In the face of increased uncertainty and a slow economic recovery, it is crucial to protect populations from the effects of systemic crises beyond the narrow goal of poverty reduction. In Ecuador,... Show moreIn the face of increased uncertainty and a slow economic recovery, it is crucial to protect populations from the effects of systemic crises beyond the narrow goal of poverty reduction. In Ecuador, social assistance programs had little effect in reducing earnings losses caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, leading to a renewed discussion on the implementation of a universal basic income (UBI). This study evaluates the potential impact of social assistance reforms using tax-benefit microsimulation techniques. Four simulated counterfactual reforms are assessed, ranging from an extension of current social assistance programs to the implementation of UBI, which would replace existing programs and be partially funded through progressive personal income tax and social security contributions. Our findings demonstrate that poverty and inequality would decrease significantly under the more generous UBI scenarios. This research contributes to the ongoing debate on the potential benefits of UBI in reducing poverty and inequality and emphasizes the importance of considering alternative social assistance reforms in the face of growing systemic challenges. Show less
The departure of most Greeks from Egypt at the beginning of the 1960s raised questions in the community about how it should readjust its presence at an institutional level. This article examines... Show moreThe departure of most Greeks from Egypt at the beginning of the 1960s raised questions in the community about how it should readjust its presence at an institutional level. This article examines how the Greek Koinotēta of Alexandria (GKA) operated as both a local and diasporic institution in periods of contraction, in terms of size and finances, and analyzes the adjustment policies it undertook concerning its institutional property and real estate. Despite the community’s demographic shrinkage in the 1960s and 1970s, the GKA was assigned its role as the value keeper and moral guide for the children of the community through its educational institutions and orphanages, having the support of the Greek representatives, in this case the consular authorities.Even though the GKA faced serious financial difficulties in the 1960s, it strived to find strategies of adaptation to maintain its agency and social, political and economic capital. Show less
The OECD is at the core of the liberal international order (LIO) that has characterised relations among Western countries since 1945. We review how the OECD has been analyzed in the field of... Show moreThe OECD is at the core of the liberal international order (LIO) that has characterised relations among Western countries since 1945. We review how the OECD has been analyzed in the field of International Political Economy (IPE). By revisiting the intellectual debates on why countries cooperate through International Organizations (IOs), we argue that the OECD has been in one of the blindspots as scholars did not grasp the role played by knowledge in legitimating the LIO. The OECD plays an important role in the creation and maintenance of a working consensus over the norms, ideologies, and practices that constitute the LIO. This started to change in the 1990s as scholarship on IOs expanded beyond IR debates over international cooperation, towards the development of an interdisciplinary study of global economic governance. Expanding on the work of Susan Strange, we suggest that the OECD’s main role in global economic governance is epistemic. Show less
This thesis explores how urban night spaces have been, and how they are currently produced, imagined, experienced, and narrated among the Cabo Verdean migrant community in Rotterdam. The common... Show moreThis thesis explores how urban night spaces have been, and how they are currently produced, imagined, experienced, and narrated among the Cabo Verdean migrant community in Rotterdam. The common thread that runs through this research is music, which is analysed through lyrics, performances, and as an integral part of nightlife. The Netherlands and Rotterdam are sung about or mentioned in many songs by Cabo Verdean artists from different generations. Cabo Verdean music about Rotterdam is distinctive in that it contributes significantly to processes of place-making as it reflects on and generates representations of specific places which were important during the times in which that music was written. It traces places and routes through the city and uncovers daily and nocturnal rhythms, echoing a particular atmosphere. Simultaneously, night spaces were used to mobilize the community politically in times of the independence struggle against Portugal and are still essential in generating a collective sense of self. With Rotterdam continuously developing, the histories of particular Cabo Verdean night spaces are appropriated in contemporary nightlife, as organisers draw on collective memories of historical nightlife events. As such, cultural texts and events not only shape Cabo Verdean life in the city, but they also facilitate the re-memorisation and re-experiencing of diasporic lives in current events and cultural productions. Show less
The increase of African per capita growth figures led international organisations, the media and pundits to proclaim that the rise of Africa is inevitable, as the result of novel policies and an... Show moreThe increase of African per capita growth figures led international organisations, the media and pundits to proclaim that the rise of Africa is inevitable, as the result of novel policies and an improved environment in the continent. Ian Taylor, in his article ‘Is Africa rising?’, is questioning the arguments on which this narrative is based. The present piece seeks to discuss the main contributions of Taylor’s article and show how it has influenced debates on the topic. Show less
‘International Relations (IR) is a state-centric discipline as well as a power-centered discipline’ mention Neumann and Gstöhl in their introduction to the edited work on Small States in... Show more‘International Relations (IR) is a state-centric discipline as well as a power-centered discipline’ mention Neumann and Gstöhl in their introduction to the edited work on Small States in International Relations (2006). Small states have long faced resistance within the field of international relations as they defy the second part of this quotation, their relative lack of capabilities questions the usefulness or relevance of studying them. Unrecognised states defy the first part of Neumann and Gstöhl’s quotation, as these constitute ‘places that do not exist in international relations’ (Caspersen, 2012), and have, therefore, often been excluded from relevant studies. While the study of small states has proliferated, it has largely neglected unrecognised small states. The aim of this paper is to establish the foreign policy goals of unrecognised states, and explore whether small states employ similar means as their unrecognised counterparts. This paper will examine the foreign policy of Somaliland and will argue that, often, the means used by unrecognised small states converge, more than usually thought so, with these of their recognised counterparts. Show less
Tibetan manuscripts in general, and Bon manuscripts in particular, are often characterised by orthographic inconsistencies and multiple contracted forms (Tib. bsdus tshig or bskungs yig). While... Show moreTibetan manuscripts in general, and Bon manuscripts in particular, are often characterised by orthographic inconsistencies and multiple contracted forms (Tib. bsdus tshig or bskungs yig). While these features may be a nuisance to the reader, they deserve to be analysed more systematically: it is possible that these heterodox spellings and other scribal peculiarities, far from being random errors, may represent local writing conventions. On the basis of an extended study of facsimile reproductions of Bon manuscripts from Bsam gling monastery in Dolpo, Nepal, this chapter aims to explore the best way forward towards defining local orthographic styles and other codicological features. A major starting hypothesis to be tested is that {\textquoteleft}heterographies{\textquoteright} may help us to detect oral and written modes of transmission. Show less
There is no or desperately little reliable early evidence to support the historicity of the grand pre-Buddhist Bon Zhang zhung Empire of later Bon po sources and their western aficionados.... Show moreThere is no or desperately little reliable early evidence to support the historicity of the grand pre-Buddhist Bon Zhang zhung Empire of later Bon po sources and their western aficionados. Imagination is nonetheless plentiful. In the PIATS 2016, I discuss the oldest historical textual sources relevant to a heartland of Bon, which is variously conceptualised as Zhang zhung, Ta zig and 'Ol mo lung ring, with special reference to a central stronghold and main seat of power in Zhang zhung: the so-called Silver Castle of Garuḍa Valley or Khyung lung Dngul dNgul mkhar. If one carefully examines the genealogy of knowledge and the history of invention of that grand Zhang zhung Bon Empire and its legendary Khyung lung castle, one cannot help but notice that our ideas about them derive from surprisingly late discourse, which postdates any relevant historical and geographical realities by a long stretch. The later Bon Zhang zhung literary construct is to be distinguished clearly from a probably historical and probably also small principality by the name of Zhang zhung, that is located west of Central Tibet, roughly centred on the Kailash area and that seems to have had a northern extension as well. But, interestingly, that historical Zhang zhung in its descriptions carries no significant Bon po associations and in time also significantly precedes Bon traditions as we know them now. ... In the following, we will examine the earliest evidence for a {\textquoteleft}location{\textquoteright} of the origin of Bon, or at least for the origin of its narratives. We find those in non-Buddhist ritualistic narratives of the Dunhuang period. For an overview and analysis of Dunhuang historical narratives, I refer to PIATS 2006 (but see also Macdonald 1971). The analysis of ritualistic narratives is significantly more involved than that of historical sources. It requires fragile attempts at connecting clusters of narrative elements that in Dunhuang sources appear loosely assembled around important names and locations to the earliest, self-consciously Bon sources, such as the mDo {\textquoteleft}dus, the Klu {\textquoteleft}bum and other sources, with special attention to those names and locations, of course, that are already familiar from later strata of emerging Bon. The latter begin to emerge in around the 10th–11th century AD and thus may be closely contiguous with the redaction of Dunhuang materials. The nature of the rituals cannot be elucidated here, for reasons of space. Show less
