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August 21, 2025

The UK Space Agency has been absorbed into the science department. The potential effects are still unclear

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Bleddyn Bowen, Associate Professor in Astropolitics and Space Warfare, School of Government and International Affairs (SGIA), Durham University

The UK Space Agency (UKSA) has become part of the government’s Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT). The announcement was made on August 20 2025 by Chris Bryant MP, minister of state for data protection and telecoms.

Cutting red tape and duplicative bureaucracy within DSIT and UKSA seems to be the main rationale in the press release – that and bringing “together the people who shape space policy and those who deliver it”.

Though it sounds like a demotion for UKSA, what the changes mean in practice for the crafting of UK space policy, and the direction of UK space policy itself, remain uncertain. More importantly, rearranging the deckchairs of DSIT and UKSA will not resolve the chronic problems facing British space policy.

The first problem is that UKSA has lacked a clear identity and responsibility over policy, regulation and research within civil space activities. It is not like Nasa or the European Space Agency (Esa) – UKSA does not operate satellites, nor conduct major research and development projects by itself.

UKSA has competed with the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) over licensing and regulatory powers for satellite launches from the UK, which the CAA has possessed since the mid-2010s.

On research, UKSA acted mostly as a research council, rivalling the work traditionally performed by the UK Research and Innovation’s and Science and Technology Funding Council (STFC).

STFC apportions funding for space science and research for universities and industry. UKSA is also the main point of contact for distributing Esa funding for British industry and university contributions to Europe-wide space projects.

UK space policymaking

UK space policy has always been an interdepartmental and Cabinet Office concern, and UKSA has traditionally only factored into consultations on the regulatory and civil space research dimensions of UK space policies. Since 2021, DSIT has taken on more space policy responsibilities regarding industrial strategy, further eroding a unique role for UKSA.

UKSA therefore has not carved out a clear niche that other departments or executive agencies cannot already claim competency within. The UK government’s position that duplication needs to be addressed is not an unreasonable one. The devil is in the details – which are missing at this time.

It is hard to say whether the bureaucratic changes will be better or worse for the creation and implementation of civil UK space policy and space science research.

The optics of this move can be easily seen and inaccurately spun as a negative in cancelling the UK space programme. No actual space projects are being cancelled.

Saxavord is one of several launch sites under development in the UK.
AlanMorris / Shutterstock

The UK government has clearly recognised this, stressing that UKSA will retain a distinctive and recognisable branding in its new role, which has been effective at home and abroad in space science, industry promotion, and facilitating high-profile projects.

The second chronic problem that pre-dates UKSA – and will continue regardless of the musical chairs in Whitehall – is the lack of a coherent, joined-up national UK space programme with the funding to match. UKSA could never resolve these problems.

For example, the UK government has long pursued a policy of encouraging small satellite launch companies, yet has never allocated the funds necessary to deliver a tangible capability within any reasonable schedule, nor has it created a national UK satellite programme (civil or military) tailored to a high latitude launch profile, which could in turn create concrete demand for such a launcher.

After 15 years of drift, UK launch has gone from being ahead of the curve in Europe (with UK-based companies such as Skyrora and Orbex) to falling behind France, Sweden, or Spain as possibly the first new European small satellite launch providers.

This is a basic lesson in space programme design that seems lost on generations of British policymakers, but one that established satellite launching countries have taken to heart.

Modestly sized space powers have focused on crucial long-term national capability programmes and stumped up the cash for them, such as France’s Spot or India’s Insat programme. Such priorities are not evident in the UK across the civil and military space sectors.

As I explained to the UK House of Lords Select Committee’s UK Engagement with Space inquiry earlier this year, British space policy spreads out too little money in too many directions on small research projects rather than bold national infrastructural space programmes.

The government must also consider the security and military dimensions of space, which cannot exclude UKSA or the civil, industrial and research dimensions as they in turn provide the capability and know how to build British space systems.

The Boris Johnson government formed the National Space Council to drive and coordinate these partnerships, yet it was abolished by the Truss government and reinstated during the Sunak government. There have been no announcements from the Starmer government yet on any meetings of the council. This bureaucratic chaos has not helped efforts to cohere a strategic direction in space.

While the Ministry of Defence claims it wishes to invest in all manner of new space capabilities in the 2025 Strategic Defence Review, it cannot do so without a large injection of new funding, far beyond the billions already allocated for the military satellite Skynet 6 and defence satellite system ISTARI. More than funding, a clear decision on a specific capability is needed, rather than doing a little bit of everything.

Developing one kind of new satellite constellation, such as radar imagery for military operational needs – numbering in dozens of new satellites – would be the biggest undertaking for the MoD in space since the Skynet satellite communications system.

Doing the same for other capabilities at the same time, such as optical imagery, signals intelligence, or laser communications relays, would be as big a challenge again, and perhaps too much to take on at the same time.

For space policy wonks, academic researchers and the space industry, this rearrangement will not change much in the short term – for good and bad. UKSA was never fully independent to begin with, so the changes are likely to be more esoteric, subtle and bureaucratic.

That would require courageous policy decisions at the top of government to deliver a coherent, focused, joined-up and fully funded UK civil and defence space programmes.

These are the author’s own views and not that of any institution or organisation.

– ref. The UK Space Agency has been absorbed into the science department. The potential effects are still unclear – https://theconversation.com/the-uk-space-agency-has-been-absorbed-into-the-science-department-the-potential-effects-are-still-unclear-263563

August 21, 2025

Let ‘performative males’ be – gender has always been a performance and our need for authenticity is bad for us

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Alexander Stoffel, Lecturer in International Politics, Queen Mary University of London

Authenticity, everyone’s looking for it, yet it seems nowhere to be found. From the political arena to pop culture to relationships, our obsessive search for authenticity is a symptom of its absence.

We have many terms to describe insincerity and inauthenticity in the age of social media. There’s virtue signalling, which is presenting yourself as aligning with an opinion, cause or social justice movement in order to look good while not really caring about it. There’s also queerbaiting, a term used to describe a person (often a celebrity) who acts as though they were queer without publicly identifying as such, often to attract an LGBTQ+ audience. And, most recently, the trope of the “performative male” seems to have sprung up.

You might catch a performative male ostentatiously reading Sally Rooney in public, while sipping a matcha latte and wearing wired headphones and a pair of Birkenstocks with socks. His profile picture on dating apps might show him holding a baby, and he probably likes to talk about his dog. His interests, gestures and style are all meant to convey a progressive political sensibility and an artistic aesthetic.

In a world where Andrew Tate is a role model and young men are being radicalised to the right, a guy quoting the black feminist scholar bell hooks over a kombucha feels like a minor miracle to many. So why are people online being snarky about men attempting to embody a reconstructed masculinity?

Dating today can feel like a mix of endless swipes, red flags and shifting expectations. From decoding mixed signals to balancing independence with intimacy, relationships in your 20s and 30s come with unique challenges. Love IRL is the latest series from Quarter Life that explores it all.

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Well, if you trust the pages of Cosmopolitan or The New York Times, it’s all “just” a performance. And what’s worse, these men are actively trying to manipulate women into believing that they’d actually be caring and progressive partners.

This raises the question: What are we asking of men exactly? That they go back to posting gym selfies and Jordan Peterson quotes? I’m not convinced that it’s “embarrassing” when straight men try to appear as “good guys”. In fact, men reading feminist literature, openly expressing their feminine side and embracing caregiving roles all strike me as pretty hopeful things.

Now, some might say that this is not what these men are really like. But treating every stranger with deep suspicion is an existentially depressing way to go through life. Our default position shouldn’t be to relate to men as manipulators. This puts them in an impossible position.

Others might insist that a man’s social media is only about keeping up an appearance. But of course it is. That’s exactly what social media and dating apps are: self-branding tools. The irony is that we’re expected to create an authentic yet also rigorously curated presentation of ourselves.

It makes sense to complain about how shallow social media is. It makes less sense to blame individual men for social media’s shallowness. Social media highlights what has always been true about gender.

Anyone who’s ever taken a gender studies class will have heard the line, “gender is performative”. The insight here is that there is no such thing as an “authentic male”. There are only different performances of masculinity. What people are commenting on when they call someone a “performative male” is simply a different kind of performance that is less traditional and less naturalised.

We should also ask ourselves what kind of culture we create when we see the world as teeming with performative males, queerbaiters and virtue signallers. Assuming every man with a tote bag is a con artist breeds a culture of surveillance, paranoia, distrust, and the creepy belief that strangers owe us details of their private lives.

The notion that most men are just fraudsters, cynically posing as well-intentioned to deceive women, creates a toxic public environment. Its effects become most visible when celebrities like Kit Connor are forced to come out to dispel suspicions about the authenticity of their gender or sexuality.

This online authenticity discourse is all the more insidious when it cloaks itself in the language of feminism while mocking performances of non-traditional masculinity. In this sense, it shares features of what gender scholar Asa Seresin has termed “heteropessimism”: a way of voicing legitimate frustrations with heterosexuality, dating and men that looks progressive but does nothing to address them.

Desire is always an uncertain business. We find it difficult and unsettling because it sits somewhere between fantasy and reality, between appearance and truth, between representation and essence. But writing off all “good guys” as manipulators won’t do away with this difficulty. We can’t stop men from performing. At least let them audition.

Alexander Stoffel does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Let ‘performative males’ be – gender has always been a performance and our need for authenticity is bad for us – https://theconversation.com/let-performative-males-be-gender-has-always-been-a-performance-and-our-need-for-authenticity-is-bad-for-us-263478

August 21, 2025

By ‘focusing on the family,’ James Dobson helped propel US evangelicals back into politics – making the Religious Right into the cultural force it is today

Source: The Conversation – USA (3) – By Richard Flory, Executive Director, Center for Religion and Civic Culture, USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences

James Dobson, founder of Focus on the Family, participates in the National Day of Prayer ceremony at the White House on May 3, 2007. Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

For decades, one name was ubiquitous in American evangelical homes: Focus on the Family. A media empire with millions of listeners and readers, its messages about parenting, marriage and politics seemed to reach every conservative Christian church and school.

And one man’s name was nearly synonymous with Focus on the Family: James Dobson.

Dobson, a primary figure of the Religious Right who died on Aug. 21, 2025, was born in 1936, when conservative Protestant Christianity was a far cry from what it is today. As a sociologist of religion who has studied American evangelicalism for 30 years, I believe Dobson’s influence and moral authority were instrumental in transforming the Religious Right into the powerful cultural and political force it has been for half a century.

A household name

Dobson earned a doctorate in psychology from the University of Southern California, where he taught for several years. In 1970, he published “Dare to Discipline,” a book encouraging parents to use corporal punishment to instill unquestioned respect for authority in their children.

“Dare to Discipline” arrived at a time when many evangelicals were alarmed about how their children were being influenced by “secular” American culture. The book was updated in 1992 and reissued several times, and Dobson’s introduction to a 2018 version claimed that the book has sold over 3.5 million copies. “Dare to Discipline” became an important source for Christian families seeking advice rooted in a “biblical” understanding of family, parental authority and child development – and it made Dobson a household name.

Capitalizing on that success, Dobson founded Focus on the Family in 1977. The organization’s signature radio program took his message about family and faith virtually anywhere people could go, and grew increasingly political. By 1995, Focus on the Family had a budget of more than US$100 million, and by 2008, the radio program had aired on over 3,000 stations in 160 countries.

Eight adults in business attire sit on chairs in a circle, heads bowed, in the middle of an open-floor office. — Focus on the Family employees in Colorado Springs pray during a morning devotion in 2004, before listening to the James Dobson radio program.
Craig F. Walker/The Denver Post via Getty Images

The primary theme throughout Dobson’s radio program and publications was that “family values” were under attack by a godless society embracing abortion, gay rights and gender equality. His views hearkened back to “Dare to Discipline”: Authoritarian patriarchal families with distinct gender roles for men and women would preserve the family and the future of the country.

From the family to the Supreme Court

Dobson left Focus on the Family in 2010 and founded the Dr. James Dobson Family Institute, originally named Family Talk. He and like-minded hosts dispensed folksy advice, along with guests well known to their audience. But they also addressed explicitly political issues, such as opposing policies that support abortion, same-sex marriage and some protections for LGBTQ+ people that they believe conflict with their religious liberty.

In addition, Dobson helped found other powerful evangelical organizations working toward the Religious Right’s ideological and political goals, such as the Family Research Council and the legal group Alliance Defending Freedom, which has supported several high-profile Supreme Court cases.

In 2022 and 2023, the Supreme Court made three rulings that advance long-held goals of the Christian Right. A slim majority overturned Roe v. Wade, the decision which established the constitutional right to an abortion in 1973. The ruling in a Colorado case, 303 Creative LLC vs. Elenis, determined that business owners could not be compelled to create messages that conflict with their “sincerely held beliefs” – meaning, in this case, that a wedding website designer could refuse same-sex clients because of her religious beliefs. And the court continued to soften limits on using state funding for students at religious schools.

Attorneys from the Alliance Defending Freedom worked on the abortion case and 303 Creative. The group submitted an amicus brief in favor of using state money for religious instruction in the third case, Carson v. Makin.

Retreat and reemergence

The roots of contemporary “evangelicalism” trace back to the Protestant fundamentalist movement that emerged in the early 20th century. Ever since, the movement has opposed ideas that it believes could undermine the core of America as a Christian nation.

In the wake of the Russian Revolution, for example, fundamentalists identified “Bolshevism” as a threat to Christian America. Today, a century later, some Christian conservatives criticize many types of history education and diversity programs as “neo-Marxist” or “cultural Marxism.”

Conservative Protestant groups have not always been such major political players, however. Around the turn of the 20th century, evangelical institutions like the Moody Bible Institute in Chicago and the Bible Institute of Los Angeles, now called Biola University, focused on individual faith and Bible training. Personal faith was promoted as the engine for social change and resistance to “un-Christian” ideas and practices, not political advocacy.

The famous Scopes Trial, the 1925 case that pitched Biblical teachings about creation against the theory of evolution, prompted some fundamentalist groups to retreat from public affairs and politics. Following Scopes, evangelicals established broad networks of their own independent churches, K-12 schools, universities and media organizations – including publishers and electronic media – thus creating a subculture within which to worship and raise their children.

Yet these organizations also laid the groundwork for what would finally emerge in the late 1970s as the Religious Right – with leaders like Dobson, televangelist Jerry Falwell and pastor and novelist Tim LaHaye.

‘One nation, under God’

Dobson’s influence will continue through his writings and the organizations he founded and influenced. In particular, his legacy can be seen in conservative evangelicals’ emphasis on the “traditional” or “biblical” family, defined as a married mother, father and children. He long promoted a gender hierarchy in marriage, with the husband being in “authority” over wife and children, and viewed LGBTQ+ rights as a threat to the family and to the nation.

Rows of people hold hands and raise them up as they assemble in a baseball stadium. — James Dobson spoke at a 2004 event in Seattle where approximately 20,000 people gathered to support defining marriage as between a man and a woman.
Ron Wurzer/Getty Images

This conception of the family has found its way into most evangelical institutions. More broadly, within the conservative movement, the patriarchal family is understood as the authentic expression of God’s law and is often viewed as the ultimate model for social institutions – including a Christian nation.

Numerous fundamentalists and evangelicals have argued that evangelical Christianity should be the true basis for a “Christian America.” What distinguishes Dobson’s approach was how he adapted Christian nationalism, framing it as a crucial issue for parents and families: translating ideas about Godly societies into guidance on “proper” child rearing and child development. His focus on the family as the foundation of Christian civilization mobilized millions of American evangelicals politically – on a scale that previous leaders never approached.

Richard Flory receives funding from the John Templeton Foundation, the Lilly Endowment, and the John Randolph and Dora Haynes Foundation.

– ref. By ‘focusing on the family,’ James Dobson helped propel US evangelicals back into politics – making the Religious Right into the cultural force it is today – https://theconversation.com/by-focusing-on-the-family-james-dobson-helped-propel-us-evangelicals-back-into-politics-making-the-religious-right-into-the-cultural-force-it-is-today-206180

August 21, 2025

Enslaved Africans, an uprising and an ancient farming system in Iraq: study sheds light on timelines

Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Peter J. Brown, Honorary Fellow in Archaeology, Durham University

Written accounts tell the story of the Zanj rebellion – a slave revolt that took place in the late 9th century in southern Iraq. Some of the rebels were enslaved Africans working in various sectors of the local economy.

Thousands of ridges and canals still stand today across a floodplain in southern Iraq. They’ve long been believed to be the remains of a massive agricultural system built by these enslaved people. Creating them, and farming here, could have been what drove the rebellion that’s often thought to have led to the rapid decline of the historic city of Basra and the local economy.

For the first time, our archaeological study offers a firmer timeline for when farming occurred across this landscape. This also allows an insight into how the Zanj rebellion affected the region.

We dated four of the 7,000 abandoned ridge features which cover a large swathe of the Shatt al-Arab floodplain, attesting to a period of agricultural expansion.

Our study finds that this agricultural system was in use for far longer than was previously assumed, calling into question the impact of the rebellion on farming and the local economy.

Our findings enhance our knowledge of the landscape history of southern Iraq and draw attention to the historical significance of landscape features which have often been overlooked.

The secret of the abandoned ridges

Abandoned and eroding earthworks litter the floodplain of the Shatt al-Arab – the river forming at the confluence of the Tigris and Euphrates. This flows through southern Iraq out into the Gulf and the Indian Ocean.

Most noticeably, groups of massive, raised, linear ridge features, some of which extend for over a kilometre, are arranged in regular formations. Among these features, the remains of dried-up canals and smaller, adjoining, secondary water channels can be traced.

Today, agriculture in the floodplain is restricted to the band roughly within 5km of the river. But the abandoned features relate to farming in the past across a much larger area. While we don’t know exactly what was grown, cereals like barley or wheat, dates or sugarcane are the most likely crops.

Accounts from travellers who visited the area, as well as historical maps, indicate that the modern agricultural pattern has existed, essentially unchanged, at least since the 17th century. So, the features we see in the landscape today must have been constructed, in use, and abandoned in an earlier period.

New scientific evidence for the dating of these features helps us to understand when this occurred and the historical circumstances around this phase of agricultural expansion.

In 2022, we excavated small trenches into the top of four of the ridges. This allowed us to extract soil samples from their cores. Using a method called optically stimulated luminescence dating, individual grains of soil could be analysed. This allows the length of time since these grains were exposed to sunlight to be calculated. As our samples came from inside the ridge features, where they would have been permanently hidden from the sun, these samples should give the date when the soil was originally deposited.

The Zanj rebellion

Until now, no significant fieldwork had been carried out to investigate these features. However, these traces of pre-modern farming have often been linked with one particular historical episode – but without concrete evidence. Documents from the early Islamic period (from about the mid 7th to mid 13th century) provide a detailed account of a slave revolt in southern Iraq during the late 9th century, between 869 and 883.

The Zanj Rebellion saw large groups of slaves rebel against the forces of the Abbasid Caliphate – which ruled most of the Islamic world. The rebellion included violent episodes, including the sacking of the nearby city of Basra and clashes with the forces of the caliph sent to suppress the revolt. This threw southern Iraq into turmoil.

An illustration of a ship with African men captive, some boarding boats as men in tunics try to control them and another ship approaches. — An Arab slave ship in the Red Sea in the 1500s or 1600s.
New York Public Library

The identity of the Zanj people involved in the uprising has been a focus for debate. “Zanj” is an Arabic term used throughout the medieval period to refer to the Swahili coast of east Africa, though it was also used to refer to Africa more generally. As a result, the Zanj have typically been regarded collectively as enslaved people transported to southern Iraq from east Africa.

While the evidence for slaving traffic between Africa and Iraq during the early Islamic period is uncontroversial, the scale of the trade has been questioned. Based on genetic evidence, and the logistics of shipping large numbers to the Gulf, it has been argued that the majority of African slaves at the time of the revolt came from west and western central Africa via Saharan trade routes, rather than coastal east Africa. Importantly, the people involved in the revolt were not all African slaves – some seem to have been local farmers – so the rebels were a mixed group.

We know little about what the group known as the Zanj were doing before the 869 revolt. Their presence in Iraq is documented for centuries beforehand – smaller scale rebellions occurred in the late 7th century but only a few details are available about the lives of the slaves before the 9th century rebellion.

Some were involved in tasks like transporting flour. Others were dispersed in groups of 50-500 in work camps across the floodplain. Details relating to life within these camps are unavailable yet the written sources suggest the slaves were treated poorly by the “agents” who oversaw them. Other than for agriculture, it’s difficult to explain why such camps would have existed across this zone.

What we know about the Zanj fits closely with the scale of the landscape features visible today. Large numbers of labourers would have been needed, both to transport the soil forming the raised ridges and to farm the areas in between. This must have been enormously difficult work.

Unanswered questions

It’s often been assumed that the Zanj rebellion caused a significant decline in the region’s economy, including activities like farming. Our results, however, indicate that the earthworks date to the period after the rebellion.

While some samples date to the period immediately after the rebellion, others gave dates from a century or two later, in the 11th, 12th or 13th centuries. Rather than features created in one go, these traces in the landscape were likely added to over a longer period – perhaps as part of the annual farming cycle.

This means the samples we dated likely do not relate to the earliest farming activity but provide a “snapshot” of ongoing work. Since some of the features date to shortly after the rebellion, the slaves discussed in the written sources were likely involved in creating these ridge features. However, farming across this landscape certainly continued for a significant period after the revolt’s conclusion.

Be it climatic change, the impact of a pandemic, or wider economic and political shifts, exactly why such a large area of farmland was later abandoned remains an unanswered question. One which requires further research to answer.

But, by more definitively linking these landscape features to their historical context, we are one step closer to understanding social and economic processes in southern Iraq during the medieval period.

Archaeology adds another dimension to what we know about a historical event like the Zanj rebellion.

Peter J. Brown receives funding from the Gerda Henkel Stiftung.

– ref. Enslaved Africans, an uprising and an ancient farming system in Iraq: study sheds light on timelines – https://theconversation.com/enslaved-africans-an-uprising-and-an-ancient-farming-system-in-iraq-study-sheds-light-on-timelines-262977

August 21, 2025

Grandparenting from a distance: what’s lost when families are separated, and how to bridge the gap

Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Sulette Ferreira, Transnational Family Specialist and Researcher, University of Johannesburg

Becoming a grandparent is often envisioned as a deeply intimate, hands-on journey, holding a newborn, sharing first smiles, witnessing the first wobbly steps. It is traditionally grounded in physical presence, marked by spontaneous visits.

For many grandparents whose children have emigrated, however, these defining moments often unfold not in person, but through screens, filtered through time zones, digital platforms, and a lingering sense of distance.

This is true in South Africa, a country with rising emigration, especially among young families. Over a million South Africans now live abroad. This has systemic, multigenerational effects.

In a recent study I explored the impact of global emigration on the relationships between South African grandparents and their grandchildren born abroad. I examined what it means to step into their grandparent role role from afar, often for the first time, and how the absence of physical closeness reshapes intergenerational relationships.

I have published various articles on migration and intergenerational relationships in transnational families. I also run a private practice that focuses on the emotional challenges of emigration.

As part of my PhD study, I conducted in-depth interviews with 24 South African parents whose adult children had emigrated. This project laid the foundation for my broader research programme on the emotional effects of migration. This research article is based on the experiences of 44 participants.

For these grandparents, emigration represents more than just geographical separation. The familiar rhythms of hands-on grandparenting, from spontaneous visits to shared celebrations, are disrupted. With it comes a layered and ongoing sense of loss, not only of everyday interactions with their grandchildren, but also the gradual fading of a cherished role once grounded in physical presence and routine connection.

The findings show that the absence of physical proximity creates profound emotional barriers, especially during the early, most formative years of a grandchild’s life. Yet despite this distance, grandparents are finding creative and meaningful ways to remain emotionally present.

In transnational families, grandparents serve as custodians of cultural continuity and emotional support as well as active agents reshaping the meaning of grandparenthood in the context of global migration.

What grandparents had to say

The central question of my research was how distance reshaped the role of some grandparents in South African families. It further investigated how grandparents adapted and renegotiated their roles across different stages of their grandchildren’s lives.

The selection criteria included: being a South African citizen; speaking fluent English; living in South Africa; being a parent whose adult child(ren) had emigrated and lived abroad for at least one year; and being from any race, culture, gender; socio-economic status; aged between 50 and 80 years.

I supplemented interviews with qualitative surveys distributed via my online support group.

Grandparents reported various challenges,such as the loss of everyday involvement, the emotional strain of distance, and difficulties with digital communication that required ongoing adaptive strategies to sustain connection.

The study shows how distance does not necessarily weaken intergenerational bonds but requires grandparents to redefine presence.

My research made it clear that the place of birth is a pivotal factor in shaping the grandparent-
grandchild bond.

Grandparents of children who are born in South Africa and move to another country later are often involved from the beginning. They assist with daily care, celebrate milestones and enjoy spontaneous visits. These everyday interactions nurture strong emotional ties.

As Annelise, a participant, shared:

When your grandchild is born here, you know them from birth, you see them every day, you share in everything.

When these grandchildren emigrate, the rupture can be profound. Grandparents not only lose regular contact but also their role as hands-on caregivers.

When grandchildren are born abroad, a different emotional journey unfolds. Joy and excitement are often tempered by longing and sadness.

The reality of nurturing relationships across borders forces grandparents to redefine their roles.

For many families, pregnancy strengthens the bond between generations, especially between mothers and daughters. This phase is typically marked by shared rituals, which shape both maternal and grandparental identities. Rituals foster emotional connection and a sense of belonging.

But for grandparents who are separated, these moments may be replaced by screenshots and voice notes, making milestones feel distant and intangible.

This early absence can feel like an exclusion from grandparenthood itself, as if the role is denied before it has even begun. The phenomenon aligns closely with US psychologist Pauline Boss’s concept of ambiguous loss, grief without closure.

Despite this, many grandparents remain actively involved. Some grandparents become what US sociologists Judith Treas and Shampa Mazumdar call “seniors on the move”, becoming more mobile, structuring their lives around flights, visa renewals and seasonal caregiving.

But the challenges are big.

Staying close from far away

Sustaining a relationship across borders is tough.

Two key strategies emerged in my research: virtual communication and transnational visits.

All those I interviewed used technology extensively: weekly Zoom story time, recorded readings, or care “parcels” filled with letters, recipes, or handmade crafts.

In-person visits were limited by a mix of financial, logistical, emotional, and relational barriers.

The flights are just too expensive, and with my health, I don’t think I could manage the trip. It breaks my heart, but it’s just not possible. I don’t think I will ever see him again.

I also found that the role of parents was key. Through sharing photos, initiating calls, and keeping grandparents present in everyday conversations, some parents helped emotional bonds flourish.

My daughter and son-in-law are both very good at sending me photos and videos regularly … They both know how much I miss being with my two grandkids, so they keep me updated … They also phone weekly and encourage the children to be focused on our calls.

Takeaways

Transnational grandparenting challenges the traditional script of hands-on involvement. It calls for a reimagining of presence.

My research shows that grandparents are doing that through creativity, emotional elasticity and enduring love. They are forging a new kind of grandparenting across continents: one where connection transcends distance.

Sulette Ferreira is a research fellow at the University of Johannesburg.

– ref. Grandparenting from a distance: what’s lost when families are separated, and how to bridge the gap – https://theconversation.com/grandparenting-from-a-distance-whats-lost-when-families-are-separated-and-how-to-bridge-the-gap-263279

August 21, 2025

Wheelchair basketball: what can be learned from a South African athlete’s journey to France

Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Phoebe Runciman, Associate Professor and Research Chair at the Division of Sport and Exercise Medicine, Stellenbosch University

Wheelchair basketball is one of the fastest-growing Para sports in the world. Over 100,000 athletes compete in national and international competitions and at the Paralympic Games and Commonwealth Games. In Africa, there are 26 national wheelchair basketball federations.

But the level of support and resources available for athletes with disability (Para athletes) varies greatly between the global north and south, shaped by gaps in healthcare, infrastructure and policy.

In African countries the sport is often underfunded. In 2022, for example, South Africa’s sports and recreation budget was 15 times lower than France’s.

Many Para sport athletes from the global south must pay for their own travel expenses and equipment. This limits their access to quality training and support, affecting their performance.

But little is known about what it’s like for Para athletes to move between countries, especially from the global south to the global north.

My case study (on page 83 of the PDF) followed Sphelele Dlamini, a 29-year-old South African wheelchair basketball player who grew up in an underdeveloped area in KwaZulu-Natal province. He was born with a condition that led to the amputation of both legs below the knee.

After beginning his sporting journey in South Africa, Dlamini moved to France in 2022 to play professionally.

His experience reveals what Para athletes can expect as well as what they gain and what they leave behind when crossing borders in search of better opportunities. Dlamini’s journey highlights how cross-border moves may offer access to resources and more recognition, but also involve cultural challenges, adaptations and identity shifts.

His story can inform the support needed from organisations helping Para athletes to navigate these transitions so that they can compete at their full potential.

What must happen for athletes to shine

Dlamini’s story highlights four key factors that must be addressed to make a difference in the lives of South Africa’s Para athletes.

1. Public services

Firstly, the South African government and schools need to address the shortage of public services for people with disability. This includes creating accessible infrastructure, disability-inclusive healthcare and social support services.

Overcrowding and limited public services have been part of Dlamini’s daily life. For people with disability, townships can be especially challenging environments.

These are residential areas that were designated for Black South Africans under apartheid, South Africa’s former system of white minority rule. Townships were deliberately underdeveloped and under-resourced and they remain structurally disadvantaged today.

As Dlamini told me in an interview for my case study:

With the things that are happening in the township, it’s wild, it’s always busy.

He shared a home with 11 family members and described his upbringing as “an ever-changing environment that never settled down”.

2. Funding and promotion

Secondly, Para sport requires more financial support and promotion to build a more inclusive society – funding and competitive opportunities.

Dlamini had all but stopped playing competitively:

I spent about two years without playing. Then suddenly, I got a chance to go to France.

In France he found himself in what he called “a different type of chaos”. Training schedules were intense, and “there was hardly any free time”. Although the move was a breakthrough, the years of limited game time had caused some self-doubt for him.

This highlights the need for investment in Para sport in countries like South Africa, so that athletes can develop locally and have greater chances of international success.

3. Athlete and coach education

Thirdly, athlete and coach education is critical. Dlamini’s move to France was self-driven with no formal pathways or international exposure. He reached out to coaches directly:

I sent them emails and sometimes I would write to them on Facebook.

In much of the global south, Para sport relies on volunteer coaches with limited access to networks. Despite having no video footage, a French coach gave Dlamini a chance. In the global north, building a portfolio through documented game performance is standard, but this kind of athlete education is rarely emphasised in South Africa.

Countries like France also have established local clubs, with leagues that create pathways for regional, national and international competitions – and opportunities for professional contracts. Athletes receive a salary and games are streamed with backing from sponsors.

4. NGO support

Securing a spot on a French team didn’t mean Dlamini’s challenges were over. While his new club offered a salary, they couldn’t cover the cost of travel to France. It was Jumping Kids, a South African non-governmental organisation (NGO), that stepped in and paid for his air ticket, visa, flights and insurance.

Dlamini first connected with Jumping Kids in 2014, when the organisation visited his school. He was selected to receive prosthetic legs and has remained in contact with them ever since. Today, he is one of the NGO’s ambassadors, alongside Paralympic athletes like Ntando Mahlangu and Arnu Fourie.

NGOs like this are a lifeline that need to be funded and supported, particularly in countries like South Africa where there are gaps in formal support.

Why Para sport matters

For many Para athletes, support starts at the school level. South Africa has 465 special needs schools catering to a range of disabilities. These schools often provide the first exposure to sport, as they did for Dlamini:

That’s where I saw people who were similar to my situation.

Research shows that sport gives individuals with disability a sense of belonging. This sense of inclusion, however, is difficult to achieve when environments are inaccessible.

In France, Dlamini felt that his skills were recognised and everyday life felt more navigable:

I really enjoy having the access [to public transport] and being able to move around and do things easily, without having to bother any other person.

Compared to South Africa, where players often share wheelchairs and go months without formal competition, France offered both structure and dignity.

However, in hindsight, Dlamini says he can look back at the setbacks and challenges he faced in South Africa, and view them from a different perspective:

I can never really judge it because, I may never know, maybe I was getting prepared for that journey.

Sphelele Dlamini’s story is one of resilience. Despite the odds, he created his path to play professionally. His journey highlights the determination required of athletes from the global south, and the systemic barriers they face that hinder development and progress in sport.

While NGOs continue to fill critical gaps, long-term progress in Para sport requires structural investment.

Faatima Adam, a biokineticist and PhD candidate, contributed to this article.

Phoebe Runciman does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Wheelchair basketball: what can be learned from a South African athlete’s journey to France – https://theconversation.com/wheelchair-basketball-what-can-be-learned-from-a-south-african-athletes-journey-to-france-261593

August 21, 2025

How Nollywood films help Kenyan housemaids make sense of their lives

Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Solomon Waliaula, Associate Professor, Department of Languages, Linguistics and Culture, Maasai Mara University

Nollywood, Nigeria’s prolific video-film industry, has been popular in Kenya since it was introduced to east Africa at around the turn of the century.

These low-budget, high-output films and TV series immediately struck a chord with ordinary people in lower income brackets. Although new Nollywood productions can be slick, high budget affairs, the bulk are not about high production values. They’re about real-life stories and social issues that are easy to relate to.

At first Nollywood films were screened in informal video-halls in poorer Kenyan communities, offering a unique going-to-the-movies experience. But in the first decade of the new millennium, TV stations began screening them. In Kenya, Nollywood was most popularly known as “Afrocinema” on TV, and it was soon a daily affair.

One of the audiences that has emerged are young women, often in their teens, working in urban Kenyan homes. Known as housemaids, they come from humble and materially deprived backgrounds and occupy a precarious position in the homes they work in. Their daily routine is a blend of domestic chores including childcare, cooking, cleaning and running errands for the family.

Employed through an informal system of social networking and patronage, housemaids don’t necessarily bring any training or experience to their jobs and generally aren’t offered employment contracts. The power is in the hands of the employer and there is little job security.

These young women were the subject of my recent study in the Kenyan city of Eldoret for the book Contemporary African Screen Worlds.

I explored the housemaid’s fandom of Nollywood films, as part of a decade-long study of electronic media audiences in the city.

It became clear that housemaids saw themselves as socially inferior to the families they worked for. Their identity as domestic labourers masked their identity as real people. Their social identity was defined by, and reducible to, their daily job card.

I found that they developed a special relationship with Nollywood cinema. This love of the movies (fandom) offered much more than leisure and companionship. Nollywood stories are a medium through which they could transcend the limits of their situations and aspire to other, more desirable worlds. Nollywood on TV helped them make sense of their lives.

The research

Twelve participants took part in the study, most of them housemaids, some former housemaids. All were drawn from similar neighbourhoods. Research mostly involved observing their working lives along with in-depth, unstructured interviews.

To establish some of the specific lessons the housemaids of Eldoret learnt from Nollywood, I asked each to discuss any two films that they considered as educational. I noted that there were some significant patterns.

The lessons raised were connected to the housemaids’ immediate life experiences, and many of the films mentioned seemed to explore the social impacts of poverty, and how it affects family relationships. The social costs of poverty on the family is a popular Nollywood theme.

Another kind of story that appealed to participants was the Cinderella tale. In these films, the orphaned girl living in abject poverty eventually becomes a princess.

Dina recalled a film that told the story of a poor woman whose father died and his extended family kicked her and her mother out. They moved to a slum. It so happened that she was actually destined to be a princess, but her father died before telling her the news. Her paternal grandmother eventually tracked her down, to link her up with her prince.

Most of the housemaids I’ve talked to over the years have clearly expressed their admiration for this Cinderella narrative in Nollywood stories. They can project themselves into her situation and use her experience as a source of hope for a better future.

Real life stories

But there were many other ways that housemaid fans of Nollywood said they saw their real lives in the films. One told me:

I used to watch films that presented young women who underwent life experiences that were like mine. But within the stories, their lives turned round, yet mine did not…

But then things changed:

I had reached the very end of my tether when God turned my life around. I met a man in church that proposed to me and we got married two months later. This is when I looked back and realised God had used Nollywood to prepare me for my portion.

She added:

The very first Nollywood film I watched was about a married couple who stayed with the wife’s mother, who ended up taking over her daughter’s husband. But the wife was a prayerful woman, and she consulted her pastor to intercede for their marriage as well. It worked.

True to Nollywood’s often melodramatic form, the mother became mentally deranged, drank a poisonous concoction and died.

I remember many other Nollywood stories that had been about the virtue of patience and waiting for God’s time.

In her case, Nollywood had helped her face her situation for what it was, and, in her view, it helped to keep her positive.

Why this matters

An exploration of the housemaids’ own understanding and use of Nollywood cinema becomes a medium through which to engage with the housemaids’ world – as well as their aspirational identities.

This is a social category of people that occupies a place of absolute subservience and has been forced by circumstances to live invisibly. Electronic media fandom is one of the few avenues where they can momentarily rise above their immediate circumstances.

The routine nature of the housemaids’ lives, coupled with limited social interaction and the pressures of long working hours, is a danger to mental health. For them Nollywood fandom served as a healthy antidote.

Solomon Waliaula received funding from the International European Research Council as a contributor to the book Contemporary African Screen Worlds: Decolonizing Film and Screen Studies (2019-2025).

– ref. How Nollywood films help Kenyan housemaids make sense of their lives – https://theconversation.com/how-nollywood-films-help-kenyan-housemaids-make-sense-of-their-lives-262059

August 21, 2025

Studying philosophy does make people better thinkers, according to new research on more than 600,000 college grads

Source: The Conversation – USA (3) – By Michael Vazquez, Teaching Assistant Professor of Philosophy, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Students take a philosophy test in Strasbourg, France, on June 18, 2024. Frederick Florin/AFP via Getty Images

Philosophy majors rank higher than all other majors on verbal and logical reasoning, according to our new study published in the Journal of the American Philosophical Association. They also tend to display more intellectual virtues such as curiosity and open-mindedness.

Philosophers have long claimed that studying philosophy sharpens one’s mind. What sets philosophy apart from other fields is that it is not so much a body of knowledge as an activity – a form of inquiry. Doing philosophy involves trying to answer fundamental questions about humanity and the world we live in and subjecting proposed answers to critical scrutiny: constructing logical arguments, drawing subtle distinctions and following ideas to their ultimate – often surprising – conclusions.

It makes sense, then, that studying philosophy might make people better thinkers. But as philosophers ourselves, we wondered whether there is strong evidence for that claim.

Students who major in philosophy perform very well on tests such as the Graduate Record Examination and Law School Admission Test. Studies, including our own, have found that people who have studied philosophy are, on average, more reflective and more open-minded than those who haven’t. Yet this doesn’t necessarily show that studying philosophy makes people better thinkers. Philosophy may just attract good thinkers.

Our latest study aimed to address that problem by comparing students who majored in philosophy and those who didn’t at the end of their senior year, while adjusting for differences present at the start of their freshman year. For example, we examined students’ performance on the GRE, which they take toward the end of college, while controlling for scores on the SAT, which they take before college.

We did the same when analyzing survey data collected by the Higher Education Research Institute at the start and end of college. These surveys asked students to, for example, rate their abilities to engage with new ideas or have their own ideas challenged, and how often they explored topics raised in class on their own or evaluated the reliability of information.

All told, we looked at test and survey data from over 600,000 students. Our analysis found that philosophy majors scored higher than students in all other majors on standardized tests of verbal and logical reasoning, as well as on self-reports of good habits of mind, even after accounting for freshman-year differences. This suggests that their intellectual abilities and traits are due, in part, to what they learned in college.

Why it matters

Public trust in higher education has hit record lows in recent years, according to polling by the Lumina Foundation and Gallup. Meanwhile, the rapid advance of generative AI has threatened the perceived value of a traditional college degree, as many previously vaunted white-collar skills are at risk of being automated.

Yet now more than ever, students must learn to think clearly and critically. AI promises efficiency, but its algorithms are only as good as the people who steer them and scrutinize their output.

The stakes are more than personal. Without citizens who can reason through complex issues and discern good information from bad, democracy and civic life are at risk.

What still isn’t known

While our results point to real growth in students’ intellectual abilities and dispositions, they do not capture everything philosophers mean by “intellectual virtue.” Intellectual virtue is not just a matter of possessing certain abilities but of using those abilities well: at the right times, for the right reasons, and in the right ways.

Our measures do not tell us whether philosophy majors go on to apply their newfound abilities in the service of truth and justice or, conversely, for personal gain and glory. Settling that question would require gathering a different kind of evidence.

The Research Brief is a short take on interesting academic work.

The research described in this article was supported by a grant from the American Philosophical Association.

– ref. Studying philosophy does make people better thinkers, according to new research on more than 600,000 college grads – https://theconversation.com/studying-philosophy-does-make-people-better-thinkers-according-to-new-research-on-more-than-600-000-college-grads-262681

August 21, 2025

Managing soil fertilization levels can make for more efficient and productive crops

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By JT Cornelis, Associate Professor, Applied Biology (Soil Science), University of British Columbia

Modern crops are often excessively fertilized, which boost yields in the short term but also harms the environment due to nutrient runoffs and greenhouse gas emissions.

Additionally, fertilizers are often inefficient because much of the applied fertilizers become bound to soil particles over the long term, making them unavailable for plants.

The application of high doses of easily soluble fertilizers may ensure crop productivity, but it comes at the cost of environmental quality and agroecosystem resilience. This fertilization strategy often results in “lazy” crops with underdeveloped root systems and reduced ability to acquire nutrients from native soil reserves.

As a pedologist (someone who studies soil formation) and biogeochemist, my research focuses on the multiscalar and interdisciplinary study of soil systems.

Improving resiliency

In Canada’s vast forests, the trees thrive in nutrient-impoverished soils because of the capacity of their deep root systems to acquire nutrients and water. In natural ecosystems, plants have evolved and developed root strategies that help to absorb nutrients.

One way they do this is by growing bigger, stronger and more active roots, which help them access more nutrients from the soil. Sometimes, they team up with soil micro-organisms to increase their capacity to access nutrients. As roots absorb nutrients, they also release certain molecules in the soil called root exudates.

These compounds contribute to breaking down organic matter and dissolving soil particles, making trapped nutrients accessible for plant root uptake. Root exudates are also a source of energy for soil microorganisms, which down the road also support soil carbon storage and enhance general soil health.

The SoilRes3 Lab at the University of British Columbia carries out interdisciplinary research on soil genesis to uncover how microscale processes shape macroscale ecosystem properties and resilience. Grounded in soil–plant feedbacks, our pedological work examines the complex relationships between land and people across diverse eco-cultural contexts, with the goal of strengthening ecosystem resilience, resistance and restoration.

Examining soil-plant feedback in natural ecosystems, we found that using a bit less fertilizer could actually benefit crops in the long run. By decreasing fertilizer, we could increase the production of root exudates. This enhances the plants’ ability to absorb nutrients on their own, rather than depending on external inputs.

By increasing microbial activity in the rhizosphere (the area surrounding plant roots) and acting as a direct carbon source into the soil, increased root exudates could also contribute to healthier soils.

plant roots in a forest — The rhizosphere is the area surrounding plant roots where the roots, soil organisms, nutrients and water interact.
(Jordan Fernandes/Unsplash), CC BY

Alternative strategies

Nitrogen and phosphorus are the two most important nutrients for plant growth, and they are the most used fertilizers around the world.

Our team of soil scientists reviewed 36 studies encompassing 30 different crops and soil contexts. We compared how plants responded under two fertilization conditions: one with the usual amount of fertilizer to maximize yield, and another with less fertilizer, especially less nitrogen and phosphorus.

We found that cutting phosphorus fertilizer by up to half boosted root exudation by 30 per cent, while only slightly reducing crop growth by just two per cent. In contrast, reducing nitrogen fertilizer raises root exudation by seven per cent, but lowers plant growth by 20 per cent.

Our findings show that optimizing phosphorus use in agriculture can stimulate more active root systems and increase exudate production.

Soil types

Optimizing phosphorus fertilizer to boost root exudation without sacrificing yield depends heavily on soil type. Soils in British Columbia differ significantly from those in Manitoba, Québec and Saskatchewan, and the impact of root exudates on nutrient uptake and carbon capture varies with soil conditions (soil pH, mineralogy, moisture, texture).

That’s why our proposed strategy — limiting fertilizers to maximize root activity — must be tested in real-world settings, with farmers, across diverse soils and crop systems.

The next step will be to examine root exudation responses and effects under varying soil physicochemical and eco-cultural contexts. Field trials are essential to tailor this approach to local conditions and ensure its effectiveness and scalability.

JT Cornelis works for the Faculty of Land and Food Systems at the University of British Columbia, as an Associate Professor in soil science. He receives funding from NSERC Discovery Grant, NSERC Alliance, Killam Trusts and BC Genome.

– ref. Managing soil fertilization levels can make for more efficient and productive crops – https://theconversation.com/managing-soil-fertilization-levels-can-make-for-more-efficient-and-productive-crops-253298

August 21, 2025

Here’s why Canada’s parents and grandparents reunification program is problematic

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Megan Gaucher, Associate Professor, Department of Law and Legal Studies, Carleton University

Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada’s recent announcement that it’s accepting 10,000 sponsorship applications under the Parent and Grandparents Program (PGP) comes with an important caveat.

Due to persistent backlog, invitations will only be sent to the 17,860 potential sponsors who submitted an interest-to-sponsor application back in 2020.

While good news for some, it means yet another cycle of uncertainty for thousands of families who have waited years for the PGP to finally reopen.

Migrant families seek permanent reunification for reasons other than a desire to live with their parents and grandparents in the same country. Those reasons include a need for child-care support and a desire to care for their older family members as they age.

As international conventions dictate, families have a right to be together.

From permanent to temporary

Grandparents have been part of Canada’s formal “family class” pathway since 1976, but current policy favours spouses and dependent children. This makes reunification for extended family members difficult.

Grandparent admissions through the PGP have comprised around 25 per cent of total family class admissions for the past 10 years.

Unlike other family class categories, there is a predetermined cap on accepted PGP applications. The PGP has also undergone a series of program freezes to deal with an application backlog, the most recent announced in January 2025. The government’s latest update included no commitment to receive new interest-to-sponsor declarations.

As an alternative to the PGP, the government recommends the super visa, a multi-entry visa valid for up to 10 years. However, the super visa requires grandparents to reapply and meet medical inadmissibility rules every five years.

The super visa also places responsibility for financial and health care of grandparents entirely on the sponsoring children, sometimes with devastating consequences.

Most importantly, the super visa does not guarantee permanent residence upon expiration. Permanent grandparent reunification remains a lottery draw, at the mercy of sponsorship intake caps.

Celebrating, denigrating migrant grandparents

Our preliminary research on grandparent sponsorship explores how elected officials consider the place of migrant grandparents in Canadian society. We’ve so far found they regard permanent family class migration as “good for business” as it attracts economic migrants. At the same time, elected officials believe that certain dependants monopolize health and social safety nets.

Grandparents, in particular, are treated by governments as human liabilities who must be admitted “responsibly.”

Admitting grandparents to Canada is tied to their perceived ability to support their sponsors by performing unpaid domestic labour. Our research has found elected officials celebrate sponsored grandparents for the substantial unpaid care work they provide like meal preparation, child care and cleaning.

In a recent survey on grandparent sponsorship, sponsors describe the unpaid work conducted by grandparents as essential to their participation in the Canadian workforce.

an older dark-haired woman plays with a boy at a playground — Grandparents can be key to helping younger family members become active in the Canadian workforce.
(Kateryna Hliznitsova/Unsplash)

Migrant grandparents are also positioned as providers of cultural care for their grandchildren. Our research draws attention to elected officials often invoking memories of their own migrant grandparents passing along languages, practices and values that shaped their unique cultural identities.

Despite the benefits migrant grandparents provide, sponsored grandparents are consistently suspected of taking advantage of Canada’s health care and social welfare systems. This is why the super visa is promoted as an alternative pathway.

Dependent on sponsors

Grandparents who come to Canada through the super visa are financially reliant on their sponsors. Even though the government recognizes that the number of sponsored grandparents applying for old age security is relatively small, treating migrant grandparents as economic burdens allows governments to justify caps and application pauses on PGP sponsorship.

Contrary to governments’ framing of the super visa as aligning with migrants’ families demands for temporary care, our research shows that grandparents often resort to humanitarian and compassionate applications to obtain permanent residence once their super visa has expired. In these cases, their ability to perform care work is further scrutinized.

In terms of grandparent sponsorship, care is largely understood as temporary and one-directional — in other words, migrant grandparents are welcomed when they provide care, but are seen as liabilities when they need care themselves.

Prioritizing the needs of migrant families

How do we reconcile government claims that family reunification is a “fundamental pillar of Canadian society” with the reality that permanent grandparent reunification remains difficult to obtain?

Intake announcements like the most recent one in July allow governments to celebrate permanent grandparent migration. At the same time, the inconsistency of the PGP and solutions like the super visa keep migrant grandparents in a state of legal, political and economic precarity.

With the Liberal government announcing cuts to family class admissions over the next three years, the impact of these changes on grandparent reunification warrants attention.

Rather than temporary reforms and routes, the government needs to consider structural changes to Canada’s family class pathway that focus on the needs and interests of families seeking permanent reunification.

Megan Gaucher receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council.

Asma Atique receives funding from Mitacs and the College of Immigration and Citizenship Consultants. She is affiliated with CERC Migration and Integration and volunteers for South Asian Women and Immigrants’ Services.

Ethel Tungohan receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council.

Harshita Yalamarty receives funding from Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council.

– ref. Here’s why Canada’s parents and grandparents reunification program is problematic – https://theconversation.com/heres-why-canadas-parents-and-grandparents-reunification-program-is-problematic-262263