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    Taking (anti-)‘woke’ seriously: the future of development cooperation and humanitarian aid
    (John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of ODI Global, 2025-08-21) Mawdsley E; Banks G; Sanyu C; Scheyvens R; Overton J
    Purpose This article examines the Trump administration’s ‘war on woke’ as a key narrative in dismantling USAID in early 2025, arguing that its cultural framing is politically significant alongside material and geopolitical impacts. Approach Drawing on Project 2025 and a Lonsdale and Black blog as examples, we explore how ‘woke’ is cast as a threat to US values and interests. Findings Cuts disproportionately harm women, children, and marginalised groups, while emboldening conservative actors globally. Anti-‘woke’ narratives gain traction from inequalities produced by neoliberal globalisation; liberal aid arguments have lost voter appeal. Reclaiming ‘woke’ in its original sense offers opportunities for justice-based development approaches. Value Foregrounding the cultural politics of aid, we call for structurally oriented, globally connected solidarity that engages alienated domestic constituencies and addresses racialised inequalities in North and South.
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    Between the teacher and educator: a political analysis of an impossible combination
    (Taylor and Francis Group on behalf of the Australian Teacher Education Association, 2025-05-14) Carusi FT
    This article responds to some of the recent challenges issued to the field of teacher education constituted “between principle, politics, and practice.” By discussing the teacher educator as a tautology, the article analyses education policy and research discourses to illustrate how different politics are generated by the tautological character of the teacher educator’s title. The article concludes with a consideration of the limits of the educational in light of the politics of teacher education that emerges from the analyses.
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    Trevor Noah and the contingent politics of racial joking
    (Cracow Tertium Society for the Promotion of Language Studies, 2021-11-01) Donian J; Holm N
    This article takes up the transnational comedy career of Trevor Noah as a way to explore how the political work of racial comedy can manifest, circulate and indeed communicate differently across different racial-political contexts. Through the close textual analysis of two key comic performances –“The Daywalker” (2009) and “Son of Patricia” (2018), produced and (initially) circulated in South Africa and the USA, respectively – this article explores the extent to which Noah’s comic treatment of race has shifted between the two contexts. In particular, attention is paid to how Noah incites, navigates and mitigates potential sources of offence surrounding racial anxieties in the two contexts, and how he evokes his own “mixed-race” status in order to open up spaces of permission that allow him to joke about otherwise taboo subjects. Rejecting the claim that the politics of Noah’s comedy is emancipatory or progressive in any straightforward way, by means of formal analyses we argue that his comic treatment of race does not enact any singular politics, but rather that the political work of his racial humour shifts relative to its wider political contexts. Thus, rather than drawing a clear line between light entertainment and politically meaningful humour, this article argues that the political valence of racial joking can be understood as contingent upon wider discourses of race that circulate in national-cultural contexts.
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    No time for fun: the politics of partying during a pandemic
    (Taylor and Francis Group, 2021-05-04) Holm N
    In 2020, in the face of the unparalleled epidemiological threat posed by Covid-19, multiple governments around the world sought to contain the spread of the virus by imposing strict lockdown measures that dramatically limited the movement and gathering of citizens. Not only did these restrictions severely curtail the regular patterns of economic, political and cultural life, they also made it very hard to have fun. While this last point may appear flippant, this article proposes that a proper accounting for fun is absolutely necessary if we are to understand not just the challenges passed by lockdown measures, but also the legal and biomedical risks people were willing to take to engage in activities like hosting parties, surfing and attending raves, during a pandemic. Arguing against the idea of fun as a form of displaced political practice, I instead suggest that fun is best understood as an example of contingent, non-transcendent aesthetic value that is absolutely central to everyday desire and the appeal of popular culture. Often easy to overlook, the experience of lockdown brought the appeal and importance of fun into sharp relief in ways that point towards the powerful role fun plays in shaping our lives both during a pandemic and (hopefully) after.
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    Spice up your ‘public policy’ : exploring the operationalisation of Sustainable Development Goal 5, Target 5.C to create employment opportunities for ethnic women in Aotearoa New Zealand Government Ministries : a research report in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of International Development at Massey University Manawatū, Aotearoa
    (Massey University, 2022) Patel Cornish, Shanti
    The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and their targets present an exciting opportunity for equity. SDG 5, Target 5.C aims to monitor the creation of legislation and policy that is designed to improve the lives of women across sectors. The core objective of this research was to explore diversity and inclusion in the government ministries of Aotearoa New Zealand (Aotearoa) and how the operationalisation of Target 5.C could create more equitable employment opportunities for ethnic women. This research used feminist methodology, post-development thought and decolonial principles to design the key informant interviews with Members of Parliament (MPs) and purposeful sampling of key documents. These methods were used to compare the views shared by MPs with policy documents and archival data from past governments to see how diversity, inclusion and equity are presented by government ministries. This researched highlighted that ethnic women face many barriers to gaining work in government ministries and SDG 5, Target 5.C could be a tool to help improve access to employment in the policy workforce. The SDGs have been utilised effectively by the government and for Target 5.C to be successful for ethnic women in government ministries there are wider changes that need to be made. The study concludes that the there is opportunity for Aotearoa New Zealand to be a world leader in the operationalisation of SDG 5, Target 5.C and the broader SDG agenda.
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    The gap between public service theory and service user experience : an exploration of service users understanding of targets in New Zealand emergency departments : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Business Studies in Management at Massey University, Albany, New Zealand
    (Massey University, 2020) O'Brien, Roselle Beverley Anne
    Demand for better public services, especially within healthcare, has been evident for decades. Practices and approaches from the private sector were posited as a solution to the ongoing failings of the public sector. The adoption of performance management and measurement was one, of many, private sector practices applied to public sector organisations. Targets, one performance management tool are examined. Targets were selected due to the media, academic and political attention they have received. This exploratory research sought to develop an understanding of the effect of targets on public service delivery, specifically from a Service Users perspective. The findings indicate that within the New Zealand healthcare system, Emergency Department Length of Stay targets are not widely known by Service Users. As a consequence there is little impact on Service Users expectations of the service. There are, however, other factors which shape Service Users expectations. The lack of awareness of Emergency Department Length of Stay targets may lend evidence to the difference between citizens and Service Users. It may also support claims that the introduction of private sector practices has compromised the relationship between citizens and government. Areas for further research are identified.