On the Artwork

An important step in putting together this journal was curating images to represent each article and the issues they touch upon. Finding aesthetically pleasing images that represent the ideas brought forth by the writers can sometimes be challenging, especially in the field of political studies, where many of the topics touched upon are abstract, the issues discussed are very current, and images published about them are still under commercial license… Yet, with the help of both editors and authors, ideas were brainstormed and I am proud to present them as complements to the insightful articles published in this volume. The details for each piece are presented below.

The Importance of Balancing Ideology with Strategy in Canadian Conservative Politics by Brooke Brimo The photograph that was chosen for this piece depicts the Provincial Legislature building in Edmonton, Alberta, since the article touches upon Alberta’s conservative politics (as well as federal-level conservative politics). The photo was usercontributed to Wikimedia Commons in 2008. Games of Thrones: The US and Russia’s Intervention in Syria’s Civil War From 2011-Present by Bo Peter Zhang The Russian and American flags are photographed here to represent the two countries’ involvement in the Syrian Civil War. The original photograph was taken after a meeting between president Barack Obama, US secretary of state John Kerry, president Vladimir Putin, and foreign minister Sergei Lavrov wherein the two countries discussed the situation in Syria. The image was contributed to Wikimedia Commons in 2015. Behind the Mask of “Progress”: Peru’s Forced Sterilization Program From 1996-1998 by Brianna Cheng This article focuses on Fujimori’s forced sterilization program in Peru in the late 1990s, and the themes presented in it remain very current in South America to this day, as thousands of women gathered to protest Fujimori’s pardoning in 2017, and further to protest his daughter’s bid for the presidency. These protests form one of many feminist movements all over Latin America that have formed in the last two decades, such as the #NiUnaMenos

movement. The photo used for this piece depicts the uterusshaped belts that Fujimori protesters wore, on which the words ‘soy 10540’ are written. This translates to ‘I am [number] 10540’ in solidarity with the tens of thousands of women who were forcibly sterilized by the Fujimori policy. Usage rights for the photograph were granted by LATFEM, a feminist editorial website based in Argentina. Their website can be visited at www.latfem.org. The Evolution of A Resistance Movement: The Case of Hamas by Madelyn Evans The image chosen to represent this article shows a crowd gathered in support of the Hamas party in 2007. The image represents a large gathering people supporting Hamas’ milestone electoral victory in the 2006 Palestinian legislative election. It was uploaded to Wikimedia Commons in 2007.

An Analysis of the Current State and Prospects for Healthcare Reform in the United States by Sophia Dilworth For this article, a photo from a pro-healthcare reform protest in the Seattle was chosen. The simple messages on the signs people are carrying — ‘Healthcare for America NOW’ — illustrate the urgency with which healthcare reform has been demanded by Americans. The same message remains popular in American politics today, over a decade after this protest took place. This photograph was uploaded to Wikimedia Commons by Joe Mabel in 2009.

Liberal Peacebuilding in Sierra Leone: The Role of the Judiciary, Natural Resource Sector, and Local Government in Consolidating Peace by Sophie Wirzba The author for this article wanted to represent Sierra Leone as a rich natural resource, while respecting Sierra Leonean dignity by ensuring not to represent images of suffering, or photos of people taken without their consent, which is unfortunately often the case when representing the Global South. I therefore decided to use a photo of an estuary on the coast of Sierra Leone, with Freetown on a peninsula in the lower portion of the image. The photograph was taken by the Sentinel-2A satellite in 2015 and was uploaded to Wikimedia Commons in 2016 by the European Space Agency. Displaced Without Advocates: Dissecting Efforts to Mainstream Internal Displacement Under Institutional Constraints by Husayn Jamal For this article, the author wanted to depict migrants in movement to represent the IDPs spoken about in the piece. The

photo we settled on was uploaded to Wikimedia Commons by photographer Mstyslav Chernov in 2015, in Budapest, and shows migrant children’s shoes during the refugee crisis. Lost shoes — though the ones in this image may belong to refugees and not IDPs — speak to the theme of those lost with no place to go, with no representation, who are most vulnerable to human rights violations.

Arabization: Towards an Exclusive National Identity by Florence Harvey-Hudon The painting Les femmes d’Alger dans leur appartement (1834) by Eugène Delacroix was chosen by the author to represent this article. The painting depicts four women in a room, and inevitably plays into the concept of Orientalism — the colonial idyllic (mis)representation of “the East” by Westerners that was very popular in the 18 th and 19 th centuries. Yet, this piece distinguishes itself from other paintings made in the same era by French artists because it avoids romanticizing the women to the point of objectification or eroticism, and thus remains an important piece in Algerian history. In fact, it served as inspiration for Assia Djebar’s collection of short stories of the same name, Femmes d’Alger dans leur appartement (1980) in which women are illustrated as strong and dignified individuals.

The Failure of the Second Reconstruction: Black Deprivation in the Post-Civil Rights Era by Leina Gabra The image chosen for this piece was one of the many photographs of the signing of the Civil Rights Act by President Lyndon B. Johnson in 1964. This particular photo was retained because, unlike many of the more posed photos that were taken that day, this one exudes a more stressed, uncertain energy, with the President looking haggard and those surrounding him rather preoccupied. There are also no Black Americans in sight, whereas most photos show Martin Luther King Jr. front and centre, smiling and shaking hands with the President. This photo speaks to the theme of the article — that the signing of the Civil Rights Act didn’t succeed in improving Black lives in the United States as much as some may have hoped it would.

Isabel Baltzan Graphic Designer