Suchergebnisse

Ensuring the integrity of elections is a foundational concern for any democratic state. Yet, it faces a grave challenge in Poland, emanating from the Chamber of Extraordinary Control and Public Affairs of the Supreme Court. Created in 2018 following controversial changes to the national judicial system and tasked with reviewing the validity of parliamentary elections, the Chamber fails to meet the essential criteria of an independent court. Confirmed by rulings of the European Court of Human Rights and the Supreme Court itself, the Chamber's flawed origin and staffing, dependent on political influence and in departure from established rules of law, undermines its capacity to authenticate the fairness and legitimacy of elections. This echoes beyond Poland's borders as well, since the Chamber's defective status fails to meet European standards of effective judicial protection, thus raising concerns in the context of European integration. This blog delves into the Chamber's position, examines its role in validating electoral process and its impact on the democratic legitimacy of Poland's Parliament.

Traditionally, human rights work has been more akin to investigative reporting, but Patrick Ball is the most influential of a handful of people around the world who see that world not in terms of words, but of figures. His specialty is applying quantitative analysis to mountains of anecdotes, finding the correlations that coax out a story that cannot easily be dismissed. Ball is 46, stocky, short, and bearded, with glasses and reddish-brown hair, which he used to wear in a ponytail. His manner is mostly endearing geek. But he is also an evangelist, a true believer in the need to get history right, to tell the truth about suffering and death. Like all evangelists, he can be impatient with people who do not share his priorities; his difficulty suffering fools (a large group, apparently) does not always help his cause. Adapted from the source document.

This essay addresses and critiques attempts by politicians to legislate the language used to describe and therefore define women's experience of sexual assault. What is written from the body changes the body and vice versa; what is performed turns back on itself changing word and body. Rep. Bobby Franklin (R-Marietta) wants to label me "accuser," thereby erasing my assaulted body unless and until "there's a conviction in the matter." There was never a conviction in the matter of my case. So where does that leave me? He doesn't want me to claim victimage, as if being a victim is somehow a privilege, a legal labeling granted on "proof" of the attack. The assaulted body is changed by the legal replacement of "victim" for "accuser." The word tries to displace or erase the action from the agent and replace it with a burden of proof. So following a most heinous experience, as "accuser," the woman must now carry the burden of proving herself, accounting not only for her own experience, but also, that it actually happened. Performative autoethnography offers a method of intervening upon legislated language assaults by speaking from the body with agency and ethical representation. The possibilities of deconstructing "accuser" and reconstructing research that offers a multiplicity of being in the body of assault offers argument to oppressive gender notions of violence. Performative autoethnography offers hope and efficacy in the doing.

This article explores the reasons for the electoral successes of the Howard governement, with particular reference to Judith Brett's Quarterly Essay analysing John Howard's personal contribution to this success.