Chapter 6 makes it clear that definitions, categories and expertise have not ended interpretive issues. Definitions are disembodied. All forms of violence and suffering, their definition and recognition remain relational in reality, born out of a labyrinthine complexity – in terms of how they are constructed, communicated, filtered and understood. Preconceptions of who is deserving of recognition, the requisites for social identification, moral commitment or collective empathy reveal this to be the case. Social science takes suffering to be (inescapably) intersubjectively, textually and sensorially understood – so judicial determinations must also go beyond the technical and doctrinal. The chapter’s discussion on temporality continues the theme of sensing. It examines temporal registers in the recognition of torture – exploring the questions: how does time feature and function in juridical understandings of torture? This discussion on time adds to the kaleidoscopic catalogue of sense-centric registers and reasoning operating in the anti-torture field – illustrating it to be a device of inclusion and exclusion.

In her contribution, Roessler is interested in what digitalization means for the concept of human beings: a specific concept, identifiable, that defies digitalization? A conceptual clarification, she argues, shows that a rather uncontested definition of a human being includes their vulnerability, their finiteness, and their rational self-consciousness. In a next step, she discusses the difference between robots and humans and engages with novels by Ian MacEwan and Kazuo Ishiguro which imagine this difference between humans and robots. Finally, she advocates that a world in which the difference between robots and humans would no longer be recognizable would be an uncanny world in which we would not want to live.

The prevalence, morbidity and mortality of youth substance misuse should mandate public health prioritisation worldwide. Roots in multiple adversity and child mental health problems point to substance misuse as an indicator of the underlying vulnerability of populations, in which case young people in the developed world are not doing so well. Child services should screen and assess all youth for substance use. Investment in the development of new treatments has shown that interventions can be moderately effective, likely to share core characteristics, and given will, training and resources are readily deployable. However, all studies show a substantial subset had not improved following intervention, so that enormous scientific and cultural challenges persist.

Human rights instruments in jurisdictions throughout the world assert the right to equality and non-discrimination. These principles lie at the heart of human rights. This chapter initially considers the meanings of equality and non-discrimination. It then examines equality and non-discrimination in the context of Article 14 of the ECHR. This includes an examination of direct and indirect discrimination and intersectionality. Examples from the Strasbourg jurisprudence illustrate the applicability of Article 14 ECHR to specific protected categories including race/ethnicity, religion, sex, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, and sex characteristics. Article 14 ECHR and its influence in domestic UK law is analysed. The final section considers the UK Equality Act 2010 (EqA)and the complexities raised by competing equality claims. There are case studies concerning sexual orientation and religious belief, employment law, education and a discussion of the concept of ‘woman’ and ‘sex’ in the EqA as referring to a biological woman and biological sex.

Chapter 5 traces the history of a number of existing UN mechanisms which represent the interests of particular vulnerable groups in the international system (persons with disabilities, women, and children). The aim of this analysis is to see what types of normative discourses have found traction and led to the development of institutions to represent these vulnerable groups, in order to ascertain the type of normative arguments that would gain support in arguing for international institutions to represent future generations. An important lesson from the case studies is that a normative discourse in which development concerns feature prominently, has been a common thread running through the history of these UN mechanisms. The chapter analyses the differences and similarities between arguments which justify the institutions which have been put in place to represent these vulnerable groups, with arguments used to justify institutions to represent future generations.

Use Case 2 in Chapter 5 examines the regulation of MDTs in the context of commercial advertising under the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), the Unfair Commercial Practices Directive (UCPD), and the Audiovisual Media Services Directive (AVSMD). An analysis under the Digital Services Act (DSA) and the Artificial Intelligence Act (AIA) will follow in Chapter 6, alongside a use case focused on political advertising. In the realm of commercial advertising, MDTs intensify long-standing concerns from consumer perspectives. The UCPD serves as a crucial reference point for related laws. Including the processing and inference of mind data in the blacklist outlined in Annex I of the UCPD would have significant implications, akin to the proposed introduction of a sui generis special category of mind data within the GDPR. Importantly, a blanket ban on the processing and inference of mind data for commercial practices under Annex I UCPD would automatically prohibit these practices under the DSA.

The Conclusion reiterates the overarching argument of the book, namely that the search for – and collective experimentation with – new forms of representation are immensely important forms of sustainable climate policy. Through proxy representation, future generations can be practically and institutionally involved in climate law and policy-making, considering both the vulnerability of future generations and their distinctive interests. The chapter discusses the need to find synergies between proposals for proxy-style mechanisms to represent future generations and development policy. New avenues for research are suggested, including the way in which science and scientific discourse can be a proxy for future generations’ interests, and also the way in which proxy representation of future generations features in climate treaty making processes and climate activism more generally.

In Chapter 3, firstly, we reconstruct central theoretical models of democracy and enquire how an expansion of representation mechanisms for future generations could be conceptualised within these justificatory narratives. Secondly, we analyse the values that underlie democratic practices which can be helpful for advancing proxy representation at the international level by providing ethical criteria for such reforms. This involves analysing the discourses of intergenerational justice, solidarity and vulnerability. The chapter then turns to examine how these discourses can be translated into political forms of proxy representation by drawing on the all affected principle which requires that those affected by a decision have a role in the making of that decision, which is argued to be an element of most, if not all theories of democracy. This in turn is hypothesised to provide a basis for extension of the demos to include future generations, which then justifies proxy forms of representation to enable their representation . Human rights are argued to constitute a practice of global values which provides a powerful normative orientation for climate law and policy-making.

How did peatlands respond to human visions of growth and development? Peat extraction entangled humans and peatlands in a relationship marked by irritation, sometimes confrontation. Examining incidents of malaria outbreaks and fire at and around peat extraction sites, this chapter highlights the agency of peatlands in the history of Russia’s fossil economy. It identifies peat extraction sites as spaces of environmental injustice and points to a crucial irony running through the history of human–peatland relationships in imperial and Soviet Russia: Peatlands had long been imagined as dangerous and useless, but they turned into unsettling landscapes only once they became part of Russia’s industrial metabolism. Central Russia’s peatland environments were not just a backdrop to history but actively challenged and constrained the different ways in which people tried to make use of them.

In order to understand how urban disaster risk changes, it is essential to understand how cities change. This chapter argues that cities are continually evolving entities whose past and present dynamics provide insights into future trends and possibilities. The chapter first reviews global trends in disaster losses, along with well-established definitions and frameworks about disaster risk. It explains why these are inadequate for understanding how a city’s disaster risk changes over time. It then proposes a simple conceptual framework, the Urban Risk Dynamics framework, to help guide empirical study of evolving disaster risk in any city. The framework is based on several premises: that local geography, or landscape, is vital to understanding urban disaster risk; that cities must be understood as economic entities; and that technological change is a key driver of urban change. The chapter then introduces and justifies the selection of the six case studies to be analyzed using the framework in Chapters 3–5.

Early African American humour functioned as a method of cultural formation, an in-group way of communicating based on the needs and experiences of the enslaved community. Contemporary Black stand-up has been a foundation upon which to reveal realities of Black life and make those realities accessible and entertaining to an increasingly global audience. This chapter explores the innovative styles and approaches to the artform as an indication that the limits of Black stand-up are expanding. Using three case studies, it demonstrates the Afrofuturistic trajectory of the genre. Elements of resistance have given way to comedic approaches that centre imagination; fleeting moments of revenge are superseded by the materiality of the emancipated Black body; a sense of contentment and personal growth are foregrounded, ephemeral pleasures looming still; and rituals of play produce Afrofuturistic otherworlds where difference matters, disabused of its regulatory power to rank and marginalise.

The literature on school maladjustment is too much engaged with its explicit expressions (e.g., school dropout), while only partially discussing its more implicit expressions. It is arguable that school maladjustment can have many faces. A student’s selection of the way to express maladjustment is a derivation of the person’s characteristics, the environmental characteristics, and the broader context within which the person adjusts (e.g., wartime). Thus, the discussion has to address four general aspects of school maladjustment: (a) silent expressions of school maladjustment, the ones that are commonly addressed by researchers and especially by school teams and parents; (b) indicative expressions of school maladjustment, which are the buds of maladjustment and of major importance in the context of students’ educational flourishing; (c) how both the indicative and the silent expressions can be integrated into a flowchart that summarizes the process of sinking into school maladjustment; and (d) vulnerability to school maladjustment as an additional aspect that deserves a different type of preventive intervention: that is, an intervention that addresses the students’ future adjustment to transitions (e.g., from elementary school to middle school)

This chapter overviews the characteristics and circumstances predisposing people to lead or join hate movements with a particular focus on the virulent anti-Semitism that united figures such as Father Charles Coughlin, Charles Lindbergh, and Henry Ford. By analyzing these figures and their followers, we extrapolate practices common among hate groups. After identifying character traits and risk factors (e.g., political and economic insecurity), we discuss their more modern manifestations. First we clarify our definition of hate groups as defined by the Department of Justice, Federal Bureau of Investigation, and Southern Poverty Law Center. We then extrapolate from these definitions to show how they align well with our definition of a cult. Following this, we acknowledge the challenges that accompany hate group designation while concluding that it is still vital for tracking modern-day hate groups and discrimination. We conclude by acknowledging the continued threat of hate groups and the presence of risk factors seen throughout history, such as global public health emergencies. We also discuss challenges unique to the technology age, such as epistemic bubbles and echo chambers. In summary, the chapter provides an outline of how hate groups come to be and provides a discussion of their continuing threat in society.

This chapter focuses on how Bangladesh, a country with extensive experience of climate-related disasters, has dealt with loss and damage in its national policymaking. In response to its high vulnerability, Bangladesh is – among the countries studied in this book – a role model in disaster reduction and preparedness. However, the government’s efforts do not meet the scope of needs connected to climate impacts on the ground. Drawing on a review of relevant policy documents and semi-structured interviews with key public and civil society actors, the chapter analyzes national-level engagement with loss and damage from climate change in Bangladesh. It demonstrates that while fundamentally all ministries in Bangladesh are involved in averting, minimizing, or addressing loss and damage, the concept is yet to be fully integrated in national policy. The chapter also finds that existing policies tend to focus on addressing economic losses and overlook the significant noneconomic losses from climate change. It is argued that integrating loss and damage into national policies, establishing a fair national mechanism, and creating a comprehensive database of loss and damage data would strengthen Bangladesh’s role as both an advocate for loss and damage governance and a leader in climate response.