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Intersecting Interregionalism moves beyond narrow understandings of regions and interregionalism that dominate the research field by focusing on the polymorphous nature of the concepts under study, theoretical advances and the empirical challenges ahead. Written by leading experts in the field, the ultimate aim of the book is to contribute to a more relevant and nuanced comparative research agenda on interregionalism in Europe and elsewhere. The volume is divided into two parts. The first provides an overview of several distinctive theoretical perspectives, with particular emphasis on the dynamic relationship between regions and interregionalism. The second part of the book uncovers the diversity of regional actors and institutions that are engaged in the creation of contemporary interregionalism. The EU is used as an entry point and detailed case studies explore the role of EU member states, the Council, the Commission, the European Parliament and the Court of Justice, in order to map out a patchwork of intersecting interregionalisms around the world

Hannah Arendt and Simone Weil, who had in common both a Jewish origin and the experience of the exile, were able to cast a light on the darkness of the 20th century with their words and actions. They lived two parallel lives – even though Simone's came to an end when she was 34 years old. The aim of this essay is to retrace their arguments on themes they both dealt with: it is interesting to note how sometimes they complete each other, while other times they provide different perspectives on the challenging tasks that the events in Europe gave to political thought in the 20th century. This essay specifically deals with similarities and differences in their ways of conceiving labour, with a particular emphasis on the labouring class – the "homo laborans", in Arendt's words – and their theories on industrial work. To conclude, I will put forward some reflections on Arendt and Weil's relationship with the Marxist tradition, in an attempt to consider their criticism and their disagreements with Karl Marx's theories.

The idea of border as 'line' has attracted a lot of critical attention in borders studies in recent years. Yet the idea of borders as lines still carries considerable power, both conceptually and politically. This chapter takes the persistence of the idea of line in contemporary border politics seriously, while also offering a couple of new ways to think about border dynamics, as 'line' suggests something static. The concept of 'tidemarks' as a way to think about border dynamics was developed in 2009 by the author at the first meeting of the EastBordNet research network (funded by COST as IS0803). That network, which was focusing on the eastern peripheries of Europe and aimed at developing a fresh way to conceptualise border dynamics there, carried on discussing the idea until 2013, when the network's funding ended. Sarah Green carried on thinking about the problem of how to conceptualise 'border' for several years thereafter. This chapter is the outcome of those 8 years of research and thinking, and summarises the idea. ; Peer reviewed

Traces the anthropological premises of Hannah Arendt's conception of totalitarianism in order to elucidate & reconstruct key arguments in her book, Origins of Totalitarianism (1958). Emphasis is on the implications of significant connections, such as that between action & the political elements of freedom, revolution, & power. It is contended that Arendt's model of politics is especially relevant today when the demise of communist regimes in Eastern Europe has prompted the need to re-think political action. An exploration of her notion of "destructive dynamics" argues that her assumption that totalitarianism methodically destroys the basic anthropological features of human existence implies that all totalitarian regimes contain "seeds of their own destruction" & therefore cannot last. The analysis focuses on Arendt's three main themes: (1) a theory of activity oriented in existential philosophy & centered on labor, work, & action; (2) distinctions between power & force in her normative theory of politics; & (3) the seeming contradiction between her theory of totalitarianism & theory of politics. J. Lindroth

In Part One, I give some background of the situation of refugees coming to Europe, especially to Greece. I give a brief outline of the EU policy of Fortress Europe and externalisation of borders. The contribution of Ireland is also discussed. In Part Two, I discuss the challenges and joys of my work in the small refugee camp Pikpa on Lesbos, run by Lesvos Solidarity where I worked for four months in 2017/2018. Other projects, such as the Mosaik Centre are also described. In view of the overall refugee population in the world of 68 million, my contribution seems just a drop in the ocean. The independent camp where I worked has around 120 residents while elsewhere on the island in the notorious "hot spot" camp Moria, 8,000 refugees are confined in a cramped space. Greece has to manage about 60,000 refugees. Still Europe's numbers of refugees with about 0.5 % of the total population of 508 million taken in are small compared to refugees fleeing to countries neighbouring conflict and war zones.

The paper analyses the 'Europeanization' of policies concerning the reconciliation of work and family life in Hungary between 1998 and 2005. It looks at how politicians – in government or in the opposition – framed European requirements and/or standards and how they used references to European processes in their arguments. The paper distinguished three periods of Europeanization. In the first period – in which the first comprehensive Family Support Act was adopted – basically no reference was made to the European Union. Accordingly, this Act – its goal being to protect the institution of the family to ensure demographic growth – did not prioritize reconciliation and women' employment at all and was criticized of not being in line with European principles. The second period before 2004 was the period of legal harmonization. Therefore, reconciliation-related acts (e.g. on telework) were mainly adopted as an answer to European expectations. Finally, in the third period after the 2004 accession, the reconciliation of work and family life became an explicit goal of the government, usually with references made to European processes and European principles. In this period, MPs started using the jargon of the EU. Furthermore, the availability of European funding was an important trigger of reconciliation-related reforms.

"Insistent Life is the first full-length interdisciplinary treatment of the foundational principles and principles of application for engaging contemporary bioethics within the Jain tradition. The book fills a significant gap in both the fields of bioethics and Jain studies since Jainism, perhaps more so than any other South Asian tradition, is strongly focused on the ethics of birth, life, and death, with regard to humans as well as other living beings. Brianne Donaldson and Ana Bajželj analyze a diverse range of Jain texts and contemporary sources on Jain doctrines and practices, alongside bioethics, to identify Jain perspectives on bioethical issues while highlighting the complexity of their personal, professional, and public dimensions. The book also features extensive original data--represented in visual graphs--based on an international survey the authors conducted with Jain medical professionals in India and diaspora communities of North America, Europe, and Africa"--

Why do mantelpieces matter? As everyday 'focal points', they offer a unique way into understanding how what matters relates to who matters. Wide-ranging, original, innovative research assembles Mass Observation Archive material with historiographies of family, house and nation from ancient Greece to present-day Europe, China and America. Entwined with insightful ethnography of British domestic and heritage practices, these studies elicit how power works in the small spaces of home. Accompanied by films made with asylum seekers and participants' 'photo-calendars', it is an engaging, effective fusion of different modes of analysis, with imaginative theorising and auto-biographical reflection. This cutting-edge contribution to current debates on identity unfolds how dominant cultural values not only exclude the dispossessed, but also limit possibilities for future networks of shared hope, loss and vulnerability.

This article analyses public discourses in the Netherlands about the arrival of boat refugees in Europe. By comparing three Dutch newspapers with received knowledge about migration in academic literature, we compare and contrast policies advocating border control in order to stop the arrival of boat refugees with scientific evidence about these proposed solutions. We argue that discrepancies exist between policy suggestions and the evidence provided by migration scholars since increased border control generally is argued not to lead to a decline in migrants, but instead to riskier routes and more deaths. Accordingly, we contend that not evidence but a nationalist discourse spreading anxiety influences the political debate. In order to corroborate this argument, we conducted a content analysis of various newspaper reports on boat refugees and their framing of the proposed policy solution of border control. This demonstrates that media are not systematically instigating moral panic as migration scholars would often like us to believe. On the contrary, much diversity is found in newspapers regarding the representation of boat refugees and many similarities may be found in arguments provided by media and scholars.

Collective bargaining is closely related to social policy making to the extent that the outcomes of the former inform and influence social policy agenda. It is widely held, however, that trade unions in Central Eastern Europe (CEE) do not have a strong bargaining position and thus exert little impact on policy decisions. This paper challenges the view of CEE labour as a uniformly weak actor. It argues that CEE unions' ability to shape the bargaining agenda and social policies depends largely on the degree of privatisation, which overlaps with sectoral divisions. We find that unions in exposed sectors are unable to oppose greater flexibility even when there are no considerable wage gains, whereas workers in protected sectors manage to maintain their status and at times even enhance their welfare, both in terms of higher wages and better working conditions.

"This paper examines new measures of fear of crime fielded in the European Social Survey. We use an analytical approach that combines statistical latent class modelling with pragmatic choices for the final classification of the responses into a six-category measure. We undertake an informal examination of the latent class solution in individual countries, and we show that frequency and impact indicators are reliable cross-national indicators (with configural or construct validity) of the experience of negative emotions about crime in people's lives. Our subsequent estimation of levels of worry in 23 European countries sheds important light on the psychological patterning of worry about crime across Europe." (author's abstract)

Integration of newcomers is a major challenge for contemporary Europe. The 'second generation' - children born of immigrant parentage - is crucial in this process, for they constitute a growing and increasingly vocal segment of the metropolitan youth. This timely book offers cross-national comparisons and a new perspective on the position of the European second generation in education, labour, social relations, religion and identity formation, drawing on data collected by the TIES survey in fifteen cities across eight European countries

Impurity of Blood analyzes the proposition of Spanish racial thought in the late 19th and early 20th centuries that racial strength came from a fusion of different groups, rather than from a kind of racial purity. By providing a history of ethnic thought in Spain in the medieval and early modern era, and by studying the formation of racial thought in Spain's nascent human sciences and its political and cultural manifestations leading into the Franco regime, it provides a new view of racial thought in Europe and its connections to the larger twentieth century formation of racial thought in the West.

Austerity politics constitute by no means an innovation. The neo-classical codes from which they draw inspiration have regulated the institutional architecture of the European Union for decades, creating an ideal framework for the rise of financial capitalism. Although often presented as a depoliticized set of 'technical' norms, they have contributed decisively to shaping the process of continental integration and redefining class relations across regions. In short, austerity has provided the normative scaffolding for the European division of labor under finance capital. However, financialization has recently entered a prolonged crisis, with no avenues for growth looming in the horizon. In the current context, the deepening of austerity politics can only translate into an undisguised process of dispossession (similar to structural adjustment programs implemented in the Global South) and a challenge to the social contract that sustained the political and economic regime of the EU in previous decades. This is nowhere clearer than in the peripheral countries of Southern Europe, where millions of people have risen up over recent years to push history in a different direction.In this chapter, I turn to Spain in order to cast light on the class relations behind austerity politics and the broad democratic movement striving to transform them—from that extraordinary outburst called the 15-M Movement to the birth of the political party Podemos.

"Viele soziologische Fragestellungen, insbesondere solche in der vergleichenden Gesellschaftsforschung, sind mit besonderen methodischen Herausforderungen behaftet, da sie die Analyse hierarchisch strukturierter Daten, erfordern. In diesem Papier soll mit der Mehrebenenanalyse ein Ansatz vorgestellt werden, mit solchen Daten adäquat umzugehen. Dies geschieht anhand einer inhaltlichen Fragestellung, nämlich möglichen Erklärungsfaktoren der Einstellung zu Zuwanderern. Dazu wurden ländervergleichender Umfragedaten (European Social Survey) aus 20 europäischen Staaten mit Kontextmerkmalen der jeweiligen Länder kombiniert. Die Mehrebenenanalyse zeigt, dass das Ausmaß der Zuwanderungsfeindlichkeit sich in den Ländern stark unterscheidet und von Kontextmerkmalen wie der Arbeitslosigkeit im Land und dem Modernisierungsgrad abhängt. Zu den individuellen Faktoren zählen beispielsweise Bildung und Alter. So haben höher gebildete und Jüngere eher eine positive Einstellung zu Zuwanderern." (Autorenreferat)