rugby is their national sport, reflecting the military’s hegemonic position (consisting primarily of iTaukei men). Like many military groups worldwide, they also “profess” nation and nationalism. Moreover, with the supremacy of iTaukeis (who are predominantly Christians (Tomlinson, 2006)) in the military, the aura of Christianity dominates (Teaiwa, 2005). As a result, militarism and Christianity are closely related, and the expression of Christianity in Fijian culture, where other religions are minorities and are marginalised, strengthens indigenous identity (Kanemasu & Molnar, 2013). Consequently, several layers intersect: “milit​ary-r​ ugby-​natio​nalis​tic-p​owerf​ul-Ch​risti​anity​-raci​al domination-hegemonic masculinity”, positioning Indo-Fijians as political and sociocultural subordinates by the colonisers and also the Indigenous Fijians (Kanemasu, 2018; Sugden et al., 2020), who still perceive Indo-Fijians as vulagis2 (Naidu, 2008; Tarte, 2014).

8.3 POSITIONING ROY KRISHNA AND SOCCER IN FIJI’S HEGEMONIC MASCULINITY SCALE Roy Krishna is a Fijian professional footballer of Indian origin who captains the national Fijian football team and is an Oceania Football Confederation ambassador.3 Krishna has been playing football in the Indian Super League since 2019, and as of 2024, he plays as a forward for Odisha FC4 (Kumar, 2022; Sportstar, 2023). Roy Krishna is a descendant of Indian indentured labourers. Like many Indo-Fijians in Fiji, Krishna’s roots are in India, and where exactly his forefathers came from is unknown. Krishna

120  Handbook of social justice in the Global South was born in 1987 to a Hindu family in a small town called Labasa, located in the northeastern part of Vanua Levu (Fiji’s second-largest island). Krishna began his football career by playing for the Labasa Football Club (Nand & Narayan, 2021), joined the New Zealand Football Championship in 2008, and became a naturalised New Zealand citizen. Krishna, while playing for Wellington Phoenix (the New Zealand team that is part of the 10-team A-League, the top-tier professional competition in Australia), was announced the 2018–2019 best player of the A-League and won the Golden Boot for scoring 18 goals in that season, the maximum by any player, in 25 games (Nand & Narayan, 2021). Krishna captained ATK Mohun Bagan FC, winning the 2020–2021 Indian Super League Championship; he was the top joint goal scorer in two seasons and the Golden Ball winner in the 2020–2021 season. Moreover, Krishna has achieved what no other Fijian soccer player has by scoring a goal against Mexico in 2016, becoming the only Fijian football player to ever score a goal at the Olympics (Kumar, 2022; Peter, 2021; Sharkar, 2019). Soccer is Fiji’s second most popular game (for men) and is considered an Indo-Fijian/ migrants’ sport (Hay, 2006; Prasad, 2013), and softer in comparison to rugby, a sport dominated by iTaukeis (men) (Besnier et al., 2018; Kanemasu, 2018; Sugden, 2020; Teaiwa, 2005). Rugby is one of the most crucial tools for young iTaukei men to show their manhood and redeem themselves as accountable citizens (Besnier et al., 2018).Rugby is prominent in Fiji and the South Pacific islands, Australia, and New Zealand (Connell, 2009). Rugby was introduced to the major Pacific Islands of Fiji, Samoa, and Tonga through imperial (British) colonisation and the evangelisation of Christian missionaries. Its aggressive, athletic, and dynamic character quickly came to figuratively embody the traditional cultural role of Pasifika5 men once it was formally established as a sport with a competitive component. This development made it a site for creating masculinity among Pacific Islanders (Horton, 2014). Moreover, rugby league, frequently accused of encouraging hyper-masculinity in Australian culture, is quickly becoming a Pasifika majority-played sport (Hawkes, 2018). Furthermore, many Pasifika people may now view rugby as a legitimate, if not “traditional”, rite of passage to manhood as a result of the (re)establishment of lost/emerging masculinity-specific identity (Horton, 2014). Relatedly, the noble, physically tough, steadfast, and emotionless Mäori men seen on the local, provincial, and national rugby grounds have served as the foundation for traditional Mäori culture’s definition of masculinity (Hokowhitu, 2004). Therefore, it is remarkable for Roy Krishna (a footballer) and a non-Mäori to win the Te Kairanga Sportsman of the Year award in 2018–2019, presented to the best athlete across disciplines in Wellington (Peter, 2020). Krishna winning this award in New Zealand reveals that (hegemonic) masculinity is fluid (Butler, 1990) and not limited to rugby or a particular race. Thus, soccer and Krishna’s masculinity in Fiji rise to a hegemonic status – equivalent to or beyond that of an elite rugby player. This perception is unlike in Fiji, where several layers intersect to define the country’s hegemonic masculinity scale: “milit​ary-r​ugby-​natio​nalis​tic-p​owerf​ul-Ch​risti​anity​-raci​ al domination-hegemonic masculinity”. Relatedly, in 2019, the Fiji Football Association President Rajesh Patel (an Indo-Fijian man) claimed that Roy Krishna deserved the Fijian Sportsman of the Year title, which was instead presented to a rugby union player (Alivereti Veitokani) (Palmer, 2019). Despite being the only Fijian player to score a goal at the Olympics, leading the charts for goals and appearances for Fiji, being the captain of the national Fijian side, and playing football for top leagues internationally, Krishna has yet to receive the Fijian Sportsman of the Year award. In Fiji, (Indo-Fijian) men who play football still occupy spaces of subordinate or marginalised masculinity (Connell, 1995; Connell & Messerschmidt, 2005).

Challenging hegemony  121

8.4 GLOBAL SOUTH MASCULINITIES AND CRITICAL RACE Race plays a central role in building gender identities in Fiji. It is not possible to describe or analyse any sort of masculine performance without intertwining it with the ethnic group to which someone claims to belong. Thus, this section presents the primary theoretical lenses – hegemonic masculinity and critical race theory (CRT) – that allow us to understand Krishna’s masculinity within a Global South context. Connell’s hierarchy of masculinities asserts that masculinities (be they hegemonic or marginalised) cannot be perceived as a fixed or ascribed artifice. Instead, these characteristics are performed in social settings, whether in everyday life or sporting arenas. Therefore, here, we employ Connell’s concept to look into the different kinds of masculinities in the Fijian context and explore how they influence the perception of the masculinities of those men who do not fit into the country’s dominant sports discourse, and in particular Indo-Fijian soccer star Roy Krishna. Perceptions of hegemonic masculinity differ for Indo-Fijians and iTaukeis; in Fiji, rugby and the military are markers of physicality and robustness. Consequently, hegemonic masculinity is associated with iTaukeis (men) (Kanemasu, 2018; Teaiwa, 2005). Hence, when Indo-Fijian masculinities factor into the Fijian masculinities hierarchy, they occupy subaltern positions (Connell, 1995; Connell & Messerschmidt, 2005). It is crucial to emphasise that those masculinities are a result of ongoing social struggles in the Pacific, such as racial issues. Racial tensions exist between iTaukeis and Indo-Fijians on political fronts (Naidu, 2008), sporting realms (Sugden, 2021), educational arenas (Naidu, 2008), and as early as kindergarten (Brison, 2011). So, in order to learn more about Roy Krishna’s masculinity, we expanded the CRT theory to look at race relations (Delgado & Stefancic, 2001; Donnor, 2006; Milner, 2007; Delgado & Stefancic, 2023), the different kinds of oppression that Indo-Fijians face (Naidu, 2008; Ratuva, 2003), and the complicated power dynamics in Fiji (Solorzano & Yosso, 2001). These factors continue to shape the (sporting) lives of Indo-Fijians who participate in sports (even if it is hegemonic rugby). CRT is apt for reflecting on the layers of gendered and ethnic identities of marginalised groups and can be particularly helpful in understanding inclusion issues (Donnor, 2006; Milner, 2007; Delgado & Stefancic, 2023).

8.5 METHODS The data for this study derives from the first author’s doctoral research, where she employed an intersectional lens and arts-based and visual methods to establish in-depth conversations with 12 young Indo-Fijian women (15 to 24 years old) about gender, physicality, class, religiosity, and race issues in the sporting arena in Fiji. Whilst coding and thematically analysing the 24 interview transcripts (12 via photo elicitation and 12 via poetry ethnography workshops with the participants) (Furman, 2006; Stenhouse, 2014; Welsh, 2002), Roy Krishna’s masculinity appeared as one of the key themes discussed by the research participants. This relevance prompted us to investigate this issue to understand not only Krishna’s particular case but also to further our comprehension of the intersectional barriers Indo-Fijian young women face to participate in sports in their communities (Balram, Pang & Knijnik, 2024; Balram & Knijnik, 2024). In order to make sense of all these data, we wove a story based on the interviews and the workshops – a story that, by combining the different voices of the Indo-Fijian young women

122  Handbook of social justice in the Global South who participated in this project (Quarmby et al., 2021), tells us who our participants are and what they experience (Dowling et al., 2012). Such “narratives recognise the role that emotions play in how we come to understand our worlds, in addition to cognitive ways of knowing” (Dowling et al., 2012, p. 3). This story will be presented and analysed through gender and intersectional lenses, revealing Roy Krishna’s masculinity based on Indo-Fijian women’s perceptions of gender, race, ethnicity, and physicality in sports. All the names in the story are pseudonyms that protect the participants’ identities.

8.6 MORE THAN A MAN, KRISHNA, THE FIJIAN GOD OF SOCCER The end-of-school bell sounds; Meena and Razia pack their bags and rush to the school playground. Arjun speeds from behind; the trio places their school bags on the sidelines and starts to warm up. “You girls should start wearing shorts; it must be so uncomfortable playing soccer in those skirts!” Arjun says with concern. “It’s okay, Ajrun, the skirt helps me hide any scratches I get from falls. Otherwise, my abbu6 would be furious if I go home with any injury – not that he knows that I play goalie after school hours,” she adds, laughingly. Ravi and Sachin (Indo-Fijian boys), the two remaining players, join the group, and they all start kicking the soccer ball around and warming up. The rival team, consisting of three Indo-Fijian boys (Amit, Kapil, and Vincent), one Indo-Fijian girl (Sania), and one iTaukei girl (Mere), noisily enters the field and starts warming up. There was never a referee; fouls were mostly avoided, and if minor ones occurred, they were ignored, allowing the match to flow and not consume precious time. Plus, everyone knew that Meena and Razia played soccer without their families knowing and had to get home on time. Meena stands in the middle of the field, intently gazing ahead with the soccer ball resting under her foot. In a loud, assertive voice, she declares the start of the game. “READYYYYY!” Meena’s voice hovers over the field. She kicks the ball hard and strong; the ball flies through the air just over Kapil’s head. Kapil tries to head the ball, but the chance goes begging. Amit claims the ball and confidently dribbles it past Ravi; he then swiftly passes it to Kapil, who is known for his notorious dancing with the ball and scoring goals; he has good speed too. Kapil dances past one player, then two, and then kicks the ball high towards the Fijian blue sky. Mere runs a fair distance and tries to control the aggressively bouncing ball, but it sails over her head. Sania, who has been ogling the round beauty for a while, jumps like a kangaroo and heads the ball. Razia (the goalie) is forced to skew towards the right side of the goalposts; she manages to tap the ball out of the field of play. Razia launches the ball back into the field, and the ball finds Arjun’s feet. He grounds the ball and then moves forward with it into an empty space. This boy has a lot of fuel in his tank. Arjun dribbles the ball affectionately and stations himself in a good attacking position. The opposing team players all surround Arjun to block any shot at goal. Like a proficient archer, Arjun glances at the busy net and then eyes an unmarked player; he gently tips the ball Meena’s way. Meena grounds the ball and taps it forward – all the YouTube videos of Roy Krishna that she had watched suddenly spring to mind. Fully empowered, Meena dances

Challenging hegemony  123 forward several more steps and positions herself just a breath away from the goal line. Vincent (the goalie) leaps to stop this tornado of a ball that she strikes with force, but the ball sails gracefully over his fingertips and into the net. “GOAL!” Arjun screams. The match heats up... Ravi finds himself on a date alone with the ball; he looks for support but loses the ball to a hungry Amit, who is eager to capitalise. Amit makes good ground; he flicks a cheeky pass to Mere, who then dribbles past Sachin and passes the ball to Kapil. Kapil moves stealthily past Meena and kicks the ball between Sachin’s legs. The ball finds Amit’s thirsty boots, and he strikes the ball firmly and hard towards the goal line. The ball spins like a top, hits Razia’s shoulder, and kisses the net. “GOAL!” Amit yells, stripping his shirt off to reveal his strong, brown eight-pack. Meena looks at her watch and signals Razia; the girls bid farewell while the rest of the players reshuffle to make even teams and continue playing. The girls run to the bus stop and catch their usual bus in time. Anshu and Ashriya, who are from the same school as Meena and Razia, call out to the girls, indicating a vacant seat behind them. The girls greet each other excitedly. “Were you girls having extra classes?” inquires Anshu, always top of her class. “No, no! We were playing soccer,” Meena responds. “Oh wow! I just got selected as a reserve player for the under-15 netball team,” Ashriya announces confidently. “That’s great!” Meena and Razia chorus. Ashriya sees Meena as a Hindu goddess – powerful, strong, and fearless in the field – her role model. Meena was extremely passionate about sports and played in the school’s under-19 netball team, social soccer after school, and rugby with iTaukei youths in her neighbourhood, all without her mother’s knowledge. Meena’s performance in the field was far better than her performance in exams. “A couple of weeks ago, I joined the girls to try soccer during Physical Education (PE) class. Poor Shiela fell and twisted her ankle; the boys wouldn’t stop teasing her,” Ashriya reminisces sadly. “Girls shouldn’t play soccer; it’s dangerous and can cause serious injuries,” Anshu responds with concern. “Yes, it is dangerous – Master Gopal is right – girls do not have that balance to play soccer,” Ashriya concludes. “That’s bullshit; I love all running, jumping, catching, and kicking games; they make me feel happy and free,” Meena states firmly. “I think I was born to stop goals. I must say that I am so proud to see Roy Krishna do so well. He is just so strong and skilled,” Razia adds admiringly. “Krishna is made for soccer; his physique is great, and he is powerful for sure, but soccer is too rough for me. It is for strong men like Krishna, and that Arjun in your class also has such a strong body. It is not a female domain,” Ashriya adds thoughtfully. “So you watch Arjun, ah?” Anshu teases Ashriya, who blushes. “Arjun is strong and skilful too; he runs like a cyclone and not only scores goals, but also plays a key role in goal assists – he can be the next Roy Krishna. Krishna is truly the Fijian soccer god; he must be related to Lord Krishna,” Meena says. “Every Indo-Fijian is proud of that man – even if he only plays soccer,” Anshu adds.

124  Handbook of social justice in the Global South “What do you mean by ONLY playing soccer? I follow Roy Krishna like a shadow; I watch all his goals and assists on YouTube over and over again, and learn lots. He is just so good – the best Fijian soccer player ever,” Meena argues. “But Roy plays soccer, NOT rugby; it’s not the same. I have seen some iTaukei girls play rugby; they look much stronger than our Indo-Fijian boys,” Anshu says. “What kind of comparison is that?” Razia asks. “I have never seen an Indo-Fijian man play rugby; they are too thin and one tackle might kill them; it’s even harder to imagine Indo-Fijian girls playing rugby,” Anshu comments. “Anshu, maybe you should come and see me play rugby on Saturdays. I think anyone can play any sport if they train well,” Meena offers. “No thank you, Meena; I only like watching the Fijian men’s team play Sevens Rugby. Plus, I have better things to do, like getting a good high school education and a degree in commerce. That’s what our parents tell us – that sports will not get you a job or put food on your table,” Anshu responds. “You’re kidding me, right, Anshu? Do you know how much Krishna earns? You might have to work seven lives as an accountant and still not get near what he earns,” Razia adds jokingly. “Masculinity really is not just muscles; my father is a real man for me – he drives a taxi day and night and also looks after and provides for his parents and all of us. I reckon Roy Krishna is the same,” Ashriya explains. “Yes, and being a good father is a sign of a real man – modelling to the children good religious and cultural values too,” Razia adds. “What happens when this super-duper Indo-Fijian sportsman gets injured, which he is prone to do?” Anshu interrupts. “Well, Krishna trains well and hard and he has the same probability of injury as any iTaukei man playing soccer or rugby,” Razia answers. “I guess we can even get a heart attack while watching TV or get badly injured if this bus crashes right now, so just play sports,” Meena adds jokingly. The girls laugh.

8.7 OPPRESSED MASCULINITIES, OPPRESSED ETHNICITIES “Arjun is strong and skilful too; he runs like a cyclone and not only scores goals, but also plays a key role in goal assists – he can be the next Roy Krishna. Krishna is truly the Fijian soccer god; he must be related to Lord Krishna,” Meena says. “But Roy plays soccer, NOT rugby; it’s not the same…” Anshu replies. The above excerpts bring a range of paradoxical understandings of Indo-Fijian masculinities within the same community. Meena is passionate about playing sports (netball, rugby, and soccer), and Roy Krishna is Meena’s role model. In the above excerpt, Meena admires her fellow player Arjun’s stamina for running and skill for scoring goals and assisting in goal. Meena compares Arjun to Roy Krishna, and in doing so, she deems both Arjun’s and Krishna’s masculinity as hegemonic in the Fijian context (Connell, 1995). Meena further points out Krishna’s masculinity as supreme, finds his name, “Krishna”, apt, and compares his strength to Lord Krishna’s. Meena perceives Roy Krishna as the epitome of hegemonic masculinity (Connell, 1995); she labels Krishna as a “Fijian soccer god”, not just an “Indo-Fijian soccer god”, therefore revealing that Krishna’s masculinity is out of this world and, to an extent,

Challenging hegemony  125 heavenly. Meena’s perception parallels the perceptions of judges who declared Krishna the winner of the Te Kairanga Sportsman of the Year award in 2018–2019. This award meant that Krishna was perceived as the best athlete across disciplines in Wellington, including rugby (Peter, 2020). This achievement is huge in New Zealand, particularly if we consider that the All Blacks rugby (sevens) team(s) is one of the strongest in the world and Fiji’s arch-rival (van Rooyen, 2015), and also when the foundation for traditional Mäori definition of masculinity centres on the robust rugby player (Hokowhitu, 2004). On the other hand, within the same ethnic community, some Indo-Fijian women, like Anshu, perceive Krishna’s masculinity as subordinate, akin to the Fijian culture, which associates hegemonic masculinity with iTaukei (men) rugby players (Connell, 1995; Connell & Messerschmidt, 2005; Delgado & Stefancic, 2023). As an Indo-Fijian young woman, Anshu admires Roy Krishna’s great heights but maintains that Krishna “ONLY plays soccer, NOT rugby”. In this instance, Anshu’s perception is akin to that of the judges who decided against giving the Fijian Sportsman of the Year (2019) award to Roy Krishna, who, according to the Fiji Football Association president, was most deserving (Peter, 2020). The award was instead given to an iTaukei rugby union player. On this occasion, several layers intersect to define the country’s hegemonic masculinity scale: “milit​ary-r​ugby-​natio​nalis​tic-p​owerf​ul-Ch​risti​anity​-raci​al domination-hegemonic masculinity” (Balram, 2022; Balram & Knijnik, 2024; Kanemasu & Molnar, 2013; Kanemasu & Molnar, 2017). According to the judges, Roy Krishna does not tick any or many of these boxes. This scenario is in line with the realist point of view of CRT, that racism is more complex than merely unfavourable impressions of members of other groups; it is a means by which society allocates privilege and status to one (dominant) group while marginalising other groups (Delgado & Stefancic, 2001; Donnor, 2006; Milner, 2007; Delgado & Stefancic, 2023). Indo-Fijian men (even as successful as Krishna) still occupy spaces of subordinate or marginalised masculinity (Connell, 1995; Connell & Messerschmidt, 2005) in Fijian sporting contexts, thus not being advantaged by tangible benefits, opportunities, or awards in sports. Moreover, being denied the best Fijian sportsman award has undoubtedly silenced the voice of the FFA president (Indo-Fijian men), the voice of Krishna (an Indo-Fijian man), and also of all the Indo-Fijian fans of Krishna – once again illuminating how in the Fijian context, the dominance of iTaukei in rugby silences other minority sporting bodies and voices. This dynamic is consistent with CRT’s notion of “other” voices silenced within a framework of whiteness (DeCuir & Dixson, 2004). Additionally, Indo-Fijians (girls) frequently internalise the nation’s racial (sporting) stereotypes as well (Kanemasu, 2018).

8.8 HEGEMONIC BODIES AND SUBORDINATE MASCULINITIES “Anshu, maybe you should come and see me play rugby on Saturdays. I think anyone can play any sport if they train well,” Meena offers. “No thank you, Meena; I only like watching the Fijian men’s team play Sevens Rugby. Plus, I have better things to do, like getting a good high school education and a degree in commerce. That’s what our parents tell us – that sports will not get you a job or put food on your table,” Anshu responds. The extract above shows that Anshu is so in tune with the iTaukei male rugby player as the epitome of Fijian hegemonic masculinity that she refuses to watch Meena play rugby, finds

126  Handbook of social justice in the Global South the Indo-Fijian male body “too thin” for rugby, and feels that Krishna is great but “ONLY” plays soccer. Also akin to Anshu, Indo-Fijian boys and their families start resonating with and internalising the racial and gender-based stereotypes associated with physicality and masculinity that echo in the Fijian (sporting) context. For example, in an interview, Krishna himself revealed that rugby was what he played more often during his childhood, but he felt that one needed to be strong and tall to play well, and he did not fit this definition; thus, his parents asked him to change his sport, so he took up football (Desai, 2022). “But Roy plays soccer, NOT rugby; it’s not the same. I have seen some iTaukei girls play rugby; they look much stronger than our Indo-Fijian boys,” Anshu says. “What kind of comparison is that?” Razia asks. “I have never seen an Indo-Fijian man play rugby; they are too thin and one tackle might kill them; it’s even harder to imagine Indo-Fijian girls playing rugby,” Anshu comments. In the excerpts above, Anshu, like Krishna’s parents, believes that the Indo-Fijian body is unsuitable for rugby. There is also an implication that soccer is less physical and softer than rugby, so the “not so tall and not so strong” Indo-Fijian men can play it. Moreover, Anshu perceives iTaukei women’s rugby players as stronger than Indo-Fijian men who play soccer; she recognises masculinity in iTaukei women’s rugby players, signifying a mighty female body (Butler, 1990). Anshu here acknowledges that gender is fluid and (hegemonic) masculinity can (temporarily) occupy an iTaukei woman’s body when they play rugby. Moreover, in Anshu’s view, these women are tough enough to qualify to play rugby. However, Anshu cannot imagine the body of an Indo-Fijian man (let alone an Indo-Fijian woman) performing the physical demands of rugby. Thus, the Indo-Fijian man is seen as unfit to embody Fijian hegemonic masculinity, even temporarily. Even though Anshu has never seen an Indo-Fijian man play rugby, she perceives that “they are too thin and one tackle might kill them”. Relatedly, often, the efforts of Indo-Fijians trying to play rugby are ridiculed, and they are provided with no facilities or funding (Sugden, 2021), nor has there been any affirmative action policy to increase the number of non-Indigenous Fijians in the sport (Sugden, 2021; Sugden et al., 2020). Therefore, in Fiji, iTaukei women challenge Indo-Fijian subordinated masculinity, but hegemonic masculinity is still rigid and unchallenged (Kanemasu, 2018).

8.9 TOWARDS GENDER AND BODY DIVERSITY IN SPORT? Moreover, the conversation between the girls reveals that Meena, who participates in sports that are traditionally associated with men, is an actual gender order troublemaker and shaker. Meena disrupts gender binaries and Fijian masculinity orders by claiming that it does not rely on gender or race (Kanemasu, 2018; Tagg, 2008). On the other hand, Anshu refusing to watch Meena play rugby indicates that, for her, Meena’s rugby (and soccer) activities are considered traditionally masculine, which is unimaginable for an Indo-Fijian woman to embody, and thus is unacceptable. Anshu affirms that the Fijian rugby discourse (hegemonic masculinity) is not a shared zone and remains with iTaukei men. This view is similar to soccer’s representation of hegemonic masculinity in Brazil, where women playing football are not entirely accepted (Knijnik, 2015). There is also a lack of awareness of the existence of minority groups playing sports, especially Indo-Fijian (rugby) teams, as they receive no media or live game coverage.

Challenging hegemony  127 Moreover, no effort is made to make such groups visible, as they do not fit into the nation’s rugby identity (Sugden, 2021). For Meena and Razia, both the Indo-Fijian women’s and men’s bodies are not perceived as “abject”. These bodies can score goals, stop goals, sustain tackles, and run and perform well on the sporting field. Being an Indo-Fijian woman and playing rugby, Meena clearly cracks the Fijian masculinity continuum. She drives the contested borders of the acknowledged and generally tolerable bodies (iTaukei) who were/are placed above Indo-Fijians on the gender and masculinity continuum, thus expanding the Fijian gender norms (Butler, 2011).

8.10 KRISHNA’S MASCULINITY: SETTING THE NEW PARAMETERS FOR SOCIAL JUSTICE IN THE GLOBAL SOUTH “Masculinity really is not just muscles; my father is a real man for me – he drives a taxi day and night and also looks after and provides for his parents and all of us. I reckon Roy Krishna is the same,” Ashriya explains. Meena, Razia, and Ashriya place Roy Krishna at the top of the Fijian masculinity continuum. Not only is Krishna physically strong and gifted at scoring goals, but he also earns well and has good values – he looks after his family. Physical strength, intelligence, earning well, and looking after one’s family are all essential tenets of Indo-Fijian (Hindu) hegemonic masculinity (Shandil, 2016; Verma et al., 2006). In Indo-Fijian (and Indian) society, being a “real man” (hegemonic masculinity) goes beyond physical strength (Verma et al., 2006; Shandil, 2016). For a Hindu man, adhering to the cultural and religious tenets of Hinduism is part of hegemonic masculinity. Born into a Hindu family, Krishna had a childhood where he tried to master the dholak7 and played alongside his father, Bal Krishna, who played the harmonium and sang religious songs derived from the Ramayana (Desai, 2022). Here, Roy Krishna, like his hard-working Indo-Fijian indentured labouring ancestors, is positioned as a “real man” and dominant in Indo-Fijian traditional masculinity (Ali, 2004; Verma et al., 2006). For Indo-Fijian (Hindu) men, apart from physicality, social, religious, economic, and cultural capital are also important markers of masculinities (Coles, 2009; Verma et al., 2006). Relatedly, Ashriya’s father is socially a “real man”; he works two shifts and looks after his elderly parents, children, and wife; these are positive aspects of Indo-Fijian traditional masculinity (Shandil, 2016; Verma et al., 2006). Indo-Fijians have faced historical exclusion across Fijian society (Dakuidreketi, 2014; Otsuka, 2006). This social dynamic aligns with CRT’s tenet that racism is a regular feature of society and is embedded within systems and institutions, from policies of land ownership to legal and educational systems that replicate racial inequality (Magdaleno & Bell, 2021). Thus, fuelled by a sense of insecurity about their socio-political vulnerability (Fraenkel et al., 2009) and the fact that sporting platforms in Fiji are racially inequitable and gender discriminatory, Indo-Fijian parents (like Anshu’s) encourage their children to perform well academically, secure well-paid jobs, or immigrate to a developed country (Balram, 2019; Narsey, 2002). Relatedly, Krishna recounts in an interview facing numerous typical Indo-Fijian cultural resistances when expressing his desire to play professional soccer – with the familiar echoes that sports would not bring food to the table, potential injuries would require him to have a backup career, and that it was better to get an education and have a proper job (Desai, 2022). Razia emphasises the hurdles mentioned above that Krishna has overcome.

128  Handbook of social justice in the Global South “You’re kidding me, right, Anshu? Do you know how much Krishna earns? You might have to work seven lives as an accountant and still not get near what he earns,” Razia adds jokingly. Krishna playing in top leagues internationally, having a stable and very high income (much more than jobs through educational merits), and becoming a naturalised New Zealand citizen has cracked some traditional perceptions of sports for Indo-Fijian parents in the Fijian context. Despite young women like Anshu continuing to disclaim Indo-Fijian physicality and persistently asserting that physical power is masculine and associated with iTaukei men and rugby, Krishna’s agency has given birth to an alternative pathway for Indo-Fijian youths who are interested in sports to dream of and pursue a career in sports. After independence in 1970, sugar production became Fiji’s main export, and most of these farmers were Indo-Fijians (Narayan & Prasad, 2005). Racism had remained embedded in Fiji since colonial times, when the Indian labourers were subordinated and controlled by colonial power and rules. Not much had changed post-colonialism, as Indo-Fijians still encountered racism after the colonisers left. The iTaukeis have dominated (and controlled) power and authority regarding political leadership and farming land ownership. This dynamic is in line with CRT’s notion of power imbalance and unequal resource distribution (Hylton, 2005), based on the racial divide between Indo-Fijians and Indigenous Fijians. Therefore, the Indian settlers have been doubly subordinated, reflecting the lack of social justice to protect IndoFijian human rights over the land they toiled on. Moreover, due to rugby’s association with iTaukei identity and nationalism (Teaiwa, 2005), racism is evident at the micro (community) and macro levels (Fiji Rugby Union). Indo-Fijian rugby teams do not receive much attention and support (from the macro level) to grow beyond their local communities (Sugden, 2021). Also, no effort is made to support or illuminate minority groups, such as some Indo-Fijian men playing rugby, as these men do not fit into the nation’s rugby identity (Sugden, 2021). Thus, several layers of marginalisation extend into the Fijian sporting realm, providing unequal opportunities for Indo-Fijian (sporting) men. Gender and race are social constructs (Butler, 1990; Delgado & Stefancic, 2023); therefore, Indo-Fijian men are disassociated and discouraged from rugby (the ultimate physical sport in Fiji) (Sugden, 2020) and associated with sports considered soft (soccer), which risks them being further labelled as lacking physicality and falling short of being “proper Fijians” (Presterudstuen, 2010). Therefore, the image, words, attitudes, unconscious feelings, scripts, and social teachings (Delgado & Stefancic, 2023) around Indo-Fijians lacking robust frames (Teaiwa, 2008) for tough sports (Presterudstuen, 2010) by the iTaukei are merely gendered (and racial) ways to portray that Indo-Fijians are “less Fijian” than the iTaukei. Krishna himself has experienced the aforementioned in the Fijian and Indian sporting arenas; as he discloses in an interview, “It’s crazy how you get mobbed here (India, where he currently plays football), the way they chant your name. Honestly, I’m more Roy Krishna here than back home, in Fiji” (Desai, 2022). Moreover, when Krishna received the Sportsman of the Year (2019) award, the Fiji Football Association (FFA) president hinted at impartiality in the judging panel and declared to the Fijian public and the sports fraternity, “You don’t recognise him (Krishna), but we at FFA will for what he deserves” (Palmer, 2021). The FFA president’s speaking out and revelation of impartiality relate to CRT’s commitment to social justice, offering elements of liberation and transformation in response to racial, gender, and class subordination (Delgado & Stefancic, 2001). CRT ensures that power imbalances and resource distribution lie at the centre of any interrogation (Hylton, 2005). Assumptions about Indo-Fijians continue to inform

Challenging hegemony  129 policymakers, schools, teachers, leaders, and the general public (Delgado & Stefancic, 2023). For example, Sugden (2021) notes that the Fiji Rugby Union, which comprises Indigenous stakeholders, employs stereotypes of Indo-Fijians lacking physicality to maintain iTaukei dominance in the sport. “What happens when this super-duper Indo-Fijian sportsman gets injured, which he is prone to do?” Anshu interrupts. The above extract reveals that Anshu maintains the normative Fijian masculinity continuum and constructs soft essentialist narratives (Messner, 2011). These narratives limit the expansion of the Fijian hegemonic masculinity scale (Connell, 1995; Connell & Messerschmidt, 2005), maintaining it as an exclusive space with the assumption that iTaukei men have the biological makeup (testosterone) to be active, aggressive, and competitive, and are naturally expected to play sports. On the contrary, Razia reveals that perceived masculinities within Indo-Fijian culture change constantly. “Well, Krishna trains well and hard and he has the same probability of injury as any iTaukei man playing soccer or rugby,” Razia answers. In 2023, Roy Krishna etched his name into history by becoming the first Fijian player to achieve 50 national caps, surpassing Tahiti in the Pacific Games. During an interview with Pacific Beat, Krishna stated modestly, “As an athlete, as a player, you don’t think about these numbers. You just want to play football, and that’s what I’m doing... Whenever my country (Fiji) calls me, I’m the first one to raise my hand” (Ewart, 2023). The above extract illuminates that, despite the hegemonic discourse associated with iTaukei masculinity and its empowerment via rugby and the military, there are new avenues for the appearance of a new, more contemporary masculinity among the Indo-Fijian population. For example, Meena and Razia perceive Roy Krishna’s soccer agency and success as Fijian hegemonic masculinity, thus destabilising and cracking the common subordinate identities of Indo-Fijian men in comparison to iTaukei hegemonic masculinities (Kanemasu, 2018). Therefore, as an icon for many Indo-Fijian boys and young Indo-Fijian women (like Meena, Ashriya, and Razia), Roy Krishna may be the one who epitomises these changes, showing that there is room in the Global South for more inclusive expressions of gender that are more open and less oppressive to all human beings, hence promoting more social justice in the gender arena as well.

NOTES 1. Native Fijians. 2. Visitors. 3. www​.oceaniafootball​.com 4. https://sportstar​.thehindu​.com/ 5. Refers to all people from Polynesia, Micronesia, and Melanesia; this also includes the Māori and Aboriginals. 6. Father. 7. A two-headed hand drum.

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Challenging hegemony  131 Guinness, D., & Besnier, N. (2016). Nation, nationalism, and sport: Fijian rugby in the local-global nexus. Anthropological Quarterly, 89(4), 1109–1141. Hawkes, G. L. (2018). Indigenous masculinity in sport: The power and pitfalls of rugby league for Australia’s Pacific Island diaspora. Leisure Studies, 37(3), 318–330. https://doi​.org​/10​.1080​/02614367​ .2018​.1435711 Hay, R. (2006). “Our wicked foreign game”: Why has association football (soccer) not become the main code of football in Australia? Soccer & Society, 7(2–3), 165–186. Hokowhitu, B. (2004). Tackling Māori masculinity: A colonial genealogy of savagery and sport. The Contemporary Pacific, 16(2), 259–284. Horton, P. (2014). Pacific Islanders in professional rugby football: Bodies, minds and cultural continuities. Asia Pacific Journal of Sport and Social Science, 3(3),222–235. https://doi​.org​/10​.1080​ /21640599​.2014​.970428 Hylton, K. (2005). “Race”, sport and leisure: Lessons from critical race theory. Leisure Studies, 24(1), 81–98. https://doi​.org​/10​.1080​/026​1436​0412​331313494 James, K., & Nadan, Y. (2020). Race, ethnicity, and class issues in Fiji soccer 1980–2015. Soccer & Society, 21(7), 741–761. https://doi​.org​/10​.1080​/14660970​.2020​.1742706 Kanemasu, Y. (2018). Going it alone and strong: Athletic Indo-Fijian women and everyday resistence. In G. A. Molnar (Ed.), Women, sport and exercises in the Asia-Pacific region: Domination-resistanceaccomodation. Routledge. Kanemasu, Y., &. Molnar, G. (2013). Problematizing the dominant: The emergence of alternative cultural voices in Fiji rugby. Asia Pacific Journal of Sport and Social Science, 2(1), 14–30. https://doi​ .org​/10​.1080​/21640599​.2013​.798450 Kanemasu, Y., & Molnar, G. (2017). Double-trouble: Negotiating gender and sexuality in post-colonial women’s rugby in Fiji. International Review for the Sociology of Sport, 52(4), 430–446. https://doi​ .org​/10​.1177​/1012690215602680 Knijnik, J. (2015). Femininities and masculinities in Brazilian women’s football: Resistance and compliance. Journal of International Women’s Studies, 16(3), 54–70. Kumar, R. (2022, July 18). Roy Krishna signs contract with Bengaluru FC. Fijivillage. https://www​ .fijivillage​.com​/sports​/ Roy​-Krishna​-signs​-contract​-with​-Bengaluru​-FC​-r85xf4/ Lakisa, D., Sugden, J., & McDonald, B. (2020). Pasifika rugby migration and athlete welfare: Stairway to heaven. In Routledge handbook of athlete welfare (pp. 251–262). Routledge. Lal, B. V. (1983). Indian indenture historiography: A note on problems, sources and methods. Pacific Studies, 6(2), 33–50. Lal, B. V. (2000). Chalo Jahaji: On a journey through indenture in Fiji. Australian National University. Magdaleno, K., & Bell, D. (2021). Preface: Tenets of critical race theory. Journal of Leadership, Equity, and Research, 7(3), 5. Messner, M. (2011). Gender ideologies, youth sports, and the production of soft essentialism. Sociology of Sport Journal, 28(2), 151–170. https://doi​.org​/10​.1123​/ssj​.28​.2​.151 Milner, R. H. (2007). Race, culture, and researcher positionality: Working through dangers seen, unseen, and unforseen. Educational Researcher, 36(7), 388–400. https://doi​.org​/10​.3102​/0013189X073094 Naidu, V. (2008). Social consequences of coups in Fiji. Fiji Institute of Applied Studies. Nand, P., & Narayan, V. (2021). Krishna creates history as the 1st Fijian to captain an Indian side to win the ISL. Fijivillage. https://www​.fijivillage​.com ​/sports​/Krishna​-creates​-history​-as​-the​-1st​-Fijian​ -to​-captain​-an​-Indian​-side​-to​-win​-the​-ISL​- 45f8rx/ Narayan, P. K., & Prasad, B. C. (2005, July). Economic importance of the sugar industry for Fiji. In Review of Urban & Regional Development Studies: Journal of the Applied Regional Science Conference, 17(2), 104–114. Narsey, W. (2002, September 10). Fijian education: The many good news. The Fiji Times. https:// narseyonfiji​.wordpress​.com ​/2012​/03​/28​/fijian​-education​-the​-many​-good​-news​-the​-fiji​-times​-10 ​-sep​ -2002/ OFC. (2022, January 2). Fijian star Roy Krishna unveiled as OFC ambassador. https://www​ .oceaniafootball​.com ​/fijian​-star​-roy​-krishna​-unveiled​-as​-ofc​-ambassador/ Otsuka, S. (2006). Cultural influences on academic performance in Fiji: A case study in the Nadroga/ Navosa province [Doctoral dissertation, University of Sydney].

132  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Palmer, D. (2019, August 21). Chief executive defends FASANOC after awards criticism. Inside the games. https://www​.insidethegames​.biz​/articles​/1083718​/fasanoc​-awards​-argument Peter, N. (2020, November 21). A Fijian touch to ISL opener: Roy Krishna born to score. Olympics​.co​m. https://olympics​.com​/en​/featured​-news​/isl​-2020​-21​-at​-mohun​-bagan​-roy​-krishna​-first​-goal​-scorer Prasad, M. (2013). Sidelines and solidarity: Race and cultural hegemonies in the transition from mission to national soccer in Fiji and South Africa. The Journal of Pacific Studies, 33(1), 26–43. Presterudstuen, G. H. (2010). “The mimicry of men: Rugby and masculinities in post-colonial Fiji”. The Global Studies Journal, 3(2), 237–248. Ratuva, S. (2003). Re-investing the cultural wheel: Re-conceptualizing restorative justice and peace building in ethnically divided Fiji. Pandanus Books. Shandil, V. V. (2016). The gender agenda in Indo-Fijian wedding songs. South Asian Diaspora, 8(1), 63–77. https://doi​.org​/10​.1080​/19438192​.2016​.1141460 Sharkar, D. (2019, July 5). Roy’s goal: Tracing India roots. Hindustan Times. https://www​.hindustantimes​ .com ​/football ​/roy​-s​-goal​-tracing​-india​-roots​/story​-i9h​tWlp​ydSf​xzWu​gXAqE4K​.html Solorzano, D. G., & Yosso, T. J. (2001). Critical race and LatCrit theory and method: Counterstorytelling. International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education, 14(4), 471–495. https://doi​ .org​/10​.1080​/09518390110063365 Sportstar (2023, July 17). ISL 2023–24: Odisha FC signs Fijian forward Roy Krishna from Bengaluru FC. https://sportstar​.thehindu​.com ​/football ​/isl​-2023–24-od​isha-​fc-fi​ji-fo​rward​-roy-​k rish​na-fr​om-be​ ngalu​r u-fc​-indi​an-su​per-l​eague​-tran​sfer-​news/​a rtic​​le670​​90335​​​.ece Stenhouse, R. (2014). Hearing voices: Re/presenting the findings of narrative research into patient experience as poems. Journal of Psychiatric and Mental Health Nursing, 21(5), 423–437. https://doi​ .org​/10​.1111​/jpm​.12094 Sugden, J. T. (2020). The role of sport in reflecting and shaping group dynamics: The “intergroup relations continuum” and its application to Fijian rugby and soccer. Sport Management Review, 23(2), 271–283. https://doi​.org​/10​.1016​/j​.smr​.2019​.02​.001 Sugden, J. T. (2021). Sport and ethno-racial formation: Imagined distance in Fiji. Sport in Society, 24(6), 847–866. https://doi​.org​/10​.1080​/17430437​.2020​.1725476 Sugden, J. T., Adair, D., Schulenkorf, N., & Frawley, S. (2019). Exploring sport andintergroup relations in Fiji: Guidance for researchers undertaking short-term ethnography. Sociology of Sport Journal, 36(4), 277–288. https://doi​.org​/10​.1123​/ssj​.2018​- 0165 Sugden, J. T., Kanemasu, Y., & Adair, D. (2020). Indo-Fijian women and sportive activity: A critical race feminism approach. International Review for the Sociology of Sport, 55(6), 767–787. https://doi​ .org​/10​.1177​/1012690219854645 Tagg, B. (2008). “Imagine, a man playing netball!” Masculinities and sport in New Zealand. International Review for the Sociology of Sport, 43(4), 409–430. https://doi​.org​/10​.1177​/1012690208099875 Tarte, D. (2014). Fiji: A place called home (p. 220). ANU Press. Teaiwa, T. (2005). Articulated cultures: Militarism and masculinities in Fiji during the mid 1990s. Fijian Studies, 3(2), 201–222. Teaiwa, T. K. (2008). On Women and “Indians”. In B. M. Sutton (Ed.), Security disarmed: Critical perspective on gender, race and militarization (p. 111). Rutgers University Press. Tomlinson, M. (2006). “Retheorizing mana: Bible translation and discourse of loss in Fiji”. Oceania, 76(2), 173–185. https://doi​.org​/10​.1002​/j​.1834​- 4461​.2006​.tb03043.x van Rooyen, M. (2015). Early success is key to winning an IRB sevens world series. International Journal of Sports Science & Coaching, 10(6), 1129–1138. https://doi​.org​/10​.1260​/1747​-9541​.10​.6​.11 Verma, R. K., Pulerwitz, J., Mahendra, V., Khandekar, S., Barker, G., Fulpagare, P., & Singh, S. K. (2006). Challenging and changing gender attitudes among young men in Mumbai, India. Reproductive Health Matters, 14(28), 135–143. https://doi​.org​/10​.1016​/S0968​-8080(06)28261-2 Welsh, E. (2002). Dealing with data: Using NVivo in the qualitative data analysis process. Forum: Qualitative Social Research Sozialforschung, 3(2). https://doi​.org​/10​.17169​/fqs​-3​.2​.865

9. Social (in)justice in Bangladesh in the context of globality Habibul Haque Khondker

9.1 INTRODUCTION The chapter seeks to understand how social justice is conceptualized, contested, and implemented in various Global South countries, considering the unique cultural, political, and economic contexts of these regions. The chapter focuses on Bangladesh, which earned its independence in 1971 following a bloody war of liberation. Bangladesh may not be a typical representative of the Global South, yet its social and political conditions illustrate the condition of the Global South in broad terms. Considering the global context is valuable because we must use some universal criteria, even a conceptual repertoire, to make any comparison or evaluation meaningful. However, at the same time, it would be helpful not to mindlessly take the assessments of some of the leading and well-meaning international NGOs without considering the local context and its historical specificities. Later in the chapter, some cases will be discussed that illustrate this tension between local and global contexts. The chapter begins by examining the historical underpinnings of social injustice, including the legacies of colonialism, imperialism, and unequal global political-economic structures. It then delves into contemporary challenges, such as the widening gap between rich and poor, the impact of globalization, environmental degradation, marginalization of “minority” religious groups, and the struggle for Indigenous rights and gender equality. The chapter also highlights how local social justice movements have been influenced by and diverged from, global and universal notions of justice. Some reflections also consider to what extent universal ideas of social justice are dressed-up Western ideas, reflecting their own concerns about social justice without taking into account the specificities of the local context. By incorporating case studies and empirical evidence, the chapter provides insights into the successes and limitations of various strategies employed in achieving social justice in the Global South, particularly regarding Bangladesh. Extreme poverty and famine are evidence of the absence of social justice. The removal and reduction of extreme poverty are evidence of the success of development initiatives in a country in the Global South. The chapter concludes by discussing the potential pathways toward a more equitable and just world, emphasising the role of transnational solidarity, local empowerment, and inclusive policymaking. The present chapter attempts to contribute to a deeper understanding of the complexities and nuances of social justice in the Global South, offering a critical perspective that acknowledges both the struggles and resilience demonstrated by the local communities.

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9.2 CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK Social justice is an essential requisite of society and a normative goal for achieving a good society. Without a necessary settlement of even a fraction of social justice, viewed as rules of the game ensuring a minimum of fair play and equity in society, the establishment of social order is not possible. Every member of society has a right to equality under the law, which is a characteristic of a good society’s denser practices of fairness, equity, and equal justice. Each of the terms used above needs to be explained further for reasons of conceptual clarity. Fairness covers both the distribution of resources and the rules and norms of resource allocation. The rules or standard procedures, typically established through consensus over time, serve as the basis for societal norms. Social institutions receive near-consensus acceptability in society, both in normative terms and as guidelines for everyday practices. These rules involve property rights, and the rules of hierarchy in society involve the dimension of power. Equity involves normatively accepted rules of just distribution and allocation of material and non-material rewards. Equity also involves individual and community rights to be treated fairly, that is, without discrimination. This point leads seamlessly to the right of equal justice, a principle and a condition for a good society where individuals and communities receive equal protection under the law and are treated equally – without exception – in the eyes of the law, but also as a general normative condition in the everyday practices of social interactions. In the latter case, exceptions are expected, considering special conditions. For example, a separate queue for older adults or a reserved seat in public transport for a physically challenged person is deemed fair and just in most societies. Social discrimination refers to ongoing inequality among individuals based on various factors such as illness, disability, religion, or sexual orientation. “Social justice is aimed at promoting a society which is just and equitable, valuing diversity, providing equal opportunities to all its members, irrespective of their disability, ethnicities, gender, age, sexual orientation, characteristics, or religion, and ensuring fair allocation of resources and support for their human rights. Any number of diverse factors, including those mentioned above, but also education, social class, political affiliation, beliefs, or other characteristics can lead to discriminatory behaviours, especially by those who may have a degree of power in their hands” (Bhugra, 2016, p. 336). According to one perspective, injustice is rooted in individual behaviour and characteristics – the root of injustice is individual deficits and missed opportunities. Job skills programmes, for example, are organised around the assumption that “if only this individual had the appropriate job skills, she would find employment”, and promote the ideology that unemployment problems derive from individual inadequacies (Kidder & Fine, 1986, p. 50). Social justice can be linked to a rule-based society where the concept and practice of the rule of law trump all other concerns and become the guarantor of social justice. At another level, social justice is a matter of the normative structure of society, a set of social norms formed over the ages about what is fair and what is unfair, what is equitable and what is not in the society concerned. Social justice is the assurance of giving each member an equal opportunity to develop their capabilities (Sen, 1992) and to be allowed to do so without restrictions imposed (Sen, 1999). Social justice is about fairness and equity. Leaving aside the thorny issue of relativisation, it can be stated with a degree of certitude that every society, whether conceptualised as a

Social (in)justice in Bangladesh in the context of globality  135 nation-state or smaller community, has its own sense of social justice. This ensures stability by forming a consensus over what is fair and what is unfair in terms of the distribution or allocation of resources – both material and non-material. A shared idea of social justice is the core and bedrock of social solidarity. The premise lies in the above conceptual and definitional frame, and we can address various issues concerning social injustice in Bangladesh. The chapter addresses four aspects of social injustice in Bangladesh: poverty and hunger, social (class) inequality, gender injustice, and the marginalisation of religious and ethnic minorities where religion, in the case of interreligious community relationships, is used against the less powerful groups. The paper takes an intersectional approach in a double sense that deals with the overlap or interconnectedness of these issues themselves on the one hand and theoretical intersectionality on the other. Although the four issues have been presented separately for analytical reasons, they overlap and sometimes interact. We draw upon multiple disciplinary perspectives to bear on these issues since no single discipline can provide us with an exhaustive conceptual tool to capture the nuances of these issues.

9.3 BANGLADESH: HISTORY, SOCIETY, AND CULTURE An exploration of the history of the region that constitutes Bangladesh reveals a great deal of neglect and social injustices based on religion. The very idea of the formation of Pakistan, ostensibly an exclusive homeland for the Muslims in the region, was premised on religious division and discrimination. The exclusivity argument undermined the traditions of Indian society, where different religious communities lived with mutual tolerance and accommodation in an inclusive society. The proponents of Pakistan were blind to the issues of religious discrimination and exclusivity that would follow the partition. They also showed utter indifference to the rights of the people in their homeland when tens of thousands of Hindus and Sikhs were compelled to evacuate their homeland in what was then East Bengal (and later, East Pakistan) and West Pakistan to migrate to India. A good number of Muslims located in India moved under compulsion from the territories that now constitute India to what became Pakistan. Moreover, those who could not make such a move remained vulnerable because of the dominant ideology of the day. Migration involves a modicum of choice, which these communities lacked. The phrase “expulsion” would be more appropriate to describe the movement of people across newly constituted borders. Disruptions caused to communities have left a legacy for the people involved in the cross-border transfer. Their religious affiliation subsumed and negated various forms of identity. The idea of creating a state based solely on religion was fundamentally unjust. The geographical region that constitutes Bangladesh had a 24 per cent Hindu population, according to the 1941 census. The logic of Pakistan made them a minority, causing a significant disruption in their status and sense of belonging. Due to a manufactured “homeland” for the Muslims of the Indian subcontinent, a large-scale migration of the Hindu population took place under duress, affecting and scarring a community. The idea of India, as far as the mainstream leaders of the Indian Congress party were concerned, was not a separate homeland for the Hindus. In other words, India was not viewed as the homeland of the Hindus; instead, it was portrayed as a secular state.

136  Handbook of social justice in the Global South The leaders of the Pakistan movement used the rationale of the cultural right of self-determination, using Muslims of the region as a cultural community. The right to self-determination is a noble idea only when one specifies the historical and social context. The Muslims in India did not live in an exclusive zone. Demographic historian Tim Dyson states: “… because of the spatial distribution of the Muslim population, it was inevitable that the new India that was formed in August 1947 would contain [a] substantial and fairly dispersed Muslim minority” (Dyson, 2018, p. 450). Thus, the creation of a state based on religion was unfair to the Muslims in the heartland of India and Hindus in what was to become the eastern part of Pakistan. It was discriminatory to the Hindus in East Bengal, which became a part of Pakistan because the numerical majority in that region were Muslims. Why would Hindus lose their land and property, as many of them felt insecure and migrated to India in haste? Following a border war between India and Pakistan in 1965, the properties left behind by the Hindus were declared “enemy property”. Why would one segment of the population be called and treated as enemies? The idea of enemy property is fundamentally wrong, discriminatory, and unjust. The semi-colonial state of Pakistan institutionalised unjust laws that violated fundamental principles of social justice by introducing inter-religious discord in society. Since her violent birth in 1971, Bangladesh has inherited a social structure where class, religion, and political power have remained intermingled. One could argue that a society that excludes certain groups from mainstream society due to unfair laws and social practices is a failed society that is rife with violence and disorder and lacks the very foundations of social justice. Bangladesh is not a failed society or a failed state, but her past casts a shadow of unstable politics, mistrust in government, and a lack of communal harmony. However, paradoxically, groups of people disagree with others on their version of social justice. Political contestations are often about competing versions of social justice, concretised as social programmes backed by specific legislation. In the global context, Bangladesh has been viewed as a poster boy of poverty and starvation. Even before the birth of Bangladesh, a US diplomat, Alexis Johnson, feared that if Bangladesh became an independent country, it would become an international basket case. To this remark, Henry Kissinger, the then National Security Advisor, quipped, “but it would not be our basket case”. Such remarks indicate a patronising and discriminatory stance and a lack of concern for humanitarian principles. However, in the 50 years since independence, Bangladesh has come of age. Bangladesh has achieved spectacular success in many regards. In terms of human development indicators, Bangladesh has superseded its powerful rival and regional power, India. Previously part of Pakistan, Bangladesh is now ahead of Pakistan in all the key social indicators. The implementation of economic liberalisation measures has established a firm footing for Bangladesh under the governance of the current Awami League administration since 2009. Once labelled the world’s “bottomless basket”, Bangladesh’s economy has matured significantly, drawing interest from international investors. In 2006, the nation’s total power generation capacity stood at 3,378 MW. Presently, Bangladesh boasts its highest power generation capacity of 26,700 MW, with a peak daily production of 14,782 MW. With the introduction of the Payra thermal power plant and the Ruppur nuclear power plant, Bangladesh is poised to receive an uninterrupted power supply (The Print, 2022).

Social (in)justice in Bangladesh in the context of globality  137 When Bangladesh gained independence on 16 December 1971, it ranked as the secondpoorest nation globally, marking the beginning of an extraordinary development journey over the subsequent 50 years. Since then, poverty has halved at an unprecedented rate. Primary school enrolment has reached near-universal levels. A significant influx of women has joined the workforce. Consistent advancements have been achieved in maternal and child health. Furthermore, the nation has strengthened its resilience against the adverse impacts of climate change and natural calamities (World Bank, 2021). Until the 1980s, per capita income in Bangladesh was one of the lowest in the world. It stood at US$170 in 1988–1989. The poorest 40 per cent of its population survived on as little as US$82 per capita income in 1986 (Rahman, 1991, p. 49). Bangladesh’s poverty and economic stagnation in the 1980s were rooted in the nature of its state. The “autocratic state power” was “symbiotically linked to the armed forces and a new affluent class” – a class “created and sustained by the aid regime” (Jahan, 1991, p. 14). Following the overthrow of President General H. M. Ershad’s military regime in 1990, Bangladesh started to democratise, and its economic performance improved. When a military-backed caretaker government assumed power in 2007 and held a free, transparent, and inclusive election that brought the Awami League under Sheikh Hasina to power, the development trajectory picked up speed. The democratic transition had several problems institutionalising the core values of democracy, but one thing that can be stated unambiguously is that the areas of social justice and voices to address those glaring parts of injustice came to the surface. Civil society, progressive groups of intellectuals, and the media took advantage of the democratic space and brought attention to social injustice. During Sheikh Hasina’s tenure (2009 onwards), several critical issues of social injustice received the state’s attention. Bangladesh has met the SDG goals and improved its human development scores. From 1990 to 2019, Bangladesh’s Human Development Index improved from 0.394 to 0.632, which put Bangladesh ahead of its South Asian neighbours (S. Jahan, 2022, p. 161). The aggregate poverty rate declined from 58 per cent in 1990 to about 20.5 per cent in 2019. The average life expectancy at birth rose from approximately 58 years in 1990 to nearly 73 years in 2019. The adult literacy rate increased from barely 35 per cent in 1990 to about 75 per cent in 2019. The infant mortality rate declined from 99.6 per 1,000 live births in 1990 to 21 in 2019. The maternal mortality rate fell from 594 per 100,000 live births in 1990 to 165 in 2019. (Razzaque, 2020, quoted in S. Jahan, 2022, p. 144). Reducing poverty, hunger, infant mortality, and maternal mortality are essential milestones to achieving social justice. Despite significant successes, Bangladesh needs to improve several issues of social justice. Bangladesh’s three significant emerging development challenges – growing income inequality, social disparity, and environmental degradation – “threaten social order” (Jahan & Sobhan, 2024, p. 10). In addition to the three major challenges, the following areas of social justice need to be addressed in Bangladesh.

9.4 POVERTY AND HUNGER Poverty and hunger in the twenty-first century are stains on human dignity and aspects of structural injustice. In Bangladesh, as in South Asia as a region, poverty was identified as an

138  Handbook of social justice in the Global South area of social injustice (Sobhan, 2010). The poverty ratio declined from 71 per cent in 1973 to 18 per cent in 2022 (Jahan & Sobhan, 2024, p. 3). Bangladesh’s government, with the assistance of international agencies, implemented measurable and concrete intervention programmes to reduce poverty. Bangladesh has also had commendable success in reducing and even eliminating hunger. In this regard, the real credit goes to Bangladesh’s resilient, hard-working people. Credit also goes to the NGOs; BRAC and the Grameen Bank are notable. The NGOs have been quite innovative in finding local solutions to address poverty by generating employment and local, small-scale entrepreneurship. Another aspect of resilience is visible among the migrant workers, whose numbers reach the millions. They undertake arduous journeys to various parts of the world, taking immense risks. Jahan and Sobhan identify the small peasants who have quadrupled food grain production, micro, small, and medium entrepreneurs – both men and women – and migrant female workers in the ready-made garment sector. Digital entrepreneurs and NGOs have recently reached the hitherto marginalised and excluded groups (Jahan & Sobhan, 2024, p. 5). There were predictions that post-independence Bangladesh would face a devastating famine in 1972, a prediction that did not materialise until 1974 when a flood devastated the economy. A famine ensued in September 1974. Following the famine, the government immediately raised its food production. Bangladesh has done reasonably well in improving its food situation by raising production and improving the earnings of its people. Hunger is a palpable indicator of social injustice. By reducing hunger to a reasonable level, Bangladesh has ensured a significant level of social justice. To promote equitable growth and broad development, institutions must be built to supply social insurance and safety nets and create a democratic space for voice and accountability (Khan & Rahman, 2022, p. 152).

9.5 CLASS INEQUALITY AND LABOUR RIGHTS Bangladesh is less unequal than its neighbours in the South Asian region, according to the Gini index. Bangladesh has a Gini ratio of 32.4 compared to India’s 35.7. This is no source of complacency. Even though Bangladesh has successfully reduced absolute poverty, it has not done well in reducing inequality (Akash, 2024, p. 110). The goal of reducing inequality has not achieved much success. “Notwithstanding the significant reduction in income poverty and improvements in human development, economic inequality has increased, and social disparities have widened” (Jahan & Sobhan, 2024, p. 10). Although, in terms of the Gini ratio, inequality has increased, the World Inequality Report shows more or less stable patterns of income and wealth inequality in Bangladesh over the past four decades. Tables 9.1 and 9.2 present a snapshot of Bangladesh’s income and wealth inequality trends.

Table 9.1  Income inequality trends from 1980–2022 Income

1980

1990

2000

2010

2022

Income of the Top 1%

11.6

14.3

16.2

16.4

11.6

Income of the Top 10%

36.5

40.5

44.5

43.6

36.5

Income of the Bottom 50%

20.0

18.1

15.8

16.1

20.0

Social (in)justice in Bangladesh in the context of globality  139

Table 9.2  Wealth inequality trends from 1980–2022 Wealth

1995

2000

2010

2022

Wealth of the Top 1%

25.4

25.2

24.7

24.6

Wealth of the top 10%

59.2

58.9

58.5

58.5

Wealth of the Bottom 50%

4.7

4.7

4.8

4.8

Source: World Inequality Report (2022). https://wir2022​.wid​.world

9.6 LABOUR RIGHTS Bangladesh has made significant socioeconomic progress over the past five decades, largely due to its labour force. As per the 2022 Bangladesh Labour Force Survey, the labour force participation rate is 61.2 per cent (80 per cent for men and 42.8 per cent for women), marking a notable rise in female participation from 36 per cent in 2010. As the Bangladesh economy grows and diversifies, the country’s labour force stands to benefit from decent work underpinned by higher-level skills, productivity enhancement, and higher remuneration. However, the safety and security of industrial workers still need to be improved. Although after the Rana Plaza disaster in 2013 that killed 1,134 garment workers, some improvement has taken place, and Bangladesh has already implemented better safety and security for female workers (United Nations, 2023). The changes in the garment industry’s working conditions have occurred mainly due to global criticism. In recent years, the government has taken various initiatives to reshape its labour sector, promoting social justice and inclusion through decent work. Significant achievements include the ratification of the Minimum Age Convention, 1973 (No. 138), in March 2022, and the subsequent specification of 14 years as the minimum age for employment. The country ratified the Worst Forms of Child Labour Convention, 1999 (No. 182), in March 2001 and has since published and updated the Hazardous Child Labour List, covering 43 sectors. Further, in July 2023, the government published the provisional report on the National Child Labour Survey 2022, which recorded a significant decrease in children engaged in hazardous work. Bangladesh ratified Forced Labour Conventions No. 29 and No. 105 in 1972 and 2022 and the Protocol of 2014 to the Forced Labour Convention of 1930 (Poutiainen, 2024). Nevertheless, the impact of such changes on the ground is not visible. Workers’ economic well-being and dignity are upheld when they are provided with safe working conditions, equal treatment and opportunities, labour rights, and fair pay. To advance social justice and create inclusive societies, the labour sector requires comprehensive awareness creation and promotion of workers’ rights and their skilling and re-skilling in new technologies. These efforts would provide a more informed, skilled, and empowered workforce. Targeted policies for vulnerable groups, including persons with disabilities, Indigenous people, and migrant and informal sector workers, are crucial to ensuring inclusivity. Addressing youth unemployment and fostering stakeholder dialogues would strengthen the foundation for a more equitable and just labour sector. Furthermore, collaboration with international organisations is vital for exchanging best practices and developing global standards for fair labour practices.

140  Handbook of social justice in the Global South The Government of Bangladesh shared five suggestions for actualising social justice, including tackling inequality and emphasising collaboration, fairness, inclusivity, tripartism, and youth empowerment (Poutiainen, 2024).

9.7 GENDER INJUSTICE A coalition of elite women who were able to overcome class and religious barriers took on the challenges of gender injustice, which has been pervasive. Bangladesh ranks 59 in the Global Gender Gap Index by the World Economic Forum compared to Sri Lanka, 115; Nepal, 116; India, 127; and Pakistan, 142 out of 146 countries (World Economic Forum, 2023). When people refer to the gender gap, they usually mean disparities or differences between men and women in various areas of life, such as education, employment, income, access to resources, representation in leadership positions, and political participation. These differences can be measured through wage disparities, educational attainment, participation rates, representation in specific fields or industries, and access to opportunities. Historical societal norms, cultural precepts, and institutional barriers that have favoured men over women in many facets of life have had an impact on the gender gap. In Bangladesh, the dominant religion is Islam, yet women have been successful in securing fundamental rights, including the right to education and employment. Several factors contribute to the gender gap, including adherence to traditional gender roles. Societal norms regarding the expected roles and duties of men and women frequently restrict women’s access to education, employment, and leadership positions. Education accessibility has historically been a challenge for girls and women in the Indian subcontinent, hindering their personal and professional growth. Discrimination in employment practices, encompassing unequal pay, limited career progression prospects, and biased hiring and promotion procedures, has been pervasive. Legal and institutional frameworks have often favoured men, particularly in matters like property rights, inheritance laws, and access to financial resources, exacerbating gender disparities. Cultural beliefs and stereotypes regarding gender roles and abilities perpetuate inequalities, constraining women’s involvement in specific fields or industries. Addressing these historical reasons for the gender gap requires concerted efforts to challenge societal norms, dismantle institutional barriers, promote gender equality in education and employment, and address cultural attitudes and stereotypes. The four indicators that form the basis of the Gender Gap Index are health, education, economic participation, and political representation. In terms of political representation and gender parity, Bangladesh has done well. Only 12 countries out of the 146 included this year scored above the 50 per cent parity score. The leading countries were: Iceland (90.1 per cent), Norway (86.5 per cent), New Zealand (72.5 per cent), Finland (70 per cent), Germany (63.4 per cent), Nicaragua (62.6 per cent), and Bangladesh (55.2 per cent) (World Economic Forum, 2023, p. 14). Despite some tangible success in reducing gender injustice achieved through government policies, innovative initiatives of non-governmental organisations such as BRAC and Grameen Bank, and the women’s rights movement, several challenges remain. These challenges include continued practices of early marriage and domestic violence, often attributed to the role of religious injunctions that perpetuate discriminatory practices. Despite successes in achieving Millennium Development targets and several Sustainable Development Goals, “the majority

Social (in)justice in Bangladesh in the context of globality  141 of women in Bangladesh have yet to be empowered to participate equitably in social, cultural, economic, and political life” (Feldman, 2022, p. 220).

9.8 MARGINALISED MINORITY COMMUNITIES The constitution designates Islam as the state religion but upholds the principle of secularism. It prohibits religious discrimination and provides for equality for all religions. Family law, enforced in secular courts, contains separate provisions for different religious groups. According to official documents, religious minorities enjoy equal rights. However, the statistics of the outflow of the Hindu population present a picture that contradicts the official narrative. The number of Hindus as a percentage of the total population has shrunk from 28 per cent in 1940 to 8.96 per cent in 2011 and is expected to reduce further to 8 per cent in 2022. The US government estimates the total population to be 165.7 million (US Department of State, 2022). According to the 2022 national government census, Sunni Muslims constitute approximately 91 per cent of the population, and Hindus approximately 8 per cent. This is a slight shift from the 2011 census, which had the percentages at 89 and 10, respectively (US Department of State, 2022). The decline in the Hindu population may not be the result of outmigration alone; the fertility rate of the Hindu population has also declined (Haider, Rahman, & Kamal, 2019). An exploration of the history of the region of what is now Bangladesh shows a great deal of neglect regarding injustices based on religion. The idea of the formation of Pakistan, ostensibly a homeland for the Muslims of India, was premised on religious division, which entailed discrimination. The proponents of dividing the geographical space based on religion were blind to the issues of discrimination. They displayed a blatant disregard for the people’s rights to their land, which was in opposition to their religious affiliation. The idea of creating a state based on religion was fundamentally unjust. In this practice, both the Muslims of India and the Hindus of Pakistan had to face the brunt of this discrimination. Their only choice was to migrate to the neighbouring nation, which was more like an expulsion than migration, which entails choice. The right to self-determination is a noble idea only when one specifies the historical and social context. The Muslims in India did not live in an exclusive zone. Thus, state creation based on religion was discriminatory to the Muslims of India and the Hindus in East Bengal. Passage of the East Bengal (Emergency) Requisition of Property Act (XIII of 1948) was Jinnah’s final action aimed at marking Hindus as second-class citizens (Feldman, 2016, p. 5). In 1965, following the outbreak of war between India and Pakistan, the military government of Pakistan promulgated one of history’s most racist and discriminatory laws, the Enemy Property Act (EPA). After a border war between India and Pakistan in September 1965, the government of Pakistan declared the properties of the Hindus “enemy property”. As the state adopted and upheld laws that specifically marginalised non-Muslims in a systematic manner, this sense of insecurity grew. Why would the Hindus lose their land and property and, after 1965, be treated as enemies? Such scapegoating of a segment of the population has few parallels in history. The idea of “enemy property” is fundamentally wrong and morally unjust. The inception of the new state was grounded in the principles of Islam. However, efforts by the state to institutionalise its ideology through various laws and principles caused concern and alienation among the non-Muslim populace, particularly the Hindus. As the state adopted

142  Handbook of social justice in the Global South and upheld laws that specifically marginalised non-Muslims in a systematic manner, this sense of insecurity grew. The Hindu community in Bangladesh experiences economic and political marginalisation due to these laws. The primary cause of economic marginalisation is the Enemy Property Act, later renamed the Vested Property Act by the Bangladesh government. This act finds its roots in laws and by-laws initially introduced by Pakistani authorities, originating from the East Bengal (Emergency) Requisition of Property Act (Act XIII of 1948). Following independence in 1947, the provincial government faced an urgent need for accommodation for numerous government offices and public servants (Barkat, 2000; Mohsin, 2004; Feldman, 2016; Guhathakurta, 2012, 2022). Post-independence Bangladesh has not been able to ensure complete security for the minorities in Bangladesh, which is reflected in the dwindling size of the Hindu population. Apart from the Hindus, there are Christians and Buddhists as well as several ethnic groups and “Dalits” who, having originated from India, came to work as sweepers and cleaners, jobs considered “unclean” in the Hindu caste hierarchy. There are an estimated 4.6 to 5.5 million Dalits in Bangladesh who, along with other itinerant minority communities (Bedays), are subject to discrimination and marginalisation (Guhathakurta, 2022, pp. 130–31).

9.9 CONCLUDING REMARKS How do we remove or reduce the second-best alternative – social injustice? According to one author, five new beliefs have recreated, renewed, and supported social injustices. “The five tenets of injustice are that elitism is efficient, exclusion is necessary, prejudice is natural, greed is good, and despair is inevitable” (Dorling, 2011, p. 27). Barrington Moore’s argument about the persistence of social injustice and the relative absence of revolts is also based on accepting cultural and institutional practices. Moore cites the Indian untouchable caste as an example; though a majority compared to the upper caste, they accept the rules that help perpetuate caste injustices (Moore, 1978). Injustice is rooted in the social structure, a view rooted in Karl Marx’s theoretical formulations and political programmes. A conflict-of-interest view says that unfair situations are caused by competitive structures rather than flaws in individuals. It backs up its analysis with examples of material conflict, hegemony, and power differences (Giroux, 1984). Reformist social programmes are viewed sceptically from this perspective because they deny that existing social arrangements ensure local and global inequality. The social science literature on social injustice in the Global South is rife with debates and discourses about coloniality and decolonisation. These are meaningful and highly useful discussions about historical conditions and junctures. However, when it leads to relativisation, it is sometimes constructed to protect the local oppressors and hatemongers that render ordinary people victims of oppression and discrimination at the hands of their ruling elite. A certain level of universalisation, or what Gayatri Spivak calls “strategic universalism”, is of great value. It can be simply stated that there is a need to recognise specific human values as universal. The discussion of social justice needs to be situated in the context of a set of global, universal values, such as equal justice, fairness, and the right to call into question all forms of discrimination and unfairness.

Social (in)justice in Bangladesh in the context of globality  143 The context of globality is essential for developing a comparative understanding of progress in equity and fairness, while not ignoring local and national specificities. With a global standard, engaging in a conversation on transparency and accountability is easier. What is needed are the rules of inclusion. Diversity, equality, equity, and inclusion (DEI) have become buzzwords, a new entry into the lexicon of bureaucratic lingo. But rather than just saying it, it is time to ensure the full implementation of these principles and try to live by the standards of global, universal norms. Inclusive politics, inclusive socio-economic policies, and institution-building based on justice and inclusivity will ensure social justice in Bangladesh.

REFERENCES Akash, M. M. (2024). "Inequality and human development: The Bangladesh perspective" in R. Jahan and R. Sobhan (eds) Fifty Years of Bangladesh, London: Routledge. Barkat, A. (2000). An inquiry into causes and consequences of deprivation of Hindu minorities in Bangladesh through the Vested Property Act: Framework for a realistic solution. PRIP Trust. Bhugra, D. (2016). Editorial: Social discrimination and social justice. International Review of Psychiatry, 28(4), 336–341. http://dx​.doi​.org​/10​.1080​/09540261​.2016​.1210359 Dorling, D. (2011). Injustice: Why social inequality persists. Policy Press. Dyson, T. (2018). A population history of India. Oxford University Press. Feldman, S. (2016). The Hindu as Other: State, law, and land relations in contemporary Bangladesh. South Asia Multidisciplinary Academic Journal, 13. Feldman, S. (2022). Gender and development. In H. Khondker, O. Muurlink, & A. Bin Ali (Eds.), The emergence of Bangladesh. Palgrave Macmillan. https://doi​.org​/10​.1007​/978–981–16–5521–0_10 Giroux, H. (1984). Theory and resistance in education. Bergin & Garvey Press. Guhathakurta, M. (2012). Amidst the winds of change: The Hindu minority in Bangladesh. South Asian History and Culture, 3(2), 288–301. Guhathakurta, M. (2022). The making of minorities in Bangladesh: Legacies, policies, and practice. In H. Khondker, O. Muurlink, & A. Bin Ali (Eds), The emergence of Bangladesh. Palgrave Macmillan. https://doi​.org​/10​.1007​/978–981–16–5521–0_10 Haider, M. M., Rahman, N., & Kamal, N. (2019). Hindu population growth in Bangladesh: A demographic puzzle. Journal of Religion and Demography, 6(1), 123–148. Jahan, R., & Sobhan, R. (2024). Fifty years of Bangladesh: Economy, politics, society, and culture. Routledge. Jahan, S. (1991). Bangladesh: Macroeconomic development during the Eighties. In R. Sobhan (Ed.), The decade of stagnation: The state of the Bangladesh economy in the 1980s. University Press Ltd. Jahan, S. (2022). Human development in Bangladesh: A dynamic trajectory. In H. Khondker, O Muurlink, & A. Bin Ali (Eds.), The emergence of Bangladesh. Palgrave Macmillan. https://doi​.org​ /10​.1007​/978–981–16–5521–0_10 Kalra, S. Esq., & Chandrakantan, A. M. D. (2018). A legal analysis of the Enemy Property Act of Bangladesh.  https://theasiadialogue​.com ​/wp​- content​/uploads​/2018​/03​/ Legal​_ Analysis​_ Enemy​_ Property​_ Act​_Bangladesh​.pdf Khan, H. A., & Rahman, S. (2022). The political economy of development: Bangladesh from its emergence toward the future. In H. Khondker, O. Muurlink, & A. Bin Ali (Eds.), The emergence of Bangladesh. Palgrave Macmillan. https://doi​.org​/10​.1007​/978–981–16–5521–0_10 Kidder, L. H., & Fine, M. (1986). Making sense of injustice. In E. Seidman, & J. Rappaport (Eds.), Redefining social problems. Perspectives in social psychology. Springer. https://doi​.org​/10​.1007​ /978–1-4899–2236–6_4 Mohsin, A. (2004). Religion, politics, and security: The case of Bangladesh. In P. Satu Limaye, Mohan Malik, and Robert G. Wirsing (eds), Religious Radicalism and Security in South Asia, Honolulu, Hawaii: Asia-Pacific Center for Security Studies.

144  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Moore, B. (1978). Injustice: The social bases of obedience and revolt. Palgrave Macmillan. Poutiainen, T. (2024). The world day of social justice reminds us of the importance of decent work. United Nations Bangladesh. https://bangladesh​.un​.org​/en​/262004​-world​-day​-social​-justice​-reminds​ -us​-importance​-decent​-work The Print (2022, September 11). Bangladesh’s economy has come of age, now attracts foreign players. https://theprint​.in ​/world ​/ bangladeshs​- economy​-has​- come ​- of​-age ​-now​-attracts​-foreign​-players​ /1124077/ Rahman, A. (1991). Poverty and human resource development. In R. Sobhan (Ed.), The decade of stagnation: The state of the Bangladesh economy in the 1980s. University Press Ltd. Sen, A. (1992). Inequality re-examined. Harvard University Press. Sen, A. (1999). Development as freedom. Knopf. Sobhan, R. (2010). Challenging the injustice of poverty. Sage. Sobhan, R., & Khondker, H. (2022). The political and economic context underlying the emergence of Bangladesh. In H. Khondker, O. Muurlink, & A. Bin Ali (Eds.), The emergence of Bangladesh. Palgrave Macmillan. https://doi​.org​/10​.1007​/978–981–16–5521–0_10 United Nations (2023, April 24). The Rana Plaza disaster: Ten years on what has changed? https:// bangladesh​.un​.org​/en ​/228936 ​-rana​-plaza​-disaster​-ten​-years​-what​-has​-changed US Department of State (2022). 2022  Report on International Religious Freedom: Bangladesh. https:// www​.state​.gov​/reports​/2022​-report​-on​-international​-religious​-freedom ​/ bangladesh/ Wirsing, R. G., & Malik, M. (Eds.), Religious radicalism and security in South Asia (pp. 467–488). Asia Pacific Center for Security Studies. World Bank (2021). Country on a mission: The remarkable story of Bangladesh’s development journey. https://www​.worldbank​.org​/en​/news​/immersive​-story​/2021​/09​/16​/country​-on​-a​-mission​-the​ -remarkable​-story​-of​-bangladeshs​-development​-journey World Inequality Report (2022). https://wir2022​.wid​.world

10. The colonial project in Kenya’s “White Highlands” and the continuing devastation of pastoral livelihoods Mokua Ombati

10.1 INTRODUCTION For many Kenyans, land is the only means of subsistence and livelihood, implying, ultimately, that land may be a question of life or death. This has made land one of the most contentious issues in the country. In pastoral regions, the ecological orientation has enormous implications for agricultural activities, limiting crop production because rainfall is too low to sustain agricultural farming. The harsh climatic conditions limit the livelihood options of communities living in arid and semi-arid lands (ASALs) to pastoralism as the most cost-effective, resilient, and sustainable livelihood system because of the ability of pastoralists to adapt to resourcescarce, ecologically fragile, and climatically highly variable circumstances (ALRMP/GoK, 2004). Pastoralism is highly dependent on livestock by definition, and a key feature qualifying pastoral production is the mobility of herds between key resource reserves and seasonal grazing lands to access fodder and water where and when they become available. To the pastoralists, therefore, land is not just the primary resource base, but most importantly, a prerequisite for pastoral productivity, implying that access to land means livelihood and basic survival. However, pastoral landholdings collectively held and managed have, over the years, faced increasing pressure as subsequent processes of defining productivity, administering, allocating, and securing land rights and associated resources within Maasai pastoral landholdings in Kenya have remained largely contentious. Often, ideas informing agrarian land reforms in pastoral rangelands, tacitly influenced by unfavourable attitudes which find foundational support in academic theorising (Hardin’s (1968) “tragedy of the commons” and Herskovits’ (1926) “cattle complex”), and driven by the modernisation ethic, vilify pastoralism as an archaic and environmentally destructive form of land use, and an inefficient anathema to productivity. Pastoralists are, in this, characterised as backward, resistant to change, and inherently violent, wilfully refusing the benefits of modernisation because of their irrational attachment to livestock and a mobile lifestyle. Contrary to pastoralism, agrarianism or agricultural development, in which poor African Kenyans are brought into the market economy as either productive smallholder commercial farmers or skilled agricultural labourers, has over the years been championed and promoted as the clearest roadmap for building the Kenyan nation-state economy into a “take off” based on Rostow’s (1962) stages of economic development. Over the years, these deep-seated negative perceptions have had, and continue to have, a direct impact on pastoral agrarian land policy, often used to justify the appropriation of pastoral lands, force-sedentarization, and other measures to turn or fashion pastoralists into “modern” livestock keepers (Boles et al., 2019; Riamit, 2013; Fratkin, 1997).

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10.2 OBJECTIVES This study, set in the Maasai pastoral lands of Laikipia County, Kenya, assumes a historical perspective to trace significant dynamics of pastoral land use measured against agrarian land reform processes as shaped by Indigenous, colonial, and post-colonial land regimes, land tenure, and land use policies. The study historicises intricacies of sustained years of communal land loss, changing land-tenure regimes, and state landholding policy reforms on pastoralists and pastoralism trajectories, pointing out ambiguities and inconsistencies viewed against climate change in the face of intensification and rapid growth in agriculture and livestock production. The study then reflects on how contrasting and contesting perspectives on pastoral land tenure are evident and sway contemporary socio-political relations, political realignments, support, and mobilisation. The complex interplay of agrarian land reform processes, state policies, legal and administrative frameworks, land privatisation and sedentarization against customary tenure systems, and pastoral productivity against the question of climate change and mounting population pressure, provides the setting for unfolding the transformation dynamics, understood in light of historical, contemporary, and future trajectories and trends of pastoral lands and livelihoods in Kenya. The study may be relevant and applicable for pastoral livelihoods and landuse options elsewhere in Kenya and sub-Saharan Africa.

10.3 LAIKIPIA COUNTY Laikipia County, a plateau located on the equator at the foothills northwest of Mt. Kenya, nestled between the Aberdare Mountains and the great Rift Valley in north-central Kenya, approximately 250 km north of Nairobi, is a semi-arid region that borders the counties of Baringo, Samburu, Isiolo, Meru, Nyeri, Nakuru, and Nyandarua. The eastern wall of the Rift Valley forms the western boundary of the county. Laikipia County covers an estimated total surface area of 9,700 km2 with an altitude ranging from low plains of 800 m to 2,800 m-high gentle and/or slightly undulating ridges, hills, and topography. To the north, the Laikipia plateau drops into low-lying plains that mark the beginning of Kenya’s northern rangelands, characterised by arid and semi-arid savanna and dry bushlands that extend far north to Ethiopia and Somalia, disrupted only by small ranges of isolated hills (Bersaglio, 2017; Ulrich et al., 2012; Graham, 2006; Evans & Adams, 2016; Bond, 2014; Letai, 2015). According to the 2019 Kenya Population and Housing Census (KNBS, 2019), Laikipia County had a total population of 518,600 spanning the three administrative sub-counties of Laikipia East, Laikipia North, and Laikipia West, which are also geographically equivalent to electoral political constituencies. Rainfall is typically bimodal, mostly falling in two seasons, the “long rains” and the “short rains”, but it is unreliable and unpredictable in terms of onset, duration, and termination, and may fall at any time of the year. However, rainfall declines from 800 mm per annum in the south to just 300 mm in the north. Most of Laikipia County drains northwards through the Ewaso Ngiro and its main tributary, the Ewaso Narok, both of which are fed by perennial streams from Mt. Kenya and the Aberdare Mountains. There are additional sources of water available on the commercial ranches in the county in the form of dams and water tanks, the latter fed by boreholes. To the north, in the lowland areas, however, the Ewaso Ngiro is the

The colonial project in Kenya’s “White Highlands”  147 only permanent source of water (Bond, 2014; Graham, 2006; Ulrich et al., 2012; Evans & Adams, 2016; Letai, 2015; Bersaglio, 2017). Variation in altitude accompanied by seasonal fluctuations in the total amount of rainfall and its inter- and intra-annual variability dictate the availability of pastures and water and is therefore associated with marked changes in land use and vegetation cover. This significantly affects and determines people’s livelihoods and livelihood coping strategies. Vegetation consists of wooded savannah dominated by several species of acacia to protected upland forests and wetlands. The high-elevation rangelands of the Laikipia plateau lie at the transition between the fertile, agricultural highlands of the south and the drier plains of the north. Land-use systems reflect a pattern of mixed zone high-potential farming in the higher, wetter areas comprising commercial large-scale farming, mainly horticultural enterprises, smallholder farming, and commercial ranching. A larger proportion of the population lives in these regions. On the other hand, arid pastoralism, large ranches, and wildlife-based tourism, conservancies, and game parks spread in the low-lying drier areas. Dotting the county is a network of urban settlements, towns, markets, and trading centres, the biggest being Nanyuki, Nyahururu, and the county capital, Rumuruti (Ulrich et al., 2012; Boles et al., 2019; Graham, 2006; Evans & Adams, 2016; Bersaglio, 2017; Bond, 2014; Letai, 2015). The largest and most famous pastoral community, not only in Laikipia but also in the whole of Kenya, is the Maasai, who inhabit Kajiado, Narok, and parts of Baringo counties. A few of their cousins, the Samburu, who speak the same language, and a few of the pastoral Turkana and Pokot, also reside in Laikipia (Galaty, 2016).

10.4 HISTORICAL CONTEXT TO THE MAASAI PASTORAL COMMONS AND TENURE REGIMES 10.4.1 The Commons and Colonial Encounter The foundation and philosophy around which property rights to land are held in contemporary Kenya, specifically in pastoral Maasailand, are rooted in the colonial encounter, which has been sustained and extended by successive post-independent Kenyan governments (Rutten, 1992). Before the colonial encounter, land in Kenya was to a large extent owned communally and governed by customary law. A whole community owned the land, with each individual having a right to till, graze animals on, or use it in a manner generally acceptable to other community members. Land was therefore not owned to the exclusion of anyone else. The choice of collective ownership and control of land over individual ownership was partly in response to environmental determinism and the hostile historical development stage, which suggested that group activity and effort bore better results in productive work. Thus, total individual autonomy in land matters was alien during pre-colonial tenure (Riamit, 2013; Lesorogol, 2008). Indigenous resource governance systems reflected the fact that communities organised their lives within the constraints of the environment in which they lived. Decision-making institutions focused on utilising and managing environmental resources based on the knowledge the community acquired over time, in addition to the immediate experiences of the users. Indigenous knowledge of the environment allowed the classification of soil and vegetation types, the prediction of resource availability, and the planning of use strategies. Frequent

148  Handbook of social justice in the Global South monitoring of environmental status and adjusting resource use patterns appropriately enabled the necessary knowledge to avoid over-utilisation in an area. Decision-making and governance processes undertaken within the parameters of traditional institutions were regulated by communal ethics, norms, customs, and belief systems. Accordingly, viable common resource use depended on institutions to identify group rights holders, establish procedures for joint decision-making, define rights to and schedules for resource extraction, and formulate reasonable benefits to be gained and sanctions against infractions (Riamit, 2013). It is against this context that when, in 1883, Scottish explorer Joseph Thomson first set foot in Maasailand Laikipia, he asserted that vast richer portions of the plateau were empty, uninhabited, and idle. Practically, “proof” of a vast, rich plateau lying idle in the highlands provided the invaluable empirical justification to transform Laikipia, and indeed the whole of what came to be known as British East Africa, into a white settlement where land could be put to sound economic use. Colonial narratives and tropes about the emptiness of Laikipia and how its landscape was ideally suited to the happiness and well-being of extra-European whites justified white control over land and resources in Kenya’s highland, as well as over people who – paradoxically – clearly did inhabit the land (Bersaglio, 2017). 10.4.2 Colonial Dream of “A White Man’s Country” Becomes Real The European colonialists identified Laikipia as a temperate patch of Africa, “admirably suited for a white man’s country”, empty, under-populated, and uninhabited, most favoured for finer European possibilities but possibilities that could only be realised with large-scale development. By 1895, just 12 years after Thomson set foot on Maasai land, Laikipia was declared part of Britain’s East African Protectorate – along with the rest of the lands that now make up Kenya (Huxley, 1953, p. 77; Bersaglio, 2017). Appointed Commissioner of Kenya in 1900, Sir Charles Eliot initiated a policy of settling whites in Kenya’s highlands with the primary motivation of transforming Kenya into a settler colony to secure the colony’s dwindling economic prospects. With the Kenya-Uganda Railway nearing completion, the railway had to be made profitable, but Indigenous Africans were perceived as reluctant sources of labour, and incapable of contributing to Kenya’s economic development. As Sir Charles Eliot asserted, “the native population alone, could not, within measurable distance of time, produce enough surplus goods to feed the railway. The natives were not accustomed even to producing enough for themselves […] Even when the season was good there was great difficulty in obtaining enough grain to provision caravans passing through […]. The whole idea of producing a surplus was foreign to the native mind” (Huxley, 1953, p. 77). The answer to Kenya’s economic woes, Eliot reasoned, was white settlement. It was to fill the “empty, dead spaces with settlers who would turn the fertile but now wasted soil to useful account, who would grow crops for the railway to carry out and buy machinery and other goods for it to carry in” (Huxley, 1953, p. 78). Thus, the construction of the “Kenya-Uganda Railway” (1896–1901) and its associated costs were critical factors in both the alienation of more African land for the rail line itself – a one-mile radius on both sides of the railway – and for the acquisition of more fertile agricultural land to be set aside for white-settler farmers to recoup costs (Rutten, 1992, p. 173; Bersaglio, 2017; Riamit, 2013). The question then arose about how to establish a legal framework to facilitate the transfer of especially arable land for commercial agriculture to the white settlers. This necessitated replacing existing land regulations with legislation that was more attractive to the prospective

The colonial project in Kenya’s “White Highlands”  149 white settlers. Accordingly, the Crown Lands Ordinance Act (CLO) of 1902, and subsequently expanded in later updates, placed more explicit restrictions on land ownership. Proclaiming all “unoccupied” lands to be “Crown land” subject to the purview of the colonial administration under His Majesty and providing that only white settlers could buy and own freehold land property, the Crown Lands Ordinance confined Black inhabitants to owning land within native reserves (Hughes, 2006). The Act provided the legal ground for white settlers to be given freehold titles of 99-year leases, later extended to 999 years, which could be used as collateral for bank loans to purchase more freehold plots to successfully meet the administration’s development criteria (Riamit, 2013). In effect, the Crown Lands Ordinance legislation rendered all communal lands, land under the railway line, and arable lands considered “unoccupied”, including the Laikipia plateau, property of the state. The Crown Lands Ordinance legislation was heavily influenced by the white settler farmers, who preferred individual and private tenureship to communal ownership (Mwangi, 2007, p. 71, Lesorogol, 2008, p. 39). Since ultimately, the Crown would not consult or recognise any claims to the so-called “unoccupied lands” made by Indigenous Africans, land already held under customary tenure was alienated. African Indigenous communities were not consulted in the identification and disposal of the so-called “unoccupied lands” (Bersaglio, 2017; Riamit, 2013; Hughes, 2007, 2006; Mwangi, 2007; Rutten, 1992). The case of the 1904 and 1911 treaties between the Maasai and the British Crown exemplifies this dispossession. 10.4.3 The Anglo-Maasai Treaties of Pastoral Dispossession Following the relatively successful recruitment of settlers to Kenya to boost the protectorate’s economy, the British Colonial Office pursued the now infamous Anglo-Maasai treaties of 1904 and 1911 respectively. In a process that contributed to numerous human and livestock deaths, the Indigenous Maasai and their herds were dubiously moved from their ancestral grazing lands. The moves facilitated the eviction and displacement of the pastoral Maasai from their productive prime grazing fields into two reserves to make way for white settlement. By the 1904 treaty, Maasai representatives were quite literally forced (or more accurately, deceived) into signing an agreement that moved Maasai occupying land in the Rift Valley into two separate native reserves – one to the north, on the Laikipia plateau, and another to the south (now defined as Kajiado and Narok counties) along the border with German East Africa (now Tanzania) (Hughes, 2006; Riamit, 2013; Bersaglio, 2017; Boles et al., 2019). The Maasais who were moved to the northern reserve on Laikipia (Boles et al., 2019) used the plateau’s rich pastures to their advantage, tripling their livestock numbers (Hughes, 2006). However, the British soon defied and reneged on the 1904 Anglo-Maasai agreement that promised the Maasai the two reserves (the northern and the southern) in perpetuity “so long as the Maasai as a race shall exist” and guaranteed compensation should any future changes occur. In a 1911 “agreement” that annulled the original treaty of 1904, the British colonial administration moved the unwilling northern reserve Maasai, at gunpoint, from Laikipia plateau to join those who had been moved to an extended southern Maasai reserve characterised by increased vulnerabilities to livestock and human diseases, and with less access to water, pasture, and salt licks. The eviction of Maasai pastoralists from the northern reserve in Laikipia to the inferior southern reserve reflected the colonial government’s endorsement of Herskovits’ (1926) frame of pastoralism as irrational, uneconomic, and based on cattle

150  Handbook of social justice in the Global South attachment and accumulation for its own sake without regard for productivity, efficiency, or sustainability. The eviction was, therefore, designed to “free Laikipia from Masai”, open additional parts of the plateau for white settlement, and facilitate administration and taxation of mobile pastoralists whose livestock was believed to pose a disease threat to imported “superior” settler stocks (as cited in Hughes, 2006, p. 38). With the Maasai representatives physically, or otherwise, coerced into signing the agreement, Laikipia was “free” of Maasai by 1913 for settlers that had already “cast envious eyes at the grazing grounds” of pastoral Maasai (Huxley, 1953, p. 265; Riamit, 2013; Bersaglio, 2017). The colonial government rationalised the eviction on account of wanting to create an exportorientated free market economy in the British East African Protectorate, and in pursuit of this, set the highlands of Kenya (dubbed “The White Highlands”) aside for exclusive European settlement (Evans & Adams, 2016). However, despite this hype and the high expectations that surrounded the White Highlands, many settlers lacked the experience, information, resources, and technology required to achieve large-scale commercial success. As a result, the pace of agricultural development lagged, prompting the Laikipia District Commissioner to admit in 1924 that “Laikipia as an alienated area has up to date been an economic failure”, and the percentage of the highlands actually utilised for commercial agriculture and/or ranching waxed and waned. In that same year, settlers only managed 17,000 cattle on the plateau, compared to the 200,000 that the Maasai had on the land before the second move. By 1933, as little as 12 per cent of lands designated for whites were occupied by settlers. Of the rest, 40 per cent was grazing land, 20 per cent was occupied by African squatters, and nearly 28 per cent was empty (Bersaglio, 2017, p. 110; Boles et al., 2019). The “Agreements” have remained a bone of contention for the Maasai, who, both then and now, question the conditions under which the “Agreements” were signed and their legitimacy with respect to individuals purported to have signed them on behalf of the pastoral Maasai. In the first count, the Maasai hold that those who signed the treaties did so under heavy duress, while some of the personalities, including the son of Lenana (Olonana), whom the British accorded the position of “Paramount Chief”, had no political mandate to represent the Maasai and were hence illegitimate in the context of the Maasai socio-political organisation (Hughes, 2006, 2007; Rutten, 1992). Often this argument has formed the basis for contemporary claims by the Maasai for reparations and restitution for the land lost, livestock killed, and associated costs and damages (Riamit, 2013; Bersaglio, 2017). Greater alienation of land in Maasailand was yet to come in the 1940s, with the establishment of the National Parks Ordinance of 1945. Most of the national parks, game reserves, and conservation areas established by the colonial administration for both tourism and wildlife conservation were hived off from Maasailand. The loss experienced by the Maasai, over land alienation for European settlement under the British colonial regime, is arguably the largest compared to that of other Kenyan communities. In retrospect, the alienated lands constitute not only a quantitative loss but also a qualitative one for the pastoral Maasai (Bersaglio, 2017; Rutten, 1992; Riamit, 2013; Mwangi, 2007; Hughes, 2007). 10.4.4 Kenya Land Commission or Carter Commission Livestock ownership figures made the Maasai fully self-sufficient pastoralists. However, the significant increase in livestock herds, as indicated earlier, came to haunt colonial administrators later (Mwangi, 2007; Riamit, 2013). The large Maasai pastoral herd was blamed for

The colonial project in Kenya’s “White Highlands”  151 soil erosion and land degradation. The colonial administration interpreted this not in terms of a reduction in grazing rangelands and quality, but rather based on two debasing theoretical frames. First is Garret Hardin’s (1968) “tragedy of the commons”, which holds that traditional pastoral practices of individual owners maximally exploiting communally shared pastures to the detriment of the collective good are wasteful and inherently degrading to the environment. Second is what was perceived as the Maasai’s irrational attachment to livestock around the arguments of the “Cattle Complex” as advanced by Herskovits (1926), which is claimed to have led the Maasai to prioritise livestock quantity over quality. In the ensuing debate, the British Administration established the Kenya Land Commission (KLC), chaired by William Morris Carter, in 1932, with the express mandate to look into native land grievances. These included broader questions of current and future land needs of Africans, Indigenous African claims over alienated land, and communal ownership against individual tenure, and provided recommendations (Mwangi, 2007; Rutten, 1992). It is worth mentioning here that the Maasai repeatedly protested the loss of their pastoral lands and appealed to the Commission for a review (Riamit, 2013). In a landmark report that defined the pastoral and agricultural trajectory of the country, the 1934 Carter Land Commission recommended destocking for pastoral areas and a land tenure system initially based on customary law to be gradually transitioned towards individual holdings. Furthermore, in response to the Maasai demand for restitution over previously alienated land (in 1904/1911), the commission held that the Maasai already had more land than they required, to the detriment of Europeans and other African groups. The commission suggested that the Maasai should instead lease land out to cultivator African communities to develop. This move, in the commission’s view, would also relieve pressure on land in other regions of the country. These recommendations were partly to blame for encroachment on Maasailand by cultivator African communities, mostly those of Kikuyu smallholder farmers from Central Kenya (Rutten, 2008; Riamit, 2013; Boles et al., 2019). The Carter Land Commission’s report legally defined boundaries for the White Highlands, reserved exclusively for European settlers, and established the Native Lands Trust exclusively for Africans. Note that, while Kenya’s highlands had long been referred to as white, it was not until the White Paper of 1923, followed by the report of the KLC (or Carter Commission), that a “white reserve” was formally established in the highlands. This excluded Indigenous Africans from owning land within the boundaries of the White Highlands, formalising a racialized property regime (Huxley, 1948; Riamit, 2013). Thus, a white man’s country was carved out of the highlands, although it would be restricted, in spatial terms, to the heart of the colony. By the onset of World War II, Kenya’s colonial administration had transformed Laikipia from an Indigenous, pastoralist rangeland into a settler society. The legacies of Laikipia’s racialised land use and tenure systems remain a serious point of contention. 10.4.5 Experimental Grazing Schemes An offshoot of the KLC, presided over by William Morris Carter, Grazing Schemes were designed to respond to what the colonial administration interpreted to be the mismanagement of pastoral lands by Indigenous African communities. Specifically, they aimed at controlling grazing through the provision of permanent water supplies in commercial ranch-like units, and the introduction of destocking systems, supplemented by disease control and improved market access (Lesorogol, 2008, Mwangi, 2007). The schemes, managed by committees

152  Handbook of social justice in the Global South comprised of government officials and local representatives, were heavily influenced by the prevailing ecologists’ argument of carrying capacity (Riamit, 2013; Okoth-Ogendo, 1986). Although the Grazing Schemes were not entirely successful, they nonetheless had a lasting, negative impression on the psyche of pastoral communities around land tenure, which would influence their responses to future policies (Lesorogol, 2008; Mwangi, 2007; Riamit, 2013). The Grazing Schemes became the precursor of latter-day group ranches in Maasailand, introduced to roughly carve up given Maasai territorial sections (olosho). The Schemes were also supposed to serve as demonstration sites on the value of sedentary life as opposed to pastoral mobility (Mwangi, 2007, p. 74; Rutten, 1992, p. 209). Overall, the Schemes’ objectives of reducing Maasai stock were not realized; they led instead to resource depletion. The reasons attributed to their failure ranged from resistance against an external, overbearing regulating authority, which often tried to control grazing and livestock numbers by force, occasionally pressuring households to split their herds in order to remain within the allowed quota defined by climatic/environmental constraints, and generally ill-planned top-down approaches (Lesorogol, 2008; Rutten, 1992; Riamit, 2013). 10.4.6 The East African Royal Commission Thereafter, the East African Royal Commission of 1952 was established by the colonial regime with the broad goal of exploring possibilities for the improvement of agriculture in the country to foster economic growth. Beyond upholding earlier views of the KLC, condemning Maasai pastoralists for their irrational attachment to both cattle and Indigenous culture, the commission went a step further to recommend the abolition of communal tenure to land, which they argued was inefficient and should be gradually replaced by the “commercialization of stock farming” (Mwangi, 2007, p. 75). The commission, informed by Garrett Hardin’s (1968) “tragedy of the commons” theoretical model, was of the opinion that customary tenure to land was untenable since it could only support a subsistence and stagnant economy, all because land was not a negotiable asset. By 1966, these recommendations for the establishment of individual tenure were adopted as official government policy, effectively setting the stage for a grand onslaught aimed at the dissolution of the Maasai pastoral commons (Mwangi, 2007; Rutten, 1992; Riamit, 2013). 10.4.7 The Swynnerton Plan The 1954 Government of Kenya Plan to Intensify the Development of Agriculture in African Areas by the then-colonial Assistant Director of Agriculture in Kenya, Roger J. M. Swynnerton, reinforced and gave impetus to the recommendations of the East African Royal Commission. The revolutionary Swynnerton report (Swynnerton, 1954) gave a formula, which laid the essential bedrocks of Kenya’s contemporary agrarian structure, outlined a scheme of basic economic reorientation of the African land units based essentially on the commercialisation of both animal and crop productions, premised on the presumed superiority of individual property rights to land over communal land tenure. Thus, the Plan considered the privatisation of land through the displacement and replacement of Indigenous property systems, relations, and modes of essential production, cautioning on the potential of traditional land tenure blocking the way towards accelerated agricultural development (Mwangi, 2007; Rutten, 1992; Riamit, 2013).

The colonial project in Kenya’s “White Highlands”  153 One of the principal features of the Swynnerton Plan was the consolidation of fragmented land, the enclosure of individual holdings, and the registration of titles as necessary steps towards intensifying African agriculture. The Plan claimed that Maasai areas in particular were the only remaining regions to settle, as any land naturally suited to settlement had already been occupied (Swynnerton, 1954, p. 7). In effect, private land tenureship and individual title deeds on land, along with consolidation and registration of landholdings, were seen as proper building blocks for a modern agrarian structure. The colonial administration, and the post-colonial bureaucracy, believed that private land tenure was attractive and advantageous, politically as well as economically. Private property rights to land were viewed as a means to internalise the benefits of innovative activities and provide the economic incentives for productivity increases in agriculture. Furthermore, private property rights were viewed as a means to solve the problems of the rather diffuse nature of customary land rights. In addition, the consolidation of land would solve the problem of excessive fragmentation (Hebinck, 1998; Riamit, 2013). Grazing Schemes: In the pastoral sector, covering the arid and semi-arid regions of the country, the Swynnerton Plan proposed that the greatest boon would be a constant and valuable flow of livestock and their products resulting from control of stock numbers, a planned grid of water supplies, and sound grazing management. This was to be achieved, partially, by expansion and intensification of the previously experimental Grazing Schemes (as proposed by the 1934 William Morris Carter KLC report), to be enhanced through improvement in the areas of market access, disease control, regulated grazing, and water supply. Although most of the Grazing Schemes up to this point were managed as individual ranches, the system of administration was altered by introducing a completely new medium through which authority over land was henceforth to be exercised, namely the Group Representatives. However, concerns over their efficacy, specifically in regard to who may hold office as group representative leaders, led to inequality, and corruption mounted. The beneficiaries of the individual ranches, for example, were, by and large, wealthy and influential Maasai elites who always happened to be men (Okoth-Ogendo, 1986; Mwangi, 2007; Riamit, 2013). Group Ranches (GR): The above concerns in Grazing Schemes culminated in the idea of experimenting with the establishment of GR within pastoral areas. In order to guarantee the success of the proposed schemes and individual ranches, the government was to provide support in terms of improved access to water and veterinary services and enhanced environmental conservation services, including pasture management typically exemplified through the promotion of rotational grazing. However, this altered the pattern of land use by severely restricting the nomadic character of pastoral communities without first improving their ability to adapt to semi-sedentary living. In particular, adequate steps were not taken to reduce the pastoralists’ dependence on the seasonal availability of water and stock feed. One consequence of this was that in order to minimise drought risks, clans and families often found it necessary to split herds and join different Ranching Schemes, a course of action that was apt to put great strain on the social institutions of pastoral society (Okoth-Ogendo, 1986; Riamit, 2013; Lesorogol, 2008; Mwangi, 2007; Rutten, 1992). In addition, the elite social actors who stood to benefit from the individual ranch schemes opposed the idea of collective rights to land as envisioned in the new concept of the GR. By the same token, increasing pressure on land in the high-potential central highlands of Kenya pushed some of the inhabitants, the Kikuyus, out in search of extra land for cultivation, most of whom settled and farmed on parts of Maasailand, particularly the Laikipia plateau, which

154  Handbook of social justice in the Global South served as well-watered dry-season grazing areas for the pastoralists (Riamit, 2013; Rutten, 1992; Boles et al., 2019). However, despite the explicit challenges, the Swynnerton Plan was later to become the blueprint for post-colonial Kenya’s development policy around land use and agricultural practice. 10.4.8 Colonial Regime's Policy Intervention in Pastoral Areas in Perspective From the outset, colonial governance was at odds with the ecology and politics of subsistence pastoralism. Their subsequent interaction with the “natives” in the East African colonies reflected this disconnect. The colonialist policy involved either isolation of communities, through fixing boundaries around them, annexation of pastoral land for white settlers, or outright neglect of subsistence pastoralism. Studies on pastoralism in the colonial era were most often undertaken with the purpose of making the transhumant pastoralists “settle down” so as to bring colonial law and order into their lands and encourage the people to cultivate (Mwangi, 2007; Riamit, 2013). By 1921, a colonial decree limited the livelihood options for pastoral societies by containing pastoralists’ seasonal migrations in Kenya within newly delineated boundaries and these territories were designated as “closed” districts. The boundaries created were inconsistent with the geopolitical and livelihood realities of pastoral societies. As a consequence, the “closure” of pastoral districts translated into both economic isolation and disruption of pastoral livelihoods and identities (Fratkin, 1998; Riamit, 2013). If what would be called the “first phase” of colonial dealings with property rights to land was characterised by the annexation of land from Indigenous communities, the second phase was predominantly characterised by the intensification of legal mechanisms and policy processes to enhance the entrenchment of individual and private property rights to land with the overall goal of freeing land for a market-orientated economy, with far-reaching consequences, especially for Maasai pastoralists. Historical processes are greatly relevant in shaping the broad direction of current processes of transformation. The laws and policies established by the colonial administration defined, if not dictated, the general direction of the transformation of land rights and associated institutions in Maasailand. Mwangi (2007) underscores the necessity of understanding the historicity of the evolution of property rights by arguing that the self-reinforcing nature of institutions provides continuity between past and current decisions. That is, once an institutional path is adopted, it often becomes increasingly difficult to deviate from it over time.

10.5 PASTORALISM IN POST-COLONIAL KENYA Coincidentally, at the advent of political independence in 1963, the successive post-colonial independence governments simply adopted and perfected policies crafted by the colonial administration. As it was during the colonial period, the guiding development philosophies for the pastoralists continued to be the “cattle complex” by Herskovits (1926) and the “tragedy of the commons” by Hardin (1968). In these, pastoralists are framed as constantly and irrationally accumulating livestock with little regard for efficiency, productivity, and sustainability, and as perpetrators of the “tragedy” wherein traditional pastoral practices of individual owners utilising communally shared pastures are wasteful, detrimental to the collective good, and

The colonial project in Kenya’s “White Highlands”  155 inherently degrading to the environment. Championed by Western aid and international development agencies, successive post-colonial governments were encouraged the curtailment of pastoral livestock production on communally held lands through periodic confiscation and punitive campaigns, and force the promotion of sedentarization and private ranching of livestock resources, as private landowners were assumed to better conserve resources (Fratkin & Mearns, 2003; Boles et al., 2019; Riamit, 2013; Fratkin, 1998; Wafula, 2015). 10.5.1 Group Ranches Early experiments with land tenure reforms in Kenya’s pastoral rangelands were GR in Maasai territories, which commenced in the mid-1960s. By the late 1970s, Kenya’s dry lands became the focus of international attention to improve the quality of life of the inhabitants. Isolated time-bound policies geared at destocking, land conservation, and quarantine regulations were now replaced by GR, an integrated approach (Riamit, 2013; Rutten, 1992). The concept of GR was partly an outcome of a proposal submitted to the World Bank by the Kenyan government in late 1965 (Wafula, 2015). Overall, the project was targeted at the commercialisation of livestock keeping, controlling environmental degradation, and increasing herd productivity within pastoral areas. The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) agreed to support aspects of the project. Security of land tenure was advocated as a key instrument in promoting the development of the pastoral rangelands (Wafula, 2015). These initial efforts at privatisation sought to maintain legally titled groupheld units, in keeping with the Maasai communal socio-cultural structure. However, by the mid-1980s, individuation of GR began in earnest and continues to this day (Mwangi, 2007; Rutten, 1992; Riamit, 2013). 10.5.2 Privatising the Commons? GR: This new approach to pastoral rangelands entailed the adjudication of former Trustlands into “Ranches” with freehold title deeds held by groups. A GR is a delineated piece of land legally allocated to a group of members, theoretically defined as all adult males with legitimate claims to land in the area, who together hold a single joint title. The collective group of owners may correspond to a tribe, clan, territorial section, or family. A register of all members with legitimate claims to land is prepared and provides the basis for the exclusion of non-members (Mwangi, 2007). Each member is deemed to share in the ownership of the GR in undivided shares. The day-to-day management of assets of the GR is the responsibility of elected and incorporated official representatives of the group. The supreme decision-making organ of the GR is the Annual General Meeting (AGM) comprised of at least two-thirds of all legally registered members. This is where decisions are supposed to be made concerning all matters of resource allocation and other rights and entitlements of members (Riamit, 2013). The concept of GR represented the first attempt to radically transform a nomadic subsistence production system into a sedentary, commercially orientated system. The arrangement called for major changes in Maasai social and political organisation and livestock management strategies. The plan, for example, entailed the allocation of grazing quotas to members to limit livestock numbers to the carrying capacity of the ranches and the development of shared ranch infrastructure, such as water points, dips, stock handling facilities, and firebreaks, using

156  Handbook of social justice in the Global South loans. Members would pay user fees and be collectively responsible for loan repayments. Additionally, members were expected to manage their own livestock and would be able to obtain loans for purchasing breeding stock and cattle for fattening (Riamit, 2013). It was envisioned that the elected GR officials would manage all GR affairs, including overseeing infrastructural development and loan repayments, enforcing grazing quotas and grazing management, and maintaining the integrity of the GR boundary. The proposal included provisions for a hired ranch manager and government extension services to assist the GR committee. However, the theoretical ideals of the GR to a greater extent deviate rather than correspond to the practical functioning and day-to-day realities on the ground. 10.5.3 Sessional Paper No. 10 Colonial disregard for comparative development needs was given further impetus by postcolonial regimes’ resort to parochialism and indeed prejudice in allocating development resources for pastoral regions. Post-colonial marginalisation of pastoral lands was, for example, institutionalised in Sessional Paper No. 10 of 1965 on African Socialism and its Application to Planning in Kenya (GoK, 1965), the pre-eminent policy statement by the post-independence government, which recommended development funding be invested in areas of greatest absorptive capacity, where they are bound to yield the largest increase in net output with surpluses being redistributed to the lower absorption parts of the country. As such, the policy focused on national development strategies towards agriculture, investing resources in the socalled high potential areas, with the expectation that this growth would trickle down to low potential areas of the Arid and Semi-Arid Lands (ASALs) inhabited by pastoralists (Wafula, 2015). However, this did not happen, as there was little redistribution to the low absorption regions and to communities previously overlooked by colonialism (Deb and Seamster, 2024). The net effects of such inequitable resource allocation have been inequalities in development status between the agriculturally high potential and low potential regions of the country. 10.5.4 The ASALs Framework In a 1979 policy paper entitled The Arid and Semi-Arid Lands of Kenya; A Framework for Implementation, Programme Planning and Evaluation, the Kenyan government aimed at settling pastoralists in irrigation schemes and group ranches with drought-resistant crops, among other alternative land use systems. The policy fell short because ASALs’ “voices” were not considered, and the policy formulators put emphasis on technical issues such as land degradation, irrigation, and the need to find solutions to the nomadic pastoralism “menace”. The policy had a technical solution to problems that were mainly social, cultural, and political. Considering that pastoral production demands mobility, the sine qua non of dryland livestock keeping, the government’s policy actions curtailed mobility through the alienation of land, demarcation of grazing boundaries, and the mechanisation of boreholes, which encouraged pastoral sedentarization. All these reflect the government’s difficulty with recognising pastoralism as a viable livelihood (Wafula, 2015).

The colonial project in Kenya’s “White Highlands”  157 10.5.5 Economic Recovery Strategy The Economic Recovery Strategy for Wealth and Employment Creation 2003–2007 (ERS) policy blueprint by the incoming National Rainbow Coalition (NARC) government in 2003 acknowledged the failure of past governments to confront the development challenges of the ASALs and demonstrated a commitment to break with the past by making the ASALs an integral part of the national economy. The policy highlighted the potential of the ASALs in livestock and identified challenges to be addressed in order for this potential to be realised. However, this largely remained plain “papers” with no tangible follow-up for implementation and no appropriate mechanisms to support mobile pastoralism as a viable livelihood system (Wafula, 2015). 10.5.6 Pastoralism in the 2010 Constitution Nomadic pastoralists are among those given special reference by the 2010 Constitution of Kenya (CoK, 2010, Art. 260) as a marginalised group who have, because of laws and/or practices, historically been disadvantaged by discrimination on one or more grounds in the social and economic life of Kenya as a whole and therefore require integration and special intervention. Article 56 of the Constitution mandates the State initiate appropriate affirmative action measures to redress historical marginalisation, effectively providing constitutional backing to strategies for addressing the historical marginalisation of pastoralists. As a first intervention step to redress this, the constitution (Art. 61) recognises “(1) all land in Kenya as belonging to the people of Kenya collectively as a nation, as communities and as individuals, and [it] shall be held, used and managed in a manner that is equitable, efficient, productive and sustainable” (Art. 60[1]). With this, the Constitution essentially bestows upon Kenyan citizens the opportunity to drive their own development priorities. Further, the Constitution (Art. 63) recognises community land, where the interests of the pastoral Maasai belong, as “(1) land vested in and held by communities” consisting of “(2a) land lawfully registered in the name of group representatives, … (d) land that is (i) lawfully held, managed or used by specific communities as community forests, grazing areas or shrines, and (ii) ancestral lands …”. In addition, the Constitution specifies limitations on the alienation and use of “(4) community lands to be within the nature and extent of the rights of members of each community individually and collectively …”. Most importantly, and specifically for the pastoralists in the Laikipia plateau, the 2010 Constitution bestows leasehold tenure only on foreign nationals, and any such lease, however granted, shall not exceed 99 years (Art. 65[1]). Effectively, the constitution annuls any previous agreements purported to confer on foreign citizens an interest in land greater than a 99-year lease and proclaims that such a provision shall be regarded as conferring on the person a 99-year leasehold interest, and no more (Art. 65[2]). By the strength of the Constitution, therefore, the Anglo-Maasai treaties of dispossession of 1904 and 1911, respectively, by which the pastoral Maasai of the Laikipia plateau were moved from their high-potential grazing lands to give room for colonial settlers for a period of 999 years, remain annulled. However, even if the 2010 Kenya Constitution recognises community tenure, acknowledging communities as direct landowners in their own right (CoK, 2010, Art. 63), questions and concerns still linger. Despite the recognition of positive attributes of customary tenure to land, it is important to note, as indicated earlier, that benefits from Common Pool Resources (CPRs)

158  Handbook of social justice in the Global South may not necessarily be fairly and evenly distributed but are differentiated, often by age, gender, and class. Elite capture and exclusion of women and young people, for example, continue to pose significant challenges to both centralised and decentralised processes. For security of land tenure to occur, identifying the nature and sources of threats that create insecurity and tailoring policy solutions to these threats is paramount (Mwangi , 2009). There is, therefore, a need to attempt reconciliation of statutory rights with customary rights.

10.6 CONTEMPORARY RELATIONS IN PASTORAL LAIKIPIA 10.6.1 Private or Customary Land Tenure? Which Way Pastoral Lands? The result of the foregoing agrarian land reform processes for the pastoral lands of Laikipia is that the stark, and even more so, racialised inequalities in land ownership have given rise to a significant contraction of pastoral rangelands. Fewer than 50 individuals and entities now own approximately 40 per cent of the whole of Laikipia County in the form of private property, used for large-scale agriculture and horticulture, commercial ranching, wildlife conservancies, and safari tourism, and managed as paramilitarised enclaves. Most of these landowners are extra-European whites (Letai, 2015; Bersaglio, 2017; Boles et al., 2019). This has put pastoral community ranches under the greatest strain, meaning that during prolonged periods of drought, pastoral herders in search of water and grass for their livestock “invade” private lands, claiming that “Without Rain, No Land is Private”. This assertion probably summarises the general feeling and subsequent debate on the often recurring and persistent conflict between customary rights to land and individual and private property rights in the pastoral rangelands of the Laikipia plateau. For the pastoral herders, disrespecting the boundaries of private and individual lands means the difference between life and death for their livestock and identity as pastoralists. In the historical circumstances defining land ownership and land use in the Laikipia plateau, conflicting perspectives on who has legitimate claims to land are often a question of great division between the proponents of the superiority of private title to property and those asserting customary tenure to land, especially during adversarial periods occasioned by climate change. 10.6.2 Claims and Counterclaims A recurring trend for pastoral herders who move onto private lands, from large commercial ranches and conservancies to smallholding farms during extended periods of drought to gain access to grazing, is to openly regurgitate claims of historical land injustices and seek to “drive away those [il]legally occupying their ancestral lands” (Matara, 2017a; Kantai, 2007). For example, in the extended 2004–2005 drought, pastoral herders moved into commercial ranches to gain access to grazing, but, given that the date coincided with the 100-year mark since the first Maasai Treaty, some took the opportunity to assert that the leasehold period of 99 years was now over, and that these lands should revert to the Maasai (Galaty, 2016). A similar trend was witnessed during the prolonged droughts experienced in 2015, 2016, and 2017 (Gitonga & Jebet, 2015; Gitonga, 2016; Matara, 2017b; Ndirangu, 2017). Human life is often lost, some are maimed, their livestock killed, and other property destroyed when brutal force is used to evict the herders and their livestock. However, the events have helped the

The colonial project in Kenya’s “White Highlands”  159 pastoralists and their political leadership to rally and mobilise, sometimes, in large “prayer meetings” to reiterate their ancestral claims to land. And the issues and questions of land, land rights, and land use have been key around which political electoral campaigns revolve and victory is determined at every electoral cycle. Nonetheless, the disconcerting question remains: Are the pastoral land invaders acting with disregard, malice, and contempt for settler-owned and other private properties, or are they reasserting historical community rights over a landscape from which they are excluded and marginalised? In the circumstances, whose tenure rights should prevail?

REFERENCES ALRMP/GoK. (2004). The Pastoralist communities and free primary education in Kenya. Preliminary findings commissioned by Coalition of Pastoralist Child Education of Arid Lands Resource Management Project and Action Aid, Kenya. Bersaglio, B. (2017).  Green grabbing and the contested nature of belonging in Laikipia, Kenya: A genealogy. Doctoral dissertation submitted to the University of Toronto, Canada. Boles, O. J. C., Shoemaker, A., Mustaphi, C. J. C., Petek, N., Ekblom, A., & Lane, P. J. (2019). Historical ecologies of pastoralist overgrazing in Kenya: Long-term perspectives on cause and effect. Human Ecology, 47, 419–434. https://doi​.org​/10​.1007​/s10745–019–0072–9 Bond, J. (2014). Conflict, development and security at the agro–pastoral–wildlife nexus: A case of Laikipia county, Kenya. The Journal of Development Studies, 50(7), 991–1008. CoK (Constitution of Kenya). (2010). Published by the National Council for Law Reporting with the Authority of the Attorney General. http://new​.kenyalaw​.org​/akn​/ ke​/act​/2010​/constitution​/eng​@2010​ -09​- 03. Deb, N., & Seamster, L. (2024). Socioenvironmental injustice across the global divide: Slow violence and institutional betrayal in Bhopal and Flint. Sociology of Development, 10(1), 61–90. Evans, L. A., & Adams, W. M. (2016). Fencing elephants: The hidden politics of wildlife fencing in Laikipia, Kenya. Land Use Policy, 51, 215–228. Fratkin, E. (1997). Pastoralism: Governance and development issues. Annual Review. Anthropology, 26, 235–236. Fratkin, E. (1998). Ariaal pastoralists of Kenya: Surviving drought and development in Africa’s arid lands. Allyn & Bacon. Fratkin, E., & Mearns, R. (2003). Sustainability and pastoral livelihoods: Lessons from East Africa and Mongolia. Human Organization, 62(2), 112–122. Galaty, J. G. (2016). Reasserting the commons: Pastoral contestations of private and state lands in East Africa. International Journal of the Commons, 10(2), 709–727. Gitonga, M. (2016, December 8). Illegal herders drive 60,000 cattle into private ranches in Laikipia. Daily Nation. https://www​.nation​.co​.ke​/counties​/ Laikipia ​/ Illegal​-herders​-drive​-cattle​-into​-private​ -ranches​-Laikipia​/1183290–3479546-format-xhtml-1asxqdz/index​.ht​ml Gitonga, M., & Jebet, V. (2015, June 9). 10 herders killed in Laikipia ranch attack. Daily Nation. https://www​. nation​ .co​ . ke ​ /counties ​ / laikipia ​ / Laikipia ​ - Herders ​ - Ranch ​ -Attack​-Isiolo ​ /1183290– 2745800-format-xhtml-paqj12z/index​.ht​ml GOK (Government of Kenya). (1965). Sessional Paper No. 10 of 1965 on African socialism and its application to planning in Kenya. Government Printer. Graham, M. (2006). Coexistence in a land use mosaic? Land use, risk and elephant ecology in Laikipia District, Kenya [Doctoral dissertation, University of Cambridge, UK]. Hardin, G. (1968). The tragedy of the commons. Science, 162, 1243–1248. Hebinck, P. (1998). “The significance of land tenure reform in Kenya: Lessons for South Africa.” Unpublished paper presented at the International Conference on Land Tenure in the Developing World with a focus on Southern Africa, Cape Town, in Proceedings, 243–254,27–29 January. Herskovits, M. J. (1926). The cattle complex in East Africa. American Anthropologist, 28(1), 230–272. Hughes, L. (2006). Moving the Maasai: A colonial misadventure. Palgrave Macmillan.

160  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Hughes, L. (2007). Rough time in Paradise: Claims, blames and memory making around some protected areas in Kenya. Conservation and Society, 5(3), 307–330. Huxley, E. (1948). Settlers of Kenya. Greenwood. Huxley, E. (1953). White man’s country: Lord Delamere and the making of Kenya. Chatto and Windus. Kantai, P. (2007). In the grip of the vampire state: Maasai land struggles in Kenyan politics. Journal of Eastern African Studies, 1(1), 107–122. KNBS (Kenya National Bureau of Statistics). (2019). 2019 Kenya population and housing census volume I: Population by county and sub-county. Kenya Government Printer. Lesorogol, C. (2008). Contesting the commons: Privatizing pastoral lands in Kenya. University of Michigan Press. Letai, J. (2015). Land deals and pastoralist livelihoods in Laikipia County, Kenya. In Hall, R., Scoones, I., Tsikata, D., (Eds.), Africa’s land rush: Rural livelihoods and Agrarian change (pp. 83–98). James Currey. Matara, E. (2017a, February 9). Claims of historical land injustices embolden herders to invade ranches. Daily Nation. https://www​.nation​.co​.ke​/counties​/ laikipia​/why​-herders​-invade​-ranches​ /1183290–3806264-format-xhtml-14dvf5oz/index​.ht​ml Matara, E. (2017b, March 14). Ranch owners, relatives fall victim to invasions by herders. Daily Nation. https://www​.nation​.co​.ke ​/news ​/ Ranch​- owners​-fall​-victim​-to ​-invasions ​/1056–3848524-formatxhtml-bhw35ez/index​.ht​ml Mwangi, E. (2007). Socioeconomic change and land use in Africa: The transformation of property rights in Maasailand (1st ed.). Palgrave Macmillan. Mwangi, E. (2009). What happens during the creation of private property? Subdividing group ranches in Kenya’s Maasailand. In J. Kristen, A. Dorward, C. Poulton, & N. Vink (Eds.), Institutional economics perspectives on African agricultural development (pp. 343–358). International Food Policy Research Institute. Ndirangu, M. (2017, June 20). 15 arrested as police flush herders out of private ranches in Laikipia. Daily Nation.  https://www​.nation​.co​.ke​/counties​/ laikipia ​/ Police​-flush​-herders​- out​- of​-private​-ranches​/ 1183290–3978840-n6f2vaz/index​.htm​l. Okoth-Ogendo, H. W. O. (1986). The perils of land reforms: The case of Kenya. In Arntzen, J. L., Ngcongco, L. D., & Turner, S., D., (Eds.), Land policy and agriculture in Eastern and Southern Africa: Selected papers presented at a workshop. United Nations University, Tokyo, Japan. Riamit, S. K. (2013). Dissolving the pastoral commons, enhancing enclosures: Commercialization, corruption and colonial continuities amongst Maasai pastoralists of Southern Kenya [Master’s thesis, McGill University, Canada]. Rostow, W. W. (1962). The stages of economic growth. Harvard University Press. Rutten, M. (1992). Selling wealth to buy poverty. Saarbrucken Verlag Breitenbach. Rutten, M. (2008). Why De Soto’s ideas might triumph everywhere but in Kenya: A review of landtenure policies among Maasai pastoralists. In M. Rutten, A. Leliveld, & D. Foeken (Eds.), Inside poverty and development in Africa: Critical reflections on pro-poor policies, (African Dynamics Series): 7, 83–118. Leiden, Brill. Swynnerton, R. J. M. (1954). A plan to intensify the development of African agriculture in Kenya colony and protectorate of Kenya. Kenya Government Printers. Ulrich, A., Speranza, C. I., Roden, P., Kiteme, B., Wiesmann, U., & Nüsser, M. (2012). Small-scale farming in semi-arid areas: Livelihood dynamics between 1997 and 2010 in Laikipia, Kenya. Journal of Rural Studies, 28, 241–251. Wafula, C. M. (2015). Transitioning pastoralism towards a green economy: Key lessons from Kenya’s arid and semi-arid areas (ASALS). In Y. Aberra & M. Abdulahi (Eds.), The intricate road to development: Government development strategies in the pastoral areas of the Horn of Africa (pp. 395–434). Institute for Peace and Security Studies (IPSS), Addis Ababa University, Ethiopia.

11. Selective state intervention and uneven agrarian marketization in upland Laos Lamphay Inthakoun

11.1 INTRODUCTION Since the 1980s, the socialist government of the Lao People’s Democratic Republic (Lao PDR or Laos) has introduced policies to liberalize its economy, enabling the development of market forces. The government has pursued this approach to generate economic growth and lift people out of poverty. A key element of market liberalization in rural areas has been the promotion of cash cropping, especially in remote areas where farmers have mostly relied on subsistence agriculture (Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry [MAF], 2015). Across the country, a range of cash crops have been grown by smallholder farmers and in larger-scale plantations, dramatically changing rural landscapes (Castella et al., 2023). Cash cropping has been an important element of rural economic development, providing villagers with valuable cash income that they can use to buy essential household goods and appliances, motorbikes, and medical care, while also sending their children to school, among other important purchases. While economic liberalization and cash-cropping policies have increased the flow of cash to rural landscapes and peoples, they have come with significant social and environmental costs (Thanichanon et al., 2018; Castella et al., 2023). Despite the opportunity to earn more cash, economic benefits are often distributed unequally, whereby some farmers improve their income while others stay in poverty or fall into debt. Successful farmers tend to have better access to key inputs of production, most importantly capital, land, and labor. They are also better able to navigate the uncertainties of the market. Farmers who have struggled lack these key production factors. Additionally, they have often been exploited by investors and traders and have taken on high levels of debt, yet have sold their crop when prices have been low (Friis & Nielsen, 2016; Dwyer & Vongvisouk, 2019; Cole, 2019; Cole & Soukhathammavong, 2021). Environmentally, cash cropping has led to deforestation and associated loss of biodiversity and non-timber forest products, soil degradation, and soil and water pollution from agrochemical use (Costenbader et al., 2015; Vongvisouk et al., 2016; Hurni & Fox, 2018; Ingalls et al., 2018b). Cash cropping can deplete the soil of its nutrients, reducing yields and making it harder for farmers to continue to make a living (Vongvisouk et al., 2016; Cole, 2019). What explains the successes and failures of cash cropping in Laos? An important element is the interactions between the state and the market. As a socialist country, the state is often seen as hindering the full development of market forces or distorting market signals. This could include dimensions such as not providing enough competition in investment, contract arrangements, and purchasing options. The opposing argument is that the negative effects of cash cropping are due to a lack of government involvement. From this perspective, market forces have been unleashed on farmers without the related forms of regulation necessary to limit negative effects. As a result, villagers are vulnerable to and exploited by investors, traders, and a volatile market. 162

Selective state intervention and uneven agrarian marketization  163 In this chapter, I argue that the key to understanding how cash cropping operates in rural Laos and its uneven economic, social, and environmental impacts, is less about whether the state is involved and more about how the state has been involved. This starts from the recognition that economic development in Laos is built upon a close interaction between the state and the market, and that the two cannot be easily separated. Therefore, any analysis of how successes and failures occur must concern the relationship between state and market forces. My contention is that state involvement in Laos is focused largely on initiating the development of new cash crops but not on maintaining and regulating their production. The government plays a role in approving investments, linking investors with communities, encouraging villagers to grow cash crops, and helping to arrange financing, contracting, and marketing arrangements between market actors and the village. However, the government rarely plays a more active role in regulating the behavior of market actors, enforcing contractual arrangements, or otherwise helping farmers to navigate challenging market environments. Moreover, they do little to help mitigate the negative social-environmental impacts of cash cropping. This demonstrates that the state is playing a highly selective role, one that is biased towards market-dominant actors and neglects the interests of most farmers and community members.

11.2

UNEVEN CASH CROPPING

The concerted emphasis on national economic development, poverty alleviation, and the promotion of modernized, market-oriented production has spurred significant and expansive growth of agricultural and plantation activities in the Mekong region, as well as in many developing countries in recent decades (Nevins & Peluso, 2008; Ehrensperger et al., 2024). While Thailand’s economy has been liberalized for a much longer period (Glassman, 2010), the economies of Myanmar, Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam have only liberalized since the 1980s when their formerly closed, socialist economies were opened to global investment and trade (Kenney-Lazar & Mark, 2021). Especially since the 1990s, market liberalization has enabled the rapid production of cash crops that have significantly transformed rural landscapes (Hurni & Fox, 2018; Castella et al., 2023). Market liberalization has been associated with rapid economic growth across the Mekong Region. Laos initiated its market liberalization program in 1986, termed the New Economic Mechanism, which eventually led to the country becoming one of the fastest-growing economies in Southeast Asia (Bouté & Pholsena, 2017). By 2015, Laos had attained its highest income per capita, reaching US$1,740. This economic milestone was attributed largely to substantial Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in natural resources and agriculture (UNDP & MPI 2016). In rural areas, cash cropping was a fundamental part of this economic growth (Castella et al., 2023). Marketization created new opportunities for generating cash income to which many rural people did not previously have access. Although cash cropping has generated opportunities for economic development in general, a closer look reveals many problems for rural peoples. The communities and farmers that have been able to take advantage of cash crop booms have been incredibly uneven (Thanichanon et al., 2018; Castella et al., 2023). For example, in the case of rubber plantations in Laos, some villages have been able to take full advantage of planting the crop, obtaining loans or saving money to plant on their own. Others have been enrolled in exploitative contract farming arrangements with foreign companies (Friis & Nielsen, 2016; Dwyer & Vongvisouk,

164  Handbook of social justice in the Global South 2019; Cole, 2019; Cole & Soukhathammavong, 2021). In other cases, they have been dispossessed of their land when the government has granted large land concessions to Chinese, Vietnamese, and Thai rubber companies (Baird, 2010; Kenney-Lazar, 2012; Suhardiman et al., 2015; Nanhthavong et al., 2022). Additionally, the boom and bust nature of cash cropping has meant that many farmers have lost out when cash crop prices drop suddenly, as was the case with rubber since its peak price in 2011 (Dwyer & Vongvisouk, 2019). Ecologically, cash cropping has radically transformed rural landscapes. Cash crop plantations have been a leading cause of deforestation and associated biodiversity loss in the Mekong Region (Meyfroidt & Lambin, 2009; Costenbader et al., 2015; Vongvisouk et al., 2016; Hurni & Fox, 2018; Ingalls et al., 2018a). They have also generated significant soil degradation, requiring high use of expensive fertilizers as productivity goes down over time. Other agrochemicals such as herbicides and pesticides are also used, leading to soil and water pollution (Sebesvari et al., 2012; Shattuck, 2021). What accounts for these negative social-ecological impacts? Is it something inherent in cash cropping, or is it specific to particular regions? Additionally, what explains the unevenness in outcomes – why are some farmers and communities able to benefit while others lose out? Oftentimes, the problem is attributed to the lack of smallholder preparation to enter these markets. Farmers are seen as having insufficient resources available to them, including technical knowledge, information, and capital, compounded by the remoteness of many communities and lack of accessibility to loans (Raj & Hall, 2020). Relatedly, blame is placed on a neoliberalized market economy, which provides no protections for farmers and the environment (Nevins & Peluso, 2008; Castellanet & Diepart, 2015). The lack of regulation of negative social-environmental impacts from the state and, relatedly, the lack of institutional support from the state are reasons for the negative impacts. Across Southeast Asia, though, the state does play a significant role in the economy, and it does not fit into a completely neoliberal model (Ong, 2006). This is particularly the case in Laos and Vietnam, which are socialist states that have integrated a market economy. This relationship between the state and the market has been referred to as a hybrid economy or a “socialist market economy” (Bekkevold et al., 2020; Cole & Ingalls, 2020), in which critical elements of a socialist economy have been retained, including state control over property and a role for state-owned enterprises. So what role does the state play in interacting with the market and shaping these outcomes? States play a number of critical roles in shaping how marketization operates, especially cash cropping. Governments select investors and types of crops for farmers to grow. They engage in land use zoning that determines where cash crops can be grown (Ducourtieux et al., 2005a; Thongmanivong & Fujita, 2006; Dwyer, 2022). They introduce investors and traders to villages and encourage forms of contract farming (Dwyer, 2014). They encourage farmers to switch from subsistence, especially upland swidden cultivation, to cash cropping (Ducourtieux et al., 2005b; Thongmanivong et al., 2009; Vongvisouk et al., 2014). In other cases, the level of the government involvement in each community differs based on the history of ethnic groups that allied with the government and those who did not, putting the latter into more disadvantaged positions (Dwyer, 2014). In Laos, although the government plays a role in the initial steps of enabling cash cropping, that role drops off in providing support for farmers throughout the process or regulating the social-environmental impacts. There is a notable absence of government involvement when it comes to mediating and resolving disputes in the context of contract farming agreements

Selective state intervention and uneven agrarian marketization  165 between farmers and investors (Cole & Soukhathammavong, 2021). Price drops have also received very little government support (Dwyer & Vongvisouk, 2019). Ultimately, the problem is not that there is a lack of government involvement or too much government, but rather that the government largely plays a role in ensuring the initiation of cash cropping but not ensuring that it occurs in a way that is most beneficial for farmers and their rural environments.

11.3 SELECTIVE STATE INTERVENTION This chapter examines the role of the state in initiating cash crop development across two case studies from two different provinces of northern Laos. The first case comes from Pha Oudom District in Bokeo Province and demonstrates how cash cropping led to exploitation because of the production arrangements that the local government set up between market actors and farmers. Villagers were influenced to take on a loan from the bank and sign a contract with a local company. Ultimately, the prices they were paid were much lower than originally promised, and they ended up in debt. The second case comes from Na Mor District in Oudomxay Province, where maize cultivation took off quickly after government promotion and transformed villagers’ livelihoods. However, villagers were not able to make much money because of the amount they owed for agricultural inputs. Additionally, the government did not play a role in regulating the social and environmental impacts, especially deforestation and decreasing yields due to soil degradation. I conducted research in both villages in 2022. The research was qualitative, blending interviews and participant observation. Semi-structured interviews were undertaken with government staff at the central, provincial, and district levels, predominantly in the agriculture and forestry agencies. Village chiefs were interviewed, as were 15 households per village. The fieldwork involved staying in villages overnight for several consecutive days, engaging in participant observation. This included spending time living and eating with villagers, accompanying them to their fields, and helping them with their agricultural production. Such immersion also spurred informal conversations, creating an environment where villagers felt at ease discussing sensitive topics. 11.3.1 State-Led Exploitation Doysoung Village1 is a case study of the state playing a key role in initiating cash cropping within the community but also enrolling them in an exploitative scheme. The local government introduced the village to a scheme to grow cardamom with financing from a state-owned bank and a Lao company. However, the district government set up this scheme with the bank in a way that left villagers with little control over the process. As the company had a monopsony over purchasing cardamom from the village, they were able to depress the price significantly and cheat the villagers, leaving them in debt. Doysoung Village is located in Pha Oudom District of Bokeo Province in Northwestern Laos, which is one of the country’s poorest and most remote areas. Pha Oudom is mountainous, like other parts of Laos, and ethnically, most of the population is Khmu, linguistically part of the Austroasiatic language family, who lived in upland areas. Historically, most farmers have practiced upland, rotational swidden cultivation. Pha Oudom’s poor-quality dirt roads have made it difficult to access in the past, especially during the rainy season. However, the

166  Handbook of social justice in the Global South roads have been improved in recent years, including a new paved road from Pakbeng town in Oudomxay Province all the way to the capital of Pha Oudom. The district has a small, lowland area surrounding the main town, which serves as the district capital. It has slowly developed over time as the town has grown, and farmers increasingly engage in cash crop production of bananas and rubber, spurred on mainly by Chinese investments. Additionally, many have migrated outside the district for wage labor opportunities in other parts of the province or Thailand, as well as a minority to other provinces. Doysoung Village comprises 40 households and is very remote due to poor road conditions that make it hard to travel there, especially during the rainy season. Thus, outsiders, including government officials, did not pass by or visit often. Furthermore, villagers had a large area of land for swidden cultivation that they could rotate in a long cycle. Swidden provided economic autonomy and was linked with other subsistence activities such as animal raising, hunting, and gathering non-timber forest products (NTFPs). Some villagers engaged in wage labor within Laos – in Pha Oudom, other parts of Bokeo Province, and Vientiane. Most villagers rarely went down to the district town to buy food, and thus most of what they consumed daily (cucumbers, chilis, squash leaves, bamboo, and some small wild animals) came from their fields and the surrounding fallows and forests. Historically, the village was located further up the mountain before it moved to the current location due to the spread of an unspecified disease. Three small villages decided to move to the same location and became one, unrelated to government village consolidation programs. However, they still owned the land in the old village. Around 2018, local government officials, in collaboration with a Lao company, actively promoted cardamom cultivation among villagers, encouraging them to secure loans for investment from the state-owned Nayoby Bank. The bank provided loans to farmers to buy the cardamom seedlings from the company. However, the villagers never directly received the money, which went straight to the company. They only received a small amount of money left over after the expenses of the seedlings were deducted, which were calculated at 1,800 kip ($0.11) per seedling.2 Farmers reported taking on debt between 6 to 10 million kip ($375 to $625) to cover the cost of the seedlings – the difference depending on how many seedlings they purchased. The villagers were able to grow the cardamom without any problems. However, at the time of harvesting and selling it to the company, they expressed that they were cheated. The company initially promised to purchase at a rate of 40,000 kip ($2.50) per kilogram (kg), but when they signed the contract, they had already reduced the price to 30,000 kip ($1.87) per kg. However, when they actually purchased the cardamom, they only offered to pay 10,000 kip ($0.62) per kg. Now, many villagers are grappling with the burden of repaying their debts, and most can only afford to cover the 7 percent annual interest on the borrowed amount. When I inquired about the discrepancy between the prices offered and the price received, one man responded: “They said they will come and buy from us, and if we sell to other buyers, they are going to fine us. If they don’t buy from us, we can fine them, but then they come to buy for only 10,000 kip ($0.62) kip per kg. The villagers are dying.” (Interview at Doysoung Village, August 11, 2022). Furthermore, he noted that the company did not explain why they were paying such a low price. The likely reason that the company offered such a low price is that they can do so without being held accountable and without any competition. District officials had granted the

Selective state intervention and uneven agrarian marketization  167 company a monopsony in the area, making it exceedingly difficult for villagers to derive any benefits from the sale of their agricultural products. One villager emphasized that “if there are more companies buying, we might earn more than 10,000 ($0.62) kip per kg, at least 20,000–30,000 ($1.25–$1.87) kip would be good. Now there is only one company, so only [they] can set the price. I heard in Luang Namtha they are selling for 50,000 kip ($3.12) per kg, in our district only 10,000.” (Doysoung Village household interview, August 11, 2022.) Although he explained that they could sell their produce to another company, there were no other companies that they could sell to because the district government would only allow this company to buy. Due to the low prices, villagers have not been able to make any profit from growing cardamom. As the same villager remarked, “the villagers are poor already, and it made them worse off” (Doysoung Village household interview, August 11, 2022). If villagers had been able to choose different financing and marketing arrangements or sell to different companies, then they might have been able to produce the crop more successfully. While government intervention enabled them to plant the cash crop, they were only able to do so in a way that led to their exploitation. 11.3.2 Selective State Absence Tham Pha Village provides a case study of cash cropping expanding rapidly across the village landscape, taking off in a way that matched government policy. Villagers had converted their swidden cultivation lands and secondary forests to maize fields, leaving very little forest. On the surface, they were a successful example of cash cropping as they now earn a cash income from their agricultural production and had transitioned away from swidden cultivation. This was likely one of the reasons why the district government suggested that I visit them. However, it quickly became apparent that the reality was much different. The villagers had taken on significant debt from traders to get the tools, fertilizer, seeds, and other agricultural inputs necessary to grow maize. Much of their harvest revenue went to paying off this debt. Additionally, the fertility of the soil decreased each year that they grew the maize, reducing the productivity of the land and the harvest. Finally, having cleared their swidden fields and fallows and secondary forests, they were left with few other types of subsistence resources important for their daily livelihoods. Tham Pha Village is located in Na Mor District of Oudomxay Province. Na Mor District is a central district within the province to the north of the country. The main north-south national road of Laos, Route 13 North, runs through the district. There is a significant amount of Chinese investment in resource extraction and commodity production projects – mining, plantations, and hydropower dams. Additionally, the Laos-China Railway, which was completed in 2021, runs through the district, and there is a railway station there. There are plans underway to significantly expand the urban landscape of the district capital. Across the district, villagers have been growing a variety of cash crops over the past several decades, such as rubber, bananas, and job’s tear, in addition to maize. Na Mor District is clearly very different from Pha Oudom District in its proximity to and association with various forms of economic development. Tham Pha Village is located a few kilometres off Route 13 along a road that was paved because it is connected to a tourist site, a popular local cave. It is a small village comprised of 80 households. The village residential area was moved closer to the road. They have a small

168  Handbook of social justice in the Global South amount of lowland paddy rice fields nearby, but the majority of their land is further upland in the area they originally lived. They have historically practiced upland swidden cultivation. They started growing maize in 2005, but in a limited area amongst a small number of households. Around 2017–2018, though, maize cash cropping expanded rapidly, and now almost all households grow the crop. The increase in cash income is evident in the material landscape, as many houses have been upgraded from bamboo and wood to brick and concrete, and many households have motorbikes now, while a few wealthier ones have trucks. The first villagers to grow maize were the village leaders. They were instructed to grow the crop by the government to set an example for the rest of the village. The government introduced them to a company to help them start growing. If they could succeed, then others would follow in their footsteps. A small number of other households started growing in later years. However, it was not until an increase in market demand and prices several years ago that growing maize became attractive to a wider swath of the village. The paving of the road several years ago also increased market access. Additionally, the district government helped to facilitate loans from a bank that they used to buy fertilizer and tools, especially for those households that lacked funds to invest on their own. The district also introduced a Chinese company to the village that sold them seeds. Villagers later used seeds from the maize they were growing to plant the next year’s crop. When villagers first started growing maize in 2005, the price was only 500 kip ($0.03) per kg. By 2022, it had reached 3,000 kip ($0.18) per kg. However, a significant portion of these earnings was consumed by repaying loans taken for maize cultivation. This encompassed expenses for land preparation, and procurement of agricultural tools, herbicides, and fertilizers. Consequently, several farmers reported having a small amount of remaining cash after settling all their financial obligations. Additionally, the expansion of maize cultivation has led to soil degradation and depletion of the villages’ forests. As a consequence, the community has become increasingly susceptible to the effects of climate change, including severe floods and droughts. Notably, the soil quality has been declining steadily over the years, making it increasingly challenging to sustain maize production.

11.4 CONCLUSION The two cases discussed in this chapter address different dimensions of state involvement in the market and cash cropping. For both, cash cropping occurred because of state involvement. The government set up financial arrangements between banks and agricultural companies or introduced agribusinesses to the village. At a basic level, this approach was successful at getting farmers to switch from subsistence farming to cash cropping. However, it was not successful in radically transforming their livelihoods and creating a sustainable form of economic development. In the first case of Doysoung Village, farmers remained in debt after switching to cash cropping. In the case of Tham Pha Village, farmers were able to make some money from maize, but not much after the costs of the inputs were calculated. Maize cultivation expanded rapidly and deforested the village landscape. Additionally, the soil became increasingly degraded, reducing the productivity of the crop. Both cases demonstrate how the problems with cash cropping are not exclusively due to the market or government involvement. The market dynamics did not favor the villages. However, these dynamics did not emerge on their own but were promoted by the government. Furthermore, the government altered the market dynamics in favor of the company in the case

Selective state intervention and uneven agrarian marketization  169 of Doysoung Village. In both cases, the government did not provide any support to the villages to help them navigate the market, and in the case of Tham Pha Village, the government did not step in to regulate the associated negative social-environmental impacts. This chapter demonstrates how the problem with cash cropping is not due inherently to the role of the market or the state. Instead, it is about how the state and market interact with one another. More particularly, it concerns how the state intervenes in market development. In the cases examined, the role of the state was to support the actions of financial actors and agribusinesses rather than farmers. Additionally, the state neglected to intervene in ways that might have supported or protected farmers. Cash cropping can be a risky business, and farmers are left to deal with all the risks on their own.

NOTES 1. Pseudonyms are used for both villages to protect the identities and privacy of respondents. 2. An exchange rate of 1 USD to 16,000 Lao kip from September 2022 is used throughout the chapter. Source: www​.xe​.com

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Selective state intervention and uneven agrarian marketization  171 Nevins, J., & Peluso, N. L. (2008). Taking Southeast Asia to market: Commodities, nature, and people in the neoliberal age. Cornell University Press. Ong, A. (2006). Neoliberalism as exception: Mutations in citizenship and sovereignty. Duke University Press. Raj, K. G. C., & Hall, R. P. (2020). The commercialization of smallholder farming – A case study from the rural western middle hills of Nepal. Agriculture, 10(5), 143. https://doi​.org​/10​.3390​/ agriculture10050143 Sebesvari, Z., Le, H. T. T., Toan, P. V., Arnold, U., & Renaud, F. G. (2012). Agriculture and water quality in the Vietnamese Mekong Delta. In F. G Renaud & C. Kuenzer (Eds.), The Mekong Delta system (pp. 331–361). Springer. https://doi​.org​/10​.1007​/978​-94​- 007​-3962​-8​_13 Shattuck, A. (2021). Toxic uncertainties and epistemic emergence: Understanding pesticides and health in Lao PDR. Annals of the American Association of Geographers, 111(1), 216–230. https://doi​.org​/10​ .1080​/24694452​.2020​.1761285 Suhardiman, D., Giordano, M., Keovilignavong, O., & Sotoukee, T. (2015). Revealing the hidden effects of land grabbing through better understanding of farmers’ strategies in dealing with land loss. Land Use Policy, 49, 195–202. https://doi​.org​/10​.1016​/j​.landusepol​.2015​.08​.014 Thanichanon, P., Schmidt-Vogt, D., Epprecht, M., Heinimann, A., & Wiesmann, U. (2018). Balancing cash and food: The impacts of agrarian change on rural land use and wellbeing in Northern Laos. PLOS One, 13(12), e0209166. https://doi​.org​/10​.1371​/journal​.pone​.0209166 Thongmanivong, S., & Fujita, Y. (2006). Recent land use and livelihood transitions in Northern Laos. Mountain Research and Development, 26(3), 237–244. https://doi​.org​/10​.1659​/0276–4741 (2006)26[237:RLUALT]2.0.CO;2 Thongmanivong, S., Fujita, Y., & Phanvilay, K. (2009). Agrarian land use transformation in northern Laos: From swidden to rubber. Southeast Asian Studies, 47(3), 330–347. https://doi​.org​/10​.20495​/tak​ .47​.3​_330 United Nations Development Programme and the Ministry of Planning and Investment (UNDP & MPI). (2016). The 8th five-year national socio-economic development plan (2016–2020). United Nations Development Programme and the Ministry of Planning and Investment. https://laopdr​.un​ .org​/en​/download​/1694​/13284 Vongvisouk, T., Broegaard, R. B., Mertz, O., & Thongmanivong, S. (2016). Rush for cash crops and forest protection: Neither land sparing nor land sharing. Land Use Policy, 55, 182–192. https://doi​.org​ /10​.1016​/j​.landusepol​.2016​.04​.001 Vongvisouk, T., Mertz, O., Thongmanivong, S., Heinimann, A., & Phanvilay, K. (2014). Shifting cultivation stability and change: Contrasting pathways of land use and livelihood change in Laos. Applied Geography, 46, 1–10. https://doi​.org​/10​.1016​/j​.apgeog​.2013​.10​.006

12. The hegemony of austerity Jon Shefner and Cory Blad

12.1 INTRODUCTION For decades, austerity has been the go-to policy to address various political and economic issues, including high state debt and financial crises. Despite persistent outcomes of income polarization, diminished wages, and declines in social well-being, policymakers have implemented these policies with only slight variations. Why have policymakers demonized state spending on social needs while persisting in imposing a policy with such consistently bad outcomes? In this chapter, we remind readers what austerity is, and examine its implementation in different settings in the Global South. We address differences of locale and history, demonstrating that the key actors involved in imposing austerity measures have changed over time, while emphasizing a general consistency of application. We argue that its consistent use across time, place, and apparent cause confirms austerity as a hegemonic policy, a tool used by global elites to consolidate and grow their wealth and power over the global economy. We describe how, across the history of its implementation, a hegemonic partnership has been formed, building a singular policy culture and network, which turned to the snake oil medicine of austerity regardless of the economic ill diagnosed. Austerity is one of the countless tools that have obstructed the Global South path to achieving development with social justice. Over the history of conquest, colonialism, imperialism, dependency, and neoliberalism, the Global South has been a locale of wealth extraction. Whether that extraction focused on enslaved peoples, natural resources, low-wage labor, or whether the mechanisms have relied on warfare, colonial ties, or trade deals, the result diminished the capacity of much of the Global South to prioritize national needs over the needs of core nations. Austerity as a tool is similar in its capacity to extract. Like many other mechanisms of extraction, it relies on an ideological rationale, yet in many ways, it is a cheaper method for the Global North than others it has employed. Relying on multilateral institutions and powerful governments to prioritize payments to the Global North not only enriches the North, but it limits the autonomous capacity of the Global South to pursue political and economic structures that would provide greater national and global equity. Our chapter proceeds as follows: first, we define austerity, and then discuss why we believe it to be a hegemonic global policy. The brief case studies make our point that, regardless of the perceived economic ills, austerity has been the cure-all of choice. Austerity has responded to debt and the threat of a socialist government in Chile, the use of state funds to resolve a legacy of apartheid in Zimbabwe and South Africa, financial crises in Thailand and Indonesia, and the incessant indebtedness of Mexico. As the go-to macroeconomic resolution regardless of the perceived economic problem, the widespread application of austerity has become hegemonic despite the harm it causes.

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The hegemony of austerity  173

12.2 WHAT IS AUSTERITY? Governments follow austerity policies when they cut expenditure that addresses social needs in order to cover perceived shortfalls. Austerity may be implemented with solidarity; rationing of consumer goods in wartime provides one example where hardships are shared to reduce inequality of consumption or service access. The neoliberal austerity of the last five decades can be distinguished from austerity with solidarity because the neoliberal agenda reinforces elite power while diminishing the state’s capacity to address citizens’ needs. Austerity policies reinforce neoliberalism by prioritizing the political and economic interests of national and global upper-class constituencies, while attacking worker protections and policies providing for citizen well-being. The concrete austerity policies we focus on include currency devaluation; reduction of welfare state spending on housing, education, and health; slashing consumer subsidies that facilitate the survival of poor, working- and middle-class citizens; layoffs or wage cuts of public sector workers; interest rate and tax hikes; and privatization of state-owned firms. Since the 1970s, the rationales for austerity implementation have widened. Initially, austerity measures were implemented in Latin America and Africa with the aim of addressing the growing public debt crisis. Later, austerity was imposed in response to economic crises in Asia as an instrument for governments to protect private creditors. Austerity is best thought of as a tool used by those in power to capture and consolidate wealth while exacerbating unequal economic and political power. In the following case studies, we lay out the paths to austerity, discuss the powers that have implemented it, and describe the outcomes. First, we discuss what we mean by austerity as a hegemonic policy.

12.3 THE HEGEMONY OF AUSTERITY Arrighi described how hegemonic transition was preceded by the “recurrent phenomenon” of financialization within great powers, demonstrating that capitalist powers invest money “as a means towards the end of securing an even greater flexibility and freedom of choice at some future point” (2006, p. 5). As a recurrent phenomenon, the effort to strengthen financial capital is a hegemonic strategy, taken when “the investment of money in the expansion of trade and production no longer serves the purpose of increasing the cash flow to the capitalist stratus as effectively as pure financial deals can” (2006, p. 8). Financialization became a policy exercised by “the concentration of power in the hands of particular blocs of government and business agencies ... essential to the material recurrent expansion of the capitalist world economy” (2006, p. 12). Austerity follows a similar strategic trajectory, reinforcing the neoliberal wave of financialization and aiding in wealth extraction. Once the technical advances of globalization – increased communication and transportation capacity – succeeded in spreading the geography of manufacturing, investment in global bricks-and-mortar production in non-core nations increased. The investment choices made by multinational firms prioritized financialization, including lending to states. To achieve global neoliberalism, debt and subsequent austerity emerged as instruments of global control. Our understanding of hegemony does not align precisely with Arrighi’s perspective, as “the power of a state to exercise functions of leadership and governance over a system of sovereign

174  Handbook of social justice in the Global South states” (2006, p. 27). Instead, we use a slightly more Gramsci-inspired definition: “a form of intellectual and political leadership which educates and transforms” (Schwarzmantel 2015, p. 38). Such a definition extends beyond the activity of a certain state while highlighting both the political and intellectual project of austerity. For Gramsci, hegemony requires an intellectual project, and is counterposed to pure dominance due to the legitimacy that the intellectual project garners (Gramsci, 1971; Adamson, 1980). Although not free from coercion, the recent history of austerity transitioned into a hegemonic intellectual project legitimized by economic elites. We find austerity to be a hegemonic policy for many reasons: its recurrence across time and place; the consistency of its application despite different crisis origins; its multiple advocates in state and private positions of power; and the ability of those advocates to avoid alternative policies. We also find austerity hegemonic because of the various institutions that pressured national governments to employ the policies: international financial institutions (IFIs), regional governing bodies, foreign governments, think tanks, credit rating agencies, and banks. The multiple institutions and advocates conferred the legitimacy Gramsci finds necessary to hegemony, despite the extensive opposition that emerges in the streets and on occasion in governments. Austerity requires the influence of global elites but also the local cooperation of ideologues trained in neoliberal orthodoxy, working within national institutions. In most cases, external power relied on the collaboration of local neoliberals, cementing the likelihood that all economic policy ills would be addressed by austerity. By the time of the Great Recession, the participation of powerful actors in addition to powerful states and IFIs proved another signal of the true hegemony of austerity. But crises came first: in all the cases we examine, austerity is utilized as a neoliberal crisis management mechanism that protects the investments and profits of creditors and financial speculators.

12.4 DEBT CRISIS AND AUSTERITY In the 1970s, the debts incurred by many developing nations came due. Banks made these initial loans to offset the diminishing profit opportunities among their traditional clientele, the stagnating Western economies. Amid an increasingly competitive commodity market and higher oil prices, more nations soon found themselves unable to service their debts. The failure to repay, however, was mostly due to increased global interest rates, which drove national debt higher than repayment plans allowed. Across the Global South, but especially in Latin America, nation after nation announced their inability to pay their debts beginning in the late 1970s. At the behest of global banks concerned about loan repayments, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) took on a new role as debt manager, casting off its Keynesian origins and embracing the untested ideology of neoliberalism and its unflagging devotion to “free markets.” Renegotiations over debt yielded conditions limiting national economic prerogatives – austerity policies. Governments devoted the money saved through austerity policies to repaying their international creditors. Chile was the first case of neoliberal austerity in Latin America after the Socialist government of Salvador Allende was toppled in a bloody coup. The “Chicago Boys,” disciples of Milton Friedman backed by the military junta of Augusto Pinochet, immediately followed the coup with austerity measures. For over seven years, and then repeatedly, Chile’s junta privatized banks, the pension and health systems, and many other firms, often those that had been

The hegemony of austerity  175 nationalized long before the Socialist government’s short tenure. The government jettisoned thousands of jobs, up to one-third of its employees, and cut health spending by 17 percent, and education by 11 percent, while interest rates were allowed to rise without limit. The government severely curtailed labor unions’ rights, both as an economic measure and a component of the junta’s repression, and kept wages under tight control despite rising prices. By 1975, wages had shrunk by a third from their 1970 level (Valdés, 1995; Ffrench-Davis, 2010; Young, 2006). Inflation was brought under control, but the crash of 1982–1984 and subsequent economic difficulties in the 1990s demonstrated that austerity policies did not resolve Chile’s economic problems. The social costs of the policies proved substantial over time. Chile’s experience is especially important because that first movement toward neoliberal austerity required coercion through a violent coup that left thousands dead and exiled many thousands more. It also provided an important laboratory for global elites, who turned to austerity to resolve debt in other nations without such extreme bloodletting, but with what became a more normal exercise of global power. The use of force demonstrated that austerity was not yet hegemonic, but hints of legitimacy were foreshadowed by the coalesced actions of the US government, new economic ideologues, and the IMF and World Bank. The imposition of austerity, followed by anti-austerity protests, and some subsequent relief, followed by more austerity, became the pattern for decades across many nations (Walton & Seddon, 1994).

12.5 APARTHEID AND AUSTERITY African nations’ path to austerity resembled that of their counterparts across Latin America, due to similar indebtedness and the power of external actors. Austerity again proves hegemonic in Zimbabwe and South Africa when it is implemented despite the crushing needs of those nations’ black majorities. Throughout the liberation struggle, Zimbabwe’s guerilla movements espoused socialist solutions to the inequities resulting from racist capitalism. Having consolidated national political power, Prime Minister Robert Mugabe was forced to follow economic policymaking that was restrained by the emancipation agreement until 1987. By the time Mugabe’s ZANU-PF was freed from the war-ending agreement, the government had become a one-party state which began to take aid from the IMF and move towards austerity policies. The inequalities confronting the new government were deep. Out of the nation’s land, the most productive portion, 39 percent, was owned by 6,000 white farmers, while 4.5 million black subsistence farmers owned only slightly more of much less productive land. At the same time, a small segment of small-scale black farmers worked about 5 percent of the nation’s land. The pre-liberation Rhodesian state had established parastatal firms that regulated “agricultural markets, mineral marketing and mining, and a few industries” (Moyo & Yeros, 2011, p. 88). New black officeholders became the caretakers of those firms. But for the most part, white elites maintained their monopoly control over the economy (Mamdani, 2009, p. 3). Additionally, the peace agreement largely protected white settlers’ economic control and gave them a disproportionate amount of political control. Despite its revolutionary rhetoric, the Mugabe government was forced to restrain how much it could address the needs of the black majority. Despite the restrictions, the Zimbabwean government pursued redistributive policies. The government maintained economic protection policies, continuing to shelter both agricultural and manufacturing firms. The government also increased spending on education, health, and

176  Handbook of social justice in the Global South emergency food provision, resulting in shrinking inequality during the early 1980s. In addition, the government introduced a minimum wage while securing workers’ jobs and increasing public-sector employment (Brett 2005, p. 96). However, less than half of the targeted population enjoyed the promised redistribution of land from white farmers to blacks. The peace agreement and the ongoing influence of the white economic global and national elites continued to restrain the new government. Limits on foreign exchange forced borrowing from the World Bank, which, along with high state expenses, contributed to an increasing public debt. Zimbabwe relied on the IMF for loans as early as 1983, forcing the government into conditions such as “wage freezes, restrictions on government expenditures, [and] cutbacks in subsidies” (Dashwood 2000, p. 65). The nation’s economic diversity and strength, in addition to the lifting of financial sanctions, helped to limit the taking on of more debt and controlled the allocation of foreign currency up through the mid-1980s. Until then, the government’s policies were mixed: providing some aid to the majority black poor while continuing to honor commitments favoring the white economic elite; addressing social needs even while employment decreased; and some policies reflected obligations to IFIs while denying their influence elsewhere. By 1987, as debt service rose to 34 percent of export earnings, national policymakers felt increasingly pressured by the IFIs to implement austerity. During this time, policymakers more comfortable with neoliberal adjustments gained power. Although national elites and IFIs generally agreed on the neoliberalization of the economy, the latter pushed the process further and faster at certain moments, with austerity increasing as time passed. In 1991, the government implemented the Economic Structural Adjustment Program (ESAP), which involved reducing social service expenditures while prioritizing investments in agricultural and manufacturing sectors. Specific spending cuts targeted education, defense, and government employment, while privatizing investment in some parastatal firms and reversing income distribution policies. In turn, the IMF-designed program increasingly diverted government resources with the goal of increasing the viability of export-oriented production. By 1992, the government lifted all price controls, even on basic foodstuffs. The goal of socialist redistribution was now replaced by the goal of economic growth, the benefits of which were expected to trickle down. The new policies clearly disadvantaged the poor majority. Negative economic and political consequences followed. By 1993, wages had declined to only 62 percent of their value in 1980, and even by the year 2000, they remained below the level observed at the time of independence. Rising unemployment and currency devaluation added to citizens’ pain. Inflation in food prices led to soaring malnutrition. Manufacturing output fell by 24 percent as local small businesses were stripped of subsidies and protection when global businesses entered in force (Dashwood, 2000, pp. 172, 175; Nyabereka, 2017; Freeman, 2014). Other social costs included the share of wages in the gross national income falling from 54 percent in 1987 to 39 percent in 1997, while that of profits increased from 47 percent to 63 percent. By 1995, 61 percent of Zimbabwean households were living in poverty, climbing further to 75 percent in 2000. Fuel prices and unemployment also increased amid the decreased state spending, leading to rising political contention (Raftopoulos, 2000). Foreign debt as a proportion of GDP tripled in the ESAP period. All this left the nation “in a far worse state than that of the 1980s, when the nation had been exemplary in Africa for the provision of social services and the reconstruction and development of infrastructure” (Nyabereka, 2017, p. 119). Access to clean water and basic medical services also declined during the ESAP

The hegemony of austerity  177 period, as the government sought cost recoveries to diminish expenditures for these services. Because Zimbabwe paid more to service the debt than it received in new loans, its debt burden increased by millions of dollars. “In 1998 Zimbabwe spent well over two-fifths of its export earnings on debt” (Moore, 2001, p. 915). A strong economy that could have resolved racist inequality was instead ravaged after 15 years of austerity. South Africa, unlike Zimbabwe, emerged from apartheid in 1994 with massive economic problems. The international campaign to weaken apartheid leaders’ resolve through economic sanctions had proven successful, but left a no-growth economy in its wake. Decades of political instability also shrank private investment and spurred capital flight. The economic model itself proved a failure; based on a violently regulated black labor force, the economics of apartheid limited domestic demand by paying impoverishing wages and restraining the expansion of skilled labor. Poverty, unemployment, and inequality rates were high, and concentrated largely among the black population (Marais, 1998). Yet the democratic transition and socialist rhetoric brought high expectations that the state would prioritize the material needs of the black majority, increasing access to well-paying jobs, electricity, water and sanitation facilities, and education. These expectations were even stronger because, under the previous apartheid National Party, the government provided generous protections from the free market to white workers. Additionally, many of the African National Congress (ANC) leaders had advocated nationalizing segments of the economy, redistributing land and wealth, and prioritizing workers’ needs. However, international financial institutions pushed for economic reforms even before the transition, and the National Party began to shift to a more neoliberal-friendly, export-oriented development scheme (Peet, 2002). The IFIs, in addition to powerful actors among South Africa’s corporate community, began reaching out to the new political elites well before the transition to multi-racial democracy. These connections “were decisive in ensuring that business’ key expectations were met on issues of private property, continuation and deepening of market liberalisation, particularly financial markets, and privatization of public assets” (Segatti & Pons-Vignon, 2013, p. 544). Economic policy soon focused on aggregate economic growth as the route to greater equity, rather than the redistribution the black majority expected. The initial Reconstruction and Development Program (RDP) demonstrated clear intentions to redress the staggering economic inequalities resulting from apartheid and prioritized redistribution from 1994–1996. The program failed to generate growth in an economy still defined by a legacy of economic sanctions, an elite-centered development orientation, and a lack of foreign direct investment. In response to ongoing economic stagnation, the government in 1996 implemented the Growth, Employment and Redistribution strategy (GEAR), authored largely by policymakers from the World Bank and the African Development Bank. Like many austerity programs, GEAR focused on “fiscal discipline, ... privatisation and corporatisation of state assets, a flexible labour market, [and] decreased levels of corporate taxation” as the route to economic growth (Habib & Padayachee, 2000, in McKinley, 2016, p. 270). The GEAR program failed: per capita income fell, as did GDP and private sector investment, while urban poverty, unemployment, and inequality grew as a result of the government’s spending cuts. Policymakers also sought to shrink public jobs through firings and outsourcing while diminishing labor protections on overtime and firings. South Africa’s high rate of poverty, coupled with the low rate of formal education and employment, meant that, in 2000, the nation was regarded as the world’s most unequal society six years after the transition to democracy.

178  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Critics pointed to the GEAR program’s limiting of expenditures to address social needs and redistribution for this stagnation. Privatization of national broadcasting firms, resorts, and airports accompanied GEAR, as did redistributive strategies articulated as “black economic empowerment.” These latter strategies aimed at building a black middle class but failed to redistribute capital to the black majority and contained insufficient sanctions to positively affect inequalities in employment and labor skills. Even as middle-class actors gained some advantage, the poor found the costs of basic services increased and access decreased. Austerity also penetrated local governments, which privatized water, sanitation, electricity, and housing across South Africa, while urban dwellers lost jobs or saw their salaries stagnate. From the end of apartheid until 2007, there was a slight decrease in inequality in South Africa. However, during the same period, the income of the poorest 20 percent of the population declined from 2.7 percent to 2.3 percent of the total income (Presidency, 2009). The beginning of the Jacob Zuma administration (2009–2018) coincided with the global economic crisis, making it hard to differentiate between economic hardships rooted in national austerity and the global slowdown. The new administration’s corruption further complicated the assessment of responsibility for ongoing economic pain. By 2016, despite decades of austerity, policymakers had resolved few of South Africa’s economic ills. Between a quarter and a third of the population remained unemployed, over half the population was poor, and even more among the black population. Despite policies targeting the black middle and upper class, the “wealthiest 10% of the population owns more than two-thirds of the country’s household assets” and those “patterns are heavily overlain by race” (Southall, 2016, p. 75). Zimbabwe’s and South Africa’s experiences show how debt and austerity superseded state efforts to reverse racist injustice. The most important policy goal in both Zimbabwe and South Africa, reversing the ravages of apartheid, was stymied as neoliberal policymakers used austerity to derail state-led development schemes. African state-controlled development was in the sights of the IFIs even during freedom struggles; an early report by the World Bank blamed Africa’s economic stagnation on “excessive and inefficient state intervention in the economy” (Harrison, 2005, p. 1303). Zimbabwe and South Africa were not alone. By the late 1980s, the IMF and World Bank had negotiated over 80 loans requiring austerity implementation with Sub-Saharan African nations (Harrison, 2005). Increasingly, the hegemony of austerity required less external coercion, as IFIs recruited participation by national policymakers, increasing the legitimacy of austerity.

12.6 FRONTLINE STATES AND FINANCIAL CRISES Some Asian nations followed a state-development-led path much longer than other developing nations, in part due to their ideological role in the world-system. Many of those nations held “frontline” positions in the struggle against both Soviet and Chinese versions of Communism, and their economic growth became celebrated as a triumph of capitalist development, in contrast to the criticism their counterparts elsewhere endured when they followed state-directed policies. The Cold War and the emergence of much of the region from direct colonial control created a context in which state-led development capitalism could flourish, especially in response to significant developmental needs. But as the threat of the communist alternative waned, the ideological importance of the frontline states diminished, and when loan payments

The hegemony of austerity  179 and crises loomed, another opportunity for austerity opened. The IMF imposed loan conditions following the 1990s economic crises in Thailand and Indonesia, just as it had earlier in other nations. After pursuing import-substitution industrialization as its post-WW2 development model, the Thai government shifted to export manufacturing funded by foreign direct investment in the 1980s. Investment booms in financial sectors and real estate in the late 1980s followed, as the Thai government facilitated international capital mobility by shifting to a tacit liberalization and deregulation strategy, including removing interest rate caps and foreign capital controls. The IMF enabled liberalization through loans, which expanded foreign investment and offshore borrowing, intending “to turn Thailand into a regional financial center” (Lauridsen 1998, p. 1576). Attracting foreign capital investment became the primary growth strategy for the Thai government, as it sought to take advantage of deregulated financial markets. These strategies significantly expanded the amount of investment capital in Thailand, much of which was funneled toward urban development and the inflating housing market in Bangkok. The Bank of Thailand used financial liberalization to create structural conditions favorable to foreign capital investment. The 1989 lifting of interest rate caps (eliminated in 1992), coupled with broad liberalization of both lending and debt restrictions, enabled massive increases in foreign capital investment, which led to subsequent increases in short-term, privately held debt that crashed in 1997 (Leightner & Lovell, 1998; Park, 2013). The Bank of Thailand welcomed the hegemonic influx of neoliberalization as a means of facilitating financial market growth, and the bank did everything it could to facilitate foreign investment, for example establishing the Bangkok International Banking Facility in 1993 as a way to facilitate global off-shore lending (Jansen, 2001). The increase in domestic lending rates met increased investment capital, which increased both prices and local investment (significantly in Thai urban real estate), with predictable inflationary costs for most Thai citizens. All of this was in line with IMF recommendations and met foreign capital demands. When the Thai real estate market collapsed in 1996, growth slowed, panicking financial markets and depressing foreign investment. Currency selloffs forced the Thai government to abandon the baht to US dollar peg (Anwar & Gupta, 2006). By 1997, investors saw the baht as overvalued and its value shrank, which subsequently led to a depreciation of both real estate values and Thai state assets and damaged several financial institutions, which struggled to service outstanding debt. The dramatic decline of Thai stock values, which were tied to private development and construction firms, coupled with the decision to remove the baht from its fixed currency valuation, sent shockwaves through the region, quickly spreading to other foreign capital-dependent states including South Korea, Malaysia, and Indonesia (Renaud et al. 1998). The IMF responded to the combined currency and financial crises in August 1997 with a massive succession of bailout funding in excess of US$17 billion, aimed at restoring credit markets. These loans, of course, came with austerity conditions that the Thai government readily accepted in accordance with its broad liberalization initiatives taken earlier in the decade. This willingness was, however, not without internal dissent. The Nukul Commission Report of 1998 blamed the rigidity of the liberalization regime for both causing and exacerbating the negative effects of the baht’s collapse and subsequent economic crisis (Thailand, 1998). Regardless, the substantial private debt burden now tied to Thailand was passed on to the state through the IMF bailout to ensure private creditor returns. The unwillingness of the Thai state

180  Handbook of social justice in the Global South to resist liberalization was not the result of ignorance, but rather an institutional choice driven by financial capital conditions. The IMF bailout forced the Thai government into spending restrictions, a 3 percent increase in VAT consumption taxes, state subsidy eliminations, and a number of fiscal regulations designed to limit deficit levels (including deficit spending) and stabilize financial industries (Lauridsen, 1998, p. 1583). The primary goal of Thai austerity became protecting the primacy of financial capital by reducing state-led initiatives to expand social and economic access to the majority of Thai citizens and shrinking broader Thai consumption. The effect of these austerity policies on the Thai population was immediate. Unemployment tripled from 1997 to 1998, consumer prices increased by 9.5 percent in 1997 and another 5 percent in 1998 (IMF, 1997). Rampant underemployment and wage theft compounded the lack of unemployment insurance in causing pain to Thai workers. Inflation and unemployment increased Thai poverty by up to 12 percent. The social costs of austerity were disproportionately felt among the less affluent, especially women, who experienced the majority of layoffs throughout the country. Families endured significant hardships, including rising malnutrition and abandonment of children. Social inequality rose when the Ministry of Health budget was reduced by 17.3 percent in 1999, while education spending dropped to pre-crisis funding levels, despite IMF proclamations that neither would be negatively affected (Lane et al., 1999, p. 74 n. 23; Bungarten, 1999, pp. 255, 256; Chomthongdi, 2000; IMF, 1997). Austerity deepened the existing financial crisis by damaging the local economy, significantly affecting exports and private domestic investment. Consistent with their errors elsewhere, the IMF severely overestimated the growth prospects following austerity policies. The IMF estimate of 3.5 percent Thai growth for 1998 (post-austerity) was subsequently “revised to -5% and the realized GDP growth rate was -10.51%” (Chari & Henry, 2015, p. 8). Based largely on neoliberal assumptions of financial capital primacy, the Bank of Thailand and the Thai government saw few alternatives to the austerity policies in exchange for conditional IMF financial support. The depth of neoliberal hegemonic integration in the Thai government and within the Bank of Thailand highlights the hegemony of austerity imposition as a “solution” to an extensive financial crisis. Although the Thai economy eventually recovered, it did so despite implementing austerity policies and in a brutally uneven fashion. The beneficiaries of the financial bailouts achieved the goal of protecting and expanding their access to financial capital, financed in part by austerity impositions. Poor, working-, and middle-class households saw only deepened hardships through commodity price increases, consumption tax increases, consumption subsidy decreases, property value depreciation, and reduced public service delivery. While some of these issues have been addressed (through, for example, the 2001 universal health care initiative and the implementation of unemployment insurance), the restrictive context of postausterity development left many Thai citizens vulnerable to price increases that exacerbate persisting adversities (Jitsuchon & Siamwalla, 2009). During the 1970s, Indonesia followed the dominant trend among developing countries by investing heavily in domestic manufacturing and extractive industries while implementing import-substitution policies. The Indonesian economy benefited significantly from oil price increases resulting from the 1973 OPEC embargo, but as energy prices declined in the 1980s, the extraordinary growth Indonesia enjoyed slowed from 7 percent in the 1970s to 4 percent in the 1980s (James & Fujita, 1989; Schwarz, 1994, pp. 57–58).

The hegemony of austerity  181 Indonesia pursued a series of adjustment and austerity policies in the 1980s in response to the decline in commodity prices. The currency was devalued in order to make export pricing more competitive, while the government deregulated the financial sector to attract foreign capital investment. Export-oriented manufacturing, agricultural, and natural resource exports grew, as did FDI (Karseno, 1997). Yet with deregulation, Indonesia was exposed to increased financial risk, which would prove disastrous in 1997. The devaluation of the Thai currency in July 1997 cascaded throughout East Asia. By October 1997, the Indonesian government turned to the IMF for an emergency loan of US$5 billion. Austerity conditions followed, increasing interest rates, cutting local subsidies, and reducing government spending (Stiglitz, 2000). The exacerbation of the financial crisis, coupled with President Suharto’s reluctance to reduce food and fuel subsidies, led the IMF to impose a second round of austerity in January 1998. This second round eliminated more subsidies, reduced tariffs, and further restricted Indonesian monetary policy. Hardships rose, with immediate price increases in the midst of job loss, particularly in urban areas. Job losses following the crisis were estimated at between 2.2 and 6.8 million additional unemployed and an unemployment rate above 10 percent. At the same time, the immediate inflation that resulted from reduced state subsidies for food and fuel created sudden hardships for the 19 million Indonesians suffering in poverty as a result of the financial crisis (Lane & SchulzeGhattas, 1999; Bullard et al., 1998, p. 519; Utting et al., 2012). Although IMF austerity conditions targeted public debt, they did little to diminish the government’s debt burden, even while transferring the ownership of Indonesian financial entities to foreign investors. Public debt declined, but only because of the privatization of formerly public enterprises, and the inability of the Indonesian state to invest in public infrastructure or address the adverse social effects of austerity continued. The insistence of the IMF and the Clinton administration to fully comply with austerity demands sustained popular protests and failed to reinstill confidence in Indonesia’s shattered financial sector. Bank closures, interest rate hikes, and subsidy cuts aggravated crisis conditions and led to a further liquidity crisis as depositors and investors fled the Indonesian banking system (Francis, 2003; Sanger, 1998; Pincus & Ramli, 1998; Stiglitz, 2000). Plagued by joblessness, material deprivation, and increasingly violent confrontations with protestors, Suharto was forced to resign in May 1998. The end of the Suharto regime ushered in a more liberal, capitalist-friendly era as sustained liberalization and austerity created significant foreign investment opportunities. Foreign direct investment increased over 500 percent from 2015–2019, as further rounds of austerity by post-Suharto administrations continued to accede to IMF liberalization initiatives. Sustained protests over subsidy reductions and cuts in services eventually led the government to seek an end to IMF-imposed austerity in 2003 (Francis, 2003). This ebb in austerity would again flow in 2005 and 2008, when then-President Yudhoyono implemented significant cuts to fuel subsidies. These cuts were made to cover the expenses of currency sales used to finance oil imports, despite the country’s substantial oil exports. Despite weathering the 2008 recession and experiencing nearly 6 percent GDP growth following the recession, the pressure to deepen liberalization through privatization and austerity motivated further subsidy reductions in 2013 and 2015. While initial austerity agreements in 1997 certainly resulted from external pressure, the sustained emphasis on cyclical austerity in the years following the financial crisis highlights the integrative nature of hegemonic austerity as a monolithic condition in support of finance capital.

182  Handbook of social justice in the Global South From 1998 to the present, the political and economic climate of Indonesia is best understood as a vacillation between neoliberalization (privatization, deregulation) and sustained protectionism (subsidies, state-owned enterprises), with austerity serving as the hammer of neoliberalization. Austerity has served as a tool in maintaining the long-term interest in foreign exploitation of Indonesian natural resources. The legacy of colonial extraction and domestic neglect means that sustained austerity policies in a country with many impoverished citizens will create severe hardships and further hinder social development. Despite these realities, neoliberalization proponents continue to push austerity to sustain the reduction of extra-market protections such as food and fuel assistance. Austerity proponents in Thailand and Indonesia were both beholden to and supportive of external capital availability afforded by the World Bank and the IMF. Their sustained influence in the years following the 1997 Asian Financial Crisis remains actively confronted by broad popular opposition to austerity. The success of the Thai Rak Thai Party in the 2001 elections while running on an anti-austerity platform and sustained protests throughout the post-Suharto era in Indonesia offer further evidence of the lack of popular support for austerity. The outsized role of finance capital in setting conditions for accumulation at any cost has allowed sovereign credit rating agencies to serve as influential mechanisms: “… where these firms exercise their quasi veto power to restrict options in public policy making in developing countries to those most appealing to foreign investors” (Datz, 2004, p. 315). Credit rating agencies have not only “aggravate(d) the East Asian financial crisis” by supporting austerity, they also contributed to a postcrisis conservatism in ratings (Ferri et al., 1999, p. 353). This downgrading tendency would, of course, be detrimental to foreign capital investment in the region, and thus, both Thailand and Indonesia were encouraged to sustain austerity policies in the hopes of upgrading credit ratings in support of foreign capital investment.

12.7 PERMANENT AUSTERITY IN MEXICO The Mexican government paid for economic development and political stability by borrowing heavily on the world capital market in the 1970s. Just as repayment loomed, oil reserves discovered in the Gulf of Mexico drove even more borrowing. When loan interest rates rose, a fall in oil prices diminished the potential to pay the loans. In 1982, Mexico shocked investors by declaring it held a debt it could not pay and entered into debt renegotiations with the IMF. This led to a nearly 40-year uninterrupted period of austerity for Mexico’s citizens. Starting from 1982, subsidies on government-supplied products, including gasoline and tortillas, were significantly reduced or completely eliminated. The peso was devalued repeatedly, while wages were frozen or decreased. By 1986, austerity policies had cut public spending by 32 percent, with public education and health budgets reduced by half, as were wages. Unemployment besieged much of the Mexican labor force, leaving 5 million out of work (Woods, 2006; Larmer, 1989; Middlebrook, 1991). The policies continued into later administrations, with annual wages dropping between 7.7 percent and 12.3 percent, from 1982 to 1997. The number of households below the official poverty line increased from 34 percent in 1970 to 43 percent in 1996 (Robberson, 1995, p. A1; Friedmann, Lustig, & Legovini, 1995; Lustig, 1998). The base interest rate surged to nearly 90 percent, while mortgage and credit rates reached as high as 150 percent. This had devastating consequences for small businesses, leading to increased unemployment and posing a serious

The hegemony of austerity  183 risk of home, car, and tractor repossession (Davison, 1995). The cycle continued with price hikes on more subsidized consumer items, further cuts in government welfare programs, and threatened hikes in higher education tuition. There appeared to be limited exit from such policies, as the repayment of loans often relied on assuming new loans. By the 2000s, and the first opposition presidency in 80 years, poverty affected 80 percent of Mexican citizens. Real wages in 1998 were 57 percent of real wages in 1980; the minimum wage in 1998 was 29.5 percent of the minimum wage in 1980. Wage controls impacted all workers, as new factories paid wages 60 percent lower than established factories and offered less union protection. The proportion of part-time workers increased from 17.4 percent to 28 percent of the workforce (Damian & Botvinik, 2006, p. 153; Dussel Peters, 2000, p. 72; Gonzàlez de la Rocha, 2001; Cypher & Wise, 2010; Lustig, 1998). Between 1988 and 1997, real salaries of middle-class professionals such as educators and health caregivers declined between 35 percent and 50 percent. The firing of state workers eliminated many white-collar middle-class positions. The years from 2000 to the current day have been little kinder to Mexico. Despite variation in political party dominance over the two decades, Mexican economic policy has remained mired in austerity.

12.8 CONCLUSION Examining the austerity experiences of Chile, Zimbabwe, South Africa, Indonesia, Thailand, and Mexico clearly shows the global reach of austerity since 1973, and current conflicts in the Global South and even European nations like Greece and Spain force us to recognize that austerity continues to define the global political economy. These cases further demonstrate that while their origins may vary, the widespread implementation of austerity policies confirms its status as a hegemonic policy. Its popularity among elite policymakers has been due, we argue, to common results across the globe: making accumulation through debt increasingly secure even while immiserating the citizens of the nations that have suffered austerity. Austerity policies have been far-reaching, being used repeatedly in many nations. The global actors responsible for austerity have increased in number: at certain times and places, the IMF and the US government played predominant roles, and, at other times and places, regional actors such as the EU or global actors such as credit rating agencies and international banks have pushed the policy. We find also the active participation in policy implementation of not only a global institutional elite but also domestic policymakers, which has helped legitimize austerity. This wide implementation across time and space by varied actors demonstrates the hegemony of austerity. So, too, does the variation in its implementation, from violently coercive ways to pressure imposed by elite institutions, to coalitions of local and global actors, to triggering mechanisms found in regional agreements. The global history of austerity also shows that governments’ professed ideology didn’t matter, as socialist parties joined conservative political actors in imposing austerity even after promising not to do so. Neither do the intentions of governments elected to address institutionalized racial hierarchies, as they too fall to the obligations of austerity. Finally, we find that the hegemony of austerity has manifested not only as policy responses to seeming crises but also in becoming a permanent and/or recurring feature of national and global political economy. This continues even in the wake of COVID-19, when the large majority of IMF loans continued to be accompanied by austerity conditions (Abdo, 2022; Ray, Gallagher, & Kring, 2020).

184  Handbook of social justice in the Global South The varied actors responsible for imposing austerity highlight how decision-making power has shifted to private finance capital, eventually rivaling the IFIs. Prioritizing the repayment of even onerous debt, a key intention of austerity, reinforces the power of financial capital. Neoliberalism and austerity provide structural (and legal) means of shifting wealth upwards as a tool of class warfare, and its hegemonic status allows this transference to be interpreted as an ideological good (Harvey, 2005). The contemporary interventions of sovereign credit rating agencies highlight the centrality of transnational capital in promoting conditions of limited domestic spending and regulation in favor of redirecting capital flows to areas amenable to short-term profitability. Even in cases where state efforts to ameliorate social strain and material inequalities are present, private capital has positioned itself in a way to ensure hegemonic persistence. The debt dependence of the contemporary neoliberal state positions private capital as a reliable funding source, if the state adheres to requisite demands for positive conditions for said private capital. Austerity, therefore, provides a corrective barometer for private capital to determine state compliance with these demands. Further evidence of hegemony exists in the presence of a counterhegemonic force and ideology. Protests responding to global austerity emphatically demonstrate the activity of a counterhegemonic force across the last 40 years, a Polanyian double movement first coming from the streets and then from governments (Walton & Seddon, 1994; Shefner, Pasdirtz, & Rowland, 2015; Chase-Dunn & Almeida, 2020, to name only a few). By the 1990s, political parties took on anti-austerity platforms, and by the 2000s, the “Pink Tide” of elections brought governments advocating anti-austerity politics to two-thirds of Latin America’s citizens, a transition also found elsewhere. This counterhegemonic effort has been articulated globally, during gatherings of the World Social Forum, at protests against annual meetings of various IFIs, and through organizations such as Jubilee and Eurodad, among many others. In some places, the counterhegemonic initiatives have been beaten back only to resurface. As the detrimental consequences of debt dependency become evident and the cycle of austerity exacerbates the very hardships that necessitate state intervention, we believe that counterhegemonic mobilization will continue to strengthen. Indeed, the flood of anti-systemic rhetoric emanating from global anti-austerity and anti-inequality protests reinforces this contention. We firmly believe it is this counterhegemonic force that will provide new paths away from the current hegemony of austerity.

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186  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Lauridsen, L. S. (1998). The financial crisis in Thailand: Causes, conduct and consequences? World Development, 26, 1575–1591. Leightner, J. E., & Knox Lovell, C. A. (1998). The impact of financial liberalization on the performance of Thai banks. Journal of Economics and Business, 50(2), 115–131. Lustig, N. (1998). Mexico: The remaking of an economy (2nd ed). Brookings Institution. Mamdani, M. (2009). Lessons of Zimbabwe: Mugabe in context. Concerned African Scholars Bulletin, 82, 1–13. Marais, H. (1998). South Africa: Limits to change. Zed Books. McKinley, D. (2016). Lessons in community-based resistance? South Africa’s anti-privatisation forum. Journal of Contemporary African Studies, 34, 268–281. Middlebrook, K. (1991). Unions, workers, and the state in Mexico. University of California, Center for U.S.–Mexican Studies. Moore, D. (2001). Neoliberal globalisation and the triple crisis of “modernisation” in Africa: Zimbabwe, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and South Africa. Third World Quarterly, 22, 909–929. Moyo, S., & Yeros, P. (2011). Reclaiming the nation: The return of the national question in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Pluto Press. Nyabereka, M. C. (2017). An exploration of the effects of structural adjustment and BRICS engagement on development in Zimbabwe over the periods 1991–1995 and 2009–2013. Politikon, 44, 111–131. Park, M. (2013). Lessons from the Asian financial crisis for the eurozone: A comparative analysis of the perilous politics of austerity in Asia and Europe. Asia Europe Journal, 11(2), 189–199. Peet, R. (2002). Ideology, discourse, and the geography of hegemony: From socialist to neoliberal development in postapartheid South Africa. Antipode, 34, 54–84. Pincus, J., & Ramli, R. (1998). Indonesia: From showcase to basket case. Cambridge Journal of Economics, 22, 723–734. Presidency (2009). Development indicators 2009. Republic of South Africa. Raftopoulos, B. (2000). The labour movement and the emergence of opposition politics in Zimbabwe. Labour, Capital and Society, 33, 256–286. Ray, R., Gallagher, K., & Kring, W. (2020). Global financial crisis: New data, same trend, and similar determinants (Working paper). Global Development Policy Center GEGI. Renaud, B., Zhang, M., & Koeberle, S. (1998). How the Thai real estate boom undid financial institutions: What can be done now? In NESDB seminar on Thailand’s economic recovery and competitiveness Bangkok. Robberson, T. (1995, March 15). Mexico faces banking and credit crisis; rising interest rates cause loan defaults (p. A1). Washington Post. Sanger, D. E. (1998, January 14). I.M.F. now admits tactics in Indonesia deepened crisis. New York Times.  https://www​.nytimes​.com ​/1998​/01​/14​/ business​/international​-business​-imf​-now​-admits​tactics​-in​-indonesia​-deepened​-the​-crisis​.html Schwarz, A. (1994). A nation in waiting: Indonesia in the 1990s. Westview Press. Schwarzmantel, J. (2015). Gramsci’s prison notebooks. London. Segatti, A., & Pons-Vignon, N. (2013). Stuck in stabilisation? South Africa’s post-apartheid macroeconomic policy between ideological conversion and technocratic capture. Review of African Political Economy, 40, 537–555. Shefner, J., Pasdirtz, G., & Rowland, A. (2015). Austerity and protest: Bringing hardships back in. Journal of World Systems Research, 21(2). Southall, R. (2016). The coming crisis of Zuma’s ANC: The party state confronts fiscal crisis. Review of African Political Economy, 43, 73–88. Stiglitz, J. E. (2000). Lessons from the global financial crisis. In J. R Bisignano, W. C. Hunter, & G. G. Kaufman (Eds.), Global financial crises. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi​.org​/10​.1007​/978​-1​- 4615​ -4367​-1_9 Thailand (1998). Krasūang Sāthāranasuk. Commission tasked with making recommendations to improve the efficiency and management of Thailand’s financial system. Nation Press. Utting, P., Razavi, S., & Buchholz, R. V. (2012). Overview: Social and political dimensions of the global crisis: Possible futures. In R. V. Buchholz, & P. Utting (Eds.), The global crisis and transformative social change. Palgrave Macmillan. Valdés, J. G. (1995). Pinochet’s economists: The Chicago School in Chile. Cambridge University Press.

The hegemony of austerity  187 Walton, J., & Seddon, D. (1994). Free markets and food riots: The politics of global adjustment. Blackwell. Woods, N. (2006). The globalizers: The IMF, the World Bank, and their borrowers. Cornell University Press. Young, M. (2006). From Pinochet to the “third way”: Neoliberalism and Social Transformation in Chile. London: Pluto Press.

13. Social justice and social perception in Latin America and the Caribbean Kevin Nazar

13.1 INTRODUCTION Social justice efforts in Latin America have focused on ethnicity, race, gender, economic inequality, the environment, and Indigenous peoples’ rights, among other things. Latin America is currently the most economically unequal region of the world, which is still under the spell of the “Middle Income Trap” (World Bank, 2023). The Middle Income Trap is defined by Felipe et al. (2012) as when a country’s economy is not growing fast enough to overcome the lower-middle-income and upper-middle-income category segments in a given number of years. This inequality was further evidenced during the COVID-19 pandemic. For example, the technological gap in access to the Internet affected girls and young women disproportionately during the pandemic (CEPAL, 2023). However, the lack of social justice in public health in Latin America has been documented even before the pandemic, especially with neglected tropical diseases like Chagas and communicable diseases in general that disproportionately affect the poor in the region (Rey León, 2020; Fleury, 2010). Social inequality was evidenced along many lines during and after the pandemic, affecting minorities such as Indigenous peoples and migrants in a disproportionate way (Carter-Thuillier et al., 2021). Afro-descendants in Latin America also suffer disproportionate levels of inequality compared to other sectors of the population (Rangel, 2023). Social uprisings during the pandemic and clashes with Latin American governments or police forces put the social cohesion of many Latin American nations to the test. Despite this, public space is a necessary place of expression if democracy is desired, especially for Latin America (Montiel, 2010). For example, street demonstrations as a form of civil expression have seen widespread use by social movements in many countries of this region. Latin America and the Caribbean are regions with a great diversity of cultures, languages, and types of social cleavages. In this brief chapter, I will give a broad overview of specific matters of social justice and perceptions of it. However, there are great differences between individual Latin American and Caribbean countries in terms of social rights advances and economic development. Nevertheless, the region does have overarching issues and intricate relationships that also make Latin America and the Caribbean challenging and heterogeneous as units of analysis. Although the region has gone through the socio-political era of the “Pink Tide,” the rift between left and right-wing governments is an ever-growing concern, which is creating dangerous antagonisms within society. The Pink Tide was a political tendency towards left-leaning governments and progressive policies in the Latin American region (Bull, 2013). Governments from both sides of the political spectrum have experienced dramatic moments, such as the coup attempt by followers of Jair Bolsonaro against the newly elected government of Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva in Brazil, or the pervading poverty and corruption in Nicolas Maduro’s 188

Social justice and social perception in Latin America and the Caribbean  189 government in Venezuela. One of the dichotomies that has to be avoided when studying social justice in Latin America is the one that assumes that social movements are only part of a leftwing political agenda in the region. Although certain left-wing governments in the region, such as that of Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador in Mexico, place special priority on supporting social movements, this does not mean that only the left supports social justice in every country. This misunderstanding has led to much polarization between social movements, often violent. Even within coalitions of left-wing governments with social movements, such as that in Bolivia between the Movimiento al Socialismo party (MAS) and the Indigenous people of the Bolivian highlands, there can be moments of tension and conflict. Several social justice leaders in South and Central America, for example, have been killed, such as Bertha Caceres in Honduras, an Indigenous environmentalist leader. Additionally, when thinking about social justice in Latin America, there are many actors that become involved in intricate relationships. These include social movements, governments, the national private sectors, multinationals, narcotrafficking cartels, and the newly emerging and politically enabled Pentecostal movements across the region (Lehmann, 2022). All these parties form part of the structural disequilibrium in Latin America’s socio-economic history (Rodríguez González et al., 1999). By some metrics, Latin America, despite its advancements, is facing a multifaceted crisis along social, health, educational, and environmental lines, all of which have impacted women disproportionately (CEPAL, 2023). These include geopolitical tensions, inflation, economic and ethno-racial inequality, and patriarchal cultural patterns, among others. I will return to this point in the section about gender equality further below.

13.2 ECONOMIC INEQUALITY Despite Latin America having become the third most democratic region in the world in the last 40 years by some metrics, it is hard to think of social justice in Latin America without bringing to mind that it is the most economically unequal region of the world (Brookings Institution, 2020; World Bank, 2023). It is even possible that this type of inequality is fueling a new rise of populism in the region (The Economist, 2022). According to The Economist and its analysis of Latin American countries compared to OECD developed economies, Colombia, for example, needs 11 generations of descendants of a low-income individual to escape the low-income threshold, compared to OECD countries that need only about four. By these same metrics, Brazil needs nine generations and Argentina and Chile need six (The Economist, 2022).The demand for governments to take an active role in addressing such economic inequality is a demand for social justice in the region (Tello, 2019). However, policies of privatization and deregulation to combat poverty have been criticized in Latin America (Stahl, 1994). Many of these policies adhered to the principles of the Washington Consensus and an initial economic development agenda in the 1990s that ended with stalled growth. Although economic redistribution is important in the region and needs urgent attention and research, a great deal of the contemporary academic research within and about Latin America has analyzed and denounced the ethnic and racist legacy of the Colonial period and how this structure has persisted culturally, structurally, and epistemically (Santos, 2014; Tello, 2011). There has also been conceptual and theoretical research into the nature of social justice from this region (Murillo & Hernández, 2011). However, an analysis of the damaging effects of economic inequality, redistribution, and lack of access to opportunity is warranted for this region.

190  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Gender inequality is rampant in the region as well, visible not only in the alarmingly high rates of feminicide in comparison to other regions but also in the lack of opportunities for women as compared to men (Nussbaum & Maldonado, 2009; Quiñonez & Maldonado-Erazo, 2020; Reyes Vasquez, 2023). Further analysis into gender inequality in Latin America and the Caribbean will be furnished below. LGBTQ+ social movements in Latin America have found solid opposition in religiously conservative social movements as well. Despite all this, it is also of great importance not to ignore the economic inequality dimension of social injustice in the region. The universalist approach to social justice is particularly applicable to the economically unequal situation of Latin America (Lehmann, 2022). Despite the need to focus on economic inequality, in addition to the lines of race, ethnicity, and gender, the ethnic diversity of Latin American countries presents a challenge to achieving social justice (Olivé, 2004). The economic struggle of the lowest-earning sectors of society, represented mostly by minorities, is largely reflected in Latin American civil societies’ negative opinions about their own governments. Of particular importance is the degree of disapproval of national governments among civilians that persists in most of Latin America and the Caribbean.

13.3 SOCIAL APPROVAL OF NATIONAL GOVERNMENTS IN THE REGION Using data from the Gallup World Poll (2023) we can see the perception that society has about its governments in Latin America and its sub-regions (South America, Central America, and

Source: Gallup World Poll (2023).

Figure 13.1  Percentage of respondents who disapprove of their national government in Latin America, the Caribbean, and the world

Social justice and social perception in Latin America and the Caribbean  191 the Caribbean) compared to that of the world at large. As seen in Figure 13.1, the percentages of individuals who disapprove of their national governments have been notably larger in all of Latin America and the Caribbean than in the aggregate of the entire world between the years 2011 and 2021 (Gallup, 2023). The aggregate of South American countries has had the highest percentages of respondents disapproving of their government between 2013 and 2021. The Caribbean region has seen a decline in this disapproval rate starting in 2018. The percentages of disapproval of national governments increased for all regions and the world after 2020, when the COVID-19 pandemic started. This trend of disapproval of national governments is worrying, especially when we consider that one of the main routes to achieving social justice is via the democratic system, despite its imperfections (Martinez, 2005). A recurring reality in the political arena of Latin America is that many of the governments in the region seek to hold on to power beyond what is constitutionally allowed. Specific administrations becoming suspiciously re-elected for numerous terms have become a reality in many countries in the region. Both governments belonging to the political left and the political right have extended their terms in this way. Corruption and extractivism have been present in both types of governments as well, making it hard to blame only one of the political currents (Álvarez-Curbelo, 2019). This has undermined the confidence that the civilian population has in the election process.

Source: Gallup World Poll (2023).

Figure 13.2  Percentage of respondents who do not have confidence in their elections in Latin America, the Caribbean, and the world

192  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Analyzing the perception that respondents in the aggregate of Latin America and the Caribbean have of their own election processes, we can see that it is not as good as the average for the world. As can be seen in Figure 13.2, the percentage of respondents from the civilian population who do not have confidence in their own election process in Latin America and the Caribbean is higher than the world aggregate (Gallup, 2023). Within Latin America, South America holds the highest percentage of lack of confidence in the process of elections, with the Caribbean holding the lowest percentages of lack of confidence between 2014 and 2021.

13.4 SOCIAL PERCEPTION OF THE JUSTICE SYSTEM One of the main guarantors of social justice should be the judicial system. However, in Latin American society, there is deep mistrust of the judicial systems, as can be seen from the data below. The justice and criminal justice systems in Latin America have several problems that need to be addressed (Rico & Salas, 1993). The long times ascribed to judicial processes, as well as the expense of these processes, make justice an unaffordable process for much of the low-earning sector of society in Latin America (Buscaglia, 1997). It is often perceived by low-earning sectors of society that litigation processes are unaffordable to them. As can be seen from Figure 13.3, the percentage of individuals who do not have confidence in their own judicial systems in Latin America is quite a bit higher than the world aggregate (Gallup, 2023). South America, Central America, and the Caribbean all have similar percentages of this lack of confidence between the years 2015 and 2021.

Source: Gallup World Poll (2023).

Figure 13.3  Percentage of respondents who do not have confidence in the judicial system in Latin America and the world

Social justice and social perception in Latin America and the Caribbean  193

Source: Gallup World Poll (2023).

Figure 13.4  Percentage of respondents who do not have confidence in local police in Latin America, the Caribbean, and the world Additionally, clashes between police forces and social movement demonstrations have left deep wounds in the history of Latin American countries, such as Mexico and Argentina, among others. However, during the pandemic, there were violent clashes between social movements, police forces, and other actors in the region. This type of conflict was also seen in many other countries belonging to the Global North, such as the United States, denoting an emerging trend of conflict between social movements and police (or those who command the police forces) globally. Taking into account this new global situation, we can analyze the perception that individuals in society in Latin America and the Caribbean have of their own local police forces using data from the Gallup World Poll. Lack of confidence in local police is an indicator that shows higher percentages in Latin America and the Caribbean when compared to the world aggregate (Gallup, 2023). The subregion that has the greatest lack of confidence in local police is Central America between the years 2015 and 2021, as shown in Figure 13.4.​

13.5 FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION Freedom of expression is one of the mainstays of social justice, and it has taken on new forms in the past 10 years, both in Latin America and the world. Notably, the use of the Internet has revolutionized the way social movements document their activities, such that they do not rely on mainstream media to give visibility to their messages anymore. This has also been

194  Handbook of social justice in the Global South a new means of journalism in the region since it has become dangerous for journalists to practice their trade. Brazil and Mexico, for example, have had some of the highest rates of journalists killed in the world in recent years (Steel & Petley, 2023). For this reason, freedom of expression is especially important in a region where traditional journalism has become a dangerous practice. Figure 13.5 shows the percentages of respondents in Latin America and the Caribbean who think the media does not have a lot of freedom. Overall, the percentages of individuals who believe there is not a lot of freedom for the media are higher in Latin America than in the rest of the world (Gallup, 2023). This trend only changes between the years 2019 and 2021 for the Caribbean, where the percentages drop below those of the aggregate of the entire world. Between 2011 and 2019, Central America was the subregion of Latin America that held the highest percentage of individuals who thought the media did not have a lot of freedom in their countries. Additionally, the use of the Internet is a highly valuable tool for freedom of expression among civil society, and as such it can be a means to promote social justice, although the opposite may be true as well. In Latin America, social media outlets have been used to share videos and information about demonstrations on the street when mainstream media has refused to give visibility to these events, such as in Venezuela. However, access to the Internet, or lack thereof, is a matter that creates inequalities in society, and this is the case in Latin America especially (Helsper, 2023). The use of the Internet is also necessary for educational purposes, especially during the years of the pandemic when most, if not all, schooling was done remotely (CEPAL, 2023). The lack of access to the Internet, for example, has affected

Source: Gallup World Poll (2023).

Figure 13.5  Percentage of respondents who think the media does not have a lot of freedom in Latin America, the Caribbean, and the world

Social justice and social perception in Latin America and the Caribbean  195

Source: World Bank World Development indicators (2023).

Figure 13.6  Individuals using the Internet in Latin America, the Caribbean, Middle income countries, and the world (% of population) young women and girls in their educational years disproportionately compared to boys in Latin America (CEPAL, 2023). Analyzing data available from internet usage in the world from the World Bank, in Figure 13.6, we can see how the percentage of the population in Latin America and the Caribbean that uses the Internet has increased steadily between 2011 and 2020 (World Bank, 2023). The percentage of internet use for the aggregate of Latin America and the Caribbean is also higher during these years than in the aggregate of the world or middle-income countries that have similar characteristics.1

13.6 GENDER EQUALITY Feminist social movements in Latin America have achieved great advances in the past 10 years. The Latin America and Caribbean region is currently among those with the greatest share of women parliamentarians in the world, with 34.4 percent in 2021 (World Bank, 2023). However, despite the advances in women’s rights globally since the Beijing Platform for Action on gender equality, many of the women’s rights agendas in Latin America stalled after the COVID-19 pandemic (Molyneux, 2011). Domestic housekeepers in Latin America, for example, an occupational group of mostly women in this region who have suffered numerous violations of their rights, were disproportionately affected during the pandemic (Reyes Vasquez, 2023). Although these and many other multidimensional forms of inequality must be addressed in the region, great hope is placed upon the large share of women who are starting to hold political power there. This high share of parliamentary women is evidenced below. As can be seen in Figure 13.7, the proportion of seats held by women in national parliaments in Latin America and the Caribbean has been higher than the world aggregate and of

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Source: World Bank World Development indicators (2023).

Figure 13.7  Proportion of seats held by women in national parliaments in Latin America, the Caribbean, and the World (%) middle-income countries between the years 2011 and 2021. This share of seats held by women has also increased in all three regions between these years, denoting a universal improvement in the political representation of women. Despite this, and advances in women’s rights in countries like Argentina, the region still has very high rates of feminicide, and economic inequality disproportionately affects women (World Bank, 2023; Lamas, 2008). Additionally, the LGBTQ+ movement in Latin America has faced opposition from religiously conservative groups, on occasions openly defying them, as in Brazil (Gomes & Cantu, 2023). Even though LGBTQ+ groups in Colombia have a strong legal framework that protects them and they were even recognized within the peace process that took place in recent years, Colombia still remains a challenging terrain for this minority group (Bocanumenth, 2020). It is because of this stark contrast seen in some Latin American countries, where the rights on paper are very different to LGBTQ+ individuals’ experience, that it is important to analyze the social perception of the acceptance of this minority group in Latin America. Figure 13.8 shows that the percentage of respondents who believe that where they live is a bad place for gay and lesbian people is higher in the Caribbean subregion than in the South American and Central American subregions between 2011 and 2021 (Gallup, 2023). Interestingly, although the percentage of this indicator is higher for the Caribbean than for the world aggregate, the percentage of respondents from South and Central America who think their region is a bad place for gays and lesbians is less than the world aggregate. This means that the Caribbean is perceived by its society as being a worse place for gay and lesbian people than in the world aggregate, and the opposite is true of South and Central America. These findings even show that the percentage of individuals who believe that their country is a bad place for gays and lesbians is at its lowest in the South American subregion. It is important to denote that this is the aggregate of all South American countries even though Brazil and Colombia, with the situations previously mentioned, are part of it.

Social justice and social perception in Latin America and the Caribbean  197

Source: Gallup World Poll (2023).

Figure 13.8  Percentage of respondents (general population) who believe that where they live is a bad place for gay or lesbian people in Latin America, the Caribbean, and the world

13.7 IMMIGRATION WITHIN LATIN AMERICA: THE VENEZUELAN DIASPORA Migrants within Latin America have faced challenges ranging from discrimination to access to jobs and a lack of access to basic health services (De Ortúzar, 2020; Carter-Thuillier et al., 2021). Internal displacement within countries, such as in Colombia, has been an issue in the region as well. Recently, however, the social and political crisis in Venezuela has generated one of the largest migration processes in Latin American history. Many Venezuelans have fled the country in search of better economic opportunities or to escape violence and insecurity. Many of these migrants have fled to neighboring Colombia, where the local government has enabled special systems to allow many of the Venezuelan immigrants to work there. Other Venezuelans have migrated to Peru and other Latin American countries. The experience of being a Venezuelan migrant in another country in Latin America has proven to be challenging for many and a matter of social justice for all. Not all countries have been culturally or socially welcoming to Venezuelans, even if there are migratory systems in place to assimilate them into the workforce. Figure 13.9 illustrates the perception that the general population has about the countries in Latin America and the Caribbean not being a good place for immigrants. Compared to the worldwide aggregate percentages between 2011 and 2021, only the percentages in Central America and the Caribbean are slightly higher. This means that between 2016 and 2021,

198  Handbook of social justice in the Global South

Source: Gallup World Poll (2023).

Figure 13.9  Percentage of respondents (general population) who believe their country is not a good place for immigrants in Latin America, the Caribbean, and the world Central America is the region which is perceived as slightly less welcoming to immigrants compared to the world aggregate and the rest of the Latin American and Caribbean regions.

13.8 ENVIRONMENT AND THE INDIGENOUS PEOPLES The region of Latin America and the Caribbean has seen great improvements in Indigenous peoples’ rights in recent years (Navarro et al., 2022). However, certain Indigenous groups within this region have faced challenges, particularly during and after the COVID-19 pandemic and also in the area of education (Castillo & Del Pino, 2022). The pandemic affected Indigenous peoples disproportionately due to their lack of access to basic healthcare, neglect by the governments of their countries, and their often remote locations. Indigenous peoples in most (but not all) Latin American countries tend to comprise small percentages of the population and as such are considered minorities. As minorities, they face many difficulties that the general population does not have. To better illustrate this, Figure 13.10 presents the percentage of respondents who think the place they live in is not a good place for racial and ethnic minorities. Even though between 2011 and 2018 the Caribbean showed the highest percentage of respondents declaring that their countries were a bad place for such minorities, we can see an overall decrease in this percentage within this region between the years 2015 and 2020 (Gallup, 2023). A slighter decrease can also be seen for the Central American region, meaning that the perception of

Social justice and social perception in Latin America and the Caribbean  199

Source: Gallup World Poll (2023).

Figure 13.10  Percentage of respondents (general population) who think the place they live in is not a good place for racial and ethnic minorities in Latin America and the Caribbean their country as a place for racial and ethnic minorities has improved for this subregion and the Caribbean between 2015 and 2020. Indigenous peoples’ social movements in Latin America are also in great part environmental protection movements. One of the main figures of this Indigenous environmental approach was Bertha Caceres, an Indigenous woman leader who was murdered because of her stance on protecting her local environment in Honduras. Many Indigenous groups advocate for environmental protection of forests, lakes, and even ocean areas. This is especially true for Brazil where Indigenous groups have faced negligence from the government of Jair Bolsonaro regarding the protection of the Amazon forest, which suffered a great fire in 2020. The environmental challenges in Latin America that have been linked to efforts of social justice are numerous. Some of the most recent examples of environmental conflicts are also the deforestation in Puerto Guzman in Putumayo, Colombia, and the impact of cattle ranching and agriculture in the degradation of grounds in the State of Sao Paulo in Brazil (Gusman et al., 2023). The problems related to water supply, mining, and social justice in Bolivia and Peru have also been well documented (Perreault et al., 2014). In countries like Brazil and others from the Latin American region, social movements such as Indigenous peoples’ movements have been at the forefront of environmental protection, often having to move the arm of governments to protect their own natural habitats. Figure 13.11 presents the percentages of respondents who are satisfied with efforts to preserve the environment in Latin America, the Caribbean, and the world. As we can see, the percentages of satisfaction with government efforts to preserve the environment are lower for Latin America and the Caribbean than they are for the world aggregate.

200  Handbook of social justice in the Global South

Source: Gallup World Poll (2023).

Figure 13.11  Percentage of respondents who are satisfied with efforts to preserve the environment in Latin America, the Caribbean, and the world

13.9 CONCLUSION As can be seen from the information presented here, there are many pressing matters of social justice that are still pending in Latin America, such as gender inequality in access to the Internet, education, and economic opportunities. Economic inequality and the lack of effectiveness of governments to address it have been a matter of social justice concern as well, pressing more for a universalist approach to redistribution of social justice as urgent (Lehmann, 2022). The hostile environment that certain minorities, such as Indigenous peoples and LGBTQ+ groups, still have to deal with has greatly shaped a negative perception of society towards their own governments and justice systems. Even then, there is a glimmer of hope in the findings that show that at least for the South American and Central American subregions, the share of the population that believes these countries are a bad place for gays and lesbians is lower than the world aggregate. Yet, the opposite was true for the Caribbean subregion in many of the past years. From the analysis of the Gallup World Poll, we see how the share of Latin American people who disapprove of their governments, and do not have

Social justice and social perception in Latin America and the Caribbean  201 confidence in their elections, judicial systems, or police forces, is above the world aggregate. This begs the question whether or not there is a larger crisis of legitimacy looming in the opinion of civil society in this region. Whether this is the case or not, these negative perceptions vary in line with the share of society that believes that the media does not have a lot of freedom in the Latin American region, which is larger than the world aggregate. All this information is important because lack of social justice creates a memory in the population, a lingering force in society that can erupt at any moment. The consequences of a lack of social justice tend to germinate in the minds and hearts of society, and the results of this can be unpredictable.

NOTE 1. With the data available from the World Bank (2023), we are able to compare the aggregate of Latin America to the aggregate of all middle-income countries in the world, which are bound to have similar characteristics. This data from the World Bank is available as aggregates. The data used in this analysis from Gallup (2023), on the other hand, does not contain immediate aggregates of the middle-income countries, but does include the subregions of Central America, South America, and the Caribbean as aggregates. This is the reason that different aggregates or subregions are used in the data charts utilizing data from Gallup and the World Bank.

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202  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Gomes, S., & Cantu, R. (2023). The conservative wave and corporate practices in Brazil: The controversy over LGBTQ in marketing. Journal of Latin American Studies, 55(2):1–26 DOI:10.1017/ S0022216X2300024X Gusman, I., Perez Guilarte, Y., Cidras, D., Vila Vazquez, J. I., & Lois Gonzalez, R. C. (Eds.) (2023). America Latina ante los nuevos retos de la justicia social y ambiental. Asociación Española de Geografía. Helsper, E. (2023). Desigualdades digitales en un mundo de pandemia Ellen (1st ed.). Ediciones Instituto de Investigaciones Sociales. Lamas, M. (2008). El aborto en la agenda del desarrollo en América Latina. Perfiles latinoamericanos, 16(31), 65–93. Lehmann, D. (2022). After the decolonial: Ethnicity, gender and social justice in Latin America. Cambridge Polity Press. Molyneux, M. (2011). Justicia de Género, Ciudadanía y Diferencia en América Latina. Studia Historica. Historia Contemporánea, 28, 181–211. Montiel, Z. C. D. (2010). Los roles políticos de la justicia social: Una reflexión desde America Latina. Opción. 26(61), 101–112. Murillo Torrecilla, F. J., & Hernández Castilla, R. (2011). Hacia un Concepto de Justicia Social. REICE. Revista Iberoamericana sobre Calidad, Eficacia y Cambio en Educación, 9(4), 7–23. Navarro, G., Saldaña, M. M., & Figueireido, J. A. M. Q. (2022). Direitos Indígena na América do Sul: Observância dos Parâmetros Interamericanos. Revista Direito E Práxis, 13(1), 580–606. https://doi​ .org​/10​.1590​/2179–8966/2022/65132 Nussbaum, M., & Maldonado, C. (2009). Las capacidades de las mujeres y la justicia social. Debate Feminista, 39, 89–129. Olivé, L. (2004). Interculturalismo y justicia social: Autonomía e identidad cultural en la era de la globalización (1st ed., Vol. 2). Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico. Perreault, T. (Ed.) (2014) Minería, agua y justicia social en los Andes: Experiencias comparativas de Perú y Bolivia. In T. Perreault et al. (Eds.),La paz: Justicia hídrica; Centro de ecología y pueblos andinos. Fundación PIEB. Quiñonez, P., & Maldonado-Erazo, C. (2020). Chapter 1: An overview of gender inequality in Latin America from a political economy perspective. In Gender inequality in Latin America. Brill. https:// doi​.org​/10​.1163​/9789004442917​_003 Rangel, R. (2023). Decenio Internacional para los Afrodescendientes: breve examen en el marco de la pandemia de COVID-19 en América Latina y el Caribe. [Documentos de proyectos].CEPAL. Rey León, J. A. (2020). La justicia social en salud y su relación con la enfermedad de Chagas. Revista Cubana de Salud Pública, 46(4), e1264. Reyes Vasquez, G. L. (2023, March 2). Visibilizando lo invisible: COVID-19 y servidumbre doméstica en América Latina. Debate Feminista, 66, 1–32. Rico, J. M., & Salas, L. (1993). La Administración de justicia en América Latina: una introducción al sistema penal CAJ. Rodríguez González, R., dos Santos Caldas, A., & Mascarenhas Bisneto, J. (1999). Desarrollo local y regional en Iberoamerica. University Santiago de Compostela. Santos, Boaventura de Sousa. (2014). Epistemologies of the South: justice against epistemicide. Boulder, CO: Paradigm Publishers Stahl, K. (1994). Política social en América Latina. La privatización de la crisis. Nueva Sociedad Nro. 131 Moyo-Junio 1994 PP. 48-71 Steel, J., & Petley, J. (Eds.). (2023). The Routledge companion to freedom of expression and censorship (1st ed.). Routledge. https://doi​.org​/10​.4324​/9780429262067 Tello, C. (2011). Epistemologías de la política educativa y justicia social en América Latina. Nómadas, Madrid. Especial: América Latina, 489–500. Tello, C. (2019). Austeridad, gasto público y crecimiento económico con justicia social. Economía UNAM, 16(46), 54–60. World Bank.

Social justice and social perception in Latin America and the Caribbean  203 The Brookings Institution. (2020). The rapidly deteriorating quality of democracy in Latin America. https://www​.brookings​ .edu ​ /articles ​ / the ​ - rapidly​ - deteriorating​ - quality​ - of​ - democracy​ -in ​ -latin​ -america/ The Economist (2022). Inequality in Latin America is fueling a new wave of populism. https://www​ .economist​.com ​/the​-americas​/2022​/08​/06​/inequality​-in​-latin​-america​-is​-fuelling​-a​-new​-wave​- of​ -populism World Bank. (2023). World development indicators. Washington D.C.

14. Navigating Sharia with condemned bodies A comparative study between Egypt and Iran on the application of Sharia on transgender policy Nora Noralla

14.1 INTRODUCTION Sharia is the secondary or primary source of law and policy in many Muslim-majority countries. Despite this, Sharia itself is not codified and is composed of various interpretations that differ from one sect to another and one Imam to another; this means that the implementation of Sharia in law and policy can vary greatly from one country to another (Daniels, 2017); this is especially true in the case of Transgenderism. Traditionally, Islamic jurisprudence has emphasized a binary two-sexes system, i.e., Allah created everything in pairs, and each sex has its duties and roles distinct from one another (Davies, 2019). In the 1980s, as sex change operations became more accessible, Islamic jurisprudence moved to tackle this issue, as they believed that if not regulated, sex change operations would be a danger to the fabric of society. Islamic jurists were especially concerned with fitting transgender people into their binary system, which they believed was one of the foundations of society and Sharia (Matin et al., 2021). Thus, two major Fatwas were issued on Transgenderism representing the two major sects of Islam, one by Shia’s Khomeini in Iran and the other by Sunni’s Tantawi in Egypt. The two Fatwas were mostly concerned with the criteria that might allow people to undergo new sex change operations (Matin et al., 2021). The two Fatwas concluded that Transgenderism is a mental disorder with possible cures. The Shia permitted gender-affirming healthcare as a cure, while the Sunni banned it, believing that a mental disorder should only be treated psychiatrically and not surgically. The two Fatwas sought to regulate the matter to fit transgender people into the preestablished binary system (Matin et al., 2021). However, these approaches were not necessarily conservative in the 1980s, a time of increased pathologizing of transgender people, where Western medical discourse was promoting that transgender people are mentally ill and should receive treatment to fit within the binary of society. Thus, when reading those Fatwas, one must be aware of the globalized context of Transgender rights at the time (Castro-Peraza et al., 2019). Policy-wise, the two Fatwas form the foundation of every transgender policy in the Muslim world, except for Pakistan, which had a large traditional transgender community called Khwaja Sira and opted to enact more transgender-friendly policies (Rashid & Rashid, 2022). The policies enacted in Egypt, Kuwait, Jordan, Tunisia, Saudi Arabia, and other Sunni-majority countries focused on banning gender-affirming healthcare for transgender individuals, placing criminal liability on doctors who performed sex change operations, and denying transgender people legal gender recognition (LGR), while promoting the notion of psychiatric treatment for transgender people (Noralla, 2022d). On the other hand, Iran, the only Shia-majority country, enacted policies that subsidize gender-affirming healthcare for transgender people and 204

Navigating Sharia with condemned bodies  205 make it accessible to them only if they prove that they are good Muslims who would play their newly-assigned sex roles well (Saeidzadeh, 2016). The chapter participates in the decolonization efforts by Global South scholars of transgender studies. In recent years, theories on Transgenderism have been very dynamic. The limitation in adapting Western-centric theories in contexts in the Global South led to the rise of the decolonization of the academia movement. This movement pushed for the departure from the overly Western-centric focus that existed in some theories in favor of a more globalized understanding of those theories (Asante & Hanchey, 2021). The chapter investigates the livelihood of transgender people under Islamic law, not as victims, but as people whose mere existence is an act of defiance and activism in the face of the discriminatory system that wishes to erase them. The chapter avoids the tropes about Islam being an inherently transphobic religion and objectively analyzes how scholars view the issue and how transgender people may manage to change those views in the future. The chapter overall provides a contextualized understanding of the Islamic view of Transgenderism and how transgender people navigate Sharia-based systems, even when not in their favor. In this chapter, I examine how those Fatwas came to be and how they might be more similar than they appear. I then move to examine the interpretation of those Fatwas in the national policy of Iran and Egypt, outlining how each country limits the rights of transgender people in its own way. Despite the differences between the Sunni and Shia in Fatwas and policy, both have a similar goal, which is the erasure of the transgender identity and people by making them fit into the binary, whether through surgery or psychiatry.

14.2 SUNNI JURISPRUDENCE In the Sunni world, Egypt’s Al-Azhar1 can be considered the entity with the biggest cultural and religious influence on the creation of modern Sunni Jurisprudence (Sullivan, 2012). When it comes to the issue of Transgenderism, the early Fatwas2 issued by Al-Azhar’s scholars in the 1980s still shape how Sunni countries deal with the issue to this day (Noralla, 2021c). The first Fatwa issued from Al-Azhar regarding the issue of Transgenderism was issued in 1981 by Gad Al-Hag.3 The Fatwa was issued to a Malaysian transgender person who was asked to seek a Fatwa from Al-Azhar by the Malaysian Islamic Research Centre, as they could not examine the issue. Despite his Fatwa being largely forgotten, Gad Al-Hag’s Fatwa outlined the logic and basis all major Sunni scholars would follow subsequently. In 1987, the most wellknown Al-Azhar Fatwa was issued in the case of a transgender woman called Sally Mursi. Sally’s transition was highly publicized by the media and religious officials, and introduced Egyptian society to the modern concept of sex change (Veneuse, 2010). Sally was a medical student at Al-Azhar University who underwent three years of psychiatric treatment before being diagnosed with gender identity disorder (GID). After receiving the diagnosis, Sally underwent multiple operations to become the woman she always wanted to be (SkovguardPeterson, 1995). Al-Azhar University, where Sally studied, refused to readmit her after the surgery and issued a statement that what Sally and her surgeon did was one of the greatest sins a human can commit: the unwarranted change of Allah’s creation. The university added that they had examined Sally before the surgery and concluded that there was no biological necessity for Sally to undergo such surgeries (Skovguard-Peterson, 1995). It is worth mentioning that Sally’s surgeon was a Christian, something which added a layer of tension to the

206  Handbook of social justice in the Global South issue, as Al-Azhar perceived the surgeon’s actions as an attack on a Muslim able-bodied man (Skovguard-Peterson, 1995). Al-Azhar was supported by the Egyptian Medical Syndicate, which at the time was controlled by the Islamist group, the Muslim Brotherhood. The Syndicate conducted an internal investigation which resulted in the surgeon’s medical license being revoked and the anesthetist being fined 200 EGP for breaching the Syndicate’s code of ethics (‫يواشنملا دمحأ دمحم‬, 2022). In its statement, the Syndicate stated that the issue at hand was not only medical, and framed it as a religious, cultural, and social issue, as they believed that unwarranted sex change operations were nothing but an attack on society’s morals (Skovguard-Peterson, 1995). Al-Azhar and the Medical Syndicate tried to criminally prosecute the doctors involved in Sally’s surgery and submitted a criminal complaint to the prosecution office. The prosecution office investigated the matter, relying on the medical expertise of Cairo University’s Dr Fakhri Salah and other medical experts from the judicial forensic medical authority (‫دمحم‬ ‫يواشنملا دمحأ‬, 2022). The medical experts examined Sally and concluded that she had been suffering from what they called “psychological hermaphroditism,” or GID in modern terms. The medical experts consulted modern medicine’s position on Transgenderism at the time and concluded that there was no wrongdoing in her case, as sex change operations are considered to be an accepted medical solution to “psychological hermaphroditism.” Thus, the prosecution’s office decided not to move forward with the case and dropped all charges against the doctors involved in Sally’s surgery (Skovguard-Peterson, 1995). In this atmosphere, all eyes were on Egypt’s grand mufti Al-Tantawi to issue a Fatwa declaring whether sex change operations for transgender individuals were permissible. Al-Tantawi received an official request for such a Fatwa from the medical syndicate and issued his infamous Fatwa on 8 June 1988: We find that Usama ibn Sharik tells: “A Bedouin came to the Prophet and said, ‘O Messenger of Allah, can you cure?’ And He said, ‘Yes, for Allah did not send a disease without sending a cure for it, knowing it from His knowledge...’” This [hadith] is told by Ahmad [ibn Hanbal]. There is another version: “Some Bedouins said, ‘O Messenger of Allah, can you cure?’ And He spoke. ‘Yes. Allah’s servants can cure themselves, for Allah never gave a disease without providing a cure or a medicine for it, except for one disease.’ They asked, ‘O Prophet of Allah, what disease is that?’ He said, ‘old age.’” This version is related by Ibn Maja, Abu Da’ud, at-Tirmidhi, and others. (Muntaqi l-Akhbar wa Sharhan Nayl al-Awtar, v. 8, p. 200, and Fath al-Bari bi Sharh Sahih al-Bukhari, by al-Asqalani, v. 9, p. 273, in the chapter on those who imitate women). As for the condemnation of those who by word and deed resemble women, it must be confined to one who does it deliberately [tacahhada dhalika], while one who is like this out of a natural disposition must be ordered to abandon it, even if this can only be achieved step by step. Should he then not comply, but persist [in his manners], the blame shall include him as well – especially if he displays any pleasure in doing so. The person who is by nature a hermaphrodite [mukhannath khalqi] is not to be blamed. This is based on [the consideration that] if he is not capable of abandoning the female, swinging his hips in walking and speaking in a feminine way, after having been subjected to treatment against it, [he is at least willing to accept that] it is still possible for him to abandon it, if only gradually. But if he gives up the cure with no good excuse, then he deserves blame.

At-Tabari took it as an example that the Prophet (Allah bless him and grant him salvation) did not forbid the hermaphrodite from entering the women’s quarters until he heard him giving a

Navigating Sharia with condemned bodies  207 description of the woman in great detail. Then he prohibited it. This proves that no blame is on the hermaphrodite for simply being created that way. That being so, the rulings derived from these and other noble hadiths on treatment grant permission to perform an operation changing a man into a woman, or vice versa, as long as a reliable doctor concludes that there are innate causes in the body itself, indicating a buried [matmura] female nature, or a covered [maghmura] male nature, because the operation will disclose these buried or covered organs, thereby curing a corporal disease which cannot be removed except by this operation. This is also dealt with in a hadith about cutting a vein, which is related through Jabir: “The Messenger of Allah sent a physician to Abu ibn Kacb. The physician cut a vein and burned it.” This hadith is related by Ahmad [ibn Hanbal] and Muslim. What supports this view is what al-Qastallani and al-cAsqalani say in their commentaries on it: “This means that it is incumbent upon the hermaphrodite to remove the symptoms of femininity.” And this is further sustained by the author of Fath al-Bari who says “…having given him treatment in order to abandon it….” This is clear proof that the duty prescribed for the hermaphrodite can take the form of a treatment. The operation is such a treatment, perhaps even the best treatment. This operation cannot be granted at the mere wish to change sex with no clear and convincing corporal motives. In that case, it would fall under that noble hadith which al-Bukhari relates through Anas: “The Messenger of Allah cursed the hermaphrodites among the men and the over-masculine women, saying ‘expel them from their houses’, whereupon the Prophet himself (Allah bless him and grant him salvation) expelled one, and cUmar expelled another one.” This hadith is related by Ahmad and al-Bukhari. To sum up: It is permissible to perform the operation in order to reveal what was hidden of male or female organs. Indeed, it is obligatory to do so on the grounds that it must be considered a treatment when a trustworthy doctor advises it. It is, however, not permissible to do so at the mere wish to change sex from woman to man, or vice versa. Praise be to He who created, who is mighty and guiding. From what has been said, the answer to what was in the question is known. Praise be to Allah the Highest.4

14.3 SHIA JURISPRUDENCE Perhaps there is no shaping modern Shia jurisprudence like Iran’s Ruhollah Khomeini; the man who led the Islamic revolution of Iran and established the foundation of the new Islamic Republic when he served as the country’s first supreme leader (Ostovar, 2016). Khomeini’s Fatwas and religious doctrines have been at the core of modern Shia jurisprudence; those Fatwas include some that he issued regarding Transgenderism (Vafai, 2018). However, just as Khomeini was influential for Shia jurisprudence, one woman was very influential in getting a favorable Fatwa from Khomeini regarding Transgenderism: Maryam Khatoon. Khatoon was a prominent transgender rights activist even before the Islamic revolution; for example, in 1974, she managed to meet the then Queen Farah Pahlavi to gain her support for the transgender cause in Iran (Vafai, 2018). Khatoon also sought to gain support from Khomeini even before he became the supreme leader of Iran. In 1975, she started sending letters to Khomeini, hoping he would issue a Fatwa permitting sex change operations for transgender people. Later, in 1978, she flew to Paris hoping to meet Khomeini, but was unsuccessful (Abbas Kazmi, 2018).

208  Handbook of social justice in the Global South In the aftermath of the Islamic Revolution, Khatoon was arrested for being too feminine and was subjected to ill treatment, including forced hormonal treatment in prison. Fortunately, Khatoon had enough powerful connections to get her out of prison (Abbas Kazmi, 2018). In 1984, she decided she would make one final attempt to meet Khomeini to gain his support for the transgender cause. The story of their encounter is debatable. However, there is one version most agree on. Khatoon approached Khomeini’s residence holding the Qur’an in one hand and a white flag in the other, screaming, “I AM A WOMAN, I AM A WOMAN.” The guards must have been confused, as Khatoon then was bearded and had a manly appearance; when the guards tried to approach her, she revealed her female breasts, leaving everyone in shock. Quickly, the women who were around rushed to cover her with a Chador (Abbas Kazmi, 2018). By then, Khomeini’s son Ahmed had arrived, and the guards brought Khatoon to him. Ahmed was moved by Khatoon’s story and took her to see his father. Khomeini was also moved by Khatoon’s story but had no understanding of GID and sought to consult three of his most trusted doctors. Khomeini asked directly, “What is the difference between hermaphrodites and transsexuals?” The doctors started explaining what they knew about the issue, introduced the concept of GID to Khomeini, and explained that some individuals could not be cured unless they underwent sex change operations (Ihrdc, 2021). Thus, Khomeini decided to issue a Fatwa to Khatoon, allowing her, and subsequently all transgender people in Iran, to undergo sex change operations. In the Name of God. Sex-reassignment surgery is not prohibited in sharīʿa law if reliable medical doctors recommend it. Inshāllāh you will be safe and hopefully the people whom you had mentioned might take care of your situation. (Ihrdc, 2021)

It is important to note that Khomeini had issued an earlier Fatwa in 1964 regarding sex reassignment surgery (SRS) while living in exile in Iraq. However, scholars debate whether this Fatwa was applicable to transgender people or if Khomeini only intended it for intersex people. It seems that sex-reassignment surgery from male-to-female is not forbidden (harām) [in Islām] and vice versa, and it is also not forbidden for a khunthā under-going it to be attached to one of the sexes [female or male]; and does sex-reassignment surgery become obligatory if a woman finds in herself [sensual] desires similar to man’s desires or some evidence of masculinity in herself – or a man finds in himself [sensual] desires similar to the opposite sex or some evidence of feminine-ity in himself? It seems that [in such a case] if a person really [physically] belongs to a [determined] sex, a sex-reassignment surgery is not obligatory (wājib), but the person is still eligible to change her/his sex into the opposite gender.5

14.4

READING THE FATWAS

To understand the logic scholars followed in the aforementioned Fatwas, one must first know the questions they were seeking to answer: (a) Can a person medically change their sex? and (b) For whom should those surgeries and treatments be allowed? (Alipour, 2017). The usage of the term “sex” and not “gender” to describe sex change operations is reflective of the emphasis on the binary Islamic jurisprudence is known for; for the scholars examining the issue of Transgenderism, there is no room for a third gender or expressions outside the binary. Thus, the logic they used to issue those Fatwas focuses on making transgender people fit within the socially and religiously accepted binary (Zaharin & Pallotta-Chiarolli, 2020).

Navigating Sharia with condemned bodies  209 To achieve this, both Sunni and Shia jurisprudence follow the same logic but with two very different outcomes. Both sides imported the pathologizing of Transgenderism concepts which were becoming popular in the West. The Western medical discourse of the 1980s focused on portraying Transgenderism as a mental disorder that could be cured through undergoing hormonal and surgical treatment or conversion therapy (Gonsalves, 2020). Thus, both Sunni and Shia scholars treated Transgenderism as nothing more than a mental illness that could be cured so transgender people could fit within the binary and not disturb the religious binary system (Zainuddin & Mahdy, 2017). Both sides agree that Allah’s creation is perfect and that any attempt to change Allah’s creation is considered a sin unless there is a strong reason to do so. Thus, the Sunni and Shia scholars differentiate between two groups of people and two types of illness: intersex people who were considered to have a “biological illness” and transgender people who were considered to have a “mental illness.” While both agreed that intersex people must undergo such treatment to fit within the social binary, they disagreed when it came to transgender people (Alipour, 2017). Both sides agreed that transgender people are ill and should seek a cure for their illness. For the Shia, surgeries and hormonal treatment presented themselves as a suitable cure. At the same time, for the Sunnis, being transgender is considered a mental illness, and one cannot treat mental illness with surgery but rather with psychiatric treatment. Thus, sex change surgeries were declared to be a sin in the Sunni jurisprudence and Halal in the Shia jurisprudence (Alipour, 2017). To summarize, both sides worked to make transgender people fit within the socially accepted binary through medicalization. While both sides agreed that transgender people are mentally ill and entitled to a cure in Islam, they disagreed heavily on what type of cure should be allowed. The Shia settled on allowing surgical and hormonal treatment as a cure. The Sunnis disagreed, viewing Transgenderism as nothing more than a mental illness that could be cured with psychiatric treatment. While some parties disagree on this interpretation of the Fatwas and work to offer a more progressive interpretation that would acknowledge the gender identity of transgender people as separate from the binary (Zaharin & Pallotta-Chiarolli, 2020), it is important to note that this is the interpretation policymakers and medical professionals have followed around the Islamic world.

14.5

APPLICATION OF THE FATWAS IN NATIONAL POLICY

14.5.1 The Islamic Republic of Iran Before Khomeini’s Fatwa and the Islamic Revolution, sex change operations for transgender people were considered immoral. In 1976, the Medical Association of Iran (MAI) announced that conducting sex change operations on transgender people was unethical and that those operations should only be only made available for intersex people (Vafai, 2018). Even after Khomeini issued his Fatwa, many Islamic jurists disagreed, claiming that it was immoral to let transgender people change their sex. However, the sheer political weight of Khomeini meant that little to no official objection would be made to any of his Fatwas (Terman, 2014).

210  Handbook of social justice in the Global South However, Khomeini’s Fatwa left a lot of confusion about how it should be applied; most notably, Khomeini did not clarify the process to be approved for the operations (Saeidzadeh, 2019). Thus, legal and medical officials sought to fill this gap and to create a system allowing transgender people access to sex change treatments. Khomeini’s Fatwa was not codified into law, and the sex change operations are still only available through the interpretation of the Fatwa as Islamic law and not substantive law. Thus, the application of the Fatwa varies from one region in Iran to another and from one office to another (Saeidzadeh, 2019). In 1987, the Legal Medicine Organization (LMO) submitted an official query to the judiciary legal official to clarify the legality of sex change operations for transgender people (Saeidzadeh, 2016). The judiciary legal office issued a circular stating that from a legal standpoint, sex change operations are not a problem, citing Khomeini’s Fatwa as the basis for the legalization of such operations in Sharia (Saeidzadeh, 2016). After this, LMO established a medical bureaucratic process that every transgender person must undergo to receive permission to undergo sex change treatments (Vafai, 2018). In Tehran, the nation’s capital, every transgender individual must receive psychotherapy consultations for four to six months with the Tehran Psychiatric Institute (TPI) (Vafai, 2018). If the applicant is diagnosed with GID, their case moves forward to a commission comprised of a lead psychiatrist, a secondary psychiatrist, and a supervising psychologist (Vafai, 2018). If the commission approves the applicant’s GID diagnosis, it moves their file to the LMO. The LMO must approve the GID diagnosis before issuing a “sex change” permit to the applicant (Vafai, 2018). With this permit, the applicant can access basic, state-funded services, such as health insurance, financial assistance for housing and sex change surgery, hormonal treatment, and exemption from conscription. The “sex change” permit also protects transgender people from Iran’s infamous moral police; without it, the person can be viewed as a crossdresser or homosexual, both of which are serious charges in Islamic law (Terman, 2014). Once the applicant undergoes all surgical and hormonal treatment, they can apply to receive LGR on all their official documents from a judge (Terman, 2014). Applicants reported the process as more an interrogation than anything else, as the primary concern of doctors during the psychotherapy process is two things: first, that the applicant is not a homosexual and truly is transgender, and second, that the person can adapt to their newly obtained sex according to the socio-religious definition of that sex’s roles and duties (Terman, 2014). The doctors examine whether the male-to-female applicants dress like a normative Iranian woman and vice versa for the female-to-male applicants. They observe whether the applicants wear masculine or feminine watches, whether or not their legs are shaved, and can even ask questions such as, “Do you squeeze a toothpaste tube from the middle or the bottom up?” (Terman, 2014). Doctors asking these questions perceive sex as synonymous with gender, whereas gender stereotypes are not stereotypes but rather concrete evidence of a person’s masculinity or femininity; the examiners believe that this line of examination line can help them root out the “fake” transgender people from the real (Terman, 2014). This official process does not mean that the transgender identity is recognized in Iran; quite the opposite. Sex change operations are only allowed as a medical treatment for “transsexuality,” which is recognized only as a medical condition in medical policy and not law (Franc, 2017). The Iranian state expects that transgender people won’t exist as independent entities but will eventually conform to the socio-religious accepted binary. Thus, Iranian laws and policies do not offer any recognition or protection for transgender people, pre- or post-operatively (Franc, 2017).

Navigating Sharia with condemned bodies  211 For example, the Civic Registration Law amendment in 1985 and the Family Law Bill amendment in 2011 include clauses referring to “persons who underwent sex change operations” but do not refer to them as transgender people (Saeidzadeh, 2016). Moreover, in 2007, the Ministry of Health sought to enforce the medicalization of transgender people by requesting that they receive an exemption from conscription for a “glandular disorder” and not a “psychological problem.” Subsequently, the Public Military Law was amended in 2011 to reflect this (Saeidzadeh, 2016). Some transgender activists have been campaigning for recognition of the transgender identity, arguing that Khomeini’s Fatwa did not necessarily obligate transgender people to undergo sex change operations but rather only permitted it for those who may wish to receive it (Saeidzadeh, 2016). Transgender activists argue that “transsexual” status in the LMO policy should be granted to every person, even those who may not undergo sex change treatment; this would allow transgender people to co-exist as an identity outside the heteronormative binary (Saeidzadeh, 2016). However, this seems nearly impossible to conceptualize in Iran’s current socio-political atmosphere; the country’s Islamic laws are grounded in the idea of only two binary genders existing, each having its duties and roles in society, and each segregated from the other. Creating a transgender identity as an in-between identity is considered a danger to the very foundation of the Islamic republic (Terman, 2014). Socially, the legalization of the surgery without any legal protection or recognition of the transgender identity has left transgender people vulnerable to discrimination, violence, and sexual and familial abuse (Terman, 2014). Transgender people are often at risk of losing their jobs and livelihoods upon coming out. For example, transgender women are often forced into survival sex work or what is known as “sigheh,” a religiously sanctioned short-term marriage (Terman, 2014). Obtaining a certificate from LMO may shield transgender people from the wrath of the morality police, but only from arrest and prosecution; the certificate does not protect them from daily harassment at the hands of the morality police for being out of the sanctioned binary (Vafai, 2018). The dominant socio-cultural belief that transgender people can never be a “proper man or woman” can be reflected in how families of transgender people treat their children (Saeidzadeh, 2019). Forced marriages, conversion therapy, or being sent to conscription are all ways to “correct” their child. If all this fails, abandoning the child seems like the appropriate solution for some to take (Saeidzadeh, 2019). The socio-cultural dominance also places transgender men in a higher position than transgender women. For some, it makes sense to want to be a man, as men under Sharia are entitled to more freedoms and rights in inheritance, marriage, and travel. Meanwhile, wanting to be a woman is not understood, as the current Sharia framework discriminates heavily against women generally. Thus, why would anyone want to be a woman? (Franc, 2017) In this atmosphere, it should not come as a surprise that most transgender people in Iran are advised not to disclose their identity but rather to be cispassing to fit within the heteronormative society of Iran. Some transgender people may choose to move away from their old life post-operation, assume their newly obtained gender roles, and pretend that they are cis and not transgender as a mechanism to survive the social stigma (Terman, 2014).

212  Handbook of social justice in the Global South 14.5.2 The Arab Republic of Egypt Following Tantawi’s Fatwa, two terms have been used to describe what is allowed and what is not allowed under Sharia: “tṣḥīḥ al-ǧns,” or sex correction, was used to describe medical intervention allowed under Sharia for intersex individuals, while “tghyer al-ǧns” was used to describe the medical interventions banned under Sharia for transgender people (Noralla, 2024). Post Sally’s case, Al-Azhar lobbied to translate Tantawi’s Fatwa into policy or law, especially after the doctors involved in Sally’s case were acquitted of any wrongdoing and the disciplinary actions against them were revoked (Noralla, 2024). Subsequently, those two terms made their first appearance in official policy in 2003, when the medical syndicate amended its code of ethics to ban sex change and only allow sex correction. Doctors are strictly prohibited from performing sex change operations. Sex correction is only permissible after receiving approval from the review committee in the Syndicate. Surgeries will only be conducted after two years of psychiatric evaluation and hormonal treatment and after conducting a full examination of hormones and the chromosomal map of the applicant (Noralla, 2023).

The same amendment stipulated the creation of a review committee within the medical syndicate to receive applications from those who wish to undergo sex reassignment surgery. This review committee would consist of two psychiatrists, a genetics expert, an andrologist, an endocrinologist, a medical head of the committee, and a representative from Al-Azhar (Noralla, 2022c). The committee was dysfunctional from the beginning, as all its members were volunteers with no incentive to meet, and they had no legal authority to enforce their decisions (Noralla, 2021a). Moreover, doctors believed that GID should be considered a reason to permit people to undergo surgeries, something Al-Azhar’s representative strictly refused, as it conflicted with their interpretation of Tantawi’s Fatwa (Dabash, 2023). In 2014, the committee stopped working after Al-Azhar’s representative withdrew an objection to referring GID applicants to surgeries. In 2017, an agreement was reached that granted Al-Azhar’s representative veto powers on all the cases referred to surgery if, in their opinion, they were not compatible with Sharia (Noralla, 2022c). In 2020, Dr. Osama Abd Al-Hay stated in an interview with news outlet Associated Press that all cases approved by the committee were for people with “physical needs” and not “GID” (Noralla, 2023) which indicates that Al-Azhar’s lobbying on the medical syndicate has worked, excluding transgender people from this process. Doctors who may wish to provide gender-affirming healthcare to transgender people outside this official process risk not only disciplinary actions by the Syndicate but also criminal prosecution (‫يواشنملا دمحأ دمحم‬, 2022). There have been some incidents of doctors being prosecuted for “causing percent disability” to their patients under Article 244 of the Penal Code (‫يواشنملا دمحأ دمحم‬, 2022). In 2010, a hospital in upper Egypt was shut down, and several doctors were arrested for performing sex change operations on a transgender patient (Noralla, 2021a). Thus, transgender people in Egypt are left with little-to-no option regarding accessing gender-affirming healthcare; an underground and unlicensed medical market emerged to close this gap (Noralla, 2021a). However, this market is known to be expensive, dangerous, and ill-equipped. Sex change surgeries can cost anywhere from 7,000 EGP (445 USD) to 25,000 EGP (1,560 USD) in a country where 72.60 percent of people earn less than 5.50 USD per day. In 2021, a 26-year-old transgender man bled to death after he was prematurely

Navigating Sharia with condemned bodies  213 discharged after suffering from a botched gender-affirming surgery in an underground clinic (Noralla, 2021a). There are no laws regulating LGR; even those who are privileged enough to medically change their sex may not be able to reflect that change on their official papers. Due to the legislative vacuum, the process is largely arbitrary (Noralla, 2022a). The process starts with submitting an application to the civil registry authority requesting a change of papers after undergoing all surgical and hormonal interventions (Elfatah, 2022). If the application is refused, the only option is to file a judicial claim with the administrative courts. In 2016, Cairo’s administrative court refused to grant LGR to a trans man citing Sharia as the reason (Dabash, 2023). The court forced the plaintiff to undergo a medical examination, which concluded that he is transgender and not intersex; thus, it is in violation of the rules of Sharia. The court stated that Personal freedom is protected in the Constitution and national law; however, it is not absolute and is governed by not only Sharia but also accepted social standards. The Court calls on the legislative assembly to perform its duties and to issue a law regulating those kinds of surgeries. Those surgeries should be allowed only when it is compatible with Sharia and the law should be amended to reflect that.6

The only other mention of Transgenderism in official policy is in the medical rules for exemption from conscription, in which transgender people are exempted due to having “severe personality disorder” (Noralla, 2022c), while in de facto policy, transgender people are targeted for criminal prosecution, as Egyptian authorities often use morality-based laws to prosecute members of the LGBTQ+ community (Noralla, 2022b). Between 2013 and 2017, no fewer than 232 people were arrested because of their perceived sexual orientation or gender identity (Hamid, 2017). Transgender people also suffer from social stigma and discrimination when trying to enjoy their daily life. In 2021, Ahmed Al-Tayeb, the Grand Imam of Al-Azhar, issued a statement attacking transgender people two days after the Transgender Day of Remembrance: Allah created humans and fashioned them in the best possible form, and decreed that the universe run as per His judgement and will. Today we are seeing an obsession with unwarranted sex change, which not only goes against basic human nature but is unanimously rejected by all divine religions. These are despicable attempts to alter Allah’s creations and give in to desires under the false pretense of freedom (Noralla, 2021b).

14.6

FINAL REMARKS

The chapter outlines the local contexts where Sharia is the primary source of policy and law governing the livelihood of transgender people. Understanding this context is critical in enacting any social justice activism for transgender people in the future. Those who wish to engage on the issue should first familiarize themselves with this context and refrain from enacting overly Western strategies, as what works in the West cannot work in this context. The chapter can serve as a first step in understanding transgender rights in Islam from a locally contextualized perspective. It is also essential to investigate what the local transgender population perceives as a good advocacy strategy and not to enforce Western standards on them.

214  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Sharia’s interpretation is dynamic and adaptable, shifting over time to encompass human advancements on different issues. For example, Egypt’s Al-Azhar has shifted its stance on topics such as child marriage and female genital mutilation, citing society’s development and the change of time (Moustafa, 2000). Thus, as at 2023, Khomeini and Tantawi’s Fatwas are 39 and 35 years old, respectively, so a revision is needed to update what can be considered a very ancient religious doctrine on Transgenderism. During those years, the World Health Organization declassified Transgenderism as a mental disorder, and several advancements were made by international human rights organizations to protect the rights of transgender people and to ensure their access to gender-affirming health and legal gender recognition (Kara, 2017). New Fatwas are needed to reflect those advancements. Just like the old Fatwas followed the common pathologizing concept of the 1980s, the new Fatwas should follow the de-pathologizing concept of the 2020s. Reforming the Islamic discourse is the only way to ensure socio-political reform in Muslim countries that will positively impact transgender rights. While the current policies aimed at erasing transgender people have failed, they were successful at abusing the human rights of transgender people in the name of Allah. Despite this, in both countries, a robust transgender community still thrives (Ghoshal, 2018). As transgender people were responsible for the issuing of outdated Fatwas before, they will undoubtedly be responsible for any new or reformed Fatwas.

NOTES 1. Al-Azhar, founded in 972 A.D., is considered to be one of the oldest Islamic schools of Fiqh and is currently Egypt’s highest Islamic authority. 2. Fatwa is a legal opinion given by an Islamic jurist (Imam) through the interpretation of different sources of Sharia, most notably the Qur’an and Hadith. 3. Gad al-Haq Ali Gad al-Haq was the Grand Imam of Al-Azhar from 1982 to 1996. 4. Translated by Jakob Skovgaard-Petersen (1995). http://hdl​.handle​.net​/2027​/spo​.4750978​ .0002​.302. Original version in Arabic available at: ‫ لجسلا ءاتفإلا راد‬118 ‫ ص‬290-292 5. “Taḥrīr al-Wasīla” (1970, Vol. 2, p. 626), translation M. Alipour (2017). 6. Judgment Number 80419/68 JY. The Egyptian Administrative Court, January 24, 2016. Translated by the author.

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Navigating Sharia with condemned bodies  215 Daniels, T. P. (2017). Sharia dynamics: Islamic law and sociopolitical processes. Springer. Davies, S. G. (2019). Islam, Sexuality, and Gender Identity. In W. R. Thompson (Ed.), Oxford Research Encyclopedias. Oxford University Press. https://doi​.org​/10​.1093​/acrefore​/9780190228637​.013​.1255 Elfatah, M. A. (2022, December 16). ‫ ًايسنج نيرباعلل ةيتوبثلا قاروأ رييغت تاءارجإ‬Colorful World. https://www​.colorfulworld​.info​/2022​/12​/01​/procedures​-of​-changing​-identification​-papers​-for​ -transgender​-people/ Franc, J. (2017). Transgender issue in contemporary Iran: A theological reflection. Family Forum, 7, 203–224. Ghoshal, N. (2018). Audacity in adversity: LGBT activism in the Middle East and North Africa. Human Rights Watch. https://www​.hrw​.org​/report​/2018​/04​/16​/audacity​-adversity​/ lgbt​-activism​-middle​-east​ -and​-north​-africa Gonsalves, T. (2020). Gender identity, the sexed body, and the medical making of transgender. Gender & Society, 34(6), 1005–1033. Hamid, D. A. (2017). The trap: Punishing sexual difference in Egypt. Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights. Ihrdc. (2021, April 14). Denied identity: Human rights abuses against Iran’s LGBT community. Iran Human Rights Documentation Center. https://iranhrdc​.org​/denied​-identity​-human​-rights​-abuses​ -against​-irans​-lgbt​-community/ Kara, S. (2017). Gender is not an illness: How pathologizing trans people violates international human rights law. New York: GATE. https://gate​.ngo​/ knowledge​-portal​/publication​/gender​-is​-not​-an​-illness Matin, U., Jahar, A., & Asmawi, A. (2021). The care ethic of Ṭanṭawī’s Fatwā (legal opinion) on Sally Muḥammad ʿAbdullah’s sex change (male to female) in Egypt. Proceedings of the 3rd International Colloquium on Interdisciplinary Islamic Studies, ICIIS 2020, October 20–21, 2020, Jakarta, Indonesia. Mousavi Khomeini, S. R. (1970). Tahrir al-Wasila (Vol. 2). Qom: Dar Al-Alam Press Institute. Moustafa, T. (2000). Conflict and cooperation between the state and religious institutions in contemporary Egypt. International Journal of Middle East Studies, 32(1), 3–22. Noralla, N. (2021a, November 10). A discriminatory system killed a transgender man in Egypt. OpenGlobalRights. Noralla, N. (2021b). Sunni Islamic jurisprudence, sex reassignment surgery and transgender rights. Open Democracy. Noralla, N. (2021c). Sunni Islamic jurisprudence, sex reassignment surgery and transgender rights. Open Democracy. Noralla, N. (2022a). Confused judiciary & transgender rights: Inside the MENA region’s case law on legal gender recognition. Manara Magazine. https://Manaramagazine.Org/2022/03/ConfusedJudiciary-Transgender-Rights-inside-the-Mena-Regions-Case-Law-on-Legal-Gender-Recognition/ Noralla, N. (2022b). Politics, society and public morals: How does a “debauchery” charge service all? The Tahrir Institute for Middle East Policy. https://Timep.Org/2022/06/21/ Politics-Society-and-Public-Morals-How-Does-a-Debauchery-Charge-Service-All/ Noralla, N. (2022c). Queer not in the Army: A study and guide on conscription’s exemptions based on LGBTQ+ related reasons in Egypt. Cairo 52. https://Cairo52.Com/2022/08/16/ Queer-Not-in-the-Army/ Noralla, N. (2022d). The Middle East has an anti-transgender bills problem. The New Arab. https:// www.Newarab.Com/Features/Middle-East-Has-Anti-Transgender-Bills-Problem Noralla, N. (2022e). Tough territory for transgender people in the Middle East and North Africa. Human Rights Watch, 8. https://www​.hrw​.org​/news​/2022​/04​/08​/tough​-territory​-transgender​-people​ -middle​-east​-and​-north​-africa Noralla, N. (2023). Gender trouble in the land of the Nile: Transgender identities, the judiciary and Islam in Egypt. Yearbook of Islamic and Middle Eastern Law Online, 1(aop), 1–37. Noralla, N. (2024). Access denied: A qualitative study on transgender health policy in Egypt. Social Science & Medicine, 348, 116867. Ostovar, A. (2016). Vanguard of the Imam: Religion, politics, and Iran’s revolutionary guards. Oxford University Press. Rashid, A., & Rashid, U. (2022). Constitutional and legal guarantees for transgender in Pakistan: Reforms and failures in law. In Örtenblad, A., Marling, R., & Vasiljevic, S. (Eds.) Towards gender

216  Handbook of social justice in the Global South equality in law: An analysis of state failures from a global perspective (pp. 79–110). Springer International Publishing. Saeidzadeh, Z. (2016). Transsexuality in contemporary Iran: Legal and social misrecognition. Feminist Legal Studies, 24(3), 249–272. Saeidzadeh, Z. (2019). Understanding socio-legal complexities of sex change in postrevolutionary Iran. Transgender Studies Quarterly, 6(1), 80–102. Skovguard-Peterson, J. (1995). Sex change in Cairo: Gender and Islamic law. Journal of the International Institute, 2(3). https://quod​.lib​.umich​.edu​/j​/jii​/4750978​.0002​.302/-​-sex​-change​-in​-cairo​-gender​-and​ -islamic​-law​?rgn​=main​;view​=fulltext Sullivan, D. (2012, February 14). Al-Azhar Huwwa al-Hall? The most influential Sunni institution in the Arab world emerges as a voice for moderate Islam. Atlantic Council. https://www​.atlanticcouncil​ .org​/ blogs​/menasource​/alazhar​-huwwa​-alhall​-the​-most​-influential​-sunni​-institution​-in​-the​-arab​ -world​-emerges​-as​-a​-voice​-for​-moderate​-islam/ Terman, R. (2014). Trans [ition] in Iran. World Policy Journal, 31(1), 28–38. Vafai, S. (2018). Iran: The formation of trans identity and possible paths toward the acceptance of greater gender deviance. Berkeley Journal of Middle Eastern & Islamic Law, 9, 1. Veneuse, M. J. (2010). The body of the condemned, Sally... Paths to queering anarca-Islam. Anarchist Developments in Cultural Studies, 1, 217–239. Zaharin, A. A. M., & Pallotta-Chiarolli, M. (2020). Countering Islamic conservatism on being transgender: Clarifying Tantawi’s and Khomeini’s Fatwas from the progressive Muslim standpoint. International Journal of Transgender Health, 21(3), 235–241. Zainuddin, A. A., & Mahdy, Z. A. (2017). The Islamic perspectives of gender-related issues in the management of patients with disorders of sex development. Archives of Sexual Behavior, 46, 353–360. ‫يواشنملا دمحأ دمحم‬. (2022). ‫يسنجلا لوحتلا تايلمع نع ةئشانلا ةيئانجلا ةيلوئسملا‬, 30(2). The translation is: Criminal Liability of Sex Reassignment Surgery and the name of the author is Mohamed Ahmed Al-Menshawy, pp. 1–28.

15. Ageing, disability, and social justice in Nigeria Ellis Onyedikachi George andPrince Chiagozie Ekoh

15.1 INTRODUCTION Discourses centring on nuanced social justice work and issues are missing in the Nigerian public space, which can be for various reasons, some of which include: the underdeveloped – or rather, still-developing – nature of critical disciplines that analyse issues of power, inclusion, and inequality, among others (George & Ekoh, 2020; Onalu & Okoye, 2021); minimal/suppressed presence and visibility of activists and radical movements (DeNardis & Hackl, 2016; Nwabunnia, 2021; Onanuga, 2021), and lack of representation of people with lived experiences of oppression, discrimination, and exclusion in policymaking or public discourses of transformation (Eneh & Nkamnebe, 2011; Ogundola, 2013; Owolabi, 2022; World Bank, 2020). Issues of gender equality stand slightly as an exception to this rule, with discourses and efforts to achieve gender justice focused on female genital mutilation, eradication of early (child) marriage, female empowerment, and intimate partner violence, among others. Yet, these issues are not typically framed as social justice issues, and critical explorations of power, inequality, and oppressive systems are sometimes missing in the discourses. While “social justice” as a term of analysis is largely absent in academic and public policy discourses, it appears more visible in Nigerian online spaces, such as Facebook, X (formerly Twitter), and Nairaland, where the term is invoked and weaponised to dismiss the alleged Western-influenced “gay/ trans agenda”, “identity politics”, or “extreme leftism” of Nigerian feminists, gay/trans rights activists, neurodiverse activists, and anti-capitalists vocal about their lived experiences and condemnation of oppressive societal norms and structures that promote inequality in Nigeria (see Nigerian X (formerly Twitter) space). There are nuances to some of these discourses, and some activists’ views indeed echo Western ideals and solutions that do not consider values and structural issues in Nigeria when proposing changes and improvements. However, these views can be critically engaged with and criticised without disparaging social justice or labelling everyone with an unnuanced critique of socioeconomic systems. Although “social justice” may be largely absent in the vocabulary of a significant part of the Nigerian population, and dismissed as something Western and negative by another significant part, social justice is deeply rooted in the traditional values of many Nigerian tribes and communities. As is the case in much of Africa, typified by the Ubuntu worldview of the Bantu people of Southern Africa, wherein communality and relationality are valued (Chilisa, 2020; Mugumbate & Nyanguru, 2013; Ngubane-Mokiwa, 2018), and the existence, humanity, and condition of everyone in the community are honoured and prioritised, many traditional values in Nigerian communities are rooted in the collective humanity and well-being of all in the community. For example, proverbs among the Igbo, such as oha bu eze (the community is king), otu onye anaghị emeri ọha (one person cannot win/conquer the society/public), and onye aghala nwanne ya (no one should abandon their family or community), and proverbs among the Yoruba such as Omodé gbón, Àgbà gbón, L’afi dá Ilé-ifè (the wisdom of the youth, 217

218  Handbook of social justice in the Global South the wisdom of the elder, is the core of the creation of Ilé-ifè, a town central to the Yoruba worldview) and Agbajo owo la fin so’ya, Ajeji owo kan o gberu dori (To beat a chest, you need the entirety of the hand; to lift a load, you need more than a finger) convey the communality, interdependence, and relationality embedded in many traditional values and belief systems. While some aspects of these may have been lost due to processes of colonialism, capitalism, and globalisation, the existence of proverbs like these and accounts of how pre-colonial traditional Nigerian communities were structured – and how some communities are still structured in contemporary times – show that issues at the heart of social justice, such as equity and equality, inclusion, non-discrimination, and acceptance, are largely embedded in the different traditional value systems (Columbus, 2014; Oladipo, 2007; Onazi, 2020). However, although traditional pre-colonial values of different Nigerian tribes were rooted in principles of social justice, different groups still experienced discrimination, stigmatisation, and exclusion. For example, in some communities Indigenous to the Igbo people (the authors’ ethnic group), women with fertility issues were treated poorly, people were sacrificed to appease deities, caste systems were in place to deny groups not considered “free-born” access to resources and representation in communal events, and twins were considered an abomination to the world (Achebe, 2006; Achufusi, 1996; Amadi & Obomanu, 2016; Offiong & Uduigwomen, 2021). Today, the face of oppression has changed regarding certain groups, while it remains the same regarding others. Older people, who, for instance, used to occupy a highly valuable position in society due to beliefs that they were custodians of clans’ traditions and histories (Ndamba-Bandzouzi, 2014), and soon-to-be ancestors, now face different forms of abuse, discrimination, neglect, and exclusion, some of which are brought on by poverty, the absence of a filial and state support system, suspicion of witchcraft, and other superstitious beliefs (Akpan & Umobong, 2013; Cadmus & Owoaje, 2012; Ebimgbo et al., 2019; Ekoh et al., 2022; Mudiare, 2013). Disabled older people, especially those with cognitive impairments such as dementia, are particularly vulnerable to these forms of abuse and violence because the impact of dementia on their memory, communication abilities, and behaviour not only makes them vulnerable to suspicion of witchcraft and abandonment but also makes them unable to defend themselves against external attacks (see Brooke & Ojo, 2020; Ndamba-Bandzouzi, 2014). In this chapter, we will discuss social justice in Nigeria, focussing on the intersection between ageing and disability. We draw particularly on the first author’s doctoral fieldwork on dementia and everyday citizenship in a community in Southwestern Nigeria to discuss social justice issues visible at the intersection of ageing and disability in Nigeria and how they are addressed at a familial and communal level. However, before we proceed with this discussion, we will draw on existing literature to provide an overview of ageing in Nigeria, presenting trends, challenges, and possibilities. Then, we will move the focus to ageing and disability within the context of social justice and conclude after a discussion on disability justice.

15.2 AGEING IN NIGERIA: TRENDS, CHALLENGES, AND POSSIBILITIES With improvements in modern medicine and an increase in the standard of living, among other factors, the population of older people worldwide has been steadily increasing. Despite the disproportionate negative impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on older people, many

Ageing, disability, and social justice in Nigeria  219 countries are experiencing a steadily ageing population, which is usually discussed within the context of the burdens that an ageing population places on states’ economic and social welfare systems (Visco, 2001). This is more so in many Global North countries and less so in countries in the Global South, particularly in Africa and Asia, where the general population is relatively young. Africa and Nigeria still have one of the lowest proportions of older adults in their populations. However, the population of older adults on the continent is projected to triple from 74.4 million to 235.1 million and surpass that of the developed world by 2050 (He et al., 2020). In 2019, the United Nations Population Division estimated that Nigeria had 9.1 million older adults aged 65 years and over, projecting that their number will increase to 26 million by 2050. The gradual and steady decline in the value and practice of filial care, which has been the main source of care and support for older Nigerians for centuries, has made older adults in Nigeria even more vulnerable (Ene et al., 2022). Older adults who were once highly valued in Nigerian culture (Ekoh, Ejimkaraonye, et al., 2021a; Okoye, 2012) now face severe cases of abuse and exclusion. They suffer extreme poverty, ageism, discrimination and oppression, accusations of witchcraft, social isolation and loneliness, chronic diseases, disabilities, malnutrition, COVID-19, and its associated health, economic, and psychosocial implications. A significant percentage of the Nigerian population (41 per cent) currently lives below the poverty line (National Bureau of Statistics, NBS, 2019), including older people, many of whom can no longer work and have no access to regular income or welfare provisions. It is difficult for the state to meet the social, health, environmental, and daily needs of older people in Nigeria because of the neoliberal market system’s effects on inequality, the existence of a larger informal sector, and the limitations on workers’ ability to save for pensions to rely on when they age (Ajomale, 2007). Many older people in the country, including displaced and disabled people, are thus left without pensions or retirement savings to care for for c themselves in their old age, and those who receive pensions receive such low amounts that they can barely be used to meet most of their needs. In Nigeria, it is a common belief that children and grandchildren are the retirement plans for older people. . However, even this is starting to change, and older people are beginning to find themselves with no retirement savings, no jobs to fall back on, and no family members to care and provide for them. What this means, as a common observation of everyday life in Nigeria, is that many older people are left in precarious situations where they have to depend on the benevolence of community members or resort to begging for food and other material needs. The growing number of older adults and the associated challenges mentioned above have led to a continuous call by civic society organisations and ageing scholars for a national policy on ageing, given that the only existing policy was the limited pension scheme (Daramola et al., 2018). In response to this, in 2021, the Nigerian government ratified the National Policy on Ageing for Older Persons in Nigeria (Federal Ministry of Information and Culture, 2021). This policy guarantees the independence, security, care, participation, self-fulfilment, and dignity of older adults in Nigeria. This policy has been cheered as a significant milestone by local and international stakeholders in the ageing space. However, Nigeria has a long history of poor implementation of policies; hence, strict measures must be taken to implement this new policy. Although it lacks extensive interventions in issues like palliative care, alternative care options, and social security for all older adults, proper implementation of this policy can be a first step in reducing old-age poverty, social and economic inequality, social structures, and cultural beliefs that disproportionately affect the well-being of older adults, and improving the general quality of life and successful ageing of Nigerians.

220  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Judging from the precedence of the implementation progress of past policies, there is no saying how long it will take for measures and structures addressing the particular challenges faced by older people in Nigeria to become a reality. Since the country’s inequality is still growing, older people are still disproportionately affected by poverty and inequality, which leads to social exclusion and other forms of social injustice (Ene et al., 2022). We may need to think about other ways to protect and mobilise people who do not depend on the slow progress of a failing state or processes started by the elite class who are not connected to the everyday lives of the average person. Community efforts can be mobilised to respond to both the failings of the state in responding to the needs of older people and the changes in the culture of intergenerational and filial care that continue to lead to increased loneliness, isolation, and a lack of social support for older people (Ebimgbo et al., 2019; Ekoh et al., 2020; Ekoh, George, et al., 2021b; Ekoh et al., 2022).

15.3 NAVIGATING LIFE WITH A DISABLED AND AGEING BODY IN NIGERIA Disabled people currently account for 15 per cent of the world’s population, or about 1 billion people (United Nations, Department for Economic and Social Affairs, UN DESA, 2015). About a quarter of that population, i.e., over 250 million people, are older persons living with moderate to severe forms of disability (UN DESA, 2015). This means that, of the total population of older persons aged 60 and above, over 46 per cent are disabled. Older people have a higher risk of disability compared to other populations, and as life expectancy increases, the world is predicted to have an increasing number of people living with different forms of disabilities (UN DESA, 2015, 2022). In 2018, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported that, of the 195 million people living in Nigeria at the time, over 29 million were disabled (World Bank, 2020). In 2023, Nigeria’s population is projected at an estimated 221 million people (UN DESA, 2022; World Population Review, 2023), which implies an increase in the number of older people currently living with disabilities in Nigeria. Although there are currently no estimates of the older disabled population in Nigeria, as of 2020, about 9.4 million people living in Nigeria were reported to be aged 60 years and above (Statista, 2023). There have been some scholarly efforts to investigate the extent to which disability and its interaction with societal realities impact the everyday lives of older disabled people in Nigeria (Ani & Isiugo-Abanihe, 2022; Lang & Upah, 2008; National Population Census, NPC, 2006). However, there has been little done to explore the lived experiences of older people living with non-physical disabilities such as dementia, even though dementia currently stands as one of the leading causes of disability among older people worldwide (World Health Organization, 2022). While we have no reported estimates of the population of people with dementia in Nigeria, over 55 million people worldwide currently live with dementia, with nearly 10 million cases arising each year, and over 60 per cent of this population lives in lowand middle-income countries (LMICs), most of which lie in the Global South (10/66 Dementia Research Group, 2015; WHO, 2022). Despite the fact that the vast majority of people with dementia live in the Global South, the region accounts for only a minority of the research and scholarship on dementia (10/66 Dementia Research Group, 2015). Much of the theorising, conceptualisation, and reported experiences of dementia are based on Western knowledge and experiences. However, what it means to be disabled with an ageing body in a country in the

Ageing, disability, and social justice in Nigeria  221 South, such as Nigeria, looks different from what it means in a country in the North, such as Norway or the United Kingdom. Poverty, spirituality, legal limitations, weak healthcare and social welfare systems, norms and values, and other such factors influence how disability is experienced, both positively and negatively, as an older person in Nigeria. In Nigeria, as in many other African countries, respect for older people is a significant cultural phenomenon. Older people on the continent traditionally occupy a sacred space where they are treated with reverence and considered custodians of clans’ traditions and history (Ndamba-Bandzouzi et al., 2014). For instance, among the Igbo people, a traditional belief is that people become ancestors when they age and die (see Nwoye, 2011), and thus, people treat many older people as they would treat ancestral spirits – with regard and respect. However, this reverence for older people, in some cases, does not extend to those with disabilities, especially intellectual and cognitive disabilities. Aspects of traditional African beliefs that credit disabilities and illnesses in general to the workings of evil spirits, coupled with the spread of charismatic Christian traditions that brandish the old, frail, and vulnerable as “witches” in need of deliverance, place older people with disabilities, such as dementia, in a different (subjugated) position from many other older adults (Etieyibo & Omiegbe, 2016; Ndamba-Bandzouzi et al., 2014; Nwakasi et al., 2019; Nwakasi et al., 2021; Ogunniyi et al., 2005). Older people with neurological impairments, such as dementia, in Nigerian communities where these beliefs are prevalent, thus face stigmatisation, abuse, neglect, and a lack of proper care. We will discuss these challenges further in the next section, highlighting some other social justice issues that are visible at the intersection of ageing and disability in Nigeria.

15.4 SOCIAL JUSTICE ISSUES Both disabled people and older people in Nigeria face numerous challenges in different aspects of society – economically, socially, academically, physically, and so on. They are vulnerable to discrimination, violence, abuse, a lack of social care provisions, inaccessible spaces and environments, limited healthcare provisions, stigmatisation, and more. However, when ageing intersects with disability, older disabled people find themselves in a space of heightened vulnerability and risk. The intersection of ageing and disability has largely been underexplored and inadequately addressed in research, policies, intervention programmes, and advocacy efforts in Nigeria. Disability activism and discourse in disability research in Nigeria focus predominantly on the experiences of younger disabled people. Far too often, the perspectives and experiences of older disabled people are absent from these discourses, and their experiences, brought on by the intersection of ageing, disability, and, in most cases, poverty, are not sufficiently explored and highlighted. Inclusion, accessibility, and access to needed resources and care, which call for a reimagining of systems, values, and norms, are important for the actualisation of both disability justice and ageing justice in Nigeria. Older people with disabilities, such as dementia, live in Nigerian communities where beliefs and attitudes suspicious and dismissive of disability are prevalent, and thus face stigmatisation, abuse, neglect, and a lack of proper care. In some communities, as is the case in many African communities, dementia is seen as witchcraft, subjecting older people with dementia – usually older women – to dehumanising conditions, including abuse such as exorcisms/ deliverance and physical violence, neglect, and isolation/exclusion from communal activities (Brooke & Ojo, 2020; Hindley et al., 2017; Charnel Kehoua et al., 2015; Khonje et al.,

222  Handbook of social justice in the Global South 2015; Mkhonto & Hanssen, 2018; Mushi et al., 2014). From the literature, it is clear that there is a significant lack of awareness of what causes dementia or why someone with dementia would behave the way they do, with the conception of dementia not only limited to witchcraft but also madness, demonic attacks, and consequences of past actions (Khonje et al., 2015; Nwakasi et al., 2019). Three participants from the first author’s fieldwork had this to say about dementia and people with dementia: People usually label people that have that condition as witches because of the way that they behave (Baba Ade). Some people see it as witchcraft… It is just a few persons that see it as such occasionally (Funmi). Yes, you will definitely find a marker… something to show you that this person caused it. Some people bring the situation upon themselves by the words of their mouth…or they inherited it… that is my belief… I know what I am telling you. Some people use malevolent means to make older persons like that (Baba Agba).

During the fieldwork, while discussing with some academics and intellectuals on the nature of dementia perception and care in Nigeria, many referenced the status quo in countries in the Global North to argue that this abysmal condition in many communities is due to limited care facilities and legislative provisions in Nigeria to cater to the needs and protect the rights of older people with dementia. In other words, “if we follow the example of the West and set up care institutions and dementia care legislations, everything will change”. While it is important to address institutional frameworks in changing dementia perception and care, it may not be effective to simply turn to solutions emanating from the Global North. We have seen from the precedence of past legislation, such as the Child’s Rights Act of 2003, which has failed to stop child abuse and child marriage, and the presence of care institutions in the country, such as mental health facilities, that changing attitudes towards oppressed or abused people requires more than a legal affirmation (see Onazi, 2020) or the establishment of care institutions. Legislations (and legislators) do not always take into consideration limitations to their practical implementation, such as lack of resources, problems of policing, such as police violence and abuse, and the involvement of those with the lived experience of abuse and oppression, as well as other members of the community who can help facilitate real and sustainable change (see Spade, 2020). In addition, this lack of awareness about the nature and symptoms of dementia and the resulting challenges that come with it is also present in existing medical and mental health facilities. Take, for example, the heartbreaking case of a Nigerian man who shared a video on Instagram early in 2023 decrying the poor treatment of his mother at a psychiatric hospital in Lagos, Nigeria’s largest and most developed city, and drawing the attention and empathy of thousands of Nigerians. In the video, which has since been widely shared and has attracted more than 80,000 likes and over 5,000 comments, the young man, while crying, stated: My mum is found, and she is fine. I always told you guys, she’s not mad. She only forgot. She only forgot…Mummy, don’t cry, we found you, don’t cry… we no forget you… Her leg don swell up, help her tie the leg … Ah, omo, Yaba Psychiatric, I swear to God, I no go forgive una. I no go forgive all of una hospital. (Gossipmilltv, 2022)

However, it is not all bad news on this front. While there are reported cases of the failings of the larger Nigerian filial and communal care system, in the absence of a robust state welfare

Ageing, disability, and social justice in Nigeria  223 system, to respond to the care and inclusion needs of older people (Ani & Isiugo-Abanihe, 2022; Ebimgbo et al., 2019; Ekoh, George et al., 2021b; Ekoh et al., 2022; Ene et al., 2022), as we can see from the example of the young man and his mother with dementia, many Nigerians are addressing the well-being of older people with disabilities. While in the field, the first author saw several instances of children of people with dementia, family members, friends, neighbours, and community members doing their best to ensure that older people with disabilities have access to food, care, and inclusion in home life and communal activities. It was common to see older children move in to care for their parents, and for neighbours to come in to check if older people with dementia who lived alone had eaten or needed help with tasks. Religious leaders and those from religious communities included older people with dementia in faith activities and welfare visitations, among other things. In addition to abuse and limited access to resources, older disabled people in Nigeria also face accessibility challenges. Although this is not a challenge specific to just the older population but to all disabled people living in the country, initiatives and calls for disability inclusion are usually restricted to the needs of the physically disabled, such as blind and deaf people, and those with other physical disabilities. Efforts to make spaces and everyday life inclusive of and accessible to people with cognitive impairments, such as dementia, appear to be visibly lacking. This may be a result of dementia and other cognitive and intellectual impairments not being taken seriously as impairments or conditions requiring specific support and aid. In Nigeria, it is common for many to see dementia as something spiritually imposed, a normal aspect of ageing, or as madness (Nwakasi et al., 2019; Nwakasi et al., 2021). We are not calling for a total dismissal of the Nigerian way of understanding dementia and relating to people with dementia. During the fieldwork, the first author saw how filial, neighbourly, and communal efforts – including those of faith and local communities – were mobilised to support and care for people with dementia. However, to facilitate the full inclusion of older people with such disabilities as dementia in the community and society, it is important to investigate aspects of our culture, norms, and attitudes concerning people with dementia, to know what we can continue to hold on to and what we can seek to change through critical education and community engagement. The path toward disability justice for older people in Nigeria does not necessarily have to imply a replication of Western values and ways of being, but it has to involve a reimagining of a society where older disabled people are fully included, fully represented, adequately cared for, and have full access to dignified ageing.

15.5 WORKING TOWARDS DISABILITY JUSTICE FOR OLDER DISABLED PEOPLE The needs and experiences of older disabled people do not appear to be visibly included in disability justice movements in Nigeria and much of Africa (see Falola & Hamel, 2021). This seems to be more the case for people with dementia, since it is not usually considered a disability, thus leaving people with dementia out of the discussion and the work towards achieving disability justice (Cahill, 2018). The lives and welfare of people with dementia can arguably be improved at a much faster pace if they are included in the movement for disability justice. This is because “disability justice recognizes the intersecting legacies of white supremacy, colonial capitalism, gendered oppression, and ableism in understanding how people’s bodies and minds are labelled ‘deviant’, ‘unproductive’, ‘disposable’, and/or ‘invalid’’’ (White Noise

224  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Collective, 2016). It might be easier, faster, and more practical to improve the lives of older people in Nigeria who have disabilities like dementia if they work with the country’s current legal and rights-based frameworks. They should also create a disability justice framework that engages critically with African and Nigerian cultural and ethical values (see Onazi, 2020) and that thinks about how impairments and aspects of culture and traditions are making life harder for these people. There are differences between international agreements like the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and how they are put into practice at the national and local levels. These differences are thought to be because human rights standards have not been made universal enough. However, societal and cultural factors that may be more important in maintaining the status quo in African settings are not taken into account (Onazi, 2020, p. 4). We see this in Nigeria, where both older people and disabled people still face social injustices despite the country’s ratification of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD) and the establishment of the Discrimination against Persons with Disabilities (Prohibition) Act (2018) and National Policy on Ageing for Older Persons in Nigeria. If sociocultural factors are not considered in the discourse around the domestication of international conventions for people with disabilities, we pass up the opportunities to advocate the promotion of positive local cultural values and norms which uphold the rights and well-being of disabled people, as well as to criticise and seek to change those which place people with disabilities in terrible conditions. Thus, the work to achieve disability justice for older adults in Nigeria would do well to acknowledge sociocultural factors, including the spiritualisation of disabilities like dementia, and may benefit from mobilising and promoting such positive African values centred on humanistic (Gyekye, 1996) and altruistic relationships with obligations that need not be symmetrical (Onazi, 2020). These include African worldviews and values not only explain the existence of disabled people but also promote their inclusion, dignity, and well-being, not based on their physical efforts or contributions to the communal relationship but based on their humanity, which other members of society share with them. Ubuntu is one of the worldviews indigenous to the African context, which is already being mobilised in theological, humanistic, and relational discourses and work involving disabled people and can also be extended to older people with disabilities such as dementia. The late Archbishop Desmond Tutu captivatingly illustrated what Ubuntu encapsulates: Ubuntu is difficult to render into a Western language. It speaks of the very essence of being human… This means they are generous, hospitable, friendly, caring and compassionate. They share what they have. It also means my humanity is caught up, is inextricably bound up, in theirs. We belong in a bundle of life. We say, “a person is a person through other people”. It is not “I think therefore I am”. It says rather: “I am human belong.” I participate, I share. (Tutu, 1999, pp. 34–35)

With the mobilisation of positive indigenous African and communal values, such as Ubuntu, Igwebuike, or Umunna bu ike (strength lies in the community), and others, activists, professionals, educators, disabled people, and other change agents can work towards reimagining and actualising a reality where all older disabled people in Nigeria live a fully inclusive life in Nigerian society. However, this may first require research efforts targeted at highlighting values at play in communities as well as understanding the realities of life with a disability for many older adults. For example, despite increasing attention to disability and elderly rights and issues in Nigeria, there is relatively little known – as reflected in the literature – about

Ageing, disability, and social justice in Nigeria  225 the everyday lives and experiences of people with dementia in Nigeria. Thus, there is a great need for knowledge about what the lives of older people with dementia and other types of disabilities look like when they live in Nigeria and how other people, including family, friends, neighbours, and even researchers and policymakers, interact with them.

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226  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Ekoh, P. C., Ejimkaraonye, C., George, E. O., & Agbawodikeizu, P. U. (2021a). “Better to die of disease than die of hunger”: The experience of Igwes (traditional rulers) in the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic in rural Nigeria. Rural and Remote Health, 21(4). https://doi​.org​/10​.22605​/ RRH6691 Ekoh, P. C., George, E. O., & Ezulike, C. D. (2021b). Digital and physical social exclusion of older people in rural Nigeria in the time of COVID-19. Journal of Gerontological Social Work, 64(6), 629–642. https://doi​.org​/10​.1080​/01634372​.2021​.1907496 Ekoh, P. C., Okah, P., Onalu, C., Ebimgbo, S., Ene, J., & Agha, A. A. (2022). Experiences of abuse and neglect of older adults in internally displaced persons (IDP) Camp, Lugbe, Abuja, Nigeria. Journal of Population Ageing, 15, 943–947. https://doi​.org​/10​.1007​/s12062​- 022​- 09388-0 . Ene, J., Agwu, P., Ekoh, C. P., & Okoye, U. (2022). Is filial care for older adults in Nigeria threatened? Examining concerns from adult offspring providing care. Journal of Ageing Studies, 63, 101078. http://doi​.org​/10​.1016​/j​.jaging​/2022​.101078 Eneh, O. C., & Nkamnebe, A. D. (2011). Gender gap and sustainable human development in Nigeria: Issues and strategic choices. Asian Journal of Rural Development, 1(1), 41–53. DOI: 10.3923/ ajrd.2011.41.53 Etieyibo, E., & Omiegbe, O. (2016). Religion, culture, and discrimination against persons with disabilities in Nigeria: Opinion papers. African Journal of Disability, 5(1), 1–6. DOI: https://doi​.org​ /10​.4102​/ajod​.v5i1​.192 Falola, T., & Hamel, N. (2021). Disability in Africa: Inclusion, care, and the ethics of humanity. University of Rochester Press. Federal Ministry of Information and National Orientation (2021). FG approves national policy on ageing for older persons in Nigeria. https://fmic​.gov​.ng​/fg​-approves​-national​-policy​-on​-ageing​-for​ -older​-persons​-in​-nigeria/ George, E. O., & Ekoh, P. C. (2020). Social workers’ perception of practice with lesbians, gays and bisexuals (LGBs) in Nigeria. Journal of Comparative Social Work, 15(2) 56–78. https://doi​.org​/10​ .31265​/jcsw​.v15i2​.306. Gossipmilltv [@gossipmilltv] (2022, March 2). Breaking news: Nigerian man who called out Yaba Psychiatric Hospital after is mom got missing there has finally found his mother who has dementia!!! [video]. Instagram. https://www​.instagram​.com ​/reel​/CamBnf3IDjP/​?igshid​=YmMyMTA2M2Y​%3D Gyekye, K. (1996). African cultural values: An introduction. Sankofa Pub. Co. He, W., Adjaye-Gbewonyo, D., & Aboderin, I. (2020). Africa aging 2020: International population reports.  chrom​e-ext​ensio​n://e​faidn​bmnnn​ibpca​jpcgl​clefi​ndmka​j/https://www​.census​.gov​/content​/ dam ​/Census​/ library​/publications​/2020​/demo​/p95​_20​-1​.pdf Hindley, G., Kissima, J., Oates, L., Paddick, S.-M., Kisoli, A., Brandsma, C., Gray, W. K., Walker, R. W., Mushi, D., & Dotchin, C. L. (2017). The role of traditional and faith healers in the treatment of dementia in Tanzania and the potential for collaboration with allopathic healthcare services. Age and Ageing, 46(1), 130–137. https://doi​.org​/10​.1093​/ageing​/afw167 Khonje, V., Milligan, C., Yako, Y., Mabelane, M., Borochowitz, K. E., & De Jager, C. A. (2015). Knowledge, attitudes and beliefs about dementia in an urban Xhosa-speaking community in South Africa. Advances in Alzheimer’s Disease, 4(02), 21. https://doi​.org​/10​.4236​/aad​.2015​.42004 Lang, R., & Upah, L. (2008). Scoping study: Disability issues in Nigeria. DFID. Mkhonto, F., & Hanssen, I. (2018). When people with dementia are perceived as witches. Consequences for patients and nurse education in South Africa. Journal of Clinical Nursing, 27(1–2), e169-e176. https://doi​.org​/10​.1111​/jocn​.13909 Mudiare, P. E. U. (2013). Abuse of the aged in Nigeria: Elders also cry. American International Journal of Contemporary Research, 3(9), 79–87. chrom​e-ext​ensio​n://e​faidn​bmnnn​ibpca​jpcgl​clefi​ndmka​ j/https://aijcrnet​.com ​/journals​/ Vol​_3​_ No​_9​_ September​_2013​/10​.pdf Mugumbate, J., & Nyanguru, A. (2013). Exploring African philosophy: The value of ubuntu in social work. African Journal of Social Work, 3(1), 82–100. https://www​.ajol​.info​/index​.php​/ajsw​/article​/ view​/127543 Mushi, D., Rongai, A., Paddick, S. M., Dotchin, C., Mtuya, C., & Walker, R. (2014). Social representation and practices related to dementia in Hai District of Tanzania. BMC Public Health, 14(1), 1–7. https:// doi​.org​/10​.1186​/1471–2458–14–260 National Bureau of Statistics. (2019). Poverty and inequality in Nigeria: Executive summary – 2019 (pp. 1–25). National Bureau of Statistics.

Ageing, disability, and social justice in Nigeria  227 National Population Census. (2006). Population and housing census of the Federal Republic of Nigeria (Vol. 1). Ndamba-Bandzouzi, B., Nubukpo, P., Mouanga, A., Mbelesso, P., Tognidé, M., Tabo, A., & Preux, P. M. (2014). Violence and witchcraft accusations against older people in Central and Western Africa: Toward a new status for the older individuals? International Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry, 29(5), 546–547. DOI: 10.1002/gps.4069 Ngubane-Mokiwa, S. A. (2018). Ubuntu considered in light of exclusion of people with disabilities. African Journal of Disability, 7(1), 1–7. doi: 10.4102/ajod.v7i0.460 Nwabunnia, O. A. (2021). #EndSARS movement in Nigeria: Tensions and solidarities amongst protesters. Gender & Development, 29(2–3), 351–367. https://doi​.org​/10​.1080​/13552074​.2021​.1982180 Nwakasi, C. C., Hayes, C., Fulton, J., & Roberts, A. R. (2019). A pilot qualitative study of dementia perceptions of Nigerian migrant caregivers. International Journal of African Nursing Sciences, 10, 167–174. https://doi​.org​/10​.1016​/j​.ijans​.2019​.03​.003 Nwakasi, C. C., de Medeiros, K., & Bosun-Arije, F. S. (2021). “We are doing these things so that people will not laugh at us”: Caregivers’ attitudes about dementia and caregiving in Nigeria. Qualitative Health Research, 31(8), 1448–1458. https://doi​.org​/10​.1177​/104973232110041 Nwoye, C. M. (2011). Igbo cultural and religious worldview: An insider’s perspective. International Journal of Sociology and Anthropology, 3(9), 304–317. https://doi​.org​/10​.5897​/ IJSA​.9000051 Offiong, E. E., & Uduigwomen, G. A. (2021). Socio-cultural values and children’s rights in Calabar. Society Register, 5(2), 13–30. DOI: 10.14746/sr.2021.5.2.02 Ogundola, O. J. (2013). Framing disability: A content analysis of newspapers in Nigeria [Doctoral dissertation, Syracuse University]. Ogunniyi, A., Hall, K. S., Baiyewu, O., Gureje, O., Unverzagt, F., Gao, S., & Hendrie, H. C. (2005). Caring for individuals with dementia: The Nigerian experience. West African Journal of Medicine, 24(3), 259–262. DOI: 10.4314/wajm.v24i3.28211 Okoye, U. O. (2012). Family care-giving for ageing parents in Nigeria: Gender differences, cultural imperatives and the role of education. International Journal of Education and Ageing, 2(2), 139–154. Oladipo, O. (2007). The notions of community and democracy in contemporary African social and political thought. In T. Ebijuwa (Ed.), Philosophy and Social Change (pp. 147–162). Hope Publications Ltd. Onalu, C. E., & Okoye, U. O. (2021). Social justice and social work curriculum at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, Nigeria. Research on Social Work Practice, 31(6), 576–583. 10.1177/10497315211001532 Onanuga, P. (2021). Coming out and reaching out: Linguistic advocacy on queer Nigerian Twitter. Journal of African Cultural Studies, 33(4), 489–504. DOI: 10.1080/13696815.2020.1806799 Onazi, O. (2020). An African path to disability justice. Springer International Publishing. Owolabi, A. M. (2022). Media conglomeration and minority voices: Nigerian Television Authority as a case study. International Journal of Management, Social Sciences, Peace and Conflict Studies, 5(2), 67–74. https://www​.ijmsspcs​.com​/index​.php​/ IJMSSPCS​/article​/view​/348​/381. Spade, D. (2020). Mutual aid: Building solidarity during this crisis (and the next). Verso Books. Statista (2023). Elderly population in Nigeria. Nigeria: Old population 2018–2020. Tutu, D. (1999). No future without forgiveness. Doubleday. United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division (2015). World population ageing 2015 (ST/ESA/SER.A/390). https://www​.un​.org​/en​/development​/desa​/population​ /publications​/pdf​/ageing​/ WPA2015​_Report​.pdf United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division (2022). World population prospects 2022: Summary of results. UN DESA/POP/2022/TR/NO. 3. https://www​ .un​.org​/development ​/desa ​/pd ​/sites​/www​.un​.org​.development​.desa​.pd ​/files​/wpp2022 ​_ summary​_of​ _results​.pdf Visco, I. (2001). Ageing populations: Economic issues and policy challenges. https://www​.bancaditalia​ .it ​/dotAsset ​/a832a24b​-d6fe​- 4460 ​-944e​- 45ab2c25ec67​.pdf White Noise Collective (2016). Exploring disability justice. www​.conspireforchange​.org​/exploring​ -disability​-justice

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16. Women’s empowerment in APCNF A critical examination of feminist goals in agroecology Anvitha Ravipati

16.1 INTRODUCTION This chapter focusses on critical issues concerning the field of agroecology, more specifically political agroecology. In reviewing an extensive range of articles and books on the field, I have identified common themes that lie at the intersection of ecology, polity, society, and economy, with an overarching focus on the sociological and political aspects of climate justice. The age of the Anthropocene gave rise to the global threat of climate change, leading to rising sea levels, extreme weather events, and an increase in infectious diseases due to environmental destruction. Global increases in population are likely to put pressure on food production and supply, which is lagging. The IPCC 4th assessment report elaborates on four major changes; a rise in average global sea level, more intense and longer droughts since the 1970s, increased frequency of heavy precipitation over most land areas, and changes in extreme temperatures since the 1960s (Martin & Sauerborn, 2013a). It is predicted that, in the tropics, the yields of several crops will reduce due to rising temperatures, with the strongest effects expected to unfold in Africa (due to the already high food-insecure population) (Martin & Sauerborn, 2013a). Climate change is being viewed as a new axis for inequality. This is evident from the fact that climate change mitigation and adaptation cannot exist without social and environmental justice. Climate injustice overlaps with existing social inequities and inequalities based on class, age, race and ethnicity, geographical location, nation, gender, immigration status, disability status, those with pre-existing health conditions, and numerous other ways. Furthermore, climate change and the incidence of extreme weather events can lead to global hunger, food insecurity, and disruptions in agricultural production and water availability (Falzon et al., 2021). There has been a steady rise in the number of environmentally displaced people (EDPs), and climate refugees. However, international law does not protect people displaced by climate change under current refugee or humanitarian agreements (Falzon et al., 2021). Moreover, inter-country differences and their histories make global climate change negotiations a difficult terrain for forging common ground and developing much-needed consensus and equity in climate justice. There are differences in contributions to carbon emissions and consumption patterns between and within countries that need to be accounted for to ensure an equitable and just distribution of burdens and responsibilities. For example, even though Africa and Asia account for lower food consumption, their resources are primarily wasted when accounting for food loss. Food waste in industrialised countries is almost as high as the total net food production in sub-Saharan Africa (Martin & Sauerborn, 2013a). The per capita use of resources for food losses is largest in North Africa and West-Central Asia (freshwater and cropland) and North America and Oceania (fertilisers), and the smallest is found in 229

230  Handbook of social justice in the Global South sub-Saharan Africa and Asia (Kummu et al., 2012). The loss in GDP associated with extreme heat events was 6.7 per cent for regions in the bottom income decile but only 1.5 per cent for regions in the top income decile (Callahan & Mankin, 2022). The link between heatwave deaths and socio-economic conditions is strong, as is the link between individual incomes and contributions to emissions (Chancel et al., 2023). Some scholars speak about the Veblen effect in contemporary economic systems wherein the top emitters may induce their middle-class counterparts to pursue a more carbon-intensive consumption lifestyle rather than reduce their emissions (Chancel et al., 2023). The emissions caused by the bottom 90 per cent of the global population in terms of income is only marginally larger than the top 10 per cent (Chancel et al., 2023). Although most of the top emitters live in developed nations, some countries in the developing world exhibit extreme carbon inequality. In 1990, 62 per cent of the difference in carbon emissions could be accounted for by between-country inequality, but in 2014, the trend reversed: 64 per cent of inequality in global emissions is due to differences within countries (Chancel et al., 2023). Therefore, efforts towards climate justice must take into account transnational patterns and trends in contributions towards climate change.

16.2 SOCIOLOGICAL THEORIES ON ENVIRONMENTAL DEGRADATION Several theories exist to explain the causal mechanisms behind the extent of current environmental harm, such as Marxist theories (metabolic rift, commodification of land, and expropriation of nature), treadmill theory of production, treadmill theory of destruction, metabolic crises, and ecological unequal exchanges (Falzon et al., 2021). Almost all theories provide important insights into issues of climate justice, albeit with a slightly different focus. Metabolic rift describes the disruption of the nutrient cycle between city and country, which leads to the ecological extraction of rural resources and urban pollution (Bosma & Vanhaute, 2021). Additionally, it shows how accumulation is taking place in national and international markets as goods and resources are transferred from distant lands in rural areas (Givens et al., 2016). Metabolic rift and treadmill theory of production assume opposition between capitalism and the environment (Givens et al., 2016). The treadmill theory of destruction examines the environmental harms of military expansion and risk-transfer militarism, wherein wealthy nations can reduce domestic casualties while subjecting other countries to destruction and environmental degradation (Givens et al., 2016). Ecologically unequal exchange theory examines the “vertical flow of energy from less developed to developed nations” due to environmental degradation caused by the exploitative, unjust extraction of resources, energy, and outsourcing of pollution and waste in developing countries (Givens et al., 2016). These theories give rise to the issue of power and its unequal distribution across nations, industries, societies, and communities in the era of globalisation and neoliberalism. The unequal power exchanges between nations have proven to have disastrous effects in terms of unjust trade practices, exploitation of land, resources, and labour in the Global South, the rise of climate refugees, and the exacerbation of the debt trap (mostly in developing and lowincome countries) due to the new climate crises. A large portion of investments from the Global North in the Global South finances “carbon-intensive agriculture, forestry operations, and extractive enterprises” that increase carbon emissions (Givens et al., 2016). World systems theorists show that greenhouse emissions are highest in core countries. More specifically, they

Women’s empowerment in APCNF  231 show that carbon emissions are associated with core countries, whereas methane production is concentrated in semi-core countries (Falzon et al., 2021). Moreover, the globalisation and neoliberal structuring of production and consumption cycles and assembly lines have given rise to pollution havens and low-wage labour havens in developing countries, exacerbated global extraction of raw materials, and led to the global accumulation of land, exponentially increased carbon emissions due to transportation, and resulted in environmental and humanitarian crimes (Falzon et al., 2021; Bosma & Vanhaute, 2021). Additionally, richer countries import more biomaterial than they export and often offshore their most polluting industries (Bosma & Vanhaute, 2021). In a longitudinal study of nations, it was found that the development of specific agricultural sectors and export orientation can cause an increase in methane emissions (Givens et al., 2016). As a result of such changes, many social justice movements in the Global South challenge the idea of “cheap labour”.

16.3 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF GLOBALISATION AND NEOLIBERALISM The global political economy does not have adequate legal and regulatory infrastructure and institutions to control or account for the dual effects of globalisation and neoliberalism. Scholars argue that the lack of a “global state” or binding international laws is deliberate to allow for continued and unchecked economic expansion of capital, scales, lower reproduction costs and increased profits (Falzon et al., 2021; Wright, 2021). Since conventional agriculture is a mode of production driven by economic pressures, it does not account for negative social and environmental externalities, nor does it aim to protect the ecological source of its profits (Gliessman, 1990b). Global agriculture, in terms of class, is producing a dual system of small, medium, and large family farms and mega-corporations (Berry, 2021). There is differentiation within the corporate agribusiness sector in terms of an elite class of corporate owners and executives, and the contract farmers, skilled workers, and other engaged in agricultural production, processing, and marketing (Berry, 2021). Jackson et al. (2016) argue that global injustice cannot be reduced to a simplistic opposition between the Global North and the Global South but can be better understood as a distinction between a “transnational capitalist class that invests in production and accumulates capital indifferent to national borders and is ‘conscious of its transnationality,’ and the disconnected, disorganised global proletariat that ‘has not … developed a consciousness of itself’” (p. 139). Moreover, transnational entities have a newfound interest in agriculture and ecological conservation, which has led to global land grabs and the displacement of marginalised communities, particularly Indigenous communities, from their land (Watts, 2021). The rise in global land grabs is an alarming indication that elites continue to pursue economic expansion, accumulation, and productivity as the answer to current crises (Givens et al., 2016; Edelman & Wolford, 2017; Watts, 2021). The promotion of export-orientated cash crops, specialised commodities, and biofuels leads to the accumulation of large amounts of land (sometimes by extortion and coercion) by governments in the Gulf region, China, and other Asian countries, as well as private investors who buy and lease for offshore production (Altieri & Toledo, 2011; Watts, 2021). Ecological modernisation theory argues that economic development will improve the reflexivity of nation-states and will give rise to corrective policy as they develop ecological

232  Handbook of social justice in the Global South rationality over economic rationality (Givens et al., 2016). The ideology of green capitalism posits that market entities, private interests, and entrepreneurs are best suited to address the problem of environmental degradation and climate change. Carbon credits are used by corporations and MNCs to offset their pollution and emissions (Jonas, 2021). However, many scholars reject this ideology due to the primary interest being profits and the tendency to externalise environmental harm (Falzon et al., 2021). The phenomenon of Jevons paradox claims that gains in energy efficiency may increase the consumption of that good, whose expanded production and consumption defeats the gains made by improvements (Givens et al., 2016). Alongside green capitalism, the ideology of green consumerism seeks to undermine corporate responsibility and increase individual responsibility to promote the consumption of environmentally friendly brands (Falzon et al., 2021). The biotechnological and genetic revolutions have instigated various forms of capital and institutional entry into agriculture, such as pharmaceutical companies, agro-food integrators, retailers, and so on (Watts, 2021). Financialisation is an important part of the current economic regime and includes three aspects: “financial domination in economic transactions, specific pressures for liquidity among portfolio investors, [and] changing investment logics where financial innovation and investment come out of diversification which is detached from the elites” (Bandelj & Sowers, 2016). Neoliberal globalisation entails the growing power of transnational civil organisations through memberships as well as the influence of international organisations on state and firm-level activities (Bandelj & Sowers, 2016). These false solutions are being promoted and pushed as appropriate policy by inter-governmental organisations (IGOs) such as the United Nations, World Bank, World Trade Organization, and others. The role of transnational capital, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa, has proven to have disastrous effects on rural communities in terms of food insecurity, agrarian distress, and displacement (Daniel & Mittal, 2010). Moreover, the dominant narrative of such intergovernmental organisations (IGOs) and sometimes international non-governmental organisations (INGOs) is food security rather than food sovereignty, which provides legitimacy to the unjust practices, actions, and ideas of the Corporate Food Regime (CFR) and industrial agriculture in terms of long supply chains, bottleneck structures of food markets wherein the middle entities (processing, distribution, and marketing) earn a disproportionate share of the profit, due to which neither producers nor consumers benefit, and conversion of huge amounts of land for the production of cash crops and biofuels (Rosset et al., 2011; Bandelj & Sowers, 2016; Jonas, 2021). Other implications include “weak farmer resources for adopting agroecological practices; demoralised and eroding rural communities; [and] investment in export support instead of environmental support” (Jonas, 2021, p. 297). Such crops include oil palm and sugarcane production (partly used for biofuels), rubber cultivation (for industrial purposes), and soybean production (largely for livestock feed) (Martin & Sauerborn, 2013b). The third wave of GMO development includes transgenic crops that can produce biofuels, biodegradable plastics, enzymes, lubricant oils, or pharmaceutical substances (Martin & Sauerborn, 2013b). Not only do large farms and monocultures lead to the simplification of agricultural systems wherein underutilised and wild species are lost, but it also leads to an erosion of different knowledge systems (Galluzzi et al., 2010). Even though the current food production is sufficient to feed 10 billion people, 1 billion people suffer from chronic hunger (Holt-Giménez et al., 2012). The problems of food insecurity are inextricably tied to industrial agriculture and the global supply chains that it has created. Almost 25 per cent of produced food crops are lost within the food supply chain,

Women’s empowerment in APCNF  233 whose production involves 24 per cent of total freshwater resources, 23 per cent of total global cropland, and 23 per cent of total fertiliser use (Kummu et al., 2012).

16.4 THE RISE OF INDUSTRIAL AGRICULTURE AND CORPORATE FOOD REGIME (CFR) As agriculture is the industry most affected by climate change, farmers are likely to be one of the most affected populations (owing to their lower socio-economic status (SES), outdoor working conditions, and lack of institutional support) as the risk of farming is borne by them and not agricultural companies or firms. The most extreme effects of climate change are experienced by those engaged in the agricultural sector in tropical and subtropical countries in Latin America and Africa with productivity losses of up to 40 per cent due to anthropogenic climate change (Chancel et al., 2023). Some scholars estimate that climate change has already negatively affected calorie intake in 27 countries. Corporate food regimes evolved from industrial agriculture, which spread globally due to the twin interventionist strategies of agricultural industrialisation and land reforms promoted by the United States from 1945 to 1973 to curb Soviet-style collectivisation, promote agricultural growth, and dismantle local serfdoms (Araghi, 1995). The emergence of petro biofuels and World War II led the United States to develop weapons with applications in pest management (carbamates, chlorinated hydrocarbons, and organophosphates are three classes of insecticides that emerged from R&D) (Perfecto et al., 2009). The origins of industrial agriculture lie in scientific policies pushed forth by the United States, which gave rise to the “green revolution” in many countries (especially in the Global South). This revolution comprised a package of herbicides, fertilisers, insecticides, and pesticides, along with infrastructural support such as mechanised tillage and irrigation (Araghi, 1995). The dominant narrative used was to blame the hunger and famines in the Global South on the lack of agricultural productivity rather than the historical injustice caused by colonialist frontier expansion (Perfecto et al., 2009). Time has shown that the green revolution has produced more harm than good due to the contamination of water, land, and soil with harmful chemicals, desertification, salinisation, feminisation of reptiles, decreased sperm count among human males, increased dependency on inputs, decreased crop resistance to pests, the problem of the pesticide treadmill, and so on (Perfecto et al., 2009; Martin & Sauerborn, 2013b). Ecological conservationists argue that this substitution of subsistence farming with the production of cash crops in monocultures/plantations has reduced the amount of biodiversity in agricultural systems. Therefore, a focus on biodiversity in farming systems is paramount. The socio-political effects of this conversion have led to large-scale displacement of rural people to urban areas (depeasantisation), as the green revolution was expensive for small farmers who could not afford the high cost of inputs (Araghi, 1995; Perfecto et al., 2009). This led to growing class disparity within farmers in countries of the Global South. During this time, US farming was heavily subsidised, which resulted in domestic surplus. This surplus was disposed of as food aid, which depressed world food prices and led to the internationalisation of the US diet. Consequences for Third World peasants included a sluggish rate of agricultural growth, an increased rate of in-migration to urban areas, and de-ruralization (Araghi, 1995). The period from 1973 to 1990 was marked by the rise of international finance capital, the expansion of non-agricultural activities into rural areas, the urbanisation

234  Handbook of social justice in the Global South of agricultural labour, export-led industrialisation, the withdrawal of state support from agriculture, the promotion of cash crops for exports, and market-orientated specialisation (Araghi, 1995). Green revolution did not solve the hunger and malnutrition crises as it claimed, and instead, made them worse. The repeated crises following World War II exacerbated the debt trap for many developing countries. Bretton Woods institutions, such as the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Trade Organization (WTO), forced such countries to adopt Structural Adjustment Programmes (SAP) as a condition for procuring loans. The programmes were aimed at allowing international capital to invest in countries with cheap labour, less regulation, and maximum resource exploitation. It also entailed deregulation of the private sphere by decreasing government interventions, cutbacks on welfare programmes, rolling back social development programmes, and opening of the economy to foreign investment (Davis, 2006). The effects of SAP were immediate in many countries. Third World cities in urban Africa and Latin America were the hardest hit by decreasing formal employment, rising oil prices, drought, soaring interest rates, falling wages, decreased provision of social goods, and increasing immigration (Davis, 2006). Newly industrialising countries follow the post-Fordist model with flexible labour conditions, welfare cutbacks or retrenchment, high mobility of capital, state incentives to attract capital, and short production cycles (Fainstein & Campbell, 2011). The rise of speculative capital into the commodities market is thought to have caused food prices to inflate in 2008 (Altieri & Toledo, 2011). Moreover, food insecurity has more to do with economic crises than ecological crises in some cases (Altieri & Toledo; 2011; HoltGiménez et al., 2012). During the financial crisis of 2008, rising food prices put 75 million people at risk of hunger in sub-Saharan Africa and Asia without any ecological crises such as drought and with plenty of food available in the markets in those regions (Altieri & Toledo, 2011). Although there has been an expansion of lands for agricultural production, the crops being planted do not contribute to increasing the food supply (Martin & Sauerborn, 2013b). International finance corporations advise governments to increase investor access to land markets, and research has demonstrated that this undermines the well-being of local communities in terms of land rights and access to food (Daniel & Mittal, 2010). It was found that Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) by multinational companies impairs developing countries’ ability to build domestic industry and develop human capital due to their reliance on low-wage, unskilled labour and low technological sophistication (Bandelj & Sowers, 2016; Akram-Lodhi, 2021; van der Ploeg, 2021). Additionally, it promotes an uneven concentration of capital across sectors and regions, limits the development of an efficient and transparent bureaucratic system, and produces lax environmental and labour laws (Bandelj & Sowers, 2016). Moreover, it threatens the sovereignty of a nation by making it susceptible to volatile international markets and geopolitics. Altieri and Toledo (2011) argue, “Contracts to buy and sell foods (cocoa, fruit juices, sugar, staples, meat and coffee) have been ‘turned into ‘‘derivatives’’ that can be bought and sold among traders who have nothing to do with agriculture’” (p. 590). In fact, contemporary economic systems and markets are commodified to an extent that sustainable agriculture is inadequate in addressing rural poverty and climate injustice if it is not accompanied by improved access to “financial services, marketing outlets and off-farm employment opportunities” (Uphoff, 2002). The model of farming has been transformed into an enterprise that follows an unsustainable model of “scale-enlargement, technology-driven intensification and specialization” (van der Ploeg, 2021, p. 292).

Women’s empowerment in APCNF  235 Large agribusinesses favour the neoliberal model of long supply chains, free trade, and export orientation to solve food security, whereas small farmers benefit from local consumption and production cycles, short supply chains, a holistic approach to farming, and an emphasis on food sovereignty (Jonas, 2021). Over the past few decades, the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), the World Bank, the IMF, and the WTO have reduced tariffs, quotas, and barriers to trade in food products and agricultural commodities, which was detrimental to peasants in developing and lowincome nations in terms of drops in farm prices, loss of land to big farmers due to low profits, and erosion of state support (Araghi, 1995; Rosset, 2000). Economists have warned against rent extraction due to the growing gap between transnational companies and local production (Binswanger et al., 1995). In OECD countries, the growth of domestic protectionism and subsidies in agriculture is linked to the interests of farmer coalitions, agribusinesses, credit cooperatives, and food processing companies (Binswanger et al., 1995).

16.5 PEASANT ECONOMY VERSUS INDUSTRIAL CAPITALISM Moreover, the interests of industrial agriculture are diametrically opposed to the interests of small farmers. Developing countries used natural resources such as soil, land, forests, water, and rural populations as fodder for the rapid transition to urban industrialisation as part of the drive to modernise (Edelman & Wolford, 2017). Polanyi states that the ideology of market capitalism views natural resources as “factors of production” that could be given an exchange value and used till exhaustion (Edelman & Wolford, 2017; Bosma & Vanhaute, 2021). Capitalism overcomes the frictions with various fixes – spatial, technological, state-led (bureaucracies and subordination to capital), and corporate (the rise of neoliberalism) (Bosma & Vanhaute, 2021). The importance of agriculture is such that certain scholars speak about the history of the world in terms of the history of trade in agricultural commodities such as sugar, rice, cotton, or corn (Edelman & Wolford, 2017). Edelman and Wolford (2017) write, “prejudice against rural life continues in ‘the form of dismissal, ignorance or romanticism’”. Several theories exist to explain why peasant economies operate by a different logic than the laws of industrial agriculture. The famous agrarian question by Kautsky is “whether and how capital is seizing hold of agriculture, revolutionizing it, making old forms of production and property untenable and creating the necessity for new ones” (Watts, 2021, p. 53). Part of the reason agriculture follows its own laws is due to seasonality, and climatic and other risks as well as the natural and biophysical limits to mechanisation and industrialisation that is possible on fields (Watts, 2021). Marx contributed three diverse theses to the understanding of the agrarian question (Akram-Lodhi, 2021). First, the process of primitive accumulation by feudal landlords used a variety of enclosure mechanisms to displace rich peasants and transform them into a class of landless, rural, waged labour (Akram-Lodhi, 2021). Second, the concept of peasant class differentiation (Akram-Lodhi, 2021). This is reflected in the modernity and disappearance thesis which argues that the peasant class will dissolve and become differentiated into the proletariat (Araghi, 1995; Watts, 2021). The third thesis is removed from capitalist determinism. Marx argued that the progressive elements of capitalism would combine with old modes of peasant economy to sustain a dualistic reality of common lands and individual peasant plots (Akram-Lodhi, 2021). Chayanov argues for the permanence thesis, and rejects the Marxist analysis, which views the goal of peasants as maximising family

236  Handbook of social justice in the Global South needs (not profits) to the point when their subjective dislike for manual labour outweighs the possible increase in output (Araghi, 1995; Watts, 2021). Luxemburg argued that the capitalist breakdown of the natural limits would entail “massive force and violence, oppressive state taxation, and cheap goods” (Watts, 2021). Patnaik (2021) argues that capitalism expanded by subjugating the rural side to a “frontier of petty commodity production”. In so doing, she views the history of capitalism as tied to the history of imperialism and colonialism in reducing agriculture in the tropical colonies to feeding the needs of the temperate lands of Europe and North America (Patnaik, 2021). Watts (2021) argues that industrial capitalism absorbs agriculture by appropriationism (wherein some elements are taken over by the industry) and substitutionism (a process where key agricultural crops are substituted for crops producing industrial products such as synthetic sugars, biofuels, and so on). Watts (2021) asserts that the peasants have been reduced to semi-proletarianised wage-labourers rather than family farmers as they rely more on off-farm employment than land-based activities. Agriculture has witnessed increasing external management by capital since the 1950s. Van der Ploeg (2021) argued that external management leads to the double expropriation of farm labour. On the one hand, there is less value addition for farmers, and on the other hand, farmers experience de-skilling and loss of autonomy (van der Ploeg, 2021). Moreover, the history of the capitalisation of agriculture has produced corporate consolidation with few firms controlling the processing, distribution, and marketing of farm products wherein the value added for the primary producer has reduced (Perfecto et al., 2009). La Via Campesina, one of the largest peasant organisations, claims that the practices of industrial farming have led to the “downward spiral of poverty, rural-urban migration, hunger and environmental degradation” (Altieri, 2008). Much of the farmland is being acquired to produce petrochemicals, biofuels, and cash crops which contribute to a quarter of total carbon emissions, rising production costs, and food prices (Altieri, 2008; Altieri & Toledo, 2011; Altieri, 2012; Rosset et al., 2011). Additionally, the rise in demand for transgenic export crops, such as soybean for cattle feed, by China, the European Union, the United States, and others, is reshaping global food supply chains with unknown consequences (Altieri & Toledo, 2011). Biofuel and insurance companies are powerful lobbyists influencing agricultural policies (Binswanger et al., 1995). Despite increasing awareness of the harms of industrial agriculture, its dominance still continues due to the “feed the world” narrative. However, the way in which total output is calculated is biased in favour of monocultures and industrial agricultural models as only yield per crop is measured rather than total output (Rosset, 2000; Altieri, 2012). Moreover, there is recognition of an inverse relationship between farm size and output. Akram-Lodhi (2021) writes on the phenomenon of “supermarketization” fuelled by the “industrial grain-oilseed-livestock agro-food complex” (p. 691). Scholars argue that small farms are key to increasing the food security of the world for a few reasons: small farms are more productive and resource-conserving, they represent models of sustainability and GMO-free agrobiodiversity, and cool the climate (Rosset, 2000; Altieri, 2008; Perfecto et al., 2009). Perfecto et al. (2009) argue that industrial agriculture cannot provide a high-quality matrix of food sovereignty, biodiversity, and conservation as do small, farmer-based sustainable systems. Given that small peasants grow at least 70 per cent of the total food on an average of 2 hectares, they are essential to maintaining food supply (Altieri, 2012). Small farms automatically follow a strategy of minimizing risk by multi-cropping, which stabilises yields over the long term, promotes variety in diet, and maximises returns

Women’s empowerment in APCNF  237 even with limited resources and technology (Altieri & Toledo, 2011) Research shows that small farms are better prepared to deal with climate change due to increased use of drought-tolerant crops, multi cropping, water harvesting, limited tillage, soil conservation techniques such as manuring, ridging, terracing, and composting, and other ingenious techniques (Rosset, 2000; Altieri, 2012). Moreover, small farms also aid local and regional development. Encouraging land reform to landless and land-poor farmers has led to improved rural welfare and is a cheaper alternative to creating employment in the commercial sector (Rosset, 2000).

16.6 CHALLENGES TO SUSTAINABLE AGRICULTURE To address the triple goals of conserving biodiversity, climate, and human well-being, there are five recommended action steps; cutting back on fossil fuel energy, promoting healthy and sustainable diets, increasing food productivity and reducing food wastage, implementing nature-based solutions, and improving governance and management of land and waters (Baldwin-Cantello et al., 2023). All five points are related to agriculture and the primary sector, which agroecology seeks to address as an alternative system of sustainable farming. Reducing food waste is important for food insecurity and can be achieved by halting farmland expansion, closing “yield gaps” on unproductive land, increasing cropping intensity, and changing diets to local conditions (Kummu et al., 2012). Curbing agricultural losses is easier in developing countries if accompanied by organised farmers, appropriate technology transfer, and education (Kummu et al., 2012). Post-harvest losses, processing losses, and distribution waste can be reduced through investment in rural infrastructure, affordable dissemination of green technologies, capacity building, expansion of processing units, creating local consumption and production cycles, restricting unfair trade practices, mobilisation of farmers and other primary producers, and creating marketing cooperatives and facilities (Kummu et al., 2012). However, there are many challenges to the adoption of sustainable farming systems, such as: the risk of takeover of lands by powerful interests which disincentivises small farmers; the voluntary migration of rural people to urban centres of power; the reaction of agro-chemical companies to their loss of power in such systems; the opposition to decentralisation and greater local decision-making power acquired by rural communities, and the unwillingness of extension agents to adopt a more democratic approach when working with farmers (Pretty et al., 2003). Additionally, participatory development does not rely on a fixed set of rules, techniques, or procedures but instead stresses creation of capacities to respond to changing circumstances, which involves “local knowledge, research, and extension” (Uphoff, 2002). Another challenge is that farmer engagement in market exchange is a necessary incentive to adopt sustainable technologies. Farmers are often hesitant to refrain completely from using chemical inputs as it is less labour-intensive, allows for better timing, and contributes to better-looking produce in the marketplace (Uphoff, 2002). Most sustainable practices are highly labour-intensive with low returns to labour, have high discount rates due to long gestation lags, and involve a short-term sacrifice in terms of income and consumption activities (Uphoff, 2002). Agroecology, in this regard can prove to be highly beneficial in addressing the dual challenge of sustainability and productivity in the modern world in two ways: (1) agroecology is highly labour-intensive, which can meet the challenge of creating jobs; and (2) agroecology is capable of meeting the demands of production and productivity as structural transformation emerges (Akram-Lodhi, 2021).

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16.7 AGROECOLOGY: A SOLUTION TO FOOD INSECURITY, ENVIRONMENTAL DEGRADATION AND CLIMATE CRISES There is growing recognition and opposition to false solutions pushed forth by IGOs, transnational companies and, sometimes, INGOs. Awareness among farmers about their earnings being expropriated by oligopolistic markets has caused scepticism about the use of chemical inputs despite showing an increase in yields (Berry, 2021). Edelman and Wolford (2017) state, “The extent to which we succeed in feeding a growing global population while conserving resources and maintaining climate change within tolerable bounds depends greatly on how different peoples, societies, leaders and interests look to harness the energies of the land and its people” (p. 961). Agroecology emerged as a response to create alternatives to industrial farming, which is becoming detrimental to the interests of small farmers and rural populations as well as the environment. Soil erosion, the deliberate erosion of commons, the devalorisation of peasant and Indigenous knowledge, and the decline of agrarian life along with environmental threats led to research on famine, food security, and agroecology (Watts, 2021). Sustainable agriculture entails making the best use of nature’s goods and services without damaging the environment through strategies such as nutrient cycling, nitrogen fixation, soil regeneration, integrated pest management, effective use of farmers’ knowledge, minimising the use of external chemical inputs, and making productive use of people’s ability to work together (Uphoff, 2002; Pretty et al., 2003). In view of present challenges, agroecology has emerged as one of the most cost-effective, environmentally friendly, and socially just alternatives to the problem of climate change. Unlike industrial agriculture, which follows the principles of yield maximisation, use of chemical inputs, ecosystem suppression, and control, agroecology follows an ecological approach that entails yield optimisation, crop divergence, and synergistic integration of natural processes (Wright, 2021). The changes brought about by the Industrial Revolution are making it more difficult to feed poor and hungry people worldwide, especially given changes in diet due to urbanisation and growing meat consumption (Pretty et al., 2003). According to Dalgaard et al. (2003), agroecology is defined as “the study of the interactions between plants, animals, humans, and the environment within agricultural systems”. Another common definition is “the application of ecological science to design and management of sustainable agroecosystems” (Dalgaard et al., 2003). Gliessman argues that the definition of agroecology needs to go beyond the spatial scale and enter the food system (cited in Wezel & Soldat, 2009). Agroecological farms entail the integration of multiple crops, livestock, and other resources that maximise “beneficial biological interactions and feedback loops” (Akram-Lodhi, 2021, p. 702). However, agroecology is widely regarded not just as a scientific discipline but also as a movement and practice (Dalgaard et al., 2003; Wezel & Soldat, 2009; Wezel et al., 2009). Central to political agroecology is the concept of sovereignty and its derivatives such as food (“the right to have access to safe, nutritious and culturally appropriate food in sufficient quantity and quality”), energy (access to sufficient energy within ecological limits), and technological sovereignty (capacity to achieve food and energy sovereignty) (Altieri et al., 2012; van der Ploeg, 2021). According to La Via Campesina, the results from agroecology include “increased autonomy from input markets, putting peasant families in control of their own production systems, restoring degraded soils, living in harmony with the Mother Earth, producing healthy food, improving the economic viability of peasant agriculture, and building

Women’s empowerment in APCNF  239 food sovereignty up from the level of the peasant family to the national level” (Rosset et al., 2011, p. 165). The successes of agroecological practices and sustainable agriculture have been researched and documented. An analysis of environmentally sensitive, low-cost alternatives to agriculture in 52 developing countries showed positive benefits in terms of the intensification of a single component of a farm system, better cropping intensity due to more efficient use of land and water, inclusion of new productive elements to the farm system, and improvements in per hectare yields (Pretty et al., 2003). In dealing with soil degradation, especially poor soils that are acidic, phosphorus-deficient, and aluminum-toxic, agroecological practices such as the integration of crop and animal production, the use of green manures and cover crops, and growing leguminous species in intercropping have proven to be successful (Uphoff, 2002). Soil fertility is a key dimension in measuring the success of agroecology as it maintains productive potential while sequestering carbon (Akram-Lodhi, 2021, p. 702). As agroecological movements envision short value chains and local production and consumption cycles, there is potential for reduced waste as well. The waste percentage for processed foods is 0.59 times that of fresh foods (Kummu et al., 2012). Agroecology enhances returns on energy expenditures while providing the potential to increase energy surplus (Akram-Lodhi, 2021). Agroecology differs from organic farming on multiple counts. Organic farming only substitutes chemical inputs for organic inputs, which are just as affordable (Rosset et al., 2011). It does not move away from monocultures and does not produce yields comparable with industrial agriculture (Rosset et al., 2011; Altieri & Toledo; 2011). Moreover, it relies on expensive certification or fair trade regulations, mostly oriented towards exports in uncertain and distant markets (Altieri & Toledo; 2011). Unlike organic farming, agroecology is more cost-effective and can produce yields comparable to industrial agriculture (Rosset et al., 2011; Martin & Sauerborn, 2013a). It was found that soil health improved in sustainable agricultural systems, which created other benefits in terms of improved yields, longer productive seasons, better water-holding capacity, increased organic matter, reduced hunger, improved nutrition, and improved natural, social, and human capital (Pretty et al., 2003). Research shows that agroecological systems are more resilient and robust against climate change due to their ability to diversify and minimise risks (Altieri, 2012). For practitioners of agroecology, transition relies on the practice of deliberate democracy, grassroots approaches, and farmer-to-farmer extension rather than the conventional model which views farmers as passive (Rosset et al., 2011; Altieri & Toledo; 2011). Peasant pedagogy involves five principles: begin slowly on a small scale, limit the introduction of new methods, achieve rapid and recognisable successes, carry out small-scale experiments, and develop a multiplier effect (Rosset et al., 2011, p. 170). Compared to other forms of agriculture, agroecology defines itself as political and defends the rights of small-scale Indigenous farmers. For Indigenous cultures, land is at the core of all spirituality, and the food chain is not just a material circuit but an energy circuit as well (Wright, 2021). The concept of energy flow entails sets of trophic interactions, and in industrial agrosystems, recycling of nutrients is minimal, and most of the energy is lost with the harvest due to a reduction in permanent biomass levels within the system (Gliessman, 1990a). Political agroecology considers the broader institutions and structures that shape our global economy. In doing so, it envisions a radical change at all levels of the economy that can

240  Handbook of social justice in the Global South reproduce itself and exist in opposition to the dominance of the neoliberal Corporate Food Regime (CFR) or industrialised and globalised food systems (Molina et al., 2019; Mendez et al., 2021). For agroecology to succeed, it must create alliances at all levels of the food supply chain, from individual players such as landless peasants to consumers and large entities such as civil society and the state to fight “institutional monoculture” (Molina et al., 2019). Traditionally, agroecological movements were pro-peasant and anti-state, but in view of present challenges, “deliberate democracy” is heralded as it must represent those who cannot speak (the silent biotic community) as well as those who could not (the future generation). Scaling agroecology comes with its own set of challenges. It must entail a “multiplicity of interstitial movements flowing from the particular” (Molina et al., 2019, p. 99). Agroecological movements are culturally specific and historically influenced movements that follow a non-linear trajectory. Additionally, it faces the challenges of rejection, co-optation, or subordination. This is in contrast to the agricultural modernisation ideology which pushed “deterministic, linear and externalist” visions of technical and social change. This has resulted in depeasantisation, wherein large numbers of peasants have been transformed into petty commodity producers, as they have become increasingly dependent on external markets and were excluded from common property resources due to the advent of private property. Free market environmentalism, on the other hand, aims to project itself as the market solution to environmental issues, which supports the privatisation of natural resources (Peet et al., 2011). Although industrial agriculture dominates food systems, family firms operate 75 per cent of the world’s agricultural land. The peasant economy and the agroecological movement’s aim towards re-peasantisation present their own challenges owing to their unique economic organisation. It is not possible to extract or appropriate surplus as the family itself the capital driving production, and it prioritises control over the means of production. Agroecology envisions a return to the peasant (re-peasantisation) or household economy, as exploitation and appropriation of surplus are not possible under these conditions. In this alternate form of economy, key elements include an independent resource base; distance from external capital and the emergence of new, localised markets; re-skilling of labour through farmer exchanges and emergent technologies; and local self-regulation (van der Ploeg, 2021). Additionally, family farms dominate 75 per cent of the world’s agricultural land (Molina et al., 2019). Cooperative institutional frameworks inherent to these economies have been resilient even in the face of state control or the more recent neoliberal commodification (and privatisation) of natural resources. Elinor Ostrom (2015) has demonstrated brilliantly the superior management of natural resources based on cooperative frameworks by Indigenous communities over the market through effective sanctions, to minimise community loss and benefit private enterprises as well as the state. Similarly, the emergence, functioning, and normative frameworks of agroecological systems reflect the unique technical, socio-cultural, historical, and economic sensibilities of the context (Molina et al., 2019; Mendez et al., 2021). It is important to note the distinction between the two types of institutional frameworks: endogenous and exogenous (Molina et al., 2019). The former is when the impetus to coordinate and control comes internally from specific historical and cultural contexts. The impetus for exogenous cooperation is external and regulatory.

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16.8 AGROECOLOGY IN SOUTH ASIA The case study revolves around an alternative farming, agricultural, and food system known as agroecology, which differs from its more widespread counterpart to which I will refer as industrial agriculture (used synonymously with conventional or commercial farming). Andhra Pradesh Community-Managed Natural Farming (APCNF), initiated by a not-for-profit company named Rythu Sadhikara Samstha (RySS) in the state of Andhra Pradesh, is one such programme that is geared towards achieving a climate-resilient, agroecological shift to natural farming from commercial agriculture. APCNF is based on agroecological principles and organised around the use of four inputs based on locally and naturally available resources (a variety of locally produced concoctions, mixtures, and inoculants to enhance “soil fertility regeneration, reduction of water use and increase in on-farm species diversity”) (Chestermen et al., 2020). The main agents for scaling the programme are Community Resource Persons (CRPs), who consists of women-led Self-Help Group (SHG) members (Chestermen et al., 2020). The main vision of this programme is to equip farmers with a conceptual understanding of sustainable agricultural systems, rather than encouraging them through market incentives. Much of the success of this programme is concentrated in the semi-arid zones (southern zone and scarce rainfall zone) of Andhra Pradesh, where rainfall and cropping intensity is low, and farmer suicides are high (APDES, 2020; Naidu, 2019). Given that the majority (82 per cent) of the farmers in India are small and marginal farmers, the message of low-cost input, ecologically sustainable farming without yield penalty appealed to farmers (Muenster, 2018; CEEW, 2020; IDSAP, 2023). At present, one million farmers across the state have adopted APCNF. While there is attention from different scientific organisations and academic institutions about the scientific aspects of agroecology, there is insufficient information about the socioeconomic and political aspects of the transition. There is a lacuna of information and understanding with respect to the social benefits of natural farming as well as a critical analysis of the political economy under which this system operates. Without political ecology, the ecology of natural farming will remain irrelevant as it will not address the economics of unsustainable and industrial agricultural systems. Since women and small farmers are the focus of APCNF, they are the main subjects of the research study. Small farmers are defined as those who own less than five acres of land. Small farms are defined in opposition to large farms as being more productive, having more biodiversity, and being more environmentally friendly. Given the principles of agroecology, there is insufficient information on how the processes of feminisation occur in specific cases, such as in APCNF. Therefore, it is important to gain knowledge on the perceptions, motivations, and beliefs of small-scale women farmers who are intended to be the main beneficiaries and drivers of such a change. Agroecology, in theory, also aims at gender equality and creating alliances with feminist and peasant movements. However, issues related to gender have been largely sidelined by the agroecological movement. While some claim that gender and agroecology are a natural pairing, the results have been mixed (Zaremba et al., 2021). Most of the studies are heavily context-sensitive, and therefore, diverse results are hardly a surprise. Pretty et al. (2003) analysed 208 sustainable farming projects in 52 developing countries and found that women beneficiaries increased their social status from the “learn by doing” approach as it increased their confidence, skills, and awareness. In a study of agroecology in Cuba, Rosset (2011) found that women played an important role in agroecology. However, they tend to be concentrated

242  Handbook of social justice in the Global South in the bottom ranks of the hierarchy rather than higher up. In a comparative study of farmers in agroecology and conventional farming in southeast Nigeria, it was found in both samples that women farmers had little access to land, even lower ownership of land, little exposure to extension services, and no access to financial credits (Ume et al., 2022). However, agroecology farmers had lower food insecurity experiences and higher observed dietary diversity scores, with most benefits attributed to those farmers who balanced self-consumption and the market as food sources rather than relying on only one source (Ume et al., 2022). In a literature review of the links between agroecology and food security, Ume et al. (2022) argued that input reduction, production diversification, and climate resilience were pathways from agroecology to food and nutritional security. All this points to the fact that agroecology and other allied movements operate as partial movements with respect to theory, as there is no agroecological field that aligns perfectly. As long as issues related to gender are not part of methodical and deliberate transition efforts, agroecology cannot fulfil its feminist aspirations. Although agroecology aims at feminisation, opportunity costs for agroecological techniques such as composting need to be considered. Agroecological methods are highly labour-intensive and increase drudgery, which may lead to more time deficits and a greater number of workdays for women compared to men (Zaremba et al., 2021). Moreover, women are more disadvantaged compared to men; they face insecure land tenure, allocation of small-size and low-quality plots, and inadequate access to capital, knowledge, and productive resources to practice sustainable soil management (Lacey, 2013; Zaremba et al., 2021). On the other hand, enhanced self-sufficiency owing to sustainable farming may reduce the disproportionate labour burden of women (Zaremba et al., 2021). The principle of fairness in agroecology by Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) dictates that agroecology is less about increasing women’s options and more about generating an economy where women’s productive and reproductive work is made visible and shared (Zaremba et al., 2021).

16.9 CONCLUSION The study of political agroecology entails consideration of certain theoretical viewpoints and empirical evidence that demonstrate the challenges and barriers to its advancement and progress. Although agroecological movements exist globally, they occupy a liminal space wherein the agroecological principles and movements cannot achieve full success. Van der Ploeg (2021) characterises agroecology’s position as defensive (restricting processes of external management) and offensive (offering a space for progressive movements to develop). Therefore, it is important to study critical issues in contemporary economic systems. Agroecology, particularly political agroecology, intersects with ecology, polity, society, and economy to address the political and sociological aspects of the Anthropocene. Climate change poses a major threat to food production and supply, particularly in Africa, and is viewed as a new axis for inequality. Climate change mitigation and adaptation require social and environmental justice to address existing social inequities and inequalities. Negotiations on global climate change are difficult due to inter-country differences and histories, and differences in contributions to carbon emissions and consumption patterns. Moreover, neoliberal capitalism has altered the nature of inequality, with within-country emissions accounting for most of the global carbon inequality rather than between-country inequality.

Women’s empowerment in APCNF  243 Several sociological theories explain the opposition between capitalism and the environment, the unequal distribution of power across nations, industries, societies, and communities, the disastrous effects of unfair trade practices, and the exploitation of land, resources, and labour in the Global South. The global political economy is lacking adequate legal and regulatory infrastructure and institutions to control or account for the dual effects of globalisation and neoliberalism. Scholars argue that this is deliberate to allow for continued and unchecked economic expansion of capital, scales, lower reproduction costs, and improved profits. Global agriculture produces a dual system of small, medium, and large family farms and megacorporations. In driving neoliberalism and global capital into agriculture, financialisation and global land grabs are highly consequential for agricultural sectors across the world. The contemporary system is characterised by the consolidation of corporate power and the reduction of small farmers to semi-proletarianised wage-labourers. La Via Campesina, a large peasant organisation, claims that industrial agriculture has led to poverty, rural-urban migration, hunger, and environmental degradation. Small farmers in tropical regions will be one of the most vulnerable groups due to climate change, given their pre-existing vulnerability, low SES, outdoor working conditions, incidence of indebtedness, exposure to environmental and economic risks, and so on. However, small farmers are also key to the world’s food production. Scholars argue that small farms are more productive, resource-conserving, and represent models of sustainability and agrobiodiversity. Sustainable agricultural programmes need to consider the economic needs of farmers for successful implementation. Sustainable farming practices require farmer engagement in market exchange and a willingness to sacrifice short-term income and consumption activities for long-term benefits. The concept of agroecology emerged as a response to create alternatives to industrial farming that is detrimental to the interests of small farmers and rural populations as well as the environment. It aims to achieve sustainable agriculture by making the best use of nature’s goods and services without damaging the environment. Agroecology is regarded as not only a scientific discipline but also a movement and practice, which seeks to improve food security and environmental degradation. As a scientific discipline, it aims to integrate ecology in a holistic and synergistic manner. As a movement, it aims for the sovereignty of rural communities as well as fostering alliances with peasant and feminist organisations. As a practice, it seeks the transition of the farm system through practices of deliberative democracy and participatory development. Agroecology is cost-effective, socially just, and environmentally friendly, and can produce yields comparable to industrial agriculture. However, the feminist goals of agroecology are yet to produce effects in the fields they operate. Very few empirical studies, if any, study the processes of feminisation in agroecology. Therefore, it is important to focus on small-scale women farmers to assess the viability of political agroecology’s claim of advancing women’s and Indigenous farmers’ interests.

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Women’s empowerment in APCNF  245 Givens, J. E., Clark, B., & Jorgenson, A. K. (2016). Strengthening the ties between environmental sociology and sociology of development. In G. Hooks, S. Makaryan, P. Almeida, D. Brown, S. Cohn, S. Curran, R. Emigh, H. Hung, A. Jorgenson, R. Lachmann, L. Lobao, & V. Moghadam (Eds.), The sociology of development handbook (1st ed., pp. 69–94). University of California Press. http://www​ .jstor​.org​/stable​/10​.1525​/j​.ctv1xxwbg.7 Gliessman, S. R. (1990a). Agroecology: Researching the ecological basis for sustainable agriculture. In S. R. Gliessman (Ed.), Agroecology (Vol. 78, pp. 3–10). Springer Berlin Heidelberg. https://doi​.org​ /10​.1007​/978–1-4612–3252–0_1 Gliessman, S. R. (1990b). Quantifying the Agroecological Component of Sustainable Agriculture: A Goal. In S. R. Gliessman (Ed.), Agroecology (Vol. 78, pp. 366–370). Springer Berlin Heidelberg. https://doi​.org​/10​.1007​/978–1-4612–3252–0_21 Holt-Giménez, E., Shattuck, A., Altieri, M. A., Herren, H. R., & Gliessman, S. (2012). We already grow enough food for 10 billion people … and still can’t end hunger. Journal of Sustainable Agriculture, 36(6), 595–598. https://doi​.org​/10​.1080​/10440046​.2012​.695331 Institute for Development Studies Andhra Pradesh [IDSAP]. (2023). Assessing the impact of APCNF [Andhra Pradesh Community Managed Natural Farming]: A comprehensive approach using crop cutting experiments. Second Interim Report 2022–23. APCNF. https://apcnf​.in​/wp​-content​/uploads​ /2024​/02​/APCNF​-Kharif​-Report​-2022​-23​- 05​_19102023​-1​.pdf Jackson, J. T., Dellinger, K., McKee, K., & Trefzer, A. (2016). Interdisciplinary perspectives on the Global South and Global North. In G. Hooks, S. Makaryan, P. Almeida, D. Brown, S. Cohn, S. Curran, R. Emigh, H. Hung, A. Jorgenson, R. Lachmann, L. Lobao, & V. Moghadam (Eds.), The sociology of development handbook (1st ed., pp. 129–152). University of California Press. http:// www​.jstor​.org​/stable​/10​.1525​/j​.ctv1xxwbg.9 Jonas, T. (2021). Peoples’ solutions to food systems transformation in Asia and the Pacific. Development, 64(3–4), 295–298. https://doi​.org​/10​.1057​/s41301–021–00306-z Kummu, M., Moel, D. H., Porkka, M., Siebert, S., Varis, O., & Ward, P. B. (2012). Lost food, wasted resources: Global food supply chain losses and their impacts on freshwater, cropland, and fertiliser use. Science of the Total Environment, 438, 477–489. https://doi​.org​/10​.1016​/j​.scitotenv​.2012​.08​.092 Lacey, H. (2013). Food sovereignty and safeguarding food security for everyone: Issues for scientific investigation. Conference paper presented at Food sovereignty: A critical dialogue, Yale University, September 14–15. Martin, K., & Sauerborn, J. (2013a). Agroecological aspects of global change. In K. Martin & J. Sauerborn (Eds.), Agroecology (pp. 299–324). Springer Nature. https://doi​.org​/10​.1007​/978–94–007–5917–6_8 Martin, K., & Sauerborn, J. (2013b). Origin and Development of Agriculture. In K. Martin & J. Sauerborn (Eds.), Agroecology (pp. 9–48). Springer Nature. https://doi​.org​/10​.1007​/978–94–007–5917–6_2 Mendez, V. E., Bacon, C. M., Cohen, R., & Gliessman, S. R. (2021). Agroecology: A transdisciplinary, participatory and action-oriented approach (Advances in agroecology). CRC Press. Molina, D. M. G., Petersen, P. F., Peña, F. G., & Caporal, F. R. (2019). Political agroecology: Advancing the transition to sustainable food systems (Advances in agroecology) (1st ed.). CRC Press. ​Muenster, D. (2018). Performing alternative agriculture: Critique and recuperation in Zero Budget Natural Farming, South India. Journal of Political Ecology, 25(1). https://doi​.org​/10​.2458​/v25i1​ .22388 Naidu, A. T. (2019, June 1). 1,513 farmers committed suicide since mid-2014 in state. The Hindu. https:// www​.thehindu​.com ​/news​/cities​/ Vijayawada ​/1513​-farmers​- committed​-suicide​-since​-mid​-2014 ​-in​ -state​/article27395256​.ece Ostrom, E. (2015). Governing the commons (Canto Classics) (Reissue ed.). Cambridge University Press. Patnaik, U. (2021). An alternative perspective on the agrarian question in Europe and in the developing countries. In A. H. Akram-Lodhi, K. Dietz, B. Engels, & B. M. McKay (Eds.), Handbook of critical agrarian studies (pp. 45–51). Edward Elgar Publishing. Peet, R., Robbins, P., & Watts, M. (2011). Global political ecology (1st ed.). Routledge. Perfecto, I., Wright, A., Vandermeer, J. H. (2009). Nature’s matrix: Linking agriculture, conservation and food sovereignty. Earthscan. Pretty, J., Morison, J., & Hine, R. (2003). Reducing food poverty by increasing agricultural sustainability in developing countries. Agriculture, Ecosystems & Environment, 95(1), 217–234. https://doi​.org​/10​ .1016​/s0167–8809(02)00087–7

246  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Rosset, P. (2000). The multiple functions and benefits of small farm agriculture in the context of global trade negotiations. Development, 43(2), 77–82. https://doi​.org​/10​.1057​/palgrave​.development​.1110149 Rosset, P., Sosa, B. M., Jaime, A. M. R., & Lozano, D. R. Á. (2011). The Campesino-to-Campesino agroecology movement of ANAP in Cuba: Social process methodology in the construction of sustainable peasant agriculture and food sovereignty. The Journal of Peasant Studies, 38(1), 161–191. https://doi​.org​/10​.1080​/03066150​.2010​.538584 Ume, C. O., Nuppenau, E., & Domptail, S. (2022). A feminist economics perspective on the agroecologyfood and nutrition security nexus. Environmental and Sustainability Indicators, 16, 100212. https:// doi​.org​/10​.1016​/j​.indic​.2022​.100212 Uphoff, N. (2002). Agroecological innovations: Increasing food production with participatory development. Routledge. van der Ploeg, J. D. (2021). The political economy of agroecology. The Journal of Peasant Studies, 48(2), 274–297. https://doi​.org​/10​.1080​/03066150​.2020​.1725489 Watts, M. (2021). The agrarian question. In A. H. Akram-Lodhi, K. Dietz, B. Engels, & B. M. McKay (Eds.), Handbook of critical agrarian studies (pp. 53–66). Edward Elgar Publishing. Wezel, A., Bellon, S., Dore, T., Francis, C., Vallod, D., & David, C. (2009). Agroecology as a science, a movement and a practice. A review. Agronomy for Sustainable Development, 29(4), 503–515. https:// doi​.org​/10​.1051​/agro​/2009004 Wezel, A., & Soldat, V. (2009). A quantitative and qualitative historical analysis of the scientific discipline of agroecology. International Journal of Agricultural Sustainability, 7(1), 3–18. https:// doi​.org​/10​.3763​/ijas​.2009​.0400 Wright, J. (2021). Re-enchanting agriculture farming with the hidden half of nature. In J. Wright (Ed.), Subtle agroecologies: Farming with the hidden half of nature (1st ed., pp. 3–20). CRC Press. Zaremba, H., Elias, M., Rietveld, A., & Bergamini, N. (2021). Toward a feminist agroecology. Sustainability, 13(20), 11244. https://doi​.org​/10​.3390​/su132011244

17. Socio-economic impacts of involuntary return migration A case study of Bangladeshi migrant workers during the COVID-19 pandemic Sebak Kumar Saha and Rhidoy Ahmed

17.1 INTRODUCTION Since the beginning of 2020, the world has been battling the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, the biggest health crisis of recent times (International Labour Organization [ILO], 2021; Siddiqui, 2021a). The pandemic has threatened human lives and livelihoods, as well as the global economy (ACAPS, 2020). The labour market is one of the worst-affected sectors, and the international migrant worker population is one of the worst-affected groups in that sector (Thapa et al., 2020; Young Power in Social Action, 2020). Millions of migrants have lost their jobs. While some have left their host countries, others are stranded there (Coz & Newland, 2021). The return of these migrants to their homes has posed a formidable challenge, as they have returned when their own countries are under tremendous pressure to tackle the health crisis and their economies are already battered due to the pandemic and lockdown measures (Alam, 2021; Coz & Newland, 2021; Khatun, 2020). Bangladesh is a major source of international migrant workers (Akhter & Islam, 2019). About 13.3 million Bangladeshi workers travelled overseas for work between 1976 and September 2021 (Bureau of Manpower, Employment and Training [BMET], 2021). Currently, the number of Bangladeshi migrant workers working globally is at least 10 million (Alam, 2021; Dhaka Tribune, 2021b). About 2.5 million people join the workforce each year in Bangladesh (Masud et al., 2019). However, the country cannot create enough jobs to absorb its labour force (Masud et al., 2019; Sarkar et al., 2018). As Bangladesh has a labour surplus (Sarkar et al., 2018; Siddiqui & Abrar, 2003), international migration of Bangladeshi workers plays a vital role in the economy, and it is predicted to remain an important component of Bangladesh’s economy in the future (Masud et al., 2019; Sarkar et al., 2018). Unlike other economic shocks, the COVID-19 pandemic has negatively impacted the economies of migrant-sending as well as migrant-recipient countries simultaneously (Chowdhury & Chakraborty, 2021). Many host countries have compelled or encouraged migrants to return to their countries of origin as a measure to address the crisis caused by the pandemic (Rashid et al., 2021;Siddiqui, 2021a; United Nations Network on Migration [UNNM], 2020). As a result, Bangladesh and other labour-sending countries, such as India, Pakistan, and Nepal, have experienced a large-scale return of their labour migrants from a number of destination countries (Alam, 2021; Siddiqui, 2021a; Dhaka Tribune, 2021b). While many of them have returned to their home country voluntarily, a large number of them have returned involuntarily (Dhaka Tribune, 2020; Coz & Newland, 2021; Sahai et al., 2020; UNNM, 2020). 248

Socio-economic impacts of involuntary return migration  249 Making a distinction between voluntary and involuntary return migration can be difficult. This chapter uses the term “involuntary return migrant” because the interviewed return migrants were compelled to leave the host country due to job losses without completing their employment contract period, despite having a proper visa and work permit, i.e., they returned under compulsion and pressure (International Organization for Migration [IOM], 2019c; Mensah, 2016; Newland, 2017; Roberts et al., 2017). Involuntary return migrants and their households experience serious socio-economic and mental crises due to their return. This chapter examines the socio-economic impacts on households of involuntary return Bangladeshi migrant workers.

17.2 IMPACTS OF COVID-19 ON BANGLADESHI MIGRANT WORKERS 17.2.1 Destination Countries, Skill Composition and Type, and Remittances Bangladeshi migrant workers go mainly to Middle Eastern countries, especially the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries of Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE), and South-East Asian countries, such as Malaysia and Singapore (ACAPS, 2020; BMET, 2021; IOM, 2005; Sorkar, 2020). Gulf countries are favoured as they rely heavily on foreign labour migrants for their economic prosperity (Weeraratne, 2020). Between 1976 and September 2021, Saudi Arabia was the top destination country for Bangladeshi migrant workers, followed by the UAE and Oman (see Table 17.1) (BMET, 2021). The total number of Bangladeshis employed overseas in 2018 and 2019 was 734,181 and 700,159, respectively, while in 2020 and 2021 (up to September) it was 217,669 and 317,011, respectively (BMET, 2021). About 60 per cent, 77 per cent, 87 per cent, and 89 per cent of total overseas employment from Bangladesh in 2018, 2019, 2020, and 2021 (up to September), respectively, were to the six Gulf countries (BMET, 2021). Moreover, 35 per cent, 57 per cent, 74 per cent, and 78 per cent of total overseas employment from Bangladesh in 2018, 2019, 2020, and 2021 (up to September), respectively, were to Saudi Arabia only (BMET, 2021). Bangladesh received about 73 per cent of its total remittance in 2019 from the migrants of only six GCC countries (Sorkar, 2020). Most Bangladeshi migrant workers around the world are less-skilled or semi-skilled temporary migrants (BMET, 2020; Masud et al., 2019). Bangladeshi migrant workers in Middle Eastern and South-East Asian countries are mainly temporary migrant workers; they go to these countries for short-term employment and return home after the employment contract period expires, if the contract is not renewed (Bossavie et al., 2021; IOM, 2005). These shortterm migrants migrate mainly for better jobs and to avoid unemployment and poverty in Bangladesh (IOM, 2005). Overseas migration offers them the opportunity to earn considerably more than in Bangladesh (Akhter & Islam, 2019). In 2020, Bangladesh was the seventh top remittance recipient country among low- and middle-income countries in the world and the third top remittance recipient country among South Asian countries by total amount (World Bank, 2021). Bangladesh received US$18.9 billion in remittances in 2021 (up to October) while it received US$21.7 billion in 2020 and US$18.3 billion in 2019 (Bangladesh Bank, 2021; World Bank, 2020, 2021). Remittance is

250  Handbook of social justice in the Global South

Table 17.1  Overseas employment of Bangladeshi migrant workers for major destination countries from 1976 to September 2021 Country

Number of Bangladeshis employed overseas

Saudi Arabia

4,458,133

UAE

2,377,344

Oman

1,546,220

Malaysia

1,057,213

Qatar

817,473

Singapore

806,274

Kuwait

631,105

Bahrain

410,472

Lebanon

267,703

Jordan

193,652

Libya

122,498

Iraq

75,752

Brunei

75,433

Mauritius

71,511

Italy

55,823

South Korea

41,760

Source: BMET (2021).

the second-largest source of foreign income in Bangladesh (Sorkar, 2020). The remittance Bangladesh received in 2020 was 6.6 per cent of the country’s gross domestic product (World Bank, 2021). Remittances sent by migrants contribute greatly to the socio-economic development of Bangladesh as well as the migrant workers and their households (Chowdhury & Chakraborty, 2021; Karim et al., 2020). At the national level, remittances help alleviate poverty, enrich foreign reserves, and support national investment and various other social developments, as well as the implementation of infrastructure projects such as the Padma Bridge (Chowdhury & Chakraborty, 2021; Karim et al., 2020). At the household level, remittances serve as a vital source of livelihood for a large number of migrant households (Chowdhury & Chakraborty, 2021; Siddiqui & Abrar, 2003) and make up a large portion of household income for many poor migrant households (Mobarak et al., 2020). Remittances contribute to poverty reduction (ACAPS, 2020) and improved living standards of migrant households by increasing their capacity to meet their basic needs (Reza et al., 2021). Migrant households in Bangladesh use remittance income for various purposes, such as food, clothing, education, healthcare, durable goods (fridge, TV, furniture, etc.), social ceremonies, loan repayments, release of mortgaged land, building and repair of housing, purchase of land, taking on a mortgage of land, investment, financing the migration of other family members, pilgrimage of family members, and savings (IOM, 2005; Kumar et al., 2018; Reza et al., 2021; Siddiqui & Abrar, 2003). Although Bangladeshi labour migrant households

Socio-economic impacts of involuntary return migration  251 use remittances for various purposes, the most important are food and clothing (IOM, 2005; Kumar et al., 2018; Siddiqui & Abrar, 2003). 17.2.2 The Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic The 1973 oil crisis and the Asian financial crisis of 1997–1999 showed that international migrants suffer more than citizens of host countries during difficult times (Castles & Vezzoli, 2009; Siddiqui, 2021a). Host countries often force migrants to leave the country in order to create jobs for their own citizens (Castles & Vezzoli, 2009; Siddiqui, 2021a). The unique nature of the COVID-19 pandemic created a greater risk for migrants than previous crises, as it not only badly affected their livelihoods but also created more risks to their health and lives (Siddiqui, 2021a; Siddiqui et al., 2021). The pandemic disproportionately affected migrants, especially low-skilled migrant workers (Migration Data Portal [MDP], 2021). Data from some countries show that the COVID-19 infection rate was higher among migrants compared to citizens of those countries (Siddiqui, 2021a). For instance, more than 95 per cent of the confirmed COVID-19 cases in Singapore by 19 June 2020 were migrants, and more than 93 per cent were related to the dormitories of the migrants (MDP, 2021). Likewise, migrants accounted for 75 per cent of all newly confirmed COVID-19 cases, as of 7 May 2020, in Saudi Arabia (MDP, 2021). The infection rate was higher among migrants due to their poor working and living conditions (MDP, 2021). Similarly, migrants were at higher risk of dying from the virus due to their limited access to healthcare services (MDP, 2021). The pandemic hit Bangladeshi migrant workers hard worldwide. It exposed them to various problems such as health risks and shocks, limited or lack of access to healthcare services, food shortages, complete or partial loss of employment, wage theft, stress and anxiety, and fear of arrest and deportation (Siddiqui, 2021b). The pandemic also badly affected Bangladeshi migrant workers through infections and deaths. About 70,000 Bangladeshi migrants in 186 countries became infected with the COVID-19 virus in the first four months of the pandemic, and more than 2,330 Bangladeshi migrants had died of COVID-19 abroad by 28 December 2020. Of them, 979 died in Saudi Arabia (Siddiqui et al., 2021). Data from Singapore show that the rate of infection among Bangladeshi migrants was very high compared to citizens as well as migrants of other countries. For instance, almost one-third of all infected people in Singapore by mid-April 2020 were Bangladeshi migrants (Bhuiyan, 2020). By the end of December 2020, about 45 per cent of all infected migrants in Singapore were Bangladeshi migrants (Hasan, 2020). In some host countries, the death toll of Bangladeshi migrants was also very high compared to the migrants of other countries. For instance, by July 2020, 122 out of 327 migrants and 70 out of 382 migrants who died due to COVID-19 in the UAE and Kuwait, respectively, were Bangladeshi (Siddiqui et al., 2021). The pandemic also affected Bangladeshi migrant workers through job losses and harassment from the governments and employers of host countries (Perera, 2021). It severely impacted the economies of the Middle Eastern countries, Malaysia, and Singapore, which host most of Bangladesh’s migrant workers (Chowdhury & Chakraborty, 2021; Ministry of Trade and Industry, 2020; Rahman et al., 2020). The pandemic badly affected the food and hospitality, transport, and construction sectors in those countries (Chowdhury & Chakraborty, 2021; Weeraratne, 2020) and therefore reduced overall demand for migrant workers (Chowdhury & Chakraborty, 2021). As a result, Bangladeshi migrant workers experienced

252  Handbook of social justice in the Global South job loss, underemployment, lower wages, non-payment of wages, and cuts in employment benefits (Weeraratne, 2020). Among Bangladeshi migrants working overseas, about 27 per cent lost their jobs and 26 per cent became partially employed due to the pandemic (Rashid et al., 2021). The same study also showed that 32 per cent of Bangladeshi migrants working overseas did not receive any salary after the pandemic started, while 35 per cent received partial payment and 33 per cent received full payment. Moreover, migrants who had not lost their jobs received low or late salaries (Rashid et al., 2021). On top of the pandemic, the drop in oil prices and the nationalisation of jobs in some sectors in the Gulf countries badly affected migrants, particularly Bangladeshi migrant workers (Sorkar, 2020). Bangladeshi migrant workers mainly experienced one of five situations due to the pandemic: they lost their job and became stranded in host countries without the means to meet their basic needs and return to Bangladesh (Chowdhury & Chakraborty, 2021; Sorkar, 2020); they did not lose their job but received low wages or did not get wages from their employers (Karim et al., 2020); they were forced to return to Bangladesh due to the job losses caused by the pandemic (IOM, 2020b); they returned to Bangladesh as they were worried about the pandemic or their families asked them to return due to the pandemic (IOM, 2020b); and they came to Bangladesh on leave and became stuck due to travel bans (Abdullah, 2021; Ahamad, 2021; Chowdhury & Chakraborty, 2021; Hasan, 2021; Karim et al., 2020; Mahmud & Hasan, 2021). In addition, some received newly granted work visas but were unable to fly to host countries due to travel bans (Chowdhury & Chakraborty, 2021; Karim et al., 2020). Many of the migrants who came to Bangladesh on leave had already lost their jobs (IOM, 2020a), whereas many were uncertain and worried about whether their employers would consider their circumstances and retain their contracts (Chowdhury & Chakraborty, 2021).Likewise, people who had been newly granted work visas were also worried about their contracts, as they were unable to travel to host countries due to travel bans (Chowdhury & Chakraborty, 2021). Bangladesh experienced a storm of returning migrant workers due to the pandemic. About 500,000 returned between March 2020 and April 2021 for various reasons, including job loss in the host countries (Dhaka Tribune, 2021b). More than 400,000 migrant workers, about 200,000 between mid-February and mid-March, returned to Bangladesh in 2020 due to the pandemic, while the number of return migrants in a typical year in Bangladesh used to be 50,000 (ACAPS, 2020; Alam, 2021; BRAC, 2021b). In addition to the large-scale return migration, Bangladesh also experienced a significant fall in the out-migration of Bangladeshi workers due to the pandemic. For instance, the number of Bangladeshi workers migrating to various countries for employment dropped from 700,159 in 2019 to 217,669 in 2020 (BMET, 2021). While many of the return migrants might have returned voluntarily to reunite and stay with their families during this difficult time, a large number were forced to return to Bangladesh (Dhaka Tribune, 2020; Coz & Newland, 2021; IOM, 2020b; Rashid et al., 2021; Sahai et al., 2020). For instance, one survey of 558 Bangladeshi return migrants found that 40 per cent were forced to return (Dhaka Tribune, 2020). Another study on 131 Bangladeshi return migrants shows that 30 per cent were asked by their employers to leave the host country (IOM, 2020b). Involuntary return migrants experienced serious socio-economic and mental health impacts due to the involuntary nature of their return (Sikder et al., 2021). In addition to their sudden job loss and consequent income loss, they experienced prejudice and discrimination in destination

Socio-economic impacts of involuntary return migration  253 countries (Sikder et al., 2021). Many of them did not even receive their due wages and had to leave their assets in the host countries (Rashid et al., 2021; Refugee and Migratory Movements Research Unit [RMMRU], 2020). They also experienced abuse and discrimination after returning to Bangladesh. Media reports and some government activities branded them carriers of the virus, creating panic among local people. As a result, some return migrants, including involuntary return migrants, experienced harassment in their neighbourhoods, and return migrants and their household members were denied access to important places such as local shops. However, the attitude of locals changed over time (Sikder et al., 2021). A large number of involuntary return migrants are struggling (Dhaka Tribune, 2020). A survey by Brac on 558 return migrants (40 per cent of whom were compelled to return) from various countries shows that 87 per cent have been struggling with no source of income during the pandemic, while 74 per cent have been living with worry, fear, and mental stress, and more than 50 per cent require urgent financial aid (Dhaka Tribune, 2020). In some cases, the dissatisfaction of household members upon their sudden return also saddened the return migrant (Sikder et al., 2021).

17.3 METHODOLOGY Interviewees were Bangladeshi temporary overseas migrant workers who had to return to Bangladesh involuntarily due to job loss caused by the pandemic. All interviewees returned to Bangladesh without completing their employment contract period, despite having valid visas and work permits for their host country. Data were collected through in-depth, semi-structured interviews conducted with 20 male return migrants. Fifteen were from Iraq, three were from Singapore, and two were from the UAE. The interviews were conducted between May and June 2021 in three districts of Bangladesh: Brahmanbaria, Mymensingh, and Narsingdi. Data were collected from 10 villages of four upazilas of three districts (see Table 17.2). Participants were recruited through snowball sampling. Five return migrants were contacted by the first author. Of them, four (two from Iraq, one from Singapore, and one from the

Table 17.2  Locations of interviews with involuntary return migrants District

Upazila

Village

No. of interviews

Brahmanbaria

Ashugonj

Araishidha

7

Brahmanbaria

Ashugonj

Bhabanipur

2

Brahmanbaria

Ashugonj

Sonarampur

1

Mymensingh

Ishawargonj Upazila

Fanur

2

Mymensingh

Ishawargonj Upazila

Jatia

1

Mymensingh

Ishawargonj Upazila

Longgail

1

Mymensingh

Ishawargonj Upazila

Maheshpur

1

Mymensingh

Nandail Upazila

Rosulpur

2

Narsingdi

Shibpur

Noadia

2

Narsingdi

Shibpur

Srishtigar

1

254  Handbook of social justice in the Global South

Table 17.3  Socio-economic characteristics of interviewed return migrants (n=20) Socio-economic characteristics

N

Male

20

Female

0

Age 21–25

8

Age 26–30

7

Age 31–35

2

Age 36 or more

3

1–5 years of schooling

4

6–10 years of schooling

14

11 or more years of schooling

2

Nuclear family

4

Extended family

16

Joint family

0

No earning members of the household at present

2

1 earning member of the household at present

8

2 earning members of the household at present

7

3 earning members of the household at present

2

4 earning members of the household at present

1

Return migrant currently employed

8

Return migrant currently unemployed

12

No present monthly personal income of the return migrant

12

Present monthly personal income of the return migrant: less than 10,000 (in BD Taka)

4

Present monthly personal income of the return migrant: 10,000–14,999 (in BD Taka)

4

Present monthly personal income of the return migrant: 15,000 or more (in BD Taka)

0

Personal monthly income of the return migrant when the return migrant was working abroad: less than 20,000 (in BD Taka)

0

Personal monthly income of the return migrant when the return migrant was working abroad: 20,000–24,999 (in BD Taka)

2

Personal monthly income of the return migrant when the return migrant was working abroad: 25,000–29,999 (in BD Taka)

7

Personal monthly income of the return migrant when the return migrant was working abroad: 30,000–34,999 (in BD Taka)

3

Personal monthly income of the return migrant when the return migrant was working abroad: 35,000–39,999 (in BD Taka)

3

Personal monthly income of the return migrant when the return migrant was working abroad: 40,000–44,999 (in BD Taka)

2

Personal monthly income of the return migrant when the return migrant was working abroad: 45,000 or more (in BD Taka)

3

Socio-economic impacts of involuntary return migration  255 Socio-economic characteristics

N

No present monthly household income

2

Present monthly household income less than 10,000 (in BD Taka)

2

Present monthly household income: 10,000–14,999 (in BD Taka)

6

Present monthly household income: 15,000–19,999 (in BD Taka)

3

Present monthly household income: 20,000–24,999 (in BD Taka)

4

Present monthly household income: 25,000 or more (in BD Taka)

3

Monthly household income when the return migrant was working abroad: less than 25,000 (in BD Taka)

0

Monthly household income when the return migrant was working abroad: 25,000–29,999 (in BD Taka)

2

Monthly household income when the return migrant was working abroad: 30,000–34,999 (in BD Taka)

1

Monthly household income when the return migrant was working abroad 35,000–39,999 (in BD Taka)

3

Monthly household income when the return migrant was working abroad: 40,000–44,999 (in BD Taka)

6

Monthly household income when the return migrant was working abroad: 45,000 or more (in BD Taka)

8

Present monthly household expenditure: less than 10,000 (in BD Taka)

7

Present monthly household expenditure: 10,000–14,999 (in BD Taka)

9

Present monthly household expenditure: 15,000–19,999 (in BD Taka)

2

Present monthly household expenditure: 20,000–24,999 (in BD Taka)

0

Present monthly household expenditure: 25,000 or more (in BD Taka)

2

Monthly household expenditure when the return migrant was working abroad: less than 10,000 (in BD Taka)

2

Monthly household expenditure when the return migrant was working abroad: 10,000–14,999 (in BD Taka)

8

Monthly household expenditure when the return migrant was working abroad: 15,000–19,999 (in BD Taka)

5

Monthly household expenditure when the return migrant was working abroad: 20,000–24,999 (in BD Taka)

2

Monthly household expenditure when the return migrant was working abroad: 25,000 or more (in BD Taka)

3

Less than 10 decimals of homestead land at present

11

10–19 decimals of homestead land at present

7

20 or more decimals of homestead land at present

2

Less than 10 decimals of homestead land before migration

10

10–19 decimals of homestead land before migration

8

20 or more decimals of homestead land before migration

2

No agricultural land at present

6

256  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Socio-economic characteristics

N

Up to 0.24 acres of agricultural land at present

2

0.25–0.49 acres of agricultural land at present

1

0.5–0.74 acres of agricultural land at present

5

0.75–0.99 acres of agricultural land at present

2

1–1.24 acres of agricultural land at present

3

1.25 or more acres of agricultural land at present

1

No agricultural land before migration

6

Up to 0.24 acres of agricultural land before migration

2

0.25–0.49 acres of agricultural land before migration

1

0.5–0.74 acres of agricultural land before migration

5

0.75–0.99 acres of agricultural land before migration

2

1–1.24 acres of agricultural land before migration

3

1.25 or more acres of agricultural land before migration

1

Less than 2 working years abroad

9

2–3 working years abroad

1

3–4 working years abroad

4

4–5 working years abroad

1

6–7 working years abroad

4

7+ working years abroad

1

3–5 months of work permit remains

3

6–8 months of work permit remains

12

9–11 months of work permit remains

4

12 months of work permit remains

1

Same current economic condition of the household compared to the period before migration

1

Better current economic condition of the household compared to the period before migration

7

Worse current economic condition of the household compared to the period before migration

12

Source: Fieldwork (2021).

UAE) were from Ashuganj Upazila of Brahmanbaria, and one from Iraq was from Shibpur Upazila of Narsingdi. The other 15 return migrants were recruited based on the information given by the five return migrants initially contacted by the first author. All the interviewed return migrants from Singapore and the UAE were recruited from Ashuganj. An interview guide was used to collect data, covering issues such as reasons for migration, financing of migration, the role of social networks in the migration process, quarantine experience (home and other places), problems in maintaining the preventive measures for COVID19, socio-economic and mental health effects of involuntary return, and future expectations of the return migrants. Although data were collected on various issues, this chapter focusses only on the socio-economic impacts of the involuntary return. Socio-economic characteristics of the interviewees and their households before migration, during the migration episode, and

Socio-economic impacts of involuntary return migration  257 after return were collected through a questionnaire at the beginning of the interview (See Table 17.3). All interviews were conducted in the homes of the interviewees. Interviews (usually 80–100 minutes) were audio recorded, and notes were taken based on observation. Interviews were transcribed fully. Data were analysed using thematic analysis. Themes were identified through a bottom-up or inductive approach, i.e., through a data driven-approach (Braun & Clarke, 2006; Saha, 2017a, 2021; Saha & Pittock, 2021). Similarities and dissimilarities among interviewees concerning a particular theme and interrelatedness among themes were carefully examined (Saha, 2021). Interviewees were contacted by phone if any issues discussed during the face-to-face interview required further clarification or a more in-depth understanding.

17.4 FINDINGS 17.4.1 Impact on Income The involuntary return of migrants badly impacted both the personal and household income of return migrants. Everyone interviewed (n=20) either experienced a complete loss or a substantial reduction in their personal income. Twelve return migrants no longer had any personal income as they had become unemployed. Eight who started working after returning to Bangladesh earned less than half of what they were earning each month when they were working abroad. My income is now low due to losing my job abroad. I used to earn 26500 Taka per month when I was working abroad. I now earn only 9000 Taka per month. (Interviewee 2, 19 May 2021, Iraq)

Similarly, all returnee households except one (n=19) experienced a substantial reduction in monthly household income (n=17) or did not have any income (n=2). Return migrants of the latter two households were unemployed and did not have any other earning members. The reduction in monthly household income is explained in the following statements: Our monthly household income has decreased a lot as I do not have any income now … My father and brother now earn a total of about 14,000 Taka per month. When I was working abroad, I used to send my family 20,000 Taka every month. (Interviewee 18, 6 May 2021, Iraq) When I was abroad, our household’s monthly income was 30,000 Taka, now our household’s monthly income is only 10,000 Taka. (Interviewee 17, 6 May 2021, Singapore)

The monthly income of one household increased due to the addition of two male household members to the workforce after the migrant returned to Bangladesh: there were initially two earning members (the return migrant working abroad and his father in Bangladesh), but then there were four (the return migrant, his father, and two younger brothers). Among the households of the 12 unemployed return migrants, the two that did not have any other earning members were dependent solely on savings, while the other 10 were dependent on the earnings of other household members for meeting household expenses, including the expenses of the return migrant.

258  Handbook of social justice in the Global South 17.4.2 Impact on Expenditure All return migrant households except one (n=19) had to sharply reduce their monthly household expenditure compared to the period when the migrant was working abroad. The financial hardship due to a reduced or complete loss of income compelled these households to cut down household expenditure in various sectors, and also created extreme difficulty for many households in meeting basic survival needs and repaying migration-related debt. 17.4.3 Impact on Food Consumption Most (n=18) households reduced their monthly household food expenses compared to the period when the migrant was working abroad. Most consumed less food or less expensive food due to a lack of money. They could not buy expensive food, such as meat and fish, and some had serious food shortages. Earlier [during the migration episode] we used to spend 7000 to 8000 Taka every month for food. Now we can spend maximum 3000 to 4000 Taka for food in a month. Earlier we used to consume one sack of rice [50 kg] per month while we are now required to run the whole month with half a sack of rice [25 kg] … Now if we eat one meal in a day, we need to think about what to eat in the next meal of the day. (Interviewee 2, 19 May 2021, Iraq)

17.4.4 Impact on Affording Clothing Most (n=18) households reduced their expenses on clothing compared to the period when the migrant was working abroad. They usually only bought clothes that were necessary, and these were inferior, cheaper clothes. Moreover, many households could only buy essential clothes for children, while some could not buy essential clothes for any member of the household. Thus, clothing, which is a basic requisite for a decent living, had become a luxury item for many households. Now I buy only the most essential things for the household. I cannot buy any clothes. (Interviewee 5, 23 May 2021, Iraq) We cannot buy clothes now because of money. … Earlier I used to buy a lungi [a cloth worn from the waist to the ankles by men in Bangladesh] every two or three months. But I cannot buy a lungi in a year now … The clothes my father wears are not good, he cannot even wear a good shirt due to a lack of money. (Interviewee 2, 19 May 2021, Iraq)

17.4.5 Impact on Healthcare Most households (n=17) could not afford healthcare after paying for essentials such as food and clothing for survival. Many could not afford to consult with a doctor if a household member fell ill. Moreover, some households that used to consult with qualified doctors could only buy medicine in consultation with pharmacies or based on their own medical knowledge. My father is suffering from arthritis, my mother is suffering from dental problems and I am suffering from nasal problems. We cannot treat these problems due to a lack of money. (Interviewee 4, 23 May 2021, Iraq)

Socio-economic impacts of involuntary return migration  259 My father has been feeling unwell for the last few days. I need to take him to a good doctor. But I am unable to take him to a good doctor. If I want to take him to a good doctor, I need a lot of money to pay for the doctor’s fees, pathological tests and medicines. (Interviewee 20, 7 June 2021, Iraq)

A few households that had an ill household member who required long-term continuous treatment and had been undergoing treatment when the migrant was working abroad had difficulty in managing the cost of treatment and sometimes only had partial treatments due to a lack of money. Now we face difficulty in managing the cost of regular check-ups [and medications] of my mother … Medication increases or decreases based on the check-ups … If we cannot arrange her checkup for a month, then her health gets worse. (Interviewee 18, 6 June 2021, Iraq)

17.4.6 Impact on School, Madrasah and College-Going Member’s Education Thirteen households had at least one member who attended an educational institution and, of them, 10 had to reduce educational expenses compared to the period when the migrant was working abroad. They were struggling to find the money for monthly school fees, private tuition, and educational materials such as books and paper. Many households cancelled private tutors or reduced the number of private tutors, and one household discontinued the education of a member due to a lack of money. My daughter [who studies in class nine] used to take private lessons from two private teachers. I stopped her from taking lessons from private teachers before Eid-ul-Adha because of a lack of money. (Interviewee 12, 2 June 2021, Singapore) My sister used to study in a madrasah … We cannot send her to madrasah now due to a lack of money … We stopped her study 5 to 6 months ago. The monthly tuition fee of the madrasah was 300 Taka. Also, there was the cost of the book. Now we cannot eat, how can we pay for her study? (Interviewee 2, 19 May 2021, Iraq)

17.4.7 Impact on Family and Religious Ceremonies Most households (n=18) had to cut down their expenses for celebrating family and religious ceremonies due to a lack of money and usually avoided celebrations such as birthdays, wedding anniversaries, and milad that they used to celebrate when the migrant was working abroad. They also spent less than they used to when they did celebrate. For instance, most households reported that they could not spend as much as they needed to on Eid ul-Fitr: I could not spend during the last Eid like the previous Eid due to a lack of money. I spent much less than I was required to spend. I bought less fish and meat. I could not buy new clothes for our family members. (Interviewee 5, 23 May 2021, Iraq) We used to buy clothes for [all household members] every Eid. I couldn’t buy a new lungi during the last Eid. That’s why I didn’t go to the Eid ground to perform Eid prayer. (Interviewee 2, 19 May 2021, Iraq)

260  Handbook of social justice in the Global South 17.4.8 Impact on Recreational Activities Most households (n=18) were compelled to reduce their usual recreational expenses due to a lack of money, and many households could not afford to spend anything on recreational activities. When I had foreign income, members of my household were able to visit many places such as parks, cities and other sightseeing places and go to restaurants often. Now we cannot buy essential daily items for the household due to a lack of money. Where can we get money to visit various places and go to restaurants? (Interviewee 7, 27 May 2021, Iraq)

17.4.9 Dependency on Savings Thirteen households had savings from foreign earnings, and seven did not have any savings. Although all 13 households had used all or part of their savings, 10 households used savings for meeting household expenses: nine only for household expenses and one for household expenses plus two other purposes. A few households had already spent their entire savings on household expenses, while some had spent almost half or more. I got 38,000 Taka from the company after coming to Bangladesh. I have already spent all the money [for household expenses]. (Interviewee 5, 23 May 2021, Iraq) I am still spending from savings. My last savings amount was 400,000 Taka, and now I have only 180,000 Taka. (Interviewee 9, 2 June 2021, Iraq)

The return migrants of two households that were fully dependent on savings in the absence of any income after return were worried as they were living on savings. As I do not have work, I am compelled to spend from my savings … I am trying hard for a job … If I could get a job, I would not use my savings … Now I am in trouble. I am eating my hard-earned money by sitting at home. (Interviewee 7, 27 May, 2021, Iraq)

17.4.10 Inability to Repay Borrowings and Loans Financing migration through money borrowed (without interest) or taken as a loan (with interest) from multiple sources, such as relatives, friends, moneylenders, and microfinance institutions is a common strategy in Bangladesh (Moniruzzaman & Walton-Roberts, 2018; Rahman, 2015). Return migrant households that had not repaid money borrowed or taken as a loan for financing migration were worse off as they were struggling to meet their survival needs and also worried about repayment of the money. Among households that borrowed money to finance migration (n=17), all except four had repaid the whole borrowed amount before the return of the migrant. Three had paid part of the borrowed money, and one paid none of it. None of the four households that did not repay the borrowed money had the money to repay it. Three return migrants who were still unemployed thought that they could not repay the money unless they got a job, and one who was employed thought that he could not repay the money unless he could go abroad again.

Socio-economic impacts of involuntary return migration  261 I don’t have a job now. I will be able to pay the money if I get a job. I have tension because of this now. (Interviewee 8, 1 June 2021, Iraq) I paid 150,000 Taka, 230,000 Taka is left to be paid … It is not possible to repay this money staying in the country … I can repay this money if I can go abroad. (Interviewee 11, 2 June 2021, Iraq)

Likewise, among households that took out a loan to finance migration costs (n=9), all households except four had repaid the full loan before the migrant returned. Three households had repaid part of the loan, and one household had not repaid any of the loan before the migrant returned. None of the four households had money to repay the loan. Moreover, two of these households had taken a further loan for survival. They would have to sell land if they could not repay the loan from their income in the future. It is not possible for me to repay the loan. I cannot even repay the loan [220,000 Taka] in five years by doing a job of 9000 Taka monthly. Will I pay for household expenses or repay the loan with this money [9000 Taka]? … My father is planning to sell half of the homestead land [total homestead land is 10 decimals] to my uncle to repay the loan. (Interviewee 2, 19 May 2021, Iraq) If my brothers and sisters do not get a job in the future, then I have to repay the loan money by selling a part of the homestead land in the future. (Interviewee 3, 23 May 2021, Iraq)

17.4.11 Inability to Release the Mortgaged Land Mortgaging land is a popular strategy to finance migration costs in Bangladesh (Moniruzzaman & Walton-Roberts, 2018; Rahman, 2015; Siddiqui & Abrar, 2003). Among nine households that mortgaged agricultural land to finance the cost of migration, five households released the mortgaged land before the migrant returned, while four households could not. Households that could not release their mortgaged agricultural land before the return of the migrant were unable to do so due to a lack of money. These households used to consume the rice produced on their land. After the land was mortgaged, they had to buy rice from the market. As the households used to receive remittances, buying rice was not a problem. However, in the absence of remittances, those households had difficulties. As we cannot release 60 decimals agricultural land from the mortgage, we are having trouble in managing the rice we need to eat … If we had the land, we would not have to spend money on buying rice. Now we need to buy rice. [The interviewee managed 150,000 taka by mortgaging 60 decimals to finance his migration cost]. (Interviewee 5, 23 May 2021, Iraq)

17.4.12 Heightened Tension or Conflict Among Household Members Many returnee households (n=7) experienced heightened tension or conflict between the return migrants and other household members. This was usually because of the economic crisis they were experiencing due to the failure of the return migrant to repay money borrowed or taken as a loan, to repay the mortgaged-back borrowed money, or to earn the money that was invested from the household’s own source for financing the migration. My brother gave me 150,000 Taka to go abroad … I could not return this money … so I am having a problem with my brother … He tells me to get out of the house … We often quarrel over the money. My brother’s wife embarrasses me more than my brother. She tells me to get out of the house in front of other people. (Interview 5, 23 May 2021, Iraq)

262  Handbook of social justice in the Global South 17.4.13 Conflict with Relatives and Others Although households were worried about how to repay borrowings or loans, only two households were in conflict with relatives and others about it. One household borrowed money from relatives and acquaintances to build a house, and one took loans from relatives to finance migration. All my relatives are pressuring us to pay back the money we took out as a loan [with interest] from them to finance migration. Our relationship with them has deteriorated. They have given us a deadline to return the money. As we cannot repay, they treat us very badly. I also said angrily that I would not pay, do what you can do. (Interviewee 2, 19 May 2021, Iraq)

17.4.14 Impact on Visits with Relatives Most households (n=18) did not attend any or most of their relatives’ events, such as weddings, birthdays, and circumcisions, as they did not have the money to pay for gifts and travel expenses. They usually gave various excuses as they could not say directly that they were unable to attend due to a lack of money. When they attended, they usually gave relatively lowcost gifts to preserve their honour: Now we cannot attend any relatives’ events. We say we cannot come because we have problems, we have work … We cannot say directly that we do not have the money to attend the event. It is a shame for us … We cannot give gifts because of money. We also do not have money to pay for travel expenses. So we do not go. (Interviewee 4, 23 May 2021, Iraq) Since I do not have money, I often avoid my relatives’ events by making other excuses. (Interviewee 3, 23 May 2021, Iraq) Earlier I used to give 2,000 to 3,000 Taka as salami (cash as gift) if I attended a relative’s wedding … Now when I attend a relative’s wedding, I save face by giving 500–1,000 Taka as salami. (Interviewee 18, 5 June 2021, UAE)

Most (n=18) of the households also visited their relatives less frequently than before as they lacked money for travel, buying food such as sweets and fruits, and buying gifts. Moreover, most households could no longer feed their relatives properly when they visited their houses: Now we rarely go to relatives’ house … We do not go because we have to spend money to visit them. (Interviewee 11, 2 June 2021, Iraq) Now when relatives come to see us, we cannot buy good food for them due to a lack of money … Earlier we used to spend about 2,000 Taka when two relatives stayed for two days, now we can only spend 800 to 1,000 Taka if two relatives stay for two days. (Interviewee 5, 23 May 2021, Iraq) I actually feel ashamed of myself when relatives come to see us … We feed them with what we usually eat. We can at best treat them with eggs … We cannot buy fish for them … We cannot buy beef for them. (Interviewee 2, 19 May 2021, Iraq)

17.4.15 Impact on Visits with Friends, Neighbours, and Acquaintances As attending invitations from friends, neighbours, and acquaintances for events such as weddings, birthdays, and circumcisions usually requires a gift to be given, most households (n=18)

Socio-economic impacts of involuntary return migration  263 no longer attended most of these events due to economic hardship. They only attended those that could not be avoided due to intimacy with the host, and they usually provided low-cost gifts compared to what they used to give. I have currently two to three wedding invitations from my neighbours. But I cannot attend these invitations. If I attend, I have to spend 5,000 Taka for the gift. (Interviewee 10, 2 June 2021, Iraq) Now we only attend those invitations that we cannot avoid. Now we have money problems. We cannot give gifts like before. When we attend now, we give low-cost gifts. (Interviewee 16, 5 June 2021, UAE)

Likewise, most households (n=18) invited friends, neighbours, and acquaintances less often than they used to before the return of the migrant, due to economic hardship. Moreover, many interviewees reported that they avoided spending time with their friends because it usually costs money, such as for snacks and tea. 17.4.16 Impact on Contribution to the Community When migrants worked abroad, households donated some money to community development activities and community events, mainly for the construction or regular operations of mosques and for religious events. However, most (n=17) households interviewed could no longer afford to donate money or they donated substantially less than before. When I was working abroad, I donated to many mosques, many waz mahfils and other programmes … But now it is not possible for me to donate. (Interviewee 12, 2 June 2021, Singapore) If people want me to donate 500 Taka for a mosque or a waz mahfil, now I donate 300 Taka. I donate less now than I used to. (Interviewee 7, 27 May 2021, Iraq)

17.5 DISCUSSION Our study revealed that the households of involuntary return migrants experienced substantial adverse socio-economic impacts. We found that all households of return migrants, except one, experienced a sharp decline in their monthly household income or had no income and, therefore, were compelled to sharply reduce monthly expenditure. This is similar to other studies that have shown that job loss negatively affects income (Brand, 2015; Coelli, 2011; Hyslop et al., 2021) and that job loss or substantial loss of income is associated with a drop in expenditure or consumption (Billah et al., 2021; Brac, 2021a; Gupta & Kishore, 2020; Hyslop et al., 2021; Penrose & Cava, 2021; Yeung & Hofferth, 1998). We showed that a fall in monthly income reduced food expenses, similar to earlier studies (Billah et al., 2021; Restrepo et al., 2021). Similarly, we found that many households only bought clothes for children, if at all. Other studies have also shown that typical poor households consider clothing a luxury item (Rufino, 2013). Likewise, in the present study, households were unable to access healthcare services due to a lack of money, similar to other studies (Billah et al., 2021; Gupta & Kishore, 2020). The households we interviewed compromised on children’s education due to a lack of money. Other studies have also demonstrated that job loss considerably reduces expenditure on education (Gupta & Kishore, 2020), negatively affects

264  Handbook of social justice in the Global South children’s educational attainment (Brand, 2015; Coelli, 2011; Kalil & Wightman, 2011), and can cause dropout from school (Brand, 2015). Households cancel private tutors, reduce the number of private tutors they use, or discontinue the education of household members due to a lack of money (Billah et al., 2021). The present study showed that financial hardship negatively impacted family celebrations and religious ceremonies, which is a finding similar to other studies (Billah et al., 2021). Likewise, households reduced expenses on or could not afford their usual recreational activities, in line with other studies that have suggested that typical poor households consider recreational activities as a luxury (Rufino, 2013). Similarly, households lived on savings from foreign earnings due to insufficient income or no income, which is consistent with the findings of other studies in Bangladesh (Billah et al., 2021; Brac, 2021a). Disaster-affected households in Bangladesh use savings to survive post-disaster situations (Saha, 2017b). The present study showed that economic hardship due to job loss increased tension and conflict among household members, similar to other studies (Brand, 2015; Broman et al., 1990; Price, 1992). We found that the unemployment of return migrants increased suffering in many households. Return migrants encountered difficulty in getting jobs due to their return during the pandemic. The pandemic and several country-wide lockdowns made finding jobs more difficult in a country that cannot even absorb its own labour force during normal times (Dhaka Tribune, 2021a; Brac, 2021a; The Financial Express, 2021a; The Business Standard, 2020; Khatun, 2020; Masud et al., 2019; Sarkar et al., 2018; Sikder et al., 2021). However, independent of the employment status of return migrants, the households in serious crisis were those that did not repay money that was borrowed or taken as a loan for financing migration, or those that did not release agricultural land that was mortgaged for financing migration (IOM, 2019b). All the interviewed households financed part of their migration costs in one or more of these three ways. However, while 11 households repaid their borrowings or loans and released mortgaged land before the return of the migrant, nine households could not do so. Of those nine households, three needed to deal with more than one issue: two needed to repay a loan as well as release mortgaged land, and one needed to repay both borrowed money and a loan. Of those nine households, the return migrants of five households got a job in Bangladesh while the return migrants of four remained unemployed. All nine households that did not repay their borrowings or loans or release mortgaged land were unable to do so due to the short stay of the migrant abroad, with eight of them away for 18 months or less and one of them away for 31 months. Many Bangladeshi households that finance migration by managing money from multiple sources require several years to repay migration-related debts, and thus migration-related debts become devastating if the migration episode is short (Moniruzzaman & Walton-Roberts, 2018; Rahman, 2015). The cost of migration to Gulf countries and Singapore, on average, is equivalent to the remittances migrant households receive in 3.5 years (Moniruzzaman & Walton-Roberts, 2018). Among the 11 households that repaid borrowings and loans and released mortgaged land, in 10 households the return migrant stayed abroad for at least three years, and of those 10, five stayed abroad for more than five years. The perceived economic condition of 12 households was worse than before migration, while for one household it was about the same, and for seven households, it was better. Three households that perceived their present economic condition as worse than before migration, despite repaying debt or releasing mortgaged land, experienced drastic income loss. All nine households that failed to repay borrowings or loans or release land for financing migration

Socio-economic impacts of involuntary return migration  265 were among the 12 households whose perceived present economic condition was worse than before migration. This is not unexpected, as they had become laden with debt or had lost access to agricultural land until they could release the mortgaged land (IOM, 2019b; Moniruzzaman & Walton-Roberts, 2018). A sudden return to Bangladesh due to job loss, as well as the debt-financed migration process, made them worse off compared to the premigration period (IOM, 2019b).

17.6 CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS The unprecedented large-scale return of migrants at an unpredictable and hasty pace, when Bangladesh is facing daunting health and economic crises due to the COVID-19 pandemic, has made it very difficult for the country to take the measures necessary for the economic reintegration of return migrants. Nevertheless, the Government of Bangladesh has initiated various programmes for the reintegration of return migrants, including involuntary return migrants, and it has allocated 200 crore Taka and 500 crore Taka under two loan schemes for this purpose (Prova, 2021; The Financial Express , 2021b). The first scheme allows a return migrant to take out a loan of 100,000–500,000 Taka at a 4 per cent interest rate, while the second allows a male return migrant and a female return migrant to take out a loan at a 9 per cent and 7 per cent interest rate, respectively (Prova, 2021; The Financial Express, 2021b). The government also paid 5,000 Taka each to thousands of return migrants for travel expenses from the airport to their home (Siddiqui et al., 2021). Moreover, the government has also established a nationwide database to collect information about return migrants in order to understand their needs and undertake suitable social and economic reintegration support programmes for them (United News of Bangladesh, 2021). Bangladesh Bank also launched a special loan programme that allows involuntary return migrants to take out a loan (Siddiqui et al., 2021). Nevertheless, a national reintegration strategy that addresses the vulnerabilities and needs of all types of return migrants, including involuntary return migrants, is still absent (Siddiqui, 2021c). The government has given little support to return migrants so far (Dhaka Tribune, 2020; ILO, 2020). Support should be greater and extended to all return migrants who need it, until they become engaged in income-generating activities (Dhaka Tribune, 2020; ILO, 2020). Return migrants’ households that are struggling for survival should be given urgent food aid and cash support (ILO, 2020). They should also be included in the available public social safety net programmes in Bangladesh (Siddiqui, 2021c). Return migrants who are experiencing mental distress should be given counselling (ILO, 2020). They should also be supported by the government and other stakeholders, such as the private sector and nongovernmental organisations (NGOs), by providing assistance for self-employment or jobs (ILO, 2020; IOM, 2018). They need to be assisted through loans with low interest rates and training on entrepreneurship development for self-employment (Abrar, 2020). Loan disbursement procedures need to be as simple as possible so that return migrants who require loans can easily get them (The Financial Express, 2021b), and they should be linked to the market so that they can sell their products easily (Abrar, 2020). Furthermore, they should be linked to employers in Bangladesh and abroad, based on their skills and qualifications. If required, they should be given training on skills that are in demand for employment at home and abroad. More funding from government, NGOs, and international donors should be allocated to equip them with

266  Handbook of social justice in the Global South necessary skills through training. A special programme should be introduced to help return migrants who want to remigrate. NGOs should also be encouraged to implement special projects that ensure social and economic reintegration of return migrants. The capacity of the Labour Welfare Wing of the Embassy of Bangladesh abroad should be improved. This would enable it to negotiate with host countries so that they take back return migrants who were sent back to Bangladesh despite having valid work permits before their employment contract period expired, provide compensation when host countries are unable to take them back, and pay pending wages and other dues of the return migrants who returned to Bangladesh without receiving them. Collective pressure from countries of origin, such as the Colombo Process countries, should be put on host countries to deal with these issues (IOM, 2019a; RMMRU, 2020). Countries of origin should also put collective pressure on the host countries to suspend involuntary returns of migrants during the pandemic, as a measure to address the crisis caused by the pandemic, protect the human rights of all migrants, ensure their access to basic services regardless of their legal status, and include all migrants in their national COVID-19 response plans and actions. They should also enhance cooperation among themselves as well as with host countries to ensure that host countries maintain due process when return is necessary. The Abu Dhabi Dialogue, which is a forum for countries of origin and destination, and the Global Forum on Migration and Development can play a vital role in addressing the issues of involuntary return migrants and ensuring the suspension of involuntary returns of migrants during the pandemic (IOM, 2019a; RMMRU, 2020). Agencies like ILO and IOM can also play an effective role in the negotiation process with destination countries. Finally, the pandemic has demonstrated how vulnerable and unprotected international migrant workers are in times of crises. The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development (United Nations, 2015) calls for facilitating “orderly, safe, regular and responsible migration and mobility of people” (Target 10.7, Goal 10) and for protecting labour rights and promoting “safe and secure working environments for all workers, including migrant workers” (Target 8.8, Goal 8). The Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration (United Nations, 2019) also calls for strengthening “international cooperation and global partnerships for safe, orderly and regular migration” (Objective 23) and for cooperation in “facilitating safe and dignified return” and “sustainable reintegration” of return migrants (Objective 21). The pandemic has shown the necessity of having a comprehensive safe return plan and a comprehensive sustainable reintegration plan to ensure the economic, social, and psychosocial well-being of return migrants and the importance of enhanced international cooperation for the governance of international migration. Lessons from the pandemic should be considered critical opportunities to rectify problems in the governance of international migration to assuage the vulnerability of international migrant workers in times of future crises.

AUTHOR CONTRIBUTIONS Conceptualisation: S.K.S.; Methodology: S.K.S.; Data transcription: R.A.; Data analysis: S.K.S. and R.A.; Investigation: S.K.S.; Resources: S.K.S.; Data curation: S.K.S.; Project administration: S.K.S.; Writing: S.K.S.; Writing review and editing: S.K.S.

Socio-economic impacts of involuntary return migration  267

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Socio-economic impacts of involuntary return migration  269 Mahmud, J., & Hasan, R. (2021, September 7). Migrants going abroad: Their pleas finally heard. Daily Star.  https://www​.thedailystar​.net ​/nrb​/migration ​/news​/migrants​-going​-abroad​-their​-pleas​-finally​heard​-2170026 Masud, S. M. M. A., Hamzah, R. B., & Ahmad, H. (2019). Bangladeshi migration across the globe: The recent experiences of development and challenges. International Journal of Research in Humanities and Social Studies, 6(11), 20–27. Mensah, E. A. (2016). Involuntary return migration and reintegration: The case of Ghanaian migrant workers from Libya. Journal of International Migration & Integration, 17, 303–323. Migration Data Portal (2021). Migration data relevant for the Covid-19 pandemic. https://www​ .migrationdataportal​.org​/themes​/migration​-data​-relevant​-covid​-19​-pandemic Ministry of Trade and Industry (2020). Economic survey of Singapore: First quarter 2020. https:// www​.mti​.gov​.sg/-​/media​/ MTI​/ Resources​/ Economic​-Survey​-of​-Singapore​/2020​/ Economic​-Survey​ -of​-Singapore​-First​-Quarter​-2020​/ FullReport​_1Q20​.pdf Mobarak, M., Sharif, I., & Shrestha, M. (2020). Returns to low-skilled international migration: Evidence from the Bangladesh-Malaysia Migration Lottery Program (Policy Research Working Paper No. 9165). The World Bank. https://openknowledge​.worldbank​.org​/ handle​/10986​/33408 Moniruzzaman, M., & Walton-Roberts, M. (2018). Migration, debt and resource backwash: How sustainable is Bangladesh-Gulf circular migration? Migration and Development, 7(1), 85–103. Newland, K. (2017). Migrant return and reintegration policy: A key component of migration governance. https://publications​.iom​.int​/system​/files​/pdf​/return​_and​_ reintegration​_policy​.pdf Penrose, G., & Cava, G. L. (2021). Job loss, subjective expectations and household spending (Research Discussion Paper No. 2021–08). Reserve Bank of Australia. https://www​.rba​.gov​.au​/publications​/rdp​ /2021​/pdf​/rdp2021–08​.p​df Perera, W. (2021). Disastrous impact of Covid-19 on Bangladeshi migrant workers. https://www​.wsws​ .org​/en​/articles​/2021​/03​/11​/ bang​-m11​.html Price, R. H. (1992). Psychosocial impact of job loss on individuals and families. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 1(1), 9–11. Prova, S. G. (2021, June 30). Bangladeshi returnee migrants in despair. Bangladesh Post. https:// bangladeshpost​.net​/posts​/ bangladeshi​-returnee​-migrants​-in​-despair​- 63211 Rahman, A. A., Jasmin, A. F., & Schmillen, A. (2020). The vulnerability of jobs to Covid-19: The case of Malaysia. ISEAS Yusof Ishak Institute, Singapore. https://www​.iseas​.edu​.sg​/wp​-content​/uploads​ /2020​/10​/ ISEAS​_ EWP​_2020​- 09​_ Amanina​_ Alyssa​_ Schmillen​.pdf Rahman, M. M. (2015). Migrant indebtedness: Bangladeshis in the GCC countries. International Migration, 53(6), 205–219. Rashid, S. R., Jahid, H. M. F., & Nasrin, R. (2021). Facing Covid-19 in the destination countries: Health shocks, income risks, detention, deportation and wage theft. In T. Siddiqui (Ed.), The other face of globalisation: Covid-19, international labour migrants and left-behind families in Bangladesh (pp. 37–60). Refugee and Migratory Movements Research Unit. Refugee and Migratory Movements Research Unit (RMMRU). (2020). The other face of globalization: Covid 19, arbitrary return of Bangladeshi migrants and their unpaid dues [Policy Brief No. 30]. http://www​.rmmru​.org​/newsite​/wp​-content​/uploads​/2020​/07​/ Policy​-Brief​-30​.pdf Restrepo, B. J., Rabbitt, M. P., & Gregory, C.A. (2021). The effect of unemployment on food spending and adequacy: Evidence from Coronavirus‐induced firm closures. Applied Economic Perspectives and Policy, 43(1), 185–204. Reza, S., Siddiqui, T., Chowdhury, Y. M., & Afrin, S. (2021). Understanding the gaps: The national statistics and the household remittance flow. In T. Siddiqui (Ed.), The other face of globalisation: Covid-19, international labour migrants and left-behind families in Bangladesh (pp. 79–99). Refugee and Migratory Movements Research Unit. Roberts, B., Menjívar, C., & Rodríguez, N. P. (2017). Voluntary and involuntary return migration. In B. Roberts, C. Menjívar & N. P. Rodríguez (Eds.), Deportation and return in a border-restricted world: Experiences in Mexico, El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras (pp. 3–26). Springer International Publishing AG. Rufino, C. C. (2013). Consumption pattern of poor households in Metro Manila – a microeconometric evaluation. DLSU Business & Economics Review, 23(1), 10–24.

270  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Saha, S. K. (2017a). Cyclone Aila, livelihood stress, and migration: Empirical evidence from coastal Bangladesh. Disasters, 41(3), 505–526. Saha, S. K. (2017b). Cyclone, salinity intrusion and adaptation and coping measures in Coastal Bangladesh. Space and Culture, India, 5(1), 12–24. Saha, S. K. (2021). Social capital and post-disaster response and recovery: Cyclone Aila in Bangladesh, 2009 [Doctoral dissertation, the Australian National University, Canberra, Australia]. http://hdl​ .handle​.net​/1885​/219618 Saha, S. K., & Pittock, J. (2021). Responses to cyclone warnings: The case of Cyclone Mora (2017) in Bangladesh. Sustainability, 13(19), 11012. Sahai, R., Bansal, V., Sikder, M. J. U., Kysia, K., & Shen, S. (2020). Shattered dreams: Bangladeshi migrant workers during a global pandemic. Journal of Modern Slavery, 5(2), 106–132. Sarkar, M. S. K., Rahman, M. Z., Islam, M. M., Sikdar, M. M. H., & Khan, A. B. (2018). Relationship between remittance and economic growth: Evidence from Bangladesh. American Journal of Trade and Policy, 5(1), 15–20. Siddiqui, T. (2021a). Introduction. In T. Siddiqui (Ed.), The other face of globalisation: Covid-19, international labour migrants and left-behind families in Bangladesh (pp. 1–11). Refugee and Migratory Movements Research Unit. Siddiqui, T. (2021b). Preface. In T. Siddiqui (Ed.), The other face of globalisation: Covid-19, international labour migrants and left-behind families in Bangladesh (pp. XXI–XXIV). Refugee and Migratory Movements Research Unit. Siddiqui, T. (2021c). Summary, conclusions and recommendations. In T. Siddiqui (Ed.), The other face of globalisation: Covid-19, international labour migrants and left-behind families in Bangladesh (pp. 155–166). Refugee and Migratory Movements Research Unit. Siddiqui, T., & Abrar, C. R. (2003). Migrant worker remittances and micro-finance in Bangladesh (Working Paper No. 38, International Labour Office). https://www​.ilo​.org​/wcmsp5​/groups​/public/--​ -ed​_emp​/documents​/publication ​/wcms​_117970​.pdf Siddiqui, T., Sultana, M., Jahid, H. M. F., Mahmood, N., & Haque, M. I. (2021). Migration scenario of Bangladesh during Covid-19. In T. Siddiqui (Ed.), The other face of globalisation: Covid-19, international labour migrants and left-behind families in Bangladesh (pp. 13–25). Refugee and Migratory Movements Research Unit. Sikder, M. J. U., Islam, S. B., & Khatoon, J. (2021). Security and insecurity in destination and origin. In T. Siddiqui (Ed.), The other face of globalisation: Covid-19, international labour migrants and left-behind families in Bangladesh (pp. 61–78). Refugee and Migratory Movements Research Unit. Sorkar, M. N. I. (2020). Covid-19 pandemic profoundly affects Bangladeshi workers abroad with consequences for origin communities. https://www​.migrationpolicy​.org​/article​/covid​-19​-pandemic​ -profoundly​-affects​-bangladeshi​-workers​-abroad​-consequences​-origin Thapa, B. J., Baniya, J., Bhattarai, S., & Pradhan, V. (2020). Rehabilitation and reintegration of Nepali migrant returnees amid the Covid-19 pandemic. International Journal of Innovation, Creativity and Change (Special Edition: Covid-19 Life Beyond), 19–36. The Business Standard (2020, May 27). Govt decides not to extend general holidays further. https:// www​.tbsnews​.net ​/coronavirus​- chronicle​/covid​-19​-bangladesh ​/general​-holiday​-not​- extend​-further​ -state​-minister​-85870 The Financial Express (2021a, May 16) Covid-19: Bangladesh extends lockdown until May 23 to contain second wave. https://www​.financialexpress​.com​/world​-news​/covid​-19​-bangladesh​-extends​ -lockdown​-till​-may​-23​-to​-contain​-second​-wave​/2252899/ The Financial Express (2021b, January 14) Reintegration scheme for returnee migrant workers. https://thefinancialexpress​.com​.bd ​/editorial ​/reintegration​-scheme ​-for​-returnee ​-migrant​-workers​ -1610641635 United Nations (2015). Transforming our world: The 2030 agenda for sustainable development. https:// sus​t ain​able​deve​lopment​.un​.org​/content​/documents​/21252030​%20Agenda​%20for​%20Sustainable​ %20Development​%20web​.pdf United Nations (2019). Global compact for safe, orderly and regular migration (73/195). https://www​ .un​.org​/en​/development ​/desa ​/population ​/migration ​/generalassembly​/docs​/globalcompact​/A​_ RES​ _73​_195​.pdf

Socio-economic impacts of involuntary return migration  271 United Nations Network on Migration (2020). Forced returns of migrants must be suspended in times of Covid-19. https://migrationnetwork​.un​.org​/sites​/g​/files​/tmzbdl416​/files​/network ​_statement​_forced​ _returns_-​_13​_may​_2020​.pdf United News of Bangladesh (2021, February 15). Comprehensive database for migrant workers launched with IOM support. https://unb​.com​.bd​/category​/ Bangladesh ​/comprehensive​-database​-for​-migrant​ -workers​-launched​-with​-iom​-support ​/64911 Weeraratne, B. (2020). Return and reintegration without assimilation: South Asian migrant workers in the Gulf during Covid-19 (ISAS Working Paper No. 327, National University of Singapore). https:// www​.isas​.nus​.edu​.sg​/wp​-content​/uploads​/2020​/06​/327​.pdf World Bank (2020). Covid-19 crisis through a migration lens (Migration and Development Brief No. 32). http://documents​.worldbank​.org​/curated ​/en ​/989721587512418006​/COVID​-19​-Crisis​-Through​-a​ -Migration​-Lens World Bank (2021). Resilience: Covid-19 crisis through a migration lens (Migration and Development Brief No. 34). https://reliefweb​.int​/sites​/reliefweb​.int​/files​/resources​/ Migration​%20and​%20Develop ment​%20Brief​%2034​.pdf Yeung, W. J., & Hofferth, S. L. (1998). Family adaptations to income and job loss in the U.S. Journal of Family and Economic Issues, 19(3), 255–283. Young Power in Social Action (2020). Research published on socio-economic impact of Covid-19 on returnee migrants in Bangladesh. https://ypsa​.org​/2020​/06​/research​-on​-socio​-economic​-impact​-of​ -covid​-19​-on​-returnee​-migrants​-in​-bangladesh/

18. Health inequalities in Latin America A Social Justice Challenge Andrea Wendt, Luiza I. C. Ricardo and Giovanna Gatica-Domínguez

18.1 INTRODUCTION “Why treat people and send them back to the conditions that made them sick?” (Marmot, 2015). These are the opening words of Michael Marmot in his book, The health gap: The challenge of an unequal world. Can we focus on and think about the “conditions” that make people sick? When we think about the causes of illnesses, we quickly attribute them to a virus, bacteria, genetic inheritance, clogging of blood vessels, trauma, or other problems related to the functioning of the human organism. However, we can also see that these health problems occur differently across population subgroups. So, what makes the occurrence of diseases different? Are there only biological characteristics? If we think strictly with a biological bias, we may have a positive answer to this question. But, why do migrants experience different healthillness processes to those individuals with the same genetic characteristics who remained in their original countries? Are the so-called “social conditions”, or the way people live, determining the chances of living a healthy life? If we look at the history of health research, we can find evidence of poverty and social context as determinants of the health and well-being of the population (Barata, 2005; Honjo, 2004). For example, the relationship between low income or population density and higher mortality rates has been discussed since the nineteenth century, starting with Louis-René Villermé in Paris (Honjo, 2004; Julia & Valleron, 2011). The role of social determinants in population health has been reaffirmed across the centuries. Today, the socio-economic gradient should be factored into any model for determining the health-illness process (Krieger, 2001; Marmot, 2018). The treatment of a disease, often based on medication, could supply a punctual need, but what if the individual returns to the original conditions? What are the chances of having a successful treatment or not developing a different disease in an environment of poverty, lack of sanitation, lack of formal education, violence, discrimination, limited access to healthy and nutritious food, and people who live in poorly built environments? The effect of social determinants on health is undeniable in the literature (Barata, 2005; Honjo, 2004; Krieger, 2001; Miller et al., 2020; Thornton et al., 2016), and it is the responsibility of all individuals living in society. The health problems of minority populations, such as the poorest, women, Indigenous and Afro-descendants, and migrants, are not only their own, but problems of society as a whole. First, mortality rates, life expectancy, criminality, and health policies could affect society. Second, and most importantly, it is a matter of ethics. Much more than that, it is time to rethink what we can do to improve the original living conditions that make some people sicker than others in a cohesive society, working with mutual trust and solidarity (Miller et al., 2020). 272

Health inequalities in Latin America  273 In this context, it is relevant to highlight the Latin America region, where wide health disparities are the result of structural problems such as poverty, income gaps, unemployment, violence/conflict, discrimination, social exclusion, weak governance, and political instability (Abramo et al., 2020; Ruano et al., 2021). The COVID-19 pandemic has also contributed to exacerbating the social inequalities in the region. A report from the United Nations showed that, in 2019, poverty and extreme poverty rates were 30.5 per cent and 11.45 per cent, respectively, while in 2021, these values reached 32.1 per cent and 13.8 per cent, respectively (Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean, 2022). Monitoring and understanding inequalities in this scenario is essential, with greater cultural and ethnic diversity (Ruano et al., 2021). This chapter discusses health equity as a social justice imperative in the Latin American context. Topics such as the definition of inequality and inequity, monitoring health disparities, and dimensions of inequalities in health will be discussed in detail, presenting examples from several Latin American countries.

18.2 WHY MEASURE HEALTH INEQUALITIES? The World Health Constitution of 1946 defined some essential topics for health. The first was the definition of “health” based not only on the physical aspect but also on mental and social well-being (World Health Organization, 1946), emphasising that health is not the mere absence of disease (World Health Organization, 1946). Nowadays, it might be expected to consider violence rates, mental health, access to improved water, and environmental degradation as public health problems. However, this was not how key actors seemed to view the issue. The earliest concept of health focussed on physical disease and curative practices, and it has been expanded over the years, to include the terms “prevention” and “promotion” (Evans & Leighton, 2014). The second important statement in the World Health Organization (WHO) constitution was the recognition of health as a fundamental human right without distinction of race, religion, political beliefs, or social condition (World Health Organization, 1946). Universal health coverage is a great challenge and should factor into laws, policies, and programmes. The components of the “right to health” are availability (programmes and services with adequate coverage in terms of quantity), accessibility to everyone, acceptability (focussing on the needs of each population), and quality of facilities, assets, and services provided to the population (World Health Organization, n.d.). Linked to the idea of the right to health, we first need to clarify some definitions of terms when we refer to health inequalities and social justice. Before going deeper into health inequalities, it is essential to highlight that there is a difference between the terms “inequality” and “inequity”. Inequality is defined as any observed difference between groups. If we can measure an outcome that presents variability according to a socially relevant characteristic (e.g., income, gender, age), we can measure inequality (Arcaya et al., 2015). These population characteristics, in which outcomes of interest are disaggregated, are called dimensions of inequality (Hosseinpoor et al., 2018). These dimensions include sex, age, wealth, and ethnicity. On the other hand, the term “inequity” incorporates some justice and fairness judgement into these differences. Inequity could be defined as any unfair disparity that is preventable and systematically evidenced (Arcaya et al., 2015; Bonati et al., 2021). When we think about the concepts of inequality and inequity, we notice that inequality is measurable only because it

274  Handbook of social justice in the Global South depends on a value judgement attributed to some differences in population subgroups. There may be disagreements due to the different perspectives of human beings. To exemplify the terms above, we may look at the most classical example: child mortality. The literature shows that boys have a biological disadvantage compared to girls, mainly in the first year of life (Park & Brondi, 2015). Thus, we would expect a difference between the mortality rates of boys and girls, where boys would have a higher rate. As this difference is biological and far from preventable or unfair, it is independent of policies and the structure of the health system. In contrast to this expected difference, some countries present child mortality rates that do not differ between boys and girls, or, worse, the rate is higher among girls. India is an outstanding example of the latter scenario, with the mortality of girls persistently higher (Costa et al., 2017). Discrimination against girls in this population, which drives parental preferences for a male child and results in an increase in abortion practices and a decrease in health and nutrition care-seeking (e.g., immunisation, nutrition counselling, and medical attention) when the child is female (Das Gupta et al., 2003; Park & Brondi, 2015), could be one factor that explains this unexpected outcome. Concerning Latin American countries, in a study assessing data from 60 low- and middle-income countries, Honduras and the Dominican Republic were ranked in the sixth and ninth positions, respectively, with the highest gender gap (higher mortality in girls) (Costa et al., 2017). Therefore, the gap observed in the cases above could be considered an inequity due to the unfair and avoidable nature of these gender differences. In summary, measuring inequalities in health is an ethical imperative (WHO Regional Committee for the Western Pacific, 2010). The recommendations of the WHO Social Determinants of Health Commission included three main principles of action (WHO Regional Committee for the Western Pacific, 2010). The first is to improve daily living conditions such as birth circumstances, early childhood development, educational levels, employment and work conditions, ageing, and, in summary, human capital. The second principle is to tackle the inequality of power and income within the dynamics of society (e.g., reducing the gaps in work, education, and wages between men and women). Lastly, the third principle is to measure and understand the problem. Therefore, the first step to decreasing inequalities in health is their measurement by identifying vulnerable groups and the dimensions of inequality and monitoring the trends of these differences over time (WHO Regional Committee for the Western Pacific, 2010). Reducing inequalities is not easy, and it is an illusion to think it is possible to overcome them only through the healthcare system. To achieve this goal, it is crucial to bring together collaborative efforts from many sectors of society and work jointly to achieve benefits for communities and countries. Goal 10 stands out among all the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) that 193 nations agreed to achieve by 2030: “Reduce inequality within and between countries” (UN General Assembly, 2015), which stresses ensuring no one is left behind. Monitoring some health indicators and their disparities is the primary tool to identify if countries are progressing toward this goal. Social exclusion can no longer be a possibility, and vulnerable groups must not be left behind.

18.3 THE RELEVANCE OF DATA DISAGGREGATION The first step of any inequality analysis is data disaggregation, or, in other words, the estimation of a given health outcome for each category of an inequality dimension. So, why is such a usual estimation as data disaggregation so relevant for health inequalities? The answer is

Health inequalities in Latin America  275 simple: When we look at the coverage in each subgroup, we can identify the size of the differences between groups previously hidden by global/national estimates, including those segments left behind.​ To illustrate, Figure 18.1 presents data on hypertension from Brazil in 2021. The data is derived from Vigitel, a phone survey in all country capitals. At the top of the graph, we can see the national prevalence of hypertension (26.3 per cent). A national prevalence of 26.3 per cent is alarming enough, mainly if we consider the size of the Brazilian population. Now, look at the second set of estimates stratified by years of formal education: the least educated (0–8 years of education), the intermediate group (9–11 years of education), and the most educated (12 or more years of education). Looking at the prevalence in the intermediate group, we see a value very similar to the national prevalence. Among the highest levels of education, the prevalence is 17.1 per cent, slightly lower than the national estimate. However, we draw attention

Source: Authors.

Figure 18.1  Prevalence of hypertension in the Brazilian population at national and educational levels

276  Handbook of social justice in the Global South to the group with the lowest education level. Among the least-educated group, the prevalence of hypertension is 44.6 per cent, meaning 23 percentage points above the intermediate group and 28 percentage points above the most educated group. This example shows us how national estimates might hide striking disparities. If we did not measure these dimensions, we would not be aware that some population groups may be more vulnerable.​ An important topic to highlight when discussing data disaggregation is the dimension of inequality. Until now, we have commented mainly on poverty, income, and education, but measuring inequalities in health goes beyond the poor versus rich dichotomy. Several dimensions of inequality could explain the differences between groups often found in health outcomes. Theoretically, any social-derived variable that divides the population under study into groups could be considered a dimension to show inequalities. So, gender, ethnicity, religion, disability, and levels of women’s empowerment could also show relevant disparities. Depending on the analysed health outcome, gender or religious background, for example, may have a similar or higher influence on the variability of the outcome than wealth. We may look at gender inequalities in mental health in adolescents to exemplify this. Figure 18.2 shows data from the Global School-based Student Health Survey (GSHS) in seven countries of Latin America. The outcome is “ever considered suicide in the last 12 months”. For all countries, girls are the most vulnerable group, with a prevalence of ever considering suicide at least nine percentage points higher than boys. In Guatemala and Peru, this difference reaches around 15 percentage points. This disparity between boys and girls is a clear example of how gender should be a highly relevant dimension in measuring inequalities. The results of consistently poorer mental health in girls than boys could be explained by the pressure of the social roles expected from girls, mainly in male-dominated (Yu, 2018) and gender-restrictive cultures.

Source: Authors.

Figure 18.2  Prevalence of ever-considered suicide among boys and girls from seven countries in Latin America

Health inequalities in Latin America  277 Additionally, girls are more frequently exposed to domestic violence, sexual abuse, or unpaid work (Yu, 2018). Although the relevance of economic inequalities to mental health is well known, the measurement of gender as a dimension of inequality raises a series of other potential pathways for public health interventions, allowing us to understand the whole problem scenario. Another example of a dimension of inequality that is consistently relevant, regardless of wealth and place of residence, is ethnicity. Populations from Latin American countries stem from three major ethnic groups, namely Indigenous, afro-descendants, and mixed race, where the Indigenous people have been the most disadvantaged ethnic group of the region in terms of nutrition and health outcomes. Gatica-Domínguez et al. showed that Indigenous children under five years old were more stunted than the reference group (mixed race) in eight countries from Latin America (except for Brazil, Guyana, Mexico, Nicaragua, and Suriname), regardless of place of residence and wealth. Additionally, research has shown that indigenous children aged 6 to 23 months had a consistently higher prevalence of breastfeeding and a worse prevalence of complementary feeding than the reference group of children, mainly in terms of diet diversity (Gatica-Domínguez et al., 2020). Native women of childbearing age were routinely left out of three programmes for maternal and reproductive health in another study from the same area (Mesenburg et al., 2018). These programmes included modern birth control, prenatal care, and skilled birth attendants. The place of residence can also be a relevant determinant of inequalities. Quituizaca et al. showed significant differences in institutional delivery coverage, four or more antenatal care visits, improved sanitation facilities, and improved water sources in Ecuador (Rios Quituizaca et al., 2021). The study also showed that, in general, the coverage of these indicators increased in the country from 1994 to 2012, but the disadvantaged situation of rural residents remained unchanged (Rios Quituizaca et al., 2021). The same study showed high variability in coverage of outcomes measured according to subnational regions of Ecuador. For example, the early initiation of breastfeeding in Morona Santiago was above 80 per cent, while in Manabi, it was below 60 per cent (Rios Quituizaca et al., 2021). Similarly, Ferreira et al. assessed the geographic inequalities in Peru’s composite coverage index (CCI) (Ferreira et al., 2022). The CCI includes eight health interventions: modern methods for family planning, at least four prenatal visits, a skilled attendant at delivery, one dose of the Bacille Calmette-Guérin vaccine, three doses of the diphtheria-pertussis-tetanus vaccine, one dose of the measles vaccine, oral rehydration salts for diarrhoea, and getting care for a child who might have pneumonia. The authors applied geoprocessing methods and identified that CCI coverage in the provinces along the coast was much higher than in the rest of the country (Ferreira et al., 2022). The results of these studies have shown that place of residence plays an essential role in the availability, access to, and utilisation of health services.​​ We have already talked about different dimensions and explained different aspects of inequalities. However, what happens when people are simultaneously from an ethnic minority, women, poor, without education, and living in outlying areas? Sometimes, we need to obtain a more granular unit of measurement for health inequalities. Dimensions of inequalities may interact among them and result in a higher vulnerability status, as exemplified in Figure 18.3. We call this interaction “intersectionalities”, which is defined as the action of multiple social characteristics simultaneously resulting in a much higher disadvantage and discrimination position for some specific group (Muirhead et al., 2020). We can start by understanding this with a simple example: In Mexico, the proportion of households with piped water

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Source: Authors.

Figure 18.3  Intersectionalities inside the home or in the yard is high (94.7 per cent), but it presents variability according to wealth and area of residence. Figure 18.4 uses data from the 2018 Mexico National Survey of Demographic Dynamics. We used a double stratification of piped water coverage by place of residence (urban/rural) and household wealth. To measure the latter, we used an index composed of the household’s cumulative living standard, such as assets in the household (e.g., television, washing machine, Internet) and characteristics of the floor, wall, and roof, divided into quintiles. This figure shows that the proportion of households with piped water is lower in the poorest areas. When we look at the combination of area of residence and wealth, we can observe that even the poorest households present a prevalence of 90 per cent or higher in the urban area. In contrast, in rural areas, only 77 per cent of the poorest households have access to this essential service. This data highlights the intersectionality between area and wealth, identifying the poorest group of rural areas as the group with the greatest vulnerability. Exploring the interaction among different dimensions, Mielke et al. combined the effect of gender, racial identity, education, and family income on the Brazilian population’s leisuretime physical activity levels ( 2022). The authors used data from the National Health Survey. They calculated the Jeopardy Index, a score ranging from 0 to 6, considering all the factors above. Men with white skin, those in the top quartile of family income, and those with tertiary degrees comprise the most privileged group. In contrast, women who are non-white (black, brown, and skin colours other than white) in the bottom quartile of family income and with none/incomplete primary education represented the most vulnerable group (Mielke et al., 2022). Higher values in the Jeopardy Index indicate a higher social vulnerability. When

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Source: Authors.

Figure 18.4  Households with access to piped water in Mexico according to wealth and area of residence comparing leisure-time physical activity levels between white and non-white, the richest and poorest, and more and less educated men and women, the authors evidenced essential inequalities. However, the intersectionalities showed alarming results. The study findings showed that, for each increment in the Jeopardy Index (increase in social vulnerability), there is a decrease of 16 per cent in the prevalence of leisure-time physical activity. The prevalence of the outcome in the most privileged group was 48 per cent, while in the most vulnerable group, it was 9.8 per cent. Additionally, the authors report that the group with the highest social advantage comprises only 3 per cent of the total population (Mielke et al., 2022). Better opportunities for white people, who are more educated and wealthier, regarding access to private physical activity facilities, access to green areas, and flexibility in work arrangements, provide possible explanations for the multiplicative effect of social variables on the outcome. Additionally, women are disadvantaged in physical activity practices due to social and cultural norms, including household and child responsibilities, which frequently overload them.

18.4 MONITORING HEALTH INEQUALITIES IN LATIN AMERICA Until now, we have mentioned why and how to measure health inequalities. However, monitoring and reporting progress is an additional topic essential to public health. Authorities and scholars should frequently measure health inequalities to establish a timeline to guide health planning. The WHO defines five steps for health monitoring: selection of relevant indicators, obtaining data, data analysis, reporting results, and implementation of changes (World Health

280  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Organization, 2013). In Latin America and low- and middle-income countries, a challenge is the availability of health indicators disaggregated by social characteristics and collecting data at more than one point in time. It is essential to highlight that monitoring is a cyclical process since, after evaluating the implementation of programmes, interventions, and policies, it is necessary to collect data again to assess the inequalities and trends. The two most well-known data sources used most frequently due to the structure required to monitor inequalities are the Demographic Health Survey (DHS) and the Multiple Indicator Cluster Surveys (MICS). Both surveys have standardised methods for collecting a series of indicators for maternal and child health in several low- and middle-income countries, including countries from the Latin America region. The surveys also include relevant dimensions such as sex, wealth quintiles, education, ethnicity, and religious affiliation. However, some Latin American countries, such as Brazil, Mexico, and Chile, focus their survey structures on their specific interests, which may differ from DHS and MICS, hampering the comparability of health and nutrition indicators with other countries (benchmarking). Moreover, countries like Nicaragua and Venezuela have had outdated national estimates from MICS and DHS for at least a decade. Given this situation, the most essential aspect for monitoring health disparities is access to high-quality, standardised data that lets us compare people’s health in Latin American countries based on various social factors. We can only understand the scenarios required for planning or redesigning programmes and public policies through data monitoring.​ An essential question in data interpretation is to pay attention to inequality patterns. Let us start with the “bottom” and “top” inequality patterns. The bottom inequality is identified when the coverage of some intervention or prevalence of some outcome includes most of the population, except the most socially vulnerable group (e.g., women, black, poorest) that is left behind. On the contrary, top inequality is the inverse concept, that is, when the coverage/prevalence is similar among all groups except for the most privileged group (e.g., men, white, richest) that presents much higher values than the rest of the population groups (Barros & Victora, 2013; Silva et al., 2018). By monitoring these patterns, we may identify significant characteristics of how a health outcome is distributed in a population, allowing better strategy planning according to the target population’s characteristics. To illustrate these different patterns of inequalities, we present Figure 18.5, obtained from the WHO Health Equity Assessment Monitor Toolkit (HEAT), which uses data from DHS and MICS surveys harmonised by the International Center for Equity in Health. This figure shows different patterns of inequality in the coverage of DPT3 immunisation among one-year-olds according to wealth quintiles in seven countries in Latin America. In Paraguay, for example, the distance between the wealth quintiles is quite similar. On the other hand, in the Dominican Republic, we can see a clear bottom inequality pattern because the poorest group displays much lower coverage than the other four groups. The inverse is observed in Panama (top inequality) because the wealthiest group presents much higher coverage than the rest. Another topic regarding inequality monitoring is the “inverse equity hypothesis”. According to this hypothesis, privileged groups typically start new health interventions (Hart, 1971; Victora et al., 2018). Victora et al. tested this hypothesis using 286 surveys from 89 lowand middle-income countries, using institutional delivery as an outcome and wealth quintiles of households as a dimension of inequality (Victora et al., 2018). The authors found that when countries presented low national-level coverages (likely a new intervention scenario), the wealthiest quintile showed much higher coverage for institutional delivery than other

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Note: The disaggregated data used in this version were drawn from the reproductive, maternal, newborn, and child health dataset of the WHO Health Inequality Monitor data repository (2022 update) which may have been revised or updated since that time. The most recent version of that database is available on the WHO website (https://www​.who​.int.​/data​/inequality​-monitor​/data). Source: Health Equity Assessment Toolkit (HEAT): Software for exploring and comparing health inequalities in countries. Built-in database edition. Version 4.0. Geneva, World Health Organization, 2021.

Figure 18.5  Patterns of inequality for DPT3 immunisation coverage among oneyear-olds according to wealth quintiles quintiles. However, when national estimates reached intermediate coverage (e.g., above 60 per cent), the poorest quintiles were the only group left behind (Victora et al., 2018). These data tell a story about coverage and access to health interventions, starting with the stage where the wealthiest group displays the highest coverage, passing through an intermediate stage where all other groups reach the wealthiest one, leaving only the poorest group behind, presenting low coverage. The final expected stage would be when this poorest group reaches the level of all other groups, including the wealthiest, which characterises universal health coverage and access. For many health outcomes, preventing the inverse equity hypothesis is almost impossible. Nevertheless, the challenge for the public health sector is to ensure that the most vulnerable achieve high coverage and access to health interventions as soon as possible. Understanding these concepts is crucial to avoid discontinuing or interrupting an intervention

282  Handbook of social justice in the Global South because, at first glance, it seems that inequalities are increasing. It is also to understand the mechanisms behind this apparent increase and find alternatives to redesign an intervention that reaches the entire population.

18.5 A GLANCE INTO THE LATIN AMERICA REGION: EXAMPLES OF HEALTH POLICIES CONSIDERING EQUITY AND SOCIAL JUSTICE In the 1980s, after the Declaration of Alma-Ata in 1978, several Latin American countries (e.g., Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Mexico, Peru, Uruguay, and Venezuela) initiated reforms to reduce poverty and social inequalities, as well as improve health outcomes. During the 1990s, reforms aimed to strengthen health systems to reduce health access inequalities, especially among the poorest, and achieve universal health coverage (Atun et al., 2015; World Health Organization, 1978). Overall, national health systems from the region are segmented; however, there are notable exceptions (Pan American Health Organization, Health in the Americas+, 2017). The Brazilian unified health system (Sistema Único de Saúde, SUS) receives global recognition as among the most comprehensive health systems in the world. The SUS provides free health assistance, ranging from fundamental care to complex health treatments, and promotes timely and context-specific preventive actions in several areas, such as immunisation campaigns and smoking and HIV-prevention programmes, among many others (Domingues et al., 2020; Portes et al., 2018; Ministério da Saúde, n.d.; Teixeira et al., 2018). Costa Rica has been notable for achieving universalisation through the Plan Nacional de Salud, started in the 1970s, which established that Social Insurance (Caja Costarricense de Seguro Social) would cover the healthcare of formal workers but also uninsured people who cannot pay for medical services (Munoz & Scrimshaw, 1996). In Uruguay, the National Health Fund and the National Health Insurance (the National Integrated Health System) were established in 2007, comprising public, private, and third-sector providers (Ballart & Fuentes, 2019). Success cases that increased health service coverage in the region included changes in the health system and the combined implementation of comprehensive policies and interventions by different state authorities and other actors, particularly civil society. Social protection policies address social determinants of health (e.g., poverty, inequalities, or social exclusion) throughout the life course and for the most disadvantaged populations, as mentioned above (Abramo et al., 2020; Atun et al., 2015). Examples of nutritional strategies targeted at pregnant and lactating women, preschoolers, and schoolchildren include the Social Milk Supply Program (Mexico), the National School Food Program (Brazil), and the Qali Warma National School Food Program (Peru) (Abramo et al., 2020). Policies with a multidimensional approach and integrated actions, such as Brasil Carinhoso, Chile Crece Contigo, Uruguay Crece Contigo, and De Cero a Siempre (Colombia), create a chain of opportunities, foster capacity development throughout the life cycle, and consequently reduce inequalities (Abramo et al., 2020). In a similar vein, since the beginning of the twenty-first century, most Latin American countries have implemented conditional cash transfer programmes (CCTs) to reduce poverty and interrupt the intergenerational transmission of poverty, as well as empower women and expand access to education, nutrition, and

Health inequalities in Latin America  283 health services targeted at families in poverty and extreme poverty (Cecchini & Atuesta, 2017; Cecchini & Madariaga, 2011). Beyond a focus on economic position, ethnicity is an important determining factor in health outcomes. In Latin America, Indigenous people live in much higher and more extreme poverty than the non-Indigenous population (Cevallos, 2009). Since the Indigenous population usually has the highest maternal mortality and unmet needs for family planning rates, in 2010, the United Nations Population Fund promoted and provided technical assistance to Ministries of Health, Indigenous women’s organisations, and other institutions in the design and implementation of intercultural reproductive health policies in Bolivia, Ecuador, Guatemala, Mexico, Panama, and Peru – the Latin American countries with the largest Indigenous populations. These policies applied culturally adapted reproductive health models in hospitals, emergency obstetric care units, and primary care clinics. By that year, Bolivia and Ecuador had developed constitutional reforms to recognise sexual and reproductive rights and the right to intercultural health (UNFPA, 2010). Child stunting is a relevant indicator of health inequalities, which is not only a general outcome of under-five child well-being but also accurately reflects social disparities. Peru is the best example of reducing the national prevalence of stunting (from 31.3 per cent in 2000 to 13.1 per cent in 2016) through the adoption of anti-poverty policies and the sustained implementation of equitable intersectoral interventions (Reproductive, Maternal, Newborn, and Child Health interventions outside and within the health sectors), focussing on the most vulnerable populations and the poorest areas. A multisectoral approach, sustained economic growth, promoted programmatic initiatives, effective and sustained political leadership, strong civil society advocacy in the design and implementation of policies and programmes, and adequate accountability mechanisms at all levels were the driving forces behind the efforts (Huicho et al., 2017, 2020). Brazil has also taken several actions related to improving food security and promoting healthy eating by distributing income (Cotta & Machado, 2013), improving monitoring and surveillance systems, and developing a national guide for the Brazilian population (Monteiro, 2014), which provides recommendations about food and feeding practices that are in line with health promotion but are also culturally minded.

18.6 CONCLUSIONS Measuring and monitoring health inequalities is an ethical issue and the responsibility of a cohesive society. Access to health is a human right and should not generate social exclusion due to ethnicity, gender, economic position, place of residence, or any other social characteristic. It is important to remember that opportunities, in general, are not equally distributed in a society because social and historical background and level of empowerment of individuals determine them. Opportunities in health are similar. The adoption or not of a healthy lifestyle, having or not having access to healthcare facilities, and having or not having access to improved water and sanitation must not be an individual merit. The role of any society and its government should be to provide essential conditions of life and empower the population to improve health. Ignoring health inequalities is not an option in current societies. Evidencing and tackling these unfair differences is our duty as humans living in society.

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REFERENCES Abramo, L., Cecchini, S., & Ullmann, H. (2020). Addressing health inequalities in Latin America: The role of social protection. Ciencia & Saude Coletiva, 25(5), 1587–1598. https://doi​.org​/10​.1590​ /1413–81232020255.32802019 Arcaya, M. C., Arcaya, A. L., & Subramanian, S. V. (2015). Inequalities in health: Definitions, concepts, and theories. Global Health Action, 8, 27106. https://doi​.org​/10​.3402​/gha​.v8​.27106 Atun, R., Andrade, L. O. M. de, Almeida, G., Cotlear, D., Dmytraczenko, T., Frenz, P., Garcia, P., Gómez-Dantés, O., Knaul, F. M., Muntaner, C., Paula, J. B., de, Rígoli, F., Serrate, P. C.-F., & Wagstaff, A. (2015). Health-system reform and universal health coverage in Latin America. The Lancet, 385(9974), 1230–1247. https://doi​.org​/10​.1016​/S0140–6736(14)61646–9 Ballart, X., & Fuentes, G. (2019). Gaining public control on health policy: The politics of scaling up to universal health coverage in Uruguay. Social Theory & Health, 17(3), 348–366. https://doi​.org​/10​ .1057​/s41285–018–0080–7 Barata, R. B. (2005). Epidemiologia social. Revista Brasileira de Epidemiologia, 8, 7–17. https://doi​.org​ /10​.1590​/S1415–790X2005000100002 Barros, A. J. D., & Victora, C. G. (2013). Measuring coverage in MNCH: Determining and interpreting inequalities in maternal, newborn, and child health interventions coverage. PLoS Medicine, 10(5), e1001390. https://doi​.org​/10​.1371​/journal​.pmed​.1001390 Bonati, M., Tognoni, G., & Sereni, F. (2021). Inequalities in the universal right to health. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 18(6), 2844. https://doi​.org​/10​.3390​/ ijerph18062844 Cecchini, S., & Atuesta, B. (2017). Conditional cash transfer programmes in Latin America and the Caribbean: Coverage and investment trends. Digital Repository. https://repositorio​.cepal​.org​/ handle​ /11362​/42109 Cecchini, S., & Madariaga, A. (2011). Conditional cash transfer programmes: The recent experience in Latin America and the Caribbean (SSRN Scholarly Paper No. 1962666). https://doi​.org​/10​.2139​/ ssrn​.1962666 Cevallos, R. (2009). Prestación de servicios de salud en zonas con pueblos indígenas. Recomendaciones para el desarrollo de un sistema de licenciamiento y acreditación de servicios interculturales de salud en el marco de la renovación de la atención primaria de la salud. Organización Panamericana de la Salud. Costa, J. C., da Silva, I. C. M., & Victora, C. G. (2017). Gender bias in under-five mortality in low/middleincome countries. BMJ Global Health, 2(2), e000350. https://doi​.org​/10​.1136​/ bmjgh​-2017–000350 Cotta, R. M. M., & Machado, J. C. (2013). Programa Bolsa Família e segurança alimentar e nutricional no Brasil: Revisão crítica da literatura. Revista Panamericana de Salud Publica, 33(1). https://iris​ .paho​.org​/ handle​/10665​.2​/9220 Das Gupta, M., Zhenghua, J., Bohua, L., Zhenming, X., Chung, W., & Hwa-Ok, B. (2003). Why is son preference so persistent in East and South Asia? A cross-country study of China, India and the Republic of Korea. The Journal of Development Studies, 40(2), 153–187. https://doi​.org​/10​.1080​/002​ 2038​0412​331293807 Domingues, C. M. A. S., Maranhão, A. G. K., Teixeira, A. M., Fantinato, F. F. S., & Domingues, R. A. S. (2020). 46 anos do Programa Nacional de Imunizações: Uma história repleta de conquistas e desafios a serem superados. Cadernos de Saúde Pública, 36. https://doi​.org​/10​.1590​ /0102–311X00222919 Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean. (2022). Social panorama of Latin America 2021. CEPAL. https://www​.cepal​.org​/en ​/publications​/47719​-social​-panorama​-latin​-america​-2021. Evans, B. R., & Leighton, F. A. (2014). A history of One Health. Revue scientifique et technique (International Office of Epizootics), 33(2), 413–420. https://doi​.org​/10​.20506​/rst​.33​.2​.2298 Ferreira, L. Z., Utazi, C. E., Huicho, L., Nilsen, K., Hartwig, F. P., Tatem, A. J., & Barros, A. J. D. (2022). Geographic inequalities in health intervention coverage – mapping the composite coverage index in Peru using geospatial modelling. BMC Public Health, 22(1), 2104. https://doi​.org​/10​.1186​/ s12889–022–14371–7

Health inequalities in Latin America  285 Gatica-Domínguez, G., Mesenburg, M. A., Barros, A. J. D., & Victora, C. G. (2020). Ethnic inequalities in child stunting and feeding practices: Results from surveys in thirteen countries from Latin America. International Journal for Equity in Health, 19(1), 53. https://doi​.org​/10​.1186​/s12939–020–01165–9 Hart, J. T. (1971). The inverse care law. The Lancet, 297(7696), 405–412. https://doi​.org​/10​.1016​/ S0140–6736(71)92410-X Honjo, K. (2004). Social epidemiology: Definition, history, and research examples. Environmental Health and Preventive Medicine, 9(5), 193–199. https://doi​.org​/10​.1007​/ BF02898100 Hosseinpoor, A. R., Bergen, N., Schlotheuber, A., & Grove, J. (2018). Measuring health inequalities in the context of sustainable development goals. Bulletin of the World Health Organization, 96(9), 654–659. https://doi​.org​/10​.2471​/ BLT​.18​.210401 Huicho, L., Huayanay-Espinoza, C. A., Herrera-Perez, E., Segura, E. R., Niño de Guzman, J., Rivera-Ch, M., & Barros, A. J. D. (2017). Factors behind the success story of under-five stunting in Peru: A district ecological multilevel analysis. BMC Pediatrics, 17(1), 29. https://doi​.org​/10​.1186​/ s12887–017–0790–3 Huicho, L., Vidal-Cárdenas, E., Akseer, N., Brar, S., Conway, K., Islam, M., Juarez, E., Rappaport, A., Tasic, H., Vaivada, T., Wigle, J., & Bhutta, Z. A. (2020). Drivers of stunting reduction in Peru: A country case study. The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, 112(Suppl 2), 816S-829S. https://doi​ .org​/10​.1093​/ajcn​/nqaa164 Julia, C., & Valleron, A.-J. (2011). Louis-René Villermé (1782–1863), a pioneer in social epidemiology: Re-analysis of his data on comparative mortality in Paris in the early 19th century. Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, 65(8), 666–670. https://doi​.org​/10​.1136​/jech​.2009​.087957 Krieger, N. (2001). Historical roots of social epidemiology: Socioeconomic gradients in health and contextual analysis. International Journal of Epidemiology, 30(4), 899–900. https://doi​.org​/10​.1093​ /ije​/30​.4​.899 Marmot, M. (2015). The health gap: The challenge of an unequal world (1st U.S. ed.). Bloomsbury Press. Marmot, M. (2018). Inclusion health: Addressing the causes of the causes. The Lancet, 391(10117), 186–188. https://doi​.org​/10​.1016​/S0140–6736(17)32848–9 Mesenburg, M. A., Restrepo-Mendez, M. C., Amigo, H., Balandrán A. D., Barbosa-Verdun, M. A., Caicedo-Velásquez, B., Carvajal-Aguirre, L., Coimbra, C. E. A. Jr., Ferreira, L. Z., Flores-Quispe, M. D. P., Flores-Ramírez, C., Gatica-Dominguez, G., Huicho, L., Jinesta-Campos, K., Krishnadath, I. S. K., Maia, F.S., Marquez-Callisaya, I. A., Martinez, M. M., Mujica, O.J., Pingray, V., Retamoso, A., Ríos-Quituizaca, P., Velásquez-Rivas, J., Viáfara-López, C.A., Walrond, S., Wehrmeister, F.C., Del Popolo, F., Barros, A.J., & Victora, C. G. (2018). Ethnic group inequalities in coverage with reproductive, maternal and child health interventions: Cross-sectional analyses of national surveys in 16 Latin American and Caribbean countries. The Lancet Global Health, 6(8), e902-e913. https:// doi​.org​/10​.1016​/S2214​-109X(18)30300-0 Mielke, G. I., Malta, D. C., Nunes, B. P., & Cairney, J. (2022). All are equal, but some are more equal than others: Social determinants of leisure time physical activity through the lens of intersectionality. BMC Public Health, 22(1). https://doi​.org​/10​.1186​/s12889–021–12428–7 Miller, H. N., Thornton, C. P., Rodney, T., Thorpe, R. J., & Allen, J. (2020). Social cohesion in health. ANS. Advances in Nursing Science, 43(4), 375–390. https://doi​.org​/10​.1097​/ANS​.0000000000000327 Ministério da Saúde (n.d.). Sistema Único de Saúde. Ministério da Saúde. https://www​.gov​.br​/saude​/pt​ -br​/assuntos​/saude​-de​-a​-a​-z​/s​/sus​/sistema​-unico​-de​-saude Monteiro, C. A. (2014). Guia alimentar para a população brasileira. gov​.b​r. http://portalsaude​.saude​ .gov​.br​/images​/pdf​/2014​/novembro​/05​/Guia​-Alimentar​-para​-a​-pop ​-brasiliera​-Miolo ​-PDF​-Internet​ .pdf Muirhead, E. V., Milner, A., Freeman, R., Doughty, J., & Macdonald, M. E. (2020). What is intersectionality and why is it important in oral health research? Community Dentistry and Oral Epidemiology, 48(6), 464–470. https://doi​.org​/10​.1111​/cdoe​.12573 Munoz, C., & Scrimshaw, N. S. (1996). La transicion de la nutricion y la salud de Costa Rica democratica. INCAP. Pan American Health Organization (2017). Health in the Americas+, Summary: Regional outlook and country profiles.

286  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Park, J. J., & Brondi, L. (2015). Why are girls still dying unnecessarily? The need to address gender inequity in child health in the post–2015 development agenda. Journal of Global Health, 5(2), 020303. https://pmc​.ncbi​.nlm​.nih​.gov​/articles​/ PMC4512263/ Portes, L. H., Machado, C. V., Turci, S. R. B., Figueiredo, V. C., Cavalcante, T. M., & Silva, V. L. da C. e. (2018). A política de controle do tabaco no Brasil: Um balanço de 30 anos. Ciência & Saúde Coletiva, 23, 1837–1848. https://doi​.org​/10​.1590​/1413–81232018236.05202018 Rios Quituizaca, P., Gatica-Domínguez, G., Nambiar, D., Ferreira Santos, J. L., Brück, S., Vidaletti Ruas, L., & Barros, A. J. D. (2021). National and subnational coverage and inequalities in reproductive, maternal, newborn, child, and sanitary health interventions in Ecuador: A comparative study between 1994 and 2012. International Journal for Equity in Health, 20, 48. https://doi​.org​/10​ .1186​/s12939–020–01359–1 Ruano, A. L., Rodríguez, D., Rossi, P. G., & Maceira, D. (2021). Understanding inequities in health and health systems in Latin America and the Caribbean: A thematic series. International Journal for Equity in Health, 20(1), 94. https://doi​.org​/10​.1186​/s12939–021–01426–1 Silva, I. C. M. da, Restrepo-Mendez, M. C., Costa, J. C., Ewerling, F., Hellwig, F., Ferreira, L. Z., Ruas, L. P. V., Joseph, G., & Barros, A. J. D. (2018). Measurement of social inequalities in health: Concepts and methodological approaches in the Brazilian context. Epidemiologia E Servicos De Saude: Revista Do Sistema Unico De Saude Do Brasil, 27(1), e000100017. https://doi​.org​/10​.5123​/ S1679–49742018000100017 Teixeira, M. G., Costa, M. da C. N., Paixão, E. S. da, Carmo, E. H., Barreto, F. R., & Penna, G. O. (2018). Conquistas do SUS no enfrentamento das doenças transmissíveis. Ciência & Saúde Coletiva, 23, 1819–1828. https://doi​.org​/10​.1590​/1413–81232018236.08402018 Thornton, R. L. J., Glover, C. M., Cené, C. W., Glik, D. C., Henderson, J. A., & Williams, D. R. (2016). Evaluating strategies for reducing health disparities by addressing the social determinants of health. Health Affairs (Project Hope), 35(8), 1416–1423. https://doi​.org​/10​.1377​/ hlthaff​.2015​.1357 UN General Assembly (2015). Transforming our world: The 2030 agenda for sustainable development. https://www​.refworld​.org​/docid​/57b6e3e44​.html, from https://unfoundation​.org​/what​-we​-do​/issues​/ sustainable​-development​-goals/ UNFPA (2010, August). Promoting equality, recognizing diversity: Case stories in intercultural sexual and reproductive health among Indigenous peoples, Panama. Victora, C. G., Joseph, G., Silva, I. C. M., Maia, F. S., Vaughan, J. P., Barros, F. C., & Barros, A. J. D. (2018). The inverse equity hypothesis: Analyses of institutional deliveries in 286 national surveys. American Journal of Public Health, 108(4), 464–471. https://doi​.org​/10​.2105​/AJPH​.2017​.304277 World Health Organization. (n.d.). Human rights and health. https://www​.who​.int​/news​-room​/fact​ -sheets​/detail​/ human​-rights​-and​-health World Health Organization (1946). Constitution of the World Health Organization. Basic documents, Geneva. World Health Organization (2013). Handbook on health inequality monitoring with a special focus on low- and middle-income countries. https://apps​.who​.int ​/iris​/ handle​/10665​/85345 World Health Organization Regional Committee for the Western Pacific, 061 (‎ 2010)‎. Regional strategy on health system strengthening and primary health care. World Health Organization Regional Office for Europe (1978) Declaration of Alma-Ata. Yu, S. (2018). Uncovering the hidden impacts of inequality on mental health: A global study. Translational Psychiatry, 8, 98. https://doi​.org​/10​.1038​/s41398–018–0148–0

19. Decentering the white gaze in African filmscape Vieux Alassane Toure

19.1 INTRODUCTION Since cinema’s inception, there has been a noticeable and egregious lack of accurate representation of Black bodies and experiences on screen. The portrayal of the Black experience has been severely limited and often depicted through the narrow lens of the white gaze. Gaze, in this study, is interpreted in line with Hawthorn’s (2006) perspective, who defines it thus: “… far from being a neutral process, our looking is saturated with the residues of our social and cultural existence, those relating to class, sexuality, [and] economics.” However, in recent years, a renewed and resolute effort has been made to change this narrative and showcase a more dignifying portrayal of Black lives and their contributions to Euro-African societies. This attempt to shift the course of Black cinematic representations with a rendering that captures a dignifying pedigree of Black bodies has been taken up by leading filmmakers such as Jean-Baptiste and Rambaldi. In the films Il a déjà tes yeux [He even has your eyes] (HEHYE) (2016) by Jean-Baptiste and Rambaldi’s Bienvenue à Marly Gomont [African doctor] (AD) (2016), there is a clear effort to decenter the traditional, Western filmic gaze. Instead of presenting Africa, its people, and diaspora as exotic or primitive, these films aim to humanize their characters and present a more nuanced, realistic depiction of African and Afrodiasporic experiences. HEHYE tells the story of a Black immigrant couple who adopts a white French Caucasian child named Benjamin. The film explores issues of race, identity, and family, and challenges us to question our assumptions about adoption and parenthood. By centering the story on the Black adoptive parents and their experiences, rather than on the white adopted child, the film disrupts the traditional power dynamic of the Western gaze. Similarly, AD follows the story of a Congolese doctor and his family who move to a rural French village where he has to work as the village doctor. The doctor and his family must navigate cultural differences and prejudices. The film portrays the doctor as a complex, multi-dimensional character, rather than a token of African stereotype. By subverting the expectations of the Western gaze, the films challenge viewers to see Africans as individuals rather than as a monolithic group. Echoing Olivier Barlet’s conclusion in African cinemas decolonizing the gaze (1996/2000), “African cinema invites us into a genuine process of how to look” (p. ix). Overall, these films represent an important step in the ongoing effort to decolonize film and challenge the traditional power dynamic of the Western gaze. By humanizing African characters and presenting a more nuanced, complex view of African life, these films offer a new vision of African cinema that is both empowering and enlightening. This comparative study explores the gazes in the narrative structure and metaphors of healing and adoption used by Jean-Baptiste and Rambaldi. These filmmakers aim to examine 287

288  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Black male, female, and child bodies in various settings, including Paris and a French province. From a decolonial lens and the concept of the gaze, I will analyze how the filmmakers conceptualize and represent the characters, whether they are Black or white males or females. The body is often seen as a place where power struggles occur, with people either accepting or rejecting it based on their physical characteristics. I want to explore the social injustices that arise from a culture of silencing the imagination of both white and Black couples through fear tactics, shaming, and humor. These boundaries and expectations prevent people from freely expressing themselves, leading to an unjust society where people hesitate to break canonical adoption barriers. If social justice refers to equal access to resources and opportunities, how come decades after the legalization of interracial marriages, Western societies still struggle to fathom the adoption of white children by Black couples? Before addressing the questions at hand, the chapter provides an overview of the current state of African cinema.

19.2 THE ROOTS AND RUTS OF AFRICAN CINEMA African cinema has a rich history that dates back to the early twentieth century. While some scholars argue that the first African film was made in 1920 by Egyptian filmmaker Ibrahim Lama, others believe that “as early as 1955, Afrique Sur Seine, was the first film ever made by Black Africans. The film aimed to reverse the colonist’s gaze which often characterizes most White Savior Films (WSF),” as theorized by Hughey (2010). According to Hughey, a WSF features a group of lower-class, urban, nonwhites (generally Black and Latino/a) who struggle through the social order in general, or the educational system specifically. Yet through the sacrifices of a white teacher they are transformed, saved and redeemed by film’s end. (p. 475)

To change the dominant narrative of the African filmscape, Africans had to take matters into their own hands. Afrique sur Seine (1955) was shot in Paris because Senegalese Paulin Soumanou Vieyra and his friends from the Groupe Africain du Cinéma [African Group of Cinema] of the [IDHEC]1 did not obtain authorization to shoot in Africa. Yet, “they remained aesthetically and thematically close to a French universalist view of cinema” (Faguer, 2010, para. 5). However, it wasn’t until the 1960s that African cinema began to flourish. This was due largely to the decolonization of Africa, which allowed for greater artistic expression and cultural independence. Many early African films focused on the struggles of post-colonial Africa, with themes of political liberation and social justice, which are rooted in the fundamental belief that all individuals deserve equal treatment and opportunities regardless of their race, gender, religion, or social status, and cultural identity. This conception of social justice is currently lacking in the tapestry of African cinema. Faguer (2010) writes that “African people were only able to access a representation of themselves that was ideologically charged made by colonial filmmakers, ethnologists or missionaries” due to the former French Minister of Colonies, Laval’s, 1934 decree (para. 2). This explains, in part, the tribulations the pioneers underwent in the early days of African cinema. Manthia Diawara’s (1992) seminal text, African cinema, maps out the history and evolution of African cinema. Diawara’s book contextualizes African cinema within the broader social and political movements that have shaped the continent over the past century. By tracing the development of African cinema alongside the struggle for independence and decolonization,

Decentering the white gaze in African filmscape  289 Diawara helps us to understand how film has played a role in shaping African identity and culture. By the same token, Diawara also recognizes the diversity and complexity of the various film movements that have emerged across the continent. Whether it involves the early pioneers of African cinema like Ousmane Sembene, considered the father of African cinema, or more recent filmmakers like Abderrahmane Sissako and Mahamat-Saleh Haroun, Diawara shows us that there is no single “African cinema,” but rather a rich tapestry of cinematic traditions and styles. Through his writing and research, Diawara has made an important contribution to the field of African studies and has helped to elevate the voices of African filmmakers and storytellers. In the same vein, Frank Ukadike’s (1994) book, Black African cinema, explores the history, themes, and styles of filmmaking in Africa, highlighting the unique early perspectives and challenges, including lack of training, means, and authorization, faced by the first generation of Black and African filmmakers on the continent. Today, African cinema continues to evolve and expand, with filmmakers from all over the continent and the diaspora exploring a wide range of topics and themes in their cinematographic productions. Francophone cinema is rich and diverse, spanning both Europe and Africa. In Africa, Francophone cinema has played a significant role in telling the stories of post-colonial nations, with films exploring themes of identity, colonialism, and independence.

19.3 BLACK REPRESENTATIONS ON FRANCOPHONE SCREENSCAPE The representation of Black bodies in Francophone cinema is a significant topic that merits attention. It is important to examine how Black bodies are portrayed in film, as these representations can shape societal perceptions and attitudes towards Black individuals and individuals of African descent. By critically analyzing the portrayal of Black bodies in African cinema, we can better understand how race is depicted in the media and work towards creating more accurate and positive representations. According to Yancy (2016), “The depiction of the Black body as the quintessence of evil has endured across historical space and time. Hence, my Black body is a site of enduring white semiotic constructions and historical power relations that inscribe and mark it as a particular type of body, an indistinguishable, threatening, evil presence, the so-called Black bugaboo” (2016, p. xxxiv). These “white semiotic constructions” evolve across time and space, particularly with the advent of the Human Zoos. Human zoos, that existed in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries in France and the United States, as evidenced by Sarah Baartman and Orta Benga2, have played a major role in the misrepresentation and mischaracterization of Black people across a multitude of mediums, whether visual or in print. As rightfully demonstrated in Fearing the Black body: The racial origins of fat phobia by Strings (2019) who when addressing the representation of female Black bodies, opines that “The image of fat Black women as ‘savage’ and “barbarous” in art, philosophy, and science, and as ‘diseased’ in medicine has been used to both degrade Black women and discipline white women.” She further notes that: Indeed, the racial discourse of fatness as “coarse,” “immoral,” “black,” and “Other” not only denigrated black women, it also served as the driver for the creation of slenderness as the proper form of

290  Handbook of social justice in the Global South embodiment for elite white Christian women. In other words, the fear of the black body was integral to the creation of the slender aesthetic among fashionable white Americans. (p. 212)

Strings’ analysis reveals the othering and debasement of Black, particularly female, bodies which still impact contemporary aesthetics. With the resilience of artistic productions, more diverse stories of Africa and its diaspora are being told, and Black actors, actresses, and filmmakers such as Ousmane Sembene, Souleymane Cisse, Safy Faye, Sylvestre Amoussou, and Alain Gomis have played an avantgarde role in Black cinema. Early depictions of Black people as savages and slaves or “colonized bodies” (Boëtsch et al., 2019) often portrayed people as one-dimensional characters who were either violent or subservient. Another important role of Black representations in cinema is how they have given voice to the Black community and helped raise awareness about important issues. For example, films such as Do the right thing (1989) and Selma (2014) have helped to spark meaningful conversations about racism and inequality in America. One topic that has been widely discussed in recent years is the representation of African people in the film industry. Many argue that there is a lack of diversity in Hollywood, with African characters often being portrayed in stereotypical or one-dimensional roles. This has sparked conversations about the importance of representation and the need for more African creatives to be involved in the filmmaking process. Some recent films, such as Black panther (2018), have been praised for their positive depictions of African culture and characters. Black panther has become a turning point in Black representations, particularly as both Black male and female bodies were given meaningfully equal, positive, and nuanced depictions, with them playing the leading roles. However, it would be naive to think that it brought the deep transformative change the film industry needs. There is still much work to be done to ensure that African and Black voices are heard and their stories are told with authenticity and respect. The issue of Black representation in the media has been a long-standing topic of conversation, but a recent event has reignited this important discussion. Chris Rock’s3 monologue at the 2016 Oscars shed light on Hollywood’s discriminatory practices against people of color. His words have caused a stir in the industry as he pokes the imaginary factory bear of the Western world. The gist of his intervention was to denounce the gap between the representation, for he believes that it is not just about the awards. He was not saying that all white people in Hollywood are racist, but there is a lot of unconscious bias that goes on, and it is time to start acknowledging it. We need to have more diversity and create opportunities for people of color to tell their own stories and to be seen as fully realized human beings. It is not going to be easy or happen overnight, but we cannot just sit back and accept the status quo. In a nutshell, Chris Rock calls for all hands on deck to shift the collective gaze that informs our imaginaries rooted in our interpersonal and transnational connections and ties. Returning to the film discussion, the lead female actress in HEHYE and AD, Aissa Maiga, followed Chris Rock’s steps by talking about racism in Francophone and French cinema. Her speech at the 2020 César (called the French Oscar) caused quite a stir in the French and Francophone film industry. In her monologue, she spoke out about the issue of racism within French cinema and how it has affected the careers of Black people working in the film industry.

Decentering the white gaze in African filmscape  291 Born in Dakar, Senegal, Maiga spent her formative years in France, where she embarked on her acting career. Her big break came with the release of the critically acclaimed film Bamako in 2006, which catapulted her to fame and earned her widespread recognition. Maiga’s acting prowess continued to impress audiences with her performances in highly acclaimed films such as HEHYE. Maiga, who is of Senegalese and Malian descent, has been vocal for years about the lack of diversity in French cinema. In her monologue, she talked about the struggles she has faced as a Black actress in a predominantly white film industry. She also criticized the French film industry for only casting Black actors in certain stereotypical roles, such as those of drug dealers, domestic workers, and prostitutes. Maiga argued that this perpetuates harmful stereotypes and reinforces the idea that Black people can only play certain types of characters. Her advocacy work has been equally impressive as she has been actively advocating for diversity and inclusion in the industry. Besides her successful acting career, Maiga is also an author and activist who champions issues of race and representation in the film industry. Her co-edited book, Noire n’est pas mon métier [Black is not my profession] (2018), is highly regarded for its insightful commentary on the challenges Black actresses face in the industry. In the book, 16 cinema professionals and actresses provide behind-the-scenes testimonies about what they had to deal with silently, far from the glamor and prestige that some of their roles entail. In the preface of the book, Maiga highlights that despite over 300 French films being produced annually in France, there is still a significant gap in terms of the representation of French social, demographic, and ethnic realities. She questions whether filmmakers are aware of this gap and whether they are in synchrony with the society in which they live (pp. 9–10). Along with 15 other actresses, she shares her testimony about the stereotypical ideas that still influence French productions. They assert they want to be valued for their talent, not just their skin color or ethnicity. In the end, they claim that “It’s time for the industry to evolve and embrace diversity in all its forms” (p. 11). France has lagged behind in equal representation of minorized communities, especially Arabs and Black people, as the number of news anchors on many television channels is scarce. It was not until 2005 and 2006 that France broadcast a Black news anchor on a major French news outlet on television for the first time. As written by Pablo Michelot (2011), Harry Roselmack is a significant figure in French media history for being the first Black journalist to present a national news program on television. His achievement is a testament to the battle for diversity and inclusivity in French media, and this act was a major milestone in France’s late and ongoing efforts to promote equality and representation on screen. The status quo has shown the relevance of Maiga and her friends’ timely book. Maiga concludes her remarks with “a plea for living together, but also an indispensable protest, so that those who come after us can evolve in a more open, fairer and more inclusive world.” (p. 12). Echoing that, Black transatlantic experience in cinema suggests the need to enter into dialogue as the struggles continue. Chris Rock’s breathless and provocative spiel and Maiga’s bold stance in a color-blind society echo or complement another similar take on the danger of misrepresentation, or what Adichie (2009), the Nigerian-American writer and intellectual, calls “The danger of a single story.” It is an insightful and thought-provoking discourse highlighting the importance of diverse storytelling. The idea that a single narrative can shape our understanding of a group of people or cultures is powerful and dangerous. Adichie’s personal experiences with

292  Handbook of social justice in the Global South stereotyping and misrepresentation demonstrate the need for multiple perspectives and voices in the media, film industry, and literature, to name a few, as pointed out by Linda Tuhiwai Smith in Decolonizing methodologies (1999/2008) when talking about representation through history books. Four things make many books dangerous to Indigenous readers: (1) if they do not reinforce our values, actions, customs, culture, and identity; (2) when they tell us only about others, they are saying that we do not exist; (3) they may be writing about us but are writing things that are untrue; and (4) they are writing about us but saying negative and insensitive things, which tell us that we are not good (1998/2008, p. 35). The same principles apply to cinematic representation, particularly because Adichie believes that many stories matter instead of just one. She explains that there is a clear link between power and stories: “the ability not just to tell the story of another person, but to make it the definitive story of that person.” Another reason why representation and having many voices matter is that “the single story creates stereotypes... and the problem with stereotypes is not that they are untrue, but that they are incomplete. They make one story become the only story.” Regardless of the differences in background, color, or look, a cultivation of shared attributes that separate us from animals must be pursued through the quest for ultimate human values, particularly when dealing with children born inherently with human values without any racial prejudice.

19.4 BLUE EYES IN BLACK FRANCE 19.4.1 Tell Me How You Look and I Will Tell You Where You Belong It is commonplace to see white people adopt people of color without raising any eyebrows, yet 10,000 questions run through most people’s minds to this day if they run across Black parents adopting a white child. In a graduate literature class at the University of Kentucky, I asked the students if they knew of any instances where a Black person had adopted a white child. To my surprise, none of the students had witnessed such cases. This led me to ask, “Why is it more common to see Black or people of color adoptees than the other way around?” The exchange was intriguing and left us all with much to ponder. Why do many white people become suspicious or call the police on Black women accompanying white children? How has modern society come to this? What has contributed to this phenomenon? My argument is not to say that this situation has not shifted, but even if it evolved, it is at a remarkably low gear to the point where one struggles to find a Black friend who is a parent of a white child. It would be limiting to make Black people the culprits for such a situation. Many theories could explain the reluctance or lack of interest among Black couples adopting a white child. These factors include the stereotypical argument concerning the higher birth rate in Black communities, which could potentially make it easier to adopt from them. Another factor includes the high cost associated with the procedures and plans of adoption. According to Juliette Halifax and Catherine Villeneuve-Gokalp (2005), there is a commonly held belief that “adoption is ‘reserved’ for the rich; the lower social categories may be more reluctant to apply for adoption because they believe they have little chance of success.” This argument is limited simply because it does not corroborate the gap between white and Black adopters.

Decentering the white gaze in African filmscape  293 On the other hand, white people’s imaginaries have been fed with, and shaped by, a variety of means and myths as to how to help poor Black communities. Their willingness and eagerness to aid Black people, who are often perceived as poor and vulnerable, are rooted in two fundamental and pervasive beliefs: a sense of superiority and the white savior complex. These two concepts underlie their actions and behaviors when it comes to doing good for Black people. The classroom scenario in HEHYE prompted us to probe further into why it is more commonplace to see Black adoptees than vice versa. It uses the metaphor of adoption to explore the complexities of family and identity. Just like how a child can be adopted into a family and become part of that family’s culture and history, the main adoptee in the film, Benjamin, must navigate his own identity as a white child who was adopted by a Black immigrant couple. The film delves into the challenges of belonging and acceptance, as well as the unique experiences of transracial adoption. Through its poignant storytelling and powerful performances, the film offers a compelling exploration of what it means to truly belong to a family. The film portrays how Paul and Sali grapple with their identity and sense of belonging in France with limited or filtered access to what the Republic of France holds dearest: its children, who constitute its future. Black and immigrants, they try to reconcile their roots with their host country. Simply put, in the mind of Mme. Mallet, guests must know their limits in the host country, as the Senegalese saying goes, Gan du yewwi ay bëy, which means in essence that a stranger must not take the liberty to free their host’s goats without the latter’s consensus. Treated as immigrants, their access to adoption is limited and challenging. The film delves into the complexities of transracial adoption and its challenges. Through its poignant storytelling and powerful performances, it highlights the emotional toll that adoption can take on families and the enduring love and connection that can be formed despite differences in race, culture, and background. Although the movie offers a compelling exploration of what it means to truly belong to a family, and the impact that adoption can have on both the adoptee and the adoptive family, it also foregrounds the legacy of the colonial mindset in French imaginaries. Next to the patriarchal view of French society, the film offers a female perspective that is dear to adoption practices. At the heart of a modern French family, shifting the gaze on the female take on adoption is equally important to the perceptions of marginalized communities in the film. Mme. Mallet’s refusal to espouse France’s changing social fabric or landscape reflects her conservative stance and perspective. She seems stuck in a colonial mindset and unwilling to embrace the diversity that now characterizes French society. As a social worker, she should be working towards promoting unity and cohesion, but, instead, she appears to be promoting division. At the same time, her voice symbolizes power struggles and racial dynamics in contemporary France, where Blacks and people of color are at the bottom of the social ladder. Beyond Mme. Mallet’s symbol of resistance to a fringe of French society, Benjamin’s journey and innocence are truly powerful. The decision not to give him a voice in the film holds powerful rhetorical significance. The choice of a white toddler is a rhetorical stance with many implications. It serves as a symbol of advocacy for all white children who need adoption and the growing number of Black parents who choose to adopt. As a society, we must ensure that all children have access to equal cultural opportunities, and this begins with recognizing that toddlers are colorblind.

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19.5 LIFTING THE BARRIERS OF ADOPTION THROUGH HUMOR Humor is an integral part of African cinema. African filmmakers have long used humor to address serious issues in a light-hearted manner. From the satirical films of Ousmane Sembène to the slapstick comedies of Nollywood, African cinema has always made us laugh while also making us think. One of the reasons humor is so effective in African cinema is that it allows filmmakers to tackle taboo subjects that might otherwise be difficult to discuss. For example, the South African film, White wedding (2009), uses comedy to explore issues of race and identity, while the Ghanaian film, Azali (2018), uses humor to explore the harsh realities of poverty and corruption. Of course, humor in African cinema is not just about social commentary. Many African comedies are simply so much fun to watch, with outrageous characters and hilarious situations that keep audiences laughing from beginning to end. From the classic The gods must be crazy (1980) to the more recent Potato potahto (2017), African filmmakers have proven time and again that they can make us laugh just as hard as any Hollywood comedy. Given its importance in African cinema, one could argue that it is one of the many reasons why the continent’s film industry continues to grow and thrive. Francophone cinema is also known for its humor, which is often witty and subtle. French comedies, for instance, tend to be character-driven, focusing on human foibles and relationships. One of the most famous examples of Francophone humor is Tati’s Playtime (1967), a film that uses visual gags and absurd situations to comment on modern society. Another classic is the Les trois frères [The Three Brothers] (1995) trilogy, which follows the misadventures of three brothers as they get into all sorts of trouble. In both AD and HEHYE, humor serves as the backdrop for a scrutiny of French society’s abhorrence of a certain type of immigrant. This abhorrence is fueled by political discourse and rhetoric that consistently blames the immigrants for all the evils in their host countries, lacking any real explanation for the new waves of immigration to France and other Western countries. These two films shift the focus to a new type of immigrant: the skilled and blended immigrant with stable conditions. These are family oriented with the sole purpose of either performing their job as doctors who heal society and patients, or extend their families by adopting a member of the society. When she meets Benjamin for the first time, Mamita experiences a culture shock. She could never have imagined in her wildest dreams that this would happen to her. She wonders what she has done to deserve such “humiliation.” The African neighboring societal gaze, gossip, and mockery will be hard to deal with in France and she will most definitely become a subject of mockery within the Black community. When she opens the door, she asks, “Who is this?” to which Sali replies, “It is Benjamin, Mommy.” She runs, shouting her husband’s name, “Ousmane!”, and nearly falls into a trance. Ousmane’s reaction is even worse as he is locked in the past. He sees Benjamin as a curse he must protect himself against as he walks away and prays, in Wolof, “Yalla nama Yallà sutural ci am sët bu weex tal [May God protect me from having a white Caucasian grandson]”. As the film unfolds, Ousmane will eventually accept Benjamin after holding an honest and sincere dialogue with his youngest daughter, who was born and bred in France. Manu, the couple’s best friend, expresses his disbelief by asking Paul if the adoption agency staff smoked weed before making such a decision, as the tradition is that Black children are

Decentering the white gaze in African filmscape  295 given to white people for adoption. The film breaks the traditional mold by inviting the public to unlearn these preconceived ideas about adoption. Adoption entails a profound sense of commitment and responsibility. It also includes closely scrutinizing the lives of those intending to adopt to ensure that the child lands in safe hands. The concept of adoption dates back to ancient times when individuals would generously take in orphans and raise them as their own. This selfless act of kindness was seen as a way to extend compassion towards the less fortunate. As time progressed, the notion of adoption expanded beyond just children to animals, and even ideas. Adopting a new way of thinking or a fresh approach to life has become increasingly popular in contemporary society. The metaphor of adoption is often employed to describe the process of embracing something novel into one’s life and making it an integral part of who they are. When discussing adoption it is important to avoid half-hearted efforts like those seen in France. Immigrants treated as guests or outsiders are never fully integrated into their new home, as they are constantly reminded of their roots. It has been quite interesting to explore how this topic has been portrayed in various films. Several recurring themes are noticeable, including the challenges faced by adoptive parents, the search for identity by adopted children, and the impact of adoption on biological family members. There seems to be a significant amount of discussion surrounding the portrayal and loaded meaning associated with adoption in Black films, including The blind side (2009) featuring Sandra Bullock and Black or white (2014) starring Octavia Spencer and Kevin Costner, and how it is tied to issues of race, identity, and family dynamics. But little research is conducted on adoption in contemporary African Francophone cinema. Apparently, this is a complex and multifaceted theme that has been explored in various ways across different films. Like in HEHYE, AD tells the story of a Congolese doctor who moves to a small French village and faces discrimination and other challenges in his new community. Aissa Maiga gives a powerful performance as the doctor’s wife, who must also navigate the difficulties of living in a new place where she doesn’t feel welcome. The film explores cultural differences and the importance of understanding and accepting others. The adoption process is depicted with sensitivity and nuance, highlighting the complexities and challenges of adopting a doctor from a different culture. Seeing the doctor and his family witness the suspicion and lack of trust that the entire community shows toward them is troubling. In the opening scene, Claire has a conversation with the director of the adoption center. During their discussion, Claire expresses her opinion without hesitation, despite knowing that it might draw attention. She reminds the director that “the primary mission of our administration is to protect the interests of the child, and we must ensure that we are not experimenting with their lives.” This experimentation on children runs deep in French transcolonial4 past and has many impacts on the socio-economic and political spectrum. Arguably one of France’s most silenced episodes of history concerns the children of Creuse, a region in the French Overseas Territories in the West Indies. In her article, “Les ‘déportés’ de la Creuse: Le dévoilement d’une histoire oubliée,” Valérie Magdelaine-Andrianjafitrimo (2009) offers the background of the story. From 1963 to 1982, the [Departmental Directorate of Health and Social Affairs] of Reunion, under the direction of Michel Debré, brought six hundred children from the island to metropolitan France. Some of these children were abandoned and living in homes, but the real scandal is that many of them were taken from their families without their full consent, or even under false pretenses.

296  Handbook of social justice in the Global South In the name of false solidarity, Michel Debre’s heinous act yielded nothing but chaotic results. Evidence from the failure of the tragic episode of Creuse children, leading to “depression, suicides, alcoholism, massive school and social failure as the consequences of this blind policy on the part of individuals who were victims of solitude and racism” justifies Claire’s skepticism about this Black adopting a white Caucasian blond and blue-eyed child. Adoption ought not to be used as a site and laboratory for exploring cultural accommodation and re-appropriation. (p. 2)

This idea of adoption as a socio-cultural experimental lab explains how Claire’s voice is an incarnation of the fear of the subversive inherited mentalities from previous generations of the overwhelming majority of French citizens, which contribute to the hindrances of shifting the gaze on white child adoption by Black families. After finding out that they can no longer have children, Paul and his wife, Sali, submit an adoption application and wait a long time before receiving a call. They sit in the waiting room of the adoption center, admiring the background décor. They notice two families depicted on the wall, one adopting a Black girl and the other adopting a white child. The couple in the middle seem to bridge the gap between these predominant forms of adoption. Paul can’t help but wonder how they could help break the adoption ceiling. His eyes shift towards the Asian girl on his left, then to the Black adopted girl. The family have big smiles on their faces. Paul and Sali lock eyes and take a moment to examine themselves, before Paul’s wife reassures him that he looks fantastic. In the office, they discuss the peculiarity of the case. “You were rather open on the form about the sex and origin of the child,” someone remarks. Claire chimes in, saying, “We can love all the children in the world but not necessarily be the parents of any of them.” Paul adds, “The child even has your eyes, don’t you think? We’re the first Benetton family, changing the world.” As Claire stands on the balcony watching the newly adoptive couple walk away with the baby, the camera zooms in on her expression. The close-up shot and the top-down view emphasize her dominance over the Black adoptive couple. This scene also depicts the couple’s weaning, indicating that Claire has successfully taken control of the situation. Claire's lofty stance could be interpreted as a gaze from the top, as someone who looks down on this newly adoptive couple. From this moment onward, she has decided to give them prompt visits with short notice or to change previously and mutually agreed schedules. As a caseworker, she wants to abide by article 345 of the French Civile Code5 which stipulates that “adoption is allowed only in favor of children under 15, who have been received in the home of the adopter or adopters for at least six months.” Then, a plenary decision will be made to officially grant or refuse adoption to the candidates. Although Paul and Sali have met all the requirements on paper, they have to pay a “Black tax,” which refers to the additional or hidden burden many Black families face due to systemic racism and inequalities in American or European society. It often means that Black individuals usually have to go the extra mile to meet the benchmark that their regular white counterparts would not have to do. This can be a major source of stress and strain on personal finances and, most importantly, mental health. Claire is under tremendous pressure from her peers, who do not condone how she is going beyond her regular duties to go after the Black couple with unorthodox methods. A couple of opposition voices have been heard, and she has been confronted and challenged by her inner circle. That shift in mentality is a deliberate act by the filmmaker to orient our focus on how

Decentering the white gaze in African filmscape  297 the narrative can only shift from within those in a dominant and oppressive position. Claire’s interaction with fellow whites opens up the diversified opinion on white privilege in France. Another gaze that draws the viewer’s attention is how the filmmaker invokes African traditions in contemporary France. The African diaspora’s presence is well depicted in the movie, particularly in the scenes at the market with all the African ladies using it as a palabor tree. However, how is Benjamin received in his new home? Fearful of her mother’s reaction to the news, Sali is reluctant to bring her son to her parents’ house. She makes excuses to delay a first encounter or discovery by her parents. Sali’s mother’s reaction is blended with a good dose of humor and coded messages that stem from African realities in times of despair. She shouts out loud when told that Benjamin is her grandson. She tries to convince Sali to adopt children from the continent. Her comments suggest that those children are much more in need of adoption than white children. The filmmaker invites the viewer to scrutinize the reaction of Ousmane, Sali’s father, who is nostalgic for his African past and refuses to blend into French society. This critique shows that conservatism exists on both ends of the adoption spectrum. On the one hand, Claire is digging to find a motive to stop the adoption project of this Black couple. By the same token, Sali’s parents are not ready to welcome a white grandson into their lineage. A closer look at the arguments for this rejection provides a better understanding of how these African societies operate even within the diaspora in France. In African traditional value systems, the individual is nothing without the community. The film has reenacted the Ubuntu6 (Tutu, 2009) principles, whose core values translate as “I exist because we are.” These practices have been passed down the generations. Sali’s sister’s conversation with Ousmane illustrates the transgenerational conflict that deals with identity politics in France. She asks her father the following question in one of the most captivating scenes: “What are you afraid of? It’s not normal… We all must get used to it now because it’s too late, we can’t go back.” Interestingly, there is a new line of thought emerging within these Afrodiasporic circles. These first and second generations of immigrants are being challenged by their own sons and daughters. In the film, Sali’s sister says that Sali adopting the white child does not bother her. She questions her father’s beliefs after living in France for so long. She acknowledges the importance of holding true to his traditions but realises the need to face the realities he is immersed in. Her decolonial line of thought espouses Walter Mignolo’s (1999) term, “I am where I think.” Two scenes set in public places portray society’s lack of preparedness for interracial adoption. At the park, Sali meets a babysitter who assumes that she is just like her. When Sali tells her she is Benjamin’s mother, the babysitter makes fun of her to such an extent that she feels embarrassed. She is sad, and cries. A mother who comes out to breathe and enjoy the beauty of the park is met with societal mockery from her fellow Blacks as if she was an outlier. The second scene occurrs when she goes to the hospital for a routine check-up. The pediatrician is surprised to see her confirm that she is Benjamin’s mother. Sali’s emotions are an outcry of the experience and challenges of a mother who is denied the basic right of motherhood by the mere fact of her skin color. Ultimately, public places and hospitals ought to grant or guarantee individuals leisure time and healthcare without discriminating on the grounds of color, beliefs, or looks. These spaces inherently designed to allow people to breathe, heal, and get the care they need. The last scene at the hospital, where the two opposing sides reconcile, is truly remarkable. It is a moment for recovery, not just physically, but also emotionally and mentally. Benjamin’s

298  Handbook of social justice in the Global South symbolic strike is incredibly powerful, and it fills everyone with a sense of hope. The community has been through a long and difficult journey towards healing, but this moment in the narrative structure is a huge success. It is as if Benjamin has invited everyone around him to bond afresh. The ultimate message from the hospital scene is that with the help of those around you, you can find the strength to overcome even the toughest obstacles. It is a beautiful moment of reconciliation and healing that is inspiring for the French nation that is still struggling to recognize Afropeans7 as citizens with equal rights, privileges, and opportunities.

19.6 THE IMMIGRANT AS A GUEST Immigration has been a major theme in African cinema. Many films explore the experiences of African immigrants who have left their home countries in search of better opportunities in other parts of the world. These films shed light on immigrants’ challenges, from the difficulties of adapting to new cultures, to the discrimination and prejudice they often encounter. Many filmmakers have tackled the subject, using their art to shed light on immigrants’ various challenges in their quest for a better life. Through their movies, they have highlighted immigrants’ struggles, successes, and failures, and in the process, given voice to the voiceless. Some of the most notable films on immigration in African cinema include Mediterranea (2015), and Borders (2017). These movies showcase the harsh realities of immigration, from the treacherous journeys across the sea to the difficulties of blending into a new society. Two movies that address immigration are Black and white in color (Annaud, 1976) and La pirogue (Toure, 2012). AD is based on the true story of the famous French rapper, Kamini Zantoko, who made his rap career debut in 2006 with the eponymous song about his adoptive rural town, MarlyGomont. This song not only put the town on the map , but also inspired the film AD, which Kamini co-wrote with Julien Rambaldi. As probably the first rapper from a less famous village in France to hit the national spotlight, he broke through barriers and found a way to share his experience with the rest of France and the world. His lyrics serve as a springboard for the major scenes and themes of the movie. The song retraces his first violent encounter in this French town, which did not have Black residents before his family’s arrival. He and his sister suffered many racial slurs, as narrated in the song, which also highlights that children often practice what parents preach. It is often said that children are like little mirrors, reflecting the world around them. And while they may not always have the most polished or eloquent way of expressing themselves, there is no denying that their unfiltered honesty can be both refreshing and revealing about the true character of their parents. In fact, on many occasions, the words that come out of a child’s mouth can tell you a lot about their parents, as evidenced in AD. The white children’s behavior changes with their parents’ changed attitude towards Dr. Seyolo Zantoko and his family of two children, a boy named Kamini and his sister, Sivi. Their mother, Anne Zantoko, is played by Aissa Maiga. Dr. Zantoko values education; he considers it the only means for the underprivileged to escape societal traps, where the usual focus lies in making ends meet at the expense of pursuing long-lasting careers such as those of physicians in France. The striking contrast resides in his being a highly educated worker, compared to the other types of workers, mostly manual,

Decentering the white gaze in African filmscape  299 that France was familiar with during the time of les trente glorieuses [thirty glorious years] following World War II. Three moments characterize their journey in Marly-Gomont: their arrival in town, which marks the disappointment of his wife and children who were expecting to live the Parisian dream (many Africans associate France with the dream of modernity). Alain Mabackou (1998) discusses this myth in his classic novel Bleu, blanc, rouge [Blue, white, red], in which he depicts two kinds of African immigrants in France: one bearing the Parisian moniker and the other called the “paysan [countryman]”. One of the subtleties of the movie lies in how it explores the challenges that immigrants face beyond urban or metropolitan cities in France, which is well-documented in cinema, literature, and other forms of epistemological productions. The first moment is characterized by their faces upon arrival, when they realize they have been deceived, as the scene captures the unique pastoral environment, which is not the French metropolitan city they envisioned. In deep France, a strong sense of community prevails in cafes where the community gathers to socialize and mingle with one another. Given the small size of the population, it becomes easier for everyone to get to know each other, which makes it easy to recognize outsiders and outliers. When Dr. Zantoko first arrives, the inhabitants of Marly-Gomont are afraid of him. Just because of his family’s looks, village gossip starts to circulate about the new “niggers” in the neighborhood.

19.7 HEALING FRANCE’S SOCIO-CULTURAL WOUND The metaphor of healing in AD demonstrates that there is always the possibility for renewal and transformation in any given society, even those with the most conservative views. We can all be like the characters in this story, finding our own paths to healing and emerging stronger and more whole on the other side. The film demonstrates that, for the most part, human beings want change but, by the same token, can be apprehensive about radical or abrupt change. Successful change usually needs time to process and plant the seeds of a smooth transition with dialogue and exchange based on mutually inclusive benefits. Like Paul and Sali and the members of Dr. Zantoko’s family, the mayor of the village, along with his patients, undergo a transformative process, shedding their old selves and emerging anew. The major characters face their unique struggles and challenges, but they all share a common thread of resilience and perseverance. It is intriguing and inspiring to witness their growth and evolution as they navigate the harsh realities of life in rural France. Because of the deception, the focus is moved to the guest. Through the metaphor of healing, the African doctor must earn the trust of his French patients, which resembles passing an elephant through the eye of a needle. The imaginaries of the French citizens have no prestored images or data for a possible positive encounter between Blacks and whites. The mental repertoire is filled with negative stereotypical images and interactions where the Blacks are always on the receiving end. Arguably, what strikes the viewer the most is the way in which the characters’ healing journey reflects the real-world experiences of people in Africa. Just as an African doctor uses traditional remedies and modern medicine to heal the body and spirit, these characters also draw on their inner strength and community support to overcome their obstacles.

300  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Motivated to escape his “double absence,”8 Dr. Zantoko finds refuge in his work. Most immigrants are torn between their host and home cultures, languages, and religions, but in the film, there is a clear demarcation in the main character. Dr. Zantoko makes a choice and commits himself to practice under any circumstances in France with the hope of obtaining French citizenship. His yearning for it allows him to turn down the offer to work with the former dictator of Mobutu, a formerly colonized country in Zaire. At first, one may question if the decision made by a doctor to practice in a Western country is a criticism of the thousands of African doctors who are needed in their home countries. However, it is important to acknowledge that professional mobility is a reality and is often necessary for individuals to fulfill their aspirations or find alternative ways to serve. With the rapid movement of people and resources, a doctor can still benefit their home country from anywhere in the world by utilizing new methods of service. Ultimately, there are numerous ways for doctors to serve their people.

19.8 CONCLUSION These two movies have the power to inspire a cure for racial tensions in France and other countries through a reexamination of the gaze. They are able to transport the viewers to another world and allow us to consider, through the Francophone filmscape, how similar struggles are dealt with by people of color, particularly Africans. Movies can also help us process and work through our emotions. Seeing characters on screen go through similar struggles and come out the other side can be incredibly validating and even therapeutic. That is precisely one of the takeaways of AD as a source of inspiration to make positive changes in contemporary societies. Adoption, depicted in HAHYE, remains a powerful and popular artistic device or backdrop that many filmmakers use to craft their stories and capture their audience’s attention. The films studied in this chapter reveal that societies from both the Global North and Global South need to decolonize not only the Western gaze but all gazes in public and private spaces, for they remain global sites of permanent encounters and interactions. These two particular films contribute to social transformational change and self-liberation from the shackles of mental reclusion, racism, and social injustice. They speak and raise awareness about a blind spot in social justice still faced by Black bodies from the Global South, especially with the prevalence of social media.

NOTES 1. Institut des hautes études cinématographiques [Institute of Advanced Cinematographic Studies]. 2. For more on this topic, see, Human zoos: America's forgotten history of scientific racism, a documentary available on YouTube (Discovery Science, 2019). 3. Recently, Chris Rock stirred up controversy with comments that were perceived as having a misogynistic attitude towards Jada Pinkett Smith’s hair loss. It is important to note that this chapter does not ignore his remarks. Rather, his 2016 Oscar speech is related directly to the topic at hand.

Decentering the white gaze in African filmscape  301 4. This concept is coined by Harvard professors Françoise Lionnet and Shu-mei Shih (2005). It refers to formerly colonized territories’ experiences with a shared and similar history of oppression from their former colonizer, such as France in the pan-Francophone world. 5. I use the translated version of France’s Code Civile by George Rouhette, Professor of Law, with the assistance of Dr. Anne Rouhette-Berton, Assistant Professor of English. 6. This concept was popularized by the South African Archbishop, Desmond Tutu (2009). 7. This concept is popularized by Leonora Miano with her collection of short stories, Afropean soul et autres nouvelles [Afropean soul and other short stories.] She also published another text, Afropea: Utopie post-occidentale et post-raciste. 8. This concept was coined by Abdelmalek Sayad (2016). It refers to the immigrant’s sentiment of not belonging to their home and host country and feeling a double rejection as a result.

REFERENCES Adichie, C. N. (2009, October 7). The danger of a single story [Video]. TED Conferences, YouTube. https://www​.youtube​.com ​/watch​?v​=D9Ihs241zeg Annaud, J. J. (Director). (1976). Black and white in color [Film]. France 3 Cinéma; Reggane Films; Smart Film Produktion; Société Française de Production (SFP); Société Ivoirienne de Cinema. Barlet, O. (2000). African cinemas: Decolonizing the gaze (1st ed. 1996). Zed Books. Beausson-Diagne, N., Gabin, M., Gueye, M., Haïdara, E., Khan, R., Maïga, A., & Zobda, F. (2018). Noire n’est pas mon métier. Éditions du seuil. Binder, M. (Director). (2014). Black or white [Film]. Sunlight Productions; Treehouse Films; Treehouse Productions; Venture Forth. Boëtsch, G., Bancel, N., Blanchard, P., Chalaye, S., Robles, F., Sharpley-Whiting, T. D., & Yahi, N. (2019). Sexualités, identité & corps colonisés. XVe siècle-XXIe siècle. CNRS. Bourbon, D., & Campan, B. (Directors). (1995). Les trois frères [Film]. Pathé Renn Productions; Prima Film; Canal+. Carpinago, J. (Director). (2015). Mediterranea [Film]. Lectures; les Films. Coogler, R. (Director). (2018). Black panther [Film]. Walt Disney Motion Pictures. Diawara, M. (1992). African cinema: Politics and culture. Indiana University Press. Discovery Science (2019, February 17). Human zoos: America’s forgotten history of scientific racism [Video]. YouTube. https://www​.youtube​.com​/watch​?v​=nY6Zrol5QEk DuVernay, A. (Director). (2014). Selma [Film]. Cloud Eight Films; Plan B Entertainment; Harpo Films; Ingenious Media. Faguer-Redig, T. (2010). Five decades of African film. Black Camera, 1(2), 92–102. Freire, P. (2000). Pedagogy of the oppressed (Rev. ed., 1st ed. 1970). Continuum. Frimpong-Manso, S. (Director). (2017). Potato potahto [Film]. 19 April Entertainment; Ascend Studios; Lufodo Productions. Gyansah, G. (Director). (2018). Azali [Film]. Ananse Entertainment; Motion Revolution. Halifax, J., & Villeneuve-Gokalp, C. (2005). L’adoption en France: Qui sont les adoptés, qui sont les adoptants? Population & Sociétés, 417, 1–4. https://doi​.org​/10​.3917​/popsoc​.417​.0001 Hancock, J. L. (Director). (2009). The Blind Side [Film]. Alcon Entertainment. Hawthorn, J. (2006). Theories of the gaze. Literary Theory and Criticism. P. Waugh Hughey, M. W. (2010). The white savior film and reviewers’ reception. Symbolic interaction, 33(3), 475–496. Jean-Baptiste, L. (Director). (2016). Il a déjà tes yeux [He even has your eyes] [Film]. UGC Distribution. Lee, S. (Director). (1989). Do the right thing [Film]. 40 Acres and a Mule Filmworks. Lionnet, F., & Shih, S. (Eds.) (2005). Minor transnationalism. Duke University Press. Mabanckou, A. (1998). Bleu, blanc, rouge: Roman [Blue, white, red: A novel]. Editions Présence Africaine.

302  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Magdelaine-Andrianjafitrimo, V. (2009). Les “déportés” de la Creuse: Le dévoilement d’une histoire oubliée. Latin American Cultural Studies, 8(2), 235–245. Miano, L. (2005). Afropean soul et autres nouvelles. Flamarion. Miano, L. (2021). Afropea: Utopie post-occidentale et post-raciste. Grasset. Michelot, P. (2011, March 18). Harry Roselmack, premier journaliste noir diffusé en “prime time” en France. L’Encre Noir. lencr​​enoir​​.com/ ​​harry​​-rose​​lmack​​-prem​​ier​-j​​ourna​​liste​​-noir​​-en​-p​​r ime-​​time-​​​de​ -la​​-fran​​ce/ Walter, M. (1999). I am where I think: Remapping the order of knowing. The creolization of theory, 159–192. Rambaldi, J. (Director). (2016). Bienvenue à marly-gomont [African Doctor] [Film]. Mars Films. Sarr, M., & Vieyra, P. S. (Directors). (1955). Afrique sur Seine [Film]. Ministère de la Coopération; Groupe Africain de cinéma. Sayad, A. (2016). La double absence. Des illusions de l’émigré aux souffrances de l’immigré. Média Diffusion. Sissako, A. (Director). (2006). Bamako [Film]. Archipel 33; Arte France Cinéma; Chinguitty Films; Louverture Films; Mali Images; New Yorker Films. Smith, L. T. (1999/2008). Decolonizing methodologies: Research and indigenous peoples. Bloomsbury Publishing. Strings, S. (2019). Fearing the Black body: The racial origins of fat phobia. New York University Press. Tati, J. (Director). (1967). Playtime [Film]. Specta Films; Jolly Film. Toure, M. (Director). (2012). La pirogue [Film]. Angeline Massoni. Turner, J. (Director). (2009). White wedding [Film]. Ster-Kinekor. Tutu, D. (2009). No future without forgiveness. Crown Publishing Group. Ukadike, N. F. (1994). Black African cinema. University of California Press. Uys, J. (Director). (1980). The Gods must be crazy [Film]. C.A.T. Films. Yancy, G. (2016). Black bodies, white gazes: The continuing significance of race in America. Rowman & Littlefield.

20. Politicizing water governance and canal allocations Realizing sustainable development and water justice Muhammad Arfan and Nabeel Ali Khan

20.1 INTRODUCTION 20.1.1 Conceptual Framework In October 2021, the authors conducted fieldwork in Mehrab Chandio, Saman Sarkar, Hayat Khaskheli, and Jarkas — small towns located in the district of Mirpurkhas, Sindh, Pakistan. These towns, once known for their bustling streets filled with laughter and music, were now deserted, echoing with the ghosts of their past. Mehrab Chandio, in particular, was once a vibrant town with a population of 5,000 inhabitants before 1947, exuding life and energy. However, the passage of time had taken its toll, leaving behind a mere shadow of its former self. The town faced the flight of human capital during the partition in 1947, and even after that, it struggled to survive due to its location at the tail end of the main canal system, which deprived it of its rightful share of water – a precious resource essential for its agriculturebased economy. The once-fertile fields now lay fallow, with only a few households engaged in agriculture, eking out a meager existence. The streets that were once bustling with activity now wore a desolate look, with only a handful of people going about their daily chores. During our fieldwork in 2021, Tariq Mahmood, the General Secretary of Tail Abadgar Tanzeem, lamented that the farmers in the area were eagerly waiting for irrigation canal water to sow a wheat crop1 – a staple food for the majority of the population. He also highlighted how the uncertainty in the canal schedule had ruined their cash crops, such as cotton and chili, during the last Kharif season. Adding to their woes, during the Kharif season of 2022, Pakistan and Sindh province experienced historic pluvial flooding, and once again, these towns were submerged under excess water due to the drainage of upstream fields into the Pooran and Mirpur Khas Main Drain (MMD) canals.2 This “double whammy” of water scarcity followed by flooding has severely affected the standing crops of these towns, as well as other areas at the tail end of the canal system, illustrating a classic case of water justice denied. In this chapter, we argue that water inequity in the Indus Basin Irrigation System (IBIS) needs to be understood as a social justice problem, encompassing issues of distribution, accountability, and participation in politics. The chapter aims to map the land and water inequity under different governance arrangements in the IBIS. To achieve this, we incorporate several remote sensing datasets along with traditional survey approaches to gain a holistic understanding of the performance of different irrigation governance regimes. This research seeks to address the existing gap in the literature by highlighting the need to politicize water governance frameworks to achieve equitable water distribution. The chapter argues that depoliticized water governance reforms like PIM have 303

304  Handbook of social justice in the Global South failed to provide water justice to the marginalized communities at the tail end of the canal systems. As a result, we propose that politicizing water governance frameworks could yield different outcomes. Water justice (Sultana, 2018) and environmental justice (Mohai et al., 2009) are two interconnected frameworks used in social sciences to address issues related to the inequitable distribution of resources and the protection of vulnerable communities from environmental harm. Water justice refers to the fair and equitable distribution of water resources among different stakeholders, including individuals, communities, and nations (Movik, 2014). It encompasses issues such as access to safe drinking water, sanitation, irrigation, and environmental conservation. In the context of water justice, social scientists examine the distributional impacts of water policies and practices, including how they may disproportionately benefit or harm different groups, such as marginalized communities or indigenous peoples (Prieto 2021; Emanuel & Wilkins 2020; Hurlbert, 2020; Boelens & Zwarteveen 2005). Environmental justice, on the other hand, focuses on the fair treatment of all people, regardless of their race, ethnicity, or socioeconomic status, in the context of environmental policymaking and practice (Mohai & Bryant 2019). Environmental justice seeks to redress the unequal distribution of environmental burdens and benefits (Shrestha et al., 2016), such as pollution, toxic waste (Stewart et al., 2014), and natural resources (Sze & London 2008). In the context of environmental justice, social scientists examine how environmental policies and practices may disproportionately impact marginalized communities and perpetuate social inequalities (Shrestha et al., 2016). Together, water justice and environmental justice provide a critical framework for understanding and addressing the complex social and environmental challenges facing our world today. By examining the ways in which water policies and environmental policies intersect with social and economic inequalities, social scientists can help to identify ways to promote more just and equitable outcomes for all. 20.1.2 Case Study of Irrigation Management: A Brief History Canal irrigation systems were established during the colonial period as a means of providing systematic water allocation to different parts of the agricultural landscape (Arfan, 2022b; Arfan et al., 2020). However, theses produced inequities in water allocation along the canal head and tail sections. These inequities were perpetuated by different formal and informal institutions that operated along the axes of power asymmetry. As a result, water conflicts emerged over the distribution of water, with different forms of power play contributing to the problem. The introduction of Participatory Irrigation Management (PIM) was a significant institutional reform that aimed to address the issues of water distribution inequity in canal irrigation systems (Crase et al., 2020). PIM was promoted by the World Bank in the 1980s, and it involved the systematic transfer of management responsibilities from the state agencies to the users of irrigation water (Arfan et al., 2022a). The primary objective of this reform was to empower farmers and other stakeholders in the management of irrigation water, ensuring that the water was allocated equitably and efficiently. However, despite the good intentions behind PIM, it did not fully address the power asymmetries that existed in canal irrigation systems (Jacoby et al., 2021). As a result, the reform failed to provide water justice to the tail-enders of the canals. The tail-enders are the farmers who receive water at the last turn in the canal system, and they often face water shortages due to inequitable water distribution.

Politicizing water governance and canal allocations  305 20.1.3 Reform Context During the colonial era, water shortage was addressed by implementing supply-side measures (Yaqoob, 2017) such as constructing massive dams, barrages/headworks, and canals, as well as educating irrigation management specialists and bureaucrats to oversee the extensive irrigation system (Yu et al., 2013). One such system, IBIS, is a supply-driven irrigation system that diverts water from barrages or headworks to main canals, which then feed branch canals, and ultimately tertiary-level irrigation systems, also known as distributary/minor irrigation systems (Figures 20.1a and 20.1b). The water is then largely applied using the surface irrigation-flooding method, with the irrigation department solely responsible for managing the system up to the tertiary tier, which is controlled by a layered framework. Below the tertiary tier, the community controls the watercourses. IBIS employs a special warabandi system to distribute water to each field along each watercourse on a pro-rata basis (Mirza, 2018), which is referred to as the water allotment. Water is progressively dispersed across fields based on the warabandi timetable after being drained from the outlet, known as Pacca Warabandi. In the 1980s, the agriculture department started World Bank-funded canal lining projects. To address the watercourse lining initiative, informal community organizations were initially grouped into Water User Associations/Water Course Associations (Byrnes, 1992). These

Figure 20.1a  Typical layout of the irrigation system

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Figure 20.1b  Comparison of centralized irrigation department with participatory reform associations provided human labor and contributed cash to the initiative, which varied in percentage over time. Following this experience, the World Bank increased its pressure on the government to grant these community organizations access to tertiary and secondary levels of organizational structure. Thus, in 1997, PIM reforms were introduced based on the experience of Mexico and the Philippines. Farmers’ Organizations (FOs) and Area Water Boards (AWBs) were structured with representation from the farming community to manage the tertiary and secondary tier irrigation infrastructure and its governance.​​

20.2 ANALYSIS DESCRIPTIONS To analyze the performance of irrigation systems, we focused on two canals: one in a participatory governance area and the other governed solely by the provincial irrigation department. Each main canal system was divided into three regions: head, middle, and tail. Remote sensing data, such as the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI), actual evapotranspiration, and evaporative fraction, were utilized to evaluate irrigation performance indicators, including cropping intensity, adequacy, and consequently how differential access to irrigation water produced economic inequity, measured in terms of the Gini coefficient through surveybased estimates of agricultural economic return (Arfan et al., 2022a). This study largely relied on mixed methods for measuring quantitative and qualitative aspects of participatory irrigation management.​​ Figures 20.2a–d show the digitized sections of the canals, meticulously chosen as the study area, under both the PIM and non-PIM irrigation regimes. The Punjab irrigation network shows the head Suleimanki and Islam command areas : the head Suleimanki command area, where the PIM reform was introduced, and the head Islam command area under the provincial

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Figure 20.2a  Study area selected canals command – head Suleimanki command area

Figure 20.2b  Study area selected canals command – Islam command area irrigation department of Punjab. The Sindh irrigation network shows the Nara and Rohri command areas: the Nara command area, where the PIM reform was introduced, and the Rohri command area under the provincial irrigation department of Sindh.

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Figure 20.2c  Study area selected canals command – Nara command area

Figure 20.2d  Study area selected canals command – Rohri command area

20.3 EMPIRICAL EVIDENCE OF WATER DISTRIBUTIONAL INJUSTICES To estimate the annual cropping intensity, the researchers used both a distributary level main survey and a remote sensing approach that utilized the NDVI as a proxy indicator (Conrad et al., 2016; Weissteiner et al., 2011). Remote sensing analysis was done at the

Politicizing water governance and canal allocations  309 subdivision scale while the main survey selected one distributary in each subdivision. To compare canal performance, the cropping intensity ratios were estimated at three scales: head-to-tail, middle-to-tail, and overall-to-tail, and the canals were compared based on equality. A cropping intensity ratio (shown in Figure 20.3) equal to one indicated perfect equity, while a value greater than one indicated that the head section had more cropped area compared to the tail section, and a value less than one indicated the opposite. Canal system inequality between the head and tail sections may be caused by technical issues (hardware problems) and mismanagement (software problems) (power asymmetry). The researchers set a 20 percent plus/minus uncertainty level as a permissible limit. The analysis revealed that the Rohri Canal in Sindh had more inequality between head and tail reaches than the Nara Canal area, whereas the cropping intensity between head and tail reaches in Punjab remained mostly within the permissible limits. This was due to the conjunctive use of saline and marginally fresh groundwater in the head, middle, and tail sections of the canal.​ Figure 20.4 shows clearly how insufficient the canal water supply is in the selected canal command areas and at the different spatial positions of the canal system. These initial findings were further validated by investigating the estimates of evaporative fraction in terms of adequacy and reliability (Ahmad et al., 2009). “Adequacy” is defined as the average seasonal evaporative fraction, while “reliability” is the temporal variability of the evaporative fraction across a season. When the evaporative fraction is 0.8 or higher, there is little stress, but values below 0.8 indicate that there is not enough water supply, resulting in increased moisture scarcity. Lower coefficients of variation suggest a more stable water supply during the growing season. The seasonal variation of the canal water supplies in each command area is shown in Figure 20.4 by comparing the delivery performance ratio and reliability of the irrigation supplies for the selected canal. Figure 20.4 also depicts that during the rabi3 season, there is overallocated canal water for the wheat crop, while during the Kharif 4 season, it just meets the cotton crop’s water requirement. The head, middle, and tail canal reaches varied in reliability and delivery performance ratios,as shown in Figure 20.4. Canal regulation is inadequate and unreliable, and water scarcity in the Kharif season is easily managed through existing water resources with better canal regulation. The Nara Canal has better canal regulation than other canal commands in the rabi season because of the Chotiari reservoir facility. There is no storage facility in the canal system where water can be stored if it is not needed in the field. Farmers reported this seasonal inadequacy of canal supplies during field investigations, which hampered wheat yield due to over-irrigation. Farmers changed crop choices to annual crops such as sugarcane and bananas, especially in the head and middle reaches, exacerbating a crisis for the tail area in the early Kharif season. The difference in canal water adequacy and reliability between head, middle, and tail reaches is more significant in Sindh canals than in Punjab canals. The crop classification reveals that the area under cotton crop decreases in both canal command areas of Sindh, with the high delta crops more visible along the head of the canal network. As the distance from the main or branch canal increases, the proportion of high delta crops decreases significantly, ultimately influencing the low cropping intensity at the tail reaches of the canal system. This situation shows another form of inequity between the head and tail sections, leading to economic inequity between them estimated as the Gini coefficient.

Figure 20.3  Comparison of cropping intensity estimated at distributary and subdivision scale

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Figure 20.4  Summary results showing how distributional inequity leads to economic inequity

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312  Handbook of social justice in the Global South 20.3.1 Water Inequity Leads to Economic Inequity In the preceding section, we examined various indicators to evaluate the distributional equity between the head and tail sections in different canal systems. Figures 20.5a–d summarize the preceding section by displaying how the land and water productivity estimates per unit and cubic meter of water used differ between the head and tail reaches. We used the crop production survey to estimate the annual gross and net return (PKR) at the distributary level. Comparing the gross and net returns of land productivity (PKR/Acre), we found that the overall Desert Canal had the highest gross and net returns among the four canals studied. The Rohri Canal middle section had the highest gross return, and the Desert Canal had the highest net return at the head section, while Rohri and Nara’s canals had more variation between head, middle, and tail reaches than the Desert and Hakra canals from an equity perspective. Although Hakra Canal had a better annual cropping intensity than Nara and Rohri, it did not yield better gross and net returns due to the per-acre yield compromise of the major cash crop and the economic cost associated with groundwater use. Canal water scarcity confirmed this pattern by examining the Delivery Performance Ratio (DPR) data. However, the low cropping intensity due to waterlogging and higher salinity in Nara and Rohri canals provides another clue to the low net return in these canal command areas. The poor state of irrigation infrastructure at the tertiary level canal system was reported by respondents in both Rohri and Nara canal areas, resulting in a low net return due to the need to lift canal water for irrigation, which incurs an economic cost. In addition, the economic water productivity (EWP) (PKR/m3), an indicator of water use efficiency (WUE), was used to compare efficiency and assess the economic value of water. Our estimate at the canal level indicated that overall, Rohri, Nara, Desert, and Hakra canals had 0.08, 0.12, 0.07, and 0.06 EWPs ($/m3), respectively. The comparison between our estimated results and the World Bank’s results (Giordano et al., 2017), as shown in Figure 20.5b, reveals that the Punjab canals, Desert and Hakra, being at the tail of the provincial canal network, performed near the provincial average, while the Sindh canals, Rohri and Nara, performed above the provincial average. This suggests that Sindh’s remaining irrigation network performed much below the provincial average. Through this economic analysis at the canal and provincial levels, we conclude that inequity related to canal regulation is one of the sources of economic inequity related to agricultural returns, termed “slow violence” or “long-term invisible violence,” as described by Deb (2021), and this economic inequity is measured at the canal level through the Gini coefficient. The Gini coefficient is a measure of economic inequality, and it ranges from 0 to 1 (Castro, 2022). A Gini coefficient of 0 indicates perfect equality, where every user has the same income, while a Gini coefficient of 1 indicates perfect inequality, where one user has all the income and the rest have none. Based on the Gini values as shown in Figure 20.5d, the Rohri Canal has the highest economic inequality, with a Gini coefficient of 0.49. This suggests that there is a significant income disparity among shareholders in the command area of the Rohri Canal. The Nara Canal has a lower Gini coefficient of 0.39, indicating that there is less economic inequality in its command area than in the Rohri Canal. The Hakra and Desert canals have even lower Gini coefficients of 0.35 and 0.30, respectively. Overall, the Gini coefficient values provide a quantitative measure of the level of economic inequality in the four canals, which is used to infer that the role of participatory irrigation management aimed at addressing economic disparities in the canal commands does not yield results.​​

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Figure 20.5a  Gross return per unit land (Rs/Acre) comparision

Figure 20.5b  Comparison of water productivity (Rs/m3) in selected canals at spatial position

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Figure 20.5c  Net land productivity (Rs/Acre) ratio comparison

Figure 20.5d  Gini coefficient comparison of the selected canals The empirical evidence analyzed in this study has led to several key conclusions. First, the reform area in Sindh performs better than the non-reform site from a head-to-tail cropping

Politicizing water governance and canal allocations  315 intensity ratio perspective, while both canals in Punjab have performed within the permissible limits. However, equity in cropping intensity does not translate into water distribution equity between the head and tail reaches of Nara and Rohri canals, as the head receives more water for high delta crops than the tail reaches. Additionally, the area under cotton crops is decreasing in both Nara and Rohri canal commands, while the area under sugarcane is increasing. The variation in crop choices between head and tail sections leads to inequity in water distribution and agricultural economic returns per unit command area. Finally, the study has found that economic inequity is the result of canal water distributional inequity, with Rohri showing more economic inequity than Nara, and Hakra having more variation when compared to the Desert Canal. 20.3.2 Qualitative Case Studies: The Case for Politicizing Water Governance The case studies presented highlight the significant disparity that exists between head and tail-end users of irrigation systems in Pakistan, particularly at the tail-end of the distributaries. While conducting a qualitative case study at two distributaries, 3-R5 and Khairpur Gambo6 irrigation sub-division, it was evident that the problem is more about unequal water distribution than natural water scarcity. The water scarcity tail-enders face is structurally produced through political institutions and the influence of powerful land-owning elites on the governance of these institutions. The canal water distribution in a canal draws a comparison to the Hollywood movie The Platform, in which prisoners on the upper levels of a vertical prison hoard food and do not let it reach the lower levels, resulting in casualties. The analogy is appropriate, as it reflects the unequal water distribution in the irrigation system, where the upper-level users get the lion’s share of water, leaving very little for the tail-end users. This unfortunate situation is due to the political and bureaucratic system’s failure to ensure equal water distribution (Rinaudo, 2002). In particular, it highlights the role of corrupt and incompetent irrigation management systems in exacerbating the problem. For example, in the case of the 3-R distributary, the tail-end users are forced to migrate from their native lands due to the unavailability of water, while retired military personnel and influential political figures steal water from the tail-end users. Despite protests and applications, the accused people continue to extract water illegally. Similarly, in the case of the Khairpur Gambo distributary, only up to half of the watercourses have water, and the rest are not even recognizable due to heavy water theft by head-end users as shown in Figures 20.6a and b. Here, the big, influential landlords with political affiliations and the support of irrigation officials were involved in water theft. The reason behind this unjust distribution of water is the cultivation of higher delta crops, such as banana and sugarcane, at the head and middle of the Rohri Canal. The banana and sugarcane crops are among the highest delta crop plantations, which require a significant amount of water for irrigation. It is not possible to irrigate these crops with the sanctioned water allowance for which these canals were designed. Therefore, illegal and ambiguous means were used to irrigate these crops, ultimately resulting in the theft of water from the tail user's water share. The issue of water theft was confirmed by one of the key informants, who was a leader of Tail Abadgaar Tanzeem,7 who talked about the protests and cases pursued by them in the Supreme Court. The farmers at the tail end are not even allowed to protest against the situation, as they risk further political victimization.

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Figure 20.6a  Tail end dry and supply shortage conditions at the Nangana Distributary

Figure 20.6b  Tail end dry and supply shortage conditions at the 3-R Distributary

Politicizing water governance and canal allocations  317 Overall, these case studies highlight the crucial role of political accountability and good governance in ensuring the just distribution of water resources. They also underscore the need for better monitoring and enforcement of water distribution systems to prevent illegal extortion and water theft. The situation is not only an issue of social injustice but also a significant loss to the national economy and natural resources. As Sylvia A. Earle rightly points out, water is the single non-negotiable thing life requires, and it is high time to ensure that all citizens have access to this basic human right. 20.3.3 A Case for Water Justice through Politicizing Governance One of the main limitations of PIM was that it was depoliticized in nature and thought of water distribution as only a technocratic issue rather than considering its highly political dimension too. This means that the reform was implemented without addressing the political dimensions of water allocation, such as the distribution of power and resources among different stakeholders. PIM assumed that the transfer of management responsibilities to the users would automatically lead to more equitable water distribution. However, this was not the practical case, as power asymmetries continued to exist among the different user groups, and the tail-enders continued to face structurally produced water shortages. During fieldwork, we encountered some Water User Associations (WUA) where the level of participation among member farmers is significantly higher due to the politicized social capital present, and farmers had historical associations with land rights struggles, either formally or informally. While such cases were exceptional, they demonstrated that farmers’ engagement in WUA activities was more robust in situations where they had a history of collective action and mobilization. This suggests that the presence of social capital, coupled with a political dimension, can positively impact farmers’ participation in WUA, indicating the importance of historical context and socio-political dynamics in shaping farmers’ engagement in water governance initiatives. Therefore, there is a need to go beyond technical and institutional reforms and address the political dimensions of water allocation to ensure water justice for all stakeholders, especially the tailenders. The depoliticized approach of PIM needs to be revisited, and the water governance framework needs to be politicized to address power asymmetries and ensure the participation of all stakeholders in decision-making processes. This requires a shift from a technical focus to a more social and political approach to water governance, which acknowledges the role of power dynamics in shaping water allocation outcomes. By doing so, we can ensure that the water justice concerns of the tailenders and other marginalized stakeholders are addressed and that the benefits of irrigation water are distributed more equitably.​​

NOTES 1.

https://www​.alamy​.com​/members​- of​-tail​-abadgar​-tanzeem​-sub​- division​-khairpur​-are​ -holding​-protest​- demonstration​-against​-shortage​-of​-water​-at​-hyderabad​-press​- club​-on​ -tuesday​-may​-17​-2022​-image470067551​.html 2. https://www​.pakistantoday​.com​.pk ​/2022​/09​/27​/despite​-lapse​-of​-month​-breach​-in​-mmd​ -canal​-yet​-to​-be​-plugged/ 3. Rabi is the local name for the crop season starting on 1 October and running to 31 March.

318  Handbook of social justice in the Global South 4. Kharif is also a local name for the crop season starting on 1 April and running to 30 September. 5. Local name for the canal distributary in district Bahawalnagar, Punjab, Pakistan. 6. Local name for the canal distributary in District Tando Allha Yar, Punjab, Pakistan. 7. Tail Abadgaar Tanzeem is an organization of the tail-ender farmers for collective action.

REFERENCES Ahmad, M.-D., Turral, H., & Nazeer, A. (2009). Diagnosing irrigation performance and water productivity through satellite remote sensing and secondary data in a large irrigation system of Pakistan. Agricultural Water Management, 96(4), 551–564. Arfan, M. (2022a). Exploring the water governance policy framework for improving participatory irrigation management reforms. Rasta: Local Research, Local Solutions, 81. Arfan, M. (2022b). Mapping impact of farmer’s organisation on the equity of water and land productivity: Evidence from Pakistan. The Pakistan Development Review. Arfan, M., Ansari, K., Ullah, A., Hassan, D., Siyal, A. A., & Jia, S. (2020). Agenda setting in water and IWRM: Discourse analysis of water policy debate in Pakistan. Water, 12(6), 1656. Boelens, R., & Zwarteveen, M. (2005). Anomalous water rights and the politics of normalization: Collective water control and privatization policies in the Andean region. In D. Roth, R. Boelens, & M. Zwarteveen (Eds.), Liquid relations. Contested water rights and legal complexity (pp. 97–123). Rutgers University Press. Castro, C. V. (2022). Optimizing nature-based solutions by combining social equity, hydro-environmental performance, and economic costs through a novel Gini coefficient. Journal of Hydrology X, 16, 100127. Conrad, C., Schönbrodt-Stitt, S., Löw, F., Sorokin, D., & Paeth, H. (2016). Cropping intensity in the Aral Sea Basin and its dependency from the runoff formation 2000–2012. Remote Sensing, 8(8), 630. Crase, L., Gandhi, V., Ahmed, B., Lashari, B., Ashfaq, M., Memon, J., & Johnson, R. (2020). Efficient participatory irrigation institutions to support productive and sustainable agriculture in south Asia. CABI Digital Library. Deb, N. (2021). Slow violence and the Gas Peedit in neoliberal India. Social Problems, spab058. https:// doi​.org​/10​.1093​/socpro​/spab058 Emanuel, R. E., & Wilkins, D. E. (2020). Breaching barriers: The fight for indigenous participation in water governance. Water, 12(8), 2113. Giordano, M., Turral, H., Scheierling, S. M., Tréguer, D. O., & McCornick, P. G. (2017). Beyond “more crop per drop”: Evolving thinking on agricultural water productivity (Vol. 169). International Water Management Institute (IWMI) & World Bank. Hurlbert, M. (2020). Access and allocation: Rights to water, sanitation and hygiene. International Environmental Agreements: Politics, Law and Economics, 20(2), 339–358. Jacoby, H. G., Mansuri, G., & Fatima, F. (2021). Decentralizing corruption: Irrigation reform in Pakistan. Journal of Public Economics, 202, 104499. Mohai, P., & Bryant, B. (2019). Environmental racism: Reviewing the evidence. In Race and the incidence of environmental hazards (pp. 163–176). Routledge. Mohai, P., Pellow, D., & Roberts, J. T. (2009). Environmental justice. Annual Review of Environment and Resources, 34, 405–430. Movik, S. (2014). A fair share? Perceptions of justice in South Africa’s water allocation reform policy. Geoforum, 54, 187–195. Prieto, M. (2021). Equity vs. efficiency and the human right to water. Water, 13(3), 278. Rinaudo, J. D. (2002). Corruption and allocation of water: The case of public irrigation in Pakistan. Water Policy, 4(5), 405–422. Shrestha, R., Flacke, J., Martinez, J., & Van Maarseveen, M. (2016). Environmental health related socio-spatial inequalities: Identifying “hotspots” of environmental burdens and social vulnerability. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 13(7), 691.

Politicizing water governance and canal allocations  319 Stewart, I. T., Bacon, C. M., & Burke, W. D. (2014). The uneven distribution of environmental burdens and benefits in Silicon Valley’s backyard. Applied Geography, 55, 266–277. Sultana, F. (2018). Water justice: Why it matters and how to achieve it. Water International, 43(4), 483–493. Sze, J., & London, J. K. (2008). Environmental justice at the crossroads. Sociology Compass, 2(4), 1331–1354. Weissteiner, C. J., Strobl, P., & Sommer, S. (2011). Assessment of status and trends of olive farming intensity in EU-Mediterranean countries using remote sensing time series and land cover data. Ecological Indicators, 11(2), 601–610. Yaqoob, M. A. (2017). Engineering historical water infrastructure in the Indus Basin of Pakistan: Interplay between climate change and water governance. Water International, 42(3), 245–260.

21. Gender digital divide in India A capability and social justice approach analysis Payel Dutta and Arindam Das

21.1 INTRODUCTION It has already been suggested that information and communications technology (ICT) researchers go beyond their usual way of thinking to look at sociocultural realities. They may even use a critical frame based on historical understandings of asymmetrical power discourse (Rydhagen & Trojer, 2008; Rodhain, 2009; Tsibolane & Brown, 2016). Rethinking ICT through critical lenses like postcolonialism, feminism, and ecocriticism broadens the digital research landscape and helps create new counter-epistemes that break its disciplinary boundaries. The transcendental myth has been criticized for showing the darker sides of ICT that make the “second sex” more vulnerable to digital injustices, especially in a developing economy (Pal & De, 2021). Information and communications technology and development have a circular relationship. With societal development, we innovate improved ICT tools, propelling a better ICTenabled world. As the ICT sector develops, we proceed towards better, more modernized living conditions. However, the lack of ICT access, usage, and skills leads to the digital divide, which slows down the development process. ICT also has the potential to stimulate gender equality and gender justice and empower women in the developmental process. However, any gender gap evident in the technological world, which itself is sociologically constructed with the capacity to create a different impact on men and women (Hafkin, 2002), leads to the Gender Digital Divide (GDD) and consequently to gender digital distrust and gender digital injustice. Such a gender gap must be identified, mainstreamed, and critically addressed. Non-advocacy of gendered lenses into ICT issues can create a new form of inequality between men and women (Sandys, 2005, p. 3). Hence, GDD, distrust, and injustice should be addressed to achieve equality in the information society. Such GDD is most prominent in developing nations. In developing countries, boys and men are more likely to access and use ICT tools than girls and women (Singh, 2017). Current research reveals that India, a developing nation, is no exception to this GDD (Sinha, 2018; GSMA, 2020). In this chapter, we will take recourse to Martha Nussbaum’s “capability approach” (Nussbaum, 2011) as a critical frame to claim that women’s dignity and well-being (or quality of life) could be enhanced if better, more holistic, more equitable, and more just digital opportunities are made available. This chapter is theoretical and has five sections. In the first part, we introduce the meaning of the digital divide. In the second part, we proceed to understand the digital divide among genders and probe the reasons behind it. In the third section, we theorize, through the Nussbaumian “capability approach”, how women’s participation in the digital world will holistically benefit the economy, create social justice, social dignity, and well-being for women, 320

Gender digital divide in India  321 and emancipate them. In the fourth part, we focus on GDD from an Indian perspective. In the fifth and final part, we highlight some prominent initiatives (both public and private) in India that attempt to bridge the GDD and distrust.

21.2 UNDERSTANDING DIGITAL DIVIDE It is well-nigh impossible to imagine a human society without ICT or digital technology. Everyday life demands the application of digital tools. ICT plays a pivotal role in our social, political, and economic structure. The concerns and critical discussions about the digital divide affecting the economic structure of a nation started in the early 1990s. The digital divide defines a gap between the haves and the have-nots, i.e., the gap in ICT access and usage (Hamburg & Lütgen, 2019). Rightly, Manuel Castells (2010) states that the Digital Divide is an outcome of “information capitalism.” As is generally agreed, the Digital Divide shows the division between the people who do and do not have access to ICT, i.e., a pillar between who benefits and who does not from using ICT in an economy. So, this divide is the division between technology-rich and technology-poor people. It may be global, national, or regional (Rao, 2005) in magnitude. It leads to social disparities and inequalities that further hinder the path of economic growth for the population of a country. This gap is starkly prominent among men and women end-users, especially in developing countries such as India (Antonio & Tuffley, 2014). This digital divide among genders is called the gender digital divide. In the next section, we will discuss GDD and how the participation of women in the digital world can reduce this gap and play a vital role in de-marginalizing the female population on the digital platform.

21.3 GENDER DIGITAL DIVIDE AND WOMEN The GDD is the digital divide or the technology and internet disparity among men and women. GDD is also the stereotyping of the digital space as pro-masculine with conscious discrimination against women from digital access and usage (Plan International, 2020). GDD results from an unequal or uneven distribution of digital technology, leading to gender inequality or a gender gap. According to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), “At 15 years of age, on average, only 0.5% of girls wish to become ICT professionals, compared to 5% of boys” (OECD, 2018, p. 10). This clearly shows a gender gap in the ICT world. At this point, an attempt to understand the definition(s) of GDD is imperative. According to Abu-Shanab and Al-Jamal, “GDD can be defined as the unequal opportunity for ICT use between men and women in social, political, economic, and cultural domains” (Abu-Shanab & Al-Jamal, 2015, p. 95). It is also a matter of underrepresentation of women in the digital/IT platform (Gargallo-Castel et al., 2010). Castano, Martín, and Martinez (2011) defined GDD as the inequalities in the intensity of use and participation in ICT between men and women. Lamani and Honakeri (2012) state that traditional gender biases in the technological era translate into GDD. According to UNESCO, one of the most significant inequalities the digital revolution will amplify is the GDD (Primo, 2003, p. 5). There are many reasons behind GDD, like hurdles to access, affordability, usage of ICT, lack of education, lack of technical know-how, pro-women technical infrastructure, social and cultural norms, and

322  Handbook of social justice in the Global South inherent biases (OECD, 2018; OECD, 2015; Hilbert, 2011; Cooper, 2006; Korupp & Szydlik, 2005). Hence, GDD is the subalternation of women in the digital economy, depriving them of access to the male-dominated ICT sector and even silencing their voices, concerns, issues, and agendas in the ICT world. Nevertheless, paradoxically, although ICT is the root cause of GDD, it is the only way to eliminate the problem. Men and women are the two inseparable agents in an economy. An equitable distribution of resources among men and women is necessary for economic strengthening. However, at every stage, we witness disproportion between the two, whether economic, social, political, cultural, behavioral, or even in the case of an information society. Economic productivity in an information society can be increased through the higher participation of women. According to Fountain, “the participation of women in the design of information technology at all stages will both straighten up a significant shortfall in human capital and influence the construction of an increasingly information-based society” (2000, p. 59). To achieve the same, we have to narrow down and eventually eliminate GDD from the world of ICT. Technology is an indicator of economic growth, and the rate of increase in the use of technology by women can further foster this growth. Technology can give women economic power, access to and control over resources, production tools, and regulation over their utilization of time and agency in meaningful decision-making in their lives and professions. Advancement in the economic power of women is beneficial for families, children, the community, and the nation at large. Education is mandatory to gain access to technology. However, many women in developing countries like India cannot access these same services. No wonder the problem of GDD is more prominent in developing countries than in developed countries. Bhawna Sinha S.S. Sahay (2019) rightly opines, “It is imperative to ensure that women in developing countries understand the significance of these technologies and use them. If not, lack of access to information and communication technologies becomes a significant factor in the further marginalization of women from the economic, social, and political mainstream of their countries and of the world” (2019, n.p.). Women cannot become a part of the global world order without using ICT, which digitally connects different parts of the globe. ICT provides psychological empowerment to women at the organizational, personal, and social levels, and it is also helpful in positively impacting society’s attitude towards women (Rathi & Niyogi, 2015). An underdeveloped or developing economy is essentially a masculine society where women often face societal, cultural, financial, educational, and political barriers. However, ICT has the power to reduce these barriers. With digital technology, women can also participate in society’s decision-making processes. ICT’s inclusion of women’s concerns can also boost national income and GDP through women’s participation in the production sector (Sandys, 2005; Sinha & Sahay, 2019). Hence, gender equality in ICT, one of the modern human rights, is imperative. ICT is a lynchpin factor in promoting economic growth and sustainable development, but without gender equality or equity, it is impossible to achieve its full extent. Also, ICT can create gender equality by making people aware of their rights to ICT (Bala, 2017). Like many other developing countries, India faces a gender gap in ICT. An informed discussion at every level, involving both genders, may help achieve this goal. In the following section, we will examine the GDD condition through the critical lens of Martha Nussbaum’s capability theories, which incorporate social justice, human dignity, and well-being.

Gender digital divide in India  323

21.4 CAPABILITY THEORY AND CRITIQUE OF THE GENDER DIGITAL DIVIDE The capability approach theory of Martha Nussbaum, a reworking of the more simplistic capability theory of Amartya Sen and its capacity-impacting-the-quality-of-life agenda, perceives the quality of human life in terms of satisfaction and the resources humans can command (Nussbaum, 2000, p. 12). Further, Nussbaum’s theory is political in that it makes demands from the nation-state for an increment in human capabilities and associated resources to create an increment in well-being to “provide a basis for constitutional principles that citizens have a right to demand from their governments” (Nussbaum, 2000, p. 12). The right to digital resources, access, and usage is urgent for a digitally subalternate woman, especially in a developing country. Any non-attempt at bridging the GDD may well be perceived as a social injustice impacting women’s development. Viewed through the lens of the capability approach, the digital divide manifests not merely as a disparity between internet access and deprivation, the digital haves and the have-nots, but also from the perspective of internet usage. With a significant demarcation between men who have better proficiency (by being better equipped through better skills and training) to leverage it for championing holistic development and advancement, and women who lack proficiency in such competencies, GDD may be addressed through the ethical and equitable guiding principles of the capability approach. The capability approach impacts policy decision-making at the government level by making it more inclusive about the issues of human dignity, human justice, and human freedom. A right to access digitality and the right to its usage may impact the fundamental rights and aspirations of a human: the right to equality, the right to freedom, the right against exploitation, the right to freedom of religion, and remedies (along with the right to psychosomatic well-being, political decision-making, or the right to equal employment opportunity). Hence, encompassing technology and having rights to it goes a long way toward realizing human aspirations and dignity. Here, one may recall Haenssgen and Ariana (2018), who, in their research, reveal how mobile phones combine with healthcare infrastructure to generate better access for marginal subjects. Based on the principle of human dignity, Nussbaum (2000, p. 76) prepared an extensive list of 10 central/fundamental human capabilities, along with thresholds: i.

Life: Living a full life up to the average life expectancy without experiencing premature death or other conditions that make life less worthwhile to live. ii. Physical health: A good, healthy life; a good, healthy reproductive life; a life that receives ample nourishment and is well-sheltered. iii. Bodily integrity: Physical freedom of movement, physique well secured against bodily attack (including domestic or sexual), having the rights to sexual and reproductive choices. iv. Senses, imagination, and thought: Having the capacity to employ our senses, imagination, cognition, and rationality – engaging in these faculties in a manner that reflects a truly human essence, one cultivated through comprehensive education encompassing literacy and fundamental mathematical and scientific aptitude. Having the ability to utilize imagination and thought in conjunction with creating and appreciating various forms of expression, be they religious, literary, musical, or otherwise. Having the liberty to employ one’s intellect in ways safeguarded by freedoms of expression, both in political discourse

324  Handbook of social justice in the Global South and artistic endeavors, as well as freedom of religious practice. Having the capability to derive pleasure from experiences and to mitigate unnecessary pain. v. Emotions: Having the capacity to form meaningful connections with entities and individuals beyond ourselves; to cherish those who reciprocate affection and concern, to mourn their absence; in essence, to love, to mourn, to feel yearning, appreciation, and warranted indignation. Avoiding the stunting of emotional growth due to pervasive fear and anxiety. (Upholding this capability entails bolstering human interactions, which are proven to be pivotal in their nurturing.) vi. Practical reason: The ability to ethically and critically distinguish the good from the bad and plan one’s own life. This aspect includes the liberty for religious and conscientious observances. vii. Affiliations: To be able to live a socially interactive life that is concerned about others in society. Safeguarding this capability involves safeguarding institutions that foster and sustain such bonds of affiliation and the freedom of assembly and political expression. viii. Other species: Being able to live with other beings of nature, viz., plants, animals, and other creatures. ix. Play: The capacity to laugh, enjoy, play, and engage in recreational activities. x. Control over one’s environment: (i.) Political environment: to make open political choices, free speech, free association, and rights for political participation; (ii.) Interpersonal environment: in comparison to others, equal rights. To property (with no unwarranted search or seizure) and employment. Through Nussbaum’s cross-cultural dialogues in India, she created the above politically invested list of abilities intended for the full realization of a perfect human life (Nussbaum, 2000). The fact that such a fundamental capability list was prepared while writing a thesis on Third World/Global South women (here in India) may well be utilized to understand the digital capacities of Global South women. From positive and ethical perspectives, Myridis (2022) has always championed the enhancement of human life by eradicating poverty, ushering in social justice, providing imaginative fillip, providing adequate information to make practical-sensible choices, providing scope for political participation, entertainment, and delivering quality life (both physical and emotional). Today, any increment in human capability may be closely linked with the increment in human digital capability. With the exponential growth in the digital economy, digital maturity, and strategic-transformative digital development encompassing the entire rubric of the nation (Melhem & Jacobsen, 2021), every nation-state subject can be expected to be kept from being left behind digitally. Hence, man’s aspirational fulfillment (reaching capabilities) through digital intervention is an ethical demand. Adequate access and effective use of technology are how we can realize human capabilities. Although much is being done, a segment (especially in the developing world) left behind in this journey of realizing capacities through digital means is women. A holistic enhancement of women’s use of technology may be seen as a positive intervention in uplifting a woman’s dignity and addressing her social rights. Digital democracy and inclusivist digital participation could only be possible when the nation-state makes a positive policy shift in giving women digital access and digital usage rights.

Gender digital divide in India  325

21.5 GENDER DIGITAL DIVIDE IN INDIA In India, the contribution of the ICT sector to its GDP has increased from 1.2 percent (1998) to 7.7 percent (2017), encouraging the path of economic development (Agarwal et al., 2018). From this, there is a direct relationship between the growth of ICT and economic growth in India. However, for sustainable development, we also need gender equality in the ICT sector. As a developing country, India faces a gender gap in usage and access to ICT. According to the GSMA report (The Mobile Gender Gap Report, 2020), there is a 50 percent gender gap in mobile internet users in India. The IAMAI-KPMG Report of 2015 reveals that among internet users in India, 71 percent are male and 29 percent are female. This statistic indicates that a significant GDD exists among internet users in India. In India, females have limited digital access due to many reasons, such as a lack of primary education, lack of ICT or digital knowledge, family restrictions, male-dominated social structure, marriage, political inequalities, occupational inequalities, and sexual violence. To have gender-equal inclusive growth with sustainable development (SDG-5) in India, we cannot ignore the causes of GDD in an information society, with ICT one of the main pillars of development. Women need support (not patronage) from the family, the social structure, the government, and their male partners (Mishra & Kiran, 2015) to advance their ICT adoption and usage. Women’s participation in the ICT sector in India is around 34 percent of the total employees (NASSCOM, 2015), which surely needs to increase. Labor is one of the factors of production in an economy. So, in work distribution, equity is required between male and female labor forces, even in the ICT sector. Women’s economic empowerment through ICT can create a challenge against discrimination and gender bias and help to overcome gender barriers (Prasad & Sreedevi, 2007). However, it is difficult to procure data on internet use by specific genders in a country, especially in developing countries. This situation exists because “standard indicators are not disaggregated by sex, and the available data are not very reliable or comparable” (Hafkin & Taggart, 2001, p. 1) – statistics on this must be interpreted cautiously (Gurumurthy, 2003). However, it is no wonder there is a substantial disparity between Indian men and women in terms of access, usage, and regulation of ICT. Measures to combat this gap require gender-inclusive policies by the government that enhance the “capability” of women, by private enterprises, and by public-private joint ventures. India is adopting measures to reduce this gap and address social-digital justice issues related to women’s digital rights. A host of such initiatives and their analysis follow in the next section.

21.6 ANALYZING INITIATIVES TO BRIDGE GDD IN INDIA To empower our society, economy, or country, we must achieve gender equality in every aspect. Especially in the digital world, we need to empower women to leverage the maximum benefit of ICT. Though most developed countries have achieved this agenda, developing countries like India are striving to achieve it. In India, social and cultural norms that favor men place restrictions on women. Furthermore, the gender issue in the digital divide is a serious problem in the case of poor, marginalized women. If we can involve women, irrespective of their geographical demographics (rural or urban), in the technological environment, then the country’s economic activity will be enhanced. Every woman’s economic advancement can be achieved, and social and economic benefits reaped. To achieve technological gender parity,

326  Handbook of social justice in the Global South policies need to be changed. They should be gender-sensitive and gender-inclusive. According to the OECD, co-ordinated policy action can help narrow the digital gender gap. This requires raising awareness and tackling gender stereotypes; enabling enhanced, safer, and more affordable access to digital tools; and stronger cooperation across stakeholders to remove barriers to girls’ and women’s full participation in the digital world. Digital technologies provide new opportunities to make progress, but technological fixes cannot address the underlying structural problems that drive the GDD. Concrete policy actions are needed to foster women’s and girls’ full participation and inclusion in the digital economy, while at the same time addressing stereotypes and social norms that lead to discrimination against women (2018, pp. 5–6).

In India, approximately 12 percent of women do not use the Internet due to the negative social perception of ICT, and another 8 percent due to the lack of family acceptance of women as subscribers to ICT (Intel & Dalberg, 2012). It shows that in India, social and cultural norms limiting women’s perception, participation, use, and access within the patriarchal structure are not uncommon. Therefore, measures to reduce the GDD should focus on these issues. Now, let us look at some select initiatives taken by India (both at public and private levels) to create a gender-inclusive and sensitized technological world that addresses women’s capacities and intends to resolve digital social injustices. a. “Internet Saathi” is a project to bridge GDD in rural India. It was launched in July 2015 in partnership with Tata Trusts and Google India to empower a cadre of women (saathi or friends) in rural India with internet skills to impart digital skills to other women. This project was developed based on research on different rural parts of India, such as Rajasthan, Jharkhand, and Gujarat. In this program, digital training is provided to village women. With digital literacy and ICT knowledge, women are expected to know about government policies, have increased access to education, and even initiate entrepreneurship. It can be said that this project is expected to minimize the digital divide in India (Paul, Aithal, & Bhuimali, 2017). The Tata Trust website documents that it has empowered 60,000 saathis and “ha[s] established a Foundation for Rural Entrepreneurship Development (FREND) for the implementation of the Internet Saathi and livelihoods programme in rural communities.” FREND is the second phase of the program that engages the saathis in transformative works and engenders livelihood opportunities by supporting them in all stages of their entrepreneurial journey. One of the success stories documented on the “Tata Trust Internet Saathi” website is that of a subaltern woman from the Muslim community, Asiya, who fought against her family to become an entrepreneur selling packaged condiments and enhanced her entrepreneurial opportunities through digital literacy. Asiya learned to use a smartphone. Initially, she used the Internet just to chat or engage on social media, but soon she began to take product-related orders and transact through it. She further started to explore the various Gram Panchayat schemes using her smartphone and began creating awareness about them in her village. Today, she is a member of the Gram Panchayat, a beacon of hope to the women in her community (with whom she shares recipes and stitching techniques), and is also respected by her family and friends for how successful her business has become. She has also trained more than 1,000 women in her village and neighborhood, spreading the joys and power of the Internet (Tata Trust, 2021).

Gender digital divide in India  327 It is this joy and power of digital freedom impacting the quality of life and wellbeing of women that Nussbaum earnestly championed. Indeed, the program addresses Nussbaum’s fundamental capacities iv and ix, which enumerate the ways a human may be truly and fully formed by receiving education, scientific training, literacy, and the ability to laugh, play, and enjoy recreational activities. b. Tech Mahindra introduced “Fightback,” a mobile non-profit application, in India in 2011 to shield women from sexual harassment. Whenever women feel unsafe, they can press an SOS button. It tracks their location using GPS and informs or alerts nearby police stations and security agencies. This app is an example of how an ICT tool can protect women virtually (Tech Mahindra Sustainability Report, 2013–2014). There are many more apps like this, e.g., “Abhaya” (2013), “Raksha – women safety alert” (2014), “Vanitha Alert” (2014), and so on (see Yarrabothu & Thota, 2015). A few more apps that address the safety needs of women include “bSafe” (2018), “Shake to Safety” (2018), “SafetiPin” (2018), and “Chilla” (2018). The last app may be activated by a loud shout if the woman cannot press the button. Nussbaum’s capacity for safe-free physical movement (“Bodily integrity”) may now be addressed through this GDD program. If a woman is the bearer of the rights of her body – its integrity and boundaries – then her choice-making ability about her body is of utmost importance. According to Nussbaum, any violation of the same violates a woman’s rights and her autonomic subject position. Nussbaum dubs the human body (especially that of a woman) as “our home” (Nussbaum, 1995, p. 76) – a protective, private, individuated space. With women’s access to and usage of safety alert apps, their right to physical integrity – their home – may be protected. The enhancement of bodily integrity for a woman by reducing gender violence through digitization and the consequent bridging of the GDD is a positive move. However, the nation and its digital policies must go a long way to create a space where women can digitally and physically navigate safely. c. The Digital India program, a program to transform India into a digitally enabled knowledge economy, was introduced in July 2015 by Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi. However, the Ministry of Electronics & Information Technology (DeitY), in its booklet, “Glimpses of Digital India Week Events” (2015), nowhere separately addresses the concerns of the women of the country. Although the prime minister may have promoted the program as a pro-entrepreneurial one, encouraging people’s participation, especially women’s, in microlocal processes of infrastructure building (Minimum Government, Maximum Governance, 2014; Gurumurthy & Chami, 2018, p. 6). Nevertheless, the focus of this national program on the marginalized women of the country, both urban and rural, should and could have been more inclusive. However, it should also be highlighted that lately, the Ministry of Women and Child Development, GoI, has partnered with Facebook to empower women (especially teenagers) with the right to information for better and empowered social media (Tewari, 2019, n.p.). This capacity-enhancement program may help women control their environment – politically and professionally. This capability may also positively enhance their digital (especially media) presence, be incremental to their imagination and thought, and boost their community (social media or otherwise) affiliations. d. According to the OECD, “The Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana programme is a governmental initiative that aims at improving the financial inclusion of women at the national level, including the promotion of mobile wallets, based on mobile transactions through

328  Handbook of social justice in the Global South telecom operators, and the development of Cash Out Point centres” (2018, p. 43). Through digital platforms, this financial inclusivity scheme promises to impact a woman’s control over her economic environment and reduce fear and anxiety about her finances. Any progress towards increasing a woman’s positive emotional capacities towards her financial justice sensitivity is highly commendable. However, research shows that this national scheme has failed to reach its desired impact on women in the more subalternized sections of the country. Digital financial literacy camps for women are essential to letting women gain rightful access to financial liberation (Businessline, 2021). e. In Gujarat (a state in India), women producers in the dairy sector use the Dairy Information System KIOSK (DISK), which helps to manage a database of all milk cattle. It also gives information about veterinary services and the dairy sector. The Centre for Electronics Governance at the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad (CEG-IIMA) created this system (Rama Rao, 2001). “This information helped women farmers to maximise their productivity and their profits” (Dey, 2018, p. 79). f. SMILE (Savitri Marketing Institution for Ladies Empowerment) is a voluntary institution in Pune (Maharashtra, India). This organization uses ICT to increase the literacy level of underprivileged women. Such women can sell products like soft toys, bags, candles, and other utility items through the Internet. In this way, the Internet helps them to have greater exposure, awareness, and market reach (Malhotra, 2015). Similarly, e-Mahile is a Karnataka State Women’s Development Corporation project under the scheme ASARE. In this project, rural women are trained on how to access the Internet and use it for information collection and to provide different services to the rural public. A laptop, UPS, digital camera, LCD projector, internet connection, educational CD, and printer are provided to each trained woman. In this project, rural women are empowered to help their villages, and they can earn a decent income. Such projects help build capacities by addressing sustainable growth and adaptability in a fast-changing socioeconomic structure. By building the capacity for senses, imagination, and thoughts and heightening decision-making power based on the intellectual faculty of women, such digitally informed programs create social justice by empowering women financially. g. A joint venture BPO company between Tele-Tech and Bharti Group called Tele-Tech India offers its employees the option to work four days a week instead of the normal five days, which benefits women employees. They also offer “housewives” and part-time employees incentives for 30-hour weeks. ICT makes it possible to do so (Malhotra, 2015, p. 505). Similarly, another BPO company named Data Matics Technologies in Mumbai (Maharashtra, India) processes data, and for this, they allow women to work from home for 20 hours a week. This is a helpful offer for married women and women with small children. It makes work flexible in terms of time and space for women. From Nussbaum’s capacity-building ix (“play” or increasing the ability for recreational activities) point of view, these kinds of measures give women from lower-income groups more chances to relax, grow, and interact with others. They also give women more socioeconomic power and help make society more fair and just for women (Bologna & Staffieri, 2022; Yerkes et al., 2020). The above policies, programs, measures, and schemes are examples of some ICT initiatives that empower women by giving them the right to earn and take part in the economy, enter into

Gender digital divide in India  329 the process of decision-making in their daily lives, and seize agency over their socioeconomic and cultural existence. As Martha Nussbaum listed, these measures improve a variety of fundamental abilities. Though we acknowledge the fact that it is a Herculean task to eliminate GDD, proper and timely governmental (and even NGO) intervention initiatives and policy changes may make the road easy and just for women.

21.7 CONCLUSION Wafa Ben-Hassine, in an article in the United Nations Chronicle, which projects the Internet as the new human right and a champion of social justice, comments pertinently, “The digital future is already here. As nearly every aspect of our lives becomes digitized, we must ensure that laws and policies are based on fundamental rights” (2020, n.p.). However, in many developing countries like India, the “second sex” still faces hurdles in obtaining the fundamental right to the digital platform. The reasons for this GDD are social, cultural, political, and economic. The gender inequity coded in ICT is more prominent in rural and socioeconomically marginalized social segments. However, according to the TRAI report, there has been a rise in telecommunication subscribers in the rural (disadvantaged) sector of India (“Rural telephone subscribers increased from 524.39 million at the end of Sep-20 to 525.92 million at the end of Dec-20, and Rural iv Tele-density also increased from 58.96% to 59.05% during the same period” (TRAI, 2021)), yet the increment is neither an indication of digital progression nor that of digital inclusiveness. As has been discussed, to procure optimal utilization of digital technology, eliminating the gender gap is obligatory. Without harnessing women and their capacities, a nation’s economy is bound to fail. Concurrently, without the optimum use of resources like ICT, generating output in the national or world economy is impossible. Hence, our aim ought to be to remove GDD from the ICT sphere and create convenience in the participation of gender-inclusive economic growth. Feminist developmental intervention in the economy with an agenda of sustained transformational outcomes, essentially impacting the capacities of marginal women in resource-poor communities and their livelihood and well-being, has been Nussbaum’s agenda. On the other hand, ICT for development (ICT4D), has the aim of promoting gender equality, employing technological and digital access and usage by women to harness development (Heeks, 2008; Unwin, 2009). A straddling of ICT4D and Nussbaum’s pitch for an increment in women’s capabilities could deliver sustained social justice.

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Gender digital divide in India  331 Malhotra, R. (2015). Empowering women through digital technology: An Indian perspective. International Journal of Business Management, 2(1), 502–508. Melhem, S., and Jacobsen, A. H. (2021). A global study on digital capabilities. World Bank. https:// documents1​.worldbank ​ .org ​ /curated ​ /en ​ / 959181623060169420 ​ / pdf ​ /A​ - Global​ - Study​ - on ​ - Digital​ -Capabilities​.pdf Narendra Modi (2014, May 14). Minimum government, maximum governance. http://www​.narendramodi​ .in ​/minimum​-government​-maximum​-governance​-3162 Ministry of Electronics & Information Technology (DeitY) (2015). Glimpses of Digital India Week events. https://www​.meity​.gov​.in​/writereaddata​/files​/ DIWActivities​.pdf Mishra, G., & Kiran, U. V. (2015). Role of ICT in achieving complete gender equality in India. International Journal of Technical Research and Applications, 3(3), 184–189. Myridis, N. E. (2022). Poverty and the quality of life in the digital era: Interdisciplinary discussions and solutions. Springer Cham. NASSCOM (2015). Indian IT-BPM industry, strategic review. http://www​.nasscom​.in​/indian​-itbpo​ -industry Nussbaum, M. (1995). Human capabilities: Female human beings. In M. J. Glover (Ed.), Women, culture, and development: A study of human capabilities (pp. 61–104). Clarendon Press. Nussbaum, M. (2000). Women and human development. Cambridge University Press. Nussbaum, M. (2002). Capabilities and social justice. International Studies Review, 4(2), 123–135. OECD (2015). The ABC of gender equality in education: Aptitude, behaviour, confidence. OECD Publishing. http://dx​.doi​.org​/10​.1787​/9789264229945​-en OECD (2018). Bridging the digital gender divide – include, upskill, innovate. http://www​.oecd​.org​/ internet​/ bridging​-the​-digital​-gender​-divide​.pdf Pal, A., & De, R. (2021). For better or for worse? A frame work for critical analysis of ICT4D for women. Proceedings of the 1st Virtual Conference on Implications of Information and Digital Technologies for Development, 2021 (pp. 521–529). https://www​.mn​.uio​.no​/ifi​/english​/research​/groups​/is​/ifip​-94​/ proceedings​-virtual​-conference​-2021​/proceedings​-ifip​-9.4–1st​-virtual​-conference​-2021​​.pdf Paul, P. K., Aithal, P. S., & Bhuimali, A. (2017). Internet Saathi: A step towards promoting rural Indian women. International Conference on Interdisciplinary Research in Humanitarian Technology (ICIRHT) (pp. 150–156). Plan International. (2020). Bridging the gender digital divide. https://planinternational​.org​/education​/ bridging​-the​-digital​-divide Prasad P. N., & Sreedevi, V. (2007). Economic empowerment of women through information technology: A case study from an Indian state. Journal of International Women’s Studies, 8, 107–120. Primo, N. (2003). Gender issues in the information society. UNESCO Publications for the World Summit on the Information Society. http://portal​.unesco​.org​/ci​/en​/file​_download​.php​/250​561f​2413​ 3814​c182​84fe​edc3​0bb5egend er​_issues​.​pdf Rama Rao, T. P. (2001, May). Dairy information services kiosk and dairy portal. Presented at the DISK and Dairy Portal workshop, Centre for Electronic Governance, Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad, (pp. 1–8). Rao, S. S. (2005). Bridging digital divide: Efforts in India. Telematics and Informatics, 22, 361–375. Rathi, S., & Niyogi, S. (2015). Role of ICT in women empowerment. Advances in Economics and Business Management, 2(5), 519–521. Rodhain, F., & Fallery, B. (2009). ICT and ecology: In favour of research based on the Responsibility principle. Mediterranean Conference of Information Systems, Athens, Greece (pp. 173–186). https:// hal​.archives​-ouvertes​.fr​/ hal​- 00777858​/document Rydhagen, B., & Trojer, L. (2008). Postcolonial ICT – feminist technoscience and technopolitics intertwined. In C. Van Slyke (Ed.), Information communication technologies: Concepts, methodologies, tools, and applications (Vol. I). Sandys, E. (2005). Gender equality and empowerment of women through ICT. Women 2000 and beyond: Published to promote the goals of the Beijing Declaration and the Platform for Action (pp. 1–36). United Nations Division of Women, Department of Economics and Social Affairs. https:// www​.un​.org​/womenwatch​/daw​/public​/w2000–09​.05​-ict​-e​​.pdf Shiva, V. (1998, March 5). Lecture on “Focus on biotechnology”. Lulea University of Technology, Sweden.

332  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Singh, S. (2017). Bridging the gender digital divide in developing countries. Journal of Children and Media, 11(2), 245–247. Sinha, S. (2018). Gender digital divide in India: Impacting women’s participation in the labour market. In NILERD (Eds.), Reflecting on India’s development. Springer. https://doi​.org​/10​.1007​ /978–981–13–1414–8_14 Sinha, B., & Sahay, S. S. (2019). ICT – a tool for women empowerment. https://www​.researchgate​.net​/ publication ​/330651046​_ICTA​_Tool​_for​_Women​_ Empowerment Tata Trust (2021). A friend to Asiya, the determined entrepreneur. https://www​.tatatrusts​.org​/our​-stories​ /article​/a​-friend​-to​-asiya​-the​-determined​-entrepreneur Tech Mahindra Sustainability Report (2013–2014). Connected world. Connected solutions. https:// cache​.techmahindra​.com​/static​/img​/pdf​/ Tech​-Mahindra​-Sus​tain​abil​ityReport​-FY​-2013–2014​.p​df Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) (2021, April 27). The Indian telecom services performance indicators (October–December, 2020). https://www​.trai​.gov​.in​/sites​/default​/files​/QPIR​ _27042021​_0​.pdf. Tewari, S. (2019, November 19). Facebook partners with Ministry of Women and Child Development to promote online safety. LiveMint. https://www​.livemint​.com​/news​/india​/facebook​-partners​-with​ -ministry​-ofwomen​-and​-child​-development​-to​-promote​-online​-safety​-11574160102215​.html Tsibolane, P., & Brown, I. (2016). Principles for conducting critical research using postcolonial theory in ICT4D studies. Association for Information Systems. https://aisel​.aisnet​.org​/cgi​/viewcontent​.cgi​ ?article​=1014​&context​=globdev2016 United Nations (2005). Women 2000: Gender equality and empowerment of women through ICT. Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Division for the Advancement of Women. Unwin, T. (2009). ICT4D: Information and communication technologies for development. Cambridge University Press. Yarrabothu, R. S., & Thota, B. (2015). Abhaya: An android app for the safety of women. https://www​ .researchgate​.net ​/publication ​/287201587​_ Abhaya ​_ An​_ Android​_ App​_ For​_The _Safety_Of_Women Yerkes, M. A. et al. (2020). Gender differences in the quality of leisure: A cross-national comparison. Community, Work, & Family, 23(4): 367–384.

22. Othered Adult children of cross-region marriages in rural Haryana, India Ankit

22.1 THE GLOBAL SOUTH: LOW SEX-RATIO, CASTE, AND CROSSREGION MARRIAGES The expression “Global South” is frequently used to refer to the group of countries that comprise the world’s poorer nations. The word “global” makes it apparent that this is not a strict geographic location division of the world but one based on socioeconomic inequalities with some geographic data coherence (Rigg, 2007). The South, however, “is everywhere, but always somewhere” (Sparke, 2007, p. 117). This results in the connotation of “South” as a condition where specific communities are deprived of their freedom or excluded from receiving particular benefits from local and governmental systems. India and China are the two most prominent nations in this area of the globe. India and China are also two of the few places where more men than women live. The 7th National Population Census, which took place in 2020, provided the most recent information on China’s population size, makeup, and distribution. The findings demonstrated that, in comparison to international norms, China’s gender disparity is still quite severe (Zhang et al., 2022). Furthermore, the gender ratio of China’s population at birth has been decreasing since 2007, according to data from the World Bank, gradually declining from 117 in 2007 to 112 in 2019 (Zhang et al., 2022) (see Figure 22.1).​​ India has consistently had a low sex ratio (defined as the number of females per 1,000 males) over the past century (see Figure 22.2). The low sex ratio is more rampant in the north of India, pointing towards a deliberate and ruthless elimination of female fetuses. “Patrilocality” (a married woman moving to her husband’s house after marriage), “Patrilineality” (property passes to sons instead of daughters), “Dowry” (paid to the groom or the groom’s family during marriage), and “old age support” (from sons and some traditional rituals performed by sons) are the four major factors for the continuance of preference for sons in India (Ministry of Finance, 2018). The logic of patrilineality is relatively inflexible in both North India and China. For instance, it is uncommon for a girl to get land as an inheritance. Sons are viewed as having more social and economic value as they can support their families financially and are crucial in carrying out their parents’ final rituals, which aid in their souls’ salvation and serve as successors to carry on the family name (Das Gupta et al., 2003). Confucianism values in China emphasize filial piety and the importance of continuing the family line through sons (Zhang, 2014). These values lead to a cultural preference for male children who can pass on the family name and make offerings to deceased ancestors. Conversely, daughters are viewed as an “economic liability” because of their large dowries and expensive weddings. 333

Figure 22.1  Gender ratio of China’s population, 1997–2020 (female = 100)

Source: Zhang et al., 2022.

334  Handbook of social justice in the Global South

Figure 22.2   Sex ratio

Source: Census of India, 2012.

Othered  335

336  Handbook of social justice in the Global South The complex web of inheritance rights, conventions, and other patrilineal practices and norms continues to provide the basis for this discrimination. Discrimination against female children begins even before they are born. A woman is forced to carry children until she reaches her desired number of sons, and then it ends (Das Gupta et al., 2003). Having a girl became extremely undesirable during the period of China’s onechild policy when families were only permitted to have one child, which led to an increase in the abortion of female fetuses (Ebenstein, 2010). Any female foeticide, whether it follows a female birth or a male birth in the same household, contributes to the problem of “missing girls” (Drèze, 2012, p. 97). Using ultrasound technology for sex-selective abortion during pregnancy happens more often among those in wealthy and socially connected groups. So does sex-selective infanticide at birth. This kind of discrimination against girls continues in early childhood through neglect and other means (Das Gupta et al., 2003; Arnold et al., 2002; Arnold & Parasuraman, 2009). It is necessary to mention Haryana, the worst-performing state in India over the decades. As per the 2011 census, the sex ratio in Haryana grew by 18 points, from 861 to 879 (Census of India, 2012). The 2011 Census showed an improvement in the sex ratio of children in the 0–6 age group, ranging between 819 and 834 (a gain of 15). In rural regions, it rose from 823 to 835 (a gain of 12 points). In a major governmental program, the Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao (Save Daughters, Educate Daughters) campaign was introduced in January 2015 by the Indian Prime Minister from Haryana to address the problem of the dropping child sex ratio and ensure the protection and education of the female child. Strategies involved implementing laws strictly, multi-sectoral district-level action, awareness campaigns, incentives, capacity building, and training programs. District officers are required to oversee the program and ensure that families and physicians who utilize sex-determination tools face severe legal consequences. The scheme’s instructions highlight how crucial it is to enforce the Pre-Conception and Pre-Natal Diagnostic Techniques (Prohibition of Sex Selection) Act, 1994 (PCPNDT Act) – a law for the prohibition of sex selection leading to female foeticide – at the national, state, and district levels. A large portion – nearly 80 percent of funds – was spent on media campaigns and advocacy alone, according to a parliamentary committee report, and several execution flaws were noted, which directly reduced the ability of authorities to monitor (Kapur, 2017). The program has thus failed for several reasons, including inadequate policy execution, financial mismanagement, and faulty monitoring systems. The requirement that parents set up suitable marriages for their adult children, taking into account the different marriage customs and benefits that a “good” marriage prospect might include in terms of status mobility for both parties, is a unique aspect of the intergenerational contract in South Asia (Mishra & Kaur, 2021; Karve, 1993). Adult children have an obligation to provide support, care, and affection to their parents in return for their parents’ aging care and financial assistance in arranging and funding their happy marriages. Patrilocality has meant that daughters-in-law and their husbands care for the husband’s co-resident elderly parents and thus make daughters-in-law necessary for a household (Brijnath, 2014). Therefore, women are most responsible for sustaining social bonds and fostering intergenerational connections (Gangopadhyay & Samanta, 2017; Allendorf, 2017; Gram et al., 2018). The girl’s ability to get along with the boy’s family and care for her elderly in-laws are crucial factors for the groom’s parents’ meticulous selection of girls throughout the matching procedure (Kabeer, 2000).

Othered  337 The monogamous institution of heterosexual marriage, which is almost universal and mandated in both China and India, is seriously threatened by unequal sex ratios (Mishra, 2013). Larsen and Kaur (2013) highlight the “marriage squeeze” phenomenon, which refers to the surplus of eligible men to marry and is not just a phenomenon of demographics. Marriage is affected not only by the age-sex structure and age-hypergamy tendencies but also by cultural norms and socioeconomic variables that influence marriage in general. Rules of caste endogamy (marriage inside one’s caste group), gotra exogamy (marriage outside specified gotras or clans), village exogamy (beyond one’s community), within the region, forbidding “exchange marriage” (exchange of sisters), and hypergamy (marrying up for brides) are also factors that affect local marriage markets (Kaur et al., 2016). India’s regressive Hindu caste system is well-known worldwide. A caste is a hierarchical, hereditary structure of social organization distinguished by exclusivity, social standing, and purity (Ketkar, 1909). Hierarchy and restrictions on marriage are two of the six identified distinctive traits of the caste system (Ghurye, 1932), with exogamy and endogamy being two opposite trends that place significant physical and geographical constraints on expanding marriage networks. When women from different castes live in the same village or area, they become unavailable due to caste endogamy. Marriages still firmly adhere to caste and community customs, particularly in rural areas, as only 5 percent of all Indian marriages were inter-caste in a nationwide survey (Rukmini, 2014). In particular, caste endogamy is practiced across India primarily to control and perpetuate the social order by preventing inter-caste marriages from causing significant social upheaval (Jaiswal, 2000). In these circumstances, weddings between members of other castes and groups are not only ridiculed and shunned, but occasionally the spouses face severe treatment, which may involve their elimination – a practice known as “honor killing” (Ahlawat, 2009). Violating the norms is considered a serious crime, resulting in the loss of family honor. The local caste panchayats impose strict penalties on the couple or family, especially when a woman from a higher caste wishes to marry a man from a lower caste. The penalties include hukka pani band karna (demanding to leave the village and boycotting the family). These penalties are acceptable and even exalted. Despite the state government encouraging inter-caste marriages and providing incentives to the couple if one of the spouses is a scheduled caste (lower caste) member under a special chief minister’s scheme, not many couples have taken advantage of these benefits due to fear of being ridiculed by local community members. Studies reveal that in Haryana, there were seven more men than women in 2012, and by 2050, this ratio will increase to 15, indicating a chronic scarcity of brides in the region (Kaur et al., 2016). However, men and their families do not usually choose to marry women from other regions, and the conversation over why young men cannot find spouses centers on unemployment rather than a lack of available women (Kaur, 2010). Contrary to popular opinion, men are also given significant cultural value regarding marriage and children in rural India. For financial and sociocultural reasons, men are also expected to get married and have children. Male marriage squeeze occurs for males who are less advantaged, with less or no agricultural land, no employment or education, and advanced ages; it does not affect all men like those in China (Davin, 2008; Fan & Huang, 1998). The communities’ strong predilection for sons has not decreased as a result of the skewed child-sex ratio in a male marriage squeeze. Kukreja and Kumar (2013), Mishra (2013), Chaudhry (2016), Kaur (2004, 2012), Ahlawat (2009), and Blanchet (2005) have all documented the marriage migration phenomenon of “cross-region marriages” for “bride importing” into the female deficit states of North India,

338  Handbook of social justice in the Global South such as Haryana, from faraway poorer eastern states, and Nepal and Bangladesh, outside of all the previously listed conventional marriage restrictions. These unions are “arranged” unions rather than “love marriages,” representing a pattern of rural, usually uneducated persons who are coming together across barriers of geography and culture (Kaur, 2004; Chaudhry, 2019). Men looking for a local wife put off getting married until later in life, and they typically settle for a cross-regional marriage as a “last resort.” Both the men and their elderly parents experience anxiety as they await marriage due to the challenges of managing household and agricultural duties without a wife or daughter-in-law. One of the questions raised in the initial years of the cross-regional marriage phenomenon was whether local women are likely to be valued more in rural communities, given the worsening sex ratio. Logically, a surplus of men should also decrease the demand for dowry (Kaur, 2004). Instead, the opposite has happened. According to local media, Haryanvi society is in denial about its habit of eliminating daughters and considers “buying brides” as the solution to the problem of a lack of women. They know they can go to these eastern regions and buy brides for themselves. Thus, the traditional ideas of hypergamy in finding grooms from betteroff families have, over the years, gotten stronger, and these groom families get as much dowry as they want. The value of local women in this way has decreased. As per Chowdhry (2005), it is ironic that while society allows women from different areas and castes to be brides in rural Haryana, it is quick to inflict serious violence on its youth who defy conventional marriage by marrying local women from other caste groups. Majburi, or the pressure or necessity most males felt to marry, was a reason to tolerate cross-regional marriage (Chaudhry, 2016).

22.2 WOMEN, CHILDREN, AND CASTE: SOCIAL JUSTICE CONCERNS IN RURAL INDIAN CROSS-REGIONAL FAMILIES Social justice indicates that everyone will have equal social opportunities to grow as individuals, regardless of their sexual orientation, ability status, gender, age, ethnicity, race, place of origin, or religion/spiritual background (Van Den Bos, 2003). Foundational pillars that support this definition include inclusivity, equal opportunity, equitable access, cooperation, and collaboration. Moreover, a democratic and equal society rests on these principles (Sue, 2001). People who live in an unjust society experience more physical and psychological distress as well as a higher risk of illness. Furthermore, the collective well-being of families and communities is intricately related to resource access and social justice matters (Kenny & Hage, 2009; Prilleltensky & Nelson, 2002). It indicates that no group in society deserves favorable treatment. In India, however, caste is a long-standing system of hierarchy built on social norms, political influence, economic control, and the cultural superiority of a specific class of individuals deemed to be at the top of the social ladder compared to others. In general, the dynamics of the caste system revolve around untouchability practices, social discrimination, excessive violence between social groups, a lack of possibilities or a blocking of opportunities, political oppression, and the suppression of rights. Caste attitudes may also be transmitted from generation to generation (Duriez & Soenens, 2009). Caste systems promote ethnocentrism within hierarchical levels that justify discrimination and prejudicial treatment against those considered by birth to be of lower status. Ethnocentrism is the evaluation of other cultures according to the values and standards of one’s own culture, with strong social dominance

Othered  339 tendencies and the belief that other groups are inferior (Hammond & Axelrod, 2006; Chatard & Selimbegovic, 2008). Discrimination refers to actions performed against a specific group or person, in contrast to prejudice, which deals with attitudes and behaviors. Practices that exclude members of one group from opportunities available to others are examples of discrimination, such as when a person does not receive a job due to gender or religion. India is a hugely diverse country. As a result, the couples involved in cross-regional marriages have little to nothing in common. These unions transcend borders related to geography, caste, language, and even religion. The challenges experienced by migrant women who do not share the host society’s culture are the subject of several articles. The cultural customs and social mores of each other’s locations are equally foreign to spouses. Women, in particular, struggle to connect with others in rural communities, and they must work very hard to deal with and try to overcome being marginalized and stigmatized in their society. The researcher found that these women are taken to belong to lower caste families back home, even if they do not necessarily belong to a disempowered group. In Haryana, it is traditional for women to hide their faces with a “ghunghat” or “veil” when they see older men. This long-standing practice runs deep in the state’s culture. Women from faraway regions do not habitually do this, as their respective regions are comparatively less patriarchal and do not impose the wearing of veils. A cross-regional woman in her 30s from Jharkhand told the field assistant, According to locals, all the faults lie within us, but they hardly care to know the actual background of us. I tell you the truth? I come from a reputed family back home and I hate this practice of veil[s] here on our faces, for what and for whom? I do not want to do it. I also hate how people speak to each other here. In Jharkhand, we have huge respect for our elders, we call bade papa or bade bhaiya, but here everyone calls each other by direct names or by tu and oye, which is not good. Those who think of improving this society should make changes to the local people here rather than scapegoating us for everything.

The likelihood of physical abuse and violence by her spouse is higher for the distant or crossregional bride than for the local bride due to the lack of her “natal support,” given the great distance between the two regions (Chaudhry, 2016). In one of the interviews, a young woman told the researcher, “My husband beats me every day after drinking. He loses both his temper and control and does not even spare the two kids. Sometimes I feel like [committing] suicide but then I think of the kids and they are my only hopes for a better future.” They are not permitted to travel back to their maternal homes because of occasional financial hardships or the worry that they may not return to their spouses. These women also lack local social support in Haryana (Singh et al., 2020). In an article about long-distance interprovincial weddings in China, Davin asserted that a migrant bride may enlist the support of other women in her home and family circle to make her feel less alone (2008, pp. 69, 75). The researcher noticed the same practice in rural Haryana, where many cross-regional women were the actual “middlewomen” for several other cross-regional marriages in the area, largely to have somebody with whom to share things – jokes, language, food, and festivals. A vast majority of these women are uneducated and even below the legal age for marriage. They talked about a wide range of psychological problems they were having, such as worry, pessimism, homesickness, adjustment problems, loneliness, anxiety, and unsettling nightmares. However, their subjective physical and psychological well-being also dropped in the new culture (Singh et al., 2020). They complained of fatigue, physical aches, sleeplessness, stress, and appetite loss.

340  Handbook of social justice in the Global South People from East or Northeast India may experience a particularly toxic kind of ethnoracism in North India because of their significantly different physical characteristics, food preferences, and linguistic patterns (Kukreja, 2018a; 2018b). Such discrimination includes a lack of empathy for outsiders, mistrust of those in the out-group, loss of objectivity, demeaning those in the out-group (insiders are frequently perceived as lacking in morals, decency, or intellect), disparaging behavior or outright physical violence (Kukreja, 2018a; 2018b; LeVine & Campbell, 1972) The whole Bihari ethnic group, including residents of the East Indian region of Bihar, is also not exempt. The term “Bihari” has negative implications in modern India. It can mean various things, including violence, disease, filth, poverty, and corruption (Kukreja, 2018a; 2018b). A woman from Bengal told the researcher, “Ham to Bengal se nahi hai, fir bhi kyu sabhi log Bihari Bihar bolta hai?” [I am from Bengal and not Bihar, but why does everyone keep referring to me as Bihari?]. The inclusion of “gendered colorisms,” or prejudice against women with darker skin tones held by people with a lighter complexion, may further marginalize brides (Ayyar & Khandare, 2013). Stereotypes are a central feature of the caste system in Hindu India (Sinha & Sinha, 1967). The number of cross-regional families is not going to come down any sooner unless there is a significant improvement in the phenomenon of low sex ratios across castes and classes. Previous research has raised several questions and concerns related to the well-being of children born into cross-regional families in rural Haryana. Kaur (2004) emphasized that in the upcoming years, their older children’s marriage prospects and patterns will serve as a true indicator of the acceptance of cross-region marriages in rural communities. It becomes important to examine whether women can truly modify marriage patterns in the next generation instead of merely appropriating and absorbing them in one generation to reinforce the patriarchal patterns of their husband’s culture. This question was also raised when Chowdhry (2005) doubted the social recognition and acceptance of such children due to the caste ambiguity of their identities and questioned whether they would be the true inheritors of their family wealth. Mukherjee (2013) mentions that the non-acceptance of such children is only socially acceptable and moral within the local communities and is not legitimate or legal, and Mukherjee (2015) finds that these children will experience problems obtaining local social recognition. Kaur (2004) made the point that potential disparities in the marriage patterns of boys and girls were further visible by the fact that boys may find it difficult to be married while girls may find it easier to get married locally owing to a shortage of marriageable girls. In texts on caste, Mishra (2013) showed special interest in the children’s caste status. However, she was unsure if the phenomenon of cross-region marriages would lead to the formation of a new sub-caste within the children’s caste or if their numbers would decline if the sex ratio gradually rose over time. Chaudhry (2016), too, wanted to know about the possible effects of cross-region inter-caste marriages on the caste status of such children. Dube (1986) discusses the “seed” and “field” metaphorical analogies to describe the biological reproduction process and a child’s identification for inclusion in a kinship group and mentioned that it is through the father that a child gets her social identity in a patrilineal structure. The research now available on cross-region marriages does not extensively address the marriage issue of adult children. Blanchet (2005) studied Bangladeshi brides in eastern Uttar Pradesh and found that the children of such marriages were married into similarly structured households, constituting a sub-caste. Further research by Blanchet (2005) revealed that the “poor rank” of the “bought woman” was passed down to their offspring. No specific study has been conducted to verify the marriage patterns and caste status in the lives of such children.

Othered  341 Kukreja and Kumar (2013) found that these children bear the stigma of their mothers being outsiders and belonging to “lower” caste groupings and are viewed as a “diluted” race rather than “pure” Haryanvi due to the mere fact that their mother belongs to a different caste and location. The prevailing belief among the landed-class locals is that the children would lack cultural training and social skills and would certainly not have a value system as they are a product of mixed culture (Mukherjee, 2013, in her study of rural Haryana). Mukherjee’s sample size is certainly very small, considering the kind of generalizations she has made. In interviews with villagers, their children, and cross-region brides, Kukreja (2018a; 2018b) found that children had to deal with “othering” on many levels in their social settings and public places like playgrounds and schools, starting in their early years. Lister describes othering as a “process of differentiation and demarcation, by which the line is drawn between ‘us’ and ‘them’ – between the stronger and weaker – and by which social distance is created and preserved” (2004, p. 101). Insofar as the group being othered is likewise described as “morally and/or intellectually inferior,” othering simultaneously creates difference and problematizes it (Schwalbe et al., 2000, p. 423). “The others” are eventually dehumanized and reduced to clichéd figures (Lister, 2004, p. 102). In the sense that marginalized individuals are limited to a small number of unfavorable traits, such processes entail reduction and essentialization. Lister also discovered that the most prevalent way the villagers expressed their prejudice against them was by calling them names and referring to them as the “unwanted weed,” like the lowly millet that is figuratively born in a field seeded with wheat (Kukreja, 2018a; 2018b). In the current state of research, the voices of these emerging adults sharing their lived experiences and speaking about their concerns are missing, as these marriages have been going on for two to three decades, and many of the children have now grown up and are of marriageable age, probably passing out of schools and colleges. To fill this gap, this research study was undertaken with the following research methodology.

22.3 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY The qualitative fieldwork was conducted in the southern district of Mahendragarh, in rural Haryana, for the following reasons: a. All districts had an increase in the sex ratio in 2011, except for Mahendragarh and Rewari, which saw the maximum drop in the child sex ratio from 818 to 775 (-43 points) and had the second lowest child sex ratio among districts in the entire country (see Table 22.1);

Table 22.1  Primary census abstract Ratio

1971

1981

1991

2001

2011

Sex ratio (number of females per 1000 males)

900

931

910

918

895

Child sex ratio (number of girls per 1000 boys in 0 to 6 age group)

-

-

-

818

775

Source: Directorate of Census Operations, Haryana. (2011). District census handbook: Village and town directory, Mahendragarh. Census of India, Haryana.

342  Handbook of social justice in the Global South b. The cattle-herding agrarian “Ahir” caste dominates the entire region, and there have been very few prior studies on cross-region marriages in the area. The “Jat” community dominates Haryana’s northern and central parts, and the literature on cross-region marriages has emphasized the “Jat” community; c. A total of 85 percent of Mahendragarh is rural, with 99.04 percent of its population being Hindus and 17 percent being scheduled castes, so it has a high proportion of lower castes as well (Directorate of Census Operations, Haryana, 2011). This made it easier to fill the research gap on the presence of cross-regional families in lower castes. d. It was easier for the researcher to access the field-level support available from the two local non-governmental organizations, the BMD Foundation and the Sarvodaya Foundation, and field assistants. The fieldwork was conducted in three administrative blocks of the district, namely Narnaul, Sihma, and Ateli Nangal. The field assistant and the researcher visited a total of 30 villages, and the elected village head, or sarpanch, remained the primary contact for entering the village. A list of all the sarpanches with basic information and contact addresses in the three mentioned blocks was acquired through the district-level development authorities, and it made it easier to reach out to those villages with more cross-regional marriages. A purposive snowball sampling technique was thus performed (Johnson, 2014). The researcher conducted biographical narrative interviews with 13 emerging adults (18–25-year-olds) separately and recorded them with Play audio, which is suitable for carrying out research. According to Denzin, biographies show “an exterior world of events and experiences as well as an inner world of thinking and experience” (1984, p. 66). The biographical endeavor seeks to identify the structural, cultural, economic, social, and historical elements that distort, shape, and otherwise modify problematic lived experiences. The act of telling a narrative has the potential to be powerful and transformative (Gouthro, 2014), allowing the participant to look back on their life with a critical eye. In the initial phase, a connection with the interview participants involved spending time with them and cracking a few jokes, and an interview date was finalized in the next few days. The interviews were spontaneous without interruption, but in one or two interviews, I had to constantly ask neutral questions like, “Tell me more about your friends,” to get their answers. Semi-structured one-on-one interviews were carried out with 37 women in cross-regional families and 30 sarpanches over a year, at different times, which were not strictly recorded; only field notes were taken as they were somewhat on the spot. The researcher decided to interview sarpanches about the status and experiences of adults from cross-regional families in their villages to address a gap in existing research on this population. The researcher’s identity as a young male doctoral student from the local area certainly helped him to get access to both cross-regional families and emerging adults through sarpanches (Komalasari et al., 2022). A humanistic and subjective sociological method influenced by symbolic interactionism was used to keenly understand human behavior and the meanings made by social actors in their social contexts (Blumer, 1986). The significance of “telling it like it is” is a distinctive practical method of symbolic interactionism, with a focus on the social actor. Interview data was recorded using a Play audio recorder and stored on a hard drive. The data was then analyzed manually over time by identifying emerging themes and making inductive inferences from them (Vaughn & Turner, 2016).

Othered  343

22.4 “OTHERED” ADULT CHILDREN: EMERGING THEMES FROM LIVED EXPERIENCES Name-calling and stereotyping: After school, I was returning home. Near the water tank, people are gathered usually playing cards and I remember, one of them that day called me “Bengali” (someone who belongs to Bengal) and asked me to not come through that way ever (an 18-year-old boy who cried during the interview and whose mother is from Bengal). My friends never call me by my name when we play. They always call me “ae Bihari” (someone who belongs to Bihar) or “bahar aali ko” (son of an outsider) and I feel very bad about it (18-year-old boy whose mother is from Bihar). During childhood, I remember, one day my mother was cooking rice and fish for our lunch. Suddenly a group of local villagers gathered at our home and enquired about what had been cooked. They did not allow us to eat fish and threw the pot away. They said “Why do you people keep eating keede make (insects) all the time? Do not you see our society is vegetarian?” Was it really the fault of my mother? She used to eat fish regularly back home and we like it too (a 19-year-old boy whose mother is from Tripura, a largely non-vegetarian state).

Partiality and othering: I have always been made to feel bad about my short height and dark skin complexion. I also do not have many friends due to this because everyone thinks that I belong to a lower caste and my Assamese mother too. I stay alone most of the time at home with my mother (18-year-old girl whose mother is from Assam). I remember from my early days, when I was 11–12 years old, that I used to play cricket outside with other boys who used to refer to me as “Chotu” (small boy). Every time someone needed water or some cricket pads, they would ask me to go and get it, just like a waiter would do in a restaurant. I always felt very embarrassed by these incidents, and one day told my mother about them. She did not let me go out to play after that (22-year-old whose mother is from Maharashtra).

Identity and meaning-making: I think I do not belong anywhere fully. I have only been once to my maternal uncle’s house and never went there again. I cannot speak my mother’s language fully well. I can speak Haryanvi but people find my pronunciation different than theirs. What can I say? (18-year-old girl whose mother is from Assam). On festivals like Diwali and Holi, maternal relatives visit everyone’s houses. No one comes to our home as our mother is from far away and her maternal family is very poor. They cannot visit us due to lack of time and resources. I wish I had my maternal relatives closer to our home like everyone has. I have missed [out] on so many things and experiences (18-year-old girl whose mother is from Bengal). My friends who visit my house often tell me that they do not understand what my mother speaks about. It is difficult to understand her accent. My accent is also like hers, but it is understandable to them (20-year-old girl who is about to be married locally and whose mother is from Bengal).

344  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Moral failure: We had three buffaloes and two cows when I was younger, but my mother could not take good care of them. She would not feed them on time, and due to this, one of the cows died, and my father beat up my mother. She did not know how to feed animals properly, and who would like her if she could not even feed animals in Haryana? Not just that, she did not maintain good relations without close relatives and I am sure that my mother did not also instill any moral principles in me and I always wished I had a mother from the locality (40-year-old whose mother is from Assam). Ma, please do not interfere with this interview and embarrass me again and again (a 19-year-old boy whose Tripuri mother kept walking past the interview room; he felt embarrassed by her presence and made sure that the researcher was not able to talk to her).

Neglect: I have never been interviewed before about my life experiences in a cross-regional family. No one asks me about how I feel about anything. I do not think our village head has also ever visited our house (19-year-old whose mother is from Tripura).

22.5 DISCUSSION Casteism involves beliefs in the inherent superiority of certain caste groups over others and associates dark skin with low caste or “untouchable” status and consequently with primitivism, uncleanliness, and ritual impurity, even though India is a predominantly tropical nation with a majority of its inhabitants having dark skin (Ayyar & Khandare, 2013). It is argued that caste is delusional, but casteism is not. For individuals and communities who practice the caste system along with strict adherence to purity, pollution, and purification rituals, it is delusional, while for communities at the receiving end of caste discrimination, it is life itself; it is their identity, category, and lived horrific experiences. Similarly, otherness sees the world as divided into mutually exclusive opposites (Dutta et al., 2022). It refers to the viewing or treating of a person or group as somehow alien or inferior and is the result of a discursive process by which a dominant in-group constructs one or many dominated out-groups by stigmatizing real or imagined differences presented as a negation of identity and thus a motive for potential discrimination (Staszak, 2009). For too long, casteism has promoted the cruel oppression and injustice against marginalized communities placed in the lower rungs of status, perpetually “othered” by society at large. However, the philosophy of social justice provides an ethical counterpoint, actively working to remedy these man-made disparities. Social justice aims to address inequities rooted in the othering and exclusion of marginalized groups. The problem of social justice is associated with social equality, and one wonders, what does social justice mean for these adult children? The answer is simple. Like other human beings, they need recognition as individuals with conscience and dignity and a claim to a fully adequate scheme of equal liberties valid for others. They need to claim the promise made to them by the Indian Constitution of no discrimination based on their caste, color, and gender. Social justice also means everyone is treated fairly. This study also revealed a concerning lack of attention and data regarding vulnerable crossregional families from the side of local self-governments (or gram panchayats). The researcher found that local leaders had essentially no information on the background and struggles faced

Othered  345 by these migrant women, despite gram panchayats being tasked as liaisons to connect rural citizens with resources and government aid programs. This oversight amounts to a neglect of social justice principles – failing to actively help the disadvantaged while allowing ignorance or bias regarding outsiders to perpetuate underlying problems. Ankit (2023) previously made a case for local self-governments to prevent violence and abuse against women in cross-regional marriages and to be the go-to institution for women in need of help. Women’s participation in local self-government activities will increase transparency and accountability in turn.

FUNDING This chapter results from the funding received from the Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Wroclaw, Poland, as Internal Grants (10/GW/WNS/2023).

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Othered  347 Kenny, M. E., & Hage, S. M. (2009). The next frontier: Prevention as an instrument of social justice. The Journal of Primary Prevention, 30(1), 1–10. https://doi​.org​/10​.1007​/s10935​- 008​- 0163-7 Ketkar, S. V. (1909). The history of caste in India; evidence of the laws of Manu on the social conditions in India during the third century A. D. (Vol. 1, pp. 1–216). Taylor & Carpenter. Komalasari, R., Nurhayati, N., & Mustafa, C. (2022). Insider/outsider Issues: Reflections on qualitative research. Qualitative Report, 27(3), 744–751. https://doi​.org​/10​.46743​/2160–3715/2022.5259 Kukreja, R. (2018a). An unwanted weed: Children of cross-region unions confront intergenerational stigma of caste, ethnicity and religion. Journal of Intercultural Studies, 39(4), 382–398. https://doi​ .org​/10​.1080​/07256868​.2018​.1484345 Kukreja, R. (2018b). Caste and cross-region marriages in Haryana, India: Experience of Dalit crossregion brides in Jat households. Modern Asian Studies, 52(2), 492–531. https://doi​.org​/10​.1017​/ S0026749X16000391 Kukreja, R., & Kumar, P. (2013). Tied in a knot: Cross-region marriages in Haryana and Rajasthan: Implications for gender rights and gender relations. Tamarind Tree Films. Larsen, M., & Kaur, R. (2013). Signs of change? Sex ratio imbalance and shifting social practices in Northern India. Economic and Political Weekly, 48(35), 45–52. https://www​.jstor​.org​/stable​ /23528754 LeVine, R. A., & Campbell, D. T. (1972). Ethnocentrism: Theories of conflict, ethnic attitudes, and group behavior. John Wiley & Sons. Lister, R. (2004). Poverty. Polity Press. Ministry of Finance, Government of India. (2018). Economic survey 2017–2018. Mishra, P. (2013). Sex ratios, cross-region marriages and the challenge to caste endogamy in Haryana. Economic and Political Weekly, 48(35), 70–78. https://www​.jstor​.org​/stable​/23528757 Mishra, P., & Kaur, R. (2021). Gender imbalance, marriage squeeze and multiple biological clocks: Exploring challenges to the intergenerational contract in North India. Anthropology & Aging, 42(1), 97–111. https://doi​.org​/10​.5195​/aa​.2021​.251 Mukherjee, S. (2013). Skewed sex ratio and migrant brides in Haryana: Reflections from the field. Social Change, 43(1), 37–52. https://doi​.org​/10​.1177​/0049085713475725 Mukherjee, S. (2015). Structural basis of gender violence in cross-regional marriages: Tale from Haryana, India. Contemporary Perspectives in Family Research, 9, 73–97. https://doi​.org​/10​.1108​ /S1530–353520150000009004 Prilleltensky, I., & Nelson, G. (2002). Doing psychology critically: Making a difference in diverse settings. Palgrave Macmillan. Rigg, J. (2007). An everyday geography of the Global South. Routledge. Rukmini, S. (2014, November 13). Just 5% of Indian marriages are inter-caste: Survey. The Hindu.​http:/​ /www​.thehindu​.com​/data​/just​-5​-per​-cent​-ofindian​-marriages​-are​-intercaste​/artic​le6591502​.ece. Schwalbe, M., Holden, D., Schrock, D., Godwin, S., Thompson, S., & Wolkomir, M. (2000). Generic processes in the reproduction of inequality: An interactionist analysis. Social Forces, 79(2), 419–452. https://doi​.org​/10​.1093​/sf​/79​.2​.419 Singh, K., Dangi, S., & Bandyopadhyay, S. (2020). Well-being of married migrant and non-migrant women of rural Haryana. Journal of the Indian Academy of Applied Psychology, 46(1), 80–91. https://jiaap​.in​/well​-being​-of​-married​-migrant​-and​-non​-migrant​-women​-of​-rural​-haryana/ Sinha, G. S., & Sinha, R. C. (1967). Exploration in caste stereotypes. Social Forces, 46(1), 42–47. https://doi​.org​/10​.2307​/2575319 Sparke, M. (2007). Everywhere but always somewhere: Critical geographies of the Global South. The Global South, 1(1), 117–126. https://www​.jstor​.org​/stable​/40339236 Staszak, J. (2009). Other/otherness. In R. Kitchin and N. Thrift (Eds.), International encyclopaedia of human geography (Vol. 8, pp. 43–47).Elsevier. Sue, D. W. (2001). Multidimensional facets of cultural competence. The Counseling Psychologist, 29(6), 790–821. https://doi​.org​/10​.1177​/0011000001296002 Van den Bos, K. (2003). On the subjective quality of social justice: The role of affect as information in the psychology of justice judgments. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 85(3), 482. https://doi​.org​/10​.1037​/0022​-3514​.85​.3​.482

348  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Vaughn, P., & Turner, C. (2016). Decoding via coding: Analyzing qualitative text data through thematic coding and survey methodologies. Journal of Library Administration, 56(1), 41–51. https://doi​.org​ /10​.1080​/01930826​.2015​.1105035 Zhang, J. (2014). The gender ratio of Chinese suicide rates: An explanation in Confucianism. Sex Roles, 70(3–4), 146–154. https://doi​.org​/10​.1007​/s11199​- 013​- 0333-9 Zhang, Y., Zou, B., Zhang, H., & Zhang, J. (2022). Empirical research on male preference in China: A result of gender imbalance in the seventh population census. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 19(11), 6482. https://doi​.org​/10​.3390​/ijerph19116482

23. From #PayUp to #PayYourWorkers Crimes of fashion in response to COVID-19, and the struggle for social justice in clothing commodity chains Jason Rhodes and Shahidur Rahman

23.1 INTRODUCTION The global fashion industry has earned its reputation as a chronic abuser of human rights. Gender-based violence, wages that produce poverty and hunger rather than economic opportunity, unsafe working conditions, and violent repression of worker efforts to organize for the purpose of improving conditions, have all been overwhelmingly documented as systemic, and not the result of occasional lapses by a few bad actors (Asia Floor Wage Alliance et al., 2018; Oxfam Australia, 2019; Worker Rights Consortium, 2021). Perhaps just as depressing as the details of abuse regularly reported at the production end of the clothing commodity chain has been the prevailing sense that garment workers have little leverage in a hyper-mobile industry that relentlessly scours the globe for the cheapest, most vulnerable workforces, and regimes of environmental regulation that range from lackadaisical to nonexistent. Indeed, the clothing commodity chain seems to have been designed expressly for the purpose of allowing those profiting most from a global industry with annual revenues exceeding $1.5 trillion to endlessly avoid responsibility for the human rights abuses that have tragically become synonymous with the process of producing clothing for global markets. This chapter tells the remarkable story of an unlikely, global coalition of garment workers, factory owners, researchers, and activists who challenged that sense of powerlessness in the face of industry power and abusive conditions with an historic organizing campaign, demonstrating that those seeking social justice in an industry rooted in exploitation do indeed have leverage, which they discovered in an emergency effort to defend the rights of workers and factory owners during the crisis of the COVID-19 pandemic. The success of what became the #PayUp campaign is historic in terms of its own success but is also notable for the lessons it offers to other global campaigns to improve workers’ rights along global commodity chains.

23.2 COVID-19: CRISIS AND RESPONSE The international brands and buyers that sit atop global fashion’s clothing commodity chain responded to the economic crisis and disruption of ordinary business resulting from COVID19 by canceling an estimated $40 billion-worth of garment orders worldwide, resulting in the abrupt firing or furloughing of millions of garment workers without pay, and threatening their employers with bankruptcy. The brands, which do not own but merely contract with the factories that supply their clothes, offered up the dubious legal justification of force majeure by claiming that the pandemic represented an “act of God” akin to a natural disaster, and thus 350

From #PayUp to #PayYourWorkers  351 representing an unforeseen event of such significance as to relieve them of any contractual obligation to pay for the billions of dollars’ worth of clothing that they had ordered, or the millions of hours of labor that had already gone into producing them. Legal and ethical arguments aside, the brands’ ability to announce their own rules and justifications as they pushed the costs of the crisis onto the most vulnerable stakeholders in the supply chain – factory owners squeezed by low prices and thin margins and garment workers, a significant number of whom tragically suffer malnourishment even in times of employment (Oxfam Australia, 2019) – brought into sharp relief the inequitable power relations that define the industry. Known as monopsony in economic terms, the global fashion industry is a classic example of buyer dominance, as thousands of anonymous global factories compete for the orders of a comparatively small number of dominant brands, which set price and deadline terms that ensure a race to the bottom in terms of wages, working conditions, and profit margins for factories, as well as environmental protections (Anner, 2020; Kumar, 2020). The massive cancellation of orders in response to COVID-19 also laid bare for all to see the vast chasm that exists between the heartening statements of shared responsibility and concern for the well-being of workers and supply-chain partners churned out by the corporate responsibility departments of the major fashion brands and the on-the-ground impact of corporate practice. The order cancellations thus threatened both workers and suppliers with disaster, but also set in motion an unlikely coalition of workers, factory owners, researchers, non-profit organizations, and activists that coalesced into the #PayUp campaign. This international effort not only achieved stunning success on its own terms – compelling major brands to reverse course and honor their commitments by paying for the clothes that they had ordered – but also built on the successes of that campaign and the lessons learned about how to organize for change in the garment sector to push forward a variety of initiatives. These initiatives seek to replace voluntary pledges of “corporate social responsibility” with legally binding agreements. These agreements compel brands to take responsibility for human rights conditions in their supply chains. This chapter will provide an overview of the #PayUp campaign and the strategies it employed to mobilize public opinion and compel brands to meet the bare minimum of social responsibility by paying for their orders. It will also examine how the same strategies developed by the #PayUp coalition are now being deployed in various campaigns aimed at replacing voluntary pledges of corporate responsibility with legally binding agreements. These agreements intended to be building blocks toward the structural transformation of the industry in the direction of living wages for workers and the guaranteed right to organize.

23.3 “HOW MERCILESS! IS THIS THE WORLD WHERE WE TALK SO BIG ABOUT RESPONSIBILITY, PURCHASING PRACTICES, AND SUSTAINABILITY?” In March 2020, as the world closed its doors in response to the rapid spread of COVID-19, headlines announcing the abrupt cancellation of millions of dollars’-worth of clothing orders by major brands began appearing in the fashion trade press. Journalist and ethical fashion advocate Elizabeth Cline, who was at the forefront of the international response to the wave of cancellations that became the #PayUp campaign, recalls that as those articles first appeared, “it was really only people who work in labor rights, or have familiarity with how clothing commodity chains work, who would have understood what those articles really meant, because

352  Handbook of social justice in the Global South you have to understand that cancellation really means non-payment for work that’s already been done, in most instances, because of the way that the fashion industry works” (E. Cline, personal communication, December 14, 2022). Specifically, in a crucial example of the buyer dominance achieved by the brands as a result of their monopsony control of the supply chain, buyers force suppliers, i.e., clothing factories, to assume all of the upfront costs associated with even the largest of orders (Anner & Worker Rights Consortium, 2020), a feature of the clothing commodity chain that not only protects buyers from risk, while exposing suppliers, but which gives buyers an enormous amount of arbitrary control over the production process, including the ability to make costly demands for design changes even after production has begun (Anner, 2020), with the threat of non-payment often confronting suppliers with a stark choice between compliance and ruin. In the wake of the global closures following the outbreak of COVID-19, the “cancellations” being announced in the trade press meant infinitely more than a decision to hold off on adding to inventory for the time being. They amounted to announcements by brands that they were walking away from obligations to pay for materials that factory owners had already purchased, and labor that had already been performed, on the basis of orders that they had placed. In a real-time demonstration of the realities of the distribution of risks and rewards along the clothing commodity chain, the brands’ announcement of cancellations not only reflected their power to dictate terms to suppliers, but to chart a course of action in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic that minimized their economic losses, while imposing immediate threats of bankruptcy and hunger on the factory owners and workers who, on the corporate responsibility pages of their websites, are referred to as “partners.” Given the power dynamics of the clothing commodity chain, suppliers are typically extremely reticent to make any public criticism of brands, for fear of risking future orders. However, this changed as order cancellations threatened factories’ survival, and factory owners began speaking publicly about what the word “cancellation” meant for them and their workers. “I’m not sure I will survive,” said Mustafiz Uddin, the founder of Denim Export Ltd., based in Dhaka, Bangladesh, which produces jeans for rapper Sean Combs’ Sean Jeans label and other well-known brands (Benson, 2020; Cline, 2020). Uddin, who pledged to continue to pay his workers for as long as he was able, despite the halt of production, personified the reality hiding behind the euphemism “cancellation,” as brands owed him millions of dollars in material costs alone incurred to fill their orders. As Uddin scrambled to keep his business afloat and to continue paying his workers, he was stunned to discover just how precarious his legal position was vis-à-vis his brand partners. While brands were cavalier in announcing their right to cancel orders, regardless of how much money Uddin had already spent to fulfill them – “You will note that we are able to cancel any order at any stage,” read one of many notifications of cancellation he received (Cline, 2020) – Uddin discovered that he was contractually forbidden to sell the millions of dollars’ worth of fabric he had purchased to fulfill now-canceled orders without the written permission of the very brands that had walked away from their obligation to pay for these materials. He spoke for factory owners across the clothing commodity chain as he expressed his incredulity and frustration at the impossibility of the situation created by brands announcing their right, and demonstrating their willingness, to cancel orders “at any stage.” I have been giving my life to save my factory from being perished [over the] last four months, and I have left no stone unturned in that effort. I was advised to explore the possibility of selling the

From #PayUp to #PayYourWorkers  353 cancelled/stocked items which were made for some of my buyers. I reached out to a few buyers and then discovered another harsh reality. I need to take a “no objection clearance” from the buyer, who cancelled the goods unethically, to be able to sell it to another buyer, and I would [need to] get the permission if I can replace the buttons, rivets, zippers, etc. Honestly speaking, if I remove and replace those then the products will not be in a proper shape to sell to a consumer. My question to this very civilized world – I won’t be paid for my goods… nor will they allow me to sell those off to third parties without altering them to a non-sellable shape. Where will we go? There is no law to protect me from unethical cancellations and non-payments, and there are laws to prevent me accessing alternate ways to live! How merciless! Is this the world where we talk so big and loud about responsibility, purchasing practices and sustainability? (Cline, 2020)

While owners like Uddin struggled with the threat of bankruptcy, garment workers, whose pay is insufficient to meet basic needs even in times of industry “prosperity,” were confronted with the urgent crisis of lost income, and the immediate loss of access to food and shelter. In June 2020, garment worker Sampa Akter, who’d worked over 12 hours a day for a decade sewing jeans in Dhaka, Bangladesh’s capital city, spoke to NPR about the devastating effects of the pandemic – and the massive order cancellations that accompanied it – on herself and her fellow workers. My factory was shut for six weeks. I fell behind on rent. I could not pay my brother’s medical bills. I’m very scared and vulnerable. It’s not only me. All my coworkers are in the same position. (Frayer, 2020)

Indeed, within just weeks of the March 2020 global shutdown, over one million Bangladeshi garment workers, about a quarter of the nation’s total, had been either fired or laid off, and the effects rippled far beyond the workers and their immediate families. Taslima Akhter, president of the labor-rights advocacy organization Bangladesh Garment Workers Solidarity, spoke of the gravity of the hardships faced by workers in the face of layoffs and job loss following the shutdowns. The COVID pandemic changed all of our lives. People faced the most critical conditions. Bangladeshi garment workers also faced their own crisis. There was a need for social distance, but that itself was a luxury few could afford. Government officials, students, and other professionals took vacations, but garment workers were forced to go to the factories. They faced lay-offs, termination, and cut-off wages, and didn’t have time to think about their health or safety. (T. Akhter, unpublished interview, April 9, 2022)

Akhter spoke of the effects of the crisis that very few Western clothing consumers would be able to relate to as she described the desperation of workers whose loss of income was immediately followed by a loss of access to food, which in some cases led to the break-up of families. “They faced a whole host of problems. The children were often married off, as things got too expensive, or they could not go to school” (T. Akhter, unpublished interview, April 9, 2022).

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23.4 “THIS IS A DISASTER THAT NEITHER COMMERCE NOR HUMANITY CAN AFFORD” It was precisely this sort of desperation – born of lost access to food, shelter, medicine, and the sudden inability to support elderly parents and children – to which Rubana Huq, president of the Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BGMEA), referred in an impassioned, videotaped plea to the fashion brands following their abrupt cancellation of orders in March 2020. Released via YouTube, Huq’s video message stressed the individual crisis and social chaos threatened by the cancellations, and diplomatically, though forcefully, underscored the gulf between the brands’ rhetoric regarding “partnership” and “social responsibility” and their attempt to push the costs of the pandemic onto suppliers and workers by abruptly canceling billions of dollars’ worth of orders, without regard for supplies already purchased, or labor already done. “Most of all,” said Huq, as she pled with brands to honor their commitments, “we will have 4.1 million workers literally going hungry if we don’t all step up to our commitment to the welfare of the workers” (Brand BGMEA, 2020). Referring to the contrite professions of concern for garment worker safety and welfare in the aftermath of the 2013 Rana Plaza building collapse, which killed over 1,130 garment workers, she reminded the brands that I think this is the one call that we all promised to take a long time ago, and I think… one thing was very, very clear, and that is our foremost responsibility was towards the workers… I’m not going to question you on your decisions. All I’m going to do is… appeal to your good senses so that you kindly take all of your current goods which are under production and are ready. Please take them under normal payment terms… Otherwise, if we do not have that support for the next three months, we will be having 4.1 million workers literally out on the streets, representing a social chaos we cannot afford. Neither do you want your reputation to be at stake, nor do we want to be facing such anarchy at our end… Please do not give up on us. Please do not cancel any ready goods… We’ve been partners for so long. It should not matter much. It is not a huge amount of money for you… Therefore I appeal to your good senses not to let us down at this point in time. Our workers’ lives will be at stake. Your reputation and credibility will be at stake, and we will be under full fire. Kindly do not let go of our hands. This is a disaster that neither commerce nor humanity can afford… We must graduate to the next level of progress. (Brand BGMEA, 2020)

Huq’s leadership proved crucial to the launch of what became the #PayUp campaign. Huq explained the unprecedented magnitude of the crisis: We were left with cancelled orders, and overdue payments, and we didn’t know how to handle it anymore. Bangladesh literally faced $3.18 billion worth of cancellations, outright. And I was the BGMEA president then, and I didn’t know what to do. (Huq, personal communication, November 11, 2022)

In fact, Huq took prompt action, first with the YouTube video, and then by using her position as BGMEA president to convince garment factory owners to do something almost unheard of in the entire history of the industry: threaten future relationships with the brands on whose orders their entire livelihoods depend by going public with the details of the cancellations. This information would provide the international coalition of activists and non-profit organizations that would become the #PayUp coalition the power to name names and apply effective pressure on the brands, with results that would not just pay immediate dividends, but offer a

From #PayUp to #PayYourWorkers  355 tactical roadmap to post-COVID-19 campaigns seeking to achieve structural change in the industry with regard to wages, working conditions, and environmental protections. Armed with a survey prepared by Mark Anner, Director of the Center for Global Workers’ Rights at Pennsylvania State University, and Scott Nova of the Worker Rights Consortium (WRC), Huq created an information portal to which BGMEA members – the garment factory owners whose product made Bangladesh the second-largest exporter of clothing on the planet – could upload their responses to the survey, which was designed to get precise, up-tothe-minute data on the details of the cancellation. Journalist Elizabeth Cline, now Director of Advocacy and Policy at the ethical fashion advocacy organization Remake, which played a central role in organizing the #PayUp campaign, recalls Rubana Huq’s crucial role in securing the factory owners’ participation in the survey. “Rubana [Huq] was the one that pretty much compelled the Bangladeshi factory owners to take Mark Anner and Scott Nova’s survey, and she was pretty much like, ‘If you don’t take this survey, I can’t help you. You’re going to go out of business. You’re going to go bankrupt. You’re going to have to lay off everybody in your factory’” (Cline, personal communication, December 14, 2022). Huq’s persuasion was effective enough to result in 316 out of Bangladesh’s approximately 2,000 clothing suppliers participating in the online survey over just a four-day period, from March 21 to 25, 2020, a sample size large enough to allow researcher Mark Anner to report results for the entire Bangladeshi garment sector with a 95 percent confidence rate (Anner & Worker Rights Consortium, 2020). That data became the backbone of Anner’s bombshell report, released in partnership with the WRC, Abandoned? The impact of COVID-19 on workers and businesses at the bottom of global garment supply chains (Anner & Worker Rights Consortium, 2020). Written in association with the WRC and released within just days of the closing of the four-day data collection period, Anner recalls the report as “the fastest research I’ve done in my life, with big help from the WRC in terms of distribution. And the New York Times picked it up, and the rest was kind of history, and the #PayUp movement came about, and all the rest” (Anner, personal communication, November 16, 2022). The research results were stunning. The study found that 46 percent of all Bangladeshi garment suppliers reported having “a lot” to “most” of their in-process or already completed production canceled, while an additional 6 percent reported that all of these orders had been canceled. Despite contractual obligations, the overwhelming majority of buyers that canceled orders that were already completed or in process refused to pay, with 72 percent refusing to pay for fabric, and over 90 percent refusing to pay for production costs. As a result of these cancellations and non-payments, fully 58 percent of factory owners reported that they had been forced to shut down most or all of their operations. Survey respondents reported that over 98 percent of buyers refused to contribute to the cost of paying the partial salary of furloughed workers, for which employers are legally responsible, and that nearly three-quarters of furloughed workers were sent home without pay, while over 80 percent of fired, or dismissed, workers were sent home without the severance pay to which they were legally entitled (Anner & Worker Rights Consortium, 2020). It was based on this research that the nearly $3.2 billion in cancellations in Bangladesh, which produces 8 percent of all ready-made garments (RMG) worldwide, could be extrapolated to arrive at a $40 billion estimate of global cancellations of fashion orders taking place as the world came to a halt in March 2020. While the data embodied in the body of the report made clear the devastating extent and impact of the cancellations, it was the appendix that set activists in motion and laid the basis

356  Handbook of social justice in the Global South for the #PayUp campaign. Anner explains, “I did my survey questions in a traditional survey approach, and I was looking at the aggregate – what percentage of orders were canceled without paying? Well, 92 percent – that was a good finding. However, in social media, and with activists, what really has an impact? They want names. Did Primark cancel? Did H&M cancel? And if so, by how much? And that’s what the portal gave us. The portal became the appendix, and it was probably the most important appendix I ever wrote, but it was an add-on, and I put a graph on it, and the #PayUp people took a snapshot of it and began circulating it” (Anner, personal communication, November 16, 2022) (see Figure 23.1).​ Along with Rubana Huq’s impassioned video plea, Mark Anner and the WRC launched a letter-writing campaign to brands, urging them to commit to honoring their obligations and pay for their orders. These efforts bore some immediate fruit, as indicated by the brands

Source: Anner & Worker Rights Consortium, 2020.

Figure 23.1  Major buyers of Bangladesh-made apparel: current position on payment for orders in production or completed

From #PayUp to #PayYourWorkers  357 listed above who immediately committed to reverse cancellations and pay for orders in full. However, the majority of brands had made no such commitment at the time of the report’s release, and these became the target of an international coalition of organizations and activists that, armed with precise data, the ability to name names, and a simple demand to right an obvious wrong – pay what you owe – would compel some of the largest brands on the planet to change course and transfer billions of dollars to those occupying the lowest rungs on the global garment supply chain – factory owners and workers. U.S.-based Remake, a non-profit ethical fashion advocacy group, launched the change​. o​rg #PayUp petition within days of releasing the Mark Anner/WRC report, demanding that brands commit publicly to paying for what they’d ordered. Working alongside Remake were a growing number of labor and human rights organizations from around the world, including Awaj Foundation, Stand Up Lanka, Clean Clothes Campaign, Labor Behind the Label, Union for Concerned Researchers in Fashion, and Business and Human Rights Resource Centre. The #PayUp campaign attracted unlikely allies, bringing together labor activists, factory owners, researchers, and non-governmental organization representatives. Representatives of this diverse group met weekly, and worked together to convey to the public a straightforward demand – #PayUp! – and to distill and update the findings of the Anner/WRC research to make very clear which brands were on the good side of the ledger, and which had walked away from their obligations, threatening workers with starvation and factory owners with bankruptcy. The campaign took off. By July, the online #PayUp petition had garnered over 250,000 signatures worldwide, and daily views of Remake’s social media posts about the devastating impact of order cancellations reached nearly 50,000 (Snowden & Remake, 2022). Sarah Newell of the US-based Worker-Driven Social Responsibility Network recalls, “It was really incredible to see how the public responded because we’ve been doing this work for a long time. Sometimes you throw things out to consumers and expect a big response, but it just doesn’t catch. You know, we’re all overloaded with information. But it was incredible to see that people really understood the devastation caused by the industry, and the framing of #PayUp, I think, was really moving to people because there’s this idea that, of course, brands are responsible for the people who make their clothes. I think this feels instinctually right to people” (Newell, personal communication, December 20, 2022). Tens of thousands of people tweeting to brands to take responsibility for the workers in their supply chains had an immediate and significant impact, as the campaign was referenced in over 800 news stories in 2020. Brands were forced to respond directly to the campaign, with both Levis and Gap agreeing to #PayUp, joining major brands and retailers such as H&M and Target in committing publicly to reverse cancellations and pay in full for the clothes they had ordered. Other brands took longer to pay, but within two years of the campaign’s launch, pressure on the brands had led to an estimated $22 billion in payments for orders that had been canceled in response to the pandemic, payments that allowed factory owners around the world to avert bankruptcy and maintain obligations to workers. On a global scale, the number of garment worker jobs saved by the $22 billion recovered by the #PayUp campaign is estimated in the millions, while it’s estimated that #PayUp payments resulted in hundreds of millions of dollars of wages that otherwise would not have been paid (Snowden & Remake, 2022). For an industry that has historically seemed impervious to demands for change, #PayUp’s success in not only compelling some of the world’s largest brands to commit publicly to changing their behavior, but to back up those commitments with the gargantuan sum of

358  Handbook of social justice in the Global South $22 billion is nothing short of historic. Despite this, the victory was hardly a total one. While certainly cause for celebration, $22 billion is just over half of the estimated $40 billion in total cancellations. And in some cases, such as with major brands Primark and C&A, the “pay up” occurred late, after significant harm to factory owners and workers had already been done (Snowden & Remake, 2022). Nonetheless, #PayUp can proudly point to what amounted to a stunning victory over the brands, with results measured in millions of workers’ jobs saved, hundreds of millions of dollars in lost wages restored, and an implicit, public acknowledgment of wrongdoing by the brands expressed emphatically in the $22 billion in recovered payments wrought by the pressure applied by the #PayUp coalition.

23.5 LESSONS LEARNED AND A PATH FORWARD: FROM #PAYUP TO #PAYYOURWORKERS The international coalition of activists that had coalesced around the #PayUp campaign emerged from their victory with lessons learned about effectively pressuring the big brands that call the shots in the global clothing commodity chain and a shared commitment to apply these lessons to a new campaign against the wage theft that runs rampant in the industry. This new campaign aims to bring urgently needed relief to workers and to lay the foundation of a new global regulatory regime in which brands are held legally responsible for the wages, working conditions, and human rights of the workers in their commodity chains. This theft typically takes the form of non-payment of legally mandated severance pay – in fact, deferred wages – owed to workers when they are fired or when factories shut down. This problem, long known to labor activists and industry observers, became recognized as a global human rights emergency over the course of the #PayUp campaign, as it became clear that the crisis of order cancellations was being compounded by factory owners not meeting their obligations to workers on legally required payments as they reduced the size of their workforces or shut down completely in the face of the pandemic-induced crisis. Indeed, one of the key lessons of the #PayUp campaign – not for longtime labor activists, but for those who were introduced to the struggle for garment worker justice through participation in the campaign – was that human rights abuses on the production end of the global fashion commodity chain are systemic, and that the brands are responsible for them. “#PayUp was pivotal and impactful in a number of ways,” said Elizabeth Cline, in reference to the lessons taught to a global audience about the realities of the global fashion industry. “First of all, it was unusual in that it shined a spotlight on aspects of the industry that we all know are there but are normally hidden. It revealed in stark detail the incredible power imbalance between the fashion brands and their suppliers. It revealed all of these corrupt, deeply unethical commercial practices that start at the top of the supply chain and flow down. So, you know, any kind of illusion that the industry wasn’t all that broken was really swept away during the pandemic, and what it did was lay the foundation for a really serious reform movement” (Cline, personal communication, December 14, 2022). Another crucial lesson from the #PayUp campaign was the power of the precise data that allowed activists to shine a light on abuses and establish brand culpability by naming names. The Mark Anner/WRC report Abandoned? The impact of COVID-19 on workers and businesses at the bottom of global garment supply chains, which provided #PayUp with the data necessary to wage an effective, global campaign that connected brands by name to the crisis

From #PayUp to #PayYourWorkers  359 of their own making, was followed by the WRC’s report, Fired then robbed: Fashion brands’ complicity in wage theft during COVID-19, which investigated worker complaints at 31 garment factories in nine countries and determined that over 37,000 workers at these factories had been denied nearly $40 million in severance pay – i.e., deferred wages – to which they were legally entitled (Worker Rights Consortium, 2021). This amounted to over $1,000 per person in denied severance pay, or about five months’ pay for the average worker. The report again connected this abuse to some of the biggest brands on the planet, as these nine factories produced clothing for such household names as Adidas, Amazon, H&M, Inditex (which owns Zara and other brands), Next, Nike, Walmart, and Target, and demonstrated that on the basis of conservative assumptions, it was likely that wage theft during COVID-19, resulting from employers’ refusal to pay legally-required severance, amounted to over $500 million (Worker Rights Consortium, 2021). Perhaps the most crucial lesson of #PayUp, though, is that it is the brands that call the shots on the clothing commodity chain, and thus any path to eradicating the poverty, hunger, wage theft, and violence that have been documented as endemic at the production end of the global fashion industry can only be achieved if the brands are made legally responsible for human rights throughout the commodity chains which they so clearly control. As Olivia Windham Stewart, Deputy Director of the Responsible Contracting Project, explains, one of the chief functions of the clothing supply chains is that it facilitates denial of responsibility: “The genius of the supply chain is that you can do absolutely whatever you want and get away with it because everything’s ‘over there’” (Windham Stewart, personal communication, November 7, 2022). Making brands legally responsible for human rights abuses that, tragically, are an institutionalized and routine feature of the process of clothing production is crucial because “it stops everything from being ‘over there’ and makes it firmly your problem. And what we urgently need is for these abuses to be made, firmly, buyer/retailer problems” (Windham Stewart, personal communication, November 7, 2022). The discussion of where leverage might be found to force improvements in the industry is an important point of debate in the literature concerning the governance of global clothing commodity chains. It is widely acknowledged that the lack of worker power in the industry has historically stemmed from low barriers to entry for clothing producers – it costs so little to establish a clothing factory in comparison to, say, an auto plant, that factory owners – or the brands and buyers that buy their clothes – facing labor unrest find it easier to pick up and leave, and find a new supply of vulnerable workers willing to accept “sweatshop conditions” in exchange for employment (Kumar, 2020). Scholars such as Gary Gereffi et al. (2005, 2010) and Ashok Kumar (2020) have argued that precisely this hyper-competition among producers engendered consolidation at the factory level, resulting in megaproducers such as Taiwanbased Yue-Yuen Holdings Limited, which produces 300 million shoes per year, accounting for fully 20 percent of all global production. Such megafirms, scholars argue, effectively reduce the monopsony power of brands and buyers, and most importantly, represent such massive investments in productive capacity that, unlike the historic sweatshop, are “too big to move.” Just like at a capital-intensive auto plant, when managers at a megaproducer like Yue-Yuen Holdings face worker unrest, they can’t abandon their massive investments in plant and equipment in search of more tractable labor, but must sit down and bargain with workers at the existing point of production. Such scholars point to the massive labor unrest in China stretching back over a decade, as well as the substantial wage gains that have accompanied

360  Handbook of social justice in the Global South it – China’s workers have seen real annual median wage increases of 17 percent since 2009, resulting in a quintupling of earnings since 2000 (Kumar, 2020, p. 94). Penn State’s Mark Anner, the author of the Abandoned? report so critical to the #PayUp campaign, wasn’t entirely convinced by such arguments, however. According to Anner, “It’s absolutely true that suppliers are getting larger and increasing their capabilities, but there are two things that are crucial to keep in mind: first, the buyers were also getting larger and increasing their power over the same time period, and second, the increased scope of activities performed by the factories – for example, sourcing fabric, which they hadn’t done before – doesn’t represent them wrestling away value-added activity from the buyers. Instead, it’s more work – and more risk – being dumped on them. It’s a double squeeze – buyers squeeze suppliers, suppliers squeeze workers” (Anner, personal communication, November 16, 2022). Anner backed this up with important research, published in a 2020 article titled, “Squeezing workers rights in global supply chains: Purchasing practices in the Bangladesh garment export sector in comparative perspective” (Anner, 2020). The article directly challenges the arguments of scholars such as Gereffi and Kumar by documenting both a price squeeze – declining real prices paid by buyers to suppliers for clothes – and a sourcing squeeze – shortened lead times and increased production-related demands placed on factories – over the time period in question, and documenting how this squeeze on suppliers translates directly to increased violations of labor rights (Anner, 2020). Of course, the two interpretations are not mutually exclusive. Like the modern university, in which part-time faculty teach for poverty wages alongside their privileged, tenured colleagues, the clothing commodity chain features both megaproducers like Yue-Yuen Holdings, where workers not only have bargaining power but have exercised it, and fly-by-night operations, to which larger factories will outsource orders when demand exceeds capacity, and where labor violations are rampant (Bedat, 2021, pp. 107–108). In the face of the collapse of global consumer demand following the pandemic-induced shutdown of retail outlets in the spring of 2020, the big brands and buyers did not pause to consider these scholarly debates as they announced their mass cancellations of orders, demonstrating that the real threat of monopsony in the fashion industry is the power that it confers on those who wield it to impose costs and risks on those occupying the most vulnerable positions in the clothing commodity chain, while avoiding all responsibility for the consequences of their actions. Brand liability is crucial to any meaningful effort for structural reform in the industry because, quite simply, brands don’t pay enough for the clothes they purchase to make living wages possible, and their demands regarding turnaround time and abrupt changes to order specifications guarantee a brutal pace of work that makes worker injury, harassment, and abuse a matter of routine (Anner, 2020). This is what Windham Stewart is referring to when she states, “If I was going to ask for one specific thing, I would ask for brands to treat their suppliers fairly. That’s it. Because if they don’t do that, you can’t do anything else” (Windham Stewart, personal communication, November 7, 2022). Indeed, without brand liability, the chief feature of clothing commodity chains is evasion of responsibility with regard to human rights and environmental protections. With regard to wage theft, even with national laws in place mandating severance pay, there is a built-in dodge available to every actor who might be held responsible. Brands insist that they cannot be held legally responsible for conditions in factories they don’t own, factory owners credibly claim that the prices offered and demands made by brands make the brutal conditions that currently define the industry inevitable, and

From #PayUp to #PayYourWorkers  361 government officials, who might be expected to enforce local law, fret that doing so will result in loss of international investment and replace poverty jobs with unemployment. For longtime labor activists and garment factory owners, the need to make brands legally liable for enforcing any meaningful reform in the industry is hardly a novel concept. Indeed, it was the guiding principle of the Accord on Fire and Building Safety in Bangladesh and the Alliance for Bangladesh Worker Safety, each established in 2013 in the aftermath of the Rana Plaza building collapse that claimed the lives of 1,133 garment workers. Both were legally binding agreements (with European brands primarily signing on to the “Accord,” while American brands typically signed the less restrictive “Alliance”) that committed brand signatories to independent safety inspections of factories in their supply chains, real consequences, including fines and contract terminations, for factories failing to make required safety improvements, and payments into a fund for safety training and factory improvements. In just a few years, Bangladesh made rapid improvements in building and worker safety, as the agreements resulted in comprehensive safety inspections of Bangladeshi clothing factories producing for export, the fixing of over 120,000 fire, building, and electrical hazards, and the permanent shuttering of nearly 200 factories deemed too hazardous for operation (Butler, 2021). This victory, and the centrality of brand legal liability to achieving it, was more than familiar to the founding members of the #PayUp campaign. Many of them, in fact, had been part of the effort to achieve it. However, to the tens of thousands of new activists and clothing consumers for whom the #PayUp campaign had provided an awakening to the problems of hunger and human rights abuses on the production end of the clothing commodity chain, the need to make brands legally liable for the enforcement of any meaningful structural improvement in the industry was a crucial lesson of the campaign. Indeed, one of the first post-#PayUp victories of the #PayUp coalition was a renewal of the Accord on Fire and Building Safety in Bangladesh Agreement, which had been scheduled to expire in 2021. Remake, which had moved hundreds of thousands to action via its #PayUp social media campaign, was able to re-mobilize this newly organized army of concerned citizens to voice support for the renewal of this landmark safety agreement. The movement is currently tackling wage theft through two major campaigns, both of which are designed to close the “accountability loopholes” that global clothing commodity chains were, in part designed to provide by setting the historic precedent of making brands legally liable for the payment of wages to workers producing in their commodity chains. In California, where Los Angeles’ 45,000 garment workers make it the largest fashion manufacturing hub in the United States, this precedent has already been set with the historic 2021 passage of Senate Bill 62, the Garment Worker Protection Act, which makes brands legally liable for ending the wage theft found to be standard practice in Los Angeles garment factories, where piece-rate systems of wage payments often resulted in workers earning less than half of the state-mandated minimum wage of $14 an hour (Farra, 2021). This form of wage theft went on for decades, costing workers hundreds of millions of dollars in unpaid wages and padding the profits of the brands, which denied any legal responsibility for ensuring that wage and labor laws be followed in the factories that produced their clothes (Farra, 2021). The successful fight for the groundbreaking S.B. 62 legislation was led by Los Angeles garment workers themselves and the L.A.-based Garment Workers’ Center, but critical to the successful passage of the bill was the public awareness raised about the conditions of garment workers, and brand culpability for them, during the #PayUp campaign. “The #PayUp

362  Handbook of social justice in the Global South campaign galvanized the passage of the Garment Worker Protection Act,” stated Remake’s Elizabeth Cline, speaking of Remake’s ability to continue to mobilize the #PayUp coalition in support of post-#PayUp anti-wage theft campaigns (Cline, personal communication, December 14, 2022). Remake CEO Ayesha Barenblatt specifically linked the prices paid by brands for clothes to the poverty, wage theft, and hazardous conditions suffered by workers in garment factories, underscoring that brand liability for the treatment of garment workers is crucial to any meaningful reform. “Their commercial practices and the low prices they set directly resulted in wage theft,” she explained. Now that S.B. 62 has made them legally liable for those conditions, “they can’t get away with that – there is multilateral accountability in the bill, which means if workers aren’t making their legal minimum wage, which is $14 an hour, manufacturers and brands will both be held responsible” (Farra, 2021). In April 2022, U.S. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) introduced the Fashioning Accountability and Building Real Institutional Change (FABRIC) Act. Modeled on California’s Garment Worker Protection Act, the FABRIC Act provides support and protection for the U.S. garment sector while making brands legally liable for wage violations in U.S.-based garment factories. Remake will draw on the awareness it raised, and the social media platform it built, during the #PayUp campaign to make raising public awareness and support for the FABRIC Act central to its organizing efforts (Cline, personal communication, December 14, 2022). A parallel anti-wage theft effort, spearheaded by another founding member of the #PayUp coalition, the UK-based Clean Clothes Campaign, seeks to address the global crisis of wage theft in the fashion commodity chain in the same way that hazardous buildings and working conditions were addressed in Bangladesh, through the establishment of a legally binding agreement making brands and buyers responsible for ensuring that workers receive the severance packages to which they are legally entitled. Just as with the Accord on Fire and Building Safety in Bangladesh and the Alliance for Bangladesh Worker Safety agreements, Clean Clothes Campaign proposes an international, legally binding Pay Your Workers agreement to which brands would become signatories. Signatories would pay into a Severance Guarantee Fund (SGF), which would be empowered to investigate worker claims of wage theft, ensure that workers receive the severance funds to which they are legally entitled, and compel brands to end relationships with suppliers who fail to make severance payments after worker complaints have been investigated and confirmed (#PayYourWorkers, 2022). With support from dozens of labor unions, nonprofits, and worker rights organizations around the world, organizers of the aptly named #PayYourWorkers campaign know that brands will never agree to accept legal liability for workers' rights, or pay into a fund designed to investigate and ensure workers’ severance pay claims unless the cost of negative publicity resulting from failure to do so is perceived to exceed the cost of participation in such a program. With the success of the #PayUp campaign behind them, however, and its successful recoupment of $22 billion originally lost to canceled orders, the #PayYourWorkers coalition is seeking to replicate that success by calling attention to the crime of systematic wage theft in the fashion commodity chain, and pressuring brands by naming names and drawing direct connections between brands’ actions – and inaction – and the routine refusal of factories in their supply chains to make legally mandatory severance payments to workers upon the termination of employment.

From #PayUp to #PayYourWorkers  363

23.6 #ADIDASSTEALS The campaign has chosen to use Adidas, the global athleticwear brand, as a case study in what Olivia Windham Stewart referred to as the “coherence gap” that exists between brands’ professed commitments to human rights, the environment, and fair treatment of “partners” and “stakeholders” with the reality of systematic human rights abuses in their supply chains (Windham Stewart, personal communication, November 7, 2022). In the case of Adidas, the company’s “Workplace Standards” statement, which states that Adidas’ mission is nothing less than “be[ing] the best sports company in the world,” commits the company to “respecting human rights,” and to “refrain[ing] from any activity, or entering into relations with any entity, which supports, solicits or encourages others to abuse human rights” (Adidas, 2016). Adding that the company expect[s] our business partners to do the same,” the statement explicitly states that “all legal requirements relating to wages and benefits must be met” (Adidas, 2016). For contrast, visit the AdidasSteals​.c​om website of the #PayYourWorkers campaign, which bluntly states that “Where we find Adidas production, we find wage theft and labor rights violations,” and that “what is truly global is the extent of wage theft and labor rights violations across their supply chain over time” (AdidasSteals​.co​m, 2022). The site documents systematic problems of wage theft and the suppression of labor rights in factories producing clothes for Adidas around the world. Examples include India and Nicaragua, where successful drives for union organization resulted in the closing of factories. In an El Salvador factory producing for Adidas, workers complain of forced overtime and 25-hour shifts. And at the Hulu Garment Factory in Cambodia, workers laid off in 2020 were never paid $3.6 million in legally mandated severance, company proclamations that “all legal requirements relating to wages and benefits must be met” notwithstanding (AdidasStea​ls​.c​om, 2022; Adidas, 2016). #PayYourWorkers organizers are hoping that the stories of worker suffering resulting from wage theft, and their ability to draw a direct, causal line between brands’ endless demands for “cheaper and faster” production and systematic violations of the rights of workers engaged in that production, will galvanize the public to equal or exceed the amount of pressure placed on brands during the #PayUp campaign. This precedent – making brands legally liable for wages and working conditions in the factories that produce their clothes – represents a first, crucial step on a path towards a global clothing supply chain characterized by living wages, humane working hours and pace of work, the right to organize, and meaningful environmental protections. Making brands legally responsible for guaranteeing these conditions at every point in the supply chain would eliminate the current global “race to the bottom” in wages, working conditions, and environmental protections, which threatens socially responsible production with capital flight, while rewarding those who abuse people and the planet in their attempt to satisfy endless brand demands for “faster and cheaper.”

23.7 CONCLUSION Garment workers suffered terribly during the shutdown period of the COVID-19 pandemic, as jobs were lost, paychecks were missed, and legally mandated severance packages went unpaid. The time will certainly be remembered as one of hardship for workers in the sector. It also may be recalled as a moment in which the big brands made a reckless miscalculation,

364  Handbook of social justice in the Global South a ham-fisted overreach in which their attempt to push the cost of the pandemic onto the most vulnerable members of their supply chains unwittingly shined a light on the causal connection between brand behavior and garment worker suffering for the entire world to see. Cheerful assurances of respect for “human rights” and the “legal payment of wages” became an embarrassment, and hundreds of thousands of consumers around the world learned lessons not just about how the clothing commodity chain worked – and who suffered as a result – but became aware of the fact that there’s nothing inevitable about the global “race to the bottom” in wages and working conditions, as brands pit factories and countries against one another in a “cheaper, faster” competition that literally starves workers and exhausts the planet. Rather, it is a simple function of the brands’ ability to dodge legal liability for conditions in the supply chains which they manage, control, and profit from, just as they attempted to dodge their obligation to pay for clothes that they had ordered – and which factories had already produced – as the world shut down in the face of the initial global spread of COVID-19. This chapter has grappled with a question of critical concern to any global citizen concerned with the poverty and human rights abuses suffered by the hundreds of millions of workers toiling at the production ends of global commodity chains. Beyond denunciation, how do we stand in solidarity with these workers in a global movement to secure not just an end to abuse, but living wages, humane hours and working conditions, and protection of the fundamental right of workers to organize on behalf of their own interests? In their emergency response to the crisis of order cancellations in the wake of COVID-19, the organizers of the #PayUp campaign found leverage in their ability to exploit the massive “coherence gap” that exists between brands’ public professions of “partnership” with suppliers and “respect” for the human rights of the workers who make their clothes, and the ruthless realities of attempting to meet impossible order demands on the thinnest of margins, and working forced overtime for wages that translate to poverty and malnourishment for workers and their families. The key is to close this gap by finally making brands legally liable for the human rights abuses that are rampant in their supply chains, and to create legally binding agreements to enforce minimum standards with regard to wages, hours, working conditions and workers’ rights, i.e., to organize a global campaign to force brands to actually live up to the images they have crafted for themselves on their pages of Corporate Social Responsibility. Armed with this realization, the international network of hundreds of thousands of concerned consumers and activists that coalesced to form the #PayUp coalition has applied the lessons of #PayUp to make brand legal liability the center of its strategy for structural reform of the industry. With victories in securing the renewal of the crucial Accord on Fire and Building Safety in Bangladesh, which makes brand signatories legally liable for building and workplace safety at factories in their supply chains, and the historic passage of the Garment Worker Protection Act in California, which for the first time holds brands responsible for labor rights violations at factories in their supply chain, this powerful network of activists is currently mobilizing in support of the passage of the FABRIC Act, which would make brands responsible for the eradication of wage theft at garment factories across the United States, and for the #PayYourWorkers campaign, which aims to pressure brands to follow up on their pledges to #PayUp by signing a legally binding agreement committing them to fund investigation of wage theft complaints, the timely payment of legally mandated severance packages when factories default on this obligation, and the termination of production agreements with suppliers who fail to rectify confirmed cases of failure to make required severance payments to workers.

From #PayUp to #PayYourWorkers  365 Of course, the success of these efforts is yet to be determined, but the #PayUp campaign demonstrated that brands could be successfully pressured – even publicly shamed – into paying billions of dollars, and that making brands legally liable for conditions found in their supply chains must be central to any solution to the age-old problem of global clothing commodity chains, where human rights abuses are always somebody else’s problem. In attempting to put a new wrinkle on time-tested tactics of evading responsibility by canceling billions of dollars’-worth of orders at the outset of the global COVID-19 pandemic, the brands may have inadvertently galvanized a global movement capable of finally holding them accountable for their actions, and effecting structural transformations that compel the brands to close the gap between facile assurances of commitment to human rights and worker well-being, and the realities of poverty, wage theft, and suppression of rights for which they are directly responsible.

REFERENCES Adidas (2016). Adidas code of conduct for suppliers: Workplace standards. https://respect.international/ wp-content/uploads/2019/11/adidas​_workplace​_standards​_2017​_e​n​.pdf AdidasSteals​.c​om (2022). Adidas theft worldwide. https://adidassteals​.com​/adidas​-theft​-worldwide Anner, M. (2020). Squeezing workers rights in global supply chains: Purchasing practices in the Bangladesh garment export sector in comparative perspective. Review of International Political Economy, 27(2), 320–347. Anner, M., & Worker Rights Consortium (2020). Abandoned? The impact of Covid-19 on workers and businesses at the bottom of global garment supply chains. Asia Wage Floor Alliance, et. al. (2018). Gender-based violence in the GAP supply chain. https://www​ .globallaborjustice​.org​/wp​-content ​/uploads​/2018​/06​/GBV​-Gap​-May​-2018​.pdf Bedat, M. (2021). Unraveled: The life and death of a garment. Portfolio/Penguin. Benson, S. (2020, April 7). I am not sure I will survive: The founder of a Bangladesh garment factory shares his story during Covid-19. Eco​-Age​.co​m. https://eco​-age​.com ​/resources​/mostafiz​-uddin​ -bangladesh​-garment​-factory​-founder​-shares​-story​-during​-covid​-19/ Brand BGMEA. (2020). Appeal to international buyers. YouTube. https://www​.youtube​.com​/watch​?v​ =LmhbW9DO4os Butler, S. (2021, April 22). Bangladesh clothing factory safety deal in danger, warn unions. The Guardian.  https://www​.theguardian​.com​/world​/2021​/apr​/22​/ bangladesh​- clothing​-factory​-safety​deal​-in​-danger​-warn​-unions Cline, E. (2020, July 14). The power of #PayUp. Atmos. https://atmos​.earth ​/payup​-bangladesh​-factory​ -worker​-social​-campaign/ Farra, E. (2021, September 30). California just passed a landmark bill to protect garment workers – here’s what it means for the entire fashion industry. Vogue. https://www​.vogue​.com​/article​/california​ -sb​- 62​-garment​-worker​-protection​-act Frayer, L. (2020, June 5). For Bangladesh’s struggling garment workers, hunger is a bigger worry than pandemic. NPR. https://www​.npr​.org​/2020​/06​/05​/869486297​/for​-bangladeshs​-struggling​-garment​ -workers​-hunger​-is​-a​-bigger​-worry​-than​-pandemi Gereffi, G., & Frederick, S. (2010). The global apparel value chain: Trade and the crisis. Policy Research Working Paper 5281. The World Bank Development Group. Gereffi, G., Humphrey, J., & Sturgeon, T. (2005). The governance of global value chains. Review of International Political Economy, 12(1) 78–104. Kumar, A. (2020). Monopsony capitalism: Power and production in the twilight of the sweatshop age. Cambridge University Press. Oxfam Australia (2019). Made in poverty: The true price of fashion. https://www​.oxfam​.org​.au​/wp​ -content​/uploads​/2021​/11​/ Made​-in​-Poverty​-the​-True​-Price​-of​-Fashion​-Oxfam​-Australia​.pdf

366  Handbook of social justice in the Global South #PayYourWorkers (2022). Frequently asked questions for consumers. www​.PayYourWorkers​.org. https://www​.payyourworkers​.org​/faq Snowden, H., & Remake. (2022, March 30). #PayUp: Two years later. Remake​.worl​d. https://remake​ .world ​/stories​/payup​-two​-years​-later/ Worker Rights Consortium (2021). Fired, then robbed: Fashion brands’ complicity in wage-theft during COVID-19. https://www​.workersrights​.org​/research​-report ​/fired​-then​-robbed​-fashion​-brands​ -complicity​-in​-wage​-theft​-during​-covid​-19/

24. Untangling the gender-corruption nexus for social justice in the Global South Kristy Kelly and Kejsi Ruka

24.1 INTRODUCTION The commonly agreed-upon definition of corruption is “the abuse of power for personal gain”. Corruption can take many forms, including behaviours like public servants demanding or taking money or favours in exchange for services, such as giving better than fair treatment. It can also include politicians misusing public funds, granting jobs or contracts to their sponsors, friends, and family members, or corporations bribing officials to get lucrative deals (Rose-Ackerman, 2013). In public discourse, corruption is often seen as a “victimless crime” because both actors (bribe-giver and bribe-taker) are assumed to participate equally in the exchange to pursue private, if illegal, interests (Ruggiero, 2001). However, suppose corruption is understood as an obstacle to good governance or as the result of discrimination or the enforcement of inequality. In that case, research should focus on the “abuse of power” side. Growing evidence shows that men and women perceive, experience, and manage corruption differently. A United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) (2012) study found that 76 per cent of women in 11 communities across eight countries identified corruption as their most significant barrier to accessing public goods and services. While many governments, multilateral organisations, corporations, and civil society actors support gender equality goals and increased transparency, few directly connect their anti-corruption work to gender equality or vice versa. This bias emerged as the scholarly literature on gender and corruption has focussed historically on women in politics. This literature tends to represent women as morally pure “political cleaners” who can help countries, companies, or organisations reduce corruption through their presence (Goetz, 2007). Such logic reproduces gender as a biological given, with women either victims or morally pure agents of change. Feminist scholars have begun to take notice and have responded with corrective research. However, it remains focussed primarily on Global North experiences and women in politics. This chapter serves as a correction to the scholarly literature on gender and corruption. It also serves as a corrective to the grey literature, which, although focussed on diverse Global South experiences, tends to construct gender as a binary and women as a stand-in for “gender” or constructs women as a homogenous group. Findings reveal opportunities for feminist, intersectional, and interdisciplinary research centred on Global South experiences of corruption in everyday life and for research to better connect with policy and practice.

24.2 METHODS AND METHODOLOGY Drawing on the work of Raewynn Connell (2007), we centre knowledge production and sharing, which are often marginalised in scholarly debates in the Global North. This means 367

368  Handbook of social justice in the Global South including the work of local civil society groups, multilateral organisations, and INGOs and civil society organisations (CSOs) working in the Global South or with Global South partners. We also centre a decolonial feminist framework (Lugones, 2007, 2008, 2010; Vergès, 2021) to examine how racism, imperialism, and colonialism produce inclusions and exclusions in scholarly and practitioner spaces. We begin by examining gaps between theory and practice and between Global North and Global South experiences, as revealed through an integrative literature review (Torraco, 2005). We specifically collected literature across both peerreviewed scholarship and “grey” practitioner literature published as fact sheets, reports, and blogs. We applied research to websites associated with gender and corruption think tanks, multilateral donors, and CSOs. We then examine gaps between these literatures and identify the challenges of linking gender and corruption in research, policy, and practice. Finally, we consider what these two streams of literature offer as a future framework for researching, designing interventions, and measuring impact and change at the intersection of gender and corruption. We conclude with a summary of key findings and opportunities for future scholarship.

24.3 SEARCH PARAMETERS AND DATA ANALYSIS First, we identified theoretical, qualitative, and quantitative studies across many disciplines and in applied practice that explore the nexus between gender and corruption. We included theoretical, empirical, and intervention research. The theoretical approach is essential for defining circumstances and hypothesising the relationships between gender and corruption, whereas the empirical approach tests these hypotheses. Intervention studies are empirical work that helps show what mitigates the effects of gender on corruption and corruption on gender. Then, we separated the literature into peer-reviewed and grey practitioner literature. We identified critical themes across both separately and then compared them. Our initial search included only peer-reviewed literature and recent academic books focused on gender and corruption. Gender and corruption as a field are new according to how we, and most authors, conceptualise them. Because our primary goal is to identify key themes and frameworks, we included only work published since 2001, the year of two seminal pieces of scholarship (Dollar et al., 2001; Swamy et al., 2001). Based on the source, we identified 2,500 items and separated them into two groups: scholars and practitioners. From the scholarly literature, we eliminated items that were not in English, those that only included sex-disaggregated data but no gender analysis, those that were based on experiments in the Global North, and others deemed not relevant. The final items included 32 scholarly articles and six books to review. Each researcher assessed the articles for relevance and methods and wrote analyses of the articles she found to be appropriate. Next, we searched for seminal practitioner pieces (determined by the extent to which subsequent publications reference them) and works published by international agencies that met the inclusion criteria. In this search of grey literature, we included a more precise focus on gender and corruption in geographic and regional diversity. This search listed countries and regions such as “Africa” and “Zimbabwe”. We conducted additional searches on the sites of the U4 Anti-Corruption Resource Center, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), the World Bank, the UN Convention Against Corruption (UNCAC) Coalition, the UNDP, and Transparency International (TI) because they serve as sources of knowledge

Untangling the gender-corruption nexus for social justice in the Global South  369 for the international aid community. We included 77 reports, blogs, studies, evaluations, and factsheets. We analysed the grey literature following the same process as the scholarly literature. When the first phase of analysis was completed, we conducted a final search using the terms “gender” and “corruption” on Google Scholar from well-known scholars determined by the number of citations, length of time publishing, level of public profile, and their overlap across scholarly and grey literature. We added 15 journal articles and book chapters, as well as 32 practitioner publications.1

24.4 RESULTS 24.4.1 Gender and Corruption in Scholarly Literature The scholarly literature on gender and corruption can be divided into two main categories. The first finds a correlation between higher levels of gender inequality and corruption. The resulting policy assertion is to increase women’s participation in the public domain to promote transparency and good governance. This category of literature extends from two early World Bank studies that argued that the more women in power, the less corrupt the country. This led to policies and programmes that promoted women as “political cleaners” who can be rallied to leadership to fix corrupt institutional practices and clean up dirty network organisations. Scholarly responses were to criticise the research and suggest that women in power may be just as likely to engage in corruption as men, or that high levels of corruption may lead to more discrimination against women, keeping them from the halls of power. There is growing research examining the connection between women’s increased presence in leadership positions and correlations with less corruption. This theme is explored further later in the chapter. The second category of literature attempts to address this gap via studies of institutional practices and network organisations across national contexts. Findings suggest that similarities across institutions increase women’s vulnerability as both direct and indirect victims of corruption. However, cross-country comparative analysis has several limitations when it comes to forming a deeper understanding of the causal mechanisms at work between two variables and, not surprisingly, when it comes to explaining variation within countries. Scholars have pointed out that such variation exists to different degrees in different countries and that more attention needs to be paid to how poverty and government or the state, for example, are constituted or critiqued through the moralising discourses and practices associated with “corruption”. In the following section, we contextualise the scholarly literature, focussing on the evolution of key themes and approaches: the “fairer sex” framework, regime effects, norm effects, patriarchal power structures, perceptions of corruption, and institutional frameworks. 24.4.2 The Fairer Sex Early studies that investigated the relationship between gender and corruption shaped the assumptions and direction of future studies. One of the earliest studies in the field posed the question: “Are women really the ‘fairer’ sex?” Under the direction of the World Bank’s Development Research Group, this study sought to establish an empirical link between

370  Handbook of social justice in the Global South corruption and gender. The hypothesis of David Dollar, Raymond Fisman, and Roberta Gatti rests on the premise that men are inherently more individualistically orientated than women, implying that women are more willing to sacrifice their individual needs for the common good. As a result, they hypothesised that the greater the representation of women in government, the lower the level of corruption (Dollar et al., 2001). The results affirmed the initial hypothesis, suggesting that at a national level, “higher rates of female participation in government are associated with lower levels of corruption” (Dollar et al., 2001, p. 427). The study’s general conclusion demonstrated that while increased female participation in government benefits gender equality, bringing women into government benefits society, given their generous nature. Another study by Swamy et al. (2001) further investigated this question of the moral superiority of women, ultimately concluding that women are more likely than men to condemn corrupt acts like bribery. These two studies concerned feminist scholars who believed that the analysis reified women as incapable of committing immoral acts. Furthermore, these studies argued for increasing women’s participation in government merely to oppose corruption rather than as a right. In response, most of the scholarly literature has been aimed at refuting the “fairer sex” framework. 24.4.3 Regime Effects One of the first studies aimed at refuting the “fairer sex” framework was by Hung-En Sung (2003, 2006). Sung’s investigations found that political systems can influence gender equality and fair governance in a nation. They criticised the Dollar and Swamy studies for making causal inferences and taking individual-level findings about women’s moral superiority to propose a theory about women in government. Instead, Sung found the connection between gender and corruption on a national level to be more closely related to political systems. Specifically, liberal democratic institutions promoted both gender equality and good governance. According to TI and other indicators, countries with more women in government have lower levels of public corruption. Liberal democracy, rather than increased female participation, was seen as the “common denominator” for progressing towards gender equality and fair governance. Justin Esarey and Gina Chirillo (2013) further examined how institutional context affects women’s participation in corrupt acts. In their analysis, women are socialised to be more norm-compliant and risk-averse, thus shying away from contexts that require them to misbehave. This may explain women’s under-representation at higher levels of political leadership, they suggest. They argue that institutions activate the relationship between gender and corruption, such that democratic institutions make corruption riskier and autocratic states treat it like a normal part of business. Because women are more likely to be discriminated against for non-conformity, this line of reasoning argues that women in democratic contexts will avoid corruption. However, in autocratic contexts, they are just as likely to participate in corruption as their male colleagues. This research served as a call to action to test how impactful gender stereotypes were across different regimes. However, it also continued to reinforce gender as binary and women as a homogenous group.

Untangling the gender-corruption nexus for social justice in the Global South  371 24.4.4 Norm Effects Moving away from regime effects frameworks but still attempting to explain how gender stereotyping may impact women’s experiences of corruption, Ina Kubbe and Merkle Ortrun’s edited collection (2022) brings into focus “gender norms”. Bringing together a wide range of scholars, they reveal how intersectional gendered norms shape the experiences, forms, and persistence of corruption in and through politics and the judiciary. They make a point of demonstrating how gender differences in access to power, gender stereotypes, and gender-based discrimination affect participation in corruption and how it can affect men and women differently. For example, Justa Mwangi, Wilson Muna, and Gitile Naituli (2022, Chapter 8) document how gendered stereotypes about women as less corruptible helped them get elected in local elections in Kenya but quickly backfired when women were found not, in fact, to be less corrupt while in office. Denise Neves Abade and Katharina Miller (2022, Chapter 10) reveal the same stereotype backfiring when courts try to prosecute women engaged in corruption in Brazil, Spain, and Germany. Their research shows that no matter the legal system, judges, juries, and society are less likely to believe the charges and convict women engaged in corruption. Gendered norms in China about businesswomen being less aggressive in investments than men appear to reduce their need to pay bribes, according to Chengyu Fe’s research (2022, Chapter 3). The opposite, however, occurs when corruption is stereotyped as being only about money. Elin Bjarnegård et al. (Kubbe & Ortrun, 2022, Chapter 13), for example, show how, in the case of sexual corruption, gendered norms in Tanzania and Colombia lead to the stigmatisation of women who pay bribes with sexual favours rather than the bribe-takers who often get away. Further, in the context of underage and polygamous marriages in Morocco, judicial corruption punishes mothers and grants men legal impunity for sexual transgressions. Women who flee abusive marriages are sanctioned through the non-payment of child support (Feather, 2022). Even though research on norm effects is still in its infancy, these studies highlight the significance of studying how contextually specific formal and informal gendered norms influence the gender-corruption nexus. Further research is needed to contextualise the role norms play for different communities across the Global South and to identify appropriate and effective interventions. Corruption opportunity gap. A literature sub-strand tests the “corruption opportunity gap” to test the norm effect theory. This literature examines how women and other marginalised groups are locked out of networks that organise, participate in, and facilitate corruption. This may explain why they appear less corrupt as leaders. The opportunity gap has long been a business, development, and political feature. A World Bank Enterprise Survey found that companies with female leaders more often report corruption as an obstacle to their business growth. It is not that women are more honest than men, but that they have fewer opportunities to engage in corrupt acts. The opportunity gap also appears relevant in European politics (CEMR, 2009), where research on women’s presence in regional councils finds that the existence of closely knit male-dominated networks exerts control over candidate recruitment, thus reducing the number of female councilwomen. The same is found to be true in parliamentary representation across Africa (Stockemer, 2011), with similar dynamics playing out in Mexico (Grimes & Wängnerud, 2010), Thailand (Bjarnegård, 2013), Iceland (Johnson et al., 2013), and Argentina (Franceschet & Piscopo, 2013).

372  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Why might it make sense for close-knit networks engaging in corruption to leave out women and marginalised others? One of the initial conditions of existing power structures is patriarchy and new corporate colonialism. For a network of individuals to coordinate any illegal or widely disapproved activity, there must be within-group solid trust, and this trust may be easier to establish and reinforce among people who have gender (or race, class, ethnic identity, etc.) in common. Helena Stensöta and Lena Wängnerud, in their 2018 edited collection on gender and corruption, remind us that the exclusionary categories are less about “women” and “men” than gender equality processes (Stenosöta & Wängnerud, 2018). Men who do not display the form of masculinity that acts as the social glue for the group – what Elin Bjarnegård (2018) terms “homosocial capital” – are left out, as are most women and nonbinary individuals. However, to date, there has been very little research on this. The norm effect theory and the corruption opportunity gap explain how closed corruption networks contribute to the glass ceiling or glass cliff (Ryan & Haslam, 2007) effects on women in leadership. Further research in other sectors and more intersectional analysis are needed to understand how gender is linked to race-ethnicity, class, age, religion, citizenship, etc., and how patriarchy and particular masculinities shape access to and control of these networks, particularly in the Global South. 24.4.5 Patriarchal Power Structures While the studies in the previous sections tried to dispel the question of women as the fairer sex through regime effect and norm effect, scholars like Anne Marie Goetz (2007) argue that patriarchal power structures prevent women from participating in corrupt behaviours in politics and the workforce. Steering the discourse towards a gendered analysis of corruption, Goetz argues against the incorruptibility of women and their use as “political cleaners”. It is not that women are less corrupt than men; instead, gender relationships condition the opportunities for corrupt or opportunistic behaviour (Goetz, 2007). Instead, women tend to behave less corruptly because they are excluded from male-dominated power networks in politics and bureaucracies. According to scholars like Goetz, the solution to corruption is not simply putting women in office and “exploiting supposed feminine virtues” (Goetz, 2007, p. 102). A contemporary study of women’s experiences in Ghana found that if corrupt opportunities and networks existed, women proved no less corrupt in the public sector. In other words, the very gendered system used to justify women’s proclivity for less corrupt behaviour and subsequent integration can become the source of corruption as women try to enter politics. Research by Rajeev Goel and Michael Nelson (2023) suggests that quotas may increase corruption. This is because quotas may promote nepotism and corruption to improve gender equality in the legislature. Further, the recruitment of like-minded individuals to run for office in quota systems could lead to the formation of corrupt networks. As noted in the previous section, patriarchy can be analysed as a form of corruption to explain how it acts as a barrier to women’s participation in government. Elin Bjarnegård (2013, 2018) documents how clientelist networks of power (electoral corruption) reduce women’s opportunities to run for office and, in turn, their chances of winning. Her research highlights the role that masculinity plays in the perpetuation of male-dominated networks. Based on data from Thailand, Bjarnegård shows how men lock women out of positions of power as

Untangling the gender-corruption nexus for social justice in the Global South  373 “untrustworthy” partners in male-dominated networks. More research is needed to understand how corruption processes are shaped by and for patriarchies. 24.4.6 Perceptions of Corruption Another important theme that the scholarly literature addresses is gendered perceptions of corruption. This literature finds that men and women generally see corruption differently depending on the spaces they occupy. Political scientist Monika Bauhr (2017) argues that there are two types of corruption: “need” corruption and “greed” corruption. Need corruption is defined as the type of corruption that “is needed to gain access to ‘fair’ treatment”, while greed corruption “is used to gain special illicit advantages” (2017, p. 561). In a study on gendered differences in perceptions of corruption, Monika Bauhr and Nicholas Charron (2020) find that women are more likely to perceive “need” corruption while men are more likely to perceive “greed” corruption. For example, women will pay bribes when they “need” something, such as necessary services (healthcare, education, land titles), or to avoid bureaucratic delays or from being discriminated against. Men pay bribes when they seek unfair advantages (greed corruption), such as advancing to the head of the line or avoiding standard bureaucratic processes. These findings are further elaborated in the work of Alice Guerra and Tatyana Zhuravleva (2022), who find that, in experiments, women are less likely to tolerate and engage in corruption when doing so reduces overall welfare. They find men are less tolerant of bribery when it enhances welfare but confers payoff disadvantages relative to the bribe recipients. While these studies continue to produce gender in binary terms and rarely centre on the experiences of men and women from the Global South, this line of research shapes the field of anti-corruption work around the world. Further research is needed, as are evaluations of the effectiveness of anti-corruption interventions based on this line of research. 24.4.7 Institutional Frameworks There is growing research on corruption as an institution (Castro et al., 2020; Persson et al., 2010; Teorell, 2007), but most neglect gender. There is a movement among feminist scholars to engender the field. It remains focussed on individual gendered impacts or gendered norms. However, gender norms are but one element of the gender system (Ridgeway & Correll, 2004), which also includes gender roles, gender socialisation, and gendered power relations. Research focussed on sexual corruption is a growing strand of literature that addresses this gap. Sexual corruption. Sexual corruption is different from monetary corruption because, in this case, “the person paying the bribe is the bribe” (Bjarnegård et al., 2024, p. 5). The power asymmetry undermines the notion that corruption is an equal exchange agreement between the service-seeker and the person in power. This is regardless of the gender of either person. As Lindeberg and Stensöta (2018) point out, sexual corruption is not just the abuse of authority but also the use of authority for sexual exploitation. This impacts the bribe-giver differently to the loss of money or resources. When a person is involved in a sexual bribe, there is shame, fear, and stigma, not unlike the experiences of those who survive other forms of gender-based and sexual violence. Unwanted pregnancies, abortions, sexually transmitted diseases, and other mental and physical health issues can result (IAWJ, 2012).

374  Handbook of social justice in the Global South The importance of this stream of research is that it sets forth a framework for recognising sexual corruption, emphasising the abuse of authority to differentiate it from sexual harassment, abuse, or other forms of sexual transactions such as prostitution. It also opens opportunities for future research on gender and corruption as separate but intertwined institutions. It draws attention to situations where sexual corruption might become institutionalised so that a person in authority does not directly initiate it but rather offers, for example, sex in exchange for grades, jobs, promotions, or immigration rights. Those in power may not necessarily need to demand sex or sexual favours because sexual corruption has become so institutionalised that it is expected of both parties. As Bjarnegård et al. (2024) argue, whenever the exercise of authority is conditional on sex, it is sexual corruption, no matter who initiates it. Further research is needed to better understand how corruption, as an institution and a gendered institution, apportions resources, roles, power, and entitlements according to whether a person or practice is perceived as male or female, masculine or feminine, or outside gender binarism. 24.4.8 Summary The biggest question in most early gender and corruption research was how to overcome the “fairer sex” myth while making meaningful changes towards anti-corruption work. While there have been great advancements in the field of gender and corruption since the initial World Bank study, the fairer sex question seems to remain. The assumption has been that women’s participation in politics is linked to lower levels of corruption. In the scholarly literature, much of the early gender and corruption literature equated gender with women and lacked intersectional feminist analysis. More recent literature expands the field and puts intersectional feminist analysis at the centre. While mainstream scholarship focusses primarily on political participation and leadership or centres women as victims or political cleaners, feminist scholars are broadening the field. New research on sexual corruption, patriarchal power structures, and gender norms is a significant contribution, demanding researchers take up the call for more research in neglected areas such as climate change (green corruption), economics/trade, sports, education, health, or agriculture. They also call for centring gender and intersectional analysis, the role of heteronormative power structures, and feminist theory to be applied to untangling the gender and corruption nexus. In many ways, this work emerged out of practitioner spaces, mainly as many feminist scholars are situated in both academia and practice. The following section reviews the practitioner literature, mainly as it has emerged from research by and for Global South audiences. 24.4.9 Gender and Corruption in Grey Literature In this section, we review the grey literature on gender and corruption, paying particular attention to the documents produced by organisations outside the traditional commercial or academic publishing and distribution channels, including reports, working papers, government documents, white papers, blogs, and evaluations produced by organisations working on gender and corruption in the field. The review reveals some common themes: defining and measuring corruption, documenting corruption as pervasive and systemic, putting corruption

Untangling the gender-corruption nexus for social justice in the Global South  375 data to work, reporting and adjudicating corruption, and mainstreaming gender into anticorruption work. 24.4.10 Defining and Measuring Corruption While anti-corruption, good governance, and transparency are established frameworks in development practice, incorporating sex-disaggregated data or gender analysis remains new. Organisations such as the World Bank and UNDP have figured prominently in quantitative studies of corruption, but often, gender and women are left out. When sex-disaggregated data is included, it appears men are the ones most affected. This is because corruption is typically measured through acts of bribery, as opposed to the gendered forms of corruption women experience, such as sexual corruption and exclusion from male-dominated networks. To better understand gender and corruption, it is crucial to have more experts and researchers who understand how gendered forms of corruption are produced and reproduced. One area of research receiving increased attention is sextortion or sexual corruption. As in the scholarly literature, studies are small and rely on anecdotal data. However, they reveal repeatedly that women and girls — and possibly also non-binary persons — are more likely to face pressure to use their bodies as the currency of corruption or a bribe, with potentially devastating physical, psychological, social, and economic long-term effects (Camacho, 2021; CGB, 2019; Feigenblatt, 2020; Kukutschka & Vrushi, 2019; Transparency International, 2020; UNODC, 2020). The information available indicates that, while it disproportionately affects women and girls, they are not the only ones who suffer. This subfield is more directly aligned with the scholarly literature on the same theme. This may partly be due to the situatedness of feminist scholars consulting with CSOs and INGOs, which informs their scholarship. 24.4.11 Documenting Corruption as Pervasive and Systemic Transparency International and the U4 Anti-Corruption Resource Centre at the Chr. Michelsen Institute have produced much of the research centred on the Global South’s experiences in terms of gender and corruption. Collectively, their research dates to 2006 and documents corruption’s pervasive and systemic nature and how it impacts women differently than men. The grey literature documents gender and corruption impacting Global South women in all areas of life, including sexual assault in peacekeeping (Jennet, 2006), education (Chene, 2009a), sexual and reproductive health (Schoeberlein, 2021), humanitarian assistance (Chene, 2009b), media (Schauseil, 2019), financial flows (Merkle, 2019), the forestry sector (Kirya, 2019), access to and control over land (Rabb, 2017), experiences within courts and the judicial system (Tøaasen, 2022), climate change (Rahman, 2022) and climate finance (Ardigó, 2016), access to water (Jenkins, 2017), in the context of cross-border trade (Klopp et al., 2022), during migration (Merkle et al., 2017), in fragile states (Wanyana, 2023), and post-conflict recovery (White et al., 2023). Much of this research is informed by small-sample qualitative or mixed-methods studies or the result of comprehensive literature reviews. Collectively, they suggest there is no aspect of daily life that is not impacted by corruption, and where women are not as clearly impacted as men. TI and U4 have also conducted large-sample regional literature reviews and surveys with women, particularly marginalised women. Reports to date have focused on Asia and the Pacific (Peiffer, 2023), Latin America and the Caribbean (Abril, 2023), sub-Saharan Africa

376  Handbook of social justice in the Global South (Schoeberlein, 2021), and the Middle East and North Africa (Mazigh et al., 2023). These studies document that research underestimates women’s vulnerability to corruption. Moreover, while women and men are similarly vulnerable to requests for bribes, women are uniquely vulnerable to requests for bribes in the health and education sectors, where they most often bear responsibility for managing family access to care. Furthermore, women’s relatively marginalised status in most societies means they are often an “easy target” for corruption more generally and for sexual corruption specifically. This is especially true for youth and children, ethnic minorities, Indigenous peoples, LGBTQI communities, and people with disabilities (Bullock & Jenkins, 2020). Discrimination and corruption are linked. Corruption and discrimination are significant obstacles to achieving sustainable and inclusive development. Until recently, they have generally been understood in isolation from each other. A report from 2021 by TI and the Equal Rights Trust (McDonald et al., 2021) examines the connections and direct causal relationships between them. It provides evidence of the links between discrimination and corruption based on different grounds of discrimination: age, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity and expression, race and ethnicity, and religion or belief. For example, cases from Russia and Nigeria reveal that having laws that discriminate against LGBTQI people creates opportunities for the entrapment of gay men. Cases in Hungary and Uzbekistan reveal how structures reducing freedom of religion increase petty bribes among those seeking preferential treatment. Historical and entrenched discrimination against Indigenous communities in Guatemala increases corruption in the mining sector. Age and gender intersect in Vietnam, Singapore, and Papua New Guinea, where corruption and discrimination serve to deny young people or elders access to retirement, public housing, or land (respectively). In addition, the grey literature shows that gender, corruption, and poverty are tightly connected. Poverty is both a cause and consequence of corruption, and marginalised individuals may be forced into unwanted situations to secure basic needs while at the same time being disproportionately affected by the consequences of corruption (McDonald et al., 2021). Women and girls are more likely to live in poverty and be responsible for securing household needs like food, access to medicine, water, and family documents. Their experiences are exacerbated during migration (Merkle et al., 2017), climate disasters (Rahman, 2022), and conflict (White et al., 2023). 24.4.12 Putting Corruption Data to Work The grey literature was early to document the linkages between gender and corruption (Hossain et al., 2015), particularly looking at the gender impact (Gerasymenko, 2018), gendered perceptions (Sierra & Boehm, 2015), and the extent of sexual corruption (Feigenblatt, 2020; Camacho, 2021). Early work on gender, land, and corruption revealed that corruption has already been defined and measured based on men’s experiences (Rabb, 2017). When women tried to report corruption as they experienced it – as gifts, favours, and petty bribes paid in advance of services rendered – they were turned away. They said their experiences were not about corruption but mundane stories of “greasing the wheels” of business. Small-scale studies suggest that petty corruption disproportionately affects poor women and that the currency of corruption is often sexualised. Women and girls without the resources to pay bribes in cash are often asked to pay in the form of sexual favours (Transparency International, 2020), particularly in the education sector (Chene, 2009a). In some contexts, failure to pay sexual

Untangling the gender-corruption nexus for social justice in the Global South  377 favours runs the risk of being excluded from services to which they have a right (UNESCO, 2003; Leach & Humphreys, 2007). This led to the development of local interventions to deal with gendered experiences of corruption. Typically, corruption cases are taken up in courts and lead to the punishment of a particular individual, company, or entity. However, the success of anti-corruption strategies often goes beyond the actions of one individual or even a network of people. Because corruption is often a systemic issue, it requires a more profound intervention than the punishment of an individual. Societal studies of corruption require large data sets and consistent funding over the years to reveal how perceptions of and experiences of corruption change over time. Researching gender and corruption also requires innovative methods and methodologies to capture experiences that do not further harm participants or put them at risk. UNDP in Europe and Central Asia developed a methodology and toolkit to survey male and female civil service employees on their experiences and perceptions of transparency and corruption risks and vulnerabilities in recruitment and promotion. The innovative toolkit is a starting point for anyone interested in developing baseline understandings in other contexts (UNDP, n.d.). The toolkit includes areas of inquiry, indicators, survey methods, sample questions, guidelines for designing and assessing focus groups, and ethical considerations. Viet Nam produces an annual study of citizens’ perceptions of corruption, which provincial leaders use to improve their performance. Launched in 2009, the Provincial Governance and Public Administration Performance Index (PAPI) remains the most extensive annual time-series evaluation of governance (PAPI, n.d.). While other intersectional data, such as age, marital status, and ethnicity, are collected, there is no intersectional feminist analysis or reporting. Such data can help anti-corruption and gender equality experts design interventions to reduce corruption. However, this is only a start. New indicators are needed to capture the gender dimensions of corruption, and they must be developed and used at the national level. These could be generated relatively quickly using existing data sources to capture the specific experiences of poorer groups of women and men. 24.4.13 Reporting and Adjudicating Corruption While women tend to condemn corrupt behaviour more than men, they are less likely to report it. The grey literature suggests that one of the reasons is a certain pessimism among women about the potential of reporting problems. For example, data from the Global Corruption Barometer (GCB, 2019) in Latin America and the Caribbean show that women are less likely to think that reporting corruption will bring about actual change. Women are also less likely to think that people can report corruption without fear of retaliation. As previously mentioned, there is a perception that women are less likely to take complaints about corruption seriously than men. Some may also lack the knowledge of their legal entitlements or the means and resources to report corruption or file a complaint (Bullock & Jenkins, 2020). A survey on gender and corruption in Zimbabwe shows that only 15 per cent of the respondents who experienced corruption reported it (Transparency International Zimbabwe, 2019). Reasons included lack of trust in the police, the sense that reporting was useless, and fear of retaliation. These challenges are particularly acute for sexual corruption, as few safe and gender-sensitive reporting mechanisms provide support to survivors/victims of sexual abuse (Feigenblatt, 2020).

378  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Globally, access to justice for women and other marginalised groups who suffer because of corruption is still a formidable obstacle. Sexual corruption is particularly under-prosecuted due to systemic inadequacies in policy and legal frameworks and systems. There are few robust or appropriate laws to enable successful prosecution and other appropriate remedies. Research suggests that reviewing good practices on sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV) might offer a roadmap forward. For instance, there are specialised SGBV courts in some Global South nations that also have specialised police units or designated officers that respond to and record cases of violence against women (Ntaganda, 2012). The process, including victims’ interface with police and courts of law, is tailored to embody a trauma-informed approach that prioritises the victims’ safety, dignity, and privacy. Incorporating training to help specialists recognise when cases of SGBV are sexual corruption will facilitate the prosecution of gendered forms of corruption. Improving whistle-blower protections is another gap that needs further analysis from an intersectional feminist perspective. Early studies have identified some reasons women might report misconduct and when they might feel more willing to do so (Zúñiga, 2020). For example, women may have more difficulty reporting minor infractions lacking ethical or moral implications, or if they are reporting on peers or supervisors, when the reporting authorities are police or other male-dominant institutions, or when the whistle-blower risks being ostracised in society as a “snitch”. However, more research is needed to create and evaluate gendersensitive whistleblowing mechanisms. 24.4.14 Mainstreaming Gender into Anti-Corruption Work As the consensus grows that corruption is gendered, it is also clear that interventions to address corruption must apply a gender lens to be more effective. Gender mainstreaming is essential for incorporating gender into anti-corruption programming throughout the planning, implementation, and monitoring processes. According to the UN, gender mainstreaming is a strategy for making women’s, as well as men’s, concerns and experiences an integral dimension of the design, implementation, monitoring, and evaluation of policies and programmes in all political, economic, and societal spheres so that women and men benefit equally. Inequality is not perpetuated (ECOSOC, 1997). Scholar-practitioners have played a key role in helping UNODC mainstream gender into their work (Merkle, 2018; UNODC, 2021b). However, anti-corruption policies and programmes continue to view gender as synonymous with women or as a mere distinction between women and men. They also tend to treat men and women as monolithic groups (Abril, 2023). This limits intersectional approaches to making gender mainstreaming more effective. UN Women (2022) only recently published a comprehensive guide to integrating intersectionality across programme and policy cycles, so it is time the UNODC strategy moved past the “add women and stir” approach. Anti-corruption training. Anti-corruption training and education are essential tools for preventing and remediating corruption. They are an essential gateway component of gender mainstreaming (Boehm & Nell, 2007; Kelly, 2019). However, while anti-corruption training is often mandatory in the business sector and for civil servants, gender is rarely included. Empirical research (Zinnbauer, 2023) finds that while anti-corruption, or integrity, training can contribute to tackling corruption and improving governance, few training programmes centre on gender. The few exceptions remain closed to the public, are self-paced (UNODC, n.d.), or designed for a limited audience (B20, 2020; Kelly & Murray, 2022). Socially constructed

Untangling the gender-corruption nexus for social justice in the Global South  379 roles, activities, attributes, behaviours, personality traits, relationships, power, and influence – that a society conceptually attributes to men and women – need to be considered at all stages of the anti-corruption programme cycle. Without tackling anti-corruption through a gender analysis, the training is incomplete in understanding the true scope of corruption issues and solutions. In addition, gender needs to be a fundamental component of any anti-corruption programme. This includes completing a gender assessment and analysis of the problem, focussing on intersectional gender analysis during project design and implementation, and incorporating gender monitoring and evaluation. Reporting findings is also crucial, so incorporating gender analysis regarding where, when, and how projects are reported should be considered. 24.4.15 Summary An intersectional feminist analysis of the grey literature reveals corruption’s pervasive and systemic nature, impacting everyone. However, women may face corruption in their interactions with a different set of public authorities to men – often with providers of essential public services upon which women are more dependent. In contrast, men typically engage with business regulators, land registry officials, and tax collectors. Furthermore, impoverished women often bear different costs of corruption. Bribes paid with money may represent a more significant portion of their income than they would for men. Women are also more often subject to sexual corruption pressures – a form of corruption that deeply erodes their equal citizenship rights, dignity, and health. Second, the analysis reveals many recommendations for policy and practice, but more is needed to bring them to fruition. While sex-disaggregated data may be collected across largescale studies, for example, little analysis reveals the extent or specificity of the problem. Few programmes are in the implementation phase; therefore, there is limited data from monitoring and evaluation to reveal what might work (or not) to address the gendered nature of corruption. Finally, this analysis raises questions about how effective gender mainstreaming has been in the context of anti-corruption work. There remain barriers to moving beyond an “adding women and stir” approach, seeing gender as more than just women or seeing women in all their diversity. It is, therefore, essential to connect the diversity of data and findings to policies and practices designed to reduce corruption. This will require connecting the scholarly literature to the grey literature and connecting theory to policy and practice, with a particular focus on Global South women in all their diversity.

24.5 COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF SCHOLARLY AND GREY LITERATURE In comparing the scholarly and grey literature on gender and corruption, several findings and recommendations emerge. First, more data collection and research – scholarly and grey literature – are needed to theorise the gender-corruption nexus from Global South experiences. More empirical, primary, interdisciplinary, and sex-disaggregated data and intersectional feminist analysis are needed to understand the nuanced linkages between gender and corruption. Quantitative and qualitative data regarding the social, legal, and political landscape, as well as the lived experiences

380  Handbook of social justice in the Global South of women, men, and gender-diverse groups, are essential not only for better theory but also for better policy and practice. It is also vital that gender and anti-corruption data systems and practices are designed to protect and empower the most vulnerable people in society. The grey literature highlights the importance of intersectional data collection and analysis approaches in developing social justice interventions in anti-corruption work. Systematically collected global sex-disaggregated data is needed to identify where sexual corruption occurs (e.g., in which sectors or institutions), in which situations it is most likely to happen, and who is most affected by it, particularly in Global South contexts. Second, this analysis allows us to see corruption as the result of patriarchal networking, patronage, and clientelist behaviour and to examine gender inequality in corrupt systems of exclusion. While individual women may not be less corrupt than individual men, when there is a critical mass of women (approximately 30 per cent) in decision-making positions, policy and budget decisions and priorities often change in ways that benefit women, girls, and communities. This opens avenues for women to seek redress for public accountability failures, which may lead to reducing the gendered impacts of corruption. Third, the analysis reveals a growing focus on identifying sexual corruption as a crime. However, the global community needs to figure out ways to prosecute sexual corruption cases as such rather than under sexual abuse laws. This is a social justice issue particularly relevant in the Global South, where marginalised women are bribing officials with sexual favours to have their basic needs met. Criminalising sexual corruption is often regarded as necessary to address the problem. However, there is some divergence in legal opinions on whether criminalisation is the answer or whether the problem requires tailored, context-specific responses. There is a need to map and analyse best practices from existing case law, administrative responses such as those in the UN system for sexual exploitation and abuse, and approaches by alternative justice systems rooted in Global South experiences to build a case for universal recognition and criminalisation of sexual corruption. It is also essential to explore how sextortion plays out in fragile and conflict-affected contexts, during migration, in education and health care, and where precarity and insecurity are most pronounced. Fourth, this analysis reveals legislative and policy gaps. Strengthening gender-sensitive mechanisms for whistleblowing and reporting, as well as whistleblower protections, is needed. While practitioner spaces have a growing focus on expanding anti-corruption laws, most of the work remains in the corporate, business, and finance sectors. More attention should be paid to women’s diverse lived experiences when encountering corruption. This requires strengthening transnational policy conversations to share best practices and make note of what is working in some countries versus others. Fifth, this analysis reveals a gap between scholarly and grey literature. The gap is shrinking because scholars work with practitioners or consult on practitioner research projects with organisations such as TI, UNDP, or others. This may lead to crossovers between their authored scholarly publications and their work published in the grey literature. Closer ties in the future may lead to deeper connections both across the two literatures and between research, policy, and practice. Identifying opportunities to centre Global South scholars, their research, and their practitioner experiences will be vital to further closing these gaps. Finally, while there is a gap between scholarly and grey literature, they reveal corruption as an institution and a gendered institution when read together. Patriarchy and global capitalism have shaped it. Women are not absent, nor are they merely victims or “political cleaners”, as much of the discourse or early research would have us believe. By taking a step back and

Untangling the gender-corruption nexus for social justice in the Global South  381 considering how “corruption” produces discourses, practices, and meanings that change over time and place and to the user, we can make visible why what appears as “corruption” to some can appear acceptable to others. Centring marginalised communities and women’s experiences within them is vital to this process.

24.6 CONCLUSION: THE CHALLENGES AHEAD This chapter moved beyond the scholarly literature to explore more recent work emerging from international development practitioner spaces, particularly in multilateral organisations and from the Global South. We mainly explored the evolution of scholarly versus practitioner grey literature on gender and corruption to understand the concerns of those working to combat corruption in national and international politics, development and humanitarian contexts, global trade, and finance, as well as in education, health, land use, climate adaptation, the forestry sector, fragile states, and post-conflict recovery. We centred Global South experiences and perspectives to identify key trends and opportunities for scholars and practitioners to learn from each other as they continue to develop the field of gender and corruption. We found that, until recently, most research on corruption that incorporated a gender perspective focussed on women as a homogeneous group. More specifically, the research focussed on women’s different attitudes toward corruption, different experiences of corruption, different ways of acting corruptly, and women’s roles in combating corruption. While there are significant contributions, there is very little research focussed on diverse women’s experiences, particularly from the Global South, nor how corruption as an institution colludes with patriarchy, global racism, and neo-colonial capital to undermine gender equality. Our findings call for concerted action to develop an interdisciplinary field of study on gender and corruption that acknowledges corruption as a gendered institution. This requires anticorruption experts to work with feminist scholars and gender experts from various disciplines (education, sociology, gender and women’s studies, health, and political science) who can add multi-dimensional analyses to the data that the more quantitative studies are capturing. It also requires gender practitioners and feminist scholars to connect their work to the growing fields of corruption scholarship and anti-corruption policymaking and practice. A breakdown of silos between the fields of “gender” and “corruption” will increase the impact both have on achieving transparency, good governance, and gender equality. These findings also have policy implications. First, anti-corruption initiatives must not neglect the forms of corruption that primarily affect diverse women and gender non-conforming communities. These involve transactions in sectors and locations that are not always subject to policy interventions. Initiatives require much more gender-sensitive and gender-disaggregated measurement tools to assess diverse women’s experiences and those of people living outside the gender binary without compromising their dignity or exposing them to potential backlash from public authorities. Second, gender-sensitive anti-corruption initiatives should focus more broadly than solely on sectors where women directly experience corruption. The focus should also encompass those areas where corruption profoundly limits women’s engagement (e.g., corruption in business regulation or political competition), which may limit women’s access to enterprise development facilities or impede candidacies for public office.

382  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Third, intersectionality should be the centre of all research, interventions, and programmes to mitigate corruption. This allows us to see corruption as the result of patriarchal networking, patronage, and clientelist behaviour. It also allows us to examine gender inequality in terms of definitions of corruption and strategies to prevent it. An intersectional feminist framework allows us to see corruption as the result of patriarchal networking, patronage, and clientelist behaviour. It also allows us to examine gender inequality, definitions of corruption, and strategies to prevent it. Fourth, while sex-disaggregated data is often collected in large-scale surveys, financial support and expertise need to be allocated to conducting intersectional feminist and gender analysis of the data. More qualitative research is needed to uncover the causes and consequences of corruption in women’s everyday lives. Innovative methods developed to engage women in anti-corruption efforts have had considerable positive effects, and feminist scholars and practitioners can work together to further develop further and test these methods. In addition, results should be publicly available and accessible so that communities, organisations, scholars, and policymakers can make use of this research. Fifth, anti-corruption efforts benefit from women’s broader engagement in civil society and positions of public authority. In terms of civil society, an important constraint that must be addressed is women’s relatively limited information about the public sector and the constraints on their capacities to analyse public expenditures and other data to expose and combat corruption. Identifying opportunities to break down the barriers between what practitioners are doing, what scholars are researching, and what diverse communities are experiencing is essential. Civil society plays an essential role in bridging these gaps. Sixth, efforts to combat corruption that rely on recruiting women into public-sector positions must recognise that public accountability systems will be needed to curb corruption by all actors in the public sector. It would be imprudent to rely on women’s gender alone to have anti-corruption effects. In addition, such approaches leave men and “masculinities” out. All members of society must share the responsibility for reducing corruption. Finally, a common theme across all approaches is the need for more information on how corruption affects different social groups. This primer has demonstrated that corruption is not gender-neutral in its workings or effects. Through an analysis of women’s experiences with corruption, much is revealed about women’s relationship to the state. In addition, much is revealed about the pragmatic means of combating corruption in such analyses, which recognise that women have a great deal to contribute to improving the quality of governance and the effectiveness of public accountability systems.

NOTE 1. Not all the literature included in the analysis has been cited in this chapter. We tried to include as many as were relevant, with priority given to citational justice (Ahmed, 2017; Belcher, 2019; Delgado, 1984; Edmond, 2021; Johnson, n.d.).

Untangling the gender-corruption nexus for social justice in the Global South  383

REFERENCES Abade, D. N., & Miller, K. (2022). Gender perspectives in justice systems: Comparative analysis of the Brazilian, Spanish and German realities on corruption cases. In I. Kubbe & O. Merkle (Eds.), Norms, gender and corruption: Understanding the nexus (pp. 182–211). Edward Elgar. Abril, A. A. (2023). Regional thematic report: Inclusion of gender approach in the fight against corruption (Latin America and Caribbean). Transparency International. https://proyectopascaorg​ .files​.wordpress​.com ​/2022 ​/04​/3.​-inclusion​- of​-gender​-approach​-in​-the ​-fight​-against​- corruption ​_ proofreading​-3​.pdf Ahmed, S. (2017). Living a feminist life. Duke University Press. Ardigó, I. A. (2016). Corruption risks and mitigating approaches in climate finance. U4 helpdesk answer 2016:13. U4 Anti-Corruption Resource Centre, Chr. Michelsen Institute. https://knowledgehub​ .transparency​.org ​/assets ​/ uploads ​/ helpdesk ​/Corruption ​_ risks ​_ and ​_ mitigating ​_ approaches ​_ in ​_ climate​_finance​_2014​.pdf B20 (2020). Gender and anti-corruption MNC training. B20 Saudi Arabia Integrity and Compliance Taskforce.  https://www​ . mayerbrown ​ . com/- ​ / media​ / files​ / uploads​ /general​ / b20​ /gender​ - and​ anticorruption​-training​-mncs​-final​-for​-distribution​-101420​.pdf​%3Frev​= def​e365​a78d​c445​084d​a844​ 0253b328f Bauhr, M. (2017). Need or greed? Conditions for collective action against corruption. Governance: An International Journal of Policy, Administration, and Institutions, 30(4), 561–581. Bauhr, M., & Charron, N. (2020). Do men and women perceive corruption differently? Gender differences in perception of need and greed corruption. Politics and Governance, 8(2), 92–102. Belcher, W. (2019). Writing your academic journal article in twelve weeks: A guide to academic publishing success (2nd ed.). University of Chicago Press. Bjarnegård, E. (2013). Gender, informal institutions and political recruitment: Explaining male dominance in parliamentary representation. Palgrave Macmillan. Bjarnegård, E. (2018). Focusing on masculinity in male-dominated networks in corruption. In H. Stensöta & L. Wängnerud (Eds.), Gender and corruption: Historical roots and new avenues for research (pp. 257–274). Palgrave Macmillan. Bjarnegård, E. Calvo, D., Eldén, Å., Jonsson, S., & Lundgren, S. (2024). Sex instead of money: Conceptualizing sexual corruption. Governance, 37(1), 1–19. Boehm, F., & Nell, M. (2007). U4 Brief on anti-corruption training and education. U4 Anticorruption Resources Center, Chr. Michelsen Institute. https://www​.u4​.no​/publications​/anti​-corruption​-training​ -and​-education Breen, M., Gillanders, R., McNulty, G., & Suzuki, A. (2016). Gender and corruption in business. The Journal of Development Studies, 53(9), 1486–1501. Bullock, J., & Jenkins, M. (2020). Corruption and marginalisation. Transparency International. https:// knowledgehub​.transparency​.org​/ helpdesk​/corruption​-and​-marginalisation Camacho, G. (2021). Gender and corruption. U4 helpdesk answer 2021:9. U4 Anti-Corruption Resource Centre. https://www​.u4​.no​/publications​/corruption​-and​-gender​-equality​-hd​.pdf Castro, A., Phillips, N., & Ansari, S. (2020). Corporate corruption: A review and an agenda for future research. ANNALS, 14, 935–968. CEMR (2009). Women in local politics in Europe: Figures from 34 European countries of CEMR’s membership. Council of European Municipalities and Regions. https://charter​ -equality​ .eu​ / multimedia ​/publications​/women​-in​-local​-politics​-in​-europe​.html Chene, M. (2009a). Gender, corruption, and education. U4 helpdesk 2009. U4 Anti-Corruption Resource Centre, Chr. Michelsen Institute. https://www​.u4​.no​/publications​/gender​-corruption​-and​ -education Chene, M. (2009b). Gender and corruption in humanitarian assistance. U4 helpdesk 2009:223. U4 Anti-Corruption Resource Centre, Chr. Michelsen Institute. https://www​.u4​.no​/publications​/gender​ -and​-corruption​-in​-humanitarian​-assistance Connell, R. (2007). Southern theory: The global dynamics of knowledge in social science. Polity Press. Delgado, R. (1984). The imperial scholar: Reflections on a review of civil rights literature. University of Pennsylvania Law Review, 132(3), 561–578.

384  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Dollar, D., Fisman, R., & Gatti, R. (2001). Are women really the “fairer” sex? Corruption and women in government. Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, 46(4), 423–429. ECOSOC (1997). Draft resolution on mainstreaming a gender perspective into all policies and programmes in the United Nations system. United Nations Economic & Social Council. https:// www​.un​.org​/ecosoc​/sites​/www​.un​.org​.ecosoc​/files​/files​/en ​/2021doc​/2021​%20ECOSOC​%20draft​ %20resolution​%20on​%20gender​%20mainstreaming​.pdf Edmond, J. (2021). Points of reference: Citing Kamau Brathwaite decolonizing citation. Diacritics, 48(3), 10–39. Erlich, A., & Beauvais, E. (2023). Explaining women’s political underrepresentation in democracies with high levels of corruption. Political Science Research and Methods, 11, 804–822. Esarey, J., & Chirillo, G. (2013). “Fairer sex” or purity myth? Corruption, gender, and institutional context. Politics & Gender, 9(4), 361–389. Fe., C. (2022). Gendered norms and firms’ corruption: Evidence from China. In I. Kubbe & O. Merkle (Eds.), Norms, gender, and corruption: Understanding the nexus (pp. 45–59). Edward Elgar. Feather, G. (2022). Sustaining the patriarchal bargain in Morocco: The normalization of gendered Moroccan judicial corruption. In I. Kubbe & O. Merkle (Eds.), Norms, gender and corruption: Understanding the nexus (pp. 252–267). Edward Elgar. Feigenblatt, H. (2020). Breaking the silence around sextortion. The links between power, sex, and corruption. Transparency International. https://images​.transparencycdn​.org​/images​/2020​_Report​ _Bre​a kin​gSil​ence​A rou​ndSe​xtortion​_ English​.pdf Franceschet, S., & Piscopo, J. M. (2013). Sustaining gendered practices? Power, parties, and elite political networks in Argentina. Comparative Political Studies, 47(1), 85–110. GCB (2019). Global corruption barometer: Latin America and the Caribbean. Transparency International. https://www​.transparency​.org​/en ​/gcb​/ latin​-america ​/ latin​-america​-and​-the​-caribbean​ -x​-edition​-2019 Gerasymenko, G. (2018). Corruption in the eyes of women and men. UNDP Ukraine. https://www​.undp​ .org​/sites​/g​/files​/zskgke326​/files​/migration​/ua​/ b6a​83d8​d765​55a0​c8c8​4 405​9421​2f96​aa61​aa46​2ee5​ cb03​35db​97df​0280f5c9a​.pdf Goel, R. K., & Nelson, M. A. (2023). Women’s political empowerment: Influence of women in legislative versus executive branches in the fight against corruption. Journal of Policy Modeling, 45(1), 139–159. Goetz, A. M. (2007). Political cleaners: Women as the new anti-corruption force? Development and Change, 38(1), 87–105. Grimes, M., & Wängnerud, L. (2010). Curbing corruption through social welfare reform? The effects of Mexico’s cash transfer program on good government. The American Review of Public Administration, 40(6), 671–690. Guerra, A., & Tatyana Z. (2022). Do women always behave as corruption cleaners? Public Choice, 19, 173–192. Hossain, N., Musembi, C. N., & Hughes, J. (2015). Corruption, accountability and gender: Understanding the connections. UNDP & UNIFEM. https://www​.undp​.org​/sites​/g​/files​/zskgke326​ /files​/publications​/Corruption​-accountability​-and​-gender​.pdf IAWJ (2012). Stopping the abuse of power through sexual exploitation: Naming, shaming and ending sextortion. International Association of Women Judges. https://www​.unodc​.org​/res​/ji​/import​/guide​/ naming​_shaming​_ending​_sextortion​/naming​_shaming​_ending​_sextortion​.pdf Jenkins, M. (2017). The impact of corruption on access to safe water and sanitation for people living in poverty. U4 helpdesk answer 2017:6. U4 Anti-Corruption Resource Centre, Chr. Michelsen Institute. https://www​.u4​.no​/publications​/the​-impact​- of​- corruption​- on​-access​-to ​-safe​-water​-and​-sanitation​ -for​-people​-living​-in​-poverty Jennet, V. (2006). Sexual exploitation in peace-keeping missions. U4 helpdesk answer 2006. U4 Anti-Corruption Resource Centre, Chr. Michelsen Institute. https://www​.u4​.no​/publications​/sexual​ -exploitation​-in​-peace​-keeping​-missions​.pdf Johnson, J. E., Einarsdóttir, P., & Pétursdóttir, G. M. (2013). A feminist theory of corruption: Lessons from Iceland. Politics & Gender, 9(2), 174–206. Johnson, Z. C., et al. (n.d.). Cite Black Women: A critical practice. Cite Black Women. https:// www​.cit​ ebla​ckwo​menc​ollective​.org​/our​-praxis​.html

Untangling the gender-corruption nexus for social justice in the Global South  385 Kelly, K. (2019). “Don’t do your gender on me!” Gender mainstreaming and the politics of training in Vietnam. In V. Demos, M. Texler Segal, & K. Kelly (Eds.), Gender and practice: Insights from the field (Advances in gender research, Vol. 27) (pp. 71–87). Emerald Publishing Limited. Kelly, K., & Murray, M. (2022). Gender and anti-corruption: A training in six sessions. USAID. Khademi, S. (2017). Relationship between corruption and gender: A systematic review. Lambert Academic Publishing. Kirya, M. (2019). Promoting a gender-sensitive approach to addressing corruption in the forestry sector. U4 Issue 2019:14. U4 Center on Anti-Corruption Resource Centre, Chr. Michelsen Institute. https://www​.u4​.no ​/publications ​/gender​-forestry​-and​- corruption​-promoting​-a​-gender​- sensitive​ -approach​-to​-addressing​-corruption​-in​-the​-forestry​-sector​.pdf Klopp, J., Trimble, M., & Wiseman, E. (2022). Corruption, gender, and small-scale cross-border trade in East Africa: A review. Development Policy Review, 40, e12610. https://onlinelibrary​.wiley​.com​/ doi​/full​/10​.1111​/dpr​.12610 Kubbe, I., & Ortrun, M., Eds. (2022). Norms, gender, and corruption: Understanding the nexus. Edward Elgar. Kukutschka, R. M. B., & Vrushi, J. (2019). Global corruption barometer Middle East & North Africa 2019. Transparency International. https://www​.transparency​.org​/en​/publications​/global​-corruption​ -barometer​-middle​-east​-and​-north​-Africa​-2019 Leach, F., & Humphreys, S. (2007). Gender violence in schools: Taking the “girls-as-victims” discourse forward. Gender and Development, 15(1), 51–65. Lindeberg, H., & Stensöta, H. (2018). Corruption as exploitation: Feminist exchange theories and the link between gender and corruption. In H. Stenosöta & L. Wängnerud (Eds.), Gender and corruption: Historical roots and new avenues for research. Springer International Publishing. Lugones, M. (2007). Heterosexualism and the colonial/modern gender system. Hypatia, 22(1), 186–209. Lugones, M. (2008). The coloniality of gender. Worlds & Knowledges Otherwise, 2, 1–17. Lugones, M. (2010). Toward a decolonial feminism. Hypatia, 25(4), 742–759. Martin, P. Y. (2004). Gender as a social institution. Social Forces, 82(4), 1249–1273. Mazigh, L. J., Khefacha, I., & Smiri, B. (2023). Gender and corruption: Examining the nexus in MENA countries using PMG-ARDL approach. International Review of Applied Economics, 37(3), 357–371. McDonald, E., Jenkins, M., & Fitzgerald, J. (2021). Defying exclusion: Stories and insights on the links between discrimination and corruption. Transparency International and Equal Rights Trust. https:// images​.transparencycdn​.org​/images​/2021​-Defying​-exclusion​-Report​-v2​-EN​.pdf Merkle, O. (2018). Mainstreaming gender and human rights in anti-corruption programming. U4 helpdesk answer 2018:8. U4 Anti-Corruption Resource Centre, Chr. Michelsen Institute. https:// www​.u4​.no​/publications​/mainstreaming​-gender​-and​-human​-rights​-in​-anti​-corruption​-programming​ .pdf Merkle, O. (2019). The gendered dimensions of illicit financial flows. U4 helpdesk answer 2019:5. U4 Anti-Corruption Resource Centre, Chr. Michelsen Institute. https://www​.u4​.no​/publications​/the​ -gendered​-dimensions​-of​-illicit​-financial​-flows Merkle, O., Reingold, J., & Siegel, M. (2017). A gendered perspective of corruption encountered during forced and irregular migration. Maastricht Graduate School of Governance. https://i​.unu​.edu​/media​ /migration​.unu​.edu​/attachment​/4665​/A​- Gender​-Perspective ​- on​- Corruption​-Encountered​- during​ -Forced​-and​-Irregular​-Migration​.pdf Mwangi, J., Muna, W., & Naituli, G. (2022). Gender stereotypes and corruption in devolved systems of government: Evidence from local governments in Kenya. In I. Kubbe & O. Merkle (Eds.), Norms, gender, and corruption: Understanding the nexus (pp. 139–158). Edward Elgar. Ntaganda, E. (2012). Exploring the special judicial responses to SGBV: best practices, challenges, and guidelines in the Great Lakes Region. International Conference on the Great Lakes Region (ICGLR). https://www​.icglr​.org​/images​/ Publications​/sgbv​%20paper​%20judicial​%20response​.pdf PAPI (n.d.). Viet Nam Provincial Governance and Public Administration Performance Index. https:// papi​.org​.vn ​/eng/ Peiffer, C. (2023). Corruption through a gendered lens: Asia and the Pacific. Transparency International. https://images​.transparencycdn​.org​/images​/ Report​- Corruption​-through​-a​-gendered​-lens​-November​ -23​.pdf

386  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Persson, A., Rothstein, B., & Teorell, J. (2010). The failure of anti-corruption policies: A theoretical mischaracterization of the problem. (QoG Working Paper Series 2010:19). Goteborg University. https://gupea ​ .ub​ .gu ​ . se ​ / bitstream ​ / handle ​ / 2077​ / 39039​ /gupea ​ _ 2077​_ 39039​ _1​ .pdf ​ ?sequence ​ =1​ &isAllowed=y Rabb, M. (2017). Gender-responsive work on land corruption: A practical guide. Transparency International. https://images​.transparencycdn​.org​/images​/2017​_ Lan​dand​Corr​upti​onGe​nderGuide​ _EN​.pdf Rahman, K. (2022). Climate change, gender, and corruption. U4 helpdesk answer 2022:16. U4 AntiCorruption Resource Centre, Chr. Michelsen Institute. https://www​ .u4​ .no​ /publications​ /climate​ -change​-gender​-and​-corruption Ridgeway, C. L., & Correll, S. J. (2004). Unpacking the gender system: A theoretical perspective on gender beliefs and social relations. Gender & Society, 18, 510–531. Rose-Ackerman, S. (2013). Corruption: A study in political economy. Academic Press. Ruggiero, V. (2001). Crime and markets: Essays in anti-criminology. Oxford University Press. Ryan, M. K., & Haslam, S. A. (2007). The glass cliff: Exploring the dynamics surrounding the appointment of women to precarious leadership positions. The Academy of Management Review, 32(2), 549–572. http://www​.jstor​.org​/stable​/20159315 Schauseil, W. (2019). Media and anti-corruption. U4 report 2019:3. U4 Anti-Corruption Resource Centre, Chr. Michelsen Institute. https://www​.u4​.no​/publications​/media​-and​-corruption​.pdf Schoeberlein, J. (2021). Corruption and sexual and reproductive health in sub-Saharan Africa. U4 helpdesk answer 2021:5. U4 Anti-Corruption Resource Centre, Chr. Michelsen Institute. https:// www​.u4​ . no ​ / publications ​ /corruption ​ - and ​ - the ​ - right​ - to ​ - sexual​ - and ​ - reproductive ​ - health ​ -in ​ - sub​ -saharan​-africa​.pdf Sierra, E., & Boehm, F. (2015). The gendered impact of corruption: Who suffers more? Men or women? Transparency International. https://www​.u4​.no​/publications​/the​-gendered​-impact​-of​-corruption​ -who​-suffers​-more​-men​-or​-women​.pdf Stenosöta, H., & Wängnerud, L. (2018). Gender and corruption: Historical roots and new avenues for research. Palgrave Macmillan. Stockemer, D. (2011). Women’s parliamentary representation in Africa: The impact of democracy and corruption on the number of female deputies in national parliaments. Political Studies, 59(3), 693–712. Sung, H.-E. (2003). Fairer sex or fairer system? Gender and corruption revisited. Social Forces, 82(2), 703–723. Sung, H.-E. (2006). From victims to saviors: Women, power and corruption. Current History, 105(689), 139–143. Swamy, A., Knack, S., Lee, Y., & Azfar, O. (2001). Gender and corruption. Journal of Development Economics, 64(1), 25–55. Teorell, J. (2007). Corruption as an institution: Rethinking the nature and origins of the grabbing hand (QoG Working Paper Series 2007:5). Goteborg University. https://www​.gu​.se​/sites​/default​/files​/2020​ -05​/2007​_ 5​_Teorell​.pdf Tøaasen, M. (2022). Gender, corruption and recruitment in the Haitian judiciary: Merit vs political contacts. U4 brief 2022:6. U4 Anti-Corruption Resources Centre, Chr. Michelsen Institute. https:// www​.u4​.no​/publications​/gender​-corruption​-and​-recruitment​-in​-the​-haitian​-judiciary​.pdf Torraco, R. J. (2005). Writing integrative literature reviews: Guidelines and examples. Human Resource Development Review, 4, 356–367. Transparency International (2020). Breaking the silence around sextortion: The links between power, sex and corruption. https://apo​.org​.au​/sites​/default​/files​/resource​-files​/2020–03/apo​-nid278106​.​pdf Transparency International Zimbabwe (2019). Gender and corruption in Zimbabwe. https://www​.tizim​ .org​/wp​-content​/uploads​/2020​/07​/Gender​-and​-Corruption​-in​-Zimbabwe​-2019​.pdf UN Women (2022). Intersectionality resource guide and toolkit: An intersectional approach to leave no one behind. https://www​.unwomen​.org​/sites​/default​/files​/2022​- 01​/ Intersectionality​-resource​-guide​and​-toolkit​-en​.pdf UNDP (n.d). Survey methodology addressing gender equality related and corruption risks and vulnerabilities in civil service. http://www​.undp​.md​/media​/tender​_supportdoc​/2015​/1103​/Survey​ _Methodology-​_addressing​_gender​_equality​_ related​.pdf

Untangling the gender-corruption nexus for social justice in the Global South  387 UNDP (2012). Seeing beyond the state: Grassroots women’s perspectives of corruption and anticorruption.  Huairou  Commission.  https://www​.undp​.org ​/sites​/g ​/files​/zskgke326​/files​/publica tions​/Grassroots​%20women​%20and​%20anti​-corruption​.pdf UNESCO (2003). Gender and education for all: The leap to equality. Education for all – global monitoring report 2003. United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). https://www​.unesco​.org​/gem​-report​/en​/gender​-education​-all UNODC (n.d.). Knowledge tools for academics and professionals: Module series on anti-corruption (Module 8: Gender and corruption). UNODC and GRACE. https://grace​.unodc​.org​/grace​/uploads​/ documents​/academics​/Anti​-Corruption​_ Module​_8​_Corruption​_and​_Gender​.pdf UNODC (2020). The time is now: Addressing the gender dimensions of corruption. United Nations. https://www​.unodc​.org​/documents​/corruption ​/ Publications​/2020​/ THE ​_TIME ​_ IS​_ NOW​_ 2020​_12​ _08​.pdf UNODC (2021b). Gender mainstreaming in the work of the UNODC: Guidance note for UNODC staff. https://www​.unodc​.org​/documents​/Gender​/20 ​- 04944​_Gender​_ Note​_final​_ebook ​_cb​.pdf Vergès, F. (2021). A decolonial feminism. Pluto Press. Wanyana, R. (2023). The gendered dimensions of corruption in fragile and conflict-affected contexts. U4 helpdesk answer 2023:10. U4 Anti-Corruption Resource Centre, Chr. Michelsen Institute. https:// www​.u4​.no​/publications​/the​-gendered​- dimensions​- of​- corruption​-in​-fragile​-and​- conflict​-affected​ -contexts White, S., Bandali, S., & Kirya, M. (2023). Feminist policy in Ukraine’s recovery and post-conflict reconstruction: A gender perspective on anti-corruption efforts. U4 report 2023:3. U4 AntiCorruption Resource Centre, Chr. Michelsen Institute. https://www​ .u4​ .no​ /publications​ /feminist​ -policy​ -in​ - ukraines​ - recovery​ - and​ - post​ - conflict​ - reconstruction​ - a​ -gender​ - perspective​ -in​ - anti​ -corruption​-efforts Zinnbauer, D. (2023). Anti-corruption and integrity training: Learning how to resist corruption. U4 report 2023:3. U4 Anti-Corruption Resource Centre, Chr. Michelsen Institute. https://www​.u4​.no​/ publications​/anti​-corruption​-integrity​-training​-learning​-how​-to​-resist​-corruption​.pdf Zúñiga, N. (2020). Gender sensitivity in corruption reporting and whistleblowing. Transparency International.  https://www​.u4​.no​/publications ​/gender​-sensitivity​-in​- corruption​-reporting​-and​whistleblowing​.pdf

25. Making insurgent citizenship in India’s Bhil heartland Alf Gunvald Nilsen

25.1 INTRODUCTION Writing about the urban poor in Brazil’s erstwhile capital city Rio de Janeiro from the 1920s to the 1960s, Brodwyn Fischer (2008, p. 1) coins the term “a poverty of rights” to refer to “the incomplete enfranchisement of the urban poor” and its consequences. The lifeworlds of the urban poor in Brazil, she argues, have, to a large extent, always been defined by tenuous legal status and incomplete enfranchisement (2008, pp. 6–7). “The fact that poor people’s citizenship remained so incomplete and fragmented, and that a common poverty of rights came to define the urban poor as clearly as material lack did,” Fischer writes, “has arguably prevented the full consolidation of Brazilian democracy” (2008, pp. 7–8). Fischer’s argument contains a simple but profoundly significant insight, namely that the socioeconomic inequalities that are often considered to be the primary negations of social justice in the Global South are, more often than not, deeply entangled with legal and political inequalities. Those who suffer material poverty, deprivation, and precarity, in other words, also suffer “rights poverty” (2008, p. 1) – a poverty that manifests in only being able to lay a very partial claim to the law and to citizenship rights to demand redistribution and recognition. The converse side of this insight is, of course, that social justice is crucially dependent on full and expansive citizenship – that is, on being recognized as having the right to have rights (see Somers, 2008). Yet, as is evident from Fischer’s Brazilian example, the right to have rights is never a given, not even in democratic contexts. On the contrary, social groups who, in actual terms, are only partially enfranchised or whose legal status is fragile must often resort to “acts of citizenship” (Isin, 2008) – that is, oppositional collective action that ruptures legal marginalization and disenfranchisement, and in so doing, also enacts the right to have rights. Becoming a rights-bearing subject in the Global South, then, is a victory gained through the struggles of subaltern movements, rather than a legal status handed down from on high by political authorities (see, for example Holston, 2008; Subramanian, 2009; Brown, 2015). In this chapter, I draw on my research on the social movements of Adivasi (Indigenous) communities in rural India to discuss how subaltern groups can claim citizenship from the ground up and how claimsmaking from below deepens and transforms the meanings of citizenship in the Global South.1 India, of course, is a democracy – the world’s largest democracy, in fact – and its people enjoy the full spectrum of rights typically associated with citizenship, both as a legal status and as a form of belonging and participation in a political community. However, it is an undeniable fact, as Patrick Heller (2000) has argued, that although India’s political system displays all the trappings of a formal democracy, it has failed to become a substantive democracy in which subaltern communities can vindicate claims for redistribution and recognition. As such, Indian democracy suffers from a distinctive “social deficit” 388

Making insurgent citizenship in India’s Bhil heartland  389 (Jaffrelot, 2000 p. 86), which means that genuine citizenship remains elusive for poorer and less powerful groups in the country. This is particularly true in relation to India’s Adivasis. The term Adivasi literally means “first inhabitant” and expresses a claim to being Indigenous.2 The origins of the term can be traced to the 1930s and the efforts of activists from tribal groups in what is now the state of Jharkhand in eastern India to stake a claim for recognition of aboriginal status in the context of the making of a new nation (see Devalle, 1992). As it turned out, the Indian state did not recognize Adivasis as Indigenous people (see Shah, 2007). Rather, in state discourse, they are defined as Scheduled Tribes under the Fifth and Sixth Schedules of the Indian Constitution, which provide an array of protective legislation, special entitlements, and reservations for Adivasis in public sector employment and higher education.3 However, India’s betrayal of Adivasi claims goes beyond constitutional codification. In 2011, the World Bank estimated that some 45 percent of India’s 104 million Adivasis, whose livelihoods typically combine subsistence agriculture in hilly and forested parts of India’s vast countryside with casual work in the urban informal sector, live below the country’s poverty line (World Bank, 2011). More recently, an index of multidimensional poverty has shown that 81.4 percent of Adivasis live in poverty, compared to 33.3 percent of upper caste groups and a national average of 55.4 percent of the Indian population (see Shah et al., 2018). Moreover, Adivasi communities are vastly overrepresented among the approximately 50 million people who have been dispossessed by large dams and extractive industries in India since 1947 (see Nilsen, 2010). Adivasi poverty is in part a result of adverse incorporation into India’s economy as marginal and dispossessed peasants and precarious workers. However, it is also a result of how Adivasis are very often incorporated on adverse terms into the state and subjected to forms of political subordination that prevent the kind of collective action and oppositional claims-making that can transform asymmetrical power relations. But what happens when Adivasi communities refuse such political subordination and claim the right to have rights? In this chapter, I address this question by exploring the activism of two local social movements that organized and mobilized Bhil Adivasi communities in the rural hinterland of western Madhya Pradesh in the 1980s and 1990s.4 Western Madhya Pradesh is part of a wider region that also encompasses north-western Maharashtra, south-eastern Gujarat, and southern Rajasthan and is home to the majority of India’s Bhil Adivasis. I refer to this region in western India as the Bhil heartland. The Bhil heartland is plagued by severe and chronic poverty. Material deprivation is in turn entrenched by the disenfranchisement of Adivasi communities in local state-society relations. However, deprivation and subordination have not gone unchallenged. Starting in eastern Maharashtra with Shramik Sangathana (Workers Organization) and Bhoomi Sena (Land Army) in the early 1970s and Kashtakari Sangathana in the late 1970s, the region witnessed the emergence of local grassroots organizations in Adivasi communities that have contested oppression by the local state and vindicated the legitimacy of Adivasi use rights in relation to land, forests, and forest resources (see Nilsen, 2016). The two movements that I focus on in this chapter – the Khedut Mazdoor Chetna Sangath (KMCS; Workers and Peasants Consciousness Organization) and the Adivasi Mukti Sangathan (AMS; Adivasi Liberation Organization) – followed in the footsteps of these struggles to democratize local state-society relations. I develop my analysis and argument in three steps. First, I present a brief sketch of local state-society relations in the Bhil heartland. I refer to these as everyday tyranny – that is, these state-society relations were characterized by a profoundly predatory and coercive set

390  Handbook of social justice in the Global South of interactions that defined the relationship between local state personnel and Adivasi communities. I discuss the main facets of this durable form of political subordination and trace its origins in colonial and postcolonial state formation. Second, I show how collective challenges to everyday tyranny were predicated on the emergence of an oppositional local rationality of moral courage and reciprocal emotions of trust and friendship among movement participants. I argue that these “emotions of protest” (Jasper, 1998) enabled Adivasi communities to engage in what was, in fact, a form of high-risk activism (McAdam, 1986). Third, I turn to an analysis of how the KMCS and the AMS used the legal and political idioms of India’s postcolonial democracy to stake claims for redistribution and recognition. Framed as a critical dialogue with Partha Chatterjee’s (2004) work on the politics of the governed, I focus on how the struggles of these two movements radicalized the meanings of the universalizing vocabularies of the state and, in so doing, created a political culture of “insurgent citizenship” (Holston, 2008).

25.2 A BRIEF NOTE ON METHODOLOGY The data this chapter is based on was collected during 18 months of fieldwork in rural western Madhya Pradesh in 2009 and 2010. The fieldwork was carried out in collaboration with two former KMCS activists who ran a school for Adivasi children in the region. Working together, we involved teachers from the school, who hailed from local Adivasi communities, in the fieldwork. We organized a two-day workshop to discuss the project and why it was important to document the narratives of activists who had been involved with the KMCS and the AMS. An interview guide was developed, first in Hindi and then in Bareli, a local tribal language, and a handful of pilot interviews were conducted. With this foundation in place, we began criss-crossing the districts of Alirajpur, Badwani, and Khargone and conducting approximately 60 interviews with activists, sometimes individually and sometimes in groups. The interviews were subsequently transcribed into English by a team of people working across multiple tribal languages, Hindi, and English. In addition, during the same period, I interviewed approximately 10 English-speaking middle-class activists who had been involved with the KMCS and the AMS. Given the dearth of a substantial written archive documenting the history of the movement, my attempt to reconstruct the trajectories of the KMCS and the AMS is based almost entirely on the data collected through these in-depth interviews.

25.3 THE EVERYDAY TYRANNY OF THE STATE Our people were very afraid of the sarkar and the town… They would sleep with the tigers and live with them, but they did not fear them. But if anyone said that the sarkar has said that things are like this, then they would believe this to be true. (Govindbhai, AMS activist, February 2010)

This is one example of many of how activists would narrate the relationship that had existed between them and the local state before they got involved in organizing and mobilizing oppositional collective action. Inevitably, these narratives would detail the predation and the violence of state personnel on the one hand, and their own anxiety and submission to this

Making insurgent citizenship in India’s Bhil heartland  391 predation and violence on the other hand. And what emerges from these narratives is an anatomy of sorts of a state-society relation of everyday tyranny (see Nilsen, 2018, Chapter 2). At the heart of this relation was a profoundly rapacious and coercive set of interactions and encounters in which low-ranking state personnel would use the powers vested in them in relation to law enforcement as well as their role in dispensing public services – coupled with very real threats of violence – to extract a wide variety of bribes from tribal villagers. The Forest Department and its nakedars (forest guards) figured most prominently in these narratives, with their persistent demands for bribes in order to turn a blind eye to Adivasi cultivation in the forest – a customary practice which was a de facto crime due to the nature of Indian forest legislation (see Gadgil & Guha, 1993) – but the police and the patwaris (revenue officials) were similarly known for demanding bribes in cash and in kind on a wide range of spurious pretexts. The state had consequently come to be viewed as a dangerous and exploitative entity in the Bhil communities in western Madhya Pradesh. Everyday tyranny was a durable form of political subordination. It goes without saying that in a context where refusing a corrupt demand was out of the question, democratic claims-making was not even thinkable. “They were gods, and we had no knowledge,” a group of activists from Alirajpur district put it. “Our job was just to work on the khet (agriculture) and do mazdoori (wage labor) to fill our stomachs. What can the poor and the kisan (peasant) do anyway?” (Group interview, KMCS activists, November 2009.) I want to note three significant things about this state-society relation. First, it had deep historical roots. In the Bhil heartland, colonial state formation gravitated around a profound restructuring of the relations of authority that prevailed between Bhil forest polities and princely states. Precolonial relations of “shared sovereignty” (Skaria, 1999), in which the political authority of Bhil chieftains tended to be recognized by princely rulers in the region to some extent, gave way to new forms of singular sovereignty, shaped by the interventions of the British, in which the Bhils were far more decisively subordinated to the enhanced power of princely rulers. The reproduction of this subordination after independence is in large part related to the fact that the Indian National Congress, when it came to power after independence, incorporated princely rulers in the region into the machinery that sustained its hegemony in national electoral politics. In so doing, postcolonial state formation effectively produced a situation in which Bhil Adivasis were subordinated to a political regime defined by the persistence of upper-caste and upper-class hegemony. Second, it would be incorrect to describe everyday tyranny in terms of a fault line that sharply separates the state from the community. Everyday tyranny was mediated and enacted in and through the internal power structures of the Bhil communities, as a result of how a village elite of patels (traditional headmen) and sarpanches (elected village heads) and wealthier households acted as dalals (brokers) between ordinary villagers and the regional and local state apparatuses. Third, everyday tyranny was also embedded in a wider social field of force in which Adivasi subordination is sanctified by the ascriptive hierarchies that are at the heart of caste ideology: subordination and submission in interactions with the local state were mirrored in the subordination and submission that characterized interactions between Adivasis and caste Hindus in the market towns that constitute important nodes of economic and political power across the rural hinterland of western Madhya Pradesh. Significantly, activist narratives convey a sense of being helplessly enmeshed in a web of overwhelmingly powerful vested interests. “This whole system to skin us had been put in place,” one activist said as he recounted the

392  Handbook of social justice in the Global South oppression of the past. Within this web, the lines between overwhelmingly non-Adivasi state personnel and dominant caste Hindu groups more generally are often blurred, and the two groups were typically defined by what they tended to have in common, namely a violent proclivity for appropriating assets from the Bhils. To fully grasp the durability of everyday tyranny, we need to probe deeper into the local rationality that this state-society relation spawned. To clarify, when I use the term local rationality, I refer to actually existing and historically specific repertoires of skills, practices, and meanings that subaltern groups develop to negotiate their adverse incorporation into specific sets of power relations in a given locale at a given point in time (see Cox & Nilsen, 2014, Chapter 3). And in the Bhil Adivasi communities of western Madhya Pradesh, the workings of everyday tyranny across time had spawned a local rationality of deference and acquiescence in relation to the state and its personnel. Rapacious demands for bribes were heeded; unlawful coercion went unchallenged; Bhil subordination was obediently performed according to the expectations of forest guards, police, and patwaris. These practices seem to have been grounded, above all, in the certainty that defiance would provoke violent reprisals from state personnel and village elites. Practices of acquiescence and deference were closely related to the meanings that Bhils ascribed to their relationship to the state. When activists spoke of how they had perceived the state and its personnel, they would return, time and again, to representations of the state as a God-like entity – they would refer, quite literally, to the state as Bhagwan – or to the state as big and themselves as small: “Our people always thought that they were very small and that the sarkar was very big,” Kulsingh of the AMS put it. “We would regard the sarkar to be very big and felt that nothing could happen without the government’s permission” (Kulsingh, AMS activist, November 2009). Acquiescence and deference were grounded in resignation and fear as a set of “cementing emotions” (Flam, 2005) – that is, emotions that work in such a way as to reproduce regnant relations of power. Resignation typically came to the fore when I prompted activists to reflect on how they felt about the constant exactions and threats to which they were subjected. For example, when I queried a Bhil activist from Khargone district as to whether people in local communities were aware that the corrupt demands to which they were subject were in fact unlawful, his response was suffused with a similar sense that their perceptions of right and wrong were of little consequence given the power wielded by state personnel: “What is wrong and what is right? We had to give – otherwise we would be beaten up” (Ringnya, AMS activist, February 2010). This pervasive sense of resignation is perhaps best understood as a psychological adaptation to the state of being without power (see Gaventa, 1988). The impacts of this adaptation were amplified by the fact that resignation was closely interlaced with a deep and widespread fear of the state and its personnel. Fear was not present in the Bhil communities of western Madhya Pradesh in the form of individual and transient responses to specific experiences of danger to which the term normally refers, but rather in a collective and routinized form. Indeed, to borrow from Linda Green’s (1996) work on the Indigenous experience of civil war in Guatemala, fear had become a way of life for Bhil Adivasis, and was specifically integral to the ways in which they lived their relationship to the state and to the ways in which they experienced this durable relation of power in their daily lives. “So much fear was inside us – not to go with the sarkar, not to climb any steps, not to educate our children. What is the Adivasi? Nothing at all!

Making insurgent citizenship in India’s Bhil heartland  393 We only know how to work hard,” Govindbhai, an AMS activist, said as he tried to explain this reality to me (Govindbhai, AMS activist, February 2010). It is entirely legitimate to ask whether this account of everyday tyranny in the Bhil heartland overstates the nature and degree of Adivasi subordination to the local state. Surely, being subjected to such heinous treatment must have generated other emotions than simply resignation and fear – for example, anger? And surely, Adivasi practices in relation to the state cannot have revolved solely around acquiescence and deference – there must have been some kind of defiance? Anger figured, quite naturally, in activist accounts, along with the ubiquitous narratives of fear and resignation. But crucially, the anger that they spoke of would never find a confrontational outlet: “We would talk amongst ourselves,” a group of activists said, “but things would never go further than that” (Group interview, KMCS activists, November 20, 2009). At most, defiance found expression in individual attempts to evade the exactions of state personnel, for example, by concealing evidence of having made use of forest resources: freshly cut timber would be smeared with mud, buried in the ground, or blackened with the soot of burnt teak leaves to escape the attention of the forest guards. Yet overt defiance – for example, refusing a demand for a bribe or for chanda – remained beyond the perceived horizon of possibility: “People would feel angry, and they would curse too. But what could they do? They had to give” (Nanibai, AMS activist, February 2010). In other words, fear, along with resignation, can be understood as constituting the foundational pillar of an “emotional habitus” (Gould, 2009) – that is, a set of collective and only partly conscious emotional dispositions shared by a social group – which contributed in crucial ways to cementing the political subordination of the Bhils. This was compounded by the absence of what Sumi Madhok (2003) calls “political literacy” – that is, knowledge of the institutions of the state, and the rules that govern their functioning. As one Bhil activist put it: “What is the state? Who is the ruler? Earlier we didn’t know any of these things” (Jalsingh, KMCS activist, February 2010). Consequently, the same state that was fearsome and overpowering was also opaque and unfamiliar to most ordinary Adivasis. “People were suppressed and there was nobody to tell us about the laws and the rules,” one AMS activist said. “If we had to fight, what would we fight with?” (Suraj, AMS activist, October 2009.) This extreme subalternity obviously begs questions about how collective resistance – resistance that in this violence-riven context undoubtedly qualifies as what Doug McAdam (1986) calls “high-risk activism” – eventually came about in the Bhil heartland.

25.4 MAKING OPPOSITIONAL LOCAL RATIONALITIES “Activism begins within fields of possibility,” writes Naisargi Dave (2012, p. 9) in her rich exploration of queer activism in India, “in the form of an emergent sense that something is now possible.” How did such a structure of feeling emerge in Bhil communities of western Madhya Pradesh? The KMCS and the AMS emerged from interventions by urban-middle-class activists. In the case of the KMCS, these were often disenchanted non-governmental organization workers, and, in the case of the AMS, the two key external figures were former activists with the All-India Students Federation. Crucially, the starting point for the mobilization of the KMCS and the AMS was a series of law-based challenges to specific cases of corruption, violence, and malpractice by local state personnel that reversed the grammar of everyday tyranny in

394  Handbook of social justice in the Global South important ways. I will elaborate on the nature of these challenges in the third part of the chapter. The point I want to make in this section is that these confrontations should be thought of as “catalytic events” that ruptured the routine practices and received wisdoms of everyday tyranny. In so doing, they were instrumental in generating an oppositional local rationality (see Nilsen, 2018, Chapter 5). In arguing this, I draw on William Sewell’s (1996) work on historical events and the transformation of structures. At the core of this work is the proposition that a localized rupture caused by a specific event always has the potential to bring about a cascading series of further ruptures, which may in turn bring about transformations in regnant structural constellations and power relations. My contention is that this is exactly what happened – albeit on a much smaller scale than that with which Sewell engages in his work – in the catalytic events that made the organizing and mobilizing work of the KMCS and the AMS possible. These confrontations constituted catalytic events mainly because they disarticulated the emotional habitus of fear and resignation that had underpinned the durability of everyday tyranny. Activist narratives of involvement with the organizing and mobilizing work of the KMCS and the AMS consistently emphasized emotional alterations of the self that centered on the loss of fear. Consider the following statement by KMCS activist Lalsingh: … I don’t feel scared if the Collector or anyone else comes. Being in the Sangathan and having fought there, all fears have left me now. We fought for our rights in the village here and also took out rallies in the cities and towns. In every village, people would hold meetings and discuss what the problems and issues were and then we would go and meet the Collector for a solution to the problems. So, by doing all this, the fears have gone away. (Lalsingh, KMCS activist, November 2009)

What he emphasizes is how he lost his fear of the state through the act of movement participation itself. Crucially, activists would also consistently link these emotional transformations of the self to the collective nature of the opposition that was being mounted against everyday tyranny. For example, when I asked whether people were hesitant to join the KMCS due to fear of reprisals, one of their activists responded: “Yes, they did think like this, but if we ourselves become scared, then the others will also get scared. So, we didn’t budge and remained unmoved. We had decided that now if anyone were beaten even once, then all of us – men and women – would come forward and save that person” (Kamalsingh, KMCS activist, September 2009). But if fear and resignation were giving way, what were they giving way to? There is one particular theme that emerges from interviews with Bhil activists, namely that of having gained the ability to speak. “We are no longer scared of the police. We can speak with freedom now,” one AMS activist asserted proudly during an interview (Bhuvan, AMS activist, April 2010). Another activist put it like this: “Gradually we learnt to speak. We got educated. Now we are not afraid to speak our mind” (Valsingh, AMS activist, February 2010). What statements such as this suggest is that the waning of fear made it possible to speak out about injustice and oppression by confronting and talking back to those who imposed everyday tyranny through coercive demands and violent exactions. Clearly, a counter-hegemonic emotional habitus crystallized around what Barrington Moore (1978) referred to in his seminal book Injustice as “moral courage” – that is, the capacity to resist powerful and frightening social pressures to obey oppressive or destructive rules or commands. Importantly, gaining a capacity to speak and the sense of moral courage that this imparted to Bhil activists tended to be linked to being able to direct rights-based claims at figures of authority in the local state structure. “The

Making insurgent citizenship in India’s Bhil heartland  395 way in which to talk, how to talk to officers and authorities, how to get the work done – this seekhna (learning) I have got,” was how a senior female activist expressed this transformation (Barlibai, AMS activist, February 2010). Moral courage is an example of what Jim Jasper (1998) calls “shared emotions” among activists – that is, an emotion directed outwards from the activist collective, typically towards opponents or objects of protest. However, my account would be incomplete without a discussion of the significance of the “reciprocal emotions” – close, affective ties of friendship, solidarity, and trust – that emerged between movement participants and sustained the activist collectives in their acts of citizenship. This is particularly so in terms of how friendship, solidarity, and trust emerged between urban middle-class activists and Bhil Adivasis in the initial phase of mobilization. For the middle-class activists who were central in bringing the two movements into existence, the Bhil heartland was largely unfamiliar terrain – indeed, for most of them, it was their first direct encounter with rural India and with political mobilization. Their first experiences with activism portray a slow and often frustrating process, characterized by persistent engagement and negotiations between them and the Bhil communities. Amit, one of the middle-class activists of the KMCS, described the initial years of the movement in terms of a continuous dialogue in which community problems were mapped and discussed, and the pros and cons of organized protest considered and debated, but nothing much would happen. “So for one or two years this thing just kept on,” he said, “we would just be talking to people” (Amit, KMCS activist, August 2009). These challenges were not just a result of the pervasive fear of reprisals from their oppressors. They were also a consequence of the fact that the Bhils were often – and with good reason – skeptical of non-Adivasi outsiders. Nevertheless, skepticism and reticence gradually yielded to trust, and Adivasi activist narratives suggest that this was a result of the nature of the interaction between them and the middle-class outsiders. First, the fact that the middle-class activists showed genuine interest in their problems played an important role, in no small part because it contrasted with the callous rapaciousness of local state personnel. Second, the middle-class activists were also perceived as being able to convey ideas of justice and dignity that resonated with the submerged anger that many Bhils felt in relation to the local state and its personnel. Third, their ability to bring about change and their willingness to put themselves in harm’s way while doing so were instrumental in building trust. And finally, conviviality and civility – for example, polite speech – in everyday interactions enabled Bhil Adivasis to trust and befriend the outsiders. Activism brings with it new possibilities for how to be in the world. This becomes particularly apparent if we consider Adivasi activist self-making in the KMCS and the AMS. When Bhil Adivasis spoke about the extraordinary transition that they made in becoming full-time activists, they often did so in an instrumental register in which activism was portrayed as a form of practice that enabled them to solve concrete problems in their daily interactions with the state. Activism, however, was never spoken of only in an instrumental register. Rather, the emphasis on the ability to bring about tangible and useful change was coupled consistently with an emphasis on idealism. “I had a desire from the start to go in the Sangathan. I wanted to do something for my community. Some sort of contribution should happen” (Guliyabhai, AMS activist, November 2009). When activists spoke in this register, they often referred to their activism as “good work” (achha kaam) or “service” (seva). As Manuela Ciotti (2012) has pointed out, when subaltern groups appropriate this idiom, it comes to be shot through with significant and potentially transgressive ramifications, as

396  Handbook of social justice in the Global South they position themselves as providers rather than receivers of social service and social work. In so doing, they also posit the possibility of subaltern self-emancipation. Such transgressive forms of self-making entail significant risks – not just of violence or imprisonment, but also of familial conflict and, for women who joined the movements in particular, stigma and dishonor in the community. However, their negotiation of these risks played an important role in nourishing the oppositional local rationality that had been brought into being by collective defiance against everyday tyranny. Ultimately, what all this points to is, of course, that the ability of subaltern groups to engage in “acts of citizenship” (Isin, 2008) – acts that rupture those sociohistorical constellations of power that deprive exploited and oppressed groups of the right to have rights – is crucially dependent on what Deborah Gould (2015) refers to as “emotion work” in social movements.

25.5 THE POLITICS OF INSURGENT CITIZENSHIP I turn now to a discussion of how Adivasi communities appropriated the universalizing vocabularies of the modern Indian state in their pursuit of emancipatory change (see Nilsen, 2018, Chapter 6). I develop my argument in this section in a critical dialogue with Partha Chatterjee’s (2004) widely influential work on the politics of the governed in India and the postcolonial world more generally. As I mentioned above, the KMCS and the AMS emerged through a series of law-based challenges to everyday tyranny. These challenges followed a typical form. For example, in one case, a delegation of villagers and activists confronted the Deputy Superintendent of Police with the corrupt demands of local constables and officers and demanded to know whether or not this was legal. The DSP confirmed that it was not and made it clear that he would take serious action against any attempt to collect bribes from the villagers. Following this incident, the constables at the local thana stayed well away from this village and never attempted to collect the bribe they had demanded. The significance of challenges such as this was two-fold. First, the confrontation between the villagers and the local police entailed a significant amount of collective learning about the local state and gave rise to substantial political literacy. However, and this is the second point, the impact of this strategy is about more than the emergence of political literacy. Although the law and legal matters were of great importance to these early mobilizations, the KMCS and the AMS never adopted a strictly judicial form of activism. Rather, the law provided these movements with a highly effective language of contention that was consistently coupled with the disruptive power of subaltern collective action. This runs counter to Chatterjee’s (2004) claim that subaltern groups attempt to gain tacit acknowledgment of various illegal practices through the declaration of an exception from legal norms. The KMCS and the AMS actively held the state and its personnel accountable to the law and insisted that legality should prevail in local state-society relations. This is an example of what Julia Eckert (2006) has called “legalism from below” – that is, political practices in which subaltern groups use the law to oppose illegal or extra-legal ways of governing. In the context of everyday tyranny, this resort to the law was fundamentally subversive of regnant power relations. The reason for this is not that the law is a great equalizer, as per the precepts of liberal theory, but rather because the law cannot serve its ideological function if it does not, at least on occasion, appear to be just (see Thompson, 1975). In short, the law

Making insurgent citizenship in India’s Bhil heartland  397 provided activists with a language of contention that could be leveraged in relation to the hegemonic political idioms of the state through collective action. Activists were clear that it was their newfound ability to pursue grievances by fusing the law with collective mobilization that had enabled them to take a stand against the illegal exactions of state personnel. Activists would also put their claims-making skills to use to obtain small-scale development interventions from the local state. Crucially, such interventions were spoken of as the rightful entitlements of citizens who contribute to the state through taxes, and this is linked to the emergence of a new way of imagining the state. Whereas previously, the state was seen as a god-like entity, a new imaginary emerged in which the state was seen as a representative institution that draws its power from a citizenry that consigns legitimacy upon it through the act of voting. Moreover, the entrenched hierarchies that ascribed superiority to the state functionary and inferiority to the Adivasi peasant were reversed. The idea that the state derives its legitimacy from citizens and is undergirded by the labor of peasant cultivators and therefore also accountable to the public was closely related to the positing of Adivasis as bearers of rights (haq). By aggregating Adivasi grievances into rights-based claims and demands and pursuing these claims through collective action, the KMCS and the AMS carved out a space in which democratic transactions could take place. In so doing, these movements effectively brought civil society from formal to substantive existence in the tribal areas of western Madhya Pradesh. This, I think, should give cause for questioning Chatterjee’s (2004, p. 4) claim that civil society exists in India only as “enclaves of civic freedom and rational law” for a privileged minority. It also begs questions about the historiography that underpins this claim, in which civil society is a circumscribed space due to its origins in the political activity of nationalist elites in early twentieth-century India. My point here is that we cannot think of civil society in static terms. Indeed, civil society is a far more fluid and porous domain than Chatterjee allows for – in no small part because subaltern groups have demanded and, to varying degrees, obtained substantial entry to and inclusion in its ambit over the past seven decades. Our conceptual attempts to grapple with subaltern politics will therefore have to take cognizance of how mobilization on the terrain of civil society shapes and reshapes both the political subjectivities of subalterns and the workings of India’s democracy. This does not entail a simple positing of civil society as a sphere of free civic association. Indeed, it is the state (or rather, that part of the state that Gramsci (1971) labeled political society) that provides the legal and political frameworks within which civil society is constituted. And while these frameworks enable the very existence of civil society, they also circumscribe what subaltern groups can and cannot achieve through mobilizations on this terrain. This, in turn, has ramifications for how we understand the impacts of the activism of the KMCS and the AMS on local state-society relations. As much as these movements democratized state-society relations by bringing a rudimentary civil society into being in western Madhya Pradesh, this cannot be construed as contesting the hegemony of the state. Rather, it is quite conceivable that, through its concessions to the demands of the KMCS and the AMS, the state bolstered its legitimacy and sought to contain subaltern claims-making within the political boundaries of a particular hegemonic formation. Yet, the containment of subaltern resistance within a liberal field of politics is neither a foregone conclusion nor an achieved state of affairs. To make clear what I mean by this, I turn now to look at how the KMCS and the AMS generated a form of “insurgent citizenship”

398  Handbook of social justice in the Global South (Holston, 2008) that, in many ways, exceeded the boundaries of what is politically permissible within a determinate hegemonic formation such as India’s postcolonial democracy. As a conceptual point of departure here, I want to suggest that citizenship should be conceived of not in Chatterjee’s (2004) terms as a specific legal status, embodied in a liberal bundle of rights, but rather as the insistence on the right to have rights. The origins of this right should instead be located in oppositional acts that rupture social and historical patterns of domination and subalternity. If we adopt such an approach, we can account for how claims are transformed into rights through collective action in ways that bring about reconstitutions of both governmental categories and legal frameworks, and by extension, new and expanded meanings of citizenship. It was precisely an oppositional claim for the right to have rights that was at the heart of mobilization in western Madhya Pradesh. In a context where state-society relations were defined by subjecthood, the KMCS and the AMS demanded the de facto recognition of Adivasis as having rights in relation to the state as a political community. Indeed, as much as the KMCS and the AMS appropriated constitutional rights and legal provisions in their claims-making, it was not the existence of those rights and provisions in and of themselves that brought about de facto citizenship in Adivasi communities – it was the act of mobilizing to challenge everyday tyranny that enabled Adivasis to constitute themselves as those to whom the right to have rights is due. To understand how this claims-making also generated new understandings and subjects of rights, I want to focus on how the AMS mobilized for local self-rule during the mid-1990s. The AMS’s mobilization was closely linked to the national campaign for local self-rule in Adivasi areas, which ultimately resulted in the enactment of the Provisions of the Panchayats (Extension to the Scheduled Areas) Act (PESA) – a law which, in a nutshell, devolves significant powers of governance to the level of the Gram Sabha in Scheduled Areas.5 Now, PESA is widely known not to have lived up to activist expectations that the law would bring about significant emancipatory outcomes for Adivasi communities. However, the law has had a significant impact on state-society relations in tribal areas by enabling Adivasi communities to articulate political imaginaries centered on ideas of autonomy, sovereignty, and – notably – rights over natural resources (see Choubey, 2015). This holds true also in the case of the AMS. Activists readily admitted that the Sangathan has not been able to use PESA to secure substantial advances in terms of self-rule. However, the notion of hamare gaon, hamara raj (our village, our rule) has come to mold the way in which activists conceive of citizenship and rights. Significantly, the rights-based claims that were articulated by the AMS were neither simply claims to be recognized as citizens with civil and political liberties in the liberal sense, nor were these claims bounded by a logic of equality in which subaltern groups demand rights that are already in existence. Rather, rightsbased claims came increasingly to be articulated in terms of a collective Adivasi identity, in which the central loci of consciousness formation were the dispossession of natural resources – jal, jangal, zameen (water, forest, land) – and the claim to have the rights to these resources restored through the restitution of Bhil sovereignty within a determinate territory. What was engendered in and through this process of opposition, appropriation, and negotiation was a form of “insurgent citizenship” (Holston, 2008). This term refers to a conception of rights that remains conjoined in many ways with hegemonic regimes of citizenship, but which pushes in the direction of the invention of a new society rather than merely a perpetuation of the old because it is grounded in the social needs of subaltern groups. To be sure, the

Making insurgent citizenship in India’s Bhil heartland  399 discourse of Indigenous rights that emerged among AMS activists was forged in relation to what Chatterjee (2004) would call governmental categories – that is, the Scheduled Tribe as a specific population group and the Scheduled Area as a particular space within the national territory inscribed in India’s constitution. Yet, it also destabilized these categories in significant ways. This is so because the claim for local self-rule was centered on the injustice of dispossession and disenfranchisement as the origin of Adivasi subalternity. This is very different from the constitutional trope of backwardness, which effectively erases from view how the dispossession and disenfranchisement of Adivasis is inextricably linked to colonial and postcolonial processes of state formation, and posits Adivasis as overwhelmingly passive and dependent on an external agent – that is, the benevolent state – for succor and uplift (Chandra, 2013). The mobilization by the AMS rejected the paternal governance of the state and insisted on Adivasi self-activity as the pivot of emancipatory transformation. In this way, the idiom of citizenship came to be inflected with insurgent meanings that exceed both that which is purely governmental and that which is purely liberal. That excess is located in the claim for justice for Adivasis – a justice that requires for its fulfillment something more than just welfare and protection, namely a particular form of inclusion and membership in the political community predicated on what Noel Castree (2004) refers to as a “differentiated geography” that grants resource control, a measure of territorial sovereignty, and the inscription of the Adivasi into the juridical framework of the state as a legal subject capable of self-governance. There is significant potential in these dynamics for rupturing political subordination, and this potential deserves to be taken seriously in the study of struggles for social justice in the Global South.

25.6 CONCLUDING REMARKS The activism of the KMCS and the AMS made significant strides in terms of democratizing local state-society relations in western Madhya Pradesh. The results of this were tangible: “The looting by the forest guards and the patwari has stopped. We don’t have to give bribes to get work done anymore. Chickens, ghee, and money – this they don’t demand now. The kind of looting that was happening earlier, that has stopped. Because of the Sangathan, there have been improvements in all these areas,” a group of KMCS activists told me (Group interview, KMCS activist, November 2009). Moreover, they were able to create a political culture of insurgent citizenship that still endures in the areas where they organized and mobilized: “Due to the Sangathan, at least our people have learnt to talk” (Barlibai, AMS activist, November 2009). This stands as a testimony, first of all, to how subaltern movements are capable of challenging the structural equations that underpin rights poverty in quite significant ways. Moreover, the case of the KMCS and the AMS also demonstrates how subaltern movements deepen the meanings of citizenship far beyond its conventional boundaries as a legal and civilpolitical status. Claims-making from below, then, “is generative of new understandings and subjects of rights” (Subramanian, 2009, p. 19). Ultimately, what this means is that subaltern movements in the Global South constantly widen the compass of social justice through their oppositional collective action. However, it is also necessary to reckon with the fact that the KMCS and the AMS were not allowed to proceed untrammeled. On the contrary, as I show in my writing, both movements were subjected to multiple forms of state repression. State coercion ultimately curbed their

400  Handbook of social justice in the Global South ability to transform asymmetrical power relations in the region (Nilsen, 2018, Chapter 7). It is possible, of course, to read this as evidence of the futility of the kind of local campaigns in which these movements engaged. However, doing so would, I believe, be a mistake for anyone concerned with the politics of social justice. When social movements face coordinated repression from above, it is because “the struggles of dominated peoples, even when they are expressed in terms of right and rights, exceed right; they speak, in the final analysis, of something else” (Kouvelakis, 2005, p. 717). For example, the demand for Adivasi self-rule, discussed above, ultimately threatened to destabilize the structure of power relations that had crystallized between dominant and subaltern groups in the region during the longue durée of colonial and postcolonial state formation. In this sense, the trajectory of these struggles reveals that advancing social justice entails sundering sedimented power relations that are embedded in the state, and raises important strategic questions about what it will take for subaltern movements to be able to do this. Finding answers to those questions is arguably the most important task facing critical scholars concerned with the imperative of achieving social justice in the Global South.

NOTES 1. This chapter draws extensively on my 2018 book Adivasis and the state: Subalternity and citizenship in India’s Bhil Heartland (Cambridge University Press). The writing of the chapter was enabled by a generous grant from the National Institute for the Humanities and the Social Sciences for my project “Growth, inequality, and protest in a rising South” (WGP/2020/05). 2. See Karlsson (2016), Baviskar (2016), Bates (1995), Damodaran (2006), Shah (2007), and Sundar (2016) on the politics of Indigeneity in the Indian context. 3. Schedules are lists in the Constitution that categorize and tabulate the bureaucratic activity and policy of the government. The Fifth Schedule applies to most tribal communities in the Adivasi belt that stretches from Maharashtra and Gujarat in the west to Bihar and Bengal in the east. The Sixth Schedule applies to the northeastern states and bestows considerable autonomy upon tribal groups in Assam, Meghalaya, Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland, Mizoram, Tripura, and Manipur. See https://legislative​.gov​.in​/constitution​-of​ -india 4. The Bhils are one of the major Adivasi groups of western and central India. Consisting of multiple sub-groups such as Bhilalas, Barelas, and Naiks, the Bhils inhabit the largely hilly regions of north-western Maharashtra, eastern Gujarat, southern Rajasthan, and western Madhya Pradesh. For the sake of simplicity, I shall use the term Bhil Adivasis to refer to Bhils, Bhilalas, and Barelas in this chapter. 5. Scheduled Areas are areas where Adivasi communities are in the majority and fall under the Fifth Schedule of the Indian Constitution.

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Making insurgent citizenship in India’s Bhil heartland  401 Baviskar, A. (2016). The politics of being “indigenous.” In B. Karlsson, & T. B. Subba (Eds.), Indigeneity in India (pp. 33–50). Routledge. Brown, J. (2015). South Africa’s insurgent citizens: On dissent and the possibility of politics. Jacana Media. Castree, N. (2004). Differential geographies: Place, indigenous rights and “local” resources. Political Geography, 23(2), 133–167. Chandra, U. (2013). Liberalism and its other: The politics of primitivism in colonial and postcolonial Indian law. Law and Society Review, 47(1), 135–168. Chatterjee, P. (2004). Politics of the governed: Reflections on popular politics in most of the world. Columbia University Press. Choubey, K. N. (2015). The public life of a “progressive” law: PESA and Gaon Ganarajya (Village Republic). Studies in Indian Politics, 3(2), 247–259. Ciotti, M. (2012). Resurrecting Seva (social service): Dalit and low-caste women party activists as producers and consumers of political culture and practice in urban North India. The Journal of Asian Studies, 71(1), 149–170. Cox, L., & Nilsen, A. G. (2014). We make our own history: Marxism and social movements in the twilight of neoliberalism. Pluto Press. Damodaran, V. (2006). Colonial constructions of tribe in India. Indian Historical Review, 33(1), 44–76. Dave, N. (2012). Queer activism in India: A story in the anthropology of ethics. Duke University Press. Devalle, S. B. C. (1992). Discourses of ethnicity: Culture and protest in Jharkhand. SAGE. Eckert, J. (2006). From subjects to citizens: Legalism from below and the homogenisation of the legal sphere. The Journal of Legal Pluralism and Unofficial Law, 38, 53–54. Fischer, B. (2008). A poverty of rights: Citizenship and inequality in twentieth-century Rio de Janeiro. Stanford University Press. Flam, H. (2005). Emotions map. In H. Flam, & D. King (Eds.), Emotions and social movements. Routledge. Gadgil, M., & Guha, R. (1993). This fissured land: An ecological history of India. University of California Press. Gaventa, J. (1988). Power and powerlessness: Quiescence and rebellion in an Appalachian valley. University of Illinois Press. Gould, D. (2009). Moving politics: Emotion and ACT UP’s fight against AIDS. University of Chicago Press. Gould, D. (2015). The emotion work of movements. In J. Jasper, & J. Goodwin (Eds.), The social movements reader: Cases and concepts. Wiley Blackwell. Gramsci, A. (1971). Selections from the prison notebooks. Lawrence and Wishart. Green, L. (1996). Fear as a way of life: Mayan widows in rural Guatemala. Columbia University Press. Heller, P. (2000). Degrees of democracy: Some comparative lessons from India. World Politics, 52(4), 484–519. Holston, J. (2008). Insurgent citizenship: Disjunctions of democracy and modernity in Brazil. Princeton University Press. Isin, E. F. (2008). Theorizing acts of citizenship. In E. F. Isin, & G. M. Nielsen (Eds.), Acts of citizenship. Zed Books. Jaffrelot, C. (2000). The rise of the other backward classes in the Hindi belt. Journal of Asian Studies, 59(1), 86–108. Jasper, J. M. (1998). The emotions of protest: Affective and reactive emotions in and around social movements. Sociological Forum, 13(3), 397–424. Karlsson, B. G. (2016). Anthropology and the “indigenous slot”: Claims to and debates about indigenous peoples’ status in India. In B. G. Karlsson, & T. B. Subba (Eds.), Indigeneity in India (pp. 51–74). Routledge. Kouvelakis, Stathis. (2005). The Marxian critique of citizenship: For a rereading of On the Jewish question. South Atlantic Quarterly 104(4): 707–721 Madhok, S. (2003). A “limited women’s empowerment”: Politics, the state, and development in North West India. Women’s Studies Quarterly, 31(3–4), 154–173. McAdam, D. (1986). Recruitment to high-risk activism: The case of freedom summer. American Journal of Sociology, 92(1), 64–90.

402  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Moore, B. (1978). Injustice: The social bases of obedience and revolt. Random House. Nilsen, A. G. (2010). Dispossession and resistance in India: The river and the rage. Routledge. Nilsen, A. G. (2016). Democratic struggles in the Bhil heartland: Historical trajectories and contemporary scenarios. In U. Chandra, & D. Taghioff (Eds.), Staking claims: The politics of social movements in contemporary rural India (pp. 31–63). Oxford University Press. Nilsen, A. G. (2018). Adivasis and the state: Subalternity and citizenship in India’s Bhil heartland. Cambridge University Press. Shah, A. (2007). The dark side of indigeneity: Indigenous people, rights and development in India. History Compass, 5(6), 1806–1832. Shah, A., Lerche, J., Axelby, R., Benbabaali, D., Donegan, B., Thakur, V., and Raj, J. (2018). Ground down by growth: Tribe, caste, class and inequality in 21st century India. Pluto Press. Skaria, A. (1999). Hybrid Histories : Forests, Frontiers, and Wildness in Western India. Oxford University Press. Somers, M. E. (2008). Genealogies of citizenship: Markets, statelessness, and the right to have rights. Cambridge University Press. Subramanian, A. (2009). Shorelines: Space and rights in South India. Stanford University Press. Sundar, N. (2016). The scheduled tribes and their India: Politics, identities, policies, and work. Oxford University Press. Thompson, E. P. (1975). Whigs and hunters: The origins of the Black act. Penguin. World Bank (2011). Poverty and social exclusion in India. World Bank.

26. Social justice and human dignity in the Global South The case of the Colombian Constitutional Court Johnny Antonio Dávila

26.1 GLOBAL SOUTH, SOCIAL JUSTICE, AND HUMAN DIGNITY: AN INTRINSIC CONNECTION The term Global South is understood to be opposed to Global North, although it does not have a single, definitive meaning (Haug et al., 2021; Waisbich et al., 2021). First, the term is used to designate the relations of dependency and subordination between the poor countries of the South and the rich countries of the North, which reap the greatest benefits from globalisation and exclude the weakest (Haug et al., 2021). Second, the Global South refers to alliances built to address social, economic, and political problems common to undeveloped countries (Haug et al., 2021). Third, the term represents a political positioning of resistance to the powerful Global North and, in general, to global capitalism and colonialism (Haug et al., 2021; De Sousa, 2011). Broadly speaking, it is a contextual term (Wolvers et al., 2015). The fact that the term has several meanings is not a problem, as it captures the common facets of the same phenomenon and allows the analysis of shared patterns (Waisbich et al., 2021). The Global South is not a term with a geographical meaning; it refers to the common characteristics of certain countries in different regions: Africa, Latin America, the Caribbean, and parts of Asia and Oceania. Several negative socio-political phenomena occurring outside the rich countries – the Global North – are intertwined around this term: poverty, inequality, poor health systems, lack of access to the global market, and so on. The three meanings of the Global South mentioned above revolve around these problems: relations of domination that cause social issues in the dominated countries; alliances to confront the problems caused by globalisation; and resistance to global capitalism and its negative consequences. From this perspective, the term Global South carries an implicit denunciation: globalisation has created or exacerbated exclusions that harm the weakest – those who do not have the power to participate in shaping the global system. In other words, the shorthand of “Global South” highlights the existence of problems that represent major challenges to realising social justice and, at the same time, protecting human dignity. There is, therefore, a close connection between the Global South, the realisation of social justice, and respect for human dignity. One of the great paradoxes of globalisation is that, while trade, profits, and relations are deterritorialised, the social consequences of globalisation are directly reflected at the national level (López, 2007), and this applies especially to the negative consequences: increasing poverty and inequality, as well as difficulties in access to health and education systems, are issues that states must deal with as national problems. This does not exclude global responsibility for such consequences, but in real terms, states are still the main entities to which appeals can be made to achieve social justice and respect for human dignity. Of course, this is 403

404  Handbook of social justice in the Global South also because the structures of marginalisation fostered by globalisation are not isolated from how states operate (Grugel et al., 2017). Hence, these are not problems caused exclusively by globalisation. The states of the Global South have had to act collectively and individually to confront social injustices in their territories and to protect human dignity. In developing this work, some states have created valuable and original theories, doctrines, and jurisprudence (Bonilla, 2013). Since Colombia is a country of the Global South where the sources of inequality and poverty are structural (Delany, 2008) and have caused profound social injustices that, in some cases, have been exacerbated by globalisation, this chapter focusses on explaining the role of the notion of human dignity employed by the Colombian Constitutional Court (CCC) in promoting social justice, and addresses some criticisms.

26.2 SOCIAL JUSTICE AND DIGNITARIAN CONSTITUTIONALISM IN COLOMBIA The realisation of social justice is a major issue in the Global South. In Latin America, one can observe several organised practices that threaten human dignity and cause social injustices, such as 12-hour-plus working days and a lack of access to basic goods, including food, medicine, and drinking water. There are numerous reasons for this situation, the main one being severe poverty, which is linked to inequality. To be more specific, 30.7 per cent of the population of Latin America (187 million people) lives in some degree of poverty. In comparison, 10.2 per cent (62 million) live in extreme poverty (Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean, 2018). The region also has a Gini coefficient of 0.467, the highest inequality rate in the world (Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean, 2018). In the case of Colombia, social inequality and poverty constitute two of the most important social problems. According to the World Bank (2021), Colombia is one of the most unequal countries in the world. In 2020, the Gini coefficient was 0.54, making it the most unequal country in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. According to the National Administrative Department of Statistics (2021), 39.3 per cent of Colombians experienced financial poverty in 2021. In tandem, poverty and inequality give rise to severe problems related to social justice, fundamentally harming the poor and the socially excluded. Against this background, many Latin American countries have included human dignity as a basic element of their social and legal systems,1 reflecting concern about the social injustices that exist in the Global South. Samuel Moyn (2014) applies the term dignitarian constitutionalism to describe the broad global acceptance of human dignity in constitutions. As a country deeply affected by poverty and inequality, Colombia has aligned itself with dignitarian constitutionalism and the realisation of social justice. The preamble of the Political Constitution of Colombia states that it seeks to guarantee “a just political, economic, and social order”, and Article 1 of title I (Fundamental Principles) states: “Colombia is a social state under the rule of law, organized in the form of a unitary republic, […] based on respect for human dignity […].” The Colombian state thus recognises the close connection between human dignity and social justice among its main political and legal premises. The Constitution does not expressly mention social justice, but it is clear that tackling social issues is one of the most significant goals of the Colombian state.

Social justice and human dignity in the Global South  405 In its turn, the CCC has expressly stated that the search for social justice is a central task of the Colombian state (CCC, T-1064/2001). In addition, it recognises that there is an essential link between the social state under the rule of law, social justice, and human dignity since “the social rule of law seeks to achieve social justice and human dignity through the subjection of public authorities to constitutional principles, rights, and social duties” (CCC, T-1064/2001, par. 4.1.1). The CCC also maintains that the social state under the rule of law is orientated towards “the satisfaction of the most basic needs of Colombians – in terms of human dignity, social justice, and general welfare – the protection of the weakest or persons in conditions of great vulnerability” (CCC, T-622/2016, par. 4). Under judgment C-251/1997 of the CCC, the interdependence of human rights: is based on the idea that to truly protect human dignity, it is necessary that the person not only has spheres of action that are free from outside interference […], but also that the individual has the possibility of participating in the collective destinies of society […], and that he or she is assured of minimum material conditions of existence, according to the postulates of socially oriented political philosophies (CCC, T-251/1997, Section VI, Legal Basis).

The paragraph indicates that the interaction between human dignity and social justice is fundamental for the correct functioning of the Colombian state. This criterion has also emerged in, for instance, judgments T-402/1992, T-596/1992, C-239/1997, T-461/1998, T-606/2015, T-691/2012, T-631/2013, C-623/2015, and C-077/2017 of the CCC. All of these refer to the protection of social rights. Thus, social rights are present in the Colombian Constitution, and, as in other regions, they have become indispensable tools for promoting social justice. Title II of the Constitution separated fundamental rights (arts. 11–41) from social rights (arts. 42–77), meaning that the latter were not considered fundamental. However, the CCC has developed a way to guarantee social justice by protecting social rights, which has often been done in the name of human dignity (Carvajal, 2005). So, after much judicial back-and-forth, the CCC has recognised that “any constitutional right that is functionally aimed at achieving human dignity is a fundamental right” (CCC, judgment T-227/2003, par. 11). This criterion was useful for judgment T-016/2007, which held that the social right to health could be protected as a fundamental right when, among other requirements, its violation would seriously harm the human dignity of the person affected. This criterion applies to all social rights. Nevertheless, decision T-881/2002, which deals with the defence of the social rights of prisoners, has really set the tone on the notion of human dignity in general and, at the same time, has served to clarify the connection between human dignity and social justice. In the following, I set out the CCC’s understanding of human dignity and how its different meanings have contributed to promoting social justice at the institutional and individual levels.

26.3 HUMAN DIGNITY AND SOCIAL JUSTICE IN THE COLOMBIAN CONSTITUTIONAL COURT Although the CCC has not expressly said so, its central idea is that human dignity encompasses a wide range of meanings; it is not univocal but multifaceted. Judgment T-881/2002 does not consider that the different ways human dignity can be presented are contradictory or lack a common point that allows them to be interconnected. On the contrary, the multifaceted

406  Handbook of social justice in the Global South meaning of human dignity would be “harmonious with the axiological content of the 1991 Constitution” (CCC, T-881/2002, par. 29), since human dignity is a founding element of the Colombian state and its legal framework. In this context, according to the CCC, human dignity can be presented in two ways: from the specific object of protection and its normative functionality. These two general categories are further subdivided as follows in Box 26.1. BOX 26.1

SUBDIVISIONS OF HUMAN DIGNITY PRESENTATIONS

General Category: Human Dignity According to the Specific Object of Protection Subcategories:

• • •

Autonomy, or the possibility of designing a life plan and making one’s own determinations according to one’s own characteristics (living as one wishes) Concrete material conditions of existence (living well) Intangibility of non-patrimonial goods, physical, and moral integrity (living without humiliation)

General Category: Human Dignity According to Normative Functionality Subcategories:

• • •

Founding principle of the legal system and of the state (value) Constitutional principle (principle) Autonomous fundamental right (right)

It should be noted that the CCC is far from offering a definitive notion to use in practice since the same ruling (T-881/2002) states that the six categories mentioned do not exhaust the meaning of human dignity in the Colombian judicial sphere, so other connotations that do not appear in this ruling are not excluded. What will follow shows the meaning of each category and, through some decided cases, how social and human rights protection have been connected to each of these spheres of human dignity, all to promote social justice. Judgments before and after T-881/2002 will be taken into account because what this judgment essentially did was to systematise and organise the criteria that already existed.

26.4 HUMAN DIGNITY ACCORDING TO THE SPECIFIC OBJECT OF PROTECTION This category incorporates what must be protected or achieved when applying norms. It is the material content of human dignity (CCC, T-881/2002). According to the CCC, it is possible to distinguish three basic forms, called jurisprudential lines, in which human dignity is manifested according to the object of protection, and these are the following: Autonomy or the possibility of designing a life plan and making one’s own determinations according to one’s own characteristics (living as one wishes). The guiding

Social justice and human dignity in the Global South  407 characteristic is protecting and exercising individual liberty against the possible rule of general or collective interests (CCC, T-881/2002). Within the framework of respect for the right to work, the CCC ordered the cessation of acts of harassment against a worker who considered that the mechanism of constructive dismissal was being used against him. According to the CCC, the worker’s dignity is not protected just by being paid a salary; other conditions must also be created to perform his work in the best possible way. If the worker’s access to work is restricted, the worker’s dignity is violated (CCC, T-461/1998). In this case, human dignity is used as a criterion or argument that protects an economic and social right to promote autonomy and allows workers to live the way they have chosen. Concrete material conditions of existence (living well). Human dignity is associated with allowing access to certain minimum material conditions to live well and ensuring that such a result is achieved (CCC, T-881/2002). In the case of a prisoner who complained about the sanitary conditions of the place where he was serving his sentence and who considered that his right to health was being violated, the CCC recognised that the main prisons in the country, because of overcrowding, have poor facilities and lack the minimum services, and therefore do not comply with the elementary requirements of human dignity (CCC, T-596/1992). The CCC stated that the Colombian state is founded on the value of human dignity, so the state has a positive duty to protect and maintain dignified living conditions for every prisoner. It ordered the penitentiary centre not to use isolation cells if the hygiene conditions were incompatible with human dignity (CCC, T-596/1992). Judgments T-606/2015, C-623/2015, and C-077/2017 have also applied this conception of human dignity (living well) to other social rights. These last three judgments are characterised by their focus on the right to access land as an inalienable means of life in certain contexts. Guaranteeing minimum material living conditions and monitoring their effective realisation means living well, respecting human dignity, and upholding social justice. Intangibility of non-patrimonial goods, physical, and moral integrity (living without humiliation). The degrading treatment of human beings in general, whether physical or otherwise, is disrespectful of their human dignity (CCC, T-881/2002). In connection with the fundamental right to health and the protection of human dignity, the CCC decided to order the Ministry of National Defence and the National Army to arrange for the implantation of breast prostheses for a citizen, the spouse of an army lieutenant, whose body physiognomy had been affected by a total resection of both breasts that was causing her physical and psychological problems. The CCC indicated that the surgery the patient needed was intended to guarantee “her right to physical integrity and human dignity” (CCC, T-572/1999, Section III, Considerations of the Court) and that these are fundamental rights. The CCC also indicated that the patient’s surgery fell within the idea of the right to health as a fundamental right, as it referred to the protection of human dignity and the conditions for a dignified life (CCC, T-572/1999). For its part, judgment T-375/2016 decided that Cafesalud, a health care provider (empresa prestadora de salud), should provide a patient with the service of in vitro fertilisation with prior sperm washing to prevent the woman and the child from being born infected with HIV (T-375/2016) since her partner had been diagnosed as HIV positive. Aiming to protect the fundamental right to health, the CCC argued that all sick people enjoy the same rights and that any discriminatory treatment that violates their fundamental rights and dignity must be avoided (T-375/2016). Note that in both cases, the CCC did not strictly limit the protection of

408  Handbook of social justice in the Global South social rights to material aspects, which is logical given that social justice and human dignity encompass a much broader spectrum.

26.5 HUMAN DIGNITY ACCORDING TO NORMATIVE FUNCTIONALITY This second general category shows human dignity not as an object to be protected but as an element that binds together the conceptual and practical structure of the Colombian political and legal system. The CCC has indicated that the normative function of human dignity covers three main points. Founding principle of the legal system and of the state (value). The state and the legal system both uphold human dignity as a value. The CCC has highlighted the normative nature of this value, from which it follows that the legal system and the state are constituted based on what ought to be contained in human dignity (CCC, T-881/2002). This opinion is found in judgment T-631/2013, in which the CCC ordered the suspension of an eviction measure issued by the Mayor’s Office of Pereira against four citizens squatting on a property. At the same time, the CCC ordered the Mayor’s Office to include them in a housing programme, all under the protection of the social right to housing, as this fundamental right is closely related to human dignity and the social conception of the state (T-631/2013). The CCC said that protecting human dignity is a positive duty that is written into the constitution. The CCC (T-881/2002) said that the state must do everything it can legally and practically to ensure that the areas of protecting human dignity – individual autonomy, material conditions of existence, and physical and moral integrity – develop appropriately. As Colombia is organised as a social state based on the rule of law and human dignity as a fundamental constitutional value, protecting the social right to housing becomes imperative due to its vital function. Constitutional principle (principle). The CCC said that protecting human dignity is a positive duty, as the Constitution states. The CCC (T-881/2002) said that the state must do everything it can legally and practically to ensure that the areas of protecting human dignity – individual autonomy, material conditions of existence, and physical and moral integrity – develop appropriately. As human dignity is a general and basic constitutional mandate that requires concretisation, it is seen as a principle. Concerning social rights, the CCC, to protect the right to social security, ordered the Social Security Institute (Instituto de Seguros Sociales) to grant an occupational disease pension to a woman. As the basis for this, the CCC held that human dignity is a material principle that underlies the Colombian legal system and that in the case of a pension, it is indeed fundamental since here human dignity refers to the principle of the relationship of individuals to society (CCC, T-124/1993). In judgment T-461/1998, mentioned above, the CCC ordered the cessation of labour harassment against a worker to protect his labour rights, as this affected his human dignity, something that cannot be allowed because, as a fundamental principle of the social state of law, human dignity does not admit relativisation of any kind (CCC, T-461/1998). These decisions show that, as a principle, human dignity is general and merits concretisation or optimisation, which is even more urgent in the case of social rights and social justice. Autonomous fundamental right (right). For the CCC, human dignity is an “autonomous fundamental right and has the elements of all rights: a clearly identified holder (natural persons), a more or less delimited object of protection (autonomy, living conditions, physical

Social justice and human dignity in the Global South  409 and moral integrity), and a judicial mechanism for its protection (writ of protection)”2 (CCC, T-881/2002, par. 26). This is why, in judgment T-1700/2000, the CCC told a branch of the Social Security Institute in Magdalena to check out a patient with a serious hearing problem before surgery. The goal was to protect her right to health since it becomes fundamental when it threatens or affects other fundamental rights like life, the person’s integrity, human dignity, or others (CCC, T-1700/2000). Following this same criterion of human dignity as a fundamental right, the CCC ruled that an old-age pension should be paid to a worker even if the employer had not carried out the due legal procedures, as this was not attributable to the worker, and the fundamental rights to the vital minimum, human dignity, and the social security of the worker would otherwise be put at risk (CCC, T-398/2013). In a similar case, this criterion was also applied in judgment T-352/2018. All the cases that have been presented show that human dignity has been essential in different court proceedings when decisions regarding the protection of social rights have been made. The CCC has carried out this work following a broad vision of human dignity that has been constructed and established through the exercise of its decision-making function. Considering this, human dignity has served, above all, as a second-order interpretation (Interpretation zweiter Ordnung), which makes it possible to understand the social reality that motivates the existence of the legal system and thus to decide on the protection of rights (Ladeur & Augsberg, 2008). In other words, a mechanism of interpretation has made it possible to know the meaning of specific norms. Still, more than that, it has placed norms and decisions in the context of Colombian social reality to promote social justice.

26.6 DEALING WITH CRITICISMS The CCC’s work in promoting social justice through the concept of human dignity is not without its critics. The main reason is that the CCC’s notion of human dignity is too broad or, as Charles Beitz (2013) would say, has a suspicious elasticity. The suspicion might arise from two issues. First, if human dignity encompasses as much as the CCC admits, this leads to the understanding that we do not know what the CCC is talking about when it resorts to the concept or deals with issues linked to it. Thus, in linguistic terms, communication and understanding of what is being discussed are extremely difficult, which could complicate the practical application of the concept and, more specifically, the CCC’s decision-making. In the framework of the social rule of law, this is especially significant in issues directly associated with social justice, as it is these for which the protection of human dignity is most often expressly demanded: guarantees for citizens of, for example, secure access to healthcare, a fair wage, and adequate education are crucial matters in favour of human dignity and social justice. However, whether this materialises in practice is linked to understanding what the term human dignity means. The plurality of interpretations of the CCC seems to be far from contributing to a clarification of the concept and, on the contrary, gives the impression of exacerbating the nebulous nature of the issue (Sandoval, 2017). Judgment T-881/2002 states that human dignity is not limited to the six meanings already mentioned. Second, suspicion emerges in another way that is associated with political and moral practice. The indeterminacy of the concept of human dignity can be a tool for introducing political or moral ideological elements specific to certain individuals or groups. Some claim that the CCC has taken advantage of the indeterminacy of the concept to obtain social changes

410  Handbook of social justice in the Global South – camouflaging extra-legal values – and to limit or allow certain behaviours of which it morally approves or disapproves (Montilla & Oñate, 2013). The criticism is that a broad or vague notion of human dignity, in conjunction with the idea of social rights, could be a tool to introduce and close political and moral debates that merit further discussion. Such a course of action would risk not only the idea of human dignity but also that of social justice, as it may create the feeling that human dignity is being used as a convenience to impose specific political and moral visions. In short, decisions about human dignity and social rights could be imposed by applying personal or group criteria that most citizens do not necessarily share, and sometimes not even broad groups. Having looked at this first group of criticisms, it is necessary to assess their relevance. To do so, let us consider the two major categories assumed by judgment T-881/2002: dignity according to the concrete object of protection and dignity according to its normative functionality. To live well, to live as one wishes, and to live without humiliation are ways in which human dignity is manifested because of the object that must be protected. Seen in this light, it is difficult to accept that any of these subcategories could be excluded and no longer understood as directly related to human dignity. If we want a life worth living, we need autonomy, a certain minimum in our material and spiritual conditions, and respect. These three components must, moreover, be concurrent and complementary. In social justice, it is impossible to think of a dignified life that provides broad autonomy but in which there are no minimum material living conditions, or that is subject to constant humiliation. In slightly more practical terms, a person should not only be guaranteed the autonomy to decide what work she will do but should also be able to decide which doctor to go to, just as she should have a guarantee that she will not be subjected to humiliation in her working environment. In the case of human dignity as a concrete object of protection, there is not as much indeterminacy as one might think. The problem is not in the categorisation itself but in how it is made effective or applied to concrete cases. This is where the integrity of decision-makers comes into play. This is not just a matter of human dignity and social justice but of the legal and judicial system. Moreover, it must be said that the broad criterion of the CCC is an expression of a reality changeable according to social circumstances (Paust, 1984; Réaume, 2003); it would be wrong to remove human dignity from its dynamic social context. Hence, it should not be seen as problematic that the CCC admits there may be other meanings of human dignity from the perspective of the object to be protected. Likewise, neither should one fall into the trap of saying that the CCC assumes political positions merely by applying the concept of human dignity, for by ensuring that the Constitution is respected, the CCC is already doing political work. Human dignity is a foundation of social justice (Pribytkova, 2013) that is necessarily linked to state policy (White, 2012)3 – something the Colombian Constitution recognises in article 1 – and neither real social justice nor real state policy is developed on the axiomatic certainty (Lembcke, 2013) that the criticisms above seem to claim, for it is the actual judicial activity that gives rise to solutions. None of this denies that the criticisms carry some weight. It is intended to show that, as they are presented, they tend to fall into the fallacy of incomplete evidence, as they only highlight the negative aspects and ignore the positive ones. The scenario is different regarding the normative functionality of human dignity (dignity as value, principle, and right). If human dignity is the fundamental value that legitimises the state and the Colombian legal system, how can it be, at the same time, a right? In other

Social justice and human dignity in the Global South  411 words, if the value gives foundation and legitimacy to the legal system and, as a consequence, to rights in particular, this means that that which must be legitimised – the right – would be legitimising itself: human dignity as a value would legitimise human dignity as a right. From an analytical point of view, it is not logically possible for something to be the foundation and, at the same time, the thing that is founded. The same applies to the case of dignity as a principle: principles must have a foundation, which in this case would be human dignity as a value, but it turns out that human dignity is also a principle, something that must be founded. If human dignity is a principle or a right, then logically, it cannot be the basis of legitimacy. This lack of coherence hinders the viability of human dignity and social justice in their functional aspects, as the two concepts are intrinsically linked. How can this breadth of human dignity be explained? There is a specific historical reason that could provide an answer. Human rights gained momentum after World War II, especially with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. One debate that arose during the adoption of the Declaration concerned identifying a specific source of legitimacy. The debate was complex, but in the end, the decision was made to choose an idea that had enough breadth and indeterminacy to allow the various ideological and cultural positions to be linked without forcing a basic compromise on its concrete meaning (McCrudden, 2008; Shulztiner & Carmi, 2014). The point was to find a common idea that was functional. This is how dignity was chosen as the source of human rights despite having an undefined meaning. The CCC should not be exculpated for its lack of clarity, but it must also be understood that there are factual reasons for the lack of conceptual definition. We can and should demand more precision from the CCC, especially regarding the normative functionality of human dignity. However, this does not prevent us from ensuring that human dignity is a useful tool for resolving concrete social justice cases, which are often hard (Habermas, 2010). The use of human dignity should not be excluded because of its conceptual difficulty. By applying human dignity as a second-order interpretation, the CCC has determined that healthcare providers must supply medicines to combat drug dependence (CCC, T-566/2010), which seemed impossible at the time since it was assumed that drug dependence was a strictly individual matter and that it was primarily up to the drug addict to find a way to obtain medicines. The broad notion of human dignity has also served as a basis for affirming that prison conditions must comply with minimum sanitation standards and for defending this position (CCC, T-881/2002). Based on human dignity, judgments T-716/2017 and T-144/2021 provide a basis for the vital minimum as a fundamental right. Judgment T-143/2018 established that certain companies are not entitled to impose on transgender people the use of clothing that categorises genders since human dignity is manifested in everyone’s power to choose and effectively live as one wishes. Seen in this light, and despite the suspicions and criticisms – which are not capricious – that may be generated by the CCC’s notion of human dignity, it would be foolish to deny its contribution to the realisation of social justice. Although far from what is desired, based on dignitarian constitutionalism, human dignity has been a tool that has favoured multiple social changes in Colombia (Pérez, 2018). It cannot be affirmed, at least, that human dignity has been inadequate for social justice.

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26.7 CONCLUSIONS One thing that characterises the Global South is the struggle to achieve better social justice standards. This text has shown that human dignity is important for the CCC in promoting social justice. To this end, the CCC has elaborated on the notion of human dignity in the social context of the Global South and Colombia. Human dignity has both a negative and a positive function regarding social justice. On the one hand, its function is negative in that it sets limits on the state and other actors’ expansion and exercise of political and economic power. On the other hand, the positive function lies in the attempt to help generate conditions conducive to the realisation of social justice. Despite these functions that promote social justice, it cannot be concealed that the CCC’s notion of human dignity entails specific problems that mainly affect its normative functionality. Those who argue that having more precision on the concept of human dignity are right. This would provide certainty and security, which makes judicial activity, in the end, more bearable in some respects. However, it must also be said that a lack of precision in a concept does not have to be at odds with its practical and effective use. This is the case with the CCC’s definition of human dignity, which needs more clarification in some areas but has also aided in fostering respect for social justice. This chapter does not advocate the idea that the countries of the Global South must necessarily resort to human dignity to address social injustices, although this is a possibility. The text implies that the Global South, despite its existing drawbacks, can seek and create its own solutions and, therefore, must do so. This often involves great risk, but neither passivity nor indifference is an ally in pursuing social justice.

NOTES 1. The constitutions of Bolivia (art. 8.2), Colombia (art. 1), Chile (art. 1), Brazil (art. 1.3), Costa Rica (art. 33), Cuba (preamble), Ecuador (art. 11.7), El Salvador (preamble), Guatemala (art. 4), Honduras (art. 59), Mexico (art. 1), Nicaragua (art. 83.3), Panama (preamble), Paraguay (preamble), Peru (art. 1), the Dominican Republic (preamble), and Venezuela (art. 3) all incorporate the terms dignity or human dignity. 2. Acción de tutela in Spanish. 3. For some scholars, such as Tamayo & Sotomayor (2018), the sense of human dignity comes earlier in the political sector than in the legal sector.

REFERENCES Beitz, C. (2013). Human dignity in the theory of human rights: Nothing but a phrase? Philosophy & Public Affairs, 41(3), 259–290. https://doi​.org​/10​.1111​/papa​.12017 Bonilla Maldonado, D. (2013). Introduction: Toward a constitutionalism of the Global South. In D. Bonilla Maldonado (Ed.), Constitutionalism of the Global South. The activist tribunals of India, South Africa, and Colombia (pp. 1–37). Cambridge University Press. Colombian Constitutional Court. Judgment T-596 of December 10, 1992. Reporting Judge: Ciro Angarita Barón. Sentencia T-596. Colombian Constitutional Court. Judgment T-124 of March 29, 1993. Reporting Judge: Vladimiro Naranjo Mesa.

Social justice and human dignity in the Global South  413 Colombian Constitutional Court. Judgment C-251 of May 28, 1997. Reporting Judge: Alejandro Martínez Caballero. Colombian Constitutional Court. Judgment T-461 of September 3, 1998. Reporting Judge: Alfredo Beltrán Sierra. Colombian Constitutional Court. Judgment T-572 of August 11, 1999. Reporting Judge: Fabio Morón Díaz. Colombian Constitutional Court. Judgment T-1700 of December 7, 2000. Reporting Judge: Martha Victoria Sáchica Méndez. Colombian Constitutional Court. Judgment T-881 of October 17, 2002. Reporting Judge: Eduardo Montealegre Lynett. Colombian Constitutional Court. Judgment T-227 of March 17, 2003. Reporting Judge: Eduardo Montealegre Lynett. Colombian Constitutional Court. Judgment T-016 of January 22, 2007. Reporting Judge: Humberto Antonio Sierra Porto. Colombian Constitutional Court. Judgment T-566 of July 8, 2010. Reporting Judge: Luis Ernesto Vargas Silva. Colombian Constitutional Court. Judgment T-398 of July 2, 2013. Reporting Judge: Jorge Julio Pretelt Chaljub. Colombian Constitutional Court. Judgment T-631 of September 12, 2013. Reporting Judge: Ponente: Nelson Pinilla Pinilla. Colombian Constitutional Court. Judgment T-606 of September 21, 2015. Reporting Judge: Jorge Iván Palacio Palacio. Colombian Constitutional Court. Judgment C-623 of September 30, 2015. Reporting Judge: Ponente: Alberto Rojas Ríos. Colombian Constitutional Court. Judgment of July 14, 2016. Reporting Judge: Gabriel Eduardo Mendoza Martelo. Colombian Constitutional Court. Judgment C-077 of February 8, 2017. Reporting Judge: Luis Ernesto Vargas Silva. Colombian Constitutional Court. Judgment T-716 of December 7, 2017. Reporting Judge: Ponente: Carlos Bernal Pulido. Colombian Constitutional Court. Judgment T-143 of April 23, 2018. Reporting Judge: José Fernando Reyes Cuartas. Colombian Constitutional Court. Judgment T-352 of August 30, 2018. Reporting Judge: José Fernando Reyes Cuartas. Colombian Constitutional Court. Judgment T-144 of May 19, 2021. Reporting Judge: Cristina Pardo Schlesinger. De Sousa Santos, B. (2011). Epistemologías del Sur. Utopía y Praxis Latinoamericana, 16(54), 17–39. https://pro​ducc​ionc​ient​ificaluz​.org​/index​.php​/utopia ​/article​/view​/3429​/3428 Delany, P. (2008). Legislating for equality in Colombia: Constitutional jurisprudence, tutelas, and social reform. The Equal Rights Review, 1, 50–59. https://www​.equalrightstrust​.org​/sites​/default​/files​ /ertdocs/​/ Legislating​%20colombia​.pdf Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (2018). Social Panorama of Latin America 2017. https://repositorio​.cepal​.org​/ bitstream ​/ handle​/11362​/42717​/6​/S1800001​_en​.pdf Grugel, J., Nem Singh, J., Fontana, L., & Uhlin, A. (2017). Analysing justice claims in the Global South. In J. Grugel, J. Nem Singh, L. Fontana, & A. Uhlin (Eds.), Demanding justice in the Global South. Claiming rights (pp. 1–19). Palgrave Macmillan. Habermas, J. (2010). Human dignity and the realistic utopia of human rights. Metaphilosophy, 41(4), 464–480. https://doi​.org​/10​.1111​/j​.1467–9973.2010.01648.x Haug, S., Braveboy-Wagner, J., & Maihold, G. (2021). The “Global South” in the study of world politics: Examining a meta category. Third World Quarterly, 42(9), 1923–1944. https://doi​.org​/10​.1080​ /01436597​.2021​.1948831 Ladeur, K., & Augsberg, I. (2008). Die funktion der menschenwürde im verfassungsstaat. Mohr Siebeck. Lembcke, O. (2013). Human dignity. A constituent and constitutional principle. Some perspectives of a German discourse. In W. Brugger, & S. Kirste, (Eds.), Human dignity as a foundation of law (pp. 207–231). Franz Steiner Verlag/Nomos.

414  Handbook of social justice in the Global South López, A. (2007). Introduction: The (post) Global South. The Global South, 1(1), 1–11. http://dx​.doi​.org​ /10​.2979​/GSO​.2007​.1​.1.1 McCrudden, C. (2008). Human dignity and judicial interpretation of human rights. The European Journal of International Law, 19(4), 655–724. https://doi​.org​/10​.1093​/ejil​/chn043 Montilla Espinosa, F., & Oñate Acosta, T. (2013). La “dignidad” de la Corte Constitucional. Universidad del Rosario/Ibáñez. Moyn, S. (2014). The secret history of constitutional dignity. Yale Human Rights and Development Journal, 17(1), 39–73. https://dash​.harvard​.edu​/ handle​/1​/16085410 National Administrative Department of Statistics (2022). Pobreza monetaria y pobreza monetaria extrema. Información pobreza monetaria 2021. https://www​.dane​.gov​.co​/index​.php​/estadisticas​-por​ -tema ​/pobreza​-y​-condiciones​-de​-vida ​/pobreza​-monetaria Paust, J. (1984). Human dignity as a constitutional right: A jurisprudentially based inquiry into criteria and content. Howard Law Journal, 27(1), 145–225. https://ssrn​.com​/abstract​=1989166 Pérez Garzón, C. (2018). Unveiling the meaning of social justice in Colombia. Mexican Law Review, 10(2), 27–66. https://doi​.org​/10​.22201​/iij​.24485306e​.2018​.20​.11892 Pribytkova, E. (2013). The human right to a dignified existence. The ethical foundations of the contemporary legal order. In W. Brugger, & S. Kirste, (Eds.), Human dignity as a foundation of law (pp. 117–129). Franz Steiner Verlag/Nomos. Réaume, D. (2003). Discrimination and dignity. Louisiana Law Review, 63, (1–51). https:// digitalcommons​.law​.lsu​.edu​/ lalrev​/vol63​/iss3/3 Shulztiner, D., & Carmi, G. (2014). Human dignity in national constitutions: Functions, promises, and dangers. The American Journal of Comparative Law, 62, 461–490. https://doi​.org​/10​.5131​/AJCL​ .2013​.0003 Tamayo Arboleda, F., & Sotomayor Acosta, J. (2018). Penas sin humillaciones? Límites al derecho penal derivados del respeto a la dignidad humana. Opinión Jurídica, 17(33), 19–41. https://doi​.org​ /10​.22395​/ojum​.v17n33a1 Waisbich, L., Roychoudhury, S., & Haug, S. (2021). Beyond the single story: “Global South” polyphonies. Third World Quarterly, 42(9), 2086–2095. https://doi​.org​/10​.1080​/01436597​.2021​.1948832 White, E. (2012). There is no such thing as a right to human dignity: A reply to Conor O’Mahony. International Journal of Constitutional Law, 10(2), 575–584. https://doi​.org​/10​.1093​/icon​/mos011 Wolvers, A., Tappe, O., Salverda, T., & Schwarz, T. (2015). Concepts of the Global South: Introduction. Voices from around the world, 1, 1–2. https://kups​.ub​.uni​-koeln​.de​/6399​/1​/voices012015​_concepts​ _of​_the​_global​_south​.pdf World Bank (2021). Building an equitable society in Colombia. Open Knowledge Repository. http://hdl​ .handle​.net​/10986​/36535

27. Dependency Theory today Álvaro Germán Torres Mora

27.1 INTRODUCTION In this chapter, I discuss the main aspects of Dependency Theory to understand its origins, contributions, and challenges. Of utmost relevance is to comprehend how influential it is and why it is still a valid approach to studying global inequality. Overall, this chapter inquires into what Dependency Theory is, how different it is from other theoretical approaches such as Modernization and World Systems Theory, and why it is still relevant. Of the population of Latin America, 30.5 percent, which is roughly 187 million people, live in poverty, and 11.3 percent live in extreme poverty (Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean [ECLAC]), 2021). This region is, however, not uniform. Poverty ranges from 3.5 percent in Uruguay and Chile to around 50 percent in Guatemala, Honduras, and Venezuela (Gasparini, Santos, and Tornarolli, 2021). In addition, despite declining in the 2000s, inequality in Latin America remains high. The average GINI index in this region is 0.463 (United Nations Development Program (UNDP), 2021). These figures contrast with those in the US and Europe. In the United States, the poverty rate is 18 percent, whereas countries such as Denmark and Finland have poverty rates of less than 6 percent (OECD, 2019). Regarding inequality, the Gini index for the United States is 0.414 (World Bank, 2021), while it is 0.302 in Europe (Eurostat, 2021). These disparities have been largely studied, and the literature agrees that colonialism played an important role in shaping the underdevelopment and current inequality of Latin America. According to Engerman and Sokoloff (2002), in those societies that began with extreme inequality, such as Latin America, elites established a legal framework that ensured them a considerable share of political power. This power was used to create rules and laws that gave them greater access to economic opportunities, thus perpetuating a high degree of inequality. North and Thomas (1973) argue that in colonial Latin America, very few Europeans lived amidst large Indigenous populations and slaves, and managed to place themselves at the top of the social hierarchy thanks to their higher knowledge of technology, wealth, and legal standing. Similarly, Acemoglu, Johnson, and Robinson (2001) argue that the Spanish and the Portuguese implemented an extractive colonization model, which created institutions to transfer resources from the colony to the colonizer. These included slavery, monopolies, legal discrimination, and rules that made Indigenous property rights insecure. The colonial legacy of inequality and underdevelopment in Latin America is widely accepted. However, the long-term impacts are still the object of debate. The unequal exchange between poor and rich countries deserves special attention in light of current concerns regarding social justice and global inequality. In the next section, I delve into the analysis of underdevelopment and the nature of global unequal exchange.

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27.2 DEVELOPMENT, UNDERDEVELOPMENT, AND DEPENDENCY Rodney (1982) argues that mainstream scholarship understands development as “economic development,” which is a combination of factors of production, namely: land, capital, population, technology, large-scale production, and specialization. However, there is no mention of the exploitation of the majority, social relations, or classes. Also, there is no mention of how relations of production form a mode of production, which varies from one historical moment to another. We can understand development based on its counterpart: underdevelopment, which entails a degree of backwardness compared to wealthy countries in a given period and a particular relationship of exploitation between two countries; developed countries exploit underdeveloped ones (Rodney, 1982). Large-scale exploitation results in global inequalities among countries and regions, bringing on the development of a few and the underdevelopment of most. This approach was first put forward by Raúl Prebisch and the ECLA in the 1950s and 1960s, followed by neo-Marxist dependency theorists – or the “dependentistas” – of the 1960s and 1970s (Robinson, 2011). Structuralists and later Dependency scholars shared a preoccupation with institutions as key determinants of economic success or failure. Raúl Prebisch highlighted that the institutional arena was more determinant than the market in the deterioration of trade, which affected most of Latin America and the developing world (Coatsworth, 2005). Interestingly, Prebisch questioned very early the role of market ideologies regarding redistribution in a global context. In his terms: “I confess that at a young age I was seduced by the logic rigor and mathematical elegance of the economic equilibrium theory. I have put great effort into rejecting those theories and understanding reality.” (Prebisch, 1976, p. 17). Underdevelopment has attracted the attention of the neoclassical growth theory, which predicts income convergence unless international technology and capital flows are proscribed. In the presence of restrictions on international factor mobility, this theory states that trade in products acts as a substitute for trade in factors, which results in the convergence of economic outcomes across countries. However, North–South models have questioned this approach, based on the existence of uneven economic development. These models identify a critical asymmetry between the North and South that goes beyond the neoclassical focus on differences in factor endowments. North–South theorists argue that history matters in fixing initial conditions and the production of structural asymmetries in economies. The already studied colonialism and imperialism have shaped those structural dissimilarities (Darity & Davis, 2005). Alam (1994) defines imperialism as the sum of coercive methods that governments from advanced countries employ in pursuit of their targets in lagging countries. These targets may consist of obtaining trade profits, securing investment and employment opportunities for their nationals, and creating economic rents for their capitals, and are derived from the superior power and the capacity to use force by center countries. In imperialist contexts, there is a bias toward primary production, along with the displacement of Indigenous entrepreneurship and the creation of monopolies. The pursuit of trade objectives may lead to growth in landrich countries because of the utilization of labor and land, both of which are cheap for the advanced country. However, most of the surpluses extracted by foreign actors will be repatriated or spent locally on imported goods. Conversely, in land-scarce countries, there is not even growth, since labor from manufacturing activities shifts to primary production, intensifying the problem of land overcrowding. With unchanged technology, there is little room for growth, which prevents lagging countries from developing their comparative advantage in

Dependency Theory today  417 manufacturing. Since the 1980s, imperialism has taken the shape of neoliberal globalization through processes of aggressive privatization, marriage of strategic convenience between capitalism (economic liberalism) and democracy (political liberalism), and more recently, after the 2000s, is characterized by the collapse of foreign inflows and the onset of political crisis, mass revolt, and regime change in countries such as Argentina, Bolivia, Ecuador, Brazil, Uruguay, and Venezuela (Petras and Veltmeyer, 2018). Dependency Theory emerged as a criticism of imperialism. This approach criticizes power inequalities among nations under the assumption that institutions are the product of history and a balance of conjunctural power; in this regard, institutions reproduce global inequality so that some nations and interests are favored at the expense of others (Heller et al., 2009). Underdevelopment is, therefore, a distinct historical condition, rather than a stage in the standard development process, for which neither Marxist nor bourgeois theories afford complete explanations. Dependency Theory criticizes the linear succession of modes of production central to Marxist thought, emphasizing that underdevelopment has its own morphology (Henfrey, 1981). This linear determinism in Marxist thought assumes that all countries will navigate through the same stages of social and economic evolution, from precapitalist forms to developed capitalist forms, and from there to socialism (Melios, Dimitri, & Economakis, 2018). However, a race that started at some point before the Industrial Revolution, in which some countries reached an advanced stage and others fell behind, does not explain the difference in levels of development. Dependency Theory argues that one of the essential features of capitalism is the creation of an international system that brought the global economy under the rule of a few European countries along with the United States from the nineteenth century onward. Development and underdevelopment occur, therefore, simultaneously (Sunkel, 1972). Dependency Theory is a reaction to linear Marxist determinism and Modernization Theory (Johnson, 1981; Robinson, 2011). Modernization assumes that traditional values and institutions lead to underdevelopment. Underdeveloped societies must reject traditional institutions and adopt new ideas, values, techniques, and organizations, including financial, industrial, and educational institutions (Valenzuela & Valenzuela, 1978). Modernization is the ideological expression of foreign capital that regards itself as the mechanism for bringing progress. In the sixties, W. W. Rostow, former adviser to John F. Kennedy, argued that developing countries had to modernize their traditional forms and behaviors, following the same roads as the rich, industrialized nations (Higginbottom, 2013). Edwards (2009) states that the mediocre economic performance of Latin America is not the result of an Anglo-Saxon conspiracy, but of poor policies and weak institutions. Latin America should implement strong policies and reform its institutions, which entails market liberalization and foreign trade encouragement (Fukuyama, 2008). Modernization depicts a road to development using the examples of rich countries and what they did to achieve such a level of wealth, privileging investment at the expense of protectionism. Even if appealing, this theory might miss the analysis of where the profits of such investments end up (Higginbottom, 2013). Together, Dependency Theory and World Systems Theory raised this critical question (Kiely, 2017). Building on the work of Raúl Prebisch, Gunder Frank (1969), Samir Amin (1974), Walter Rodney (1982), and others, argued that the prosperity of Western states (the core) was produced based on deepening poverty in their colonies (Palat, 2014). World Systems Theory scholars argue that a world system whose constituent parts interact in a relationship of subordination is essential to capitalism. The cores or metropoles exclude or dominate the satellites or peripheral regions (Kiely, 2017). The capitalist world system is a hierarchical organization

418  Handbook of social justice in the Global South of labor that reproduces itself. Activities such as textile production, which boosted industrialized countries in the nineteenth century, became peripherical today. An uneven capital accumulation process that increases productivity while keeping differences between the core and the periphery characterizes the system (Chase-Dunn, 1982). World Systems Theory stresses the role of historical antecedents in shaping the contemporary world. Overall, this theory criticizes the expansionary nature of capitalism over the entire world in the past 400–500 years (Robinson, 2011). This basic idea links to an old argument elaborated by Marx (1977), who stated that capitalism was born on a global scale, considering that world markets and world trade date from the seventeenth century, before the existence of modern nation-states. Wallerstein summarizes that the world system has had capitalistic features since the sixteenth century and core areas have specialized since then in higher-value production and surplus appropriation from peripheries (Wallerstein, 1974; 1980). In Wallerstein’s analysis, exchange tends to broaden the gap between the cores and peripheries, since further peripheralization of extraction-intensive regions occurs when profits accumulate in the cores. On the other hand, dependentistas argue that metropolitan and peripheral areas are distinct although interconnected through market mechanisms. In World Systems Theory, these concepts are relational: no core exists without a periphery (Palat, 2014; Martin, 1994).1 Wallerstein (1980) adds a second difference: a new semiperiphery emerged after 1945 in southern Europe and East Asia, which operates as a buffer between the core and peripheries. The semiperiphery comprises states that used to be part of the core, such as the Iberian powers, and those that moved upward, such as Russia after the Soviet Revolution, or contemporary China, Brazil, or the Asian tigers. The semiperiphery is absent in the center-periphery binary that characterized Prebisch’s works (Robinson, 2011). In the following section, I explore further Dependency Theory.

27.3 THE CORE OF DEPENDENCY THEORY Dependency Theory emerged to understand global disparities and the relationship of dependence between countries or regions. This approach analyzes why some countries retain most of the profits, while also preventing the growth of others. Dependency Theory is critical itself, since it questions the neutrality of open markets in the world economy and highlights the role of extra-market instruments and state interventionism in economic growth. Additionally, as addressed previously, Dependency Theory criticizes the Marxist thought prevalent in core countries, which assumed that all countries had to follow the same path toward socialism. Dependency Theory vindicates specificities in peripheral countries and underlines how development and underdevelopment coexist and are two sides of the same coin. In other words, the development of core countries takes place by keeping peripheral countries underdeveloped. Central to this argument is the idea of unequal exchange, which focuses on the allocation of advantageous industries in core countries and the conservation of primary activities in peripheral ones, thereby ensuring profitability to the former at the expense of the latter, which ends up excluded from the fruits of global markets. This requires the complicity of local elites, whose comfort depends on keeping their countries subordinated. Below I expand the study of Dependency Theory. From the 1970s onward, criticism of national development projects in Latin America rose. These projects upheld ideas of productive development led by national bourgeoisies, aligned

Dependency Theory today  419 with the working classes to promote industrialization by breaking dependency bonds and implementing agrarian reforms to expand local markets and access to food, all within a classic capitalist framework. ECLA’s economists presented the theories of unequal exchange (Valenzuela & Valenzuela, 1978), which explained the global asymmetry in the distribution of the benefits of technical progress between core capitalist countries and peripheral ones. They argued that countries like country A exported manufactured goods (M) to countries like B, which, in turn, exported primary products to A. In A, productivity increases are rapid since technical progress is likely to penetrate industrial activities, leading to a reduction in the prices of M. In B, productivity increases are slow, given the focus on primary production, which results in a non-drastic reduction in the prices of M (Cardoso & Serra, 1978). Similarly, the shift from traditional agriculture to commercial agriculture does not imply a shift to modern agriculture, which limits the introduction of foreign techniques. Instead, the produced surpluses result in imports to supply the consumption habits of the ruling classes (Furtado, 1973), thus marginalizing the masses from both production and consumption. If classical equilibrium theory were true, the expansion of technical progress in world trade would eventually reach peripherical countries, which is not the case (Evans, 1979). Dependency Theory encompasses a set of theories whose common assumption is that underdevelopment results from factors external to the underdeveloped nations (Smith, 1979). Overall, Dependency Theory criticizes common arguments of Modernization, according to which underdevelopment is the outcome of sociocultural backwardness. At the same time, Dependency Theory argues that the world has a core and a periphery. The advanced countries are the core, and the underdeveloped countries are the periphery. The exchange between countries is unequal, since advanced economies retain most of the profits (Angotti, 1981). Centerperiphery terminology is widely accepted in the underdeveloped world, even by governments that welcome the entry of foreign investment. In the 1940s, Raúl Prebisch formulated this thesis, which implies a hegemonic relationship between two discrete elements in a single economic system. The center derived part of its wealth from the periphery (but not all. For example, the center builds technology) (Love, 1980). Global capitalism frustrates the aspirations of the so-called peripheral countries for selfdetermination (Blaney, 1996), exporting modern values, techniques, and ideas from the center, which do not necessarily produce development, but the opposite; they tend to produce underdevelopment. Dependency implies a relation of subordination in the international capitalist system rather than the result of archaic or feudal structures, and its existence explains why Latin American countries did not develop similarly to the center (Grosfoguel, 2000). Dependency Theory highlights specific constraints that peripheral economies face, which include technological dependence, unequal exchange, and falling terms of trade for their exports (Kvangraven, 2021), resulting in a certain structure of the world economy that favors some countries to the detriment of others (Dos Santos, 1970b). The world capitalist economy privileges the productive centers at the expense of the peripheries, which is partially due to the late adoption of modern techniques in peripheral production. The interests of the centers articulate with the higher classes of the peripheries. When claims for redistribution rise in the peripheries, the centre reacts, even by using force. Following these arguments, Prebisch (1976) defines peripheral development as the penetration of techniques from centers that result in structural transformations. These techniques are concentrated in the hands of higher classes, taking into account that they already have concentrated the means of production, which excludes the lower classes. Peripheral capitalism worsens the gap between classes.

420  Handbook of social justice in the Global South According to Evans (1979), the penetration of techniques in the underdeveloped world has not resulted in development, but in a form of dependent development, as it is clear that multinational corporations have expanded their role in local production. The new scenario consists of a mix of local entrepreneurs, managers of multinational companies, and government representatives, who aim to participate in public enterprises. Paradoxically, the imported technology and industries do not provide enough jobs for people who move to cities, displaced by this form of development. In this context, enterprises crop up in poor countries, whereas exports end up in affluent countries. Powerful nations use their advantages to shape world production, aiming to maximize their benefits. Core countries reallocate production to richresource countries, ensuring the most profitable industries for themselves. In this scenario, an international division of labor is necessary. Core countries produce manufactured goods while peripheral countries focus on raw materials, which results in an unequal exchange since the former are more valued (Wallerstein, 2011; Bunker, 1984). Latin America owes its dependence to this international division of labor (Sunkel, 1969). A set of conditions contributes to this dependency, including: a) Antiquated agricultural practices that do not respond efficiently to the demand for agricultural produce. b) A structure of foreign trade that forces the region to rely on exporting a handful of primary commodities at the expense of diversification and transformation of primary materials. c) An industrialization process that does not work properly, since a significant part of the domestic industry is foreign-owned, and public and private financing from abroad is necessary to accelerate the process. Deciding what to do and how to break this structural dependency in Latin America led to further divisions, which I study in the next section. 27.3.1 The Bifurcation of Dependency Theory In the early 1970s, Dependency Theory bifurcated into two branches: the Marxist branch, led by Andre Gunder Frank and Theotonio Dos Santos, and the Reformist branch, which includes authors such as Fernando Henrique Cardoso, Enzo Faletto, Osvaldo Sunkel, and Celso Furtado. This bifurcation occurred when some authors like Sunkel noticed that the socialist revolution proposed by Gunder Frank seemed improbable (1969). Later, Evans (1995) acknowledged that attempts to dismantle the state had perverse consequences. Communist revolutionaries often ended up constructing state apparatuses more repressive than those of the age of absolutism. Acknowledging this improbability, Cardoso and Enzo Faletto focused on alternatives within capitalism. They distanced themselves from the analysis of the exchange of primary products or manufactured ones to a situation in which industrial production for the global market in Latin America became more important. From this point of view, some local prosperity is achievable insofar as local goods produced by foreign investments induce effects in dependent countries (Cardoso & Faletto, 1979). Although the reformists contributed significantly to both academia and activism, the Marxist branch became more widespread and generalized by including perspectives from Africa and Asia (Hout, 2016).

Dependency Theory today  421 27.3.1.1 The Marxist branch The progressive national aspirations for economic independence of underdeveloped countries, according to Dependency Theory, encountered strong opposition from orthodox Monetarism2 (Frank, 1974). Historical research demonstrates that underdevelopment is the product of past and ongoing economic and other relations between the underdeveloped satellites and the developed countries. Classic economic theory has argued that the development of underdeveloped countries requires stimulation by the introduction of capital, institutions, and values originating in developed countries. However, past experiences indicate that development can occur only independently from developed countries (Frank, 1969). The metropolis-satellite relations penetrate the life of underdeveloped countries. Provincial capitals, satellites of the national metropolis, are, in turn, provincial centers around which local satellites gravitate. The capitalist world economy resembles constellations whose centers are Europe and the United States. In this structure, the satellites extract capital from their own local satellites and channel part of it to the world metropolis. Each national and local metropolis imposes and secures this exploitative relationship as far as it serves the interest of the metropolis, which takes advantage of the whole structure and promotes the enrichment of the ruling classes (Frank, 1969). This results in complex transitions, given that local elites’ comfort depends on industrialized countries; structural transformation in the center and/or peripherical countries through political action is necessary to change global uneven development (Baumgartner, Buckley, & Burns, 1976). Dos Santos (1970a) argues that the role of these local elites in the perpetuation of dependence of their countries is problematic to the point at which their elimination is necessary. However, to keep their privileges, violence is to be expected, which justifies revolutionary armed movements. The dual condition in a single country (metropolis-satellite) prevents regions such as Latin America from overcoming their feudal institutions. Frank (1969) argues that those regions that today are the most underdeveloped and feudal-seeming used to have the closest bonds with the metropolis in the past (for example, Minais Gerais in Brazil, the Highlands in Peru and Bolivia, and central Mexico). In their territories, they were the greatest exporters of primary products. Later, when business dropped, these countries were left behind, which indicates that isolation and pre-capitalist institutions are not a cause of underdevelopment. In these regions, latifundium was created as a commercial enterprise to respond to the increasing demand in markets. In other words, the amount of land, capital, and labor expanded through this colonial semi-feudal institution, found mainly in former agricultural centers. This institution, therefore, was not transplanted from Europe; instead, it is a commercial response to increased demand (Frank, 1969). Laclau (1971) argues that Frank confuses the concepts of capitalist mode of production and participation in the world capitalist economy. Relations of production that involve the sale of free labor power are the foundational concept in capitalism rather than the existence of markets. Therefore, the servile relations of the latifundia located in the Third World are far from freedom. The capitalist development on a world scale preserves precapitalist relations on the periphery, where feudal conditions prevail in productive activities. Traditional agrarian structures were preserved, seriously limiting the technological advance of agricultural production, which made the rural sector unable to respond to the demand for farm produce and worsened the balance of payments deficit, due to either increased imports or decreased exports (Sunkel, 1969). Laclau’s and Sunkel’s arguments are reminiscent of an old discussion in the social sciences concerning the mode of production that better defines social relations in Latin America. At the end of the 1980s, Stern and Wallerstein

422  Handbook of social justice in the Global South had a very interesting related discussion. Stern (1988) argued that, given the discontinuity of contemporary and colonial economy, colonial Latin America should never have been called capitalist. Labor patterns in Latin America were explained in part by local conditions. These conditions made possible a combination of heterogeneous relations of production in pragmatic packages, which made Latin America at least partially feudal or not entirely capitalist. For example, in colonial Mexico and Bolivia, laborers’ shares in the ores they produced were an even more significant reward than salaries (a defining aspect of capitalism as highlighted by Laclau (1971)), which lowered the profits of mine owners. In response, Wallerstein argued that colonial Latin America was indeed capitalist. Back in colonial times, production was oriented to supply the world market demand and used capital in the form of mills, animals, and food for the workforce (Wallerstein, 1988). 27.3.1.2 The Reformist branch This approach advocates for following the capitalist path instead of a socialist revolution to overcome economic hardships in the peripheries. Dependency focuses on the extent to which the development of poor countries relies on the global economy under the rule of developed nations. This variant argues that there are strong ties between groups and classes within nations. The relationship between external and internal forces is rooted in the coincidence of interests between local dominant classes and international classes (Sánchez, 2003). Cardoso (1977), in alignment with Wallerstein (1988), criticizes orthodox Marxists who state that feudalism was an important characteristic of Brazilian society, arguing that, even since colonial times, capitalism best described the mode of production in Brazil. What is intriguing in Brazil is how slaveholding colonial production was created by expanding mercantile capitalism, which also reserved its most dynamic part for the international market. Cardoso acknowledged that Frank contributed to transforming the interpretation of Latin American society, which seemed to be feudal. Underdevelopment is a historical process generated by capitalism, completely distinguishable from slaveholding colonialism. There is a clear passage from the colonial situation to a situation of dependency, which implies: a) the creation of states that protect property-owning classes; b) the creation of networks of bourgeoisies in the Western world and local dominant groups in peripheral countries, who share common interests; and c) double domination experienced by the local subordinates, who are subjugated by both the bourgeoisies from core countries and local dominant groups from peripheral countries (Cardoso, 1977). According to Cardoso and Faletto (1979), at least in some countries of the periphery, the penetration of industrial-financial capital accelerates local production, intensifies the productive forces, and absorbs labor power in expansive cycles, producing an effect similar to capitalism in advanced countries. Some degree of local prosperity is feasible as long as goods produced locally by foreign stakeholders induce dynamic effects on dependent economies. According to Cardoso (1977), Frank mistakenly assumed that Dependent capitalism always produces hyper-exploitation of labor while also resulting in unemployment in phases of contraction. It is neither true that Dependent capitalism is incapable of broadening the internal markets nor that in all scenarios it reproduces underdevelopment. Cardoso suggests that some countries should take advantage of “dependent-associated development.” Similarly, Furtado (1973) argues that even if it is true that the centers of colonialist powers tend to appropriate surpluses, domestic ruling classes appropriate part of such surpluses as well, aiming to import other products that match the consumption habits of core countries, often linked to modernization ideas related

Dependency Theory today  423 to lifestyles, thus reproducing a vicious cycle. The role of local elites is relevant in the analysis of reformists and has contributed to perpetuating the underdevelopment of Latin America. Sunkel (1969) rejected the radical-socialist revolution, for which the Marxist branch stood, given how unlikely it is in Latin America due to external factors, such as the influence of the United States. However, Sunkel also acknowledged that the dependent status of the region was unsustainable due to the lack of capital transfer and the persistent exclusion of the masses. Instead, Sunkel, in contrast with Dos Santos (1970a)3 advocated for development policies. The national development policies of Latin America, he argues, must aim to strengthen regional integration, expand the markets of products manufactured in the region, create Latin American multinational companies, promote industrial cooperation with advanced regions, and speed up the growth of agricultural production available for cities at constant or decreasing prices for the urban consumer (Sunkel, 1969). Peter Evans (1995) further elaborates on national development through developmental states. Unlike predatory states that extract at the expense of society and undercut development even in the narrow sense of capital accumulation, developmental states preside over industrial transformation and make it happen. One of the characteristics of developmental states is their embedded autonomy, which consists of a combination of coherent internal organization and close links to society. States exist in a set of social ties that bind them to society and provide institutionalized channels for the continual negotiation and renegotiation of goals and policies. In the presence of problems that protectionist policies (such as import substitution industrialization) have, often associated with a lack of investment, the state must protect private investment. In this context, embedded autonomy means securing private investments for development with relative independence from state intervention. The state has to be fiscally disciplined and protect public savings to promote stable growth and reduce inequality (Doyran, 2015). More intriguing in Evans’s arguments is his approach to the global political economy. He states (1995) that modern nations must fit their aspirations into a global division of labor since the placement in production for global markets implies the welfare of their citizens. In this regard, the international division of labor is a basis for enhanced welfare, based on the theory of comparative advantage, according to which countries are better off if they concentrate on what they do best. Producing goods that other countries can better produce will lower the welfare of everyone. “If you are sitting on copper deposits, you are stupid not to sell copper,” Evans (1995, p. 8) straightforwardly wrote. These statements naturally contradict the arguments of Raul Prebisch (1950), for whom the position in the international division of labor is a cause of development, not a simple result.

27.4 CHALLENGES OF DEPENDENCY THEORY Dependency Theory has faced some salient challenges associated with the rise of formerly underdeveloped countries, corrupt local dynamics, and even conceptual controversies that may undermine the whole basis on which this approach is built. In this subsection, I discuss these challenges.

424  Handbook of social justice in the Global South 27.4.1 Dependency Theory and Local Dynamics Objections to Dependency Theory criticize its focus on exchange and spatial relations at the expense of production relations. According to Johnson (1981), this criticism often concentrates on the economism of Dependency Theory, which exaggerates the impact of international political economy and downplays the role of local struggles. Smith (1979) argues that Dependency Theory has overestimated international factors to the detriment of studying the influence of the South over its own affairs. Even if external forces have played a role in the growth of underdeveloped countries and considering the uncertainty of their late industrialization, discussing the role of national institutions is necessary. Few peripheral states managed to create strong governing institutions, lack representative (of ethnicity and class) party structures, and either tolerated or actively created incompetent and corrupt bureaucracies. These elements altogether shape a weak state (Smith, 1979). Yasuhiko Matsuda and Michael Walton (2003) argue that Latin American states are weak relative to OECD and other developing countries of similar income. This means weaknesses in providing public goods such as the rule of law and protection of property rights, as well as basic services such as primary and secondary education. This weakness is also the result of excessive influence of elites on public decisions through clientelist structures where political support depends on material incentives. The state is therefore captured, impeding policies that reduce inequality. A strong state, Sunkel (1969) elaborates, is one that can knit together the social forces under its jurisdiction while also building national development policies, stimulating and promoting institutional and structural changes for the achievement of sought social goals. This entails a change of what is traditional and challenges both domestic and foreign entrenched interests. Internal growth of Southern states must result in their international growth; as their economies become more diversified and their institutions are more organized, they gain international strength. Dependency Theory is correct in highlighting the power that the North retains over the South. However, the power of this interaction is not immediate. The strength and independence of local factors also matter (Smith, 1979). Considering everything, the North (or center countries) have been able to penetrate the South (or the periphery) by employing alliances with local elites. However, an analysis of domestic corruption is not unusual in this approach. Even if Dependency Theory focuses on how institutions operate to keep some countries developed at the expense of others, it has also studied the domestic conditions of underdeveloped countries. This approach has constantly highlighted the role of internal elites in perpetuating the status of the countries they belong to in the world economy. Dos Santos (1978), highlighted how higher classes in the peripheries help the centers to retain their privileges when demands for redistribution rise, even by using cooperative violence. Frank (1969) argued how the ruling classes in peripheries enforce mechanisms to maintain the satellite condition of their countries, under the protective umbrella of center countries, in a situation of mutual benefit. Similarly, the reformist dependentistas have also highlighted the role of local mechanisms. Cardoso (1977), for example, emphasizes how dependency needs the protection of property-owning classes, along with alliances between Western bourgeoisies and dominant groups in peripheral countries, which subjugate the local subordinate groups. Finally, Furtado (1973) discusses how surpluses are accumulated in the peripheries by local ruling classes, who spend them on importing other products to match the consumption habits of core countries. Even if it is true that local corruption and elite-based state formation have not been the main

Dependency Theory today  425 object of study of Dependency Theory, it is also true that numerous scholars of this approach have highlighted how local elites have utilized the institutions they control to protect their interests to the detriment of majorities. What is yet to be investigated is how local elites have reproduced institutions that benefit only them, at the expense of national interests. 27.4.2 Dependency Theory and Emerging Countries The emergence of formerly underdeveloped countries within capitalist channels has led to the question of the validity of Dependency Theory. For example, Amsden (2003) argues that the scenario depicted by Dependency Theory is no longer relevant. Dependency relies on a constant flow of foreign capital to an extent that becomes key for a given country’s growth. This presumption, she argues, ignores domestic structures of power, for example, autarchic regimes in Arab-speaking countries and the emerging left-leaning governments in Latin America. In addition, today, 30 percent of world manufacturing value added is produced in developing countries. A developing country does not need innovation to trigger rapid growth; instead, it can use its capabilities of production and execution skills to outcompete advanced economies as South Korea, Japan, China, Singapore, and Taiwan have done (Sánchez, 2003). These countries have made the most impressive economic strides in the postwar era, registering record economic growth from the 1960s onward, along with relatively egalitarian distribution of income (Gereffi, 1989), and, for example, in the case of South Korea and Taiwan, were the scenario of radical agrarian reforms backed by the United States (Grosfoguel, 2000; Popov & Jomo, 2018). Arrighi, Silver, and Brewer (2003) question the relevance of this convergence, since it does not relate to the average levels of income of the average resident. China, for example, is still a low-income country (back in 2003) and has a share of one-twentieth of the world’s population. Fischer (2015) argues that even if China grows, the central countries are the primary sources and regulators of international liquidity and keep control over it in times of crisis (for example, by attracting highly skilled migrants). On the other hand, the industrial growth and export increase of South Korea have relied heavily on external debt from 1960 onward (Fischer, 2018) rather than on extractive industries as occurs in other peripheral countries. The historical capitalist development of South Korea has consisted of import substitution and export promotion, both of which were core policy prescriptions by Dependency theorists (Kvangraven, 2021). The depreciation of more than 400 percent of the Korean currency concerning the US dollar between 1960 and 1980 facilitated this process (Nakahima & Hiroshi, 1995). The fast growth of the Asian countries was possible when private enterprises that relied on the state for receiving low-interest loans in targeted industrial sectors and protected markets expanded their production to Western markets (Palat, 2014). It follows that the rapid growth of South Korea, and to some extent, Taiwan and Singapore, builds on extensive state intervention rather than open markets. In contrast, countries relying on the modernization paradigm, like Ireland, tend to experience rising inequality and slow growth (O’Hearn, 1989). The case of China is, however, problematic. In 2003, it was a low-income country, but today it is a middle-income country (Sicular, Gustafsson, & Yang, 2017) that relies on exports and extractive industries. Given the size of the Chinese population, its economic expansion is even more challenging for the cores than any of the other Asian miracles (Arrighi, 1994). China has performed outstandingly in terms of its global share of high-tech manufacturing, financial competitiveness, and international aid to the point that the world seems to be entering an era of

426  Handbook of social justice in the Global South interdependent hegemony (Li & Shengjun, 2018). China is, therefore, looking for new places to invest, such as Latin America. A partnership between China and Latin America may reduce the dependence of the latter on Western cores and may benefit the export sector of Latin America as long as the prices of commodities are high, as occurred until 2013 (Liebetreu, 2021). However, such a partnership may create a new dependency. Whilst most Latin American countries export commodities and low-tech products to China, Chinese exports to the region are high-tech and mediumtech industrial products, as well as low-tech and low-cost manufactures. This foreign trade structure may decline the share of industrial production in Latin America, thus hindering its economic progress (Lopes, Quinet, & Salgueiro, 2021). Even if the global commodity boom accelerated trade relations with China, with positive implications for economic growth, Latin America has increased its reliance on primary goods, thus producing trade imbalances (Giraudo, 2020). For example, in the case of Chile, there is a clear formation of market dependency on China. Nearly half of the Chilean copper ends up in China, which needs this mineral to boost its industrial development (Liebetreu, 2021) while also creating a situation of dependency in Chile, a country that leaves aside industrial aspirations to focus on exporting this non-transformed product. Similarly, 55.73 percent of Argentinian exports to China consist of oilseeds, mainly soy, whereas almost all Chinese imports to Argentina consist of manufactured and high-tech products (Ludueña & Cibils, 2016). Recently, Stallings (2020) has stated that China is creating a new dependent relationship with itself at the center and Latin America on the periphery.

27.5 CONCLUSIONS Dependency Theory contributes to increasing the understanding of global inequality. International disparities have greatly benefited center countries and impoverished peripheral ones, worsening the conditions of people who live in the latter. The unfair unequal exchange is a blatant example of social injustice that is often taken for granted. Poor countries are blamed for their underdevelopment, ignoring the active role that center countries play in perpetuating that condition. Dependency Theory has deep critical roots based on the failure of linear Marxism and Modernization to explain why some countries are persistently poor. Dependency Theory discredits the notion that all countries must follow the same paths to achieve development, and along with this, it questions the assumed constant growth within capitalism, which requires keeping regions underdeveloped for extracting primary resources and continuing the process of capital accumulation. In addition, Dependency Theory debunks the myth of cultural backwardness and protectionism as causes of underdevelopment. The implementation of unregulated open markets has failed to boost economic development in poor regions. Instead, examples such as the Asian tigers prove that heavy state intervention is critical for economic growth. Remarkably, Dependency Theory has developed a solid theoretical background for studying underdevelopment. The use of the center-periphery binary is useful for understanding essential subordination on a global scale in capitalism and under domestic conditions. However, the case of semiperipheral countries such as China is still challenging for Dependency Theory,

Dependency Theory today  427 given its rapid transition from a low-income country to a middle-income country through a path that is not dependent on center countries and even creates new relations of dependency, placing itself as a new center. Finally, Dependency Theory has highlighted the role of local elites in underdeveloped countries in keeping the status quo. However, this is a concept that requires further exploration. It is necessary to explore how local elites in the periphery reproduce institutions that benefit only them, to the detriment of national interests, perpetuating a condition of subordination on a global scale.

NOTES 1. Dependentistas have a similar argument. Development and underdevelopment occur simultaneously. Developed countries must keep other countries underdeveloped to secure their advantage (Sunkel, 1972). 2. Monetarism is the view that the quantity of money influences economic activity and the price level. The rate of growth of the money supply is the main target of monetary policy to achieve its objectives (Cagan, 1989). 3. Dos Santos (1970a) rejected national development policies since these served only the elites.

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430  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Robinson, W. (2011). Globalization and the sociology of Immanuel Wallerstein: A critical appraisal. International Sociology, 26(6), 723–745. DOI: 10.1177/0268580910393372 Rodney, W. (1982). How Europe underdeveloped Africa. Howard University Press. ISBN: 0882580132 Sánchez, Ó. (2003). The rise and fall of the dependency movement: Does it inform underdevelopment today? Estudios Interdisciplinarios De América Latina Y El Caribe, 14(2), 31–49. https://doi​.org​/10​ .61490​/eial​.v14i2​.893 Sicular, T., Gustafsson, B., & Yang, X. (2017, August). China’s emerging global middle class. Working Paper Series, Working Paper #2017–14. Centre for Human Capital and Productivity (CHCP). Smith, T. (1979). The underdevelopment of development literature: The case of dependency theory. World Politics, 31(2), 247–288. https://doi​.org​/10​.2307​/2009944 Stallings, B. (2020). Dependency in the twenty-first century? The political economy of China-Latin America relations. Cambridge University Press. https://doi​.org​/10​.1017​/9781108875141 Stern, S. (1988). Feudalism, capitalism, and the world-system in the perspective of Latin America and the Caribbean. The American Historical Review, 93(4), 829–872.​https:/​/doi​.org​/10​.2307​/​1863526 Sunkel, O. (1969). National development policy and external dependence in Latin America. The Journal of Development Studies, 6(1), 23–48. https://doi​.org​/10​.1080​/00220386908421311 Sunkel, O. (1972). Big business and “dependencia”: A Latin American view. Foreign Affairs, 50(3), 517–531. https://doi​.org​/10​.2307​/20037926 United Nations Development Program (UNDP) (2021). Overview regional human development report 2021. Trapped: High inequality and low growth in Latin America and the Caribbean. UNDP. Valenzuela, S., & Valenzuela, A. (1978). Modernization and dependency: Alternative perspectives in the study of Latin American underdevelopment. Comparative Politics, 10(4), 535–557. https://doi​.org​ /10​.2307​/421571 Wallerstein, I. (1974). The rise and future demise of the world capitalist system: Concepts for comparative analysis. Comparative Studies in Society and History, 16, 387–415. doi:10.1017/S0010417500007520 Wallerstein, I. (1980). The capitalist world economy. Cambridge University Press. https://doi​.org​/10​ .1177​/003232928000900315 Wallerstein, I. (1988). Feudalism, capitalism, and the world-system in the perspective of Latin America and the Caribbean: Comments on Stern’s critical tests. The American Historical Review, 93(4), 873– 885. https://doi​.org​/10​.2307​/1863527 Wallerstein, I. (2011). The modern world-system. I, capitalist agriculture and the origins of the European world-economy in the sixteenth century. University of California Press. ISBN: 9780520267572 World Bank (2021). Gini index (World Bank estimate). https://data​.worldbank​.org​/indicator​/SI​.POV​ .GINI

28. Voice, positionality, and social justice in higher education An evocative autoethnographic (re)framing of an AfroCaribbean woman scholar Talia Esnard

28.1 INTRODUCTION United States-(US-)based scholars lead on research that speaks to the experiences and challenges of Black women leaders within the academy. A central argument within that body of literature has been that, despite increased access to institutions of higher education, Black women leaders face many institutional barriers that negatively impact their personal and professional experiences (Cobb-Roberts & Esnard, 2020; Delany & Rogers, 2004). These struggles, captured mainly to describe the experiences of Black American women, have been linked to a long history of institutionalised gendered racism that is laced with notable stereotypes and presumptions (Patitu & Hinton, 2003; Harley, 2008). Some key insights have been that those Black women and women of colour who are interested in positions of leadership, and who take up these roles, experience ongoing forms of hostility and microaggressions that negatively impact their well-being and professional outcomes (Gildersleeve, Croom, & Vasquez, 2011; Turner Sotello-Viernes & Myers, 2002). Central concerns have also been how these women experience and respond to these confrontations (Allen & Lewis, 2016; Collins, 2000) as well as the implications for social justice agendas within the academy (Musser, 2015). While these concerns generally encourage ongoing scholarship and activism around the disruption of these injustices from and for Black women leaders within the academy, there is still some invisibility around the experiences of Black women across other social geographies, particularly in the Global South, and, as is the concern of this chapter, for the Caribbean. What exists for the Caribbean is a wealth of scholarship on gender-based inequalities, marked by a discussion on numbers and participation of women across the broader spectrum of educational systems (Duryea et al., 2007). What remains relatively absent within this broader examination of educational systems, however, is an interrogation of the experiences of women academics in general, and in particular, of Black or Afro-Caribbean women scholars (Esnard & Cobb-Roberts, 2018; Gregory, 2006; Stewart, 2019). Moving beyond these scholarly limitations requires, therefore, that we advance research that addresses issues of difference, power, privilege, and oppression. An important step in this scholarly direction is the ongoing explorations that situate universities as “possible site[s] and points of reference for [understanding] social justice action” (Nixon & Comber, 1995, p. 63). The potential within this institutionalised approach lies in the needed contextualisation, with more deliberate examinations of subtle or not-so-subtle power structures, dynamics, and relations that are experienced and that impact social justice action or inaction. The 431

432  Handbook of social justice in the Global South chapter advances these curiosities to centre issues of voice, positionality, and social justice action for Black women in Caribbean institutions of higher education. The use of an evocative, autoethnographic, race-sensitive approach within Caribbean feminism allows such interrogation. Therefore, the chapter proceeds with (i) a review of the literature on marginality and injustices in higher education, (ii) the use of an autoethnographic approach to situate race and gender within Caribbean feminism, (iii) the presentation of three cases, and (iv) the discussion of these in relation to social justice agendas.

28.2 MARGINALITY AND (IN)JUSTICE WITHIN HIGHER EDUCATION While there are many attempts in global systems of higher education to advance social justice agendas, concerns about institutional inequality remain. In the realm of leadership, these contradictions are clear in the number of studies within the US, for instance that report on persistent forms of discrimination and ostracism faced by Black women and women of colour within administrative and academic leadership positions (Eagly & Karau, 2002; Evans, 2011). Here, the weight of organisational culture and chilly institutional climates, with mentoring as a subversive practice for Black women (Coate et al., 2015) offer a useful starting point for understanding experiences related to marginality and (in)justice in US systems of higher education. At a general level, these discernments within this body of scholarship draw attention to experiences related to social relations of gender and race within the US. A central starting point within these writings is the relevance of gender and racial stereotypes in how Black women are both represented and situated as outsiders within the academy (Adams, 2010; Gildersleeve, Croom, & Vasquez, 2011); a reality that impacts their experiences of building resilience, grit, and professional counter spaces (Griffin, 2016; West, 2017). These representations and trepidations of Black American women raise many questions not only around issues of denigration, insults, or open hostility and the microaggressions that emerge from racialised environments, but also how these impact marginalised groups (Joseph-Salisbury, 2019). The questioning of Black women’s knowledge and experiences within the academy (Collins, 2000) and the degree of anti-Black racist misogyny emerge as ongoing issues (Bailey, 2021), which shape perceptions of legitimacy and credibility within the wider academic community (Henderson et al., 2010; Allen & Lewis, 2016). The literature on the experiences of Black Caribbean women academics, and, more particularly, those in leadership, remains limited but also instructive. Of note are examinations of gender relations and identity formation that connect ideological and patriarchal structures with those of women’s institutionalised experiences (see Carty, 1988). Yet, as other scholars suggest, these gender relations are textured to reflect more cultural interpretations and framings of Caribbean social structure, which inadvertently impact the degree of openness to women in leadership roles and their own progression within the academy (Leo-Rhynie & Hamilton, 1996; Leo-Rhynie, 2005). Sheila Gregory (2006) has extended this discussion to underscore more complex intersections and constructions of race, class, and gender, which differently weigh in on the decisions, identities, and engagement of Black women within Caribbean institutions of higher education. Esnard and Cobb-Roberts’ (2018) work on Black women academics across the US and the Caribbean called attention to the need for intersectional analysis that

Voice, positionality, and social justice in higher education  433 situates institutional structures, cultures, and processes within understandings of Black women’s survival and success. Through their comparative analysis, the authors note that, while gender emerges as the core axis of power that defines the experiences of Afro-Caribbean women, experiences of racial stereotypes and denigration unfolded as quiet concerns, which were not openly expressed within institutional settings (Esnard & Cobb-Roberts, 2018). While these findings centre questions on (in)justice within Caribbean institutions of higher education, studies on social justice agendas remain limited to the Global North. Within that literature, there is a general push for self-awareness and self-empowerment as points of action for Black women leaders within the academy. To a large extent, the work of Collins (2000, 2015) remains central to this discourse with the re-positioning and privileging of a Black standpoint, a sense of self and purpose, which all remain counter to how they have been structured and constructed within institutionalised contexts. Such scholarship recognises both the significance of institutional contexts but also the need for critical consciousness and action. Dillard (2016) extended this thinking with the push for self-love and open dialogue as necessary aspects of re-positioning Black women within the US. Cobb-Roberts and Esnard (2020) also challenged scholars to centre the spaces, voices, and critical praxes of Black women administrators to restore equity and justice within higher education contexts. Beyond difference, diversity, and inclusion, therefore, scholars call for humanising spaces of higher learning that remove the isolation and racialisation of Black women and women of colour (Elmesky, 2021; Sieben, 2021). Though not extended to examine Black women’s experiences within the Caribbean, this move towards humanising spaces of higher education shapes the current project.

28.3 CRITICAL RACE INSIGHTS IN CARIBBEAN FEMINISM: AN AUTOETHNOGRAPHIC EVOCATIVE APPROACH While Critical Race Feminism (CRF) has been used to centre the impact of dominant cultures and ideologies on the material, social, and psychological realities of Black women in the US (see Evans-Winters & Esposito, 2010; Wing, 2000), it can also provide an important reference point, though with some caution, for interrogating the lived realities and stories of Black women who are situated within the intersection of race and gender. In this case, CRF can be used to make visible the social relations of power that exist based on the social constitutions of, and connections between, race, gender, and social justice within the context of higher education (Childers-McKee & Hytten, 2015). CRF also serves as a more general resistance and social justice framework (Wing & Willis, 1999; Pratt-Clarke, 2011) that advances the use of counter-narratives (Delgado & Stefancic, 2000; Solórzano & Yosso, 2002) to challenge the status quo (Pratt-Clarke, 2011). The primacy of race and broader applicability of the CRF, however, remain contested. Feminist scholars in the Caribbean have been at the forefront of this critique and subsequent re-theorisation of Black women’s experiences (see Barriteau, 2000, 2003, 2006). While Barriteau (2000, p. 11), for instance credits Black feminists for their work on the relevance of race to the public-private dichotomies for Black American women, she notes a pressure to rank oppressive structures and to choose the one that has the most “debilitating” and “devastating” effects. The same limitation can be extended to the Caribbean, where the prioritisation of gender as an analytical reference point within Caribbean feminist scholarship also limits

434  Handbook of social justice in the Global South the knowledge of how women’s lives are constructed and framed in more complex ways to influence their everyday forms of relations and engagement. For Barriteau (2003, p. 40), the focus on gender within the region has “minimised [the] feminist thrust”; a reality that requires ongoing “re-evaluat[ion of] feminist strategies and scholarship”. Barriteau (2006) advocates for ongoing theorisation that situates the experiences of Black women within the broader significance of race, gender, and class structures for the Caribbean. Such re-theorisations within the umbrella of Caribbean feminism centre issues of context in relation to structure, culture, and action for Black women. By rejecting the portability of US-based Black Feminism, Caribbean feminists have advanced a more cultural and structural understanding of how women are positioned to experience and resist oppressive contexts. Such scholarship has played a critical role in disrupting neo-colonial appropriations and stigmas associated with race, gender, colour, and class in the region (Reddock, 2007). The pushback against racial and anti-colonial vestiges also represents a move towards the contextualisation and historicisation of Black women’s experiences within the Caribbean (Wynter, 2003; Nixon, 2009). The merging of critical race and Caribbean feminism through a reflective process therefore offers a way through which race is neither centralised nor ignored. This line of inquiry, with a centring of racial and gendered structures within the theorisation of Black Caribbean women, therefore serves as an act of social justice. Evocative autoethnography offers a method of introspection and contextualisation to process and address some of the struggles or challenges related to everyday experience (Ellis et al., 2011; Bochner & Ellis, 2016). In this way, recollection becomes transformed into data that is to be analysed to better understand and decode the how and why of a given phenomenon (Bohme, 2022). This standpoint is particularly useful insofar as it allows one to better locate how self is connected and/or withdrawn from the claws of tradition, institutions, peoples, and cultures. While this approach is limited to self-examination and critique (Edwards, 2021), it remains an effective tool to conceptualise oneself (Turner, 2013) and to recognise collective histories and experiences that ensure survival and liberation (Rodriguez et al., 2012). It can also be positioned as a transgressive tool through which one can critically ground personal experience to sensitise readers to matters related to identity, voice, and representation within the context of larger societal dynamics (Bochner & Ellis, 2016; Barley, 2020). Evocative autoethnography delves into memories, impressions, and experiences with people and cultures that have impacted one’s thoughts, feelings, and practices (Ellis, Adams, & Bochner 2011). I employ the use of autoethnography as a way of interrogating self, making important disclosures, and reflecting on the meaning and impact of context and experience (Ellis, 2001, 2004; Bochner, 2001). I use this method to make visible the struggles related to individual experiences and the larger socio-cultural, historical, and social structures that underpin my own experiences as a Black woman within a position of academic leadership. In this case, it is my own attempt to project some of the practices and structures that impact lived experience. I reflect, therefore, on three key experiences within academe that are based on and have encouraged a consciousness around the significance of positionality, voice, and social justice. These events have all been written and documented through reflection and reproduction of texts, without details that threaten the protection of persons and cases.

Voice, positionality, and social justice in higher education  435

28.4 INTROSPECTION AND REFLECTION Where such examinations of experience remain deeply rooted in analyses of social and cultural conditions of existence, Ellis (2004, p. 37) advances the use of outward and inward lenses to “theorise on the vulnerabilities within self-definition and actualization” that are “moved by... through, refract, and resist cultural interpretations”. In positioning self, I speak of and on my own heritage as a Black woman, one of two children, born to Black parents, in a small island of St. Lucia, which remains populated predominantly by people of Black or African descent. I grew up in urban circuits, but with a cultural rooting planted firmly and socialised within rural farmlands, where my grandparents raised their children and where we learnt to love and celebrate kinship that extended beyond bloodlines to friends and associates of the family. There are no memories of racial sensitivities or socialisation during these years. Class and colour, however, stood out as defining aspects of social privilege and status. Education remained a main conduit to social mobility. I left my homeland many years ago and entered a multicultural and ethnic space in Trinidad and Tobago as a first-generation undergraduate student. While there were many cultural shocks during those years, I have learnt to love the cultural diversity and innovative thinking of the people. I stayed to complete doctoral work and later to start an academic career as a teacher trainer within a teaching institution. There, I refined my pedagogical focus and developed a consciousness about the culture of learning, teaching, collaborating, and using changing institutionalised contexts through critical praxis. While I have since transitioned into a more research-focussed institution, I have used these teaching and knowledge insights within institutional practices and interventions, with the hope of building communities of practice. My work, scholarship, and praxis therefore represent a commitment to collaborative and transformative praxis, even in the face of structural inequalities, paternalistic practices, and social injustices. 28.4.1 Experience #1: Standing through Doubt, Defamation, and False Representation In the first instance, I spoke out against the experiences of receiving personalised attacks, which planted external discussions of my own readiness to engage as an academic leader. Thus, in April 2020, I wrote and reflected on a conversation with a well-intended female colleague who cautioned me “about entering in[to] small, networked spaces, and with people who will try to undermine you”. I flagged a then troubling statement that “I do not know if you want that for yourself”. While I initially situated the conversation within my own experiences within the academy, I subsequently understood how and why her sense of institutionalised contexts informed a sense of fear and a position of caution. In many ways, I located the conversations with male and female colleagues about my presumed vulnerability within the reality of living through what I write and seek to transgress. I experienced then how the personal becomes political. Subsequent attempts at defamation and false representation both reinforced those sensitivities and sharpened the critical lenses for making sense of these oppressive contexts. Thus, in the same month, I recalled “the experience of processing the informal and calculated dissemination of information related to my perceived youthfulness and lack of readiness for academic leadership”. Through that reflection, I learnt about “toxic leadership” across genders, and the need for re-representing self through lived experience. Yet, in looking inward, I also understood how paternalistic structures and cultures shape embodied action. I recognised the ways

436  Handbook of social justice in the Global South in which internalised institutional contexts can become internalised to create entanglements and tensions within the representation of self and in the relationship with others. Through this introspection, I appreciated the need to stay the course and to accept the responsibility for repositioning self to serve as an agent of change. Yet, I also accepted that agency remained situated precariously between the structures of difference as they are constructed within the academy, the silences around these, the networks and gatekeepers that sustain these, and my own personal and professional groundings. Thus, in accepting the responsibility to give voice to these experiences, I reflected on my own value system, my own history, and my experience of being raised by a resilient, spiritual mother within a close-knit family. While I choose to centre a shared or collaborative re-creation of the academic space as a visionary position, I take into consideration the weight of institutional hostility, tribalism, and its impact on collegiality. 28.4.2 Experience #2: Threats and Allegations Following a formal examination, I moved from the position of an examiner to that of a perceived instigator, with accusations of racialised judgements within the process. In this incident, I became subjected to allegations of using agendas that were influenced by an assessment of my own race-related scholarship. These allegations persisted post-event through multiple written communications, with embedded threats and attempts at intimidation. While I recognised that this unfolded as a breach of examination protocol, I also recognised the extent to which my scholarship became weaponised to justify allegations and threats to my professional integrity. While at first, I did not engage in any retort, I remained taken aback by the defaulting to racialised professional attacks and the open threats to declare a so-declared “truth” that was constructed and created within the framework of aggression. I must admit to my initial inability to locate or make sense of this action. However, I soon connected this occurrence to a default narrative around difference and denigration that was muddled within reference to various aspects of power and positionality that were subtly expressed within written texts. What I discovered through these moments of communication, however, was that related to the weight of invisible discomforts, with points of difference that are not openly discussed or declared within everyday interactions but which surface within moments of tension and/or disagreement. Whether these perceptions or thoughts remain points of primary reference that influence the everyday thinking and actions of persons remains a point for further examination. It was clear through the experience that the unsaid, untold, or undeclared tensions lurk within the corridors of the institution and are not openly discussed to change mindsets or address the nature of the tensions that emerge within these contexts. 28.4.3 Experience #3: Internet Slander As someone who stands by the need for professionalism and fairness, a recent attempt at internet slander within the academic community did not sit well with me. Therefore, I am sharing the story of another professional attack that I received indirectly. This was a social media post riddled with inaccurate and personalised representations of a specific event during my position as chair. In this case, an individual used the mask of public posting with no identifiers or tags, and with reference to specific internal happenings or events within the department, but without any information on the context or insights into the rationale for key decisions. In this

Voice, positionality, and social justice in higher education  437 case, the allegation was for a perceived bias, which was clearly linked to named persons and emphasised their racial backgrounds. While there was no conversation with my accuser, or any attempt to address their grievance using legitimate channels of communication, I noted the sense of boldness and calculatedness in the agenda to slander and the callousness in their naming of individuals in the process. In my own reflection, I also observed the ease with which my accuser implicated actors not involved in the decision-making process and framed their thinking and actions within open spaces where natural retort and justice cannot occur. Representation and fairness here were scarred by personalised, politicised, and racialised agendas that were meshed within allegations and inferences related to events. Voice here also became entangled in the actioning of grievances that were undeclared, undisclosed, and not deliberated. In the immediate moment, I reflected on the mischief, the misrepresentation, the breach of institutionalised codes of conduct, and a lack of adherence to the formalised mechanisms and pathways for addressing grievances. I subsequently accepted, however, the ways in which social media offered an open space through which conjectures can be shared without a requirement for validation and credibility.

28.5 DISCUSSION The use of evocative autoethnography calls for attention to the potential impact of structures and cultures on persons and their experiences in relation to others (Edwards, 2021). While matters of race, gender, and sexuality have been well researched in the context of the Global South, it is not yet clear whether existing mechanisms address these multiple axes of power or foster equitable societies (Paton et al., 2020). The reflections echo the presence of many grey areas that are yet to be institutionally recognised or substantively tackled within the context of higher education. These findings suggest that seeking justice to address informal and unaddressed acts of aggression must extend into examinations of structures and expressions of difference that exist for Black women within the academy. The advancement of this research calls for an acknowledgement of the structural and systemic nature of these injustices to locate, recount, and transgress social injustices that persist within the academy. In this chapter, acknowledgement is being re-represented as a process of recognising how voice and positionality can be used to underscore and subvert racialised and gendered encounters that are enmeshed with concerns for age, seniority, and networks within the academy. By doing so, this work troubles the blindness and/or silence on the workings of gendered racism that are experienced within the Caribbean academy. Through an attention to race and gender that is contextualised to reflect the parameters of Caribbean realities, the work therefore makes visible the structural and discursive contexts that underlie the academy and the nuanced ways in which such experiences can influence individual capabilities or the substantive freedom to choose, represent, and influence social thought and action. While the work remains limited to personalised reflections, it demonstrates how taking responsibility to act is neither fully agentic nor structural but emerges as a negotiation of structure, context, values, and action. These findings also raise more pointed questions as to whether and how ongoing forms of racism are produced and sustained to impact the positionality and voice of women within institutional spaces to inform thinking and relations of power. Watson (2001, p. 452) notes that “race is central to creating difference and arrangement through which various groups

438  Handbook of social justice in the Global South participate in the political economy on the basis of class [and] ethnicity”. In the context of the academy, it is Lindsay (2005), however, who reminds us that the ideology of racial denial is profoundly ingrained within Caribbean intelligentsia and impacts the many indignities associated with self-denial, hatred, and institutionalised ambivalence. While inherent positionalities defined by these socially constituted hierarchies have been less than substantively examined within the academy, there is research that points to the significance of racial identity for social and professional divisions among academic women and lack of parity within the institutional landscape (Gregory, 2006, 2017). More recent research points to the negotiation of power and privilege as a form of resistance and subversion in a hetero-patriarchal and colonial academy (Stewart, 2019). These questions call for the recognition of their histories and their presence; those being, how they have worked through racialised trauma and denigration, and how these have influenced social stigma and self-representation. Bolland (1999, p. 488) traces this to “the colonial hegemony, which [has] influenced the ways [in which] people think of themselves and others, and even how such concepts as race, ethnicity, and gender are constructed, was itself contested”. While historical Caribbean scholarship provides important starting points for centring the social and cultural significance of race, gender, and class that have shaped ascriptive particularistic tendencies for social differentiation and denigration (Singh, 1999; Reddock, 2007), these must be extended to analyse the relevance of these understandings to the experiences of diverse groups of women within the contemporary period. The academy remains an important site for decolonising these realities (Boyce-Davies et al., 2003). Noble’s (2016) work on the registers of colonial liberalism, biopolitical mechanisms that sustain governmentality with freedom, may also offer a way of situating the use of digital media to denigrate and control the lives of racialised women. While there are fewer open and authentic spaces to address the discomforts around this, it is important for those in positions of leadership to use their voices and positionality to centre the oppressive and disruptive agendas that disadvantage women who confront these injustices. Here, I see the value of choosing a commitment to change for the greater good of the academy (Tatum, 2009; Wheelan, 2009) within a context that neither encourages nor sustains the possibility of enacting freedoms. In this case, the difficulty of achieving social justice lies in the absence of work and visibility that addresses the racialised and gendered realities of Black women within institutional and academic contexts. This vocalising of voice through disclosure represents a way to bring visibility to the loud silences within the academy that are built on the intersection of race and gender (Dillard, 2016). This ability to reflect on personal and professional experiences as part of a critical discourse becomes a reflection of agency and responsibility to subvert oppressive contexts (Stewart, 2019). Such work also centres issues related to the politics of equity and human rights that draw on the need, not just for taking up space, but also for being critical of the actors within the space and holding institutions accountable for the degree of academic and personal freedoms that are created and sustained within that space. The reflections also call for the disruption of the silences around the messiness and violence embedded within that experience. In this case, we are reminded of the importance of speaking out against the everyday surveillance and control of Black women (Evans-Winters & Esposito, 2010) but also of negotiating institutional integrity and reputability. This negotiation is particularly important given the recognition that while “stories about race and racism derive from individual experience, they also communicate cultural assumptions and habits

Voice, positionality, and social justice in higher education  439 of thinking that transcend the individual and idiosyncratic” (Bell, 2003, p. 4). The analytical strength of these racialised experiences of professional Black women in leadership roles therefore provides an opportunity to centre lived but silent experiences and normalised institutional cultures that suppress agentic expressions within the institution. The work speaks to the need to both address the injustices for all actors and strengthen the importance of diversity and inclusion. The work also tells of the need for career development initiatives that function developmentally to encourage Black women and other marginalised groups to claim the space that best aligns with their desires for success and pathways for using positions of leadership to promote meaningful engagement for all.

28.6 CONCLUSION Stigmatisation is “one of the more fruitful causes of human misery” (Delgado, 2018, p. 131). Until recently, however, these forms of oppression and the implications for Black women within the academy did not receive much scholarship (Delany & Rogers, 2004). To advance this work within the Caribbean, I have positioned my story, lived experiences, and impressions of the interaction and messages of others as a way to theorise on the experiences of (in) justice as a Black woman within an academic position. The findings suggest that while gender remains a core analytical lens through which the lives of women are understood, issues of race and age (defined more so by length of time in the institution) emerge as underlying messages of denigration and difference that are politically employed to disrupt institutional presence, influence, and association. These findings are particularly important to how we recognise the multiple and intersecting axes of power that are weaponised to impact the experiences of marginalised women. These experiences, while not validated by extensive research in the Caribbean, call for extended examinations and honest conversations that deal with the symptomatic and systematic nature of these relations of power and work towards transgressing these within spaces of learning and scholarship. Yet, we must also recognise that a social justice-minded institution must boldly examine its policies, philosophies, and practices. This calls for examinations of the socially just nature of institutional policies and the extent to which these recognise and address inequities that extend beyond gender and are consciously or unconsciously employed to negatively displace racialised women within academe. It is necessary, therefore, for the evaluations of these policies to be located within broader definitions of social justice that take into consideration the multiple axes of power that impact women within the academy. While feminist scholarship has, to a large extent, privileged gender within this critical framing of the subaltern woman, there is a call for the repositioning of both gender and race within the understanding and transformation of these experiences (Momsen, 2002). By speaking to issues of power and structure, these recollections provide important reference points to widen the conversation on women’s experiences within the Global South. These reflections are used to remove the threat of voicelessness, a state of silence and invisibility that unfolds without expression or articulation. This type of scholarship, where race is situated within analyses of women’s experiences, is necessary to address ongoing forms of oppression and microaggression that pervade Caribbean contexts and to locate the specific experiences of Black women within what unfolds as a form of colonial patriarchy (Stewart, 2019).

440  Handbook of social justice in the Global South The hope, therefore, is for the “exposing and critiquing [of] normalised dialogues that perpetuate racial stereotypes” (DeCuir & Dixson, 2004, p. 27). The call is for greater critical scrutiny, awareness, and understanding of the landscape to locate both the bases of these oppressive structures and the ways in which others have internalised these to frame representations and engagements of others in ways that are consistent with these colonised groundings. Where this consciousness remains critical to voice and agency, then these can work to shape a sense-making process that centres the context and the structures of power rather than the individual in defining and addressing related problems. This type of positionality moves beyond the call for self-definition and how Black women resist oppressive images for themselves and others (Collins, 2015) to include how these define the broader structures and cultures through which they are positioned. While unearthed tensions and fragmentation may emerge as an initial consequence of these efforts, the benefits of addressing these injustices must also be seen as an imperative of higher education institutions invested in shaping more liberalised and democratic societies in which all citizens can thrive. This research, therefore, highlights one of the many silences related to racialised women with the hope that this will centre the importance of voice and positionality in how these experiences are received and confronted.

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Voice, positionality, and social justice in higher education  443 Tatum, D. B. (2009). Choosing a commitment to change. In B. L. Bower, & M. Wolverton (Eds.), Answering the call: African American women in higher education leadership (pp. 77–100). Stylus Publishing. Turner, L. (2013). The evocative autoethnographic I. In N. P. Short, L. Turner, & A. Grant (Eds.), Contemporary British autoethnography (pp. 213–229). SensePublishers. https://doi​ .org​ /10​ .1007​ /978–94–6209–410–9_14 Turner Sotello-Viernes, C., & Myers, S. (2002). Snapshots from the literature: Elements influencing the workplace environment. In C. Turner Sotello-Viernes, A. Antonio, B. Garcia, B. Iaden, A. Nora, & C. Presley (Eds.), Racial and ethnic diversity in higher education (2nd ed., pp. 222–247). Pearson Custom Publishing. Watson, H. (2001). Theorizing the racialization of global politics and the Caribbean experience. Alternatives, 26(4), 449–483. https://doi​.org​/10​.1177​/030437540102600405 West, N. M. (2017). Withstanding our status as outsiders-within: Professional counterspaces for African American women student affairs administrators. NASPA Journal About Women in Higher Education, 10(3), 281–300. https://doi​.org​/10​.1080​/19407882​.2017​.1363785 Wheelan, B. S. (2009). For the greater good. In B. L. Bower, & M. Wolverton (Eds.), Answering the call: African American women in higher education leadership (pp. 121–142). Stylus Publishing. Wing, A. K. (Ed.). (2000). Global critical race feminism: An international reader. New York University Press. Wing, A. K., & Willis, C. A. (1999). From theory to praxis: Black women, gangs, and critical race feminism. La Raza Law Journal, 11(1), 1–15. Wynter, S. (2003). Unsettling the coloniality of being/power/truth/freedom: Towards the human, after man, its overrepresentation – an argument. CR: The New Centennial Review, 3(3), 257–337.

29. Social justice through economic democracy The decisive focus of community banks in Brazil Jeová Torres Silva Junior and Jean-Louis Laville

29.1 INTRODUCTION A large number of citizen initiatives have emerged around the world in the last few decades. Many have tried to act against social inequalities and ecological problems to meet aspirations and demands, neither satisfied by the market nor the state. Among these initiatives are the community development banks (CDBs), which stand out for promoting social justice through the democratisation of the economic system without losing sight of consolidating close ties with the neighbourhood and stimulating political processes of citizens’ empowerment. A CDB is an organisation of solidarity economy in Brazil that supports communities, neighbourhoods, cities, or territories, especially those of low socio-economic development, by providing the collective building of social justice to economically, socially, and politically excluded populations. This chapter aims to address the context in which these citizen initiatives arose, expose the limitations of the classic theoretical approaches that seek to delimit this socio-historical phenomenon, explain, as an alternative, the theoretical framework that best assimilates and typifies these initiatives, and finally, based on this, reveal and analyse the case of the CBDs in Brazil and their referential action in the promotion of social justice. Further to this introduction and the final considerations, the chapter is structured in three central sections to better convey these reflections and arguments. In the first of these sections, we explain why the two main existing classical frameworks that ground the studies about the citizens’ initiatives seem insufficient and inadequate to sustain them. The third sector or nonprofit sector approach, mainly resulting from Anglo-Saxon analyses, as well as the social economy, more spread in continental European countries, have the same limitations: they are West-centred. In contrast, in the second of the key sections, we present another framework, simultaneously designed in the Global South and the Global North, with the challenge of minimising the shortcomings of the other approaches. In the third central section, we present, deepen, and discuss the case of Brazilian CDBs. It was born in the neighbourhood of Conjunto Palmeiras, a poor suburb of the city of Fortaleza, State of Ceará, Northeast Brazil, with the foundation of the CDB Banco Palmas in January 1998 (França Filho, Rigo, & Silva Junior, 2012; França Filho, Silva Junior, & Rigo, 2019). With Banco Palmas as a methodological reference, new CDBs started to appear in the nation after 2005 thanks to initiatives from the federal, state, and local governments. According to Rigo et al. (2024), in October 2024, there were 167 CDBs affiliated with the Brazilian Network of Community Banks (RBBC), created in 2006. Many of these banks are directly connected to state or municipal public policies of social protection, income transfer, territorial development, and microcredit for production and consumption. 445

446  Handbook of social justice in the Global South This happens through economic democracy (Dowbor, 2007) processes set up in the areas served by CDBs. These are based on three things: (1) making it easier for more people to get bank accounts, solidarity loans, social currency, basic income, and to produce and consume goods locally; (2) giving more power and control to the people in the area, so they can make political decisions about their economic choices and investments in the area’s infrastructure; and (3) making more money available to everyone. The effect is a change in the characteristics of the production process and access to the results of collective effort and participation in public decisions, which allows political emancipation, better living conditions, and freedom of choice, essential aspects of achieving social justice. The research assumption was that CDBs play a relevant role in social development, economic democracy, and political emancipation of the populations in the areas where they are established. Political emancipation occurs by participating in public issues that reorient their actions (Guerreiro Ramos, 1984). Social development relies on strengthening freedoms (Sen, 2000) and primary sociability relationships (Caillé, 2007). In turn, economic democracy (Dowbor, 2007) is articulated with the foundations of political emancipation and social development and is embedded in plural economic relations, either of market, non-market, or non-monetary characteristics (Laville, 2003; Polanyi, 2011). In the chapter, the theoretical framework of analysis focusses on the conceptual fields that support the CBD phenomenon, based on the approaches of the authors cited in this paragraph about the solidarity economy, social transformation, economic democracy, emancipation, and associative action. The theoretical framework also draws on the sociology of emergences and the epistemology of the South, according to Sousa Santos (2001, 2002, 2006), as a case study of an experience from the Global South. Furthermore, analyses were based on our 22 years of theoretical and empirical studies on plural democracy, plural economy, solidarity economy, solidarity finance, and CDBs. This chapter gathers data collected in ethnographic studies, observations, focus groups, and interviews conducted over the years, with results published as reports, articles, chapters, and books (Laville, 2003; França Filho & Silva Junior, 2005; Hart, Laville, & Cattani, 2010; França Filho, Silva Junior, & Rigo, 2012; França Filho, Rigo, & Silva Junior, 2012; Laville, 2013; Laville, Bucolo, Pleyers, & Coraggio, 2017; Eynaud et al., 2019; França Filho, Silva Junior, & Rigo, 2019; Laville, 2019; Cheng & Silva Junior, 2022; Frère & Laville, 2022; Silva Junior, 2023, Rigo et al., 2024).

29.2 THE INADEQUACIES OF THE NON-PROFIT SECTOR AND SOCIAL ECONOMY FRAMEWORKS Civil society initiatives have generally been understood through two frameworks. The first, based on the Anglo-Saxon context, is the non-profit or third sector, and the second, based on the European context, is the social economy. However, both seem to have serious limitations regarding the realities of the Global South, as we will address in the next topics of this section. 29.2.1 The Third-Sector Approach This approach relies on the neo-classical economic perspective and apprehends non-profit organisations through market failures in providing individual services and through state

Social justice through economic democracy  447 failures in rendering collective services. It explains the reasons why the market, the state, or the non-profit sectors are resorted to. This approach assumes a separation between these three “sectors” and a hierarchy, with the non-profit sector being a second or third option when solutions provided by the market and the state prove inappropriate. However, the non-profit approach has received much criticism. One regards the status of the non-profit criterion. This approach makes the non-distribution constraint autonomous and considers it the privileged channel of users’ trust in the services provided by non-profit organisations. But this criterion is not the only one capable of generating trust; standards adopted by for-profit organisations can compete with it. Different studies have confirmed that all types of organisations can use other methods (ethical codes, certifications, labels, etc.). Therefore, it is difficult to notice when and why the non-distribution constraint is crucial for the decisions of the individuals concerned. Adverse selection and moral risk exist in many activities and signal market difficulties. These characteristics did not prevent market development in many of these activities, such as consulting services for companies or professional services. However, the market, in such cases, is a “network-market”, characteristic of a quality economy and a market of organisations where customers do not choose a product or service, but rather the organisation that provides it (consulting firm, hospital centre, etc.), because it is well known and well-positioned. As a result, markets with quality rules and institutions ensuring deontological criteria can overcome the limitations of the orthodox market model. A second criticism concerns a weak explanation for the creation of non-profit organisations. This explanation details the reasons why users or donors choose non-profit organisations, but the implicit statement refers to their pre-existence, why they were established, and why they have become an alternative choice. The lack of interest from promoters of non-profit organisations, which is clearly manifested in the non-distribution constraint, is assumed to generate trust and explain consumers’ individual economic interests, who turn to these organisations to optimise their satisfaction. This theoretical dead end is taken to the extreme by the economic theory of altruism, which shows how disinterest is economically rational and a form of achieving one’s individual interest by considering the satisfaction of helping others as a utility function of the consumer. The third criticism of the non-profit approach refers to its focus on self-interest concerning service provision. It reduces all human decisions to rational choices resulting from instrumental behaviours; that is, behaviours orientated towards the result of the action, which leads to denying the existence of society (Etzioni, 1988). Society, in this perspective, is just the result of interest-orientated individual choices, and individuals are seen only as consumers whose decisions tend to maximise their advantages. Thus, the role of organisations is only noticed through their function of service production; other dimensions are not considered. Social integration and democratic participation are overlooked. Some of these utilitarian theories can even understand rich and complex cultural legacies as hindering logical decisions or as less important than providing efficiency. The fourth criticism relates to a sectorial conceptualisation, which authorises a functional and peaceful version of the relations between the market, the state, and non-profit organisations. The approach based on market and state failures can obviously be used with an ideological vision when the non-profit sector is used to justify the state withdrawal. Hence, the shift towards the valuation of civil society as an alternative to state intervention can follow the theory of rational choice, where agents choose between the market, the state, and non-profit solutions.

448  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Finally, the fifth criticism relates to implicit hierarchization by considering the market, the state, and non-profit organisations as distinct entities and placing them in separate compartments (Lewis, 1997). It goes further by proposing an analytical framework where the market and the state are seen as the pillars of society and non-profit organisations as a complement. According to Godbout (2000, p. 98), “the market and the state represent the regular way for circulating goods and services”, and if non-profit organisations can take the place of the state, it indicates that the state has failed in its protection task because bureaucracy dominates it. 29.2.2 The Social Economy Approach Given that associationism existed before public intervention, the previous conception is false. Hence, it is necessary to shift towards conceptions based on other prerequisites, which do not ignore a history that is more than two centuries old. In this regard, a more historical approach allows for another conception: the social economy. The concept of social economy, as understood in Europe, comprises a set of organisations broader than the non-profit sector, as defined in the North American approach. Indeed, Anglo-Saxon analyses exclude cooperatives and mutual societies because they distribute part of their profits to members. This exclusion cannot be justified in the European context. First, some cooperatives, such as building cooperatives in Sweden, have never distributed any profit. Second, profit distribution is limited in all cases since cooperatives and mutual societies are rooted in the same ground as associations. They are not created with the purpose of achieving a return on the capital invested, but to satisfy the general interest or a mutual interest (Gui, 1992), to contribute to public welfare, or to meet social demands from some parts of the population. The legal forms of initiatives (cooperatives, mutual societies, associations) define a set of social economy organisations, where the decisive criterion is not to ban profit sharing but rather to limit the material interests of investors. Therefore, the border is not drawn between for-profit and non-profit organisations, but between capitalist and social economy organisations, the latter prioritising the formation of a collective heritage over the return on individual investments. In other words, what is stressed in Europe is, at the initiative level, all the legal forms which limit the private appropriation of benefits. Hence, the definition adopted by the Comparative Nonprofit Sector Project, carried out by Johns Hopkins University, has a self-centred American bias (Borzaga, 1998) since it is based on the non-distribution constraint, which shapes the North American configuration of the sector with an important role for foundations. This criterion does not provide a correct understanding of the legal particularities of European countries, where the decisive criterion is to limit profit distribution. This characteristic is responsible for social economy organisations’ specificity compared to other productive organisations. Beyond their differences, European initiatives share a common tradition – different from North American – that is specific to them and focusses less on the non-distribution constraint, philanthropy, and volunteering than on collective actions based on the mutual help and participation of citizens concerned with social problems. The social economy is based on a system of rules. It goes beyond the debates on values, carrying out a more thorough analysis of the specific characteristics of participating organisations. It is possible to understand social economy organisations by their unique characteristics, which include the voluntary combination of a group of people and a company (Vienney, 1994),

Social justice through economic democracy  449 connected by a relationship of association and activities. In this conception, the cooperative model becomes the reference for the whole social economy. The social economy is composed of non-capitalist enterprises active in the market, and success is indicated by the increase in the volume of market activities; questions on the internal functioning and the non-market spheres of the economy are hidden. This definition assesses cooperatives, mutual societies, and associations in terms of the evolution of the relations between their members and their economic results from the standpoint of their level of integration in the market economy.

29.3 THE EPISTEMOLOGY OF THE SOUTH: ANOTHER FRAMEWORK FOR EMERGENCES The epistemology of the South does not reflect a claim on behalf of any region of the world. Here, it is essential to clear up a misunderstanding: the South is not a geographical entity. Instead, it serves as a metaphor for the suffering that the dominant world order causes to people and an understanding of the resistance it inspires. It is true that the populations that have been and are most affected by inequalities and discrimination caused by capitalism and colonialism live in the Global South. But the South also exists in the Global North, where, just as in the countries of the South, oligarchies benefit from the dominant order. Rethinking global justice and emancipation is a necessary task that must be carried out on a planet-wide scale and cannot defend a single path – a counter-project symmetrical to what neoliberalism would like to be. It is a matter of establishing a dialogue on intercultural translation. The goal, as Zapatistas say, is “a world where there is room for many people”. Taking plurality into account is part of the process. It is not about pointing out a path to follow or mapping resistance, but opening up to diversity. If Western theory is losing strength, it is not just because of capitalism’s artifices but also due to the limits inherent to its vision of standardisation. Moving away from this consensual attitude, the sociology of emergences suggests studying the emancipatory potential of a great diversity of alternative practices that are born in a prevailing capitalist system (Mauss, 1987). Even though they are constantly in danger of marginalisation or recovery, they serve as a testament to the fact that, to paraphrase the World Social Forum’s famous slogan, “another world is possible”, it is also already a reality in a variety of experiences that are occasionally fragile but also realistic and occasionally utopian. It is about going beyond the hermeneutics of scepticism and no longer despising initiatives that fight capitalist hegemony, stating, amidst difficulties, the logic of reciprocity, equality, and solidarity. The sociology of emergences is attentive to these actions, which it analyses based on case studies carried out in several countries in South America, Asia, and Africa (Sousa Santos, 2006). Based on these, theses are formulated and emphasise, from an economic point of view, that these initiatives should be conducted both internally and outside the state and the market. In addition, the sustainability and success of these experiences depend largely on their insertion into cooperation and mutual support networks. Moreover, their economic dimension is inseparable from their political dimension. In other words, the radicalisation of participatory democracy goes hand in hand with the radicalisation of economic democracy, and the future of processes of social justice is linked to their relationship with economic, political, cultural, and social dynamics. A theoretical issue that arises is the heuristic scope of this sociology of emergences. There was a tradition of non-capitalist companies, whose theorisation in the Global North

450  Handbook of social justice in the Global South characterised them alongside the social economy. However, the joint emergence in South America and Europe of the so-called solidarity economy (Hart, Laville, & Cattani, 2010) provided the opportunity for a collaboration that considerably renewed the approaches on both continents. Therefore, the epistemologies of the South allow the deepening of an intercultural dialogue already started through the analyses of the substantive economy and democracy by authors from the North and the Global South. 29.3.1 A Substantive Economy Based on Labour and “Buen Vivir” As far as economics is concerned, the orthodox approach can be described as formal. It places shortages at the centre of the analysis and makes material interest the basis for individual choices. It contains an economic fallacy that confuses economics with market mechanisms, which is why the solidarity economy cannot be considered. Polanyi (2008, 2011) synthesises anthropological observations that help consolidate the heterodox proposal for a substantive economy and highlight the differences between the two approaches. However, focussing on the criticism of modernity as a market society, Polanyi did not mobilise a pluralistic analytical framework for addressing contemporary substantive economies. The contribution of South American authors is essential in this regard, in particular, their studies on the popular economy conceived as an economy of labour, which was one of the essential bases for the genesis of the solidarity economy (Coraggio, 2011; Quijano, 2008; Razeto, 1993). Additionally, new ways of running institutions like those in the Bolivian and Ecuadorian constitutions help make a solidarity economy a real thing that is part of a real economy and seen as a way to achieve buen vivir (Acosta & Abarca, 2018). Recognised by this reference to buen vivir, Andean philosophies of life such as sumak kawsay also converge with the idea of subsistence expressed by Polanyi, associating the concern for life reproduction with the concern for “good living”. Studies on feminist economics also sparked debates. The research agendas on social provisioning and care advocate a link between production – the object of study in the formal economy – and reproduction, made visible within a substantive economy structured by social gender relations (Hillenkamp, Guérin, & Verschuur, 2014). Decoding the empirically observable combinations between the distinct principles of economic integration can help reconcile emancipation and protection by detailing the ambivalences of household administration and the effects of a shift to reciprocity. 29.3.2 A Substantive Democracy, Rooted in Deliberation and Inter-Subjectivity Regarding politics, the first tradition of thought refers to public authorities. Thus, in a democratic society, there should be a “monopoly of legitimate violence”, to use Max Weber’s expression. That is, a coordinating body that can ensure that society is not a war of all against all, and that the rules of life in society are respected. But a second tradition of political thought insists on public spheres, which are places where people gather, trying to define the rules of a common world. The emphasis on the public sphere characterises the approaches of Hannah Arendt and Jürgen Habermas. This orientation moves away from the paradigm based on expressing individual preferences and understanding democracy formally. In this case, it extends the political process to forums and other public arenas that fit a deliberative paradigm and emphasises intersubjectivity in shaping opinions and decisions. The unique contribution

Social justice through economic democracy  451 of South American authors in this area is their ability to cross borders between the political and economic spheres, which favours the autonomy of politics and distrusts its perversion by economics. In this sense, extending Fraser’s (2005) observation that popular public spaces necessarily address socio-economic issues, this epistemology of the South deepens the initiatives aiming to enhance social justice, and everyday life through democratic dynamics must deal with delegitimisation processes. For example, women’s initiatives can be spaces of production but also places of socialisation and a public sphere, with the particularity of combining, to a greater or lesser extent, economic activity, social justice, and political action (Guérin, Hersen, & Fraisse, 2011; Cheng & Silva Junior, 2022). The sociology of emergences seems capable of revitalising critical theory by valuing alternatives that are often denied or ignored in the Global North. It deliberately emphasises its “emancipatory features” in order to strengthen its visibility and credibility. However, the hermeneutics of emergency does not renounce a rigorous and critical analysis. Instead of undermining their potential, it aims to consolidate these alternatives (Sousa Santos & Garavito, 2013). Founded on these epistemological pillars, the solidarity economy is a witness to diversity and collaboration. In the current economic balance of power, each continent’s specific solidarity economy initiatives can only be strengthened by bringing together Latin American, African, Asian, and European players. Indeed, if Northern approaches tend to despise such initiatives, Southern approaches lose all relevance if they adopt a maximalist vision that idealises them (Wanderley, 2015). Faced with these two symmetrical traps, it is only by elucidating the ambivalences that it becomes possible to consider reality’s complexity. The attention paid to emergences changes the way we look at current realities and leads to renewed debates, making visible what was left out of official history. The following section aims to highlight one of these emergent initiatives from the Global South precisely, within the Latin American perspective of the solidarity economy that, through its actions, seeks to rethink the way to achieve social justice. The solidarity economy framework demonstrates the necessity of transversal axes that support and guide any action for social justice on three pillars: ecological, anthropological, and economic. It does this by associating economic democracy, political empowerment, and territorial cohesion. The anthropological pillar regards the social, cultural, and historical conditions that guide community life, but it also refers to the capacity to establish spaces of territorial self-management (Caillé, 2007; Guerreiro Ramos, 1984). The ecological pillar refers to the guidelines for preserving the quality of ecosystems and ecological goods essential to survival, such as air, water, and land, emphasising the gains from prevention and repair before thinking about the increase in wealth caused by destruction (Sen, 2000). Lastly, the economic pillar connects the environmental and human rights foundations with non-liberal ethics-based production and consumption. This turns economic activity into a political act and opens up chances for economic democracy to happen in the area (Dowbor, 2007; Laville, 2003; Polanyi, 2011). This is a Southern epistemological perspective that articulates combined conceptual approaches from the North and the Global South and, in our view, makes achieving social justice more feasible. Turning to practice, the case of the CDBs will show that it is necessary to address social justice based on territorial cohesion, political empowerment, and especially economic democracy.

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29.4 ANALYSING THE CASE OF CDBS IN THEIR EFFORTS FOR SOCIAL JUSTICE The CDBs’ intention was to design a project for creating jobs and generating income by stimulating production and consumption through microcredit for local use (França Filho, Rigo, & Silva Junior, 2012). Therefore, aiming at integrated territorial development, CDBs were established to use funding as a tool to build and consolidate a territory of solidarity economy. As part of this perspective, the CDBs rely on the principle that local communities can organise their own subsistence structures, combining the political and economic struggle for citizenship, economic democracy, and social justice. In addition, the role of local people in CDBs is essential. They are ubiquitous in granting loans, policy-making, and management, and the majority of workers at CDBs are from the neighbourhood. For CDBs, social relationships are more important than economic operations. This goes against the usual market logic, which says that economic relationships or the initiative’s economic-mercantile goal come before social relationships. Operating in the domain of solidarity finance and articulating production, commercialisation, finance, and territory mobilisation, the CDB assumes a prominent role in fostering collective political empowerment, territorial cohesion, economic democracy, and social justice. To do that, the joint building of supply and demand is an essential aspect since the bank operates to meet the real needs of the population. Thus, the CDB funds and guides the creation of socio-productive projects and service provision, as well as local consumption. In addition to disseminating microcredit for multiple purposes, according to lines of credit defined by each CDB, its greater commitment is to build territorial networks by gathering producers, service providers, and consumers. These are known as prosumer networks and imply a rupture of the classical dichotomy between production and consumption, characteristic of the orthodox vision of economic relations. The use of complementary currencies – social currency, as it is called in Brazil – is another distinctive aspect of CDBs (Freire, 2011; Rigo, França Filho, & Leal, 2015; Brito & Oliveira, 2019). According to França Filho and Rigo (2021), the social currencies created by CDBs serve two purposes: (i) as a mechanism to foster consumption becoming legitimate in the territory and among local consumers, producers, and sellers; and (ii) to induce a new type of relationship with money, restoring degraded social ties while proposing a new type of arrangement for territorial economic life, thus building a new form of sociability. In this approach, the concept of economic democracy prevails, where everyone should be included in the economic system, regardless of their economic condition. This is a way of ensuring the exercise of citizenship and nurturing the possibility of future social justice. Hence, there are different financial products related to microcredit developed by CDBs, according to the reason for using the resources, the borrower’s status, the amount of the loan, interest rates, and monthly payments. A person who cannot access credit at traditional banks can apply for, and eventually receive, loans from CDBs. For informal activities (home production, street vendors, small-scale production, etc.), microcredit lines have monthly interest rates between 2 per cent and 2.5 per cent. As for consumer credit, the payment of social allocations and basic income transfers is often made in social currency, which is the main type of financial transaction used by CDBs. The first CDB social currency was created in 2002, the Palmas, to be used at Conjunto Palmeiras. Most of the CDBs’ social currencies that existed in the form of banknotes/money bills have operated

Social justice through economic democracy  453 since 2015 through a digital platform called e-Dinheiro. The social currencies strengthen the market and increase the circulation of wealth by stimulating demand, raising local purchasing power, and favouring the flow of production and distribution in the territory. Despite some initial reluctance, local vendors and service providers have gradually accepted social currency through the e-Dinheiro digital platform. To do so, they have to make an agreement with the bank and offer an average discount of 2 per cent when selling in social currency compared to the same item sold in national currency (Brazilian Real, or BRL). CDBs set aside a percentage of social currency transactions to set up a credit fund to offer to merchants at lowinterest rates. Of the 167 Brazilian CDBs, 70 per cent were active in 2024 (Rigo et al., 2024). According to Rigo et al (2024), 57 per cent of CDBs carry out credit operations, and 29 per cent operate with the e-Dinheiro platform for spending, bill payment, cell phone recharging, access to credit, and social benefits. CDBs have more than 300,000 e-Dinheiro users in the country, handling BRL 1.1 billion (about US$220 million) in transactions per year after 2021. In the city of Maricá, in the state of Rio de Janeiro, the CDB Banco Mumbuca began to operate in 2017 in close relationship with the local government. Due to municipal law, this CDB became the financial operator of local programmes of socioeconomic benefit, among which Maricá’s Basic Citizen Income programme is the most relevant. This basic income programme used the CDB bank card and the social currency, Mumbucas, for each citizen to receive their earnings. Through CDB, this public policy provides an annual average of BRL 86.7 million (around US$17.3 million) to 42,500 Maricá citizens. This ensures a minimum monthly income for 26 per cent of the local population, reducing poverty and promoting social justice for the most vulnerable. The benefit of a CDB running such an experiment through its bank card or social currency is that it promotes socio-economic growth and increases the flow of wealth within the municipality (Waltenberg et al., 2021). Another episode is also significant. In May 2022, Banco Palmas created, at Conjunto Palmeiras, an income transfer programme called Community Basic Income for families living in extreme poverty. This is Brazil’s first programme of its kind, funded with resources from CDB transactions. In this case, the CDB transfers part of the resources it gets from fees each time a transaction uses Palmas social currency. BRL 54,000 (about US$10,800) is expected to be invested in the first year, serving 100 neighbourhood families. Finally, another situation shows CDB as a platform for local social, economic, and cultural projects by providing resources like physical space, seed funding, and technical assistance. One illustration is the Elas project, which Banco Palmas established in 2011 to support the empowerment of local women (Cheng & Silva Junior, 2022). Women interested in credit receive vocational training and attend workshops on financial education, women’s rights, health, and gender and sexuality. Their husbands and children are invited to participate in the workshops, thus involving the family in the women’s empowerment process. At the end of the programme, women can receive credit for creating their individual or collective businesses. On average, there are 30 women per group in each project edition over a period of nine months. In all, more than 500 women have already participated in this project. These are examples of the decisive actions of Brazilian CDBs, which show their role in building, providing, and managing solutions to economic democracy for the promotion of social justice by using their own means, expertise, and resources. Given these specific characteristics, CDBs cannot be seen as a type of organisation reduced to the conventional field of microfinance. They go beyond this framework, and these are their distinctive attributes:

454  Handbook of social justice in the Global South (1) A steering committee with a majority of local members oversees the management and coordination of CDB resources; (2) Use of microcredit lines for production and consumption with a fair interest rate that allows the creation of income and jobs in the territory; (3) Loan guarantees are based on inclusion and the possibility of reducing socio-economic asymmetries, and recovering loans from delinquent payers is done through an analysis of each individual case; and (4) The development of other instruments to encourage local spending – credit cards and social currencies – is recognised by producers, merchants, consumers, and users as effective in democratising wealth circulation in the territory. Therefore, CDBs are defined as a financial system with an associative and community perspective, aligned with the guiding precepts of the solidarity economy, for the democratisation of the financial system through access to credit and payment methods, income generation, and expanding the circulation of local wealth (França Filho, Silva Junior & Rigo, 2019). These axes of action allow CDBs to contribute to improving general living conditions, reducing inequalities, and promoting social justice at the territorial level.

29.5 CONCLUSIONS The discussion and analyses in the previous section show that a CDB is an organisation that, through economic democracy, encourages territorial cohesion and social justice, while simultaneously financing producers, sellers, and consumers. It expands the capacity to generate income in the community and, mainly, stimulates the political empowerment of the population. In carrying out these actions, CDBs are directly involved with a public policy of social development and income transfer, highlighting the relevance of articulating with public authorities to support their activities for the promotion of social justice. A key feature of CDBs, regarding their economic democracy, is a well-adjusted connection between the socio-economic and socio-political dimensions of development. This is because the elaboration of socio-productive activities is combined with a form of territorial public action, where the population of a given territory is directly involved, debating politically their common problems and deciding its destiny collectively. This is coherent with the fact that CDBs, as a vector of multidimensional sustainable development, are part of collaborative territorial dynamics. CDBs act in an environment where neither the state nor the market fully meets the demands. Therefore, it becomes mandatory for CDBs to take the lead role in actions that promote social justice in the territory. And they do it, as we have shown, through the economic democracy path. Figure 29.1 summarises the path from economic democracy to social justice followed by CDBs. This chapter contributes by analysing the results of Brazilian CDBs’ operations, a Global South experience, and their role in fostering social justice, economic democracy, and political emancipation of the populations where they are established. It also adds to the body of research by showing how these organisations that work with the solidarity economy, which is rooted in the knowledge systems of the South, use a variety of action mechanisms to make social justice the centre of their business.

Social justice through economic democracy  455

Source: Based on Guerreiro Ramos (1984), Sen (2000), Caillé (2007), Dowbor (2007), Polanyi (2011), Laville et al. (2017), Laville (2019), & Cheng and Silva Junior (2022)

Figure 29.1  The path from economic democracy to social justice Mainly as a result of the level of cooperation and close ties in the territory, CDBs merge their financial operations with relationships of trust, solidarity, and concern for the collective benefit. Such initiatives are, at the same time, unprecedented forms of public space expansion in their respective territories. Their way of acting in the territory to achieve social justice marks their uniqueness, whose basic requirements are close relationships and certain values and principles such as mutual trust, citizen participation, economic democracy, and redistributive solidarity mechanisms. In other words, CDBs’ social justice lies in their distinct structure of management, a new way of operation, and the search for a more equitable, symmetrical, and balanced society.

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456  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Brito, E. C., & Oliveira, C. M. (2019). Bancos comunitários de desenvolvimento e moedas sociais: A experiência pioneira do Banco de Palmas. Orbis Latina, 9(2), 23–36. https://revistas​.unila​.edu​.br​/ orbis​/article​/view​/1582 Caillé, A. (2007). Anthropologie du don: Le tiers paradigme. La Découverte. Cheng, K. R., & Silva Junior, J. T. (2022). The role of solidarity in women’s empowerment: Narratives from Northeast Brazil. Voluntas: International Journal of Voluntary and Nonprofit Organizations, 1–11. https://doi​.org​/10​.1007​/s11266–022–00539–7 Coraggio, J. L. (2011). Economía social y solidaria. El trabajo antes que el capital. Abya-Yala. Dowbor, L. (2007). Democracia econômica: Um passeio pelas teorias. Banco do Nordeste do Brasil. Etzioni, A. (1988). The moral dimension. Free Press. Eynaud, P., Laville, J.-L., Santos, L., Banerjee, S., Avelino, F., & Hulgård, L. (Eds.). (2019). Theory of social enterprise and pluralism: Social movements, solidarity economy, and the Global South. Routledge. França Filho, G. C., & Rigo, A. S. (2021). Moedas sociais: Contextos, conceitos, potencialidades e desafios. Espiral, 5, 38–51. http://www​.iecomplex​.com​.br​/wp​-content​/uploads​/2022​/04​/revista Espiral​_v5​.pdf​# page​=39 França Filho, G. C., Rigo, A. S., & Silva Junior, J. T. (2012). Microcredit policies in Brazil: An analysis of community development banks. In I. Hillenkamp, F. Lapeyre, & A. Lemaître (Eds.), Securing livelihoods – informal economy practices and institutions (pp. 115–131). Oxford University Press. França Filho, G. C., & Silva Junior, J. T. (2005). Une dynamique associative emblématique au Nord-Est brésilien. In G. C. França Filho, J.-L. Laville, J.-P. Magnen, & A. Medeiros (Eds.), Action publique et économie solidaire (pp. 105–121). Érès. França Filho, G. C., Silva Junior, J. T., & Rigo, A. S. (2012). Solidarity finance through community development banks as a strategy for reshaping local economies: Lessons from Banco Palmas. RAUSP Management Journal, 47(3), 500–515. https://www​.sciencedirect​.com​/science​/article​/pii​/ S008021071630245X França Filho, G. C., Silva Junior, J. T., & Rigo, A. S. (2019). Bancos comunitarios de desarrollo y finanzas solidarias: Una estrategia socialmente innovadora para reconfigurar las economías locales. In J. J. Michelini (Ed.), La metrópolis creativa – innovaciones sociales en América Latina y el Sur de Europa (pp. 231–258). Editorial Catarata. Fraser, N. (2005). Qu’est-ce que la justice sociale? Reconnaissance et redistribution. La Découverte. Freire, M. V. (2011). Moedas sociais: Contributo em prol de um marco legal e regulatório para as moedas sociais circulantes locais no Brasil [PhD Dissertation, School of Law, University of Brasília]. http://icts​.unb​.br​/jspui​/ handle​/10482​/9485 Frère, B., & Laville, J.-L. (2022). La fabrique de l’émancipation – repenser la critique du capitalisme à partir des expériences démocratiques, écologiques et solidaires. Seuil. Godbout, J. (2000). Le don, la dette et l’identité. Homo donator vs homo economicus. La Découverte. Guérin I., Hersen, M., & Fraisse, L. (2011). Femmes, économie et développement. Érès. Guerreiro Ramos, A. (1984). New science of organizations: A reconceptualization of the wealth of nations (2nd ed.). University of Toronto Press. Gui, B. (1992). Fondement économique du tiers secteur. Revue des Études Coopératives Mutualistes et Associatives, 44–45(4), 160–173. https://gallica​.bnf​.fr​/ark:​/12148​/ bpt6k6575594p​/f162​.item Hart, K., Laville, J.-L., & Cattani, A. D. (2010). The human economy. Polity Press. Hillenkamp, I., Guérin, I., & Verschuur, C. (2014). Économie solidaire et théories féministes: Pistes pour une convergence nécessaire. Revue d’économie solidaire, 7, 4–43. https://hal​.ird​.fr​/ird​- 01197164 Laville, J.-L. (2003). Avec Mauss et Polanyi, vers une théorie de l’économie plurielle. Revue du MAUSS, 21, 237–249. https://doi​.org​/10​.3917​/rdm​.021​.0237 Laville, J.-L. (2013). L’économie solidaire: Une perspective internationale. Pluriel/Fayard. Laville, J.-L. (2019). Réinventer l’association. Desclée de Brouwer. Laville, J.-L., Bucolo, E., Pleyers, G., & Coraggio, J. L. (Eds.) (2017). Mouvements sociaux et économie solidaire. Desclée de Brouwer. Lewis, J. (1997). Le secteur associatif dans l’économie mixte de la protection sociale. In J.-N. Chopart, J.-L. Outin, B. Palier, & S. Rozier (Eds.), Produire les solidarités – la part des associations (pp. 370– 371). Collection Rencontres et Recherches. Mission Interministérielle Recherche-expérimentation (MIRE) - Ministère de l’Emploi et de la Solidarité - Fondation de France.

Social justice through economic democracy  457 Mauss, M. (1987). Écrits politiques. Fayard. Polanyi, K. (2008). Essais. Seuil. Polanyi, K. (2011). La subsistance de l’homme. La place de l’économie dans l’histoire et la société. Flammarion. Quijano, A. (2008). “Solidaridad” y capitalismo colonial/moderno. Otra Economía, 2(2), 12–16. https:// revistas​.unisinos​.br​/index​.php​/otraeconomia​/article​/view​/1077 Razeto, L. (1993). Los caminos de la economía de solidaridad. Vivarium. Rigo, A. S., França Filho, G. C., & Leal, L. P. (2015). Moedas sociais nos bancos comunitários de desenvolvimento: A experiência das conchas em Matarandiba/BA. Revista Interdisciplinar de Gestão Social, 4(2), 15–31. https://doi​.org​/10​.9771​/23172428rigs​.v4i2​.9053 Rigo, A. S., Jesus, L. F., Lopes L. M. S., Silva Junior, J. T., & Araújo, E. A. (2024). Pesquisa nacional dos bancos comunitários de desenvolvimento: Relevância, resultados e principais desafios. Mercado de Trabalho: Conjuntura e Análise, 30(78),127–144. http://dx​.doi​.org​/10​.38116​/ bmt78​/espp1 Sen, A. (2000). Development as freedom. Anchor Books. Silva Junior, J. T. (2023). Participation, governance, collective action, democracy and the social and solidarity economy. In I. Yi, P. Utting, J.-L. Laville, B. Sak, C. Hossein, S. Chiyoge, C. Navarra, D. Jayasooria, F. Wanderley, J. Defourny, & R. Nogales-Muriel. (Eds.), Encyclopedia of the social and solidarity economy (pp. 271–281). Edward Elgar. Sousa Santos, B. (2001). Nuestra America: Reinventing a subaltern paradigm of recognition and redistribution. Theory, Culture & Society, 18(2–3), 185–217. https://doi​.org​/10​.1177​/026327601220 51706 Sousa Santos, B. (2002). Towards a sociology of absences and a sociology of emergence. Revista Crítica de Ciências Sociais, 63, 237–280. https://doi​.org​/10​.4000​/rccs​.1285 Sousa Santos, B. (2006). Another production is possible – beyond the capitalist canon. Verso. Sousa Santos, B., & Garavito, C. R. (2013). Alternatives économiques: Les nouveaux chemins de la contestation. In I. Hillenkamp, & J.-L. Laville (Eds.), Socioéconomie et démocratie: L’actualité de Karl Polanyi (pp. 125–147). Érès. Vienney, C. (1994). L’économie sociale. La Découverte. Waltenberg, F., Abchiche, D., Silva, R. C., Costa, R. M. E., Freitas, F. J. G., Santana, A. G., Lima, J. P., & Silva, J. L. (2021). Monnaie sociale, revenu de base renforcé et prestations d’urgence aux travailleurs: Analyse préliminaire des politiques innovatrices mises en place à Maricá au Brésil pendant la crise de la COVID-19. In B. Boudarbat, H. H. Guermazi, & M. B. O. Ndiaye (Eds.), Les pays francophones face à la COVID-19: Impacts socioéconomiques, politiques de riposte et stratégies de sortie de crise et de résilience économique (pp. 136–154). Observatoire de la Francophonie Économique, Université de Montréal. Wanderley, F. (2015). Desafíos teóricos y políticos de la economía social y solidaria: Lecturas desde América Latina. Plural Editores.

30. International organisations and development Exerting Global North power and privilege Stephanie E. Trapnell

30.1 RELATIONSHIPS Much has been made about the encroachment on the sovereignty of nation-states by global governance structures. Facing an ever-connected world of finance, consumerism, media, pandemics, climate change, and so forth, governments have met capacity limits within their own territories and are increasingly ceding control to international organisations that can often regulate more effectively than domestic governments. Bureaucratic organisations and networks constitute de facto governance arrangements with the ability to make decisions that impact the lives of individuals, through both the regulation of norms and the delivery of services. Rather than being overseen by one controlling entity, global governance structures are a patchwork of organisations that address various global concerns, such as health, conflict, poverty, the macroeconomy, or trade. Examples of intergovernmental organisations, comprised of member nations rather than individuals, include the United Nations (UN), North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), World Bank, World Health Organization, and the World Trade Organization (WTO). But governance is also constituted through parallel configurations that operate alongside governmental entities. These international nongovernmental organisations (INGOs) sit outside government control, though they are often funded by governments through foreign assistance frameworks, as much of their work is conducted in countries of the Global South. There are persistent and valid concerns surrounding the accountability of international organisations. Intergovernmental organisations are legally not answerable to anyone except their members, while INGOs operate far outside their domicile but function with a nonprofit model that leaves responsibility with their local governing board. The Global South is targeted heavily by international organisations, particularly the poorest countries, the most conflictprone, the most affected by climate change, and so on. The individuals living in these countries have little say in the management of this assistance, as the business of foreign aid is not subject to democratic decision-making once authority has been granted (or ceded) to international organisations. This chapter addresses concerns over the accountability of international organisations with a view to understanding how power is wielded, responses to that power, and alternatives to it. The first section deals with the global governance deficit: the absence of democratic decisionmaking within the global system, which struggles with the participation and scrutiny of the people it is supposed to serve, having never envisioned this need in the first place. The next section addresses the failings of the foreign aid system in particular, with a focus on international organisations that purport to be part of the solution (to poverty, climate change, conflict, 458

International organisations and development  459 etc.), but in reality, often serve to perpetuate systems of domination and oppression. The final section discusses the primary ways that international organisations wield power, specifically through funding, knowledge production, and relationships. Throughout the chapter, examples are provided of how individuals and groups are responding to the lack of accountability and proposing alternatives that encompass justice in different ways.

30.2 ADDRESSING THE GLOBAL GOVERNANCE DEFICIT: MULTISTAKEHOLDER INITIATIVES The normative nature of regulation, coordination, or intervention in international organisations is masked through discussions of bureaucratic efficiency and efficacy. International organisations are bureaucratic creatures and function much like any organisation, with concerns over administration, management, and personnel. But any notion that global governance structures are apolitical in nature is incorrect: their mandates may incorporate bureaucratic or coordination functions, but they certainly wield power over private individuals. Dahl (1999) echoes many practitioner concerns when he contends that the delegation of government authority to representatives in international organisations is problematic. Agents, employees, or representatives of international organisations are not democratically elected, are not employed by governments, are rarely subject to domestic laws, and as such, they sit in inaccessible positions of power that are not subject to popular control. These organisations should be viewed as “bureaucratic bargaining systems”, rather than vehicles for more democratic governance, with the suggestion that it is dangerous to accord legitimacy to organisations that lack most of the features of what is traditionally considered democratic government. Unfortunately, neither stringent ethical standards nor shifting of perspective eliminate the issue of holding global power to account. The problem of the democratic deficit in global governance looms large. Global governance entities are intended to address the scale and complexity of major global challenges that elude single actors. Yet, they remain unaccountable to any citizenry or public sphere, casting doubt on the legitimacy of their authority and compatibility with democratic values. Global multi-stakeholder initiatives (MSIs) attempt to bridge these gaps by inviting a range of stakeholders (interested or affected parties) to participate in the governance and processes of their organisations. Like the transnational governance networks proposed by Dale and Samara (2008), these initiatives involve a “variety of networks… that can include, in addition to states, sub-state actors, corporations, professional organisations, and media”, many of which operate across the boundaries of a traditional nation-state. However, while MSIs can be built within and around transnational governance networks, they are much less transitory than networks and operate with distinct rules and membership criteria. Their internal governance arrangements must regularly balance the “interests and perspectives of highly diverse constituencies” in order to maintain legitimacy (Bezanson & Isenman, 2012). Sociologist Saskia Sassen (2003) has questioned whether the authority of a nation-state might serve as a “bridge to a politics of the global for citizens”, but more often, citizens are only allowed a voice if they are considered stakeholders in a global initiative, and even then, only if they are recognised as members of that initiative. MSIs thus do not alleviate all of the concerns with legitimacy and democratic accountability.​

Figure 30.1  Types of multi-stakeholder initiatives

Source: Author.

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International organisations and development  461 Though most MSIs include nation-states as stakeholders, not all MSIs are alike in their internal governance arrangements and scope of influence, as captured in Figure 30.1. Entities like the UN and NATO are considered intergovernmental organisations, with a focus on political cooperation among nation-states, and aim at negotiating responses to problems that affect more than one state or region. There are also private sector forums that aim to substitute for weak government capacity, as well as national and subnational collaborative governance entities that are focussed less on transnational networks and more on local constituencies and issues. The current mandate from the UN High Political Forum on the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals requires domestic MSIs such as this. There is also a type of MSI that focusses more on the performance of member states on specific activities within their own borders, rather than actions taken for the global good. This kind of supranational meta-governance is based on nation-state membership, despite the involvement of a range of stakeholders. It also involves the issuance of membership criteria, as well as performance criteria and monitoring of specific standards for member states. Supranational meta-governance is conducted by other transparency and accountability MSIs like the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative and the Infrastructure Transparency Initiative (CoST), which are concerned with sector-specific activities within member states, rather than global coordination of their issue areas. Despite the differences in governance and scope, global MSIs function through normative soft power, which involves “efforts to regulate and reconstitute the interests of actors through cooption and attraction” (Brockmyer, 2016). The understanding is that states are concerned with their global reputations, particularly with respect to foreign direct investment and foreign assistance/aid, and international governance among states will exert some influence over individual state behaviours. Modes of participation are non-binding, with responsibilities shared among a variety of actors and at a variety of political levels. There is a clear focus on formal and independent multi-stakeholder governance that establishes the legitimacy of the initiative, particularly through inclusive, participatory decision-making processes. But there is also the concern that a focus on leadership and policies crowds out any focus on outcomes and performance. In the case of MSIs that address transparency and accountability in governance, this translates into performative arrangements characterised by “open washing”, whereby states fail to implement reforms even though they publicly commit to global standards. This risk is meant to be mitigated by independent evaluations of national government performance, regularly conducted, with a formal set of standards for methodological rigour; however, without sanctioning power, there is little to be done for underperforming members except suspension from the initiative, which is a hard line that MSIs prefer to avoid. Given the fact that the number of MSIs has increased substantially in the last two decades, focus has shifted from their entry onto the scene to their purported impacts on the governance of the public sector, as well as other areas of government. One of the most important findings of recent studies on the impacts of MSIs is that practitioners are not necessarily convinced that MSIs deserve all of the attention (and funding) that has been invested (Brockmyer, 2016; Global Financial Integrity, 2020). Criticisms of MSIs centre on the difficulties with internal governance. These include failures to achieve consensus on essential structures, processes, or goals, and the sheer number of participants that inhibit the capacity to act, either collectively or individually (Khadiagala, 2015). There is also concern with the coordination and opportunity costs, and difficulty in achieving trust among actors (Brockmyer, 2016; MSI Integrity, 2020). In particular, the

462  Handbook of social justice in the Global South power imbalances that characterise much of foreign aid and development are replicated in MSIs that are launched by powerful states and supported by major donors (Kahler, 2013; Khadiagala, 2015). There is less attention paid to the complexity of social change, particularly on the pathways of change that may be highly dependent on national sociopolitical factors, including civil society capacity, existing policymaking arrangements, and government incentives for reform. Political sociologist Kees Biekart and development scholar Alan Fowler (2018, p. 1694) point out that though many MSIs use the term “partnership” in their titles, it obscures inherent power asymmetries, since “a relationship between ‘partners’ would suggest a relationship between equals, which can be an intentionally misleading aspirational labeling if it is structurally improbable”. Other criticisms of MSIs include the distortion of country priorities, the bypassing of country leadership, and the proliferation and channelling of aid into specific issue areas rather than sector-wide reforms.

30.3 POWER IMBALANCES IN GLOBAL AID INFRASTRUCTURE This discourse that purports to be about partnership and transformation is framed by endless discussion of donors, recipients, and assistance. As Cornwall and Rivas (2015) astutely note, “[t]here is in this framing an abject failure to consider the implications of structural factors and global processes of power” (2015, pp. 399–400). This is the context of international development, a sector ostensibly dedicated to improving the living conditions of the world’s population, within which international organisations play an outsized role. The practice of international development is fraught with the difficulties of translating economic theory into a reality characterised by severe power differentials among states and civil society actors. This manifests as unequal competition for resources, pervasive intellectual dominance and co-optation, and the depoliticisation of any transformative potential. To start, there is a distinct lack of funding for organisations in the Global South, which must compete for bilateral aid contracts from Northern donors that are often informally tied to domestic suppliers. For example, in 2015 and 2016, 90 per cent of bilateral aid contracts in the United Kingdom were awarded to British firms. In the United States, the figure is 95 per cent (Meeks, 2018 p. 10). In the absence of direct channels of aid from states, organisations in the Global South rely on INGO funding that is subject to strict parameters on expenditure, often limiting financing to projects rather than operational overheads (Martins, 2020). This competition for resources is exacerbated when INGOs localise their structures in specific countries in the Global South, ostensibly moving operations closer to the populations they serve, but ultimately crowding out the efforts of less well-resourced local organisations (Hodgson, 2020). Little attention is paid to the underlying drivers of inequality that provide the moral impetus for wealthy countries to send assistance to struggling ones. A more radical assertion is that “[a]id is not charity; it is a matter of justice, since the wealth of the richest countries is borne of historical and ongoing exploitation of the developing world” (Lawson et al., 2019, p. 69). Foreign aid to the “poor countries” of the Global South is pitched as moral leadership in a turbulent, uncharitable world. But it is not a benevolent act of grace as much as it is cover for the massive outflows from aid-recipient countries. As Hickel (2017) describes:

International organisations and development  463 The idea of aid overrides any suggestion that Western powers are in any way complicit in the suffering of the South. Indeed, aid stands as irrefutable proof of Western benevolence. After all, rich countries give out about $128 billion in development aid to poor countries each year. This is an enormous amount of money – more than all of the profits of all of the banks in the United States combined. But if we take a moment to look more closely, we see that it is vastly outstripped by financial resources that flow in the opposite direction. In reality, rich countries aren’t developing poor countries; poor countries are developing rich ones. (Hickel, 2017)

The wealth that flows out of countries of the Global South is tremendous, comprising not just people and natural resources, but as Hickel notes, money. Based on data gathered on global financial outflows, experts estimated in 2012 that countries of the Global South received US$1.3 billion in total inflows but saw US$3.3 trillion in outflows, making them net creditors to the rest of the world (Global Financial Integrity 2020). Hickel (2017) goes further to estimate that “for every dollar of aid that developing countries receive, they lose twenty-four in net outflows”. (emphasis added). This includes not only interest payments on sovereign debt, but also repatriated profits from multinational companies, and illicit financial flows in both trade and services. Ongoing exploitation is thus driven by a global financial system that continuously subjects countries of the Global South to enormous debt burdens, US$700 billion of it considered “odious” by international standards. Odious debt is also known as illegitimate debt, which is interest paid on principal that was borrowed by deposed leaders, often corrupt dictators who were propped up by foreign powers. These loans are decades old, and already paid off many times over. Foreign companies are able to repatriate profits rather than invest locally, which further generates enormous loopholes in global trade that facilitate large, corruptly acquired, flows of money. The pervasive intellectual dominance of the Global North in development has also recently come under significant scrutiny, as more practitioners from the Global South reveal the condescension, racism, and self-importance of employees of international organisations working “in the field”. International staff are accused of mocking local employees for their lack of Western expertise and providing only basic accommodation (if at all) in extreme conditions. The bureaucracies of international organisations effectively limit access to career opportunities through informal networks of white expats and the use of short-term contracts for young, mobile staff with near-native English language skills. The advocacy and programmatic work of international organisations is infused with the rhetoric of social movements, such as for gender equality and climate change, with often little attention paid in the delivery of projects, prompting accusations of co-optation of concepts for funding proposals and public relations purposes (Al-Karib, 2018). Similarly, knowledge production practices are administered from the Global North, with few inputs from local researchers and analysts on the direction or scope of the research, while the appropriation of local knowledge is used to establish the credibility of the outputs. Although the terms are often used in binary, defining Global North and Global South in the context of international organisations is challenging. Location is too limiting a concept to encompass the realities of power and practice. Because of the difficulty in defining precisely whether an organisation is part of the Global North, one network of INGOs has suggested that the focus should be on whether organisations benefit from “Global North power and privilege, including benefits derived from the legacies of colonialism” (Gender and Development Network, 2022). This shift in perspective eschews the limitations of geography and allows for

464  Handbook of social justice in the Global South consideration of where power originates, how it is exercised, who benefits from it, and how it can be reallocated.

30.4 PATHWAYS OF POWER: FUNDING, KNOWLEDGE PRODUCTION, AND RELATIONSHIPS The space of international development is dominated by donor financing linked to institutions of the Global North. With government funding from various high-income nation-states, INGOs subcontract to smaller organisations in the Global South through so-called “partnerships”. These relationships are based on the channelling of funds from major donors to smaller organisations in the Global South, through INGOs that serve as middlemen in the process (Wong, 2012; Bob, 2005). In some cases, donors fund organisations directly, without the intervention of transnational intermediaries. But this process is costly, especially when grants are small and there are many recipient organisations. The funding cycles of foreign donors can wreak havoc on the stability of local civil society organisations, unless they are formally part of an INGO that regulates its funding to needs in the Global South. Donor funding and influence, as well as multi-stakeholder partnerships, are considered by local actors to be part of the development industry. “These are colonialistic initiatives”, commented one local activist, “because there is good will but not good knowledge about the context” (Trapnell, 2021). The Global South is large and diverse, but it often serves as a socially-constructed vessel for the reception of funding from high-income countries or intergovernmental organisations like the World Bank, regardless of whether donors understand the context. Even when Southern-led organisations are empowered enough to communicate that reforms are not working as expected, the development machine is so well-structured that any pushback is often ignored. Regardless, Southern-led organisations working within the foreign aid framework often have close links to Global North power and privilege and are influenced toward particular pathways of change by those donors. The foreign assistance framework is heavily stacked against organisations based in the Global South. Less than 2 per cent of international humanitarian aid funding goes directly to organisations based in the Global South (International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, 2015), while the remainder is funnelled through INGOs, who then subcontract 87 per cent of project delivery to local organisations (Okumu, 2019). This funding relationship is the basis for many of the partnerships that INGOs purport to establish with organisations in the Global South, often required by global donors before INGOs are even considered for core funding provision. Thus, the system establishes the funding relationship (at its various levels and scales) as the core of the aid disbursement process. Along with funding, knowledge plays an outsized role in perpetuating power imbalances in the aid infrastructure, and knowledge production practices allow organisations of the Global North to serve as gatekeepers of ideas and solutions that are then funded by powerful donors. Primarily because of the dominance of economics in the development paths of poor countries, the “scientification” of development has skewed knowledge production upward, away from the communities being studied or consulted. Even within research efforts that aren’t steeped in economic theory, the connection between producing knowledge and producing solutions is often tightly linked. There is little space for discussion with affected communities about the policy recommendations, and more importantly, the subsequent interventions designed on the

International organisations and development  465 basis of research findings, that make the most sense for their interests and needs. These decisions are made by organisations of the Global North even prior to discussions with potential “partners” in the Global South, who are then brought into conversation once the core parameters of intervention have been formalised, only to hash out logistics of delivery and how to convince local communities to engage. There is a distinct presumption that knowledge produced in the organisations of the Global North is legitimate and robust, which allows INGOs and other Northern actors to co-opt research projects and local knowledge for their own purposes (Martins, 2020). Powerful actors exercise an “epistemic privilege” that constructs “particular visions of the world as natural, and as the universal and inevitable path of human progress” (McMichael & Morarji, 2010, p. 236). These hierarchies of knowledge support the broad aid infrastructure that centralises knowledge production and financing in the Global North. Feminist researchers have argued for decades that existing power structures produce particular solutions because critical viewpoints and questions have been excluded from consideration. This has resulted in streams of research in feminist development that work with “women’s own realities, perceptions, hopes, fears, and emotions” (Wallace & Porter, 2016, p. 11), where local knowledge and community interests are respected, instead of appropriated and engulfed in discussions of outputs, outcomes, and measurement. This kind of work is also being reflected in intersectional research that takes into account not only the lack of data available on marginalised groups but also how the lived experiences of individuals provide insight into what matters for them, and not what matters to funders (Rivas, 2018). This practice illuminates the question of whether traditional INGOs actually “empower and support the local” with vastly more money, resources, employees, and influence that serve to centralise decision-making in the Global North. Even capacity building, which is intended to strengthen civil society, has proven to be an unwelcome intrusion for Southern-led organisations: “[l]ocal partners are exhausted by constant yet segmented training that does not reflect their own goals or needs. What they really want is autonomy based on their own diversified funding sources, rather than reliance on sub-granting relationships” (Redvers, 2015). Financial reporting arrangements also force local organisations to conform to complex procedures of measurement, monitoring, and evaluation, which skews control upward, and distorts accountability away from local populations to INGOs. Increasingly, there have been calls for INGOs to consider their roles as “competitors, extractors, and resource-holders” rather than “sources of solidarity” in the tenuous ecosystem of global civil society (Hodgson, 2020). The development vision of unending linear progress leads to beliefs that best practice is about the necessary scaling up of successful projects, a narrowly prescribed evidence-based results agenda, and the exportation of social change models with cursory regard for historical or political injustices. But there are alternative visions being proposed that seek to thwart the rigidity of models that prize individualism, economic rationality, and the centralisation of power. It is not simply that development as a driving paradigm is insufficient, but that it is also unnecessary. In the absence of norms about efficiency, a blinding focus on measurement to establish effectiveness, and, by extension, to justify intervention, there is space for the consideration of meaning, connection, and ideas of justice. In particular, the question of global equity looms large, concerned as it is with a rebalancing of power and resources on a global scale. Though the INGO bottleneck of international funding plays a large role in maintaining vast and institutionalised power imbalances, “re-routing flows of money from the Global North”

466  Handbook of social justice in the Global South is not the only solution (Hodgson, 2020). As Hodgson (2020) notes, a Southern-led organisation may simply “replicate the top-down behaviors of organisations in the North” if they are subject to the same donor requirements and institutional culture within which INGOs operate. One approach is community philanthropy, which employs a combination of direct funding from global centres and a focus on building a local financial base for organisations, thus establishing a co-investment approach that challenges existing donor-recipient frameworks, and most importantly, “creates new spaces for community participation based on control of resources” (Hodgson, 2020). As one activist commented: When you have the capacity to raise money, to design and implement projects, you begin creating social capital and networks. When an organisation raises money from people who understand the context or know the community, it strengthens credibility and accountability. This is often lacking for many [local] NGOs because they get their money from another part of the world. (Presentation by GFCF and Wilde Ganzen at International Fundraising Congress, Netherlands, October 2018, quoted in Hodgson, 2020)

Community philanthropy is one movement within the global philanthropy field that serves as a sort of bridge between existing aid funding structures and emerging practices in financing, which aim to shift power away from the Global North and into local organisations that can become accountable to community stakeholders rather than controlling external actors. It is not a short-term experiment; this kind of shift is intended to be a long-term proposition that recognises the non-linearity of social change and the amount of time that it takes to effect meaningful impact. This regularly extends beyond the two, three, or five-year time horizons that characterise modern development funding, after which projects are wrapped up with a lessons learned mechanism, and communities are either abandoned or subject to the next new idea emanating from the Global North.

30.5 CONCLUSION One of the main criticisms of international organisations, particularly those engaged in development work, is that Eurocentric norms serve as the standard for the pinnacle of achievement, as well as the comparative for determining underdevelopment. Academic research has shown “how the promise of betterment functions as a mechanism of legitimation”, which is manifest in the rise of lessons learnt case studies on which the development industry leans when projects fail to produce expected outcomes (Ziai, 2017, p. 2551). However, little changes, except a reformulation of the promise of Western modernity that international development offers, and international organisations provide through extensive programming in the Global South. Most worryingly, alternatives to existing practices are often absorbed and institutionalised within international organisations without fundamentally changing the system. Superficial changes are implemented while continuing with business-as-usual, and international organisations remain primarily concerned with achieving success on their own self-developed performance metrics (Trapnell, 2021). This precludes the possibility of local, grassroots networks acting as agents of change outside an economic model of linear, infinite growth. The accountability of international organisations is thus a difficult problem to solve; domination and prejudice are deeply entrenched in the system, if not in the individuals that sustain the system. Efforts to #shiftthepower have become prominent over the last few years,

International organisations and development  467 concerned with not only illuminating the power imbalances in the foreign assistance system that functions through international organisations, but also instigating tangible change1 ( Emerhi, 2022). These campaigns have been initiated by practitioners linked to both the Global North and Global South and have prompted serious discussions about the role of INGOs in perpetuating a system of global inequity. INGOs have been called to account for continuing to benefit from a system based on the tenets of colonialism and for ignoring domestic concerns with poverty, racism, and sexism in the face of their battle with inequality in the Global South (Aly, 2022; Gender and Development Network, 2022; Peace Direct, 2022; Zamaere Smith, 2022). These calls are not entirely new: antiglobalisation protests have occurred off and on for decades about the role of intergovernmental organisations in perpetuating inequity. Tens of thousands of protesters gathered as far back as 1988 in Berlin with campaigns against the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF), in 1999 in Seattle against the WTO, and in 2000 against the World Bank and IMF in Washington, DC, among others (Shah, 2001). One reason that INGOs are being targeted by #shiftthepower and #decolonizeaid campaigns is because they are still relevant and responsive to affected groups in the Global South, and they are funded by democratically elected governments. Direct investment from a crowd of private firms has no such public face, even as it has eclipsed the spending and authority of the World Bank in the development sector, and pandemics and economic crises have shifted focus to emergency spending rather than development programmes. This makes intergovernmental organisations less receptive to calls for change that require more than straightforward, technical fixes, and originate from outside their formal channels of accountability.

NOTE 1.

https://shiftthepower​.org/

REFERENCES Al-Karib, H. (2018, December 13). The dangers of NGO-isation of women’s rights in Africa. Al Jazeera. https://www​.aljazeera​.com ​/opinions​/2018​/12​/13​/the​- dangers​- of​-ngo ​-isation​- of​-womens​-rights​-in​ -africa/ Aly, H. (2022, August 12). Ten efforts to decolonise aid: Changing practices around funding, leadership, narrative and identity. The New Humanitarian. https://www​.thenewhumanitarian​.org​/feature​/2022​ /08​/12​/10 ​-efforts​-to​-decolonise​-aid Bezanson, K. A., & Isenman, P. (2012). Governance of new global partnerships: Challenges, weaknesses, and lessons [CGD Policy Paper 014]. Center for Global Development. https://www​.cgdev​.org​/sites​/ default​/files​/1426627​_file​_Bezanson​_Isenman​_ FINAL​.pdf Biekart, K., & Fowler, A. (2018). Ownership dynamics in local multi-stakeholder initiatives. Third World Quarterly, 39(9), 1692–1710. https://doi​.org​/10​.1080​/01436597​.2018​.1450139 Bob, C. (2005). The marketing of rebellion: Insurgents, media, and international activism. Cambridge University Press. Brockmyer, B. (2016). Global standards in national contexts: The role of transnational multistakeholder initiatives in public sector governance reform [Unpublished dissertation, American University]. https://doi​.org​/10​.13140​/ RG​.2​.2​.23488​.53760

468  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Cornwall, A., & Rivas, A.-M. (2015). From “gender equality” and “women’s empowerment” to global justice: Reclaiming a transformative agenda for gender and development. Third World Quarterly, 36(2), 396–415. https://doi​.org​/10​.1080​/01436597​.2015​.1013341 Dahl, R. A. (1999). Can international organizations be democratic? A skeptic’s view. In I. Shapiro, & C. Hacker-Cordón (Eds.), Democracy’s edges (pp. 19–36). Cambridge University Press. Dale, J. G., & Samara, T. R. (2008). Legal pluralism within a transnational network of governance: The extraordinary case of rendition. Law, Social Justice, and Global Development, 12(2 [Winter]). https://warwick​.ac​.uk ​/fac​/soc​/ law​/elj​/ lgd​/2008​_2​/daleandsamara/ Emerhi, E. (2022, March 15). #ShiftThePower manifesto for change: Where it started and where we are now. Bond. https://www​.bond​.org​.uk ​/news​/2022​/03​/shiftthepower​-manifesto​-for​-change​-where​ -it​-started​-and​-where​-we​-are​-now/ Gender and Development Network (2022). What is the role of Northern organisations in global justice advocacy? https://gadnetwork​.org​/gadn​-resources​/northern​-organisations​-global​-justice​-advocacy Global Financial Integrity (2020). Trade-related illicit financial flows in 135 developing countries: 2008–2017.  https://gfintegrity​.org​/report​/trade​-related​-illicit​-financial​-flows​-in​-135​- developing​countries​-2008​-2017/. Hickel, J. (2017). The development delusion: Foreign aid and inequality. American Affairs Journal, 1(3). https://ame​r ica​naff​airs​journal​.org​/2017​/08​/development​-delusion​-foreign​-aid​-inequality/ Hodgson, J. (2020). Disrupting and democratising development: Community philanthropy as theory and practice. Gender & Development, 28(1), 99–116. https://doi​.org​/10​.1080​/13552074​.2020​.1717214 International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (2015). World disasters report. https://www​.ifrc​.org​/sites​/default​/files​/ World​-Disasters​-Report​-2015​_en​.pdf Kahler, M. (2013). Rising powers and global governance: Negotiating change in a resilient status quo. International Affairs, 89(3), 711–729. https://doi​.org​/10​.1111​/1468–2346.12041 Khadiagala, G. M. (2015). Global and regional mechanisms for governing the resource curse in Africa. Politikon, 42(1), 23–43. https://doi​.org​/10​.1080​/02589346​.2015​.1005789 Lawson, M., Chan, M.-K., Rhodes, F., Butt, A. P., Marriott, A., Ehmke, E., Jacobs, D., Seghers, J., Atienza, J., & Gowland, R. (2019). Public good or private wealth? (p. 106) [Oxfam Briefing Paper]. Oxfam.  https://s3​.amazonaws​.com ​/oxfam​-us​/www​/static​/media ​/files​/ bp ​-public​-good​- or​-private​wealth​-210119​-en​.pdf Martins, A. (2020). Reimagining equity: Redressing power imbalances between the global North and the global South. Gender & Development, 28(1), 135–153. https://doi​.org​/10​.1080​/13552074​.2020​ .1717172 McMichael, P., & Morarji, K. (2010). Development and its discontents. In P. McMichael (Ed.), Contesting development: Critical struggles for social change (pp. 1–14). Routledge. Meeks, P. (2018). Development, untied: Unleashing the catalytic power of official development assistance through renewed action on untying. European Network on Debt and Development (EURODAD). https://www​.eurodad​.org​/development​-untied​-2018 MSI Integrity. (2020, July). Not Fit-for-Purpose: The Grand Experiment of Multi-Stakeholder Initiatives in Corporate Accountability, Human Rights and Global Governance.” Institute for Multi-Stakeholder Initiative Integrity. https://www​.msi​-integrity​.org​/wp​-content​/uploads​/2020​/07​/ MSI​_ Not​_ Fit​_ For​_ Purpose​_ FORWEBSITE​.FINAL_​.pdf. Okumu, P. (2019) How NGOs in rich countries control their counterparts in poor countries..​.a​nd why they refuse to resolve it, July 12, Inter Press Service, https://www​.ipsnews​.net​/2019​/07​/ngos​-rich​ -countries​-control​-counterparts​-poor​-countries​-refuse​-resolve/​#google​_vignette Peace Direct (2022). Race, power, and peacebuilding: Insights and lessons from a global consultation. https://www​.peacedirect​.org​/wp​-content ​/uploads​/2022​/05​/ Race​-Power​-and​-Peacebuilding​-report​.v5​ .pdf Redvers, L. (2015, June 8). NGOs: Bridging the North South Divide. The New Humanitarian. https:// www​.thenewhumanitarian​.org​/analysis​/2015​/06​/08​/ngos​-bridging​-north​-south​-divide. Rivas, A.-M. (2018). Thinking about race and gender in conflict research. In A.-M. Rivas, & B. Browne (Eds.), Experiences in researching conflict and violence: Fieldwork interrupted (pp. 135–142). Policy Press. Sassen, S. (2003). The participation of states and citizens in global governance. Indiana Journal of Global Legal Studies, 10(1). https://www​.repository​.law​.indiana​.edu​/ijgls​/vol10​/iss1/2

International organisations and development  469 Shah, A. (2001, July 13). IMF & World Bank protests, Washington D.C. Global Issues. https://www​ .globalissues​.org​/article​/23​/imf-​-world​-bank​-protests​-washington​-dc Trapnell, S. E. (2021). Contesting open government: Discourse, development, and democracy [Unpublished PhD dissertation, George Mason University]. Wallace, T., & Porter, F. (2016). Feminist alternatives to the development paradigm [Briefing Paper]. UK Gender and Development Network. https://gadnetwork​.org​/ blogs​/2016​/7​/20​/envisioning​-feminist​ -futures​-gadns​-newest​-project​-tackles​-alternative​-development​-from​-ideas​-to​-outcomes Wong, W. H. (2012). Internal affairs: How the structure of NGOs transforms human rights (1st ed.). Cornell University Press. Zamaere Smith, A. (2022, September 13). Why INGOs need to do the heavy lifting. Bond. https://www​ .bond​.org​.uk ​/news​/2022​/09​/why​-ingos​-need​-to​-do​-the​-heavy​-lifting/ Ziai, A. (2017). Post-development 25 years after The development dictionary. Third World Quarterly, 38(12), 2547–2558. https://doi​.org​/10​.1080​/01436597​.2017​.1383853

31. Analysing child labour through the lens of child hawkers Towards advocacy for legislation on social security and enforcement of children’s rights Oluwaseun Olanrewaju

31.1 INTRODUCTION Nearly half of all children who work do so in hazardous occupations, according to a joint report by the International Labour Organization (ILO) and the United Nations Children’s Fund (ILO/UNICEF, 2021a). However, what constitutes child labour requires significant clarification, considering the varying definitions of the minimum age of a child and the minimum age for employment. Khair (2010) and Golo et al. (2018) emphasise that the definition of child labour is relative and varies from one society to another. According to the ILO Minimum Age Convention of 1973 (Convention 138), the minimum age for employment is 18 years. The ILO (2019) defines child labour as work that is morally dangerous and harmful to children’s mental, physical, and social development and deprives them of their childhood, potential, and dignity. However, the ILO states that children who engage in activities that do not cause distress to their health or impede their education and personal development cannot be considered child labourers. These include work to assist a family business as well as running errands for parents (ILO, 2012). Although child labour is a global challenge, it is more common in the less-developed countries of Asia, Latin America, and Africa. Child labour in underdeveloped countries is a result of exponential population growth, urbanisation, poverty, a high level of unemployment, inflation, a lack of education, a lack of parental hard work, economic austerity, and cultural and religious factors (Bass, 2004; Osita-Oleribe, 2007; Togunde & Carter, 2008; Subhash, 2011; Benedict & Ennem, 2021). Child labour, in its intricate nature, is symbolic of the perverse injustices confronting many children in underdeveloped and developing countries in the global south. As of 2020, the estimated number of African children engaged in child labour was 92 million (ILO/UNICEF, 2021b). In many ways, child labour poses an impediment to the well-being, survival, and development of children. In Nigeria, the majority of the least advantaged children are subjected to child labour despite the 1999 ILO Convention (No. 182) on the prohibition and immediate action for the elimination of the worst forms of child labour. Sadly, the social welfare system in Nigeria is inefficient and does not offer children any form of social security for their development and the fulfilment of their rights. Children’s rights are embedded in the larger interpretation of human rights and cover a broad range of civil, economic, social, cultural, and political rights. The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) of 1989 is one of the legal frameworks adopted to eliminate the menace of child labour. This study uses indices such as selfesteem, education, health, and insecurity, as well as aspiration, to analyse child labour from 470

Analysing child labour through the lens of child hawkers  471 the perceptions of children engaged in the menace. The study substantiates that over the years, successive governments in Nigeria have not appropriately backed policy frameworks with the action plan required to eradicate child labour. Ultimately, the study aims to provide an elaborate framework from which to tackle the lingering menace of child labour, while promoting social justice for children. This chapter comprises six sections. The introduction in section one presents a brief background to the study. Section two reviews existing literature on the subject matter. Section three examines the research method employed. Section four analyses the research findings. Section five covers the conclusion and recommendations. Section six raises issues for further investigation.

31.2 LITERATURE REVIEW Child labour in the context of Nigeria is a more complex phenomenon. An ILO report from 2020 reveals that about 15 million children in Nigeria engage in child labour activities (Vanguard, 2022). These children are engaged in agricultural work, domestic services, apprenticeships, mining, factory work, commercial sex exploitation, and street hawking. The most common form of child labour in Nigerian cities is hawking, and boys and girls between the ages of 12 and 17 are active participants (Nseabasi & Abiodun, 2010). Street hawking is a wanderinglike movement in which an individual carries his or her goods with a tray on the head or by means of transportation such as a wheelbarrow, bicycle, or trolley in search of customers (Oli, 2013). Child hawking is an approach to survival most common among low-income parents and guardians. Children who hawk on the streets are forced to engage in work to earn a living for themselves or to support their families. Although both boys and girls engage in street hawking, Adebayo and Olaogun (2019) observed that more girls carry out street hawking compared to boys. Their study, conducted in Osun State, South-West Nigeria, may be limited in its conclusion as a result of its geographical location and context: for example, a similar study by Ogunkan and Adeboyejo (2013) in Ibadan, South-West region in Nigeria, revealed that there were more male child hawkers compared to females in the study areas. Hawking exposes children to various risks, such as accidents, illness, rape, kidnapping, and death (Eboh, 2018). In the process of hawking, children develop habits that are delinquent and that also shape their behavioural patterns. These behaviours affect their moral, physical, social, psychological, and academic growth. Conversely, there are scholarly works that identify some positive impacts of child labour (Oloko, 1991; Rao, 2015; Bourdillon, 2017; Aufseeser et al., 2018). These studies underline that some children exposed to child labour develop self-confidence and other positive values, such as negotiating and mathematical skills. Child labour in this regard is viewed as an opportunity for children to develop their potential and gain some experience that will prepare them for future challenges (Brockhaus, 2004; Rao, 2015;Eboh, 2018). Regardless, Ali et al. (2017) consider child labour a human rights issue and a complex social phenomenon. Adopting the CRC in 1989 and the ILO Convention (No. 182) in 1999 on the Prohibition and Immediate Elimination of the Worst Forms of Child Labor reignited efforts to understand, fight, and end child labour from a human rights point of view (Weston & Teerink, 2006). The CRC discountenanced the idea of children’s needs, which had hitherto served as a framework for legislative and policy agendas on children, and made adequate provision for the rights of children that must be protected. A rights-based approach to child labour provides the legitimate framework to promote as well as protect the interests of children. According

472  Handbook of social justice in the Global South to Arat (2002), child labour is sustained by a triangular dimension that involves three parties: employers, parents, and the state. Arat maintained that critics often see employers and parents as immediate violators of children’s rights but hold the state accountable for failing to protect children’s rights. Nigeria has ratified and domesticated relevant conventions on children’s rights, such as the CRC, the African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child (ACRWC), and the African Charter on Human and People’s Rights (ACHPR). The federal government enacted the Child’s Rights Act (CRA) in 2003 to protect the rights of children. However, not all the states in Nigeria have adopted the CRA. According to UNICEF (2022), 31 out of the 36 states in Nigeria have adopted the CRA, including Lagos State. Despite existing legal frameworks to ensure the protection of children, Bomu and Akani (2019) emphasise that the rights of Nigerian children have suffered diverse abuses. The failure of the government to enforce the law and implement policies has rendered legal and policy frameworks in Nigeria weak and ineffective in tackling the menace of child labour and protecting the rights of children. According to Omokhodion and Uchendu (2009) and Ubajaka et al. (2010), most parents whose children engage in child labour are aware of its hazardous consequences. Nevertheless, due to economic austerity, poverty, and ignorance, these parents send their children to the streets to hawk. Relatedly, social protection programmes that ought to alleviate the sufferings of poor and vulnerable citizens have been inadequate and ineffective (Umukoro, 2013; Okon, 2018). Consequently, the failure of the government to provide social safety nets for the citizens has exacerbated the level of poverty. Nigerian laws on social security frameworks are limited in scope. The ILO has advocated for adequate social protection as a mechanism to combat the scourge of child labour. However, the recent ILO report in 2019 on social security in Nigeria shows that social protection coverage for children is low and inefficient, despite Nigeria being a beneficiary of the Accelerating Action for the Elimination of Child Labour in Africa (ACCEL), sponsored by the government of the Netherlands (ILO, 2022). Programmes such as the National Children School Feeding Programme, the Fight Poverty Programme, the Technical Vocational Training for the Youth, and the Youth Employment in Agriculture Programme, introduced by the Nigerian government, have not recorded any meaningful impact towards eliminating child labour. According to Shadare (2022), the Nigerian state has failed to achieve sustained social security for its citizens due to the mismanagement of public funds, and this has continuously undermined the authority and legitimacy of the state. This is more so because the lack of social protection has widened the inequality gap in Nigeria and poses a serious threat to national security and development. Anifalaje (2017) correctly argues that national and state social security programmes are not social protection schemes in the strictest sense. Furthermore, The right to social security is not justiciable and hence cannot be enforced through the courts. In 2021, Nigeria commenced the second cycle of its national policy on the elimination of child labour and launched a National Action Plan to eliminate child labour between 2021 and 2025 (ILO, 2021). As it appears, the latest National Action Plan to eradicate child labour by 2025 may end up being a mirage, considering that the first phase of the National Action Plan (2013–2017) was unsuccessful and made no significant impacts. While it may be possible to eradicate child labour within four years, in the context of Nigeria, where child labour is primarily the consequence of protracted and unresolved socio-economic challenges, it is practically impossible to achieve this objective. Scholars have researched extensively on child labour and hawking in Nigeria (Okokon & Charles, 2004; Nseabasi & Abiodun, 2010;

Analysing child labour through the lens of child hawkers  473 Ubajaka et al., 2010; Nsisong & Eme, 2012; Oli, 2013; Farauta & Yumbak, 2013; Eboh, 2018; Adebayo & Olaogun, 2019; Omotosho & Ola, 2021). In addition, studies have examined child labour from a rights-based perspective (Dubagari, 2015; Ogunsakin, 2015; Ojebiyi et al., 2016; Okpara & Okpara, 2021). However, research has yet to explore fully the theme of child labour from the perspective of social security for vulnerable children. In filling this gap, this study emphasises that a rights-based approach toward eliminating child labour in Nigeria will be ineffective without the implementation of social security for vulnerable children.

31.3 METHODOLOGY The study adopts mixed methods, combining quantitative and qualitative techniques. This research method is essential, as it provides a deeper understanding of the subject matter than if a single research method had been used. Closed-ended questionnaires were used as an instrument of research. The study applies a five-point Likert scale in the format of Strongly Agree, Agree, Undecided, Disagree, and Strongly Disagree. The Likert scale is deemed efficient as it provides a range of options for respondents to choose from, compared to binary questions that suggest yes or no answers. The purposive sampling method was applied as a sampling technique and was useful in selecting the respondents. Although purposive sampling is prone to bias, the researcher minimised this weakness by critically evaluating the validity of the data provided. Purposive sampling is cost-efficient and enabled the research assistants to easily select the sample based on common characteristics. The respondents selected were between the ages of 10 and 17 and had been hawking for a minimum of two years. A total of 230 child hawkers in five suburbs, namely Abule-Egba, Ikotun, Akowonjo, Ipaja, and Ayobo, in the Alimosho Local Government Area of Lagos State, were sampled over a period of six months. These areas were selected because they have a large concentration of children engaged in hawking, especially in traffic. Twenty-seven of the respondents declined further participation midway through the research. As a result, the study was based on 203 respondents who provided complete answers to the questionnaires. The research assistants asked the respondents similar questions and completed the questionnaires. In addition, semi-structured interviews were conducted in order to gain a broader knowledge of the respondents’ experiences as child hawkers. Furthermore, to ensure the validity of the research, the research assistants addressed the ethical issues that may arise with the participation of children in the study. To achieve the above, the research assistants explained in basic terms the purpose of the research to the potential respondents in “Pidgin English” (an informal language of communication). More importantly, the respondents were selected after the research assistants solicited and received the verbal consent of their parents and adults who are also hawkers in the same vicinity as the respondents. The research assistants assured the parents and adults that the respondents’ privacy would be protected. The data were analysed using quantitative and qualitative analysis. Quantitative findings were interpreted through mean analysis, using statistical tools in the modes of percentage and frequency, while qualitative data were analysed through thematic analysis, which included identifying, reviewing, and analysing the themes.

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31.4 FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION ​​​Table 31.1a shows that 28.1 per cent of the respondents are 15 years old, the highest percentage in terms of age category. Furthermore, Table 31.1b data reveal that 54.7 per cent of the respondents are female, a higher percentage than male participation. Table 31.1c shows that 4.4 per cent of the respondents are primary school pupils, while 51.7 per cent of the respondents are secondary school dropouts.​ Education is a key factor in the development of a child. Any nation that invests in the education of children is building a strong foundation for its growth and development. The data in Table 31.2 reflect that 52.7 per cent of the respondents strongly agreed that hawking is a barrier to their educational pursuits. This corroborates the work of Holgado et al. (2014), Mathias and David (2014), Okpechi (2014), Odey, Ita, and Nchor (2017), Oni (2018), Harrison and Eremie (2020), and Abongiasede (2021), which state that there is a significant relationship between child labour, school attendance, study habits, and poor academic performance. A 15-year-old male respondent explains: I hawk every day after school and on weekends. I do not have enough time to read my books, and this is affecting my grades.

A female respondent reported: My mum is a widow and has four children. She stopped me from furthering my education after junior high school in order to support the family financially.

The legitimacy of children’s right to education places political as well as social obligations on the government to protect and enforce this right. Therefore, the right to education demands that every child attend school and gain access to education (Isokpan & Durojaye, 2018). In September 2022, the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) stated that 20 million children are out of school in Nigeria (Thisday, 2022) because the majority of the children from low-income and least-advantaged families lack access to educational opportunities. For this reason, these children are exposed to labour early

Table 31.1a  Description of respondents based on age Age

Frequency

Percentages (%)

10

16

7.8

11

15

7.4

12

21

10.4

13

39

19.2

14

32

15.8

15

57

28.1

16

12

5.9

17

11

5.4

Total

203

100

Analysing child labour through the lens of child hawkers  475

Table 31.1b  Description of respondents based on sex Sex

Frequency

Percentages (%)

Female

111

54.7

Male

92

45.3

Total

203

100

in life compared to children from middle-class and affluent backgrounds. Children that lack access to education are not only subjected to child labour but also have limited employment opportunities to explore in the future and often live in poverty as adults. A total of 31 per cent of the respondents were undecided in their responses when asked whether hawking affects their health negatively. However, 22.2 per cent disagreed and 18.2 per cent strongly disagreed that hawking affects their health negatively. This finding contradicts earlier studies (Oli, 2013; Johnson & Ihesie, 2015; Eboh, 2018). These studies emphasised that children involved in child labour are subjected to unhealthy working conditions and environments that affect their health negatively. The respondents who disagreed that hawking affects their health had no concrete evidence to substantiate their claims, apart from the fact that, as child hawkers, they have not had any major health challenges. A male respondent stated: I have been hawking for over three years, and, apart from malaria, I have not had any serious sickness.

A 13-year-old female respondent explains: I have not fallen sick in the last two years since I started hawking.

While the comments from these respondents may be true, it is important to note that hawking could have a negative effect on their health without any visible symptoms as yet, especially with respect to mental health. These children are not medical experts, so the credibility of their responses may be questionable. Again, they lack access to free or affordable medical care. As a result, these children do not have the opportunity to visit hospitals for regular medical check-ups in order to ascertain their state of health. Beyond the above, it is important to note that some of the respondents answered that child hawking has negative effects on their health.

Table 31.1c  Description of respondents based on education Education

Frequency

Percentages (%)

Primary School Pupil

9

4.4

Primary School Leaver

27

13.3

Secondary School Dropout

105

51.7

Secondary School

62

30.6

Total

203

100

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Table 31.2  Frequency of responses to questions relating to the respondents’ perceptions of child hawking ITEMS

Strongly Agree

Agree

Undecided

Disagree

Strongly Disagree

Hawking is a barrier to my education

107 (52.7)

47 (23.2)

9 (4.4)

25 (12.3)

15 (7.4)

Hawking affects my health negatively

31 (15.3)

27 (13.3)

63 (31)

45 (22.2)

37 (18.2)

Hawking exposes me to harmful and unsafe environments

112 (55.2)

32 (15.8)

11 (5.4)

48 (23.6)

0 (0)

Hawking is not a barrier to my future goals

20 (9.9)

7 (3.4)

37 (18.2)

96 (47.3)

43 (21.2)

Hawking improves my self-esteem

54 (26.6)

12 (5.9)

13 (6.4)

71 (35)

53 (26.1)

Hawking does not violate my rights

23 (11.3)

40 (19.7)

124 (61.1)

12 (5.9)

4 (2.0)

As this study shows, 55.2 per cent of the respondents strongly agreed that hawking exposes them to unsafe and harmful work environments. A 16-year-old male respondent recounts: There was a particular night when robbers attacked passengers in traffic. The robbers shot sporadically to scare pedestrians. I could not hawk for a week because of the horrific experience.

A 14-year-old female respondent narrates: I run after cars in order to sell plantain chips to customers. Sometimes, when the customers want to pay, they throw the money on the road when they are in a haste to drive off, regardless of the oncoming vehicles.

Hawking in Nigeria exposes children to risky working conditions in a society that is overtly insecure (Oli, 2013; Nduka & Duru, 2014; Sennuga et al., 2021). These children are exposed to the hazards of insecurity, such as kidnapping, ritual practices, violence, physical molestation, child trafficking, rape, and accidents. In addition, children involved in child labour face the possibility of becoming victims of societal ills because hawking exposes them to touts at motor parks and on the streets, and such interactions may affect their behaviour negatively. In all, 47.3 per cent of the respondents strongly disagreed that hawking is an obstacle to their future aspirations.An 11-year old male expressed his feelings: My uncle brought me to Lagos from our village when my parents died in a road accident three years ago. He promised to enrol me in school, but he is yet to do so. My ambition is to become a doctor.

A 10-year-old female respondent stated: I want to become a teacher, but how will I achieve this if I do not go to school?

Analysing child labour through the lens of child hawkers  477 Another male respondent laments: My family is extremely poor, and we find it difficult to meet the basic necessities of life. My parents have eight children, and I am the fifth child. We live in a one-room apartment. My ambition is to become a lawyer, but I need to hawk to survive.

Child hawking jeopardises the development as well as the future of the children involved (Kurfi & Aliyu, 2014; Nyamubi, 2015). The scourge presents a serious challenge that creates a social imbalance, which influences, corrupts, and destabilises the future of children. In particular, their right to survival and development is threatened as they live in fear and trepidation. Given the circumstances in which these children grow, their chances of fulfilling their potential and ambitions become limited, if not impossible. Surely, no child will develop and survive in harrowing circumstances that disturb their peace, frustrate their aspirations, and violate their rights. As reflected in Table 31.2, 35 per cent of the respondents disagree that hawking improves their self-esteem. A 15-year-old female respondent narrates her ordeal: I hawk groundnut after school from 3 p.m. to 8 p.m. on weekdays. On weekends, I hawk from 1 p.m. to 7 p.m. Men make advances at me, and some of them touch my body without respect for me.

Another respondent, a 13-year-old boy, remarked: Sometimes, I run into my friends on their way back from school while hawking bananas. I am not happy that I have been identified with selling bananas.

Children are entitled to grow up in circumstances and conditions that support their development mentally and physically into confident adults. Sadly, children subjected to child labour are traumatised physically, socially, and emotionally. Alem et al. (2006), Ubajaka et al. (2010), Okpechi (2014), and Ibrahim et al. (2018) emphasise that children engaged in child labour experience low self-esteem as a result of their exposure to intolerable working conditions that are damaging to their dignity and self-worth. On the contrary, 26.6 per cent of the respondents strongly agreed that hawking improves their self-esteem.A 15-year-old female stated: : I meet different people on the streets, and the interactions have improved my interpersonal skills and self-confidence.

Another respondent, a 14-year-old female, replied: I like the way I haggle with customers. Hawking has exposed me to negotiation and improved my ability to calculate figures.

A 17-year-old male commented: Hawking has imbibed in me the principle of hard work and the zeal to succeed. I believe I will overcome poverty and become successful in future.

478  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Although this study supports the works of Oloko (1991), Rao (2015), Bourdillon (2017), and Aufseeser et al. (2018), who identified that some children exposed to child labour develop self-esteem and other positive values, such as negotiation and arithmetic skills. Regardless, the complexities involved in child labour far outweigh the benefits highlighted by some of the respondents. While it appears that child labour offers practical and real-life experiences for children to acquire certain beneficial skills, it must be noted that children can develop similar skills through developmental approaches that will not jeopardise their future. Data from the study reveals that the majority of respondents are not sure of the implications of child labour on their rights. A total of 61.1 per cent of the respondents were undecided in their responses to the question on hawking and violations of their rights. This finding indicates that the majority of respondents lack knowledge of human rights. Of course, there is no direct correlation between the knowledge of the human rights of the respondents and the violation of their rights. The enforcement of rights is the responsibility of the government, and it is expected that the government will fulfil this obligation without discrimination. Wabwile (2010) clearly argues that the ratification of the international law on the protection and promotion of the rights of children as adopted by states in the international community creates a binding obligation on governments to ensure the fulfilment of these rights. Children’s rights place enormous social responsibilities on the government and state actors. However, children are often not taken into cognisance when issues concerning the enforcement of human rights are discussed. Those responsible for protecting and enforcing the rights of children ( duty bearers) perceive children as minors who have little or no knowledge of their worth as humans. Added to this is the preconceived notion that children are dependent and incapable of protecting and enforcing their rights without adults (Sigurdsen, 2020). The weak conception that children rely on adults to enforce their rights poses a drawback to the enforcement of children’s rights. It not only establishes a form of superiority on the part of adults but conversely creates a form of inferiority on the part of children, who are human beings with dignity just as adults. While education may be acquired in a formal setting, such as a school, the pedagogy of teaching is not limited to the classroom (Binazzi, 2016). Child hawkers are capable of learning about human rights on the streets. There are numerous non-governmental organisations (NGOs) whose advocacy is focused on human rights. It is expected that these NGOs will indulge in educating children on the streets about human rights. However, little or no effort has been geared towards adopting this approach. Broadly, the responsibility of educating children about their rights should not rest on NGOs alone, but on the larger civil society. Children should not just be informed about their rights; they must also be informed that they have the right to be heard (Sigurdsen, 2020). It is apparent that children’s rights must be adequately protected for child labour to be eliminated. The unpleasant challenges posed by child labour in Nigeria raise a pertinent question: what is the commitment of the government toward eliminating child labour? Significantly, the enactment of legislation on social security, designed to improve the welfare of vulnerable children, will provide an elaborate framework to promote social justice and eliminate child labour in Nigeria. The importance of a social security scheme for children cannot be overemphasised, considering that the least advantaged families in Nigeria struggle to meet the basic needs of their children. Although it is appropriate to give parents of vulnerable children more power, the legally mandated social security system will provide vulnerable children with immediate protection. Social security will cover issues such as education, health, and the

Analysing child labour through the lens of child hawkers  479 general welfare of vulnerable children and protect them from the consequences of poverty. Furthermore, social security would be framed around a comprehensive tax regime that will compel citizens to remit monthly taxes towards contributing to the social security scheme. This approach entails the understanding that child labour is a human rights issue that requires collective responsibility to eradicate (Khakshour et al., 2015). Again, this approach will supersede the argument of successive governments in Nigeria that scarce and limited resources serve as barriers to social welfare services. It is expected that the government, through its legislative arm, will embark on extensive consultation and dialogue with representatives of CSOs, NGOs, development experts, and other stakeholders that shape public policies before enacting the legislation. This is important in order for the citizens to understand fully the intentions of the government, the purpose of the law if enacted, as well as the action plan for implementation. As Nwabueze (1975) rightly stated, there must be a degree of social sensitivity and consensus among the majority on the need to provide for the vulnerable members of society. Apparently, legislative action on social security and its full implementation will reduce the effects of poverty on low-income households, improve the welfare of vulnerable children, enhance the protection of children’s rights, and promote social justice. A major argument against having a social security scheme for vulnerable children is the misappropriation of funds by government officials (Alumona & Odigbo, 2017; Chukwuma, 2022; Shadare, 2022). However, it is more realistic to hold the government accountable for the misappropriation of funds meant specifically for the socioeconomic needs of vulnerable children than to sue the government for the non-enforcement of Chapter 2 of the 1999 Constitution (as amended) of the Federal Republic of Nigeria (CFRN). Chapter 2 of the 1999 CFRN, captioned Fundamental Objectives and Directive Principles of State Policy, highlights the responsibility and commitment of the government with respect to the welfare and security of its citizens. However, the provisions of Chapter 2 of the CFRN are not justiciable and cannot be enforced through the courts (Edih & Ganagana, 2020). It is envisaged that there will be no fundamental conflict between the constitution as the norm and the proposed social security law for vulnerable children.

31.5 CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS This study examined the phenomenon of child labour from the purview of child hawkers. Notably, it emphasises that a social security law for vulnerable children is required to eradicate child labour. It is recommended that the government enact legislation on social security to meet the socio-economic needs of vulnerable children. Second, civil society organisations (CSOs) must direct their advocacy towards promoting the enactment of legislation on social security for vulnerable children. Third, the government must curb corruption and promote transparency and accountability to ensure the successful implementation of the social security scheme. Furthermore, the federal government must make it mandatory for all state governments to adopt and implement the social security law and scheme. Lastly, there is an urgent need for CSOs and NGOs to educate children on their rights.

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31.6 LIMITATIONS OF THE STUDY AND ISSUES FOR FURTHER RESEARCH There is no research without limitations. This study did not interview the parents/guardians of children engaged in child hawking to ascertain their perceptions of child labour and children’s rights. The study focussed on child hawkers and was thus limited in the scope and diversity of respondents. Indeed, the participation of respondents engaged in other forms of child labour would have introduced a deeper dimension to the study. Broadly, the study could have adopted a dynamic approach by interviewing government representatives in the Lagos State Ministry of Youth and Social Development in order to understand the challenges confronting the government in its efforts to eradicate child labour. Going forward, it is pertinent for future research to involve the parents/guardians of children/wards that engage in child labour in order to ascertain their knowledge of child labour, as well as human rights. Furthermore, future research should investigate citizens’ perceptions of the proposed legislation on social security for vulnerable children in Nigeria.

REFERENCES Abongiasede, C. K. (2021). Child labour and academic performance of public secondary school students in Obio/Akpor local government area, Rivers State. International Journal of Institutional Leadership, Policy and Management, 3(1), 38–52. Adebayo, A., & Olaogun, J. A. (2019). Gender imperatives of children street hawking and its effects on children’s education in Olorunda local government area of Osun State, Nigeria. Gender and Behaviour, 17(2), 13084–13092. Alem, A., Zergaw, A., Kebede, D., Araya, M., Desta, M., Muche, T., Chali, D., & Medhin, G. (2006). Child labor and childhood behavioral and mental health problems in Ethiopia. Ethopia Journal of Health Development, 20(2), 119–126.DOI:10.4314/ejhd.v20i2.10022 Alumona, I., & Odigbo, J. (2017). The state and challenges of social security in Nigeria. Socialscientia Journal of the Social Sciences and Humanities, 2(2), 82–100. Anifalaje, K. (2017). Implementation of the right to social security in Nigeria. African Human Rights Law Journal, 17, 413–435.DOI: 10.17159/1996-2096/2017/v17n2a4 Arat, Z. F. (2002). Analyzing child labor as a human rights issue: Its causes, aggravating policies, and alternative proposals. Human Rights Quarterly, 24, 177–204.DOI: 10.1353/hrq.2002.0003 Aufseeser, D., Bourdillon, M., Carothers, R., & Lecoufle, O. (2018). Children’s work and children’s wellbeing: Implications for policy. Development Policy Review, 36(2), 241–261.DOI: 10.1111/dpr.12215 Bass, L. E. (2004). Child labour in sub-Saharan Africa. Lynne Rienner Publishers. Benedict, B. S., & Ennem, U. (2021). Parents’ perception of child labour and the Child Rights Act in Suleja Emirate of Niger State Nigeria: Implications for counselling. African Scholars Journal of Contemporary Education Research, 23(8), 53–68. Binazzi, A. (2016). The role of formal and non-formal education for children’s empowerment and as a prevention tool from violence. Comparative Cultural Studies: European and Latin America Perspectives, 2, 77–87.DOI: 10.13128/ccselap-19999 Bomu, L., & Akani, N. (2019). Protection of the rights of children in Nigeria: A comparative analysis. The Journal of Property Law and Contemporary Issues, 10(1), 58–71. Bourdillon, M. (2017). Ignoring the benefits of children’s work. Open Democracy. https://www​ .opendemocracy​.net​/en​/ beyond​-trafficking​-and​-slavery​/ignoring​-benefits​-of​-children​-s​-work/ Brockhaus, R. H. (2004). Family business succession: Suggestions for future research. Family Business Review, 17(2), 165–177.​https:/​/doi​.org​/10​.1111​/j​.1741​- 6248​.20​04​.00011.x

Analysing child labour through the lens of child hawkers  481 Chukwuma, N. S. (2022). Problems and prospects of social welfare administration in Nigeria: A study of the Covid-19 response strategies in Enugu State. International Journal of Management Sciences, 9(6), 17–38. Dubagari, U. (2015). Legal framework for the elimination of child labour in Nigeria. International Journal of International Law, 2(1), 144–157. Eboh, A. (2018). Perceived effects of street hawking on the well-being of children in Anyigba, Dekini local government area of Kogi State, Nigeria. Pakistan Journal of Public Health, 8(1), 1–7.DOI: 10.32413/pjph.v8i1.138 Edih, U., & Ganagana, B. (2020). Justiciable or non-justiciable rights: A debate on socioeconomic and political rights in Nigeria. Global Journal of Politics and Law Research, 8(4), 78–85. Farauta, K., & Yumbak, G. (2013). Effect of street hawking on the academic performance of students in practical agricultural: A case study of second schools in Taraba State. Journal of Education and Practice, 4(15), 33–35. Golo, H. K., Attom, L. F., Brew, E., & Eshun, I. (2018). Human rights issues of child labour and economic activities: The way forward. American Journal of Social Science Research, 4(2), 40–52. Harrison, A. N., & Eremie, M. (2020). Influence of child labour on academic performance of secondary school students in Rivers State and its implications for counselling. International Journal of Innovative Psychology & Social Development, 8(4), 31–38. Holgado, D., Maya-Jariego, I., Ramos, I., Palacio, J., Oviedo-Trespalacios, O., Romero-Mendoza, V., & Amar, J. (2014). Impact of child labor on academic performance: Evidence from the program, Edúcame Primero Colombia. International Journal of Educational Development, 34, 58–66.​https:/​/ doi​.org​/10​.1016​/j​.ijedudev​.20​12​.08​.004 Ibrahim, A., Abdalla, S., M., Jafer, M., Abdelgadir, J., & De Vries, N. (2018). Child labour and health: A systematic literature review of the impacts of child labour on child’s health in low- and middleincome countries. Journal of Public Health, 41(1), 18–26.​https:/​/doi​.org​/10​.1093​/pubmed​​/fdy018 ILO (2012). What is child labour? https://www​.ilo​.org​/ipec​/facts​/ lang-​-en ​/index​.htm ILO (2019). Advancing social justice, promoting decent work. https://www​.ilo​.org​/ipec​/facts​/lang-​-en​ /index​.htm ILO (2022). Nigeria organizes a media engagement event to commemorate the 2022 World Day Against Child Labour. https://www​.ilo​.org​/africa ​/countries​-covered​/nigeria ​/ WCMS​_853115​/ lang-​-en ​/index​ .htm ILO/UNICEF (2021a). Child labour. Global estimates 2020, trends and the road forward. https://www​ .ilo​.org​/ipec​/ Inf​orma​tion​resources​/ WCMS​_797515​/ lang-​-en ​/index​.htm ILO/UNICEF (2021b). ILO supports Nigeria’s response to child labour emergency. https://www​.ilo​.org​ /africa ​/about​-us​/offices​/abuja ​/ WCMS​_803364​/ lang-​-en ​/index​.htm Isokpan, A. J., & Durojaye, E. (2018). The child’s right to basic education in Nigeria: A commentary on the decision in SERAP v. Nigeria. African Journal of International and Comparative Law, 26(4), 639–648. Johnson, O. E., & Ihesie, C. A. (2015). Health problems of child hawkers in Uyo, South-South Nigeria. Journal of Medicine and Medical Sciences, 6(5), 104–108.DOI: 10.14303/jmms.2015.089. Khair, S. (2010). Globalisation and children’s rights: The case of child labour. In S. Alam, N. Klein, & J. Overland (Eds), Globalisation and the quest for social and environmental justice (1st ed.). Routledge. Khakshour, A., Abbasi, M. A., Sayedi, S. J., Saeidi, M., & Khodaee, G. H. (2015). Child labor facts in the worldwide: A review article. International Journal of Paediatrics, 3(1–2), 467–473. Kurfi, M. H., & Aliyu, M. A. (2014). Understanding the complexity of child labour experiences in the Global South: A survey of Kaduna Metropolis-Nigeria. Arts and Social Sciences Journal, 5(2), 1–10. DOI: 10.4172/2151-6200.100078 Mathias, B. A., & David, M. (2014). Effects of child labour on academic performance of children in selected schools in Akwa South local government of Anambra State. International Journal of Health and Social Inquiry, 2(1), 21–27. Nduka, I., & Duru, C. O. (2014). The menace of street hawking in Aba metropolis, South-East Nigeria. Journal of Medicine and Medical Sciences, 5(6), 133–140.DOI: http:/dx​.doi​.org/​10​.14303​/jmms​.2​ 014​.088

482  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Nseabasi, A., & Abiodun, O. (2010). The menace of child abuse in Nigeria: A case study of street hawking in Uyo, Akwa Ibom State. Journal of Social Sciences, 24(3), 189–192.DOI: 10.1080/09718923.2010.11892855 Nsisong, A. U., & Eme, U. J. (2012). Behavioural problem of juvenile street hawkers in Uyo Metropolis, Nigeria. World Journal of Education, 2(1), 137–144.DOI: 10.5430/wje.v2n1p137 Nwabueze, R. O. (1975). The evolution of social security measures in Nigeria. South African Journal of African Affairs, 1, 34–46. Nyamubi, G. J. (2015). The impact of child labour on primary school children’s access to and participation in basic education in Tanzania. International Journal of Learning, Teaching and Educational Research, 13(2), 26–36. Odey, M. O., Ita, P. M., & Nchor, E. E. (2017). Child labour and academic performance of junior secondary school (JSS III) students in Ogoja education zone of Cross River State, Nigeria. International Journal of Scientific and Research Publications, 7(10), 234–239. Ogunkan, D. V., & Adeboyejo, A. T. (2013). Gender dimensions of street children in Ibadan, Nigeria. Scottish Journal of Arts, Social Sciences and Scientific Studies, 15(2), 89–101.DOI: 10.2139/ ssrn.3810806 Ogunsakin, J. (2015). A legal prognosis of child labour under the Nigerian Child’s Rights Act. International Affairs and Global Strategy, 30, 28–36. Ojebiyi, W. G., Ashimolowo, O. R., Banmeke, T. O. A., & Ariyo, A. M. (2016). Societal awareness of the Child’s Rights Act among rural and urban dwellers of Ogun State. Journal of Humanities, Social Sciences and Creative Arts, 1(2), 14–25.DOI: 10.51406/jhssca.v11i1.1667 Okokon, J., & Charles, A. O. (2004). Family and child labour: A study of child hawkers in Calabar. Journal of Social Development in Africa, 19(2), 113–133. Okon, E. O. (2018). Poverty in Nigeria: A social protection framework for the most vulnerable groups of internally displaced persons. American International Journal of Social Science Research, 2(1), 66–80.DOI: 10.46281/aijssr.v2i1.169 Okpara, C. J., & Okpara, T. N. (2021). The impact of child labour on the rights of the Nigerian child. International Journal of Comparative Law and Legal Philosophy, 3(2), 186–193. Okpechi, P. A. (2014). The negative effect of child labour on academic performance of secondary school students in central senatorial district of Cross River State-Nigeria. Global Journal of Educational Research, 13(1), 37–44.DOI: 10.4314/gjedr.v13i1.6 Oli, N. P. (2013). Impact of street hawking on the social and physical wellbeing of children in Nigeria. Practicum Psychologia, 3(1), 54–62. Oloko, B. A. (1991). Children’s work in urban Nigeria: A case study of young Lagos street traders. In W. E. Myers (Ed.), Protecting working children. Zed Books, 11-23 Omokhodion, F. O., & Uchendu, O. (2009). Perception and practice of child labour among parents of school-aged children in Ibadan, Southwest Nigeria. Child Care Health and Development, 36(3), 304–308. https://doi​.org​/10​.1111​/j​.1365​-2214​.2009​.00988.x Omotosho, B. J., & Ola, M. Y. (2021). Negotiating work risks and challenges of street vending among female youths in southwest Nigeria. Multidisciplinary Journal of Gender Studies, 10(1), 45–69.: http://dx​.doi​.org​/10​.17583​/generos​.2021​.4432 Oni, A. (2018). Impacts of child labour on school attendance and academic performance of senior secondary school students in Nigeria. Estudios E Investigaciones, 7, 151–168.DOI: 10.5944/ reec.32.2018.22880 Osita-Oleribe, O. E. (2007). Exploring the causes of child labour series. International NGO Journal, 2(1), 006–009. Rao, C. R. (2015). Child labour and education in India. International Journal of Academic Research, 2(5), 57–62. Sennuga, S. O., Adedayo, T. G., Sennuga, M. A., & Sokoya, O. E. (2021). Underage labour in Nigeria: A study of street hawkers. International Journal of Educational Research and Review, 2(2), 011–017. DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.4568402 Shadare, G. A. (2022). The governance of Nigeria’s social protection: The burdens of developmental welfarism? Societies, 12(20), 1–19.DOI: 10.3390/soc12010020

Analysing child labour through the lens of child hawkers  483 Sigurdsen, R. (2020). Children’s right to respect for their human dignity. In T. Haugli, A. Nylund, R. Sigurdsen, & L. R. L. Bendiksen (Eds.), Children’s constitutional rights in the Nordic countries Brill, 19–36 DOI: https://doi​.org​/10​.1163​/9789004382817​_003 Subhash, B. (2011). Socio-economic and demographic impact on child labour in India. Journal of Alternative Perspectives in the Social Sciences, 3(2), 376–403. Thisday (2022). UNESCO: Estimated number of out-of-school children in Nigeria now 20m. https:// www​.thisdaylive​.com ​/index​.php​/2022​/09​/02​/unesco​- estimated​-number​- of​- out​- of​-school​- children​ -in​-nigeria​-now​-20m/ Togunde, D., & Carter, A. (2008). In their own words: Consequences of child labour in urban Nigeria. Journal of Social Sciences, 16(2), 173–181.DOI: 10.1080/09718923.2008.11892615 Ubajaka, C., Duru, C. B., Nnebue, C. C., Okwaraoha, O. B., & Ifeadike, G. O. (2010). Parents’ perception on the effects of child labour in a community in Anambra State, Nigeria. Afrimedic Journal, 1(1), 15–19. Umukoro, N. (2013). Poverty and social protection in Nigeria. Journal of Developing, 29(3), 305–322.​ https:/​/doi​.org​/10​.1177​/0169796X1​3494281 UNICEF (2022). UNICEF commends Kebbi State Government for Enacting child protection law, urges its full implementation.​https:/​/www​.unicef​.org​/nigeria​/press​-releases​/unicef​-commends​-kebbi​-state​ -government​-enacting​-child​-protection​-l​aw​-urges​-its​-full Vanguard (2022). Nigeria is getting more victims of child labour, Aisha Buhari laments. https://www​ .vanguardngr​.com​/2022​/09​/nigeria​-is​-getting​-more​-victims​-of​-child​-labour​-aisha​-buhari​-laments/ Wabwile, M. (2010). Legal protection of social and economic rights of children in developing countries: Reassessing international cooperation and responsibility. Intersentia. Weston, B. H., & Teerink, M. B. (2006). Child labour through a human rights glass brightly. Human Rights & Human Welfare [Working Paper no. 35]. https://www​.du​.edu​/korbel​/hrhw​/workingpapers​ /2006​/35​-weston​_teerink​-2006​.pdf

32. Social enterprises for transformative social justice and inclusion A triangulation approach scoping through theoretical linkages and case analysis Noufal N., Biju A. V. Nair, Nithi Krishna P. P., and Nisha Sheen

32.1 INTRODUCTION Social enterprises, a part of a social economy related to the tertiary economic sector, fall between profit-making and non-profit enterprises (Chandra et al., 2020). Steiner and Teasdale (2019) say these undertakings produce, sell, and promote products and services while supporting social causes. Industries and activities are of considerable social importance for offering services that satisfy people’s needs. Their top priority is social problem-solving by creating and providing job opportunities to help develop local communities and support vulnerable groups in society (Cheah et al., 2019). Social enterprises are typically community organisations, cooperatives, non-governmental organisations (NGOs), trade unions, churches, clubs, charitable organisations, and associations (Javed et al., 2020). The activities of social enterprises should contribute to achieving sustainable and inclusive growth, ensuring social justice for the poor and marginalised. Social entrepreneurs drive the economy systematically closer to a social outcome by identifying social issues or addressing excluded people in society by developing mechanisms to accommodate these externalities in the system (Santos, 2012). Therefore, social entrepreneurship is a social justice tool that empowers the marginalised population sector and promotes lucrative technological developments and sustainable jobs with collaborative models. Extant literature shows that one approach social enterprises adopt to increase their social influence is the Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) route. CSR initiatives help to solve many social problems and advance society’s sustainable development, notwithstanding their primary goal of maximising profits (Javed et al., 2020). However, corporations carry out CSR activities rather than other enterprises (Singh et al., 2017). On the contrary, social enterprises are proactive in social change and inclusion; however, corporations are reactive only. This chapter focusses on social enterprises rather than pure corporate CSR initiatives for social inclusion, which lead to social justice. The European Commission (2010) has defined the term “social inclusion” as “a process which ensures that those at risk of poverty and social exclusion gain the opportunities and resources necessary to participate fully in economic, social, and cultural life and enjoy a standard of living and well-being considered normal in the society in which they live”. Kummitha (2016) propounds that social entrepreneurship is a platform to create and foster systems that facilitate social inclusion by enabling citizens to participate in mainstream activities. Further, it helps to mitigate social exclusion by creating opportunities to help alleviate poverty and 484

Social enterprises for transformative social justice and inclusion  485 other deprivations (Peterson, 1988). Social entrepreneurship should catalyse social transformation by addressing problems in small societies and larger systems (Alvord et al., 2004). Social entrepreneurial activities are highly significant in promoting social justice and inclusion because India is a country where more than half of the population lives in rural areas, and most of them remain excluded from the mainstream of society. Ample literature on social entrepreneurship and its role in social inclusion and justice is available in developed countries. However, more research is needed regarding developing economies (Nabi et al., 2016). This chapter clarifies the relationship between the three dynamic concepts of social enterprise, social justice, and social inclusion. Our study takes marginalisation and inequality issues as a specific aspect of social injustice in deprived communities and explores whether social enterprise is viable for delivering worthwhile solutions. Further, we examine the role of social enterprises in sustainable social inclusion by considering the above constructs of sustainable social inclusion practices. These constructs are critical determinants of the performance of social enterprises, as is apparent during the crisis times of “The Kerala Flood 2018” and "COVID-19”. We used a qualitative approach to discuss social enterprises’ initiatives to achieve transformative social inclusion.

32.2 THE PROBLEM In India, and the context of its states, despite the country’s rapid economic growth over the past decades, large numbers of people are excluded in terms of economic and social benefits. Social exclusion and inequality have been the most challenging issues in the modern world. Surprisingly, India’s per capita net national income (NNI) at current prices during 2020–2021 has attained 128,829 Indian rupees,1 a fair figure for an emerging economy. On the contrary, the UN (United Nations) Development Report of 2014 states that India has the largest number of poor people, with about one-third of the world’s extremely poor population residing in India. Furthermore, it is evident from the data that around 30 per cent of the population in India lives below the poverty line. Therefore, 20 per cent of the people holding assets, the primary cause reflected in the per capita income, shows a relatively high figure. Hence, it is apparent that social and economic imbalance is a severe issue in India. We expect that social enterprises in India could address this type of challenge. Chakravarty and D’Ambrosio (2006) assert that, generally, social exclusion in a country encompasses the inability of a citizen to participate in the basic day-to-day economic and social activities of life. As per the Oxfam2 (2017) report, the gap between rich and poor continues to grow. The Oxfam report refers to it “Crony Capitalism”, which benefits the rich at the expense of the common good. Extant literature also suggests that financial and employability exclusion are challenges in emerging economies. Societies in developing countries like India still experience disparity and discrimination along the lines of caste, religion, region, and gender. The UN World Social Report (2020)3 revealed that inequalities were growing and that small elites were benefiting from growth at the expense of the majority. The UN (2016)4 declared that social inclusion and exclusion concepts are multidimensional and context-dependent. Income and human poverty are both the results of exclusion. Exclusion from access to credit further deepens the deprivation and results in the vicious circle of poverty5 (World Bank, 2008).

486  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Social exclusion can curb people’s happiness because fear of future rejection kills it (Sjåstad et al., 2021). Eventually, it creates a society that has no happiness. The government machinery is active in reducing social exclusion but we can find discrimination in several facets of society. Discrimination is the primary instrument through which people or a specific group remain excluded from essential community activities. This discrimination causes social injustice. Inequality and exclusion occur in many parts of the world. The role of social enterprises here is to create sustainable products or services that make a social impact and allow their social enterprises to take shape. As a result, social entrepreneurs’ contributions to advancing social inclusion are crucial for creating secure, stable, and just societies (Giambona & Vassallo, 2014). Unemployment is another significant issue that increases the disparity between the haves and the have-nots. Sinha (2018) found that unemployment has a psychological impact, such as social embarrassment, feelings of worthlessness, and high stress. Moreover, some individuals also reported a lack of motivation in their lives. Poverty represents a negative facet of human development. A vicious cycle of low capital, low productivity, low incomes, low savings, and, consequently, a weak capital base is problematic in developing economies (K, 2015). This cycle increases the disparity. However, Killean (2016) says that the association between poverty and social exclusion is complicated because everyone who experiences poverty is socially excluded to some extent. However, not everyone who is socially excluded is poor. When we think of the solution to social exclusion and improving social justice, we find social entrepreneurs and social entrepreneurship as the most tangible solutions. Social entrepreneurs work in the marginalised communities of society. Our study considers marginalisation and inequality issues in specific areas of social exclusion in deprived communities. Therefore, we explore whether social enterprises can deliver meaningful solutions to overcome this. In this chapter, we examine the role of social enterprises in fostering sustainable social inclusion by considering the above constructs of sustainable social inclusion practices. The constructs are the critical determinants of the performance of social enterprises. Kerala has a sufficient number of social entrepreneurs and enterprises; their role in social inclusion and social justice is crucial during crises like the Kerala Flood of 2018 and COVID-19. We employed a qualitative methodology to discuss the social inclusion initiatives of the selected social enterprises in a small state of India, i.e., Kerala.

32.3 RESEARCH QUESTIONS Through the qualitative approach, we focussed on the following research questions: First, we examined the role of the selected social enterprises in serving poor and marginalised communities. Second, we examined the role of social enterprise initiatives in promoting transformative, sustainable social inclusion. Third, we analysed the dimensional differences between the performance of corporate social inclusion, government social inclusion, and social enterprises’ social inclusion initiatives. Last, we examined the centrality of these social enterprises’ initiatives towards social inclusion.

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32.4 METHODOLOGY Our methodology pursued the case-based theoretical linkage model of Eisenhardt (1989) and Eisenhardt & Graebner (2007). Here, we use a combined methodology, including theoretical insights, interviews, and data triangulation. In a developing country context, an underexplored area of research from multiple cases was deemed suitable for examining a given theme of how social enterprises serve impoverished and socially excluded people. Yin (1994) and Eisenhardt and Graebner (2007) recommend that the researcher choose numerous cases rather than a single case to enable comparisons, yielding a relatively more robust method for theory development. An exploratory case study approach examined two cases supplemented with direct interviews for this investigation. It enabled the researchers to address all aspects of the research question about inclusive social justice interventions in social entrepreneurship. Yin (1994) recommends multiple data sources for developing case studies. This study conducted in-depth interviews with top-level managers and critical decision-makers in each case. In addition to interview data, secondary data also facilitated the process of triangulation and corroboration (Eisenhardt, 1989). We utilised primary and secondary data sources, including company websites, articles from newspapers and magazines, annual reports, social performance reports, sustainability reports, videos and vlogs, and other related online sources and social media content. However, a significant amount of internal documentation supported the two case analyses. We used the qualitative methods software MAXQDA to perform the qualitative analysis. The interview transcripts and documentation collected on each case were imported into the software. Code- and metric-based social inclusion and social justice themes were developed through an iterative cycle. The findings illustrate the present scenario of social entrepreneurship-led social justice in various degrees of social inclusion, such as accessibility, social justice participation, and potential human empowerment.

32.5 EVIDENCE In this section, we provide evidence of the need for social enterprises to foster social inclusion and social justice. Oxfam International (2017)6 found that the top 10 per cent of the Indian population holds 77 per cent of the country’s total national wealth, and 73 per cent of the wealth generated in 2017 went to the wealthiest 1 per cent. There are 119 billionaires in India, and, surprisingly, the number of billionaires has increased from nine in 2000 to 101 in 2017. The report further says India is estimated to produce 70 new millionaires daily. Concurrently, many ordinary Indians cannot access the healthcare they need. Sixty-three million people are pushed into poverty because healthcare costs increase annually. The Government of India mandated CSR in 2013 to address these challenges. However, CSR has its limitations in supporting this dilemma. Further, cooperatives and microfinance have been developed in later periods to tackle such barriers and help poor and deprived groups achieve socio-economic empowerment. However, there are many roadblocks, even with these institutions, owing to the changing dimensions of poverty and marginalisation. Social enterprise is a new perspective, reframing social problems as opportunities, not barriers. Based on this evidence, we chose Kerala, where social enterprises are vital to social inclusion and improving social justice. We proved the same in the next session through qualitative analysis.

488  Handbook of social justice in the Global South 32.5.1 Solution John & Kay Alan (2003) assert that an economy is divided into three categories. First, the private sector involved in trading is market-driven and profit-centric. Second, non-trading activities are a part of the public or government sector that belongs to the general public. The intention is service facilitation. Finally, the community or voluntary sector is socially owned and aims to create non-personal profit, self-help, and social aims. The significance of social enterprises by social entrepreneurs is visible in the third sector. Social enterprises are innovative business models that function without eroding sustainability. Social enterprises’ key areas include agriculture, education, financial services, healthcare, housing, sanitation, energy, and water.7 Social entrepreneurship has emerged as a dynamic unit that calibrates the transformative social inclusion of underprivileged people. Social entrepreneurship is an idea that has aroused interest in recent decades because it is based on different approaches to classical economic underpinnings. Social entrepreneurship initiatives are always built on human development, aiming at social well-being. This orientation differs from commercial entrepreneurship, in which profit is the primary goal and the main measure of growth (Šimundža et al., 2016). Social enterprises respond to local needs through social and integrated economic platforms, facilitating social outcomes (Kilpatrick et al., 2021) and generating good health and economic benefits for beneficiaries (Roy et al., 2014). Social entrepreneurship is the third sector that brings added value different from existing corporate, private, and government structures and offers sustainable and innovative solutions to unaddressed social problems. Social sustainability and inclusion focus on putting people first in development processes. It promotes social inclusion for the poor, marginalised, and vulnerable by empowering people. There are social inclusion practices by corporations in the form of CSR, governments, and others. However, their inclusion practices could be more sustainable and transformative. Literature suggests that the initiatives of social enterprises lead to the transformation of marginalised and underprivileged people and their inclusion. However, the social enterprise’s transformative, sustainable social inclusion may imbalance and disturb traditional structures. Hence, they face challenges during their initiatives. Social sustainability focusses on the following aspects,8 which are part of social justice: social cohesion and resilience, social sustainability, citizen engagement, Indigenous people, sexual orientation and gender identity, disability inclusion, and community-driven development. Social entrepreneurship has also been characterised as creating new business models to serve people experiencing poverty (Seelos & Mair, 2005). Based on the theoretical background and real-life case description, social businesses can significantly affect social exclusion through community development. The findings from our case study on a cooperative labour movement and a small finance bank in Kerala justify this fact. The following section shows the results of the case study that we conducted.

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32.6 CASE ANALYSIS 32.6.1 Case I: Case Respondent 32.6.1.1 Evangelical Social Action Forum (ESAF) Small Finance Bank ESAF Small Finance Bank (formerly ESAF Microfinance and Investments Pvt. Ltd.) is an Indian small finance bank providing banking services and microloans to the underbanked. ESAF Microfinance started its operations as an NGO in 1992 as the Evangelical Social Action Forum. ESAF was a non-banking finance company and microfinance institution (NBFC-MFI) licenced as a bank by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI). ESAF Small Finance Bank is forging ahead with the objective of “Fighting the Partiality of Prosperity” by strengthening the people at the bottom of the pyramid. ESAF disrupted the unorganised moneylending space through its SHG-based microfinance business models. Its social banking initiative forced traditional moneylenders to cut their interest rates and pledging requirements, enabling marginalised and rural populations to access a sustainable source of finance. The organisation is regarded as the leading social bank with universal access and has adopted sustainable and holistic initiatives to bridge the financial inclusion gap. 32.6.2 Case II: Case Respondent 32.6.2.1 Uralungal Labour Contract Co-operative Society (ULCCS) ULCCS is a master in the construction industry in Kerala. This labourer-owned cooperative undertakes government and non-government projects and is keen to deliver on time and with the utmost quality. In the past two decades, the enterprise has diversified its presence into infrastructure development, IT and ITeS, agriculture, tourism, handicrafts, materials testing, skills training, and education. In this way, the employee-centric organisation addresses the career concerns of unskilled, semiskilled, and educated youth. It is Asia’s most extensive and the world’s second-largest labour cooperative. It is the Total Solution Provider (TSP) for the Government of Kerala’s infrastructure development and management projects. The International Co-operative Alliance has endorsed this resilient, democratic, and inclusive labour cooperative movement. The study considers the social inclusion of prominent areas of social groupings, which was repeatedly mentioned in the extended pieces of literature (for example, Gidley et al., 2010; Atkinson et al., 2004; Amado et al., 2013). These include demographic differentiation for economic background, including unemployment and homelessness; socio-cultural vulnerability based on education, caste system, religion, language, and Indigenous groups; age, including children, youth, and senior citizens; geographical factors, including those in rural and remote areas; gender orientation; and health, including mental and physical disabilities. A hierarchical schema of degrees of inclusion (Gidley et al., 2010) has been used to conceptualise the level of social inclusion. The narrowest interpretation focusses on the neoliberal ideology of social inclusion as “accessibility”. A more comprehensive interpretation considers the social justice concept of social inclusion as "participation”. The most comprehensive interpretation includes the potential human perspective of social inclusion as “empowerment”. This section contains information that represents the authors’ interpretation of the precoded interview transcript and the findings of the analysis they extracted from the MAXQDA software. The Document Comparison Chart in Figure 32.1 shows the flow of the theme codes

Figure 32.1  Case study-based document comparison chart

Note: The initial two rows represent the length of thematic codes in the documentary analysis file (ESAF#DF) and the in-depth interview transcript (ESAF#IT) of ESAF Small Finance Bank. The last two rows represent the thematic codes of the documentary analysis file (ULCCS#DF) and the in-depth interview transcript (ULCCS#IT) of the Uralungal Labour Contract Cooperative Society. From left to right, the different shades represent 1) comments about the inclusion of economically weaker section groups; 2) comments on social justice related to socio-cultural vulnerability; 3) comments on geographical inclusion; 4) gender equality; 5) the inclusion of youth and senior citizens; 6) comments about the inclusion of physical and mental disabilities; and 7) inclusion of people with low educational backgrounds. Source: MAXQDA Software output.

490  Handbook of social justice in the Global South

Figure 32.2  Social justice areas and degrees of social inclusion of ESAF Small Finance Bank-Code-Related Browser theme

Notes: CRB visualises the connection between social justice thematic clusters based on degrees of inclusion. Nodes (squares) represent the number of codes to each intersecting theme. Source: MAXQDA Software output.

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492  Handbook of social justice in the Global South in the interview transcript. This visual tool tab of structured documents depicts the standardised document length of each document. The chart shows the documents of each case on the y-axis and the length of common themes on the x-axis.​ Figure 32.1 depicts how much space each topic occupies in different documents. The inclusion of economically underprivileged groups in society came in second on the list of social justice priorities after the ESAF Small Finance Bank. The social bank gives the least priority to the inclusion of disabled communities. In the case of ULCCS, prominent areas of social inclusion were the participation of illiterate and unskilled communities, followed by economically weaker section groups. A code-related browser in Figure 32.2 shows the result of individual case-wise analysis at a glance.​ The following is an example of a typical comment elicited from the respondents that proves ESAF’s involvement in the social inclusion process of the state of Kerala: We realise that there is ample growth potential because of the uneven distribution of financial services in India. Our strategy is to grow sustainably and responsibly, focusing on inclusiveness and progress for all. We primarily focus on expanding the banking horizon to new unbanked/underbanked areas. Yet, we stand as a bank for all with presence in urban, semi-urban, rural, and rural unbanked areas. (ESAF#IT-5)

BOX 32.1  ESAF STRATEGIES: PROCESS AND OUTCOMES Strategies (Social Entrepreneurship Orientation) • • • • •

Providing inclusive and social banking services. Priority sector lending: energy, education, housing, agriculture, MSME, exports, and social development. Hrudaya deposit scheme (which stands for a social cause and promotes customer participation in economic development at the bottom of the pyramid). Micro-banking services (income generation loans, business loans, Vidya Jyothi loans, Nirmal Jeevan Dhara loans, and micro-energy loans). Rural customer requirements-based schemes: sanitation loans, water loans, ultrapoor microfinance loans, home improvement loans, Haritha loans, education loans.

Process (Social Inclusion Interventions) • • • • • • • • • •

Education and child development programmes. Farm sector initiatives. Urbanisation initiatives. Sustainable tribal and rural development initiatives. Skill and livelihood development activities. Healthcare services. Environmental protection and upgrading. Microenterprise development programmes. Financing farmer producers’ organisations (FPOs). “Vayo Jyoti” programme: created for senior citizens and conducted in 84 bank branches, where in 2003, senior citizens and 274 caretakers benefited.

Social enterprises for transformative social justice and inclusion  493 • • •

Swanthana: a mental health and counselling service with outreach services that reach 1,500 families (Kerala SDGs impacted). Dairy-based livelihood development programmes. A broad package of financial inclusion products and business development services to the socially and economically challenged.

Outcomes (Transformative Social Justice) • • • • • • •

Priority for women: More than 1.20 million women enjoy the benefits of microbanking services across the country. As per the 2021–2022 annual report data, the organisation serves 38.86 lakh MFI customers, 7.53 lakh retail customers, and 23.40 lakh women borrowers. The operating network contains 575 bank branches spread across 21 states and two union territories. The organisation has more than 4,100 employees with a mean age of 31.73 years, out of which, 30.02 per cent are female employees. The organisation facilitates the financial needs of small and marginal farmers, including landless farmers, tenant farmers, and sharecroppers, and promotes ancillary activities. It also facilitates the discounting of invoices and bills of exchange in favour of MSMEs. It meets the financial needs of students aspiring to study abroad for a career.

Note: ESAF is orientated as a social bank. It conducts social inclusion interventions and ultimately leads to social justice. We can find items in each construct under social entrepreneurship, social inclusion, and social justice.

Figure 32.2 shows the social interventions of ESAF that lead to social justice. The degree of intervention shows the strongest concentration on geographical inclusion, subsequently addressing the needs of economically weaker sections. The weak concentration is on physically and mentally challenged people, as well as on the socio-cultural vulnerabilities of the population. Box 32.1 illustrates major social entrepreneurship strategies adopted by ESAF and corresponding social intervention activities. It also shows the outcome as transformative social justice.

32.7 URALULANGAL LABOUR CO-OPERATIVE SOCIETY (ULCCS) The following remarks by the respondents highlight the social inclusion process of ULCSS. We are a labour society rooted in equality. As a part of our sustainable development goals, we have ensured good participation from people of all walks of life. (ULCCS #IT-2) Since its inception, we have incorporated social responsibility into everything we do. In many cases, we have undertaken initiatives without considering a financial return. Instead, we consider how the project will benefit the community at large. (ULCCS#IT-6)

494  Handbook of social justice in the Global South BOX 32.2 ULCCS STRATEGIES: PROCESS AND OUTCOMES Strategies (Social Entrepreneurship Orientation) • • • • • • • •

Construction and infrastructure development including roads, bridges, shopping complexes, and apartments. Tourism. Handicrafts. Technology Solutions (IT/ITeS sector). Digital transformation solutions. Web and mobile application development. Agriculture. Disaster management. Medical laboratory services.

Process (Social Inclusion Interventions) • • • • • • •

Inclusive labour market operations. Skills training and internship programmes for the semiskilled and unskilled labour force. Subsidiary (a foundation-led charity) addressing the issues of intellectually challenged adults, specially-abled children, and elderly people. An employee-centric organisation addressing the career concerns of educated youth. Empowering agribusiness. Sustainable farming solutions. Palliative care and affordable medical services.

Outcome (Transformative Social Justice) • • • • • •

Offer safe and secure employment to unskilled, unorganised, and migrant labour groups (13,000+ total employees, 30% women, 4,500 migrants). Cater to the rights and needs of the lower-caste communities in Kerala. Transform the neglected labour community with job security. Provide a sustainable solution to structural and educational unemployment in the state. Create a resilient, democratic, and inclusive Labour Cooperative. Achieve 13 out of the 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals set for 2030.

Note: ULCSS is a cooperative labour movement in Kerala. It carries out social inclusion interventions, which, it is hoped, finally lead to social justice. We can find items in each construct under social entrepreneurship, social inclusion, and social justice.

Figure 32.3 shows the social inclusion activities of ULCCS and the degree of inclusion. The economically weaker segments of society come second in importance to caring for the illiterate and unskilled. Also, they consider the career concerns of unemployed and educated youth. ULCCS has weaker consideration for social-cultural vulnerability and addressing the needs of physically and mentally disabled people. Box 32.2 shows the social entrepreneurship

Figure 32.3  Social justice areas and degrees of social inclusion of the ULCCS-Code-Related Browser theme

Notes: The CRB visualises the connection between social justice thematic clusters based on degrees of inclusion. The CRB corresponds to accessibility, social justice participation, and human capital empowerment. The size of the square (node) indicates the number of co-occurrences of codes corresponding to each intersecting theme. Source: Output from MAXQDA visualization tool.

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496  Handbook of social justice in the Global South strategies and corresponding social inclusion activities. The resulting outcome is in the form of transformative social justice.

32.8 CONCLUSION The findings from the data analysis imply that the ESAF Bank and Uralungal Labour Contract Co-operative Society from Kerala have undertaken remarkable initiatives to foster social inclusion and social justice. On this basis, other states and nations should replicate and adopt this business model, acting as an intelligent model. Uralungal Labour Contract Co-operative Society (ULCCS) is now India’s fifth-largest small finance bank, addressing the career concerns of upcoming generations of sustainable engineering and technology solutions. They are Asia’s most prominent and the world’s second-largest labour cooperative. The society’s members’ strength reaches 13,000+ workers, 1,000+ engineers, 1,000+ modern technicians, and 500+ migrant or guest labourers. Poverty continues to affect billions of lives globally, especially in developing economies. Muhammad Yunus, a Bangladeshi economist who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2006, has already demonstrated that microfinance is one of the best tools for eradicating poverty. Yunus’s key innovation was creating a loan circle with five women as members to ensure high repayment rates and sustain their creditworthiness (Adams & Raymond, 2008). ESAF uses the same strategy or idea that microfinance meets the needs of people experiencing poverty and needing financial services. Traditionally, formal banking operations have excluded people experiencing poverty from legitimate financial services. With new financial products, such as group lending, small financial institutions have been able to meet the challenges of lending to people with low incomes (Kanimozhi & M., 2022). Financial inclusion, or deepening, creates equal opportunities for economically and socially excluded people by delivering affordable financial services. The economic benefits include bank accounts, savings, insurance, payments and remittances, credit, and financial advice. The increasing attention of government, policymakers, and researchers reflects the significance of financial inclusion for social and economic growth (Siddiqui, 2021). As previously stated, the strategies of ESAF, including inclusive and social banking services, micro-banking, and microfinance, helped them capture the market widely, whereas other banks remained excluded. Indeed, they focussed more on the excluded segment of society and addressed their needs. They are India’s fifth-largest small finance bank, showing a fantastic growth rate in financial inclusion transactions. The 2021–2022 annual report data show that the organisation serves 38.86 lakh MFI customers and 23.40 lakh women borrowers. The operating network contains 575 bank branches across 21 states and two union territories. The organisation has more than 4,100 employees with a mean age of 31.73. Of these, 30.02 percent are women. More than 1.20 million women enjoy the benefits of micro-banking services, establishing strategic partnerships with NGOs, collaborating with MFIs, forming and promoting SHGs, and offering capacity-building training to MFIs. To the best of our knowledge, this is a pioneering study that examines the role of social enterprises in promoting social inclusion and social justice. Broadly translated, our findings indicate that the two social enterprises – ESAF Bank and ULCCS – play a pivotal role in social inclusion and justice. There is considerable scope for the further expansion of social enterprises, but how they develop in Kerala and other parts of India is unpredictable considering

Social enterprises for transformative social justice and inclusion  497 the critical exigencies and allied innovation strategies, which ultimately depend on the state’s or nation’s socio-political and economic context. Social enterprises must go mainstream in the coming decades because of their proven impact on poverty alleviation and bridging the socio-economic divides among the poor and marginalised population through transformative social inclusion and justice. Indeed, ESAF’s community banking model rests on the concepts of social and financial interventions. We conclude from the little evidence available that the CSR activities of corporations and government machinery are inadequate in terms of social inclusion and justice. Social entrepreneurs are considered the architects of a new social economy (Jeffs, 2006). Social entrepreneurial interventions are about creating value (Santos, 2012). Therefore, we recommend that the government and corporations promote the setting up of social enterprises to boost social justice. Here, it is evident that social enterprises like ULCCS and ESAF are providing initiatives that are helpful for social inclusion and social justice. We need transformative institutional reforms and innovations to help overcome inequalities and structural disadvantages and empower weaker actors (UNRISD, 2017). However, the government’s support is essential in formulating inclusive policies and reforming legal, regulatory, and supervisory frameworks to ensure social justice.

NOTES 1. Source: IMF World Economic Outlook (April 2021) https://statisticstimes​.com​/economy​/ country​/india​-gdp​-per​-capita​.php 2. Oxfam is a confederation of 20 independent charitable organisations, whose activities focus on alleviating global poverty. 3. https://www​.un​.org​/development​/desa​/dspd​/wp​-content​/uploads​/sites​/22​/2020​/01​/ World​ -Social​-Report​-2020​-FullReport​.pdf 4. Identifying social inclusion and exclusion (UN, 2016) https://www​.un​.org​/esa​/socdev​/ rwss​/2016​/chapter1​.pdf 5. World Bank, 2020 https://www​.worldbank​.org​/en​/topic​/financialinclusion​/overview 6. https://www​.oxfam​.org​/en​/india​-extreme​-inequality​-numbers 7. Social enterprise typology by Kim Alter and Virtue Ventures LLC https://knowhow3000​.org​/wp​- content​/files​/CoPs​/ KM​/Global​%20Social​%20Enterprise​/Sessions​/1.​ %20Introduction​/Social​_Enterprise​_Typology​_Updated​_ Novem​.pdf 8. https://www​.worldbank​.org​/en​/topic​/soc​ials​usta​i nability#:~​:text​= Social​%20Sustain ability​%20and​%20Inclusion​%20focuses​, accessible​%20and​%20accountable​%20to​ %20citizens

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33. Why is there a non-WhatsApp exodus in the Global South(s)? Sérgio Barbosa

33.1 INTRODUCTION: WHATSAPP AND THE GLOBAL SOUTH WhatsApp acts as a global communication chat platform. It is well known as an everyday “problem-solver” for sharing messages easily and quickly. Ordinary citizens regularly use WhatsApp as their primary form of communication (Johns et al., 2024). It is used socially to stay in touch with friends and family, as well as for professional appointments. WhatsApp encourages emerging forms of political participation, which expands the repertoire of chat apps and favors the potential of community solidarity (Barbosa, 2020; Milan & Barbosa, 2020). Meet the WhatsApp “exodus”: In the Global North, Elon Musk and Edward Snowden tweeted that they were leaving WhatsApp and migrating to Signal on January 6, 2021. Both were calling users to switch to other encrypted messaging services like Signal and Telegram. As a consequence, millions of people decided to download WhatsApp’s direct competitors. One of the reasons would bethe announcement of WhatsApp’s new privacy policy on data collection which indeed stimulated a digital migration to other chat apps. The goal of this chapter is to understand why WhatsAppers, after being notified through a message regarding the app’s privacy policy, suddenly shifted to other chat platforms, or, after doing so, “fell back”. Data from this article showcases two WhatsApp private groups in Brazil – “United Against the Coup” (henceforth UCG, for Unidos Contra o Golpe) and “#Campeche and South of the Island Popular Struggle Committee” (henceforth Campeche). Both groups are experienced in progressive WhatsApp-mediated activism, adapting from time to time to foster emerging kinds of local participation. The data collection is based on digital ethnography, complemented by two-question interviews with a few group members. #United Against the Coup was created in March 2016 by a political activist in Florianópolis (Brazil) in the run-up to the parliamentary vote on the impeachment of President Dilma Rousseff. The group opposed this “soft coup” and later demanded her return to the presidency. At the outset, virtually most of the participants were listed as group administrators on a private chat, which enabled each of them to add or exclude members. The still-active group is heterogeneous, and includes professionals, journalists, and students, with a minority from other parts of the country. It brings together experienced activists (for example, trade unionists) and newcomers to active politics. It hosts political content (for example, news, images, links, memes, and videos), calls to street actions, and reflections and heated debates about Brazil’s political situation. “#Campeche and South of the Island Popular Struggle Committee” was created in October 2022 by a grassroots activist from the Campeche neighborhood in Florianópolis in the runup to the 2022 elections, uniting existing local groups in the south of the island. The group opposed the far-right movement of former president Jair Bolsonaro and aimed to drive votes for Lula da Silva. It is still active, with 168 participants, including retirees, grassroots activists, 500

Why is there a non-WhatsApp exodus in the Global South(s)?  501 and local councilors, mostly based in Campeche. They position themselves as defenders of democracy, promoting equality and social change, mainly in the local neighborhood and nearby areas in the south of the island. The two case studies were chosen for three main reasons: first, both groups facilitate multiheaded tasks to collectively promote decision-making processes, enrolled in private communities on WhatsApp “by invitation only” membership; second, they bolster a diverse cohort of activists of different ages, including old and young people engaged in political activities on WhatsApp backstage; and third, both groups appropriate WhatsApp for a progressive agenda, since the first campaigned for the return of Dilma Rousseff to the Presidency of Brazil, while the second opposed the far-right candidate Jair Bolsonaro in the 2022 elections. Furthermore, they are resilient initiatives in bolstering local strategies to adapt and respond in a timely manner to the turbulent political episodes in the past years (2016–2022). The chapter is composed of four sections. First, it outlines the huge penetration of WhatsApp in Global South countries. Second, it conducts a literature review on how WhatsAppers appropriate the chat app to foster social change mainly at the local level. Then, it presents how chat apps attract new members with their different features such as encryption protocols. The fourth section discusses how Brazilian WhatsApp activists responded to the “exodus,” looking at two case studies. The final remarks link social justice, and imbalance and inequalities between theGlobal North and the Global South chat app ecosystem.

33.2 THE RISE OF CHAT APPS This case study is context-driven and detail-oriented, zooming in on the Brazilian chat app ecosystem, one of the largestdemocracies from the Global South(s). WhatsApp was created in the United States in 2009 as a chat app for “hanging out” with like-minded people, but this chat platform assumes multiple uses and diverse meanings in Global South countries, including the battlefield itself that encompasses everyday political struggle and a central element guiding collective action. Here, “South” is a proxy for resistance, subversion, and creativity. It is a flexible and adaptive geographical definition that replaces the former idea of the so-called developing countries or countries from the third world. However, the voices from the Global South(s) are largely missed in the chat app research field, as well as from much of the theorization and praxis-based analysis of digital activism in Europe and the United States, which relies mainly on large-scale mobilizations (Özkula & Reilly, 2024). It remains the case that the Global South’s interrelations with nuances of subversive margins and local epistemologies have too often been overlooked and are largely missing from this canon (dados & Connell, 2012). Diverse media scholars interrogate the digital practices enhanced by the Global North while subverting the dominant narratives of datafication in the Western world (Arora, 2016, 2019; Couldry & Mejias, 2023, Mann & Daly, 2019; Ricaurte, 2019). The core idea of this scholarly group is to decolonize research topics based on media studies as well as surveillance and privacy scholarship, looking for alternative models and practices beyond the Western needs, contexts, user behavior patterns, and theories. As summarized by Arora (2019, p. 8) who discusses the “third digital divide”: “[there are] differences in the access, intent, and use of digital leisure time as the dominant paradigm shaping global internet usage. The leisure economy needs a new description in terms of digital life today, especially among those at the

502  Handbook of social justice in the Global South margins in the Global South (Africa, Latin America, and much of Asia, including the Middle East).” In sum, the key idea here is to confront the dominance of for-profit companies based in the Global North, which extensively control the extraction and exploitation of mineral and (digital) resources from the Global South(s).

33.3 WHATSAPPERS FROM BRAZIL From the South(s) to the North(s) and from the North(s) to the South(s), chat platforms, such as Signal, Telegram, and WhatsApp, cross the social relationships of individuals, digitizing them and making them an integral part of everyday life. On the one hand, scholars emphasize the role of chat apps in fostering civic engagement (Gil de Zúñiga et al., 2019; Treré, 2020; Waterloo et al., 2018), and promoting collective identity (Milan & Barbosa, 2020). On the other hand, however, chat apps operate as “weaponized” platforms to spread mis/disinformation (Evangelista & Bruno, 2019; Tactical Tech Collective, 2019). The term “weapon,” is a political metaphor referring to the spreading of malicious content through mis/disinformation shared through private and public groups on chat apps, revealing its dark side (Barbosa & Back, 2020). Global South countries have incredible penetration rates in WhatsApp. Specifically, WhatsApp has become one of the most widely used messaging platforms globally. Indeed, it is the most popular global mobile messaging app; as of January 2023, it had two billion monthly users (Statista, 2023). Brazil is an extremely unequal country across multiple dimensions. It is one of the largest democracies in the Global South and so makes an excellent test case for the study of (im) material resources of local resistance movements, for a variety of reasons. It has a long history of grassroots movements – from Indigenous rights to radical environmentalism and human rights to independent media – and a decade-long tradition of participatory democracy. Finally, it is one of the world’s biggest markets for mobile phones, with 75 percent of the population reportedly using WhatsApp daily as a platform to find and share news (Reuters Institute/ University of Oxford, 2023). This is because the “zero rating” fees offered by Brazilian telecoms companies allow Brazilians to access WhatsApp and Facebook “for free” instead of using more expensive short-text messages (Belli & Zingales, 2021; Corynne, 2016; Lorenzon, 2021).Audio voice messages sent on WhatsApp “facilitate communication for those who have difficulty in writing and reading” (Spyer, 2017, p. 192). This chat app has established itself as a powerful political tool for interpersonal communication all over the country. It has been central in the organization of the 2018 truck drivers’ strike, considered the largest in the history of the country (Fox, 2018), as well as a game-changer in the 2018 Brazilian elections (Barbosa & Back, 2020). The so-called WhatsAppers – a new genre of (digital) activists – appropriate WhatsApp to participate in political life, from treating it as a secure sphere of interpersonal trust to using it for social mobilizations on the ground. Through WhatsApp, group members create political, personal, family, and work functions, using a communication repertoire to share text messages, voice messages, links, and images. Any average citizen could, in theory, be a WhatsApper, including those not previously politically active. They interact digitally with others through closed messaging communities, where online and offline arenas are, most of the time, blurred. WhatsApp stands out as an emerging space of political participation for three main reasons. First, it affords structurally civic engagement and boosts interpersonal

Why is there a non-WhatsApp exodus in the Global South(s)?  503 trust (Barbosa, 2021). Second, it forges communities of mutual interest (Milan & Barbosa, 2020). Third, it promotes internal decision-making processes on a small group scale (Barbosa & Milan, 2019).

33.4 WHATSAPP EXODUS There are different types of affordances (e.g., visibility, interactivity, persistence, editablity) of the three main chat platforms mostly used in Western countries (see Herrada Hidalgo et al., 2024). Affordances are properties that enable or constrain the types of action that technological systems offer (Hutchby, 2001). This means different users may not only act differently as they adopt a platform, but they may have different expectations or outcomes than in reality (Nagy & Neff, 2015). To name a few, chat app communication is encrypted, everyday social interaction occurs through engagement in private or public groups where members can interact, it runs a simple iterface, with free service and low data usage, and they share and exchange information through audio messages, video messages, images, and written messages. All these technological features have been updated since the chat apps were created. Chat apps launch new features that mimic each other, while competing to attract new customers. This section explores the differences between the features and how these chat apps have updated their sociotechnical systems in terms of their business model and geopolitical architecture (Dijck, 2009, 2013; Bucher & Helmond, 2017; Santos & Faure, 2018). Signal is a nonprofit company, born of the output of an open-source project. It supports end-to-end encryption on group text, voice, and video chat. Since its creation, it has allowed only people in the chat to see the content of those messages, not even the company itself. It is developed and maintained by a nonprofit entity called the Signal Foundation. It has also received funding from the Open Technology Fund. The desktop version works in conjunction with the phone app. Brian Acton, a former WhatsApp co-creator, is currently one of the board directors of Signal with the goal of worldwide distribution of this chat platform. He provided a significant loan of $50 million to Signal. Meanwhile, it is funded through grants and small donations from its millions of users. In 2022, Signal hired Meredith Whittaker as president. She also serves on their board of directors. Before this, she served as a Google employee for 14 years and a well-known big tech critic. The only personal data Signal stores is your phone number, and it makes no attempt to link it to your identity, making this chat platform the most secure from a privacy point of view. Unlike WhatsApp, for example, Signal gathers much less metadata to avoid incursions on its users’ privacy, and thus shares far less with law enforcement. There is a pressing need for privacy-friendly chat platforms that are based on nonprofit, open-source principles and share communal standards, and Signal appears the frontliner to challenge for-profit platforms. Endto-end encryption serves as a necessary precondition for the formation of networked publics in the field of chat apps (West, 2019). The momentum following the Snowden revelations consists of a progressive move from the grassroots community towards making encryption a daily feature, with almost no effort required from the end user and, most important, moving beyond the interest of tech-savvy user groups (Ermoshina & Musiani 2019; Musiani & Ermoshina, 2017). Telegram was created by the Russian Durov brothers (owners of the popular social network, VK). Given its main functionalities, it is the main direct global competitor to WhatsApp. It supports group chats for up to 100,000 people and implements end-to-end encryption, like

504  Handbook of social justice in the Global South WhatsApp and Signal. It is popular among politically active citizens in countries like Russia and Iran. Telegram has a file size share limit of 1.5 GB (better than WhatsApp and Signal). The desktop version is independent of the mobile app. Telegram collects contact information and user ID from the smartphone. From a usability point of view, Telegram is a very attractive and user-friendly chat app. WhatsApp was created in 2009 by ex-Yahoo! employees, Jan Koum and Brian Acton. It is self-defined as asimple, personal, real-time messaging app. In 2014 it was integrated with Meta (its mother company). It has implemented end-to-end encryption since 2016 as a marketing strategy to provide digital privacy to its consumers (Santos & Faure, 2018). One of its key features is its group chats, which can be made private (by invitation, run by administrators) or public (joined via invitation link), to share information quickly on a large scale. Users can send messages to groups with up to 1,024 members or communities with up to 2,000 members, which allows breakaways of smaller groups. It facilitates large-scale forwarding from individual messages to reach a maximum group level. There have already been some security attacks (Zureik, 2020), although Meta’s app has presented high penetration far beyond its siblings’ platforms, reaching more than 2 billion users worldwide. From a practical point of view, WhatsApp is the most downloaded chat app worldwide, especially in Global South countries (Johns et al, 2024). Box 33.1 summarizes the key dates that led to the global WhatsApp exodus. BOX 33.1  TIMELINE OF EVENTS THAT LED TO THE WHATSAPP EXODUS Updated privacy policy: In January 2021, WhatsApp announced its updated terms and privacy policies. It was required that users of the chat app share their data with WhatsApp’s parent company, Meta (which also owns Facebook and Instagram). WhatsApp exodus: After WhatsApp informed users that some of their information would be shared with Facebook and Instagram and could be used for advertising purposes, the exodus started. Users in their millions shifted immediately to chat apps such as Telegram and Signal, who experienced a huge spike in downloads. Elon Musk and Edward Snowden tweeted that they had moved their communications to Signal. #SaveWhatsApp: WhatsApp began to receive formal complaints from its users. Members of civil society and digital human rights activists launched a campaign called “#SaveWhatsApp” to motivate everyday citizens not to accept the new privacy policies. With the slogan “Don’t Feed the Monster App,” they showed that the changes in WhatsApp’s privacy policy would help Meta strengthen its market domination and block potential competitors. WhatsApp backlash: In February 2021 WhatsApp released an official statement that no one would have their account suspended or deleted. WhatsApp then moved back its business plan, meaning that the advocacy practices of the civic campaign #SaveWhatsApp had been successful. Source: Author.

Why is there a non-WhatsApp exodus in the Global South(s)?  505

33.5 CASE STUDIES AND METHODOLOGICAL REFLECTIONS In methodological terms, the chapter investigates both case studies using qualitative methods, following two steps. First, social interactions were collected through an extensive digital ethnography on WhatsApp private chats to identify the practices of social actors within the chat app research environment, while taking a “long zoom” perspective on everyday social interactions. Digital ethnography is useful for identifying and analyzing the practices of everyday activists inside the (private) chat environment (see, e.g., Coleman, 2010; Pink et al., 2016). The author became a member of both groups in 2016 and 2022, respectively, and kept a record of all daily social interactions within the WhatsApp private groups. It is worth mentioning that no members presented any opposition to the research. The second source is two-question interviews to explore how group members elicit values and motivations to leave WhatsApp or not. From the group “#United Against the Coup,” this researcher sent the two-question interview through WhatsApp messages, while for “#Campeche and South of the Island Popular Struggle Committee,” the data was collected through 30 face-to-face, semi-structured interviews in 2022. The two-question interview was composed as a section of the semi-structured questionnaire. The 30 face-to-face, semi-structured interviews were conducted with a few group members to elicit values, motivations, and individual trajectories of engagement from the perspective of individual participants. The two-question interviews were intended to find out about group members’ motivations related to the so-called WhatsApp exodus: Question 1: Did you switch to another chat platform (e.g., Telegram, Signal) from January 6, 2021? Question 2: If YES, was it due to privacy concerns, or just a recommendation from a friend, family member, or a colleague? If NO, why did you decide to stay on WhatsApp? What motivations drive you to remain on WhatsApp?

33.6 RESEARCH ETHICS There were several key ethical issues to consider before the researchers joined the WhatsApp private groups. First, there was complete transparency regarding the researcher’s identity and research purposes. The group members were informed immediately after joining and asked for their consent regarding the use of conversations, anonymously and confidentially. Informed consent was sought at regular intervals, mindful of the fluctuating membership and intermittent engagement inherent in WhatsApp groups. Second, the group members were provided access to all research outputs using the data. Third, no biographical data was collected, to protect the privacy and anonymity of the participants. After joining the groups, the conversations were backed up so that it was possible to organize all the content throughout different cycles of interaction (Herrada Hidalgo et al., 2024). The following decisions were taken: i) group members were informed about the purpose of the research; ii) participants were able to ask about the further steps of the research; iii) calls to interview were by open invitation in the group chat. This study anonymizes all interviewees (see Barbosa & Milan, 2019).

506  Handbook of social justice in the Global South

33.7 #UNITED AGAINST THE COUP The WhatsApp exodus was not followed by UCG activists. Interviewee #8 pointed out: “I have migrated to Telegram. But I don’t use it for anything. The reason was a recommendation from friends. However, I decided to stay on WhatsApp.” Interviewee #8 continued: “The groups that I’m part of remained only on WhatsApp. Also, I didn’t understand how Telegram works,” which also highlights WhatsApp as a user-friendly platform in the Global South. Interviewee #6 stated: “I stayed on WhatsApp for convenience and especially for having decreased my interest in social media platforms that were taking up too much of my time. I have been using it more for specific tasks, especially making announcements and interacting with general and medical service providers.” This answer reveals the change of communication from social media platforms to messaging apps. Interviewee #3 said, “I haven’t migrated from WhatsApp because I have more skills and all my contacts are in this app. I decided to stay on WhatsApp because I am already very skilled here, besides all my contacts only have WhatsApp.” The interviewee pointed out the difficulty of moving all the networks to a new chat app. Interviewee #4 said, “I haven’t changed, I’m still only on WhatsApp. I have been using it for work and decided to keep it.” The professional networks stay concentrated on WhatsApp groups. Interviewee #5 stated, “No, because none of my contacts or groups decided [to] or [were] invited to do the migration.” Most of the answers also related to personal contacts that did not follow the WhatsApp exodus.

33.8 #CAMPECHE AND SOUTH OF THE ISLAND POPULAR STRUGGLE COMMITTEE The same occurred with the Campeche participants, where most of the interviewees remained only on WhatsApp. I think that in a face-to-face meeting, someone said that the safest chat platform they knew was Signal, especially because we work with social assistance for minorities, like women. We decided: Let’s migrate the entire WhatsApp group to Signal. Another group was created on Signal, and the previous one ceased on WhatsApp. I remember the way we executed the migration: the previous one was still working, and after a while, it was gone. It was a lot of work to complete the digital migration, because people forgot and sent the information to the WhatsApp group, because [they thought it was] an easier route, right? But then we all decided to delete the WhatsApp group. And then the other group on Signal worked very well from the start … I addressed a very important issue, which is legalizing abortion. And the women who brought us to Signal were aware of the importance of our safety.” (Interviewee #29)

Interviewee #19 highlighted: “I haven’t migrated from WhatsApp because I have many contacts here,” while interviewee #15 stated, “I haven’t changed, I’m still only on WhatsApp. I have been using it for professional reasons.” Interviewee #13 affirmed, “No, because none of my contacts or groups decided or invited to do the migration.” The results point to user “convenience”: leaving WhatsApp means that users will lose their previous networks, already consolidated in other chat groups. This means that they might not be interested in letting go of their closer contacts, with whom they have already connected over many years, alongside professional, personal, political, and social connections.

Why is there a non-WhatsApp exodus in the Global South(s)?  507

33.9 DISCUSSION WhatsApp everyday activism provides an excellent illustration of how digital technology enables a heterogeneity of daily activities. As the group members are already familiar with the WhatsApp platform, it becomes very reasonable to understand why they prefer to remain active on this platform and not switch to its competitors, corroborating that the “big five platforms in many branches of the tree marks society’s increased dependency on them” (van Dijck, 2020, p. 8). In fact, all layers of Brazilian civil society should have the freedom to leave WhatsApp. However, due to zero-rating fees as a way of providing free navigation on WhatsApp , alternatives that could be offered to consumers are not favored. The telecom companies have dominated the market by operating these one-off solutions, mainly in Brazil. The reasons elucidated by the interviewees showed that WhatsApp has been used and (re) appropriated by a great number of everyday activists, as well as its pitfalls as a commercial platform, alongside being part of the mother company Meta. It is worth mentioning that Metaowned WhatsApp “has now penetrated the core of economic and civic life on most continents” (van Dijck, 2020, p. 3). Currently, WhatsApp potentially competes with other sibling platforms such as Signal and Telegram to dispute users’ membership in digital daily life, while Meta confirms, “their extraordinary power also negatively affects markets and democracies” (van Dijck, 2020, p. 3). This process increases social and economic inequality in Global South countries through its geopolitical GAMAM (Google, Amazon, Meta, Apple, Microsoft) power over its “family of apps,” such as Facebook Messenger and Instagram Messenger. WhatsApp has shown high rates of penetration far away from its siblings, playing as a global chat platform. Therefore, Meta’s chat app is expected to grow and attract more users in the coming years and continue to expand its influence all over the planet (Johns et al., 2024). In doing so, WhatsApp’s backtracking on its privacy policies has shown it to be a strategic choice to maintain its dominant role in the global market with platform dominance in the Global South. However, this decision does not suggest a long-term agenda to build alternative pathways to engage everyday citizens as a central component of these apps’ privacy updates. The main challenge remains how to support a more open and clear digital ecosystem in the realm of chat apps. For the reasons given, new imaginaries from the Global South(s) matter: they address unequal power relations, digital colonialism (Arora, 2016, 2019; Magalhães & Couldry, 2021), and invisibilities processes in the chat apps realm. The zero-rating fees should be removed or reconsidered to offer a fair chat platform option . Here, the two case studies corroborate the (urgent) need to understand in depth the interactions between daily chats and dynamics on WhatsApp usage beyond the United States and Europe, while building a communicative and collaborative bridge between group members and the platform. Everyday citizens are often presented as passive users of chat apps. Instead, they need to be at the core of the process. Most importantly, digital migration cannot be a privilege just for Global North citizens; it must also be an inclusive process for and from the Global South(s). The discussion opens up the debate to three main ideas. First, shifting to other messaging apps means providing free access to alternative chat apps like Telegram and Signal, rather than just unlimited Internet access through zero-rating fees. Indeed, Telegram or Signal, as regular chat apps, are not freely accessible through zero-rating. To make feasible the digital migration movement, it is necessary for it to be accessible to all layers of civil society, and

508  Handbook of social justice in the Global South not restricted to a selected group of like-minded citizens who have acquired minimum levels of digital literacy and privileged Internet access. The shift should be for them, by them, and should leave no one behind. Second, digital literacy matters, as well as long-term education policies (Barbosa, 2024). Mobilizing policy actions to foster digital literacy campaigns throughout the bottom of society is crucial and urgent. Recognizing research is indispensable to developing better long-term solutions: personalize learning processes to enhance collective ways to include non-concerned citizens. It makes sense to foster the “digital capital-based approach,” namely: “it is not only knowledge, digital skills and motivation, but also the capacities and possibilities to use the digital capital as a currency to obtain other resources that can improve individuals’ life chances” (Ragnedda, 2018, p. 2373). In other words: “It is crucial to promote digital tech literacies – at all levels of education – that combine skills and know-how in computer sciences, critical thinking, and governance. Curricula that put interdisciplinary techno-cultural competencies and values (competencies evolve, values remain) at the center of attention are to be favored” (Calzati, 2021, p. 926). Third, we must consider WhatsApp as a platform that goes beyond communication with like-minded people in the Global North. In the first decade of this global messaging platform, private data has been captured by the for-profit interests of big tech companies, which jars with public values and reinforces the platform’s power. Every time WhatsApp makes the statement that they “are focused on the privacy of our users, maintaining a high degree of reliability and preventing abuse,” WhatsApp should be questioned on what the company truly means. In this vein, civic campaigns such as “#SaveWhatsApp,” launched by digital human rights activists, succeeded in forcing WhatsApp to reverse their new privacy policies. As the case studies of #UnidosContraOGolpe and “#Campeche and South of the Island Popular Struggle Committee” show, digital activism today is facilitated by chat apps, mainly in Global South countries. Yet, investigating the WhatsApp “exodus” shows it did not derive from a programmatic structure, but evolved organically from members’ everyday life experiences. Group members appropriated WhatsApp affordances to act and interact politically, motivated by indignation at the Brazilian turbulent situation and propelled by the enthusiasm to create new forms of political participation, but most of all without the need to shift to another messaging service.

33.10 CONCLUSION: CONTEXT-DRIVEN FROM AND WITH THE SOUTH(S) This chapter has investigated the ways in which progressive groups on WhatsApp based in Brazil did not follow the “exodus” that happened in Europe and the United States. Looking at the Global South countries and zooming in on the Brazilian context, it shows that Meta adjusts privacy policies according to its goal to expand its business dominance . Although the chapter shows how WhatsApp is embedded in Brazilian digital infrastructure thanks to the so-called zero-rating fees, the non-exodus from Brazil shows the need for more research across Global South countries: to understand the pitfalls of WhatsApp usage from a perspective outside Europe and the United States. It means looking at diverse meanings of this chat platform beyond Silicon Valley “born-and-bred,” while contextualizing its use and appropriations in the Global South countries.

Why is there a non-WhatsApp exodus in the Global South(s)?  509 The practical challenge today is how to connect everyday activists primarily affected by their much-neglected contextual situation: the implementation and management of the app’s privacy policy should be designed by them, for them, and situated locally and adapted to their contexts beyond digital universalism (Loukissas, 2019). In so doing, it is necessary to privilege instead a recursive, iterative, transdisciplinary, and dialogic process able to engage everyday citizens in order to better inform them about the role of their privacy and safety in the chat platform ecosystem beyond the “digital grammar” created and imposed by the Global North. This means to combat oppressive power structures – digital colonization, algorithmic violence, gender violence, class divides, and racism, not just in Western Europe and the United States with lexicons from the Global North, but also with contagious of hope from and with South(s). In fact, the research agenda needs to be context-driven, and South-oriented beyond the major influence of the Global North. In order to transgress the geopolitical power of GAMAM and their platform dominance in the current stage of generative AI technologies, it is needed to situate social harms and imbalances among vulnerable populations and minorities from the Global South(s). As Arora (2024) remind us: “We can go beyond the North– South binary and strive for a meaningful relationship with technology that enhances human flourishing while mitigating potential harms. Hope is not an option. It is a moral imperative for an inclusive and responsible digital future” (p. 3). Our data shows that, unfortunately, there is little alternative to engaging in digital activism beyond WhatsApp’s digital infrastructure, at least when we look at the local grassroots of the Brazilian society, but there is hope on how they engage collectively to foster social change through the novelty of WhatsAppers.

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34. Achieving social justice through constitutional change in Latin America Rodolfo López Moreno

34.1 INTRODUCTION Latin America has historically been a profoundly unequal region. The roots of this inequality are manifold, ranging from the lasting legacies of colonialism to the implementation of policies that do not prioritise the redistribution of economic growth among the population. These conditions have shaped and maintained exclusionary practices that are not only economic but also create hierarchies that systematically marginalise important sectors of the population due to their class and social status, particularly Indigenous peoples and women (Quijano, 2015; Hooker, 2005; Deere & De Leal, 2001). Moreover, the implementation of neoliberal policies over the last 30 years to bolster commodity-based economies has added problems, such as widespread environmental degradation that threatens the existence of rural and native communities and entire ecosystems (Liverman & Vilas, 2006). In this scenario, the demand for social justice, expressed in the claims for political participation and recognition, economic equality, and environmental justice, has become a salient issue in Latin America since the Third Wave of democracy (Silva, 2009). Social movements in the region are crucial for organising and articulating excluded groups’ demands to pressure governments and parliaments to pass policies or laws that address their grievances (Calderón et al., 2018). However, the passage of legislation or social programmes is only one side of the story. Since the 1990s, Latin American social movements have become salient actors in the processes of constitutional replacement, promoting demands conducive to achieving social justice. These demands include traditional claims for extending economic and social rights (ESR) to impoverished groups (e.g., housing, free education, healthcare), recognising and repairing the historical injustices of exclusion, and addressing challenges posed by environmental degradation. The political incidence of activists is one of the most consequential political impacts of a social movement (Amenta et al., 2010), as it secures the long-term protection of rights, the distribution of power in a society, and the recognition and enhancement of the status of marginalised actors. This chapter argues that constitutions are crucial for advancing social justice by recognising social rights or enabling legal innovations and instruments that extend them in the future. Here, social movements matter as they establish synergistic relations with constitutions. Activists participate and can become influential at different stages of the process, such as favouring the conditions for constitutional change through their mobilisation, promoting clauses that expand ESR during its drafting, and pushing for its implementation. Focussing on the cases of Bolivia, Colombia, and Chile, this chapter shows the potential of constitutions for advancing social justice and the role of social movements. However, this chapter shows that constitutional changes also render conflicting results due to two important caveats. First, constitutions are entwined in broad and contentious political processes that symbolically expand 512

Achieving social justice through constitutional change in Latin America  513 ESRs but may backfire in other dimensions. Second, partisan and resource-wise considerations limit the capacity and willingness of state actors to implement a constitution, which limits the fulfilment of the charter’s promise and potential.

34.2 CONSTITUTIONAL CHANGE IN LATIN AMERICA AND ITS LIMITATIONS Constitutions are central to understanding the advancement of social justice. From a positivist point of view, constitutions set the core tenets for the functioning of governance and the central aspects of a country’s social and political life. However, from a sociological point of view, they serve more complex purposes. Constitutions also reflect social processes and pressures (Thornhill, 2017), simultaneously becoming the symbolic expression of a political community while carrying out integrative functions for society (Habermas, 2001). Therefore, as constitutions play a role in structuring the core proceedings guiding social and political life, they also become a space where societal actors can project and legitimise their aspirations. The history of Latin America reflects the dual role of constitutions. Since the dawn of emancipatory processes in 1810, Latin America has enacted 195 constitutions. This amount is more significant than in any other world region (Negretto, 2015), showing an inclination to solve social and political conflicts or implement new ideological projects through constitutional change. However, this figure is unevenly distributed since countries like the Dominican Republic and Venezuela have had 33 and 26 constitutions, respectively, while Argentina has had only three. This abundance of constitutional projects was initially related to power distribution during nation-states’ construction (e.g., the relation between the executive and legislative powers, a unitary or federal state structure). However, constitutional objectives shifted with the turn of the twentieth century as several countries faced the so-called “social question” (Gargarella, 2022). The exclusion of impoverished masses resulting from lasting colonial legacies at the national level (unresolved after independence) triggered sizeable social discontent. Seeking to alleviate this problem, national elites enacted new constitutions that opened political spaces and enabled the enactment of incipient welfare systems in the region (Couso, 2017). For instance, the constitutions of Mexico (1917), Bolivia (1938), and Costa Rica (1949) included provisions that bolstered the recognition of political, economic, social, and cultural rights. Including a comprehensive list of rights (by constitutional replacement or reform) to address various inequalities has continued to become a characteristic of Latin American constitutionmaking (Gargarella, 2022; Angel & Lovera, 2014). However, a recent wave of constitutional change in the region has moved this social constitutionalism one step further, crystallising into a distinctive constitutional approach called “Latin American neo-constitutionalism” (Couso, 2022), which encompasses two different schools of thought: “progressive constitutionalism” and “radical neo-constitutionalism”. Despite their different perspectives and emphases, both constitutional schools have three crucial elements in common. First, they emerged as a response to acute social and political crises, just like previous constitutional replacement experiences in the region. However, now, these constitutions directly address the recognition of historically marginalised groups (e.g., women and Indigenous communities) and new social problems (e.g., environmental issues). Second, these constitutions are intertwined with contextual urgencies and the participation of traditional (e.g., partisan) and emergent (e.g., social

514  Handbook of social justice in the Global South movement) leadership in shaping the content and implementation of a constitution (Negretto, 2015). Third, evidence shows that, despite their intentions, these constitutions have had only modest success in bringing about more equal societies (Couso, 2022).

34.3 PROGRESSIVE CONSTITUTIONALISM According to this view, national constitutions should have an ample and robust bill of rights (e.g., education, pension, housing, living in a clean environment) that responds to and aims to end the pervasive patterns of socio-economic inequality in Latin America. These inequalities are understood broadly, encompassing the economy, environmental problems, gender disparities, and the recognition of Indigenous communities in a political and cultural sense. Constitutions within this tradition (e.g., Colombia 1991, Brazil 1988, Costa Rica after 1989) achieve this goal by stating provisions or clauses and giving courts the responsibility of protecting ESRs. This enhanced role of the courts highlights the importance of judges in enforcing the Bill of Rights through a progressive and expansive interpretation of constitutional principles and rights (Couso, 2022). Due to the salient role of courts, an essential advantage of this approach is its emphasis on the justiciability of social rights. These constitutions have reduced their distance from regular politics and the citizenry to achieve that justiciability. For instance, as the Colombian case shows, marginalised groups used constitutional principles to frame their demands before the state and society. Moreover, they used the new tools created by the constitution to take their claims directly to the courts when the other state branches could not respond to their demands. Therefore, although the constitution may not have explicitly considered specific movements and claims during its drafting, it now grants widely accepted legal instruments and principles for activists to engage in institutional activism and shape policy discussions legitimately. However, this approach has also been criticised for granting non-elected political actors like judges too much leeway to interpret the constitution, leading to legal procedure uncertainty.

34.4 RADICAL NEO-CONSTITUTIONALISM On top of an extensive list of social rights, this perspective stresses the importance of reliably translating the people’s will and popular sovereignty into constitutional charters and subsequent political affairs. It uses ideas from post-Marxist, postcolonial, and radical democracy (Couso, 2022) to come up with a more Latin American solution to the problems of social inequality and lack of political representation that these constitutions are trying to fix, rather than bringing European constitutional models to Latin America. Unlike the previous approach, the people, and not the judges, define constitutional matters, usually through direct participation via referenda. This perspective not only recognises historically marginalised groups but does so through conceptual constitutional innovations that transform the structure of the state. The constitutions of Bolivia (2009) and Ecuador (2008) establish a dialogue with their Indigenous legacies to incorporate novel concepts from that tradition, such as declaring the plurinationality of the state or the Sumak Kawsay (or “good living”) as political and socio-economic principles, respectively. However, an essential weakness of this constitutional school is the potential

Achieving social justice through constitutional change in Latin America  515 deterioration of democratic standards. According to Negretto (2020), the constitutions of Venezuela (1999), Bolivia (2009), and Ecuador (2008) emerged after a political force gained massive support following a presidential election. They controlled the assemblies that drafted their country’s new constitutions through that position, shaping the state’s institutional design to gain more power. This institutionalisation allowed presidencies to interfere with other state powers and engage in the co-optation of social movements, popular mobilisation, and plebiscites. Thus, these partisan forces expanded their grasp on the state and engaged in politically exclusionary practices akin to cases like the Hungarian constitution of 2011.

34.5 THE POLITICAL ASPECT OF CONSTITUTIONAL CHANGE IN LATIN AMERICA Although regular or organised citizens struggle to gain the political influence necessary to shape legislative discussions, a noticeable element of recent processes of constitutional change in Latin America is their presence at different stages of replacing and enforcing a constitution. Either creating the conditions for a new constitution and its drafting and implementation, this mobilised civil society remains to different degrees in each stage to demand better living conditions. To illustrate two points, this section develops the latest constitutional change and implementation cases in Colombia, Bolivia, and Chile. First, to examine the potential of constitutions to address lasting legacies of economic, political, and social inequalities affecting these countries. Second, constitutional processes should be connected with social movement activism. This explains how organised social groups can change meaningful political and legal discussions to meet past needs. 34.5.1 Progressive Constitutionalism: The 1991 Colombian Constitution The 1886 Colombian constitution was the longest-living one in Latin American history. However, its replacement in 1991 responded to need by confronting the country’s political and social challenges. Although the country had experienced long episodes of political turmoil in the past, by the 1980s, the situation had worsened due to a combination of factors such as the extensive operations of leftist guerrillas, the counter-offensives of rightist paramilitary forces, and the rise of drug-trafficking cartels. These factors caused Colombia to experience a spiral of violence that weakened the rule of law and the lives of the Colombian people, degenerating into a severe political crisis (Barreto-Rozo, 2022). In this scenario, the suggestion to replace or reform the 1886 constitution to generate a new social pact has been a constant in political life since 1974 (Negretto, 2015). By 1990, after numerous attempts to reform it had failed, the student movement and other mobilised actors, such as Indigenous groups and feminist organisations, gave legitimacy to the call for a constitutional replacement through a nationally elected assembly (Negretto, 2015; Valdivieso, 2017). This assembly, put together in 1991, had a heterogeneous composition that included partisan actors and members of the student, labour, and Indigenous movements. The assembly proposed the new charter in the same year, which included a robust bill of rights that incorporated an extensive list of ESR. However, it also made two consequential innovations. First, while representing 3.4 per cent of the population, the new charter recognised Indigenous people by declaring Colombia a multicultural state and granting them local spaces of political autonomy.

516  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Second, international human rights treaties became a central component for interpreting the new constitution and the validity of national laws. Additionally, the 1991 constitution defined Colombia as a social and democratic state of rights, which set the tone for the state to promote and protect economic and social rights and incorporate environmental protection and conservation as state duties. The constitution’s institutional and legal design went beyond the mere recognition of ESR to provide tools to favour their justiciability. As an example of “progressive Latin American constitutionalism,” this charter granted courts a crucial role. The Colombian Constitutional Court was mandated to enforce the newly recognised rights, assuming a more activist stance than the 1886 constitution. For instance, the Colombian Constitutional Court can address other state powers (e.g., the presidency or congress) to pass legislation to redress or overcome legal gaps that affect the fulfilment of ESR by the population or one group in particular. The ability of Colombian courts to safeguard constitutional rights is contingent on the legal preferences of judges (Botero, 2017). So, for the judicial branch to play a progressive role, there need to be progressive majorities. These majorities may take a less formalist approach to interpreting the law, considering how politics work or how complicated social policies are (Brinks & Forbath, 2013). Additionally, the constitution strengthened the more active role of courts by democratising people’s access to the judicial system through a legal proceeding called tutela (Landa, 2011). This constitutional innovation tool enables people to directly accuse a judge of a threat or violation of their human rights. Moreover, individuals can also engage in public interest litigation by denouncing on behalf of other groups that may not be able to act by themselves (e.g., children or nature). Given the context of its promulgation and the time required for its implementation, the new charter did not immediately transform Colombian society. However, it became decisive for advancing social justice in the future as the democratisation of the country moved forward and political violence subsided. Although judicial review existed in Colombia, the renewed centrality of courts in promoting ESR and the legal tools available to citizens turned Colombian courts into a locus of social movement activism (Botero, 2017). Organised citizens could target the judicial system (along with complementary tactics such as lobbying congress) to obtain institutional support and some of their demands. Thus, the role of progressive courts became consequential in gradually securing and expanding the fundamental rights of groups suffering from structural marginalisation or stigma. The legalisation of abortion rights is an illustrative example of the courts’ progressive interpretation of the Colombian 1991 constitution. During the 1980s and 1990s, local women’s groups advocated and lobbied congress to legislate the decriminalisation of abortion under limited clauses. However, these efforts were fruitless since all the bills on the matter stalled, leaving Colombia as one of the three countries with a total abortion ban in Latin America (alongside Chile and El Salvador). Given this legislative deadlock, in the 2000s, feminist groups observed the role of the Constitutional Court and shifted their activism towards that institution. A feminist non-governmental organisation filed a case for the decriminalisation of abortion before the Constitutional Court in 2005, spurred on by the mediatised case involving a child, pregnant by rape. One year later, the Court recognised the right of women to access abortion in cases of rape, the risk to the woman’s life, and the unviability of the foetus (sentence C-335 of 2006). The Court argued that terminating a pregnancy is closely related to a

Achieving social justice through constitutional change in Latin America  517 woman’s right to life, health, self-determination, intimacy, and dignity, making it a fundamental right that the state must protect. While this was an essential step for the Colombian feminist movement, there were still practical obstacles that precluded women (particularly from rural areas) from safely accessing abortion services under the criteria established in the 2006 ruling (Oquendo, 2021). Therefore, in 2020, almost 100 feminist groups formed a coalition called Causa Justa (Just Cause) that reignited the discussion by proposing a total decriminalisation of abortion before the Constitutional Court. In 2022, Colombian justices decided to legalise abortion in the first 24 weeks of pregnancy based on similar constitutionally granted rights as the previous ruling (sentence C-055 of 2022), situating the country at the forefront of abortion rights in Latin America. While these efforts have triggered the action of conservative counter-movements seeking to reverse this decision (Botero, 2017), they have not been successful at overturning these judicially attained gains. In general, the role of the Constitutional Court in applying the 1991 constitution to resolve social disputes has allowed the advancement of equality and justice in other areas (BarretoRozo, 2022). For instance, the Court has recognised affirmative action for women at different levels of public power, enforced the right of native communities to be consulted when there are plans to exploit natural resources in their communities, granted the legalisation of civil unions and then equal marriage for the LGBT+ community, and even recognised a river as a subject of rights to protect it from environmental degradation. All these advancements were possible due to the activism of local organisations to promote their causes in a context where neither the presidency nor congress were willing to advance their issues. However, this constitutional model also has some limitations. First, the rights-friendly approach of judges is not guaranteed as it is contingent on the appointment politics taking place backstage (Botero, 2017). Second, this constitutional model enshrines some crucial ESR, but the lack of state resources precludes their implementation. For instance, the Court has declared an unconstitutional state of affairs in Colombia regarding the right to health, the protection of human rights advocates, or the rights of internally displaced people, but the state has a limited capacity to reasonably meet the standards set by the court (Bernal, 2017). 34.5.2 Radical Neo-Constitutionalism: The 2009 Bolivian Constitution Although the most populous group in the country (48 per cent), Bolivia de facto marginalised Indigenous people from high positions of power, and its constitutions historically had a restricted view of them (del Águila, 2014). Even until the 1990s, Bolivian society disparaged Indigenous self-identification (Braver, 2022), and Indigenous people had a peripheral role in regular politics. However, the social and political scenario started to shift in the early 2000s due to two episodes of widespread unrest opposing the implementation of neoliberal policies. These contentious episodes and growing calls to decentralise the country further created a social and political crisis scenario that reshaped the country’s political landscape. The first was the “Water War” in Cochabamba, the fourth-largest city in Bolivia, which resulted from the city’s municipal water supply company’s privatisation to a British company. In January 2000, a coalition of local social movement organisations rose to oppose an increase in water rates decided by the new company. These protests regularly mobilised thousands of people and culminated in April of the same year after the private company left the country and the government repealed the law regulating water service privatisation in the city. Three

518  Handbook of social justice in the Global South years later, the so-called “Gas War” confronted grassroots movements with the government, as the former resisted the latter’s decision to exploit the country’s vast natural gas reserves. Among the reasons the government’s plan was unpopular was the perception that it would benefit a privileged minority and not most of the population. Protests started in September 2003 and heightened in October, mobilising hundreds of thousands of people who faced heavy police repression. Ultimately, the president stepped down, and the state stopped its original plans to exploit natural gas. These episodes of mobilisation highlight two relevant conditions preparing the ground for constitutional change. On the one hand, they were a popular response to neoliberal adjustment policies and dire living conditions, nationally diffusing claims for a better distribution of national resources. On the other hand, they marked the emergence of organised Indigenous organisations as crucial political players (Schavelzon, 2012). Although historically marginalised, this time, Indigenous groups organised and articulated their demands around MAS (Movement to Socialism), a political party that served as a platform for the most prominent Indigenous nations in the country, and led by Evo Morales, a historical rural Indigenous leader. Second, Indigenous groups participated decisively in the previous wave of protests, bolstering their main claim and adding their demands, such as a more inclusive and participatory democracy that promotes economic equality and social justice (Van Cott, 2007). These groups’ political inroads favoured and validated the emergence of a now-revalued Indigenous identity and leadership in mainstream Bolivian politics. Morales won the presidency in 2005 with 53.74 per cent of the votes, a historical result considering that since 1966, all Bolivian presidents had won the elections with less than half of the electorate’s support. Morales and MAS promised to call for a democratically elected constitutional assembly to institutionally solve the historical exclusions and political divides splitting Bolivian society. Capitalising on its political momentum, MAS dominated the assembly after gaining 54 per cent of the seats, of which 75 per cent self-identified as Indigenous (Schilling-Vacaflor & Kuppe, 2012). This sizeable presence allowed MAS to set the pace for the most relevant internal discussions. After three years of intense political tensions and negotiations, the Bolivian population passed the constitutional draft in a 2009 referendum. Although Bolivia has constitutionally defined itself as a multi-ethnic and pluricultural society since 1994, the new Bolivian constitution conceptually innovated by expanding the recognition and rights of Indigenous peoples. Unlike widespread Western liberal notions of the state as matching a homogenised people, the concept of plurinationality entails that different nations can coexist within the state as equals, which has political, economic, cultural, and symbolic implications. Politically, the new constitution recognised 36 nations and allowed them to create autonomous spaces of self-government that would stand as equals before the other levels of state administration (e.g., regional departments or municipalities). Indigenous communities within these autonomous territories could exert their own justice system, complementing common law with traditional practices. They would have a strong hold over the exploitation of their natural resources. Moreover, Indigenous peoples have guaranteed quotas of representation in Congress. Economically, the constitution granted Indigenous communities special land property rights to repair historical injustices against this group (Saffon, 2022) and recognised cooperative economic practices (Esteves, 2014). Culturally, the constitution recognised and protected the ancestral practices of its nations and their linguistic heritage, mandating the state to take steps to preserve and promote it. Consequently, the 2009 Bolivian constitution represented an

Achieving social justice through constitutional change in Latin America  519 essential step towards improving the status and political standing of a significant and historically marginalised group. Additionally, it transformed the relationship between the state and the Indigenous groups, who are now crucial actors within an institution that politically integrates them without forcing their cultural assimilation (Schilling-Vacaflor & Kuppe, 2012). The new constitution also responded to other emergent demands of Bolivian society. For instance, its twenty-sixth article bolstered women’s political participation as it stated their right to participate in political activities under equal conditions compared to men. This provision inspired a future electoral law demanding that lists of candidates for congressional elections must include the same number of men and women in alternate order. The percentage of women elected to congress gradually increased to 52 per cent of all members of congress in the current (2020–2025) legislature. The constitution also expanded social and economic rights, such as universal entitlements to healthcare, free education, and social security, prohibiting the privatisation of public social services (Wolff, 2012). Additionally, protecting the environment became a guiding principle of the 2009 Bolivian constitution, mandating the state to preserve and protect nature and promote a harmonious use of natural resources. Moreover, it recognises the right of every citizen to initiate all legal procedures necessary to protect the environment. Despite these advancements, the Bolivian case also depicts the limitations of constitutions in fostering democratisation and bringing about social justice. Although the constitution promotes a participatory view of democracy, according to different indexes like IDEA or Polity IV, the quality of Bolivian democracy has decreased since 2009 due to its institutional design. For instance, the partisan control of the assembly increased the list of social rights while simultaneously amplifying the prerogatives of the presidency, which eroded the autonomy and impartiality of essential organs of democratic control, such as the Constitutional Tribunal. This presidential control was crucial to MAS’s political gains in the future and was eventually used to justify a coup against President Morales in 2019. Additionally, although the constitution stated that constitutional rights and guarantees were immediately applicable, it is still open to interpretation if these rights have improved the lives of Bolivians due to the scarcity of resources to secure the coverage and quality of welfare provisions. Finally, there are substantial obstacles to fully implementing Indigenous rights. For example, the way Indigenous representation works in institutions makes it easier for grassroots groups that support the ruling MAS to be included and gain political power. The ruling MAS has also blocked the creation of local Indigenous autonomy because they are afraid of losing power (Schilling-Vacaflor & Kuppe, 2012). 34.5.3 The Truncated 2021–2022 Chilean Constitutional Process The recent developments in Chile illustrate the limitations of relying on constitutional change to achieve social justice. The country adopted its charter in 1980, when the then-dictatorial government implemented the neoliberal model (which had just started taking off globally) nationally. It consolidated the primacy of private companies in providing welfare (e.g., pensions, education, and healthcare). It recognised fewer social rights than other Latin American constitutions (Gargarella, 2013). This constitution’s dictatorial origin was an open flank that undermined its legitimacy for years. Successive governments since the democratic restoration of 1990 have amended the constitution’s content 51 times, and the discussion about replacing it has varied in intensity but

520  Handbook of social justice in the Global South never ceased. Although this constitution partially bolstered economic growth, it also received open criticism, given its limits on democratic governance and the country’s limited social welfare provisions and fragile living conditions (UNDP, 1998). A wave of protests in 2011 continuously conveyed widespread dissatisfaction about the low quality of public services (e.g., educational quality, lack of access to healthcare, meagre level of pensions) and the denunciation of the stark inequalities affecting the country despite its economic prosperity. Public discontent peaked on October 18, 2019, when the largest protests in Chile’s history initially paralysed Santiago and the entire country (Somma et al., 2021). This scenario of widespread upheaval did not have a specific political leadership or social movement, unlike the cases in Colombia or Bolivia. However, different groups participated in the rallies and riots to publicly express their demands (Garretón, 2021). After weeks of continuous and massive protests, marches, and riots, the main political parties in Congress agreed to start a constitutional process on November 15, 2019, which contributed to assuaging but not demobilising protesters. Despite the delays caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, in October 2020, 78 per cent of voters agreed to replace the constitution by electing a convention to propose a new charter. The election of the delegates made the Constitutional Convention the most heterogeneous institution in Chilean history. There was equal representation of men and women; it secured the representation of Indigenous groups, and 60 per cent of its members were independents (many of whom were feminist and environmental movement leaders). The Convention’s constitutional draft was ready in July 2022, addressing feminist (e.g., equal gender representation in all state organs, abortion rights), environmental (e.g., nature as the subject of rights, ending the privatisation of water, animal rights), and Indigenous (e.g., the plurinationality of the state) demands, including a long list of social rights that aligned Chile with the Latin American constitutionalism tradition. These clauses also mandated a more active role for the state in providing welfare. However, 62 per cent of Chilean society rejected this draft in September 2022, a resounding defeat for the Convention and the social movements and parties backing it. Several factors interplayed to explain this result, including the widespread use of disinformation, criticism over some delegates’ behaviour and political responsibility (Moreno 2023), the exclusion of right-wing ideas, the straining economic conditions resulting from the pandemic, and the proposal’s weaknesses (Larraín et al. 2023). Among the latter, some articles (e.g., abortion rights and plurinationality) were poorly socialised and highly controversial, as several polls identified those specific issues as the primary legal issues to which people pointed to justify their negative vote. While symbolically relevant to a movement, some of these points found less resonance among the population and may have been the subject of ordinary laws instead of constitutional ones. After the referendum, the local scenario depicted deep political, social, and economic uncertainties. The presidency and Congress continued the constitutional process after the failure of the Convention, and in 2023 the citizenry elected a new body in charge of drafting a constitutional proposal. However, conservative forces controlled this new body, and their proposal threatened several social rights, such as the right to strike and access to abortion. Ultimately, while this proposal was defeated in a referendum the same year, it left the country with a delegitimised constitution. As constitutional discussions dominated the political scenario, the advancement of significant social reforms stalled. Two consecutive administrations paused any major welfare reform to wait for the result of the constitutional drafting and

Achieving social justice through constitutional change in Latin America  521 referenda, leaving unattended the urgent demands and social tensions that spiked the 2019 protests.

34.6 CONCLUSION Looking at the trends of constitutional replacement in Latin America, this chapter argues for the importance of examining the synergic relationships social movements and constitutions can create to bring about social justice. Regardless of the differences in their constitutional models, the cases of Bolivia and Colombia illustrate this relationship concerning the origins and prospects of constitutional change. Social movements in both countries promoted a new social contract by denouncing the social and political tensions created by enduring inequalities and institutional rigidity. Additionally, activists placed significant demands on their countries’ new constitutions, bolstering the creation of a robust bill of rights. In the case of Bolivia, activists were critical in shaping its content. In contrast, in the case of Colombia, the meaning and coverage were expanded with the assistance of courts during its implementation. These cases also show that constitutions matter in enhancing the standing and influence of marginalised actors. For instance, Indigenous people in Bolivia consolidated their political leverage and symbolically bolstered their social status in a traditionally marginalised society. Also, Colombian women (and other groups) were able to expand their rights by using the constitution when the Executive and Legislative powers were unwilling to address their demands. However, achieving social justice through constitutional changes also poses some limitations. The Colombian and Bolivian constitutions recognise several economic and social rights, but their enforcement clashes with the material ability of their states to provide them. Moreover, as the Bolivian case shows, constitutional change can also be used to expand the power of a partisan group over state institutions and undermine democratic life. Ultimately, the Chilean case also warns about the limitations of the synergistic relationship between movements and constitutions to repair lasting inequalities. Despite the massive support for a new constitution and the sizable selection of activists to write it, adding too many scarcely socialised changes at once estranged people from the constitutional draft and was a factor in its rejection. While the national cases discussed in this chapter reflect different patterns of constitutional change in Latin America, the case of Colombia (or Costa Rica) dialogues with trends observed in other countries that highlight the centrality of constitutions as tools for attaining social change globally. In India, but especially in South Africa (Bonilla, 2013; Couso, 2017; Gargarella, 2017; Curcó Cobos, 2018), courts have also assumed an activist approach that has allowed them to enforce the protection of human rights and make ESR justiciable for essential groups of the population. While South Africa also faces significant resource limitations in enforcing and implementing some social rights, it has decisively promoted egalitarian views on issues such as LGBT+ rights, becoming a key actor in extending equal marriage rights locally. The promise and aspiration of constitutionally strengthening courts (along with social and institutional conditions) could pave the way for other regions of the Global South (e.g., Gloppen et al., 2010) to gradually enhance the specific extension and protection of human, social, and economic rights in the long term.

522  Handbook of social justice in the Global South

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Achieving social justice through constitutional change in Latin America  523 Hooker, J. (2005). Indigenous inclusion/black exclusion: Race, ethnicity and multicultural citizenship in Latin America. Journal of Latin American Studies, 37(2), 285–310. https://doi​.org​/10​.1017​/ S0022216X05009016 Landa, C. (2011). El proceso de amparo en América Latina. Anuario de Derecho Constitucional Latinoamericano,17, 207–226. Retrieved from https://www​.corteidh​.or​.cr​/tablas​/r27649​.pdf Larraín, G., Negretto, G, & Voigt, S. (2023). How not to write a constitution: Lessons from Chile. Public Choice, 194(3), 233–247. https://doi​.org​/10​.1007​/s11127​- 023​- 01046-z Liverman, D. M., & Vilas, S. (2006). Neoliberalism and the environment in Latin America. Annual Review of Environmental Resources, 31, 327–363. https://doi​.org​/10​.1146​/annurev​.energy​.29​.102403​ .140729 Moreno, R. L. (2024). Movimientos sociales, partidos políticos y la continuidad institucional del estallido social chileno en la Convención Constitucional. Desafíos, 36(1), 1. Retrieved from https:// dialnet​.unirioja​.es​/servlet​/articulo​?codigo​=9312772 Negretto, G. L. (2015). La política del cambio constitucional en América Latina. Fondo de cultura económica. Negretto, G. L. (Ed.). (2020). Redrafting constitutions in democratic regimes: Theoretical and comparative perspectives. Cambridge University Press. Oquendo, C. (2021, September 23). Colombia judicializa a más mujeres cada año por abortar. El País. https://elpais​.com ​/internacional ​/2021​- 09​-23​/colombia​-judicializa​-a​-mas​-mujeres​-por​-abortos​-cada​ -ano​.html. Quijano, A. (2015). Colonialidad del poder y clasificación social. Contextualizaciones latinoamericanas, 2(5), 342–386. https://doi​.org​/10​.32870​/cl​.v0i5​.2836 Saffon, M. P. (2022). Property and land. In C. Hübner, R. Gargarella, & S. Guidi (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of constitutional law and Latin America. Oxford University Press. Schavelzon, S. (2012). El nacimiento del Estado Plurinacional de Bolivia, etnografía de una asamblea constituyente. Fondo de las Naciones Unidas para la Democracia UNDEF. Plural editores. Schilling-Vacaflor, A., & Kuppe, R. (2012). Plurinational constitutionalism: A new era of indigenousstate relations? In D. Nolte & A. Schilling-Vacaflor (Eds.), New Constitutionalism in Latin America: Promises and Practices (pp. 347–370). Routledge. Silva, E. (2009). Challenging neoliberalism in Latin America. Cambridge University Press. Somma, N. M., Bargsted, M., Disi Pavlic, R., & Medel, R. M. (2021). No water in the oasis: The Chilean Spring of 2019–2020. Social Movement Studies, 20(4), 495–502. https://doi​.org​/10​.1080​/14742837​ .2020​.1727737 Thornhill, C. (2017). The sociology of constitutions. Annual Review of Law and Social Science, 13, 493–513. https://doi​.org​/10​.1146​/annurev​-lawsocsci​-110316​-113518 UNDP (1998). Desarrollo humano en Chile. Las paradojas de la modernización. https://www​.undp​.org​ /es​/chile​/publicaciones​/ las​-paradojas​-de​-la​-modernizacion Valdivieso Ide, M. (2017). Propuestas feministas en los procesos constituyentes latinoamericanos de las últimas décadas. In M. Sagot (Ed.), Feminismos, pensamiento crítico y propuestas alternativas en América Latina (pp. 43–63). Clacso. Van Cott, D. L. (2007). From movements to parties in Latin America: The evolution of ethnic politics. Cambridge University Press. Wolff, J. (2012). New constitutions and the transformation of democracy in Bolivia and Ecuador. In D. Nolte & A. Schilling-Vacaflor (Eds.),New constitutionalism in Latin America: Promises and practices (pp. 183–202). Routledge.

Afterword to the Handbook of Social Justice in the Global South Paul K. Gellert

Sociologists, particularly those attuned to struggles for global justice, are currently buffeted by crosscutting winds. From some directions, there blows a wind of anti-sociology: for example, from the Floridian south, where sociology classes were removed from core curricular options1, and the midwestern plains, where a bachelor’s of science in sociology was eliminated from the University of Iowa.2 From other directions, there blows a wind that takes public sociology further by proposing that the contributions of sociologists are essential to understanding and addressing societal problems and, unfortunately, too often absent from the public arena (Delgado, 2022). Some have called for a more collaborative and decolonial praxis (Arribas Lozano, 2018; Delgado, 2022).3 Each of these social trends, backed by particular social forces, may give different segments of society reasons for pessimism or optimism. These winds have been blowing more strongly in the current period of neoliberalization and austerity politics. A web search for “sociology cuts” results in a reminder that in 2017 the University of the District of Columbia (UDC) cut its sociology program.4 In 1989, the University of Washington at St. Louis notoriously announced that its sociology program would close.5 In this case, the department was brought back in 2015. A report on the revival noted, “Depending on who is telling the story, Washington University of Saint Louis (WUSTL) dropped its sociology department in 1991 because it was filled with radical thinkers or because it was not strong enough academically.”6 The new WUSTL department tries to thread the needle by a seemingly radical approach with a nod to the first African American Ph.D. from Harvard University. Its pragmatic mission statement declares, “we adopt an approach rooted in the work of W.E.B. Du Bois, focused on undertaking rigorous empirical research to identify and suggest solutions to social problems.”7 Identifying problems meshes with an initiative that Monica Prasad (2021) has recently championed, called a “problem-solving approach” to sociology. Pointedly, she means problem-solving in reference to the process and the understanding needed to engage in the process, and not just sociologists providing solutions (Prasad, 2021, p. 172). Still, I wonder, does the problem-solving approach represent what sociologists should be doing? Prasad’s approach begs the question of problem-solving for whom? She concedes that, in addition to problem solving, sociologists may also produce important work when they uncover the historical causes and deep structures that undergird injustice. However, she does not explicitly address, let alone define, justice. What are we to make of these solution-oriented approaches to sociology? Do they not accede to the demands of neoliberal universities, which have twisted the old adage of publish-orperish into a new adage “be useful”-or-perish? The Handbook of Social Justice in the Global South is right in calling for a deeper sociological engagement, one that does not offer simple solutions – especially as these “solutions” are so frequently addressed to state and private capital powerholders – so much as identify problems and contribute to struggles. In fact, the 524

Afterword to the Handbook of social justice in the Global South  525 editors of this volume take an approach that may seem less... pragmatic. They introduce justice as a concept needing more nuanced and relational thinking. From this insight, we can see that thinking about justice requires uncovering injustice as an urgent first step. It is felicitous, therefore, to find that this Handbook contains multiple analyses of injustice. Various chapters uncover injustice both in the Global South and in relation to the Global South, notably through historically produced structures (see, among others, chapters by Noralla, Olanrewaju, Schaeffer, Semwaza and Smucker, and Shefner and Blad). For me, the most important lesson of gathering multiple cases from the Global South is not merely to celebrate the diversity of voices and experiences from the 85 percent of the population found within this vast area. While the recognition of diverse experiences is worthwhile, this approach is vapid if it stops there. Nor is the aim merely to “decenter” the Global North and its power. Even though that is preferable, as it recognizes inequalities, decentering the Northern perspective or “gaze” and replacing it with less visible and recognized perspectives is not the same as identifying structures of inequality in the world. In other words, the project of illuminating examples of agency by peoples of the Global South (or, what some term subalterns), or their national projects, may lead to an assertion that the world is polycentric with fluid relations reshaping predictable North-South relations (see, e.g., Borras et al., 2013; Kaps & Komlosy, 2013; Horner & Nadvi, 2018). Polycentrism, or the idea that the world no longer has a clear center of political, economic, or cultural power, is touted as if it were a contemporary challenge to unequal North-South relations. As a result, the idea of polycentrism appears to challenge the myth of “development” that more developed countries show less developed countries their future (Rist 1997). This myth has long been held up for people of the Global South as their false lodestar, while exploitation, oppression, and injustice persist. The myth is also held up to the Global North, where people remain mostly unaware of the power of capitalist enterprises under neoliberalism (Harvey 2005), let alone of increasing state support for capitalist firms in the United States, the hegemonic core of the world-system and ideological bulwark of neoliberalism (Block, 2024). Polycentrism therefore carries an unfortunate, if implicit, message that power relations in the world have been “flattened.” Such views are found in both academic and activist spaces, where neoliberal flattening (Friedman, 2005) overlaps with poststructural and postcolonial flattening (Chibber, 2013). The further risk of flattening is a focus on gradations. However, development is not a magic staircase of gradations. Even when it existed, the “Third World” was not so much a place that was trailing the West as a political project aimed at dismantling structural inequalities (Prashad, 2007). The Global South is another hotly contested political project. The purported success of “rising powers” is debated by those holding “(conventional) hope” for Third Worldist liberation from Northern domination and radical critics “who see this very success of the South as being far too profoundly subsumed within the existing global capitalist development paradigm, which, however, is currently heading for a possible global environmental catastrophe if not dramatically challenged and altered” (Gray & Gills, 2016, p. 559). From an older, world-systems perspective, the term “rise” attributed to the Global South writ large is, in fact, most frequently applied to semiperipheral states (Wallerstein, 1979; Worth, 2009) such as the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa) (McKay et al., 2016). GDP per capita may indeed rise in these states, but it often does so via agro-extractive exploitation of peripheral classes and degradation of peripheral ecologies in processes of ecologically unequal exchange (Frey, Gellert, & Dahms, 2019) that support domestic capitalists and urban

526  Handbook of social justice in the Global South middle classes. The history of Indonesia’s “extractive regime” exemplifies these processes (Gellert, 2010, 2019). It demonstrates how semiperipheries – both exploited and exploiting – continue to perform a vital legitimation role by providing illusions of progress and equitable, national development (Arrighi, 1990). Privitera and Pellow’s useful effort (this volume) to link studies of the Global South and environmental justice may go even further in building “opportunities to question the power that produces socio-ecological inequalities” if it were to integrate more structural analysis. Critique is vital. Yet, beyond this first step of uncovering injustice, there is a second urgent step needed to redress injustice and create paths to justice. Howard Zinn repeatedly warned, you “can’t be neutral on a moving train.” He added, “if you define patriotism as obedience to the government, then you are following a kind of totalitarian principle” (Zinn, 2005). This volume advocates non-obedient, decolonial, justice-oriented paths (see especially chapters by Noralla and Rahman and Rhodes). The authors of this volume share Zinn’s realistic optimism for future possibilities8 but add that it requires answering the questions of who suffers and who benefits while being wary of false solutions, especially to the world’s most urgent environmental problem: climate change (Charman, 2008; Climate False Solutions, 2021). Given the growing threat of right-wing authoritarian, white nationalist, and neofascist regimes (Ayers, 2024), a comprehensive response to the forces of injustice is needed that engages related antiracist, anti-imperialist, antimilitarist, feminist, and ecological struggles. Optimism in the face of such threats will not be naive if it is based on a critical understanding of the powerful and deep structures of exploitative and oppressive relations, both material and epistemological, and if it emanates from dual commitments to research and to the possibilities of justice for those with whom researchers engage.

NOTES 1. 2.

See https://www​.nytimes​.com​/2024​/01​/24​/us​/florida​-universities​-sociology​.html See  https://dailyiowan​.com ​/2023​/04​/20​/university​-of​-iowa​-to ​-terminate​-two ​-degrees/ Drake University also proposed eliminating a variety of programs, but in April 2024, it was reported that Sociology was no longer on the list of programs to be eliminated. https://iowacapitaldispatch​.com ​/2024​/04​/23​/drake​-university​-trustees​-to ​-vote​-on​-academic​-program​-eliminations/ 3. Mahadeo (2024) goes even further, rejecting efforts at collaboration as complicity with state and capital and arguing for a “counter-public sociology” that rejects the university as a producer of knowledge and efforts to engage with, and even curry the favor of, media and policymakers, by supporting more radical efforts based on knowledge producers outside the academy. 4. See https://thesociologistdc​.com​/all​-issues​/farewell​-to​-a​-legacy​-the​-closing​-of​-a​-sociology​-program/ 5. See a special issue of reflections in The American Sociologist https://link​-springer​-com​ .utk​.idm​.oclc​.org​/journal​/12108​/volumes​-and​-issues​/20–4 . 6. See https://www​.stlpr​.org​/education​/2014​-03​-25​/after​-nearly​-25​-years​-washington​-u​-will​ -bring​-back​-sociology. 7. See https://sociology​.wustl​.edu/ . 8. https://www​.zinnedproject​.org/

Afterword to the Handbook of social justice in the Global South  527

REFERENCES Arrighi, G. (1990). The developmentalist illusion: A reconceptualization of the semiperiphery. In W. G. Martin (Ed.), Semiperipheral states in the world-economy, contributions in economics and economic history (pp. 11–42). Greenwood Press. Ayers, A. J. (2024). “The fire this time”: The long crisis of neoliberal capitalist accumulation and spectre of neofascism. Critical Sociology, 50(3), 413–435. https://doi​.org​/10​.1177​/08969205231195229 Block, F., Keller, M. R., & Negoita, M. (2024). Revisiting the hidden developmental state. Politics & Society, 52(2), 208–240. https://doi​.org​/10​.1177​/00323292231152061 Borras, S. M., Franco, J. C., & Wang, C. (2013). The challenge of global governance of land grabbing: Changing international agricultural context and competing political views and strategies. Globalizations, 10(1), 161–179. https://doi​.org​/10​.1080​/14747731​.2013​.764152 Charman, K. (2008). False starts and false solutions: Current approaches in dealing with climate change. Capitalism Nature Socialism, 19(3), 29–47. https://doi​.org​/10​.1080​/10455750802348788 Chibber, V. (2013). Postcolonial theory and the specter of capital. Verso. Climate False Solutions (2021). Hoodwinked in the hothouse: Resist false solutions to climate change (3rd ed.). Biofuelwatch, Diablo Rising Tide, Climate Justice Alliance, Energy Justice Network, ETC Group, Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives, Global Justice Ecology Project, Indigenous Climate Action, Indigenous Environmental Network, Just Transition Alliance, La Via Campesina, Michigan Environmental Justice Coalition Movement Generation, Mutual Aid Disaster Relief, North American Megadam Resistance Alliance, Nuclear Information and Resource Service, Rising Tide North America, and Shaping Change Collaborative. https://ggjalliance​.org​/resources​/hoodwinked​ -in​-the​-hothouse/. Delgado, H. L. (2022). Afterword. In G. W. Muschert, K. Budd, H. Dillaway, D. Lane, M. Nair, & J. Smith (Eds.), Agenda for social justice 2 (pp. 138–141). Polity Press. Friedman, T. L. (2005). The world is flat: A brief history of the twenty-first century. Farrar, Straus, and Giroux. Gellert, P. K. (2010). Extractive regimes: Toward a better understanding of Indonesian development. Rural Sociology, 75(1), 28–57. Gellert, P. K. (2019). Neoliberalism and altered state developmentalism in the twenty-first century extractive regime of Indonesia. Globalizations, 16(6), 894–918. http://doi​.org​/10​.1080​/14747731​.2018​ .1560189 Gray, K., & Gills, B. K. (2016). South–South cooperation and the rise of the Global South. Third World Quarterly, 37(4), 557–574. http://doi​.org​/10​.1080​/01436597​.2015​.1128817 Harvey, D. (2005). A brief history of neoliberalism. Oxford University Press. Horner, R., & Nadvi, K. (2018). Global value chains and the rise of the Global South: Unpacking twentyfirst century polycentric trade. Global Networks, 18(2), 207–237. http://doi​.org​/10​.1111​/glob​.12180 Kaps, K., & Komlosy, A. (2013). Centers and peripheries revisited: Polycentric connections or entangled hierarchies? Review (Fernand Braudel Center), 36(3–4), 237–264. Lozano, A. A. (2018). Reframing the public sociology debate: Towards collaborative and decolonial praxis. Current Sociology, 66(1), 92–109. https://doi​.org​/10​.1177​/0011392117715897 Mahadeo, R. (2024). A call for counter-public sociology. Critical Sociology, 50(3), 391–411. https://doi​ .org​/10​.1177​/08969205231195105 McKay, B. M., Hall, R., & Liu, J. (2016). The rise of BRICS: Implications for global agrarian transformation. Third World Thematics: A TWQ Journal, 1(5), 581–591. http://doi​.org​/10​.1080​/2380 2014​.2016​.1362323 Prasad, M. (2021). Problem-solving sociology: A guide for students. Oxford University Press. Prashad, V. (2007). The darker nations: A people's history of the Third World. The New Press. Rist, G. (1997). The history of development: From western origins to global faith. Zed Books. Scott Frey, R., Gellert, P. K., & Dahms, H. F. (Eds.). (2019). Ecologically unequal exchange: Environmental injustice in comparative and historical perspective. Palgrave Macmillan. Wallerstein, I. (1979). Semiperipheral countries and the contemporary world crisis. In I. Wallerstein (Ed.), The capitalist world-economy: Essays (pp. 95–118). Cambridge University Press.

528  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Worth, O. (2009). Whatever happened to the semi-periphery? In O. Worth & P. Moore (Eds.), Globalization and the ‘new’ semi-peripheries (pp. 9–24). Palgrave Macmillan. Zinn, H. (2005, April 27). Howard Zinn: “To be neutral, to be passive in a situation is to collaborate with whatever is going on.” Democracy Now! https://www​.democracynow​.org​/2005​/4​/27​/ howard​ _zinn​_to​_be​_neutral​_to

Index

1973 oil crisis 251 1991 Colombian constitution 515 2009 Bolivian constitution 517, 519 Abade, D.N. 371 Abongiasede, C. K. 474 abortion rights 516 Abu Dhabi Dialogue 266 Abu-Shanab, E. 321 academic leadership 435 academic research 466 access 47 contemporary dynamics of 47 by locals and outsiders 50 access to health 283 accountability 458, 466 Acemoglu, D. 415 acquaintances 262 activism 393, 395 acts of citizenship 388 Adebayo, A. 471 Adeboyejo, A.T. 471 adequacy 309 Adichie, C.N. 291 #AdidasSteals 363 Adivasi (Indigenous) communities 388–90 Adivasi Mukti Sangathan (AMS) 389–90, 394, 399 Adivasi poverty 389 adoption 293, 295–6, 300 lifting the barriers of 294 adult children 336, 340, 344 affording clothing, impact 258 Africa 217, 219, 223, 233–4, 242, 403, 449 African cinema 288–9, 294, 298 humor in 294–8 roots and ruts of 288–9 African cinemas decolonizing the gaze 287 African diaspora 297 African traditional value systems 297 Afrique Sur Seine 288 Afro-Caribbean women 433 Afro-descendants 188, 272 age-hypergamy tendencies 337 ageing 85, 94–5, 218–21 competing images and processes of 88 in Nigeria 219–20 ageing justice 221

Agenda for Sustainable Development 266 age-sex structure 337 agricultural commodities 235 agricultural development 150 agricultural industrialisation 233 agricultural productivity 233 agroecology 229, 237–43 in South Asia 241 “Ahir” caste 342 Ahlawat, N. 337 air 64 Airhihenbuwa, C.O. 111 Akani, N. 472 Akhter, Taslima 353 Akram-Lodhi, A.H. 236 Alam, M.S. 416 Alburez-Gutierrez, D. 102 Alem, A. 477 Al-Hay, Osama Abd 212 Ali 471 Al-Jamal, N. 321 allegations 436 Altieri, M.A. 234 altruism 447 altruistic movements 21–2 Amin, S. 417 ancestral home 93 Andhra Pradesh Community-Managed Natural Farming (APCNF) 241 Anglo-Maasai treaties 149 Anifalaje, K. 472 Ankit 345 Anner, Mark 355–6, 360 Anthropocene 229, 242 anthropology 4 anti-apartheid movement 17 anti-Black racist misogyny 432 anticare 65 anti-corruption effects 382 anti-corruption initiatives 381 anti-corruption policymaking 381 anti-corruption programme 379 anti-corruption training 378 anti-corruption work 378–9 anti-imperialism 42 apartheid 175–8 Arab Republic of Egypt 212 Arab-speaking countries 425

529

530  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Arat, Z.F. 472 Arendt, H. 450 Argentina 189 Ariana, P. 323 arid and semi-arid lands (ASALs) 145, 156–7 Armiero, M. 60, 69, 76 Arora, P. 501, 509 Arrighi, G. 173, 425 Asia 219, 403, 449 Asia as method 5 Asian Financial Crisis 182, 251 Askew, K.M. 41 Asuwada Theory of Sociation 5 Aufseeser, D. 478 austerity 172, 173, 179, 181, 183–4 apartheid and 175–8 debt crisis and 174–5 hegemony of 173–4 Australia 3 autoethnographic evocative approach 433–4 autonomous fundamental right 408 Awna 24, 29–31 ayah-centred approach (ACC) 96 ayahs 82–4, 86–9, 93, 95–6 Azali 294 Baartman, Sarah 289 baht 179 Banco Palmas 453 Bandung Conference 4 Bangladesh 133, 135, 137–42, 248, 250, 252, 257, 264–5, 361 class inequality and labour rights 138 gender injustice 140 history, society, and culture 135–7 labour rights 139–40 poverty and hunger 138 Bangladesh economy 139 Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BGMEA) 354–5 Bangladeshi migrant workers 248–52 COVID-19 impacts on 249 Bangladeshi return migrants 252 Bangladesh Labour Force Survey 139 Bank of Thailand 179 bankruptcy 357 Bantu people 217 Barlet, Olivier 287 Barriteau, E. 433 Barriteau, V.E. 434 Basu, A. 103 Basu, H. 84 Bauhr, M. 373 Bebbington, A. 8 behavioural patterns 88

Beitz, C. 409 Benga, Orta 289 Ben-Hassine, W. 329 bereavement assistance 94 Bhalla, N. 101 Bhil Adivasis 389, 395 Bhil heartland 389 Biekart, K. 462 Bihari ethnic group 340 biogerontology 85 biopolitical governance 85 Bjarnegård, E. 371–4 Black African cinema 289 Black Americans 21 Black American women 432–3 Black and white in color 298 Black bugaboo 289 Black Caribbean women 432 Black communities 292–3 Black France 292 Black panther 290 Black parents 292–3 Black representations 290 Black women leaders 431 Blanchet, T. 337, 340 Bleu, blanc, rouge 299 Bluwstein, J. 46 body diversity 127 Bolivar, Simon 14 Bolivia 199, 517–18, 521 Bolland, O.N. 438 Bomu, L. 472 Bourdillon, M. 478 brand liability 360 brands 357, 359, 361, 363, 365 Braun, V. 87 Brazil 189, 194, 196, 199, 275, 283, 445, 452, 500–1, 507–8 WhatsAppers from 502 Brazilian civil society 507 Brazilian democracy 388 Brazilian unified health system 282 Brewer, B. 425 Brezhnev Doctrine 17 bribes 379, 391 British colonial domesticity 83 British Land Act of 1923 45 Buen vivir 35 buen vivir 450 Bullard, R.D. 108 Butt, N. 108 Cafesalud 407 Campania 69–70 Campeche 506

Index  531 canal irrigation systems 304 capability approach 320, 323 capitalism 4, 6, 42, 230, 235, 243, 417 capitalist development paradigm 525 carbon credits 232 carbon emissions 230 carbon inequality 230 Cardoso, F. 422, 424 care labour 84 care work 85 careworker 82 care workers 95 Caribbean 188, 190–2, 194–7, 199, 403, 431–3, 439 Caribbean feminism 433–4 Caribbean realities 437 Carter Commission 150 Carter Land Commission 151 Carter, William Morris 151–2 cash cropping 162–4, 167–9 uneven 163 Cassano, F. 62 Castano, C. 321 caste 333, 338 caste endogamy 337 casteism 344 Castells, M. 321 Castree, N. 399 Castro Torres, A.F. 102 Causa Justa 517 CDRs 70, 72 center-periphery terminology 419 Chakraborty, S.S. 84 Chakravarty, S.R. 485 Charmaz, K. 47 Charron, N. 373 chat apps 501–2, 503, 507 chat platform 500–3, 506 Chatterjee, P. 390, 396–9 Chaudhry, S. 337, 340 Chavis Jr, B. F. 108 cheap labour 231 child labour 470–1, 477–8, 480 child mortality rates 274 children 338 children’s rights 470, 472, 478, 480 child sex ratio 336 child stunting 283 Chile 183, 189, 426 Chilean constitutional process 519–21 China 3, 425–6 Chirillo, G. 370 Chowdhry, P. 338, 340 cinematic representation 292 Ciotti, M. 395

citizenship 13, 18–21 expanding 18–20 Civic Registration Law amendment 211 civic society organisations 219 civil rights 21 civil society 18, 382, 447 civil society initiatives 446 civil society organisations (CSOs) 368, 464, 479 Civil War 19 The Civil War in France 2, 6 claims 158 Clarke, V. 87 climate change 3, 59, 229, 233, 242, 458 climate crises 238 climate injustice 59, 229 climate justice 59, 229 climate refugees 230 Cline, Elizabeth 355, 358, 362 closed-ended questionnaires 473 closed military zone 30 clothing commodity chain 364 Cobb-Roberts, D. 432–3 cognitive injustice 101 coherence gap 363 Coldham, S. 43 Cold War 15 collective efficacy 105 college-going member’s education, impact 259 Collins, P.H. 433 Colombia 189, 196, 404, 408, 411–12, 521 Colombian Constitutional Court (CCC) 404–12 human dignity and social justice in 405 Colombian social reality 409 colonial dream 148 colonial encounter 147 colonial experience 43 colonial governance 154 colonial hegemony 438 colonialism 4, 35, 236, 415, 512 colonial regime 154 colonial system 15 colonial violence 2 colonized bodies 290 Color Revolutions 17 commodities market 234 Common Pool Resources (CPRs) 157 commons 154–5 communication scholarship 102 community development banks (CDBs) 445–6, 451–5 for social justice 452–4 community philanthropy 466 Comparative Nonprofit Sector Project 448 compensation 49–50, 53 composite coverage index (CCI) 277

532  Handbook of social justice in the Global South concrete material conditions 407 conditional cash transfer programmes (CCTs) 282 conflict 261 with relatives 262 conflicting rationalities 62 conflict mediation 51 Confucianism 333 Connell, R. 62, 367 constitutional change 512–13, 518, 521 in Latin America 513–14 constitutional principle 408 contemplating justice 5–6 contribution to community, impact 263 cooperative institutional frameworks 240 Copp, G. 94 Cornacchione, J. 104 Cornwall, A. 462 Corporate food regime (CFR) 240 corporate food regime (CFR) 233 Corporate social responsibility (CSR) 484 corporate social responsibility (CSR) 53, 351, 364 corporeal marginality 89 corruption 367–70, 372–9, 381–2 as pervasive and systemic 375 defining and measuring 375 documenting 375 perceptions of 373 reporting and adjudicating 377 corruption opportunity gap 371–2 corruption scholarship 381 counterclaims 158 counter-public sociology 526 courts 514, 516 COVID-19 pandemic 58–9, 65, 69, 72, 75, 87, 112, 191, 195, 198, 218, 248, 251, 265, 273, 350, 352–3, 363, 365, 520 crisis and response 351 critical-cultural scholarship 112 critical environmental justice studies (CEJ) 62–3 critical health communication 106–7, 111 research 110–12 Critical Race Feminism (CRF) 433–4 critical race theory (CRT) 121 Crony Capitalism 485 cross-regional families 342 cross-region marriages 337, 340, 342 Crown Lands Ordinance Act (CLO) of 1902 149 Cuba 241 cultural assimilation 519 cultural beliefs 140 cultural knowledge systems 111 cultural landscape 93 cultural sensitivity 105 culture 105

culture-centered approach 105–7, 111 Dahl, R.A. 459 daily activity 25, 28 daily occupations 25 Dairy Information System KIOSK (DISK) 328 Dale, J.G. 459 Dalgaard, T. 238 D’Ambrosio, C. 485 data analysis 368 data collection methods 118 data disaggregation 274–9 data sources 487 Dave, N. 393 David, M. 474 Davin, D. 339 Deb, N. 312 Debré, Michel 295 debt crisis 174–5 “debt-crisis riots” 21 debt-financed migration 265 decision-making 437, 461 decision-making institutions 147 Declaration of Alma-Ata 282 decolonial ethnography 26 decolonization 15–16, 205 Decolonizing methodologies 292 decriminalisation 517 defamation 435 deliberate democracy 240 dementia 222, 225 democracy 8, 14 democratic accountability 459 democratisation 68, 519 Demographic Health Survey (DHS) 280 denigration 439 denizens 13 Denzin, N.K. 342 dependency 416 dependency theory 415, 417, 426 bifurcation of 420 challenges of 423 core of 418–20 and emerging countries 425–6 and local dynamics 424–5 Marxist branch 421–2 reformist branch 422–3 dependentistas 427 depoliticization 8 de Sousa Santos, B. 101 development 416–17 Development and freedom 7 Diawara, M. 288 digital activism 509 digital capital-based approach 508

Index  533 digital divide 321, 323, 325 understanding 321 digital ethnography 505 Digital India program 327 digital injustices 320 digital literacy 508 digital migration 506 digital social injustices 326 dignitarian constitutionalism 404, 411 Dillard, C.B. 433 disability 218, 220–1, 224 disability justice 218, 221, 223–4 for older disabled people 223 disabled people 220–1 disaster-affected households 264 discrimination 140, 142, 217, 338, 369, 376, 486 disrupted self 92–4 dissemination 435 diversity, equality, equity, and inclusion (DEI) 143 divine worship 83 Dollar, D. 370 domestic surplus 233 Dos Santos, T. 421, 423, 425, 427 doubt 435 Doysoung Village 165, 168–9 drought 153, 156, 158 Dube, L. 340 Dutta, M.J. 101–6, 111 dysfunctional waste management system 70 Dyson, Tim 136 East Africa 46 East African Royal Commission 152 East Bengal (Emergency) Requisition of Property Act 142 Eastern Europe 21, 68 Eckert, J. 396 ecological crises 234 ecological modernisation theory 231 ecological pillar 451 ecological rationality 231 ecologies of knowledges 28 Economic and philosophical manuscript 6 economic and social right (ESR) 512–14, 516–17 economic crisis 74, 261, 265 economic democracy 446, 449, 451–4 economic development 163, 416 economic growth 512 economic hardship 263–4 economic imbalance 485 economic inequality 189–90, 201 economic inequity 312–15 economic justice 20 economic liberalization 43, 162

economic opportunities 415 economic policy 177 Economic Recovery Strategy 157 economic redistribution 189 economic reintegration 265 economics 7 variations within 7–8 Economic Structural Adjustment Program (ESAP) 176 economic water productivity (EWP) 312 eco-systemic violence 67 ecosystemic violence 75 Edelman, M. 235, 238 e-Dinheiro digital platform 453 educational systems 431 Edwards, S. 417 effective occupation 43 Egypt 204–6 Eisenhardt, K.M. 487 e Latin America 273 elder care 96 elders 90 illness and dependency-based typologies of 91–2 Eliot, Charles 148 Ellis, C. 435 emotions 122 empowerment 8, 133 end-of-life care 94–5 end-to-end encryption 503 Enemy Property Act 142 Enemy Property Act (EPA) 141 Engerman, S. 415 Entertainment-Education (E-E) 104–5 environmental degradation 230, 238, 273, 512 environmental determinism 147 environmental discourse 108–10 environmental injustice 64, 65 environmental injustices 108 environmental justice 63–4, 58–60, 66, 74, 304 epistemological interventions 4 epistemologies 25, 37 epistemology of the South 449, 449–50, 451 equality 134, 140–1 Equal Rights Amendment 22 Equal Rights Trust 376 equity 134, 282 Eremie, M. 474 Ershad, H. M. 137 Esarey, J. 370 Esnard, T. 432–3 ethnicity 283 ethnocentrism 338 ethnography 121 ethnoracism 340

534  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Eurocentrism 4 European colonialism 6 Evangelical Social Action Forum (ESAF) Small Finance Bank 489, 496–7 Evans, P. 420, 423 Everyday Forms of Resistance 33–5, 29–31, 37 as ontological and epistemological stance 33–4 everyday tyranny of state 390–3 evocative autoethnography 434, 437 exchange marriage 337 exclusion 47, 217 contemporary dynamics of 47 exodus 501, 503–4, 504, 506, 508 expenditure, impact 258 extended parallel process model (EPPM) 104 extractive zones 103 Faguer-Redig, T. 288 fairer sex 369, 370 fair governance 370 Faletto, E. 422 false representation 435 family and religious ceremonies, impact 259 Family Law Bill amendment 211 Fanon, F. 6 Fashioning Accountability and Building Real Institutional Change (FABRIC) Act 362, 364 Fatwas 204–5, 207, 208–9, 214 in national policy 209 Fearing the Black body: The racial origins of fat phobia 289 Fe, C. 371 Fein, Sinn 14 Felipe, J. 188 feminist economics 450 feminist movement 517 feminist social movements 195 Ferreira, L.Z. 277 Fightback 327 Fiji 118, 121 Fijian God of Soccer 122–4 Fijians 118 finance capital 182 finance migration costs 261 financial crises 179–82 financial inclusion 496 financial inclusion gap 489 financialisation 232 financialization 173 financial liberalization 179 financial poverty 404 financial services 234 financing migration 264

Fischer, A. 425 Fischer, B. 388 Fisman, R. 370 food 64 food consumption, impact 258 food insecurity 238 food sovereignty 235 food waste 229 foreign capital investment 179 Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) 163, 234 foreign investment 234 formal democracy 388 foundational pillars 338 Foundation for Rural Entrepreneurship Development (FREND) 326 Fowler, A. 462 França Filho, G.C. 452 France 300 Francophone cinema 289, 294–5 Francophone filmscape 300 Francophone screenscape 289 Black representations on 289 Frank, A.G. 417, 420–1, 424 Fraser, N. 451 freedom of expression 193–4 French imaginaries 293 frontline states 178–82 funding 464 Furtado, C. 422, 425 Galeano, E. 2 Gallup 201 Gallup World Poll 200 GAMAM (Google, Amazon, Meta, Apple, Microsoft) power 507, 509 Garment Worker Protection Act 361–2, 364 “Gas War” 518 Gatica-Domínguez 277 Gatti, R. 370 Gaza Strip 27 gaze 288, 300 gender 128, 368–70, 126–7, 372, 374–9, 381, 439 gender-based violence 350 gender digital divide (GDD) 320–1 analyzing initiatives to bridge, India 326–9 capability theory and critique of 323–4 in India 325 and women 321 gendered colorisms 340 gendered norms 371 gender equality 189, 195–6, 217, 241, 320, 370 gender gap 140, 321 Gender Gap Index 140 gender identities 118, 121 gender identity disorder (GID) 205, 208, 210

Index  535 gender inequality 190 gender inequity 329 gender injustice 140 gender justice 320 gender mainstreaming 378 gender norms 374 gender parity 140 General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) 235 generational ageing 89 German Crown Land Ordinance of 1900 45 The German ideology 6 German, L. 52 gerontological traditions 85 Gini coefficient 309, 312, 404 Gini index 138, 415 Gliessman 238 global agriculture 231, 243 global aid infrastructure 462 global capitalism 380, 403, 419 global commodity chains 364 Global Corruption Barometer 377 global fashion industry 350–1 global financial crisis 61 Global Gender Gap Index 140 global governance 458, 459–62 global injustice 231 globalisation 231–3, 403 globality 143 globalization 173 global justice 524 global knowledge 10 global land grab 3 global neoliberal paradigm 5 Global North 3, 18, 24, 35–6, 60–2, 69, 74, 102, 110, 172, 222, 231, 300, 367–8, 403, 445, 449, 451, 463–5, 467, 501, 507–9, 525 global political economy 423 Global School-based Student Health Survey (GSHS) 276 Global South 2–3, 8, 10, 13, 15–16, 18–19, 22, 24–6, 28, 33–7, 41, 58–61, 63, 74, 76, 82, 90, 95–6, 101, 103–6, 108, 110, 112, 133, 142, 172, 174, 183, 205, 219–20, 230–1, 233, 243, 300, 324, 333, 367–8, 371–3, 375, 378–9, 381, 388, 399–400, 403–4, 412, 431, 437, 439, 445–6, 449, 451, 454, 458, 462, 500–1–7, 501–2, 506–9, 521, 524–5 as resistance 4 health (in)justice in 108–10 and knowledge production 4–5 masculinities and critical race 121 socio-ecological and epistemological injustice in 60 in world order 3–4

Godbout, J. 448 The gods must be crazy 294 Goel, R.K. 372 Goetz, A.M. 372 Golo, H.K. 470 Gordon, A,. 66 Gould, D. 396 government intervention 167 Graebner, .M.E. 487 Graebner, M.E. 487 Gramsci, A. 174, 397 grassroots advocacy association 73 Grazing Schemes 151–3 Greece 183 green capitalism 232 green consumerism 232 Green, L. 392 Green New Deal 6 green revolution 233–4 Gregory, S.T. 432 grey literature 375–6, 379, 379–80, 381 Grosfogul, Ramón 34 Group Ranches (GR) 153, 155–6 Grover, S. 84 Growth, Employment and Redistribution strategy (GEAR) 177–8 Guajardo Córdoba, A. 35 guerilla movements 175 Guerra, A. 373 guerrilla warfare 14 Habermas, J. 450 Haenssgen, M.J. 323 HAHYE 300 Haitians 13 Halifax, J. 292 Hardin, G. 151–2, 155 Harding 86 Harrison, A.N. 474 Haryana 336–42 Hasina, Sheikh 137 hawkers 478, 480 hawking 471, 474–7, 480 Hawthorn, J. 287 healing labour 83, 91, 93 health belief model (HBM) 104 healthcare, impact 258 healthcare system 82 healthcare workers 84 health communication 103, 104, 110 approaches in 103 health discourses 101 health equity 273 Health Equity Assessment Monitor Toolkit (HEAT) 280

536  Handbook of social justice in the Global South The health gap: The challenge of an unequal world 272 health inequalities 273–4, 283 in Latin America 513–14 monitoring 279 health interventions 101 health justice 102, 112 health policies 282 health promotion campaigns 104 health research 272 health service coverage 282 healthy ageing 82 hegemonic bodies 125–6 hegemonic masculinity scale 119–20 hegemonic policy 172–4, 183 hegemonic strategy 173 HEHYE 293–4 heightened tension 261 Heller, P. 388 hermaphrodites 207–8 Hernandez, L.H. 107 Herskovits, M.J. 145, 149, 151, 154 heterosexual marriage 337 Hickel, J. 462–3 higher education 431, 437, 440 introspection and reflection 435 marginality and (in)justice within 432–3 high-risk activism 393 Hodgson, J. 466 Holgado, D. 474 home care work 84 home-site micro-ethnography 86 homosocial capital 372 Honakeri, P. 321 honor killing 337 Hossain, Begum Rokeya Sakhawat 6 household members 261 Hughey, M.W. 288 human dignity 403–12 human rights 478 human suffering 85 humor 294 hunger 137 Huq, Rubana 354–5 hypergamy 337 IAMAI-KPMG Report 325 Ibrahim, A. 477 The idea of justice 7 Igbo 217–18, 221 immigrants 298–9 immigration 298 imperialism 236, 416–17 inclusion 439, 489 inclusive policymaking 133

income, impact 257 income inequality 138 indebtedness 175 India 3, 320–2 Indigenous entrepreneurship 416 Indigenous knowledge 9 Indigenous movement 515 Indigenous peoples 198, 518 environment and 198–9 Indigenous resource governance systems 147 individual behavior change 104 Indo-Fijians 118 history and positionality of 119 Indonesia 182–3 Indus Basin Irrigation System (IBIS) 303, 305 industrial agriculture 233, 235 industrial capitalism 235–6 Industrial Revolution 238, 417 inequality 273–4, 278, 404, 415, 512 inequity 273 information and communications technology (ICT) 320, 322 informed consent 505 injustices 36 institutional frameworks 373–4 institutional gender violence 65–6 institutionalisation 515 insurgent citizenship 390, 396 politics of 396–9 interconnectedness 3 intercultural translation 449 intergovernmental organisations 458, 467 international finance capital 233 international finance corporations 234 international financial institutions (IFIs) 174, 177, 184 International Labour Organization (ILO) 470, 472 International Monetary Fund (IMF) 174, 179, 181, 183, 467 international nongovernmental organisations (INGOs) 458, 462, 464–7 international organisations 458–9, 466 international political economy 424 international solidarity 29 Internet Saathi 326 internet slander 436 inter-subjectivity 450 intimidation 436 inverse equity hypothesis 280 involuntary return migrant 249, 253, 263 involuntary return of migrants 257 Iran 58, 64–7, 74, 205 Iranian prison 63

Index  537 state violence and environmental injustice in 64 Iran Wire 66 irrigation management 304 Islamic jurisprudence 204 Islamic Republic 15 Islamic Republic of Iran 209 Islamic Revolution 209 Islamophobic domestic policies 109 Island Popular Struggle Committee 506 Israeli settler-colonialism 24 Italian jail 67 Italian prison system 67–8 Italy 58, 74 Ita, P.M. 474 iTaukeis 119, 121 Jackson, J.T. 231 Jahan, R. 138 Japan 425 Jasper, J.M. 395 “Jat” community 342 Jean-Baptiste, L. 287 Jeopardy Index 278 Jewish supremacy 27 Jim Crow laws 19 job loss 251–3, 263–5 job skills programmes 134 John, P. 488 Johnson, Alexis 136 Johnson, D. 424 Johnson, S. 415 Jones, C.L. 104 junior-senior relations 89 justice system 192 social perception of 192–3 Kaur, R. 337, 340 Kay, A. 488 Kenya 146–7, 154 Kenya Land Commission 150–1 Kenya-Uganda Railway 148 Kerala Flood of 2018 485–6 Khair, S. 470 Khandan, Reza 66 Kharif season of 2022 303 Khedut Mazdoor Chetna Sangath (KMCS) 389–90, 394–5, 399 Kiria 53 Kirya 47, 51 Kissinger, Henry 136 knowledge 34 knowledge production 464 Krause, M. 101 Krishna, Roy 121–2, 119–20, 127

Kropotkin, Peter 36 Kuan-Hsing, Chen 5 Kubbe, I. 371 Kukreja, R. 337, 341 Kumar, A. 359 Kumar, P. 337, 341 Kummitha, R.K.R. 484 labour market 248 Laclau, E. 421 Laikipia County 146–7, 158 contemporary relations in 158 Lama, Ibrahim 288 Lamani, P. 321 Lamb, S. 89 Lancet 27 land acquisition 47–9 Land Act 1999 43, 45, 48 land consolidation 41, 44 land grab 43, 46 dissecting 48–9 land policy 50, 53 land reform 44, 46, 233 land tenure 41, 43–7, 50, 52, 54, 146, 151–3, 155, 158 policies 43–6 Land Use Planning Act 50 land-use systems 147 Laos 162–5 La pirogue 298 large agribusinesses 235 large-scale exploitation 416 Larsen, M. 337 latifundium 421 Latin America 14, 16, 21, 105, 188–97, 199–200, 233–4, 276–7, 282, 403–4, 415–18, 420–1, 425–6, 512, 514, 521 constitutional change in 513 immigration within 197 political aspect, constitutional change 515 Latin American neo-constitutionalism 513 La Via Campesina 243 leadership 438 legal gender recognition (LGR) 204, 213 Legal Medicine Organization (LMO) 210 legitimate violence 450 leisure economy 501 Lewis, I. 104 LGBTQ+ movement 196 liberal democracy 370 liberalization 40, 417 Lindeberg, H. 373 Lindsay, L. 438 Lionnet, F. 301 “living-dying” existence 94

538  Handbook of social justice in the Global South living well 35–6 loan disbursement 265 local communities 133 long-term invisible violence 312 low sex-ratio 333, 336, 340 low-skilled migrant workers 251 Lynch, K. 85 Maasai 149–53, 155, 157–8 Maasailand 147, 154 Maasai pastoral commons 147 Maasai Treaty 158 Mabanckou, A. 299 Madhok, S. 393 Madison, James 16 madrasah, impact 259 Magdelaine-Andrianjafitrimo, V. 295 Maghreb 68 Mahadeo, R. 526 Mahendragarh 341–2 Mahler, A.G. 102 Majburi 338 male marriage squeeze 337 Manji, A.S. 46 marginalised minority communities 141–2 market capitalism 235 market colonization 6 market economy 150, 164 marketization 163–4 market liberalization 162–3 Marmot, Michael 272 “marriage squeeze” phenomenon 337 Martinez, J.L. 321 Martín, J. 321 Marxist determinism 417 Marx, K. 6–7, 142, 418 masculinities 121–2, 124, 127, 127–9, 129 MAS (Movement to Socialism) 518 material deprivation 389 Mathias, B.A. 474 Matsuda, Y. 424 MAXQDA software 487, 489 McAdam, D. 393 medical (anti)care 65–6 Medical Association of Iran (MAI) 209 medical policy 210 Medical Syndicate 206 Mediterranean economy 28 Mehrab Chandio 303 Meta 508 metabolic rift 230 Meta-owned WhatsApp 507 Mexico 182–3, 194, 277 permanent austerity in 182 Michelot, P. 291

microfinance 453 Middle Income Trap 188 Mielke, G. I. 278 migration 107–10, 135 military occupation 24 Miller, K. 371 Mingolo, D.W. 34 Mishra, P. 337, 340 mobility 145, 152, 156 modern French family 293 modernization theory 417, 419, 426 Mohammadi, Narges 64 Monetarism 421 monetarism 427 Monroe Doctrine 16 Moore, B. 142, 395 moral courage 395 Morales, Evo 518–19 moral integrity 407 morality police 67 mortgaged agricultural land 261 mortgaging land 261 Motallebzadeh, Alieh 64 Mouffe, C. 8 Moyn, S. 404 Mugabe, Robert 175 Mukherjee, P. 111 Mukherjee, S. 340–1 multi-epistemological analysis 62 Multiple Indicator Cluster Surveys (MICS) 280 multi-stakeholder initiatives (MSIs) 459, 461–2 Muna, W. 371 mutual aid 36–7 Mwanga District 50–1 Mwangi, E. 154 Mwangi, J. 371 Mwinyi, Ali Hassan 43 Myridis, N.E. 324 Naituli, G. 371 Nakba 27, 29 National Action Plan 472 national governments 191 National Parks Ordinance 150 national reintegration strategy 265 Native Americans 18, 20 Nchor, E.E. 474 Negretto, G.L. 515 Nelson, M.A. 372 neocolonialism 4 neoliberal globalisation 232 neoliberalism 8, 172–4, 184, 230, 231–3 neoliberal policies 512 network-market 447 Newell, Sarah 357

Index  539 Nigeria 218–24, 472, 476, 478, 480 Nkrumah, Kwame 4 Noble, D. 438 Noire n’est pas mon métier 291 nomadic pastoralism 156 non-communicable diseases (NCDs) 93 nonhuman species 66 non-patrimonial goods, intangibility 407 non-profit Sector 446 non-trading activities 488 Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) 306, 309 normative functionality 406, 408, 410 norm effects 371–2 North, D. 415 Nova Scotia 108 Nukul Commission Report of 1998 179 Nussbaum, M. 320, 323–4, 327, 329 Nwabueze, R.O. 479 Nyerere, J.K. 41 occupation 25 occupational deprivation 25 occupational injustice 25 occupational justice 24–6, 28, 35 occupation, defined 38 Oceania 403 Odey, M.O. 474 Ogunkan, D.V. 471 Okpechi, P.A. 474, 477 Olaogun, J.A. 471 old-age framing 88 older disabled people 223 older disabled population 220 older people 221, 225 older people, caregiving 95 olive growing 30, 33–4, 28 Oloko, B.A. 478 Omokhodion, F.O. 472 Oni, A. 474 ontology 33 Open veins of Latin America 2 opportunity gap 371 oppositional local rationalities 393–6 oppressed ethnicities 124–5 oppressed masculinities 124–5 oppression 217 organic farming 239 Ortrun, M. 371 Oslo accords 29 Ostrom, E. 240 “othered” adult children 343 otherness 344 ousehold expenses 260 Oxfam report 485

paid care 83 paid caregiver 96 paid care workers 86 paid female care workers 83 Pakistan 141 Palestine 24, 26, 28 Geopolitical context 27 Pal, M. 103 Paraguay 280 participatory democracy 449, 502 participatory irrigation management (PIM) 303–4, 306, 317 partnerships 464 pastoral areas 154 pastoral dispossession 149 pastoralism 145–6, 149, 154, 157 in 2010 Constitution 157–8 in post-colonial Kenya 154 pastoral landholdings 145 pastoral lands 158 pastoral productivity 145 pastoral societies 154 patient-centred care (PCC) 85 “patient-er duty” 92 Patnaik, U. 236 patriarchal power structures 372–3 patriarchy 380 patrilineality 333 patrilocality 333, 336 #PayUp campaign 350–1, 354, 356–8, 360–2, 364–5 #PayUp movement 355 #PayUp petition 357 #PayYourWorkers campaign 358, 362–3 peasant economies 235 peasant economy versus industrial capitalism 235–7 peasant pedagogy 239 Pellow, D.N. 73 Perfecto, I. 236 peripheral capitalism 419 permanent austerity 182 personhood, changing 92–4 Peru 199, 283 petty bribes 376 physical abuse 339 Pink Tide 188 The Platform 315 Playtime 294 pluriversality 34–5 Polanyi, K. 6, 450 policy interventions 9, 154 political accountability 317 political agroecology 239, 242 political cleaners 380

540  Handbook of social justice in the Global South political community 388 political-economic history 6–7 political economy 8 of globalisation and neoliberalism 231–3 political elites 20 political ideology 40 political injustices 30 political representation 140 political stability 182 political victimization 315 political violence 516 polycentrism 525 popular sovereignty 13–16, 18 positivism 85 post-independence restructuring 43 postwar decolonization 15 Potato potahto 294 poverty 8, 133, 137, 182, 218, 249, 272, 282, 404, 415, 475, 486–7, 496 poverty of rights 388 poverty reduction 53 power 458–9 pathways of 464 power asymmetry 373 power exchanges 230 power imbalances 462–4 Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana programme 327 Prasad, M. 524 prayer meetings 159 Prebisch, R. 416, 418–19, 423 pre-colonial practices 43 pre-colonial tenure 147 Pre-Conception and Pre-Natal Diagnostic Techniques (Prohibition of Sex Selection) Act, 1994 (PCPNDT Act) 336 pre-liberation Rhodesian state 175 Pretty, J. 241 price drops 165 prison 58–60, 74 prison environmental justice (PEJ) 58–9 prison medical ethnography 76 private land tenureship 153 private sector 488 private tutors 264 problem-solving approach 524 progressive constitutionalism 515–17 progressive Latin American constitutionalism 516 property loss 49–50 property rights 134, 153–4 psychiatric therapy 76 psychological hermaphroditism 206 psychotherapy process 210

Public Administration Performance Index (PAPI) 377 public social services 519 public sociology 524 Punjab irrigation network 306 purchasing practices 351 purposive sampling 473 Qarchak 64–6 qualitative case studies 315 qualitative in-depth interviews 86 race 118, 120–1, 126, 128, 437, 439 race-related scholarship 436 racial dynamics 293 radical environmentalism 502 radical neo-constitutionalism 514–15, 517 Rahet El bal 28 Rahman, M.M. 111 Rambaldi, Julien 287–8, 298 Rao, C.R. 478 Rawls, John 8, 35 Ray, P. 84 ready-made garments (RMG) worldwide 355 recognition 8 Reconstruction and Development Program (RDP) 177 recreational activities, impact 260 Redclift, M. 61 reform context 305 refugeeization 109 regime effects 370 relationship-centred care 85 relationships 458, 464 release the mortgaged land, inability 261 remittances 249–50, 261, 264 repay borrowings, inability 260 repay loans, inability 260 Reporters Without Borders (RSF) 64 repression 66 republics 13–21 democratizing 16–18 rise of 13–16 research ethics 505 research methodology 341 research questions 486 resistance 92–4 resistant epistemologies 62 Resnicow, K. 105 resource allocation 134 responsibility 351, 357, 360, 376 “restrictionist” social movements 21 reticence 395 return migrants 253–4, 256–7, 260, 263–6 revolutionary Swynnerton report 152

Index  541 right to education 474 right to health 273 right-wing populism 8 Rigo, A.S. 445, 452–3 Rios Quituizaca, P. 277 Rivas, A.M. 462 Robinson, J. 415 Rock, Chris 290–1 Rodney, W. 416–17 Rogers, E. 105 Roselmack, Harry 291 Rosset, P. 241 Rostow, W. W. 145, 417 Rousseff, Dilma 500 Rufiji 47–8 Rufiji’s large-scale land acquisitions 48–9 rugby 118–19, 121 rural Indian cross-regional families 338 Ryder, A. 86 Salazar, Antonio de Oliveira 14 Samara, T.R. 459 sanitation 283 San Martin, Jose de 14 Santa Maria Capua Vetere (SMCV) jail 75–6, 69–74 San Tammaro landfills 70 Santos, B.S. 25, 28, 35 Sassen, S. 52, 459 Sastry, S. 111 #SaveWhatsApp 504 savings dependency 260 Sayad, A. 301 Scheduled Tribes 389 scholarly literature 379–80, 381 school, impact 259 Scott, J.C. 33 search parameters 368 second sex 329 selective state absence 167–8 selective state intervention 165 self-determination 13–14, 16–17, 20, 29, 37, 136, 141, 419, 517 self-employment 265 self-esteem 478 selfhood 88 self-identification 517 self-reliance 42 self-representation 438 Sembène, Ousmane 294 Semwaza, F. 46 Sen, A. 7–8, 323 sense-making process 440 sense of fear 435 Sessional Paper No. 10 156

settler-colonialism 28 Severance Guarantee Fund (SGF) 362 severe personality disorder 213 Sewell, W. 394 sex change 205 sex change operations 204, 208–10, 212 “sex change” permit 210 sex correction 212 sex-determination 336 sex-disaggregated data 382 sex-reassignment surgery 208 sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV) 378 sexual bribe 373 sexual corruption 371, 373–6, 378–80 sexual harassment 374 sexual transactions 374 Shadare, G.A. 472 sharīʿa law 208 Sharia 204, 211, 213 shepherding 33–4, 28 Shia 204–5 Shia jurisprudence 207–8, 209 Shih, S. 301 Shivji, I.G. 45, 52 shongo deowa 93 short-term migrants 249 Silver, B. 425 Sinatra Doctrine 17 Singapore 425 Singhal, A. 105 Sinha, N. 486 Sinha, S. 322 skepticism 395 skill composition 249 slow violence 312 SMILE (Savitri Marketing Institution for Ladies Empowerment) 328 Smith, L.T. 34–5, 292 Smith, S.W. 104 Smith, T. 424 Sobhan, R. 138 soccer 119, 119–20–20, 122–4 social actors 153 social approval 190 social change 409, 484 social chaos 354 social constitutionalism 513 social contract 521 social currency 452 social determinants 272 social discrimination 134 social economy 448, 484 social economy approach 448–9 social economy frameworks 446 social emancipation 35

542  Handbook of social justice in the Global South social enterprises 484–8 social entrepreneurs 484, 486, 488, 497 social entrepreneurship 484–5, 488, 494 social entrepreneurship orientation 492 social exclusion 484–6 social fabric 68 social hierarchy 415 social identity 340 social inclusion 484–9, 491–2, 494, 496 social inequality 188, 404 social influence 484 social injustice 46, 133, 135, 138, 142, 412, 486 post-reform land-related 46–7 social institutions 134 social integration 447 socialism 42 socialist market economy 164 Social justice 403–4 social justice 2, 5–10, 13, 16, 19–20, 24–6, 28, 35, 40–1, 43, 52, 85, 95–6, 103, 111, 127, 133–4, 172, 188–93, 197, 199–200, 217–18, 221, 231, 273, 282, 288, 338, 344–5, 388, 403–5, 407, 409–12, 415, 445, 449, 452, 454–5, 478–9, 484–7, 491, 496, 513, 518, 521 in early post-colonial Tanzania 41–2 economic struggles for 20 in Global South 127–9 issues 221–3 movements for 21–2 social justice action 431 social media 194, 437 social mobility 435 social movement 13, 512, 521 social organization 337 social perception 192–3 social question 513 social recognition 340 social reforms 520 social responsibilities 354, 478 social rights 405, 410 social science 4, 33, 142 social security 470, 472–3, 478–80 social sensitivity 479 social service 396 social service expenditures 176 social solidarity. 135 social stigma 438 social sustainability 488 social well-being 488 social work 396 societal norms 134, 140 sociocultural realities 320 socio-cultural wound, France 299 healing 299–300

socio-ecological inequalities 62 socio-ecological injustice 60 socio-economic conditions 69 socioeconomic health issues 101 socio-economic impact 249, 256, 263 socio-economic inequalities 60, 514 sociological theories 230 sociology 4 socio-political dynamics 317 socio-political effects 233 socio-political factors 27 socio-political relations 146 soil erosion 238 soil fertility 239 Sokoloff, K. 415 solidarity economy 446, 450–2, 454 solidarity finance 452 sophisticated counterparts 86 Sotoudeh, Nasrin 64 Sousa Santos, B. 446 South Africa 175, 177–8, 183 South America 449–50 Southern cultural communities 112 South Korea 425 South-South migration 109 South-to-North migrations 109 Spade, D. 36 Spain 183 speciality-based medical training 95 spheres of influence 15 Spivak, G. 142 Stallings, B. 426 state actors 513 state-led exploitation 165–7 state violence 58, 64–9, 69, 74 Steiner, A. 484 Stensöta, H. 372–3 Sterchele, L. 68, 76 stereotypes 140, 210, 292, 340 Stern, S. 422 Stewart, Olivia Windham 359 Stewart, Windham 363 stigmatisation 439 STIR 70 storytelling 293 strategic universalism 142 Strings, S. 289 structural inequalities 525 structural injustices 27 subaltern theory 106 subordinate masculinities 125–6 substantive democracy 388, 450 substantive economy 450 Suharto regime 181 Sultana’s dream 6

Index  543 Sumud 24, 30–1 Sundstrom, B. 104 Sung, H.E. 370 Sunkel, O. 423–4 Sunni 205 Sunni jurisprudence 205–7, 209 supermarketization 236 supply chain 352 sustainability 351 sustainable agriculture 234, 237–8 challenges to 237 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) 274 sustainable farming practices 243 sustainable farming systems 237 sustainable reintegration 266 Sutra 24, 29, 31–2 Sutra-‘Awna-Sumud 33, 37 Swamy, A. 370 Swedish Ethanol Chemistry AB (SEKAB) 49 Switzerland 14 Swynnerton Plan 152–4 Swynnerton, Roger J. M. 152 symbolic interactionism 342 systematic environmental racism 61 systemic prison violence 73 Tail Abadgaar Tanzeem 315 Taiwan 425 Tanzania 40–1, 43, 46, 48, 50–3 Tanzania Investment Centre (TIC) 44 Tata Trust 326 Tati, J. 294 Tatyana, Z. 373 Teasdale, S. 484 Tehran Psychiatric Institute (TPI) 210 Tele-Tech India 328 tenure insecurity 49–50 tenure regimes 147 tenure rights 159 tenure security 52 Thai currency 181 Thai economy 180 Thailand 166, 183, 372 Tham Pha Village 167–9 theory of planned behavior (TPB) 104 On the political 8 There’s Something in the Water 108 third digital divide 501 third-sector approach 446 Third Wave of democracy 512 Third World 421, 525 third World 3 Thomas, R. 415 Thomson, Joseph 148 threats 436

three-fold legacy 43 Toledo, M.V. 234 torture chamber 64 toxic leadership 435 transformative social justice 493–4 transgender identity 205, 211 transgenderism 204–5, 207, 209, 213–14 transgender people 209–11, 213–14 transgender policy 204 transgender women 211 transnational entities 231 transnational solidarity 133 transracial adoption 293 transsexuality 210 transsexuals 208 transtheoretical model (TTM) 104 treadmill theory of destruction 230 triangulation 487 tutela 516 Tutu, D. 224, 301 two-sexes system 204 “Typhoid Mary” Mallon 20 Ubajaka, C. 472, 477 Ubuntu 217, 224 Uchendu, O. 472 Uddin, Mustafiz 352–3 Ujamaa 40, 42 Ukadike, Frank 289 UK-based Clean Clothes Campaign 362 Ume, C.O. 242 UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) 470 underdevelopment 416–17 unemployment 249, 264, 486 unification 62 “#United Against the Coup” 505–6 United Nations Population Fund 283 United States 425 University of Kentucky 292 unoccupied lands 149 UN World Social Report 485 Upton, S. D. L. S. 107 Uralulangal Labour Co-operative Society 493 Uralungal Labour Contract Co-operative Society (ULCCS) 493–6, 497 urban India 83 urban industrialisation 235 Uruguay 282 Van der Ploeg, J.D. 236, 242 “Vayo Jyoti” programme 492 Veblen effect 230 Venezuela 197 Venezuelan diaspora 197

544  Handbook of social justice in the Global South Venezuelan immigrants 197 Venezuelan migrant 197 Vested Property Act 142 victimless crime 367 Vietnam 164 Village Land Act 1999 43, 45–6, 48 villagization 42–3 Villeneuve-Gokalp, C. 292 violence 339 visits with friends, impact 262 visits with neighbours, impact 262 visits with relatives, impact 262 VLUP 51–2 Wabwile, M. 478 Wallerstein, I. 14, 418, 422 Walter, M. 297 Walton, M. 424 Wängnerud, L. 372 warm intimacy 89 water 64, 283 water distributional injustices 309 water governance 303, 317 water governance, politicizing 315 water inequity 312–15 water justice 303–4, 317 through politicizing governance 317 water service privatisation 517 water theft 315 water use efficiency (WUE) 312 Water User Associations (WUA) 317 “Water War” in Cochabamba 517 Watson, B. 104 Watson, H. 437 Watts, M. 236 wealth inequality 139 well-being 58, 91, 323 Western gaze 300 WhatsApp 500, 500–1–2, 504–8

backlash 504 case Studies and methodological reflections 505 exodus 503–4, 505 research ethics 505 updated privacy policy 504 WhatsAppers 502 white gaze 287 White, K.M. 104 white man’s country 148 White Savior Films (WSF) 288 white semiotic constructions 289 White wedding 294 Wolford, W. 235, 238 women 338 women’s vulnerability 369 workers’ economic well-being 139 workshops 121 World Bank 176, 201, 333, 369, 404, 464, 467 World Bank-funded canal lining projects 305 World Health Constitution of 1946 273 World Health Organization (WHO) 82, 214, 220 World Inequality Report 138 World Social Forum 184 World Systems Theory 418 Yancy 289 Yin, R.K. 487 Yorubas 5 Yue-Yuen Holdings 359–60 Yunus, Muhammad 496 Zantoko, Kamini 298 Zapatistas 34, 449 zero-rating fees 502, 507–8 Zhang, N. 104 Zimbabwe 175–6, 178, 183 Zinn, Howard 526 Zionist settler-colonialism 27