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Missing finance in social impact bond research? A bibliometric overview between past and future research

This paper provides a bibliometric review of 156 articles published between 2011 and 2021 on social impact bonds (SIBs). We identified five research streams, namely studies that: (i) place the origins of SIBs in the neo-liberalism framework; (ii) consider SIBs as an evolution of the new public management approach; (iii) focus on conceptualizing SIBs as an impact investment approach rooted in the social finance landscape; (iv) look at SIBs as a funding source for social entrepreneurship; and (v) detect an emerging phenomenon labeled as sustainable financial partnerships for the SDGs. Our results suggest that the current literature is strongly based on those that we have defined as a sort of UK influence, which is dominating the scientific perspective and the current use of SIBs, and that there is still less “finance-based” research in this field. We conclude by proposing areas for future research.

"The Soros Center was a Perfect Machine": An Exchange between Aaron Moulton and Geert Lovink

The following exchange, over email, between Dutch media theorist and Internet critic Geert Lovink and Aaron Moulton occurred on the occasion of the exhibition The Influencing Machine at Galeria Nicodim in Bucharest, which closed on April 20, 2019. The show, curated by Aaron Moulton, was an anthropological investigation into the macroview of the Soros Center for Contemporary Art (SCCA), an unprecedented network of art centers that existed across twenty Eastern European capitals throughout the 1990s. A survey of historical and contemporary artwork that explored ideas of influence, revolution, colonialism, and cultural exorcism, the Bucharest exhibition included a large archive covering the SCCA network that allowed first-time research into the institutionalized strategies of curatorial practice in the early years of the SCCA network, trajectories of influence that lead to specific kinds of cultural production.

Detech technology who participates

In this article it is argued that we will no longer be able to spare the elephant in the room, technology, which has gradually evolved into technocracy, governing our day-to-day behaviour without being consciously or politically chosen. We do this on a large scale and meanwhile worldwide. For example, who knows the Jevons Paradox, dating back to 1865? Or the Khazzoom Brookes postulate? The rebound effect perhaps? All observations that showed that technologically more efficient applications irrevocably lead to an increase in the use of resources and thus to a decrease in ecology and ecological diversity. In other words, technology and sustainability are in a paradoxical relationship (Jason spoke of an oxymoron, so two terms that exclude each other, such as an uncrowned king, or the chaos that reigns). Unbridled technological growth, in every conceivable direction (often greenwashed under the heading of necessary innovation), is not sustainabl

The intervention in Libya: "The responsibility to Protect" as a new norm?

In maart 2011 dreigde Muammer Gaddafi van Libya duizenden onschuldige burgers van de stad Benghazi uit hun huizen te halen om hen te vermoorden. De Veiligheidsraad van de Verenigde Naties verwees de situatie door naar het Internationaal Strafhof in Den Haag, dwong een no-flyzone af en gaf de NAVO een mandaat om burgers te beschermen with all necessary means, met de uitzondering van grondtroepen. Deze operatie was snel, robuust en effectief. Het principe van The Responsibility to Protect (R2P) -de verantwoordelijkheid van de internationale gemeenschap om genocide, misdaden tegen de menselijkheid, etnische zuivering en oorlogsmisdaden te voorkomen en te stoppen- werd voor het eerst volledig toegepast. Is R2P daarmee een norm geworden? Dit onderzoek plaatst de casus Libië in het model van de "Norm Life Cycle" (de levenscyclus van een norm) van de Constructivistische theoretici Finnemore en Sikkink (1998). Libië toont aan dat R2P nu een tipping point (omslagpunt) heeft bereikt, en zich van de fase norm emergence (opkomende norm) naar de fase norm cascade heeft verplaatst. Er is echter een spanning ontstaan: de terughoudendheid van de Veiligheidsraad om R2P toe te passen in Syrië (2012) wijst de andere kant uit. Er is dus nog een lange weg te gaan, voordat R2P als een internalised norm (vanzelfsprekende norm) kan worden beschouwd. ABSTRACT In March 2011, Muammar Gaddafi of Libya threatened to pull thousands of civilian protesters in the city of Benghazi out of their homes and kill them. The Security Council of the United Nations referred the crisis to the International Criminal Court, imposed a no-fly zone and provided NATO with a mandate to protect civilians by all necessary means, with the exception of ground troops. This operation was fast, robust and effective. It also marked the first time that the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) principle was fully implemented, being the responsibility of the international community to prevent and respond to genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes if the state in question is not able or not willing to protect its citizens itself. Has R2P become a new norm? This study situates the case of Libya in the 'Norm Life Cycle' model of Constructivist theorists Finnemore and Sikkink (1998). It suggests that R2P has reached a tipping point and has moved from the stage of norm emergence to the stage of norm cascade. However, a certain tension still exists: the reluctance of the Security Council to implement R2P again in the crisis in Syria (2012)points in the opposite direction. This suggests there is still a long way to go before R2P becomes an internalised norm in the international community.

Op het punt van breken? Verzet, loyaliteit en de stille vlucht van sociaal werkers

Artistic Educational Commoning as a Laboratory of the Real

This article presents and discusses an extracurricular, co-constructed programme: “The Catalyst Club” as a form of Artistic Educational Commoning (AEC). Having been developed as part of a PhD research at Minerva Art Academy (Groningen, TheNetherlands), The Catalyst Club (TCC) explored new perspectives on the education of artists and designers in a globalized world and created alternative modes of operating in higher art education. It brought together students, alumni, teachers from a range of disciplines, and external participants. During developing TCC, the author occupied a dual role as researcher and participant, working together with others in an artistic co-creative process. TCC drew on and developed the methods relating to Collaborative Autoethnography, Participatory Action Research and Artistic Research. This study presents AEC as a communal effort to build spaces for learning and experimentation. They are created through interaction and cooperation, based on social relations and the production of shared values. As such it can offer a counterbalance to the extensive individualisation, instrumentalization, and commodification of communities in higher art education. The article formulates some recommendations on how AEC can reconnect the education of artists and designers with the role of the arts in wider technological, societal, and political contexts.