bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words: Examining learners’ illustrations to understand Attitudes towards Mathematics
Authors: Syyeda Farhat , Syyeda Farhat
Published: August 2018

This article presents my experience of using pictures/images drawn by children as a form of data in research and discusses the merits and implications of employing this method. It comes from research of a mixed method exploratory case study to investigate the attitudes of 11 and 15 year old secondary school students (in the East Midlands) towards Mathematics. The aim of this research was to gain an insight into the emotions, cognition, beliefs and behaviour of learners regarding Maths and the factors which influence their attitude. Besides using the tried and tested data collection tools such as focus groups and questionnaires, the children were asked to draw pictures illustrating their vision of Maths and its impact on their lives. The idea was to offer them an alternative medium of communication to exhibit their feelings and thoughts. Students used emoticons, numerals, figures, characters and mathematical symbols to show their favourable/unfavourable attitudes towards Maths and their understanding of the importance of Maths in future life. The results of visual data in this study conform to the findings of the other forms of data collected and show that boys and higher ability students have a more positive attitude towards Mathematics as compared to girls and low ability students.
The Global Trade of Textiles and Clothing in the Early Modern Period: Exchange, Meaning and Materialities
Authors: Hutkova Karolina , Hutkova Karolina
Published: August 2018

The two-day workshop at the University of Warwick brought together early career researchers studying various aspects of textile history – production, consumption, trade, fashion, and design – with the aim of drawing broader conclusions about the role of textiles and clothing in the development of societies, cultures and economies. The methodological and geographical breadth of the presented research holds a promise that in the near future we will be presented with a much more global picture of textile production, consumption and trade in the early modern period.
Acting Law | Law Acting: A Conversation with Dr Felix Nobis and Professor Gary Watt
Authors: Mulcahy Sean Alexander , Mulcahy Sean
Published: August 2018

Dr Felix Nobis is a senior lecturer with the Centre for Theatre and Performance at Monash University. He has worked as a professional actor for many years. He previously played an assistant to the Crown Prosecutor in the Australian television series, Janus, which was set in Melbourne, Victoria and based on the true story of a criminal family allegedly responsible for police shootings. He also played an advisor to a medical defence firm in the Australian television series MDA. He is a writer and professional storyteller. He has toured his one-person adaptation of Beowulf (2004) and one-person show Once Upon a Barstool (2006) internationally and has written on these experiences. His most recent work Boy Out of the Country (2016) is written in an Australian verse style and has just completed a tour of regional Victoria. Professor Gary Watt is an academic in the School of Law at the University of Warwick where his teaching includes advocacy and mooting. He also regularly leads rhetoric workshops at the Royal Shakespeare Company. He is the author of Dress, Law and Naked Truth (2013) and, most recently, Shakespeare’s Acts of Will: Law, Testament and Properties of Performance (2016), which explores rhetoric in law and theatre. He also co-wrote A Strange Eventful History, which he performed with Australian choral ensemble, The Song Company, to mark the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death.
Training Future Actors in the Food System: A new collaborative cross-institutional, interdisciplinary training programme for students
Authors: Reed Kelly , Reed Kelly , Collier Rosemary , White Rebecca , Wells Rebecca , Ingram John , Borrelli Rosina , Haesler Barbara , Caraher Martin , Lang Tim , Arnall Alex , Ajates Gonzalez Raquel , Pope Harley , Blake Lauren , Sykes Roger
Published: August 2018

There is an urgent need to train a cohort of professionals who can address and resolve the increasing number of fundamental failings in the global food system. The solutions to these systemic failings go far beyond the production of food, and are embedded within broad political, economic, business, social, cultural and environmental contexts. The challenge of developing efficient, socially acceptable and sustainable food systems that meet the demands of a growing global population can only be tackled through an interdisciplinary systems approach that integrates social, economic and environmental dimensions. The new cross-institutional training programme, IFSTAL (Innovative Food Systems Teaching and Learning), is designed to improve post-graduate level knowledge and understanding of food systems from a much broader interdisciplinary perspective, which can be applied to students’ own studies. Ultimately, these graduates should be equipped to apply critical interdisciplinary systems thinking in the workplace to understand how problems are connected, their root causes and where critical leverage points might be.  This article outlines the programme and presents a review of its first year (2015-2016 academic year).

Note: Rosina Borrelli's surname is misspelled as 'Borelli' in the paper and should be cited by the author's correct name in all references.
Defining 'Movement' in Global History: The Early Modern Iberian World in a Global Frame (16th-18th centuries)
Authors: Arbo Desiree , Arbo Desiree
Published: August 2018

On 9 June 2017, scholars from a range of disciplines across the United Kingdom and Spain met at the University of Warwick to discuss the ways in which taking a global perspective can enrich research on early modern Iberia and colonial Spanish America. Coming at a time when Spanish exceptionalism is being increasingly challenged but the Americas are still being side-lined in the writing of global history, the presenters addressed gaps in current historiography and challenged Eurocentric narratives of early modern history which have predominated since the Enlightenment. The final roundtable called for definition in the language of movement in global history and concluded that we need to rethink global history as a project that began in the sixteenth century with conceptions of an Iberian or Catholic globe, an orbe hispano.
China Plates and Japanned Trays: British Encounters with Chinese and Japanese Aesthetics in the Long Nineteenth Century
Authors: Loh Waiyee , Loh Waiyee
Published: August 2018

This is a ‘Critical Reflection’ piece on the research seminar ‘China Plates and Japanned Trays: British Encounters with Chinese and Japanese Aesthetics in the Long Nineteenth Century’, which was held at the University of Warwick on 20 March 2017. The guest speaker was Dr Jenny Holt (Meiji University). In this seminar, we discussed how the British public responded to the increased availability of Chinese and Japanese art objects in the nineteenth century.
Enhancing the Employability of Chinese International Students: Identifying Achievements and Gaps in the Research Field
Authors: Cao Xuemeng , Cao Xuemeng
Published: August 2018

This article shows what achievements have been made by existing studies on graduate employability, and what gaps need to be filled in this field. It starts with a retrospective account of the changing concept of employability, followed by a presentation of the practices that have been used to support graduate employability enhancement in different countries. Moreover, this article gives a critical review of Chinese contexts of graduate labour market. Last but not least, limitations of existing studies are identified, which reflect an expectation for future research on graduate employability to meet the demand of an increasingly international dimension of higher education.
Spatial Justice: Space, place and counter-normative movement in Latcho Drom
Authors: Patchett Emma , Patchett Emily
Published: August 2018

At a time when diasporic identity is being acutely challenged, it is important to pay critical attention to counter-cultural texts which refract hegemonic discourse through alternative spatial landscapes. The French film Latcho Drom (Gatlif, 1993) provides a stylised and radically unique retelling of the journey of the Roma from the Thar Desert in Northern India to Spain, passing through Egypt, Turkey, Romania, Hungary, Slovakia, and France. Gatlif’s film can be read as a sensory refraction of legal frameworks of exclusion on the ‘edges of Europe’, and acts as a site in which it is possible to explore the way in which a minority filmmaker constructs alternative spaces of justice. Through the practice of textual analysis, this article will examine how various framing techniques subvert the hegemonic qualities of the law through the cinematic depiction of a lyrical and diasporic journey through Southern Europe, in order to deconstruct the way in which the aural and visual space refracts law’s function as a spacing mechanism. Drawing on Gilles Deleuze’s work on cinema and within a theoretical framework of critical space theory, this article will discuss key issues of counter-cultural topographies, alternative spacing mechanisms and the construction of spaces of justice in the context of law and film.
A Pedagogy of Movement: Interdisciplinary Approaches to Human Motion
Authors: Chatzistefani Nefeli , Chatzistefani Nefeli , Heron Jonathan
Published: August 2018

This critical reflection documents a collaboration between an arts practitioner-researcher and a biomedical engineer in the field of interdisciplinary pedagogy. From one perspective, we read movement as a cultural practice engaging theories of embodiment and informed by dance studies; from another perspective, we study movement as a product of internal and external forces acting on the body and we investigate the science behind the structure and function of human motion. This article reflects upon these differences and considers opportunities for new experimentation within interdisciplinary movement studies, in particular, the co-authors reflect upon the various definitions and affordances of the term ‘bio-mechanical’ and its application to movement and motion capture. The article ends with an overview of the experiments yet to be undertaken within transdisciplinary pedagogy at the Institute for Advanced Teaching and Learning (IATL), University of Warwick.
The Stillness in Movement: A Buddhist Reading of Ash-Wednesday
Authors: Xiao Chutian , Xiao Chutian
Published: August 2018

Commonly seen as a religious poem that reflects T. S. Eliot’s conversion to Catholicism, Ash-Wednesday demonstrates intensively the poet’s religious experience, especially the union of the spiritual stillness and the movements in time which verges on mysticism. However, such extraordinary experience can be comprehended from the perspective of Buddhism. It corresponds with the Buddhist concept of suchness, which is further connected to religious meditation and the attitude of non-attachment in face of worldly life. It does not violate the speaker’s pursuit for a kind of Christian salvation, for it concerns more the process and the way to achieve the destination than the destination itself.
Academic Freedom and Society: Some Critical Questions
Authors: Choksey Lara , Choksey Lara
Published: August 2018

A review of a recent one-day conference, Academic Freedom and Society, held on June 2 2017 at the University of Warwick, which sought to pose questions about ideals and practices of academic freedom, historically and in the current moment, across disciplinary and national borders. Speakers discussed the university and human rights practices, Islamophobia and teaching law, ‘Decolonise the University’, links between funding and research, digital piracy, new sites of knowledge commons, and university managerialism, and the challenges and possibilities these topics pose to the practice of academic freedom. Has the university ever been autonomous from state interests, and what modes of freedom are currently available to academics – already unevenly contingent on social and national identifications – in practice?
INTELLECTUALIZATION BUSINESS ECONOMICS AND NEW REQUIREMENTS FOR THE COMPETENCE OF ITS EMPLOYEES
Authors: Kovalenko M.A. , Shworob G.M. , Zhytchenko G.O.
Published: August 2018

The main trends of modern economy development and features of future economy, the demands that it brings to the professionals of tomorrow are defined. The role of human factor and intellectual capital in forming of the results of production activity of enterprise is shown and some ways of ensuring that the knowledge and skills of workers will satisfy the demands of tomorrow's economy are formulated.
DIRECTIONS OF THE TRANSITION OF THE MILITARY-INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX AND THE ARMED FORCES OF UKRAINE TO THE "GREEN" MODEL OF DEVELOPMENT
Authors: Kupinets L.E. , Obniavko T.S.
Published: August 2018

The place of Ukraine's territory and its military-economic potential in the accumulation in the European region of a large number of troops, naval forces, military equipment and armaments, powerful enterprises, institutions and organizations of defense purposes, which have a negative impact on the environment are determined; �ontaminated and continues to be contaminated the main components of the environment: soil, surface and groundwater, atmosphere air. The basic principles of internal policy in the field of national security and defense are indicated. The transition of the military-industrial complex and the Armed Forces of Ukraine to the "green" model of development is substantiated. The role of the military-industrial complex in the environmental pollution is proved. It is shown that the domestic defense industry has some scientific, technical and production capabilities to create competitive armament and military equipment, but significantly behind in the implementation of environmental standards and ecology-oriented technology and is not a leader in the new global transition to the "green" economy and the "green" growth.
It is proved that in the course of reforming the military-industrial complex, its reconversion, the destruction of outdated ammunition, wastes of military production and military products, and in the event of non-compliance with environmental requirements, should expect the deterioration of the ecological state of the territory. Considered the main innovational directions, which provide an increase of the degree of ecologization of the military economy and form a technological "green" jump in the specified sphere of activity: introduction of alternative types of energy into the activities of defense enterprises and army units; creation of weapons based on "green" technologies, using of "smart" clothing. Substantiated the prospects of further researches, which consists in defining the goals, objectives, principles, directions and approaches of ecologization of the military-industrial complex and the Armed Forces of Ukraine, assessment and classification of eco-friendly technologies, development of high-tech competitive industries, rational re-engineering of the military-industrial complex, development of mechanisms and tools for the ecologically oriented development and transition to the "green" technological model.
TRANSPORT TASK OF OPTIMIZATION OF COSTS WITH MULTIMODAL TRANSPORTATION
Authors: Kukharchyk A.G.
Published: August 2018

In the article, the questions of cost optimization in solving the transport problem using mathematical models are considered. A group of criteria that have the greatest influence in solving the transport problem is determined. The mathematical model of the transport problem allows us to describe a multitude of situations that arise in multimodal transport. The formulation of the goal is optimization - a task more economical, on the other - knowledge of economic and mathematical methods can more effectively solve this problem. The rationale for choosing an optimization criterion is a procedure that cannot be fully formalized, it must be performed taking into account the performance of transport and the interrelationship between them. The common approach to choosing and justifying an optimization criterion is usually based on the following circumstance: as a criterion, only a measure that can be quantified is chosen. Most often, the justification of one indicator is taken as a criterion (characteristic) of the process, less often - a group of criteria, depending on which one speaks of tasks with one criterion or multicriteria. As can be seen from the above, each criterion of optimality has advantages and disadvantages, which most often result from the measure of the synthetic criterion, the difficulty of preparing information in the form an array of coefficients for unknowns in the target function, the narrower or broader scope of its application. The selection and justification of the optimization criterion are performed taking into account all these circumstances in each particular case. In conclusion, it should be noted that all of these criteria have meaning in such tasks, where the volume of traffic is predetermined.
INSTITUTIONAL FACTORS OF TAX PROVIDING INVESTMENT DEVELOPMENT OF TERRITORIAL COMMUNITIES
Authors: Laiko O.I. , Araftenii A.M.
Published: August 2018

The article defines the factors of the institutional provision of effective use of the existing investment potential of territorial communities. The influence of the tax reform on the development of territorial communities is considered. The reform of local self-governance involves the transfer of the share of national taxes to local budgets, creates economic interest of communities in the development of new industries, of business support and of economic development for the country as a whole. It is shown that issues of tax competition and developmental balance are at the center of the attention of the European Commission and the whole European community, since the consequences of such concept are implemented in real life there are both positive and negative results. The results of the research tell that the formation of a supportive institutional environment should take place on the basis of an integrated combination of measures of rapid direct and indirect impact with the tools of organizational support and the formation of a business image. It is admitted that competition, privacy and sovereignty are the features of a free society, therefore, tax competition between countries should be noted. It is stated that the main instruments for the formation of a favorable institutional environment for the development of the region include legislative, organizational, economic and financial measures of a direct or indirect nature, the impact of which should promote the revitalization of socio-economic development of regions, as well as must ensure the sustainability of the stimulating effect in the form of investment viability of projects through the existing organizational approaches, rules, conditions of effective use of available resources of territories. The applied mechanisms for the formation of a favorable institutional environment for the economic development of the regions are proposed.
The modified red mud reduction smelting
Authors:   “Institute of Metallurgy and Ore Beneficiation” JSC, Abdulvaliev R.A. ,   Satbayev University, Akhmadieva N.K. ,   “Institute of Metallurgy and Ore Beneficiation” JSC; Satbayev University, Gladyshev С.V. ,   “Institute of Metallurgy and Ore Beneficiation” JSC; Satbayev University, Imangalieva L.M. ,   “Institute of Metallurgy and Ore Beneficiation” JSC; Satbayev University, Manapova A.I. ,   “Institute of Metallurgy and Ore Beneficiation” JSC; Satbayev University
Published: August 2018

The article presents the results of investigations of complex processing of red mud obtained from high-alumina bauxites of alumina production by the smelting reduction method. Red mud is a production waste that contains useful components and can used as a complex raw material for the production of pig iron, rare earth element (REE) concentrates and titanium dioxide. Known methods of red mud processing by the smelting reduction method have not found application because of the impossibility of obtaining slag with low iron content. The urgency of the problem solved by the research is in the need of ways for red mud recycling. As a result, a method for processing the modified red mud by the smelting reduction was developed to produce cast iron and an oxide-free slag containing rare earth elements and titanium dioxide. The method consists in the preliminary treatment of red mud in a high-modulus alkaline solution at a temperature of 240-260 ° C with the addition of calcium oxide to the pulp from the calculation for obtaining a modified red mud – a hydrogarnete slurry those main compound is the ferrous garnet-3CaO ∙ Fe2O3 ∙ 2SiO2 ∙ 2H2O. Reducing melting of the hydrogarnete slurry has made it possible to produce cast iron, and after magnetic separation – a nonmagnetic slag fraction containing 0.22 % of iron, which determines the possibility of obtaining high-quality REE concentrates and titanium dioxide in hydrometallurgical processing. The extraction of iron into cast iron is 88.0 %, into the magnetic fraction – 11.9 %, into the non-magnetic fraction – 0.1 %. The extraction of titanium into the magnetic fraction was 34.3 %, and in the nonmagnetic fraction was 65.7 %. The recovery of REE into the nonmagnetic fraction was 65.7 %.
Influence of weave and densities on visual appearance of woven fabrics made from two colored yarns
Authors:   University of Ljubljana, Faculty of Natural Sciences and Engineering, Department of Textiles, Graphic Arts and Design, Slovenia, Dimitrovski Krste , Grum Ursa ,   University of Ljubljana, Faculty of Natural Sciences and Engineering, Department of Textiles, Graphic Arts and Design, Slovenia, Kostajnsek Klara ,   University of Ljubljana, Faculty of Natural Sciences and Engineering, Department of Textiles, Graphic Arts and Design, Slovenia
Published: August 2018

The paper examines the effect of different factors, i.e. weft density, weave type and consequently agglomeration of the interlacing points of the same type, on the colour impression of a woven fabric. The experimental part is based on 60 weaved samples which differ in weave type (we used 10 different weave types in which the technical face and technical back are the same), colour of the warp (we used white and black warp) and weft density (we used yarns with densities 15, 20 and 25 yarns / cm). We measured the colour values of the woven samples. We arranged the measurements in different ways and tried to visually evaluate the effect of density, effect of weave type, also the effect of the size and shape of agglomerated interlacing points of the same type, on the colour impression of the woven fabric. The results of the colour measurements were sorted into tables and presented in graphs, which were used to find the samples within the observed groups of characteristics that showed the biggest colour differences, to calculate these colour differences and observe and explain the effect of the observed factors on the colour impression.
Der rot-grüne Einstieg in den Abschied vom „Modell Deutschland“: Ein Erklärungsversuch
Authors: Beck Stefan , Scherrer Christoph
Published: August 2018

Contrary to popular headlines of reform deadlock in Germany, substantial economic reforms have taken place in the past few years. First, we analyze the impact of these reforms on the institutional features of the Modell Deutschland. Second, we ask why the red-green government abandoned the original agenda that favored the core constituency of the coalition government and adopted the unpopular Agenda 2010. For an answer to these questions we turn to theories of hegemony for an explanation of the broader context in which the events have un folded. Within this context, we will explore the actors behavior from a Machiavellian perspective. Our main thesis is that when the left is on the defensive because of a lack of mobilization capabilities, a left-of-center coalition government will feel under pressure to veer to the middle.
Argentinien nach dem Zusammenbruch des neoliberalen Modells
Authors: Boris Dieter , Malcher Ingo
Published: August 2018

Starting from the deep financial and economic crisis, which took place in Argentina towards the end of 2001, the political, economical and societal reconstruction phases up to early 2005 are briefly summarized. Especially the government of Kirchner - in office since May 2003 - set new priorities in several fields of politics, e.g. human rights, the attitude towards the IMF and the foreign creditors, as well as foreign policy. Many structural elements and legacies of the neoliberal era, however, are still very present even three years after the collapse. In spite of the high growth rates in the last two years the reconstruction process has to be qualified as fragile and reversible. Compared to 2002 the social movements appear mainly weakened today. Whether the Kirchner government will succeed in establishing a more social and law abiding type of capitalism, remains to be seen, since a durable change of power relations in favour of progressive forces has not been realized.
Wenn Angst die Hoffnung besiegt
Authors: Paulani Leda
Published: August 2018

The victory of Lula and the PT in Brazilian elections in late 2002 was accompanied by the hope of a refoundation of society and freeing Brazil out of the ‘external trap’. The Lula-government argued that Brazil is on the brink of an abyss so that hard measures, like high interest rates and austerity policy are necessary. The article shows, that it were not the constraints of the economic situation but the decision of the government (trying to avoid conflicts with the forces of national and international capital) to continue the neoliberal politics of the former Cardoso administration.
Corporate Social Responsibility – vom Reputationsmanagement zum politischen Projekt
Authors: Görges Luise , Kadritzke Ulf
Published: August 2018

Luise Görges, Ulf Kadritzke: Corporate Social Responsibility – from Reputation Managementto the Strategic Advance of Corporate Power. This history of CSR exemplifies theadvancement of corporate power in the process of capitalist globalization. Initially started inresponse to reports on the violation of human rights, the transnational corporations (TNCs)managed to design the CSR concept as a voluntary and highly selective commitment to bridgethe gap between the rhetoric and the reality of corporate conduct. With the worldwide rise ofthe neoliberal paradigm in economic and social policy, these CSR-concepts were combinedinto a capital-dominated CSR-complex. The article tries to reconstruct the scientific, politicaland ideological roots of the concept and the steps transforming the corporate CSR-movementinto a successful ‘industry’. But the company-driven CSR is consistently confronted withactors and actions of a new social movement (including NGOs as well as unions). Theseorganizations of civil society steadily uncover the social consequences of corporate globalstrategies. The so far asymmetric balance of power may nevertheless give NGOs and theirallies– backed by the new media – a chance to lay open corporate misconduct and demonstratethe main ‘performance’ of global corporate power: the deepening of class polarization andecological instability.
Irans Außenpolitik zwischen Religion und Macht
Authors: Götsch Katharina
Published: August 2018

Protector of Shiites, export of Islamist revolution, fight against Israel and support of Palestine – the religious element plays an obvious role in Iran’s foreign relations. At the same time, several foreign policy actions and positions of Iran indicate the prioritization of material national interests (of geopolitical and economic nature): a recent example is the nuclear deal from July 2015. The article will first discuss theoretical approaches in the social sciences for the analysis of religion in international relations; subsequently, the ideological foundation and constitutional principles of the Islamist Republic of Iran are set out as the basis for empirical case analyses in the final section.
Widersprüche im langen Sommer der Migration.
Authors: Georgi Fabian
Published: August 2018

Today, the analysis of migration and migration policy from a perspective of critical political economy is necessary, because of the dramatic conflicts surrounding the so-called “refugee crisis” of 2015/2016, but also because explicitly materialist analyses of these issues have been marginalized for years, with problematic effects. Thus, the article sketches a theoretical and methodological outline of a materialist border regime analysis. It first criticizes problematic aspects of the influential “ethnographic border regime analysis” approach and then, by relying on regulation theory, develops a materialist understanding of migration and border regimes. Starting from a discussion of the social and political conflicts around German migration policy in 2015/2016, the article then goes on to identify three migration-related structural contradictions that are regulated within migration and border regimes: accumulation by dispossession and the autonomy of migration;labour conflicts; and the structural chauvinism of national welfare states.
Editorial: Ökonomie der Flucht und der Migration
Authors: Redaktion PROKLA
Published: August 2018

Editorial: Ökonomie der Flucht und der Migration
Citizenship by work?
Authors: Scherschel Karin
Published: August 2018

The paper discusses current changes of the German labor market for certain groups of refugees. On the one hand, we can observe a partial opening of the labor market. Especially the economy welcomes the idea of opening the labor market for refugees. On the other hand, this policy establishes a perspective that puts a strong emphasis on economical benefits, even in the field of refugee protection. This policy is inconsistent with the idea of human rights, which state a right to work. Some researchers argue that the access to the labor market will be a chance to get citizenship rights. In contrast to this view, I argue that the focus on labor market participation leads to a classification of ‘good’ and ‘bad’ refugees. At the same time, the partial opening is a gateway for ‘activation policies’ with different sanctions intervening into the refugee protection system.
Die deutsche Rüstungsexportpolitik.
Authors: Schmidt Dorothea
Published: August 2018

The laws regulating the exports of arms are relatively strong in Germany. But in practice, until today all German governments, irrespective of their political affiliation, have only made weak efforts to enforce the compliance of laws and regulations and hardly any attempts to close loopholes like the uncontrolled licensed production in other countries. This is why German arms, especially small arms like machine guns from Heckler & Koch, are not only used by government agencies to which they have been officially delivered, but also, often as a result of a blowback effect, by their opponents, e.g. ISIS militia groups. The article retraces the transfer of arms to Iraq, Afghanistan, and Syria in the last decades and argues that this has contributed to the prolongation and brutalization of the wars in these countries. Hence, the German export of arms must also be seen as a major factor for the ongoing migration of refugees to Europe. Finally, this raises the question, if there are tendencies to stop or at least to reduce the fatal exports.
Nuit Debout: Frankreich gerät in Bewegung!
Authors: Syrovatka Felix
Published: August 2018

France is in motion! In spring 2016, a huge movement against the French labor law reform formed and is since then protesting in the streets and squares all over France. The article examines these struggles and asks, why the movement is currently on the rise. It discusses the struggles in relation to the general crisis dynamics and focuses on the protests of trade unions and civil society (Nuit Debout). Furthermore, the labor law reform of the Valls-Government is being illustrated in the context of the recent French labor market policy and its continuities.
Venezuela: Die „bolivarianische Revolution“ in der Krise
Authors: Tauss Aaron
Published: August 2018

Three years after the death of Hugo Chávez, the “Bolivarian Revolution” in Venezuela has plunged into the deepest crisis in its 17-year history. After winning a two-third majority of Congress in the parliamentary elections late last year, the country´s right-wing opposition is now pushing for the ouster of President Nicolás Maduro via a recall referendum. The main reason for the election results is Venezuela´s deepening socio-economic crisis. Hyperinflation, food shortages, water- supply problems, electricity rationing and rising crime make everyday life increasingly burdensome for the majority of the population. The article argues that Venezuela’s two main economic problems – hyperinflation and shortages - need to be analyzed against the backdrop of the deepening of the extractive and export-oriented model of accumulation under Chavismo, the failure to develop an alternative, non-capitalist economy and the ongoing political destabilization campaign launched by the country´s oligarchy and its international allies.
Zwischen Neo-Fossilismus und „grüner Ökonomie“.
Authors: Wissen Markus
Published: August 2018

Capitalism and the fossilist energy regime have been considered so closely interrelated that a crisis of the latter would inevitably raise a major threat for the former, resulting amongst others in growing geopolitical tensions. In critical (Marxist) debates such a crisis has been conceptualized as “peak oil” or “the end of cheap nature” ( Jason Moore). However, the recent boom of unconventional fossil energies particularly in the USA has put such diagnoses in question. The article analyses recent development trends of the global energy regime. Its main argument is that the crucial problem is not so much the peak of scarce fossil resources. Neither is there simply a rising tension between the capitalist core and its geopolitical competitors for reasons of energy supply. Rather, there are multiple energetic conflicts some of which criss-cross the line between the sphere of U.S. hegemony on the one hand and its competitors like China and Russia on the other. The major energetic threat arises from the socially and environmentally destructive power of the (neo-)fossilist patterns of production and consumption. This threat won’t be overcome by a “greening” of capitalism. Instead, overcoming it requires a fundamental transformation of the mode of producing and consuming energy.
Die Bewegung für Klimagerechtigkeit und Energiedemokratie in Deutschland.
Authors: Sander Henrik
Published: August 2018

This article argues that social movement research must be renewed by a historical-materialist perspective to be able to understand the emergence and effects of the relatively new climate justice movement in Germany. The previous research on NGOs and social movements in climate politics is presented and the recent development of the climate justice movement in Germany is illustrated. In a final step two cases of climate movement campaigns are explained by means of the historical-materialist movement analysis proposed by the author.
Die Strategie der convergence des luttes in Frankreich
Authors: Döll David
Published: August 2018

The movement against the Loi Travail pushes the line of antiausterity and democracy struggles to the center of Europe. This paper reflects on the different steps of the “Convergence des luttes”(Convergence of Struggles) in the context of global movements and the crisis of neoliberal hegemony. It argues for strategic convergences of struggles on a European level. The coming “European left” has to form a transnational project against the neoliberal EU and the nationalist regressions.
Zur Mitte drängt sich alles (Teil 1).
Authors: Kadritzke Ulf
Published: August 2018

The public and scientific discourse about the social structure in Germany is characterized by an absence of class categories and a peculiar attentiveness towards the middle classes - even the misleading term ‘Mittelstand’ is in use. This mode of thinking ‘beyond classes’ is criticized in a historical perspective. We reconstruct how several important socials scientist of the ‘Weimar Republic’ (1919-1933) analyzed the socio-economic status and mentalities of the so called ‘Neuer Mittelstand’ (primarily consisting of private and public employees).These sociologists revealed the clear majority of white collar and service workers as ‘hidden class’. In economic terms they are an essential part of the wage-dependent working class, albeit employed under specific conditions. Their position in the hierarchy of organizations and their (often merely pretended) prestige are the main causes of ‘middle class’ mentalities and their ‘alienation’ from working class values, habits and orientations. Referring to the Marx-related, but modified class studies of the past, the second part of the essay – coming up in the next PROKLA issue - will discuss the shortfalls of theories and conceptions of German middle classes in current sociology and politics, criticising their scientific approach as ‘classignoring’ ideologies.
Der globale Kapitalismus im Ausnahmezustand
Authors: Redaktion PROKLA
Published: August 2018

In recent years, the political development of global capitalism has been accelerating enormously. Catastrophic incidences and new crises demanding our daily attention and reflection are taking turns at rapid pace. As a journal for critical social science and a political project of the left, it has become more and more difficult for PROKLA to keep up with the most recent developments and offer in-depth analyses that are ‘up to date’. With this article, we take up one of the journal’s earlier traditions and publish an extensive discussion held among the editors on this matter. Building on the many contributions to Marxist crisis theory that have been published in PROKLA since the early 1970s, we try to bring seemingly disparate developments together and discuss topics such as the financial crisis of 2008, the rise of new rightwing movements and parties in Europe and the Americas, the aftermath of the Arab Spring, and the devastating effects of eco-imperalism within one framework.
Kapitalistische Krisen mit und ohne systemischer Herausforderung.
Authors: Schmidt Ingo
Published: August 2018

This article draws on Marxist theories of crises, imperialism, and class formation to identify commonalities and differences between the stagnation of the 1930s and today. Its key argument is that the anti-systemic movements that existed in the 1930s and gained ground after the Second World War pushed capitalists to turn from imperialist expansion and rivalry to the deep penetration of domestic markets. By doing so they unleashed strong economic growth that allowed for social compromise without hurting profits. Yet, once labour and other social movements threatened to shift the balance of class power into their favor, capitalist counter-reform began. In its course, global restructuring, and notably the integration of Russia and China into the world market, created space for accumulation. The cause for the current stagnation is that this space has been used up. In the absence of systemic challenges capitalists have little reason to seek a major overhaul of their accumulation strategies that could help to overcome stagnation. Instead they prop up profits at the expense of the subaltern classes even if this prolongs stagnation and leads to sharper social divisions.
Produktivkraft als Versprechen
Authors: Siefkes Christian
Published: August 2018

The ‘Fragment on Machines’ from Marx’s Grundrisse is often cited as an argument that the internal forces of capitalism will lead to its doom. But the argument that the progressive reduction of labor must doom capitalism lacks a proper foundation, as a comparison with the ‘Schemes of Reproduction’ given in Capital II shows. The latter, however, aren’t fully convincing either. In reality, more depends on the private consumption of capitalists than either model recognizes. Ultimately, most can be made of the ‘Fragment on Machines’ by reading it not as an exposure of capitalism’s internal contractions, but as a discussion of a possible communist future where labor (or work) will play but a minor role.
Zur Mitte drängt sich alles (Teil 2).
Authors: Kadritzke Ulf
Published: August 2018

In public opinion and the social sciences, German post-war society has been interpreted as a ‘society beyond classes’, regardless of the fact that the class structure had not changed to a significant degree since the times of the Weimar Republic. This positive self-image was scientifically confirmed by Theodor Geiger’s study Society in the melting pot (1949) and Helmut Schelsky’s concept of a Leveled middle class society (1953). Even though in the last decades the level of inequality has risen, the mainstream of social and economic research in Germany keeps focusing on the income, living conditions and ‘anxieties’ of a widened and vaguely defined middle class – instead of reflecting the class structure of contemporary society as a whole. This kind of research and sociological thinking tends to focus on the distribution of wealth rather the causes of inequality stemming from the capitalist mode of production. Criticizing the dominant conception of middle classes on the basis of current examples, the author underlines the importance of a classrelated concept of modern capitalist society. The main groups of employees, even the more qualified ones, belong to the majority class of wage earners, not to an opaque ‘middle class’ unduly mixed of small business people, freelancers and dependent labour force. What is needed is a closer look at the changes in class structure and the growing influence of gender, habitus, milieus and ‘ways of life’ – but not at all the ideological and political segregation between the allegedly ‘old’ working class and the allegedly ‘new’ middle classes.
Kybernetik und Kontrolle
Authors: Raffetseder Eva-Maria , Schaupp Simon , Staab Philipp
Published: August 2018

This paper analyses algorithmic control in labour processes as cybernetization of production. It starts from two empirical cases, the process management system Salesforce and sensor-based feedback systems for industrial production. In both cases, we conducted interviews with managers, developers and workers. From this basis, we argue that feedback-based cybernetic control constitutes a new quality of domination in the context of capitalist labour. The central vision put forward by the steering personnel interviewed by us is one of controlled self-organization of labour processes. This vision in turn is grounded on the elimination of cognitive planning and hierarchical order and therefore contrasted with human reflexivity on the level of the worker as well as the manager. Contrasting visions of cybernetic control with theories of reflexive action, we argue that cybernetics can be understood as the attempt to solve the “reflexivity problem” of modern control systems.
Reelle Subsumtion und Insubordination im Zeitalter der digitalen Maschinerie
Authors: Barthel Georg , Rottenbach Jan
Published: August 2018

The article presents the results of ongoing co-research at the fulfilment centre of Amazon in Leipzig. It demonstrates exemplarily that despotic forms of labour are a central feature also of digital capitalism. Amazon is implementing various strategies of real subsumption to get the workers functioning as a senso-motoric part of the digital machinery in order to exploit their labour power. It is monopolizing the knowledge about the production process, setting up the FC as a panoptic factory and producing an internal public. This however encounters moments of insubordination resulting in daily micro-conflicts over working conditions and capitalist commands. Workers try to withdraw themselves from the despotism of the factory, use primitive forms of sabotage and develop a counter-public.
Kritik der Politischen Ökonomie im 21. Jahrhundert.
Authors: Büttner Hans-Peter
Published: August 2018

While the majority of the scientific community holds Marxian Value and Price Theory to be internally inconsistent because of the so-called “transformation problem”, these claims can be sufficiently refuted. The key to the solution of the “transformation problem” is quite simple, so this contribution, because it requires the rejection of simultanism and physicalism, which represent the genuine method of neoclassical economics, a method that is completely incompatible with Marxian Critique of Political Economy. Outside of the iron cage of neoclassical equilibrium economics, Marxian ‘Capital’ can be reconstructed without neoclassical “pathologies” and offers us a whole new world of analytical tools for a critical theory of capitalist societies and its dynamics.
Becoming the Nuclear-Front-End
Authors: Schukalla Patrick
Published: August 2018

Uranium mining often escapes the attention of debates around the nuclear industries. The chemical elements’ representations are focused on the nuclear reactor. The article explores what I refer to as becoming the nuclear front – the uranium mining frontier’s expansion to Tanzania, its historical entanglements and current state. The geographies of the nuclear industries parallel dominant patterns and the unevenness of the global divisions of labour, resource production and consumption. Clearly related to the developments and expectations in the field of atomic power production, uranium exploration and the gathering of geological knowledge on resource potentiality remains a peripheral realm of the technopolitical perceptions of the nuclear fuel chain. Seen as less spectacular and less associated with high-technology than the better-known elements of the nuclear industry the article thus aims to shine light on the processes that pre-figure uranium mining by looking at the example of Tanzania.
Diesseits der Dematerialisierung
Authors: Groneweg Merle , Pilgrim Hannah , Reckordt Michael
Published: August 2018

Resource demands of Industry 4.0. In contrast to promises of dematerialization and resource efficiency, digitalized production – also known as Industry 4.0 – and the technologies required for this digitalization will create specific raw material demands. The article introduces the dominant discourses of Industry 4.0 and points out the interlinkages between new technologies, increasing raw materials demands and the social and ecological consequences of mining, particularly in the Gloal South. Furthermore, it demands a democratic and globally just resource politics.
Die Naturalisierung des Wachstums in Produktion und Konsumtion
Authors: Koch Max
Published: August 2018

This paper analyses the hegemony of the growth paradigm through the example of its naturalisation in capitalist production and consumption relations. Applying a combination of theoretical elements from the Marxian tradition, the Regulation approach and Bourdieusian sociology, emphasis is placed on how the growth imperative is reflected in people’s minds and bodies. It becomes hegemonic because it appears to be the natural way of steering economy and society so that all people – including working people – benefit from the continuation of growth. To overcome the growth paradigm, activists would need to build on a crisis of the ‘objective’ structures of economy and society.