Hybrid Open-Access
Refine
Has Fulltext
- no (2)
Document Type
- Article (2)
Language
- English (2)
Is part of the Bibliography
- yes (2)
Keywords
- institutions (2) (remove)
Institute
Gender at the crossroads
(2021)
Since the early 2000s, the United Nations (UN) global counterterrorism architecture has seen significant changes towards increased multilateralism, a focus on prevention, and inter-institutional coordination across the UN’s three pillars of work. Throughout this reform process, gender aspects have increasingly become presented as a “cross-cutting” theme. In this article, I investigate the role of gender in the UN’s counterterrorism reform process at the humanitarian-development-peace nexus, or “triple nexus”, from a feminist institutionalist perspective. I conduct a feminist discourse analysis of the counterterrorism discourses of three UN entities, which represent the different UN pillars of peace and security (DPO), development (UNDP), and humanitarianism and human rights (OHCHR). The article examines the role of gender in the inter-institutional reform process by focusing on the changes, overlaps and differences in the discursive production of gender in the entities’ counterterrorism agendas over time and in two recent UN counterterrorism conferences. I find that gendered dynamics of nested newness and institutional layering have played an essential role both as a justification for the involvement of individual entities in counterterrorism and as a vehicle for inter-institutional cooperation and struggle for discursive power.
How can labour market institutions make workers confident about their economic future? While quantitative studies have repeatedly shown that countries’ labour market regulations and policies are related to variations in workers’ perceived job security, these studies did not explain how these institutions affect workers’ perceptions and expectations. This study seeks to close this gap by analysing qualitative interview data collected on employees in Germany and the U.S. during the great financial crisis (2009–2010). The study's main finding is that policies vary in their effectiveness at making workers feel secure about their jobs. While unemployment assistance can reduce workers’ worries about job loss, dismissal protection does not seem to effectively increase workers’ confidence that their jobs are secure. Overall, employees know relatively little about the policies and regulations that are meant to protect them and have limited trust in their effectiveness. Individual and organisational characteristics seem to be more relevant for employees’ feelings of job security than national-level policies. In particular, comparisons with others who have lower levels of protection increase workers’ perceived security. These insights are particularly important in light of the ongoing changes in the world of work that are making workers’ lives more uncertain and insecure.