Work Samples
THIRD WAVE FEMINISM?
In the same way that third wave feminism was denied to exist, currently, fourth wave feminism is facing the equivalent dilemma. As a result, there is a complete lack of academic literature surrounding fourth wave feminism, largely due to its disputed existence and its misrepresentation. Consequently, this essay will assume that all the new terms coined to describe recent feminist movements, such as cyber feminism, will eventually fall under the term of fourth wave feminism. Gardner defines the fourth wave of feminism as “tech-savvy and gender sophisticated…young women coming of age in the 80s and 90s…utilising social media for activism online and offline… offering a platform for any feminists to identify themselves as such…and covering issues such as sex work, transgenderism and male feminists” (Baumgardner, 2011, p.13). Baumgardner goes on to state that as a result of globalisation and media and technological advances, waves of change are coming with a growing frequency and are all part of the same movement known as feminism (Baumgardner, 2011).
Pythia (2005) argues that feminisms fourth wave can be characterized by a shift towards spiritually and social justice reminiscent of the era of the civil rights movement. She goes on to state that fourth wave feminists are “exploring a new feminine paradigm” in terms of power that is founded on tolerance and mutuality which are values that they see as crucial in curing the global issue of inequality (Pythia, 2005).
Online activism that encompasses much of the fourth wave of feminism is largely driven by technological savvy young people which has the ability to remain predominantly unnoticed by older generation second and third wave feminist (Munro, 2015). Therefore, academics who write and publish literature on feminism are arguably, mostly, in that older feminist category and as a result fourth wave feminism is notably missing from academic literature (Munro, 2015).
Schuster (2013) is a New Zealand based academic who researches the online activity of feminists and feminist groups. Whilst she doesn’t state that there is a fourth wave of feminism; her research points to a new wave of feminism that is facilitated online using new media and produces both online and offline political gains which she argues is invisible feminism (Schuster, 2013). Schuster (2013) states that online activism within new media is a key part of feminism as it provides a platform for young women to share their feminist perspective and dialogue. On the other hand, online activism amongst feminism is becoming a powerful tool yet is rendering them invisible to the public and older politically active feminists as they may not use the internet and social media platforms, thus, creating a generational divide amongst feminists (Schuster, 2013). Nonetheless, Schuster credits the “invisible feminists” with the ability to utilise their technology savvy to culminate in offline meetings and demonstrations (Schuster, 2013) which contradicts her point about them being invisible.
A further term used to describe “internet feminists” which could be characterised as the fourth feminist wave is cyber feminism. Cyber feminism is a term created by Sadie Plant in 1994 to define the effort of feminists in the areas of critiquing, exploiting and generally theorizing cyberspace, the internet and new media (Consalvo, 2015). A critical argument of cyber feminism is that it leads to the empowerment of women through the increased knowledge of new media and technologies (Consalvo, 2015) Additionally, cyber feminism enables women who do not necessarily identify themselves as feminists to exploit the opportunities in which knowledge and application of technology offers them (Consalvo, 2015). Cyber feminism aims to explain the interrelated nature of the internet and gender combined with the belief that cyberspace is the future of feminism (Schulte, 2011).
The EUPM BiH was the first EU crisis management mission implemented and it had glaring and complex teething issues. Solana (2013) establishes that the success of the mission can be seen with it being used as the framework for its future interventions. Nonetheless, he states that this mission was a reaction following the EU’s inablility to deal with the catastrophic break up of Yugoslavia. Perhaps if the EU had been more proactive in its dealing with this conflict and more organised, the fall out could have been reduced; however, this assumption is all very well and good in hindsight and perhaps points to a more general failing of the EU as an international security actor in its earlier days.
However this mission is judged, it is noteworthy that BiH is still on the periphery of the EU and becoming a fully functioning member looks as distant as it did 10 years ago. Both Bosnian politicians and its population are frustrated with the outcomes of EU intervention; 88.2% still support EU membership for BiH, yet 69.8% are not pleased with the speed of this integration
The problems of this being the first mission is backed up by Brljavac (2012) when he contends that the EU and BiH should have had a more inclusive model in what is a segregated country. It is this cohesiveness, he states, would have led to a more inclusive approach and policy with the EUPM BiH. Furthering to this Brljavac continues that the EU is ‘deeply divided and inchorent’ (p.4) which has done little to bridge the political issues within BiH. This issue is directly linked to how Helly (2013) describes the mission being schizphrenic in its approach; with so many different actors and voices being prevalent in the EUPM BiH mission, its difficult to see how it could achieve the lofty goals it set for the mission. This incoherence and bifurcation severely hampered the mission and was a lesson that must be learnt for future missions.
MEDIA REGULATION IN RUSSIA
This essay aims to explore media regulation in Russia. The first section will look at the structure of media in Russia as well as the laws and legalities of media regulation. The second part will encompass a
To get an idea of media regulation in Russia, a quote will be used from the Russian Cultural Minister, Vladimir Medinsky, in reference to state funding of media outlets, he states that “all flowers should grow, but we will only water the ones we like.” (Beaumont-Thomas, 2015).
According to the BBC, (2014), Russian media is dominated by channels that are either run directly or indirectly by the state or companies with extremely close links to the Kremlin. For most Russians, TV is the main news source (BBC, 2014). To gather an opinion on how much control the state has over the media in Russia, one must examine the number of channels in which people are able to view on the TV. This number is three. Two of those (Channel One and Russia One) are state owned and controlled, whilst the third (NTV) is owned and controlled by Gazprom which is a state controlled private company (BBC, 2014).
Russian Radio is largely the same as TV with an abundance of state controlled stations. Although, since the collapse of the Soviet Union, there is now an increase in the number of stations and they are now allowed to have political leanings as long as they do not openly criticise the Kremlin as this will lead to them being shut down (BBC, 2014).
However, in theory, there is no official media regulation in Russia. Media outlets are expected to perform self-regulation with a mixture of soft laws issued by the state (Vasilyev, 2010). As a result of this, there is a complete lack of diversity in the ownership of the main media outlets in Russia. The lack of diversity in the ownership of media outlets is something that the Russian state clearly views as a good thing since they have recently introduced a number of laws banning foreign investors from holding more than a 20% stake in any media outlet (Luhn, 2014). As a result of this, media outlets, even with foreign investors are controlled by the state because the limit of 20% ownership ensures this.
Simons, (2010, p.46), states that a problem when considering responsibility and transparency in Russian mass media is one of ownership. He contends that by law, the owner of a mass media outlet does not have to declare their ownership. Rather, they can appoint a representative known as a founder (Simons, 2010, p.46). This means that there is a potential for the misleading of the media consumers. This is because the information put out to the people via the mass media could be influenced by the owner, who could have reasons to restrict or censor certain information whilst the media consumers (the people) may not know the identity of the owner.