Is the state becoming too much like your nanny? Does it act like your dad or more like your uncle? Does it tell you what to do, protect you from harm, or nurture you just like a mother? Which familial figure should the state aspire to be in relation to the cultivation of citizens and the appropriate extent of government regulation? And what are the political implications of these gendered metaphors for describing state practices?

These questions and more are explored in the first issue of volume 44 of Antipode – available, without a subscription, and with a new look, here – in Jessica Pykett’s ‘The new maternal state: The gendered politics of governing through behaviour change‘. Before you disappear and download it, though, take a couple of minutes to hear Jessica, a lecturer in Aberystwyth University’s Institute of Geography and Earth Sciences, discussing it, and the projects related to it, below.

Sorry, the video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G6-pyh0WAns is not available.