WorldWideScience

Sample records for political challenges encountered

  1. Qualitative Data Gathering Challenges in a Politically Unstable Rural Environment: A Zimbabwean Experience

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Tabitha Grace Mukeredzi

    2012-02-01

    Full Text Available Gaining access to participants in rural, politically unstable settings demands authority and consent not only from the participants and immediate line managers, but also from other players with interests in the research sites. This paper discusses data gathering experiences and challenges encountered during fieldwork for a PhD amidst a politically volatile situation in Zimbabwe in mid-2008. The article highlights the challenges encountered, how the researcher overcame some of them, and was stymied by others. Specifically, political challenges related to gaining access to schools and participants, which created time constraints and frustrations, fears and anxieties for the researcher. Issues of poor topography and interview space also emerged as other challenges. The paper proposes that the snags and surprises, the feelings of frustration, fear and anger that go with researching participants in politically unstable settings should not stall the research process but instead, handled with flexibility and patience, and used as motivation to continue. The experiences not only enhance the researcher's own reflexivity and reflectivity but also provide insights into the human conditions and actions as viewed from multiple perspectives.

  2. Border Encounters: American Cultural Politics and the U.S.-Mexico Border

    OpenAIRE

    Reimer, Jennifer Andrea

    2011-01-01

    AbstractBorder Encounters: American Cultural Politics and the U.S.-Mexico BorderbyJennifer Andrea ReimerDoctor of Philosophy in Ethnic StudiesUniversity of California, BerkeleyProfessor José David Saldívar, Co-ChairProfessor Laura E. Pérez, Co-ChairBorder Encounters: American Cultural Politics and the U.S.-Mexico Border is a transnational, interdisciplinary cultural study of the contemporary U.S.-Mexico border that argues for the critical role of the international border in the racial past, p...

  3. Y. Laberge on Raphael-Hernadez and Steen’s AfroAsian encounters: Culture, History, Politics.

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    2008-12-01

    Full Text Available Heike Raphael-Hernadez and Shannon Steen,  Eds. AfroAsian encounters: Culture, History, Politics. New York: New York University Press, 2006.  xxiii + 342 p. An overlooked, interdisciplinary, often innovative book, Afroasian encounters: Culture, History, Politics offers a collection of seventeen new essays related to the African-Asian intersections, cosmopolitanism and cross-cultural theories. In terms of emerging disciplines, we already had Atlantic studies (or "Trans-Atlantic studies", an i...

  4. POLITENESS IN REQUESTS: SOME RESEARCH FINDINGS RELEVANT FOR INTERCULTURAL ENCOUNTERS

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Aura CODREANU; Alina DEBU

    2011-01-01

    Full Text Available The major aim of this article is to analyze the relationship between indirectness and politeness in requests. The research project supporting the findings of the paper was undertaken in order to find out to what extent politeness and indirectness are viewed as overlapping or mutually excluding categories by Romanians compared to other nationalities, such as the British and the Hebrew. Another inherent goal of the paper is to provide an example of the socio linguistics instruments that can be employed in the investigation of the differences and similarities likely to emerge in intercultural encounters. Thus, we believe that only through similar research undertaken in the fields contributing to the emerging field of interculturality one can actually trespass the theoretical assumptions and move on to the identification of the right tools and means through which intercultural discourse to be approached at a pragmatic level and thus better understood and taught in educational establishments.

  5. Challenges in the professional care encounters

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Kaldal, Maiken Holm; Kristiansen, Jette; Uhrenfeldt, Lisbeth

    in the review. Data were extracted and the findings were categorized and themed on the basis of similarity of meaning and aggregated to produce a comprehensive set of synthesized findings. The review process resulted in 55 findings and 14 categories. The categories generated six themes: Psychological reactions...... to keep the patients happy as they try to avoid conflicts. The imagination and thoughts of what might happen in the encounter are based on the nursing students’ personal life experiences. They uses their close relatives as keys to the express empathy in the establishment of the nurse-patient relation...... are challenged by their personal boundaries in the professional care encounter and they experience a great psychological impact Patient contact is an unavoidable and complex component in the nursing education. The students have not yet built up a professional filter and are exposed to a wealth of emotional...

  6. Party Political Panthers: Hegemonic Tamil Politics and the Dalit Challenge

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Hugo Gorringe

    2011-12-01

    Full Text Available The Viduthalai Ciruthaigal Katchi (VCK, Liberation Panther Party has successfully transformed from the largest Dalit movement in Tamil Nadu into a recognised political organisation. Social movement theorists like Gamson (1990 view political recognition and engagement as one of the main aims and successes of social mobilisation. Despite the obvious achievements of the VCK, however, activists and commentators express disappointment or disillusionment with its performance. The Panthers clearly reject the caste hierarchy, but they increasingly adopt hegemonic forms of politics which can undermine their aims. This paper, thus, engages with the questions of movement institutionalisation by tracing the political trajectory of the VCK and charting its resistance to and compliance with Dravidian hegemony. It argues that institutionalisation needs to be understood within particular socio-political contexts and notes how the hegemony of Dravidian politics partly explains the disjuncture between activist and political perceptions. It portrays how the dominant political parties have set the template for what it means to ‘do’ politics in Tamil Nadu which serves as both an opportunity and a constraint for potential challengers.

  7. Challenges Encountered in the Compilation of an Advanced Shona ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    turvitenskap, Seksjon for Leksikografi, Oslo, Norway. Abstract: This paper highlights the challenges encountered by the African Languages Lexical ... looks at: (a) the limitations of the current Shona orthography, the selection and codification of ... that were suggested, without getting too deeply involved in theoretical issues.

  8. Challenges teachers encounter in teaching English reading to the ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    This study is a descriptive survey designed to investigate challenges teachers encounter in teaching English reading in the uThungulu District schools in the province of KwaZulu Natal. This study comprised ... Data were analysed using Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 24, resulting in descriptive data.

  9. Pipeline negotiations as a challenging setting for organised cultural encounters

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Guerrieri, Valeria

    has linked together countries, cultures, identities, ultimately challenging, reorganizing and renegotiating them. Starting from these premises, the following paper intends to show how Canadian Mackenzie Valley represents a unique contact zone for the development of cultural encounters, where different...... with often competing interests and positions - the practice of public hearings can be approached as a form of organized cultural encounter, whose “implied purposes” are to deal with more or less substantial cultural differences and to provide a wider cultural understanding of each different position. Through......Within the context of resource extraction, cultural encounters have been historically performed in the way of more or less antagonistic social interactions, ranging from outright domination to more empowerment-oriented relations. Throughout the last decades, the building of pipelines in particular...

  10. Feminism and Political Participation in Nigeria: An Empirical Analysis

    OpenAIRE

    Fatile Olufemi Jacob; Akhakpe Ighodalo; Igbokwe-Ibeto; Chinyeaka Justine; Oteh, Chukwuemeka Okpo Ph D

    2012-01-01

    Nigerian women have encountered a number of problems while venturing into politics. There is large scale discrimination from the men folk, both in voting for candidates and in allocating political offices. This paper examines women political participation in Nigeria and the challenges facing them. In analysizing the issues raised, the paper utilizes the nature of society, political, socio-cultural, and economic approach to feminism. To scientifically investigate the issues of feminism and pol...

  11. Political Legitimacy of Vietnam’s One Party-State: Challenges and Responses

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Carlyle A. Thayer

    Full Text Available This article focuses on the challenges to the authority of Vietnam’s one-party state that emerged in 2009 and state responses. Three separate challenges are discussed: opposition to bauxite mining in the Central Highlands; mass protests by the Catholic Church over land ownership issues; and revived political dissent by pro-democracy activists and bloggers. The Vietnam Communist Party bases its claims to political legitimacy on multiple sources. The bauxite mining controversy challenged the state’s claim to political legitimacy on the basis of performance. The Catholic land dispute challenged the state’s claim to legitimacy on rational-legal grounds. Revived political dissent, including the linkage of demands for democracy with concerns over environmental issues and relations with China, challenged the state’s claim to legitimacy based on nationalism. Vietnam responded in a “soft authoritarian” manner. Future challenges and state responses will be debated as Vietnam moves to convene its eleventh national party congress in 2010.

  12. (Im)Politeness in Cross-Cultural Encounters

    Science.gov (United States)

    House, Juliane

    2012-01-01

    In this article I will first discuss the notions of "politeness" and "impoliteness" including a multilevel model of politeness and impoliteness that relates universal levels to culture- and language-specific ones. Given this framework and my earlier postulation of a set of parameters along which members of two linguacultures differ in terms of…

  13. How Do Business Interest Groups Respond to Political Challenges?

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Paster, Thomas

    2018-01-01

    adaptation. The paper illustrates these two response strategies with four episodes of political conflict in the political-economic history of Germany: (i) the adoption of social insurance under Bismarck, (ii) the adoption of unemployment insurance in the 1920s, (iii) the adoption of board...... their interests, using four episodes of political conflict in Germany. The paper elaborates a model of response strategies and their likely impact on political outcomes. The model suggests that business interest groups can respond to political challenges in two ways: by seeking confrontation or by pursuing...

  14. Challenges Encountered Using Ophthalmic Anesthetics in Space Medicine

    Science.gov (United States)

    Bayuse, T.; Law, J.; Alexander, D.; Moynihan, S.; LeBlanc, C.; Langford, K.; Magalhaes, L.

    2015-01-01

    On orbit, ophthalmic anesthetics are used for tonometry and off-nominal corneal examinations. Proparacaine has been flown traditionally. However, the manufacturers recently changed its storage requirements from room temperature storage to refrigerated storage to preserve stability and prolong the shelf-life. Since refrigeration on orbit is not readily available and there were stability concerns about flying proparacaine unrefrigerated, tetracaine was selected as an alternative ophthalmic anesthetic in 2013. We will discuss the challenges encountered flying and using these anesthetics on the International Space Station.

  15. The Politics and Challenge of Institutional Transformation in Sub ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    The Politics and Challenge of Institutional Transformation in Sub-Saharan Africa. ... Ghana Journal of Development Studies ... This paper draws insights from theories of institutional change to analyze the interface between indigenous and contemporary socio-political institutions of governance in Sub-Saharan Africa.

  16. Politics in Schooling: Linguistic Challenge to African Philosophy

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    Administrator

    The Original project of the politics in schooling is becoming a critical challenge to African ... Such a linguistic challenge ends in .... xviii to take this principle in the logic course. I think this by itself is restriction and .... empires that dominated the world scene in recent centuries. ... a psychological penetration of colonialism.

  17. The political challenges of nuclear waste

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Andren, Mats; Strandberg, Urban

    2005-01-01

    This anthology is made up of nine essays on the nuclear waste issue, both its political, social and technical aspects, with the aim to create a platform for debate and planning of research. The contributions are titled: 'From clean energy to dangerous waste - the regulatory management of nuclear power in the Swedish welfare society. An economic-historic review , 'The course of the high-level waste into the national political arena', 'The technical principles behind the Swedish repository for spent fuels', 'Waste, legitimacy and local citizenship', 'Nuclear issues in societal planning', 'Usefulness or riddance - transmutation or just disposal?', 'National nuclear fuel policy in an European Union?', 'Conclusion - the challenges of the nuclear waste issue', 'Final words - about the need for critical debate and multi-disciplinary research'

  18. Political stability in conditions of overtaking modernisation: challenges and reference points

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    M. K. Mantashyan

    2017-07-01

    To sum up, compensatory mechanisms of the political stability in conditions of the ongoing modernization should accelerate the development of civil society within the absence of a stable and adaptive political community. Challenges to political stability should be compensated by creativity and optimality of the authorities’ activities. Prospects for further consideration of problems, being raised in this paper, are as following: to determine the socio-cultural constraints of the institutional adaptability of the political system.

  19. Space, politics, and the political

    OpenAIRE

    dikec , mustafa

    1987-01-01

    International audience; Introduction Geography and politics'', Gottmann wrote in 1980, ``have long been in search of each other'' (page 11). Debates in the literature suggest not only that they have found each other, but also that the encounter has instigated, notably in the last decade or so, a body of literature seeking to think space politically, and to think politics spatially. This is not to suggest that previous work on space was apolitical, nor to suggest that previous work on politics...

  20. Challenges encountered during postgraduate program in orthodontics: An online survey

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Amanish Singh Shinh

    2017-01-01

    Full Text Available Introduction: Orthodontics and Dentofacial Orthopedics requires profound and disciplined training over a considerable period. Given the rigorous nature of the program, it is but logical to assume that the students can encounter some difficulties during the course. The aim of the present study was to gather detailed first-hand information from the postgraduate students of all the practical challenges they encounter in academic programme of orthodontics in India. Materials and Methods: Utilizing a descriptive, cross-sectional survey, conducted through a web-based self-administered questionnaire, the sample population consisted of 799 orthodontic postgraduate students in India and 39 questions were put forward to them. Conclusion: Results showed that even while keeping the basics intact, every course should aim at inputs to help make the academic climate productive, less stressful and student-centric. Change in teaching technology, methodology and structure is needed in training our postgraduate students, to promote a more congenial academic climate.

  1. Political communication research: New media, new challenges, and new opportunities

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Rasmus Kleis Nielsen

    2014-06-01

    Full Text Available The rise of new media and the broader set of social changes they are part of present political communication research with new challenges and new opportunities at a time when many think the field is at an intellectual impasse (e.g., Bennett & Iyengar, 2008. In this article, I argue that parts of the field’s problems are rooted in the way in which political communication research has developed since the 1960s. In this period, the field has moved from being interdisciplinary and mixed-methods to being more homogenous and narrowly focused, based primarily on ideas developed in social psychology, certain strands of political science, and the effects-tradition of mass communication research. This dominant paradigm has contributed much to our understanding of some aspects of political communication. But it is struggling to make sense of many others, including questions concerning people’s experience of political communication processes and questions concerning the symbolic, institutional, and technological nature of these processes—especially during a time of often rapid change. To overcome this problem, I argue that the field of political communication research should re-engage with the rest of media and communication studies and embrace a broader and more diverse agenda. I discuss audience research and journalism studies as examples of adjacent fields that use a more diverse range of theoretical and methodological tools that might help political communication research engage with new media and the new challenges and new opportunities for research that they represent.

  2. Navigating political minefields: partnerships in organizational case study research.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Moll, Sandra

    2012-01-01

    The purpose of this paper is to examine key challenges associated with conducting politically sensitive research within a workplace setting, and to highlight strategic partnerships that can be developed to address these challenges. The author's research on employee mental health issues within a large healthcare facility serves as the foundation for identification and description of "political minefields" that investigators may encounter when conducting organizational case study research. Key methodological principles from the literature on qualitative case study research will frame discussion of how to understand and address political sensitivities in the research process. The benefits of conducting organizational case study research will be outlined, followed by discussion of methodological challenges that can emerge in negotiating entry, collecting data (gatekeepers, researcher reflexivity, participant authenticity and non-maleficence), and communicating research findings. Courage, collaboration and clear communication with stakeholders at all levels of the organization are critical to the success of workplace based case study research.

  3. Challenges hindering female participation in politics as expressed ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    The study challenges hindering female participation in politics as expressed by female politicians in the federal capital territory, Abuja, Nigeria. The research design adopted for this study was descriptive survey. The respondents were 210 female politicians selected from six Area Councils of the FCT using a proportionate ...

  4. The Nigerian Economy in the Face of Socio-Political Challenges: A Retrospective View and Ways Forward

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Tomola M Obamuyi

    2016-04-01

    Full Text Available This paper examines the Nigerian economy and the tendency for its growth in the face of several socio-political challenges facing the country, which have hampered the rate of economic development in spite of the tremendous human and material resources inherent. The paper identifies the socio-political challenges to include corruption, poverty, unemployment, insecurity, politics and governance, among others. The central argument of the paper is that steady economic growth can be achieved and financial crisis mitigated in Nigeria, if the effects of socio-political challenges, which are the key factors that have contributed to the high poverty, unemployment and economic instability in the country, are minimised. To ensure economic growth and move the country forward politically and economically, government must be more accountable in managing the nation’s resources in order to avoid wastage, poverty and unemployment. Close attention should be given to those socio-political challenges in the formulation of policies that aimed at maintaining economic growth at a level commensurate with the country’s growth rate. This study put forward that government must be proactive in all issues relating to the socio-political challenges to prevent resource mismanagement, poverty, unemployment, insecurity and slow economic growth in future.

  5. The environment as radical politics: Can ?Third World? education rise to the challenge?

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hickling-Hudson, Anne

    1994-01-01

    The pattern of industrial development which has been adopted globally in the last two centuries by both capitalist and socialist economies has caused unprecedented damage to the physical and ecological health of our planet. This paper argues that any challenges to these systems, including educational challenges, will involve political understanding and activism. It examines the potential of educational structures in Third World regions, using the Caribbean as the main example, for implementing eco-political education. This would involve encouraging students to use ecological and social justice criteria for comparing consumerist with sustainable development approaches to rethinking and refashioning the international economy, particularly the Third World share of it. It would involve teachers and students exploring how political and economic structures could be challenged and altered to obtain a fairer quality of life for the majorities now living in poverty and an adjustment of the opulent and wasteful lifestyles of affluent minorities primarily responsible for environmental degradation. Finally, those in eco-political education would work to achieve such goals within broad movements and pressure groups in rich and poor countries.

  6. The challenges and factors of political socialization of the contemporary youth

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    N М Belgarokova

    2009-09-01

    Full Text Available The article provides the analysis of the conditions and results of the processes of political culture development and political socialization of the contemporary youth in the frame of sociological research. The analysis of the conflicting influences of the agents of political socialization (family, system of education, mass media, the difficult circumstances and the challenging economic status of the contemporary Russian youth as well as the macropolitical environment in the country provides an opportunity to arrive at the conclusion concerning the socialization crisis of youth in contemporary Russia.

  7. Political Activism: Post-communist Challenges and Opportunities in East Central Europe

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Alexandra Iancu

    2016-04-01

    Full Text Available Contrary to standard narratives on the declining function of parties in fostering political participation, this article argues that far from abandoning the cause of participation, post-communist political parties diversified the understanding of the party as a mobilizing agency by adapting their internal organizations. On the basis of a mid-range number of cases (e.g. Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Romania, and Slovakia the study identified different patterns of evolution within a complex interaction effect between participation and organizational development. The peculiarity of the parties’ organization and functions has shaped political participation both as an opportunity structure (legitimizing the political system and increasing citizens’ involvement in politics and as a democratic challenge (increasing the pro-pensity of parties towards populism, ‘seasonal’ membership, corruption and clientelism.

  8. The German federal election of 2009: The challenge of participatory cultures in political campaigns

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Andreas Jungherr

    2012-06-01

    Full Text Available Increasingly, political actors have to act in online communication environments. There they meet overlapping networked publics with different levels of participatory cultures and varying expectations of participation in the (remaking and co-production of political content. This challenges political actors used to a top-down approach to communication. Meanwhile, online users are increasingly politically involved as legislatures all over the world become more active in regulating communication environments online. These new political actors often share participatory practices and have high levels of new media skills. Now they are challenged to adapt these bottom-up participatory cultures to the traditional political environment. This paper examines these adaption processes by examining three examples from the campaign for the German federal election of 2009. These examples include the attempt of Germany's conservative party (CDU to encourage their supporters to adapt participatory practices, the German Social Democrats' (SPD top-down production and distribution of online content that mimicked the look and feel of user-generated content, and the bottom-up emergence of political flash mobs.

  9. Challenges Encountered in Creating Personalised Learning Activities to Suit Students Learning Preferences

    OpenAIRE

    O'Donnell, Eileen; Wade, Vincent; Sharp, Mary; O'Donnell, Liam

    2013-01-01

    This book chapter reviews some of the challenges encountered by educators in creating personalised e-learning activities to suit students learning preferences. Technology-enhanced learning (TEL) alternatively known as e-learning has not yet reached its full potential in higher education. There are still many potential uses as yet undiscovered and other discovered uses which are not yet realisable by many educators. TEL is still predominantly used for e-dissemination and e-administration. This...

  10. Home Truths: Promises and Challenges in Linking Mortgages and Political Influence

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Deniz Igan

    2016-11-01

    Full Text Available What can “big data” tell us about the dynamics shaping the regulation of and activities in housing and mortgage markets? This paper describes a detailed database of the lobbying activities, campaign contributions, political connections, and mortgage lending activities of the financial industry. A review of the findings of recent research that has utilized this data set suggests that the political influence of the financial industry may have a bearing on the regulation of mortgage markets and, in turn, on risk-taking by lenders. A key challenge is deciphering the motivations behind the politically targeted activities of the financial industry.

  11. The Idealized Cultural Encounter

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Christiansen, Lene Bull

    Studies into cultural encounters have predominantly taken point of departure in ‘problematic encounters’, in which researchers and participants see cultural difference as an obstacle on the road to harmonious relationships (e.g. in ‘the clash of civilisations,’ or in migration/integration studies......). This paper proposes to study cultural encounters which are organised around ideals of cultural difference as a positive social and political force. The Danish People to People NGO Mellemfolkeligt Samvirke (MS) is build around ideals of equality, co-operation, mutuality and solidarity between people...... and cultures. A prominent feature of the organisation is organised cultural encounters between Northern (predominantly Danish) volunteers and Africans, which takes place at ‘training centres’ both in Denmark and in African countries, such as Kenya or Tanzania. In this paper I will outline the theoretical...

  12. The political and scientific challenges in evaluating compulsory drug treatment centers in Southeast Asia.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Vuong, Thu; Nguyen, Nhu; Le, Giang; Shanahan, Marian; Ali, Robert; Ritter, Alison

    2017-01-11

    In Vietnam, like many countries in Southeast Asia, the commonly used approach of center-based compulsory drug treatment (CCT) has been criticized on human rights ground. Meanwhile, community-based voluntary methadone maintenance treatment (MMT) has been implemented for nearly a decade with promising results. Reform-minded leaders have been seeking empirical evidence of the costs and effectiveness associated with these two main treatment modalities. Conducting evaluations of these treatments, especially where randomization is not ethical, presents challenges. The aim of this paper is to discuss political challenges and methodological issues when conducting cost-effectiveness studies within the context of a non-democratic Southeast Asian country. A retrospective analysis of the political and scientific challenges that were experienced in the study design, sample size determination, government approval and ethics approvals, participant recruitment, data collection, and determination of sources, and quantification of cost and effectiveness data was undertaken. As a consequence of the non-randomized design, analysis of patient characteristics for both treatment types was undertaken to identify the magnitude of baseline group differences. Concordance between self-reported heroin use and urine drug testing was undertaken to determine the reliability of self-report data in a politically challenging environment. We demonstrate that conducting research around compulsory treatment in a non-democratic society is feasible, yet it is politically challenging and requires navigation between science and politics. We also demonstrate that engagement with the government decision makers in the research conception, implementation, and dissemination of the results increases the likelihood of research evidence being considered for change in a contentious drug policy area. Local empirical evidence on the comparative cost-effectiveness of CCT and MMT in a Southeast Asian setting is

  13. Transforming epistemologies in the postcolonial African university? The challenge of the politics of knowledge

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Amasa Philip Ndofirepi

    2014-11-01

    Full Text Available The process of knowledge production, dissemination and consumption has captured much scholarly attention from a political viewpoint in recent times. Discourses on development, empowerment, transformation and democracy have revolved around knowledge and power and more precisely on the politics of knowledge. Institutions of higher learning, especially universities, globally, as nerve centres of knowledge production and distribution, have not been spared from the challenges of the politics of knowledge. In this conceptual paper, we theorise the dynamics of the challenges and opportunities of the politics of knowledge in the context of the postcolonial African university’s endeavour to transform epistemologies in higher education in the 21st century Africa. Our case is premised on three claims, namely that 1 the production and mediation of knowledge is a genuinely political process(Weiler, 2011b 2 universities can be considered among the most political institutions in society (Ordorika, 1999 and 3 recontextualisation and transformation of university epistemologies (Weiler, 2011a is a prerequisite for an authentic postcolonial African university.

  14. Identifying the Ethical Challenges Encountered by Information Technology Professionals Working within the Nevada Casino Industry

    Science.gov (United States)

    Essig, Michael R.

    2014-01-01

    A thematic analysis qualitative study was used to identify the unethical challenges encountered by Information Technology (IT) professionals working within the Nevada casino industry. Fourteen current and former IT leaders working or who worked in the Nevada casino industry were interviewed. Using thematic analysis, nine themes regarding ethical…

  15. Cultural diversity, democracy and the prospects of cosmopolitanism: a theory of cultural encounters.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Delanty, Gerard

    2011-12-01

    The most appropriate way of theorizing cultural diversity is to situate it in the context of a broader relational theory of culture in which the key dynamic is cultural encounters. The relational conception of culture places the emphasis on the relations between social actors and the processes by which some of these relations generate enduring cultural regularities and forms. This has important implications for political community and in particular for cosmopolitanism. It is in relationships that cultural phenomena are generated and become the basis of different kinds of political community. The paper outlines a typology of six kinds of cultural encounters and discusses four major cultural trends that variously emerge from these encounters. This approach with its emphasis on cultural encounters is the broad sociological context in which questions about cultural change and the prospects of cosmopolitanism should be discussed. © London School of Economics and Political Science 2011.

  16. Tropospheric ozone and aerosols in climate agreements: scientific and political challenges

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Rypdal, Kristin; Berntsen, Terje; Fuglestvedt, Jan S.; Aunan, Kristin; Torvanger, Asbjorn; Stordal, Frode; Pacyna, Jozef M.; Nygaard, Lynn P.

    2005-01-01

    In addition to the six greenhouse gases included in the Kyoto Protocol, the tropospheric ozone precursors CO, NMVOC and NO x and the aerosols/aerosol precursors black carbon, organic carbon and SO 2 also play significant roles in climate change. The aim of this paper is to review some of the main scientific and political challenges associated with incorporating tropospheric ozone and aerosol precursors into climate agreements, and to discuss how these challenges have a bearing on the design of future climate agreements. We argue that the optimal policy design for a particular substance depends on a combination of scientific and political concerns. We look particularly at regional climate effects, negative forcing, metrics (measuring climate effects against other gases on a common scale), political attractiveness, and verification and compliance. We systematically review the existing knowledge on these issues, explore their impact on policy design, and conclude that, with current scientific knowledge, CO and NMVOC could conceivably be included in a global climate agreement, either in a basket with the long-lived greenhouse gases or in a separate basket, while NO x and aerosols might be regulated more appropriately through regional agreements with links to a global agreement. However, the complexity and fairness implications of including tropospheric ozone precursors and aerosols might negatively affect the political feasibility of a future agreement

  17. Foucault's Political Challenge

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Bang, Henrik

    2014-01-01

    If one reads Michel Foucault "backward," so to speak, one can sense the contours of a "big narrative" of "the political" which is founded on the claim that "Where there is obedience there cannot be parrhesia" (Foucault, 2011, p. 336). What Foucault is doing with this sentence is breaking the circle...... from showing how obedience is incompatible with a politics of truth. The unity created by centralized domination, he holds, is democratically "false," however legitimate it may be. There can be no real democracy where laypeople are commanded to hand over their capacity and right to govern themselves...

  18. Regional cooperation on energy in South Asia: Unraveling the political challenges in implementing transnational pipelines and electricity grids

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Huda, Mirza Sadaqat; McDonald, Matt

    2016-01-01

    Political challenges are arguably the biggest constraint to the realization of regional energy projects in South Asia, an issue that has impeded cooperation despite the existence of substantial economic incentives. Although challenges such as technical difficulties, financial constraints and bureaucratic inefficiency are important, they are essentially subsidiary issues, the solutions to which are held hostage by often mentioned but rarely examined political impediments. While existing accounts of political obstacles in contemporary literature are relatively abstract, this paper draws on interviews with government officials, academics, representatives of regional institutions and officials of multilateral development banks in Bangladesh, Nepal, Pakistan and India to get insights into their experience of possibilities for and limitations to energy cooperation. By synthesizing the findings of interviews with relevant literature, this paper undertakes a systematic analysis of the political challenges to regional energy projects and provides a number of policy recommendations to overcome these impediments. - Highlights: • Political impediments constitute the key obstacle to energy cooperation in South Asia. • These political challenges have not been the subject of evidence-based analysis. • The paper uses data from interviews with policymakers in four South Asian countries. • Leadership and astute planning are identified as necessary in order to overcome political obstacles.

  19. What Are the Professional, Political, and Ethical Challenges of Co-Creating Health Care Systems?

    Science.gov (United States)

    Singh, Guddi; Owens, John; Cribb, Alan

    2017-11-01

    Co-creation is seen by many as a means of meeting the multiple challenges facing contemporary health care systems by involving institutions, professionals, patients, and stakeholders in new roles, relationships, and collaborative practices. While co-creation has the potential to positively transform health care systems, it generates a number of political and ethical challenges that should not be overlooked. We suggest that those involved in envisioning and implementing co-creation initiatives pay close attention to significant questions of equity, power, and justice and to the fundamental challenge of securing a common vision of the aims of and agendas for health care systems. While such initiatives present significant opportunities for improvement, they need to be viewed in light of their accompanying professional, political, and ethical challenges. © 2017 American Medical Association. All Rights Reserved.

  20. Adopting a Blended Learning Approach: Challenges Encountered and Lessons Learned in an Action Research Study

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kenney, Jane; Newcombe, Ellen

    2011-01-01

    Adopting a new teaching approach is often a daunting task especially if one is an early adopter in a limited-resource environment. This article describes the challenges encountered and the strategies used in pilot testing a blended instructional method in a large size class within the college of education at a medium-sized university. The main…

  1. Political Dynasty in Public Governance: A Close Encounter with the Cebuanos

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Fredrich Rama

    2016-05-01

    Full Text Available This is a qualitative study which described the existence of political dynasties in Cebu, Philippines. The prevailing issues on political equality and perennial rule of political families were also investigated unfolding the Cebuanos’ perceptions of political dynasty and its impact on Cebuano bureaucracy. The method of data analysis used in the study was narrative inquiry where storytelling among the selected key informants served as data collection technique. Purposive sampling was used in the selection of key informant politicians while random sampling for key informant voters was determined. The instruments used in data gathering were interviews and observations. The study revealed the true meaning of political dynasty, its advantages and drawbacks to its constituents. Varied rejoinders and call for democracy motivated the selected key informant politicians to continue serving the citizenry. This study recommends that an anti-individualistic voting preferences campaign be promoted by the government, education and youth sectors in transforming intelligent Filipino voters.

  2. Generation of global political priority for early childhood development: the challenges of framing and governance.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Shawar, Yusra Ribhi; Shiffman, Jeremy

    2017-01-07

    Despite progress, early childhood development (ECD) remains a neglected issue, particularly in resource-poor countries. We analyse the challenges and opportunities that ECD proponents face in advancing global priority for the issue. We triangulated among several data sources, including 19 semi-structured interviews with individuals involved in global ECD leadership, practice, and advocacy, as well as peer-reviewed research, organisation reports, and grey literature. We undertook a thematic analysis of the collected data, drawing on social science scholarship on collective action and a policy framework that elucidates why some global initiatives are more successful in generating political priority than others. The analysis indicates that the ECD community faces two primary challenges in advancing global political priority. The first pertains to framing: generation of internal consensus on the definition of the problem and solutions, agreement that could facilitate the discovery of a public positioning of the issue that could generate political support. The second concerns governance: building of effective institutions to achieve collective goals. However, there are multiple opportunities to advance political priority for ECD, including an increasingly favourable political environment, advances in ECD metrics, and the existence of compelling arguments for investment in ECD. To advance global priority for ECD, proponents will need to surmount the framing and governance challenges and leverage these opportunities. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

  3. The political challenges of nuclear waste; Kaernavfallets politiska utmaningar

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Andren, Mats; Strandberg, Urban (eds.)

    2005-07-01

    This anthology is made up of nine essays on the nuclear waste issue, both its political, social and technical aspects, with the aim to create a platform for debate and planning of research. The contributions are titled: 'From clean energy to dangerous waste - the regulatory management of nuclear power in the Swedish welfare society. An economic-historic review{sup ,} 'The course of the high-level waste into the national political arena', 'The technical principles behind the Swedish repository for spent fuels', 'Waste, legitimacy and local citizenship', 'Nuclear issues in societal planning', 'Usefulness or riddance - transmutation or just disposal?', 'National nuclear fuel policy in an European Union?', 'Conclusion - the challenges of the nuclear waste issue', 'Final words - about the need for critical debate and multi-disciplinary research'.

  4. The Power of Citizens and Professionals in Welfare Encounters

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Mik-Meyer, Nanna

    relationships with welfare workers. However, other factors impact these interactions; factors which often pull in different directions. Welfare encounters are thus influenced by bureaucratic principles and market values as well. Consequently, this book engages with both Weberian (bureaucracy) and Foucauldian...... (market values/NPM) studies when investigating the powerful welfare encounter. The book is targeted Academics, post-graduates, and undergraduates within sociology, anthropology and political science....

  5. Review: Iwanaga, Kazuki (ed. (2008, Women’s Political Participation and Representation in Asia. Obstacles and Challenges

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Dagmar Hellmann-Rajanayagam

    2010-04-01

    Full Text Available Review of the edited volume: Iwanaga, Kazuki (ed. (2008, Women’s Political Participation and Representation in Asia. Obstacles and Challenges, Copenhagen: NIAS Press, = Women and Politics in Asia No. 2, ISBN 9788776940164, XVII and 314 pages.

  6. DEMOCRATIZATION AND POLITICAL TRANSITION IN ARAB WORLD: PROSPECTS AND CHALLENGES

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Ibrahim Kawuley Mikail

    2015-12-01

    Full Text Available Democracy and Democratization process was among the top priorities in the new post-cold war global agenda. This issue has convinced some undemocratic countries of Arab World to set up in quest for democracy and to assertively demand their long-denied socio-economic and political justice by the autocratic rulers for the region. Indeed, the current Arab spring is geared towards transition from undemocratic system (i.e. Monarchy and Military dictatorship to democracy. Secondary data was adopted in this study. The study revealed that humiliation, prolong monarchy/military dictatorship, lack of economic reform, globalization and proliferation of mass literacy were among the factors responsible for political transition in the region. Meanwhile, establishment of tenets of democracy (i.e. rules of law, human rights, freedom, etc. and insecurity, external domination and loss of lives were among the prospect and challenges of the transition. The paper recommended among others that there is need for political and economic reform in the Arab countries which would lead to transit to democracy.

  7. Encounters with immigrant customers: perspectives of Danish community pharmacy staff on challenges and solutions.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Mygind, Anna; Espersen, Sacha; Nørgaard, Lotte Stig; Traulsen, Janine M

    2013-06-01

    To explore the challenges that Danish community pharmacy staff encounter when serving non-Western immigrant customers. Special attention was paid to similarities and differences between the perceptions of pharmacists and pharmacy assistants. A questionnaire was distributed to one pharmacist and one pharmacy assistant employed at each of the 55 community pharmacies located in the five local councils in Denmark with the highest number of immigrant inhabitants. The total response rate was 76% (84/110). Most respondents found that the needs of immigrant customers were not sufficiently assessed at the counter (n = 55, 65%), and that their latest encounter with an immigrant customer was less satisfactory than a similar encounter with an ethnic Danish customer (n = 48, 57%) (significantly more pharmacists than assistants: odds ratio, OR, 3.19; 95% confidence interval, CI, 1.27-8.04). Forty-two per cent (n = 35) perceived that immigrant customers put pressure on pharmacy staff resources, while 27% (n = 23) found that the immigrant customer group make work more interesting. More pharmacists than assistants agreed on the latter (OR, 3.43; 95% CI, 1.04-11.33). Within the past 14 days, 86% (n = 72) experienced that their advice and counselling were not understood by immigrant customers, whereas 49% (n = 41) experienced lack of understanding by ethnic Danes; and 30% (n = 25) had consciously refrained from counselling an immigrant, whereas 19% (n = 16) had done so with an ethnic Dane. Use of under-aged children as interpreters during the past month was reported by 79% of respondents. Regarding suggestions on how to improve encounters with immigrant customers, most respondents listed interventions aimed at patients, general practitioners and pharmaceutical companies. Community pharmacy staff report poorer quality in their encounters with immigrant customers, including sub-optimal counselling and frequent use of under-aged children as

  8. Obstacles and Challenges to Gender Parity. Political Violence, Electoral System and Interculturalism

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Laura Albaine

    2015-05-01

    Full Text Available This study is a contribution to the debate about the adoption of gender parity policies in Latin America analyzing particular obstacles and challenges related to the implementation of this principle. Electoral systems tend to either optimize or reduce the impact of such gender parity measures. As well as with quotas, the size of the electoral district and the kind of electoral list system are the two variables that most influence the effective implementation of these measures. At the same time, the socio-cultural context also influences the process of implementation of gender parity measures. In patriarchal societies –with high levels of gender-based violence– electoral processes are often characterized by gender-based harassment and political violence, one of the greatest obstacles for increasing women’s political participation. These situations are further complicated in societies which are also characterized by ethnic and cultural diversity, presenting the challenge of including women who are also discriminated against for their ethno-cultural identity.

  9. Why do some adolescents encounter everyday events that increase their civic interest whereas others do not?

    Science.gov (United States)

    Stattin, Håkan; Hussein, Oula; Özdemir, Metin; Russo, Silvia

    2017-02-01

    Using a longitudinal design, we asked 2 age cohorts of adolescents (15- and 18-year-olds) whether they, during the last year, had experienced events that had increased their civic interest and about details of their experiences. Based on self-determination theory, we predicted that the adolescents who reported having experienced events of this kind had already been more interested and had had more positive feelings about politics much earlier in time, and that this original interest would have increased more over time, than that of other adolescents. Second, we proposed that the adolescents who had encountered events that triggered their civic interest would have been engaged in behaviors that reflected their needs for autonomy, relatedness, and competence, much earlier in time, and that, over time, they would have increased these behaviors more than other adolescents. These 2 predictions were largely confirmed. As for the content of the events the adolescents reported, many of them concerned national and international issues experienced as threatening, and that challenged the adolescents' beliefs and morality. Overall, a previous interest in politics and engagement in exploratory behaviors that reflect the adolescents' psychological needs seem to play crucial roles in understanding why adolescents in their everyday life encounter events that trigger their civic interest. Further, the findings show that having had everyday experiences that trigger the adolescents' civic interests are associated with a later increase in political interest more broadly. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2017 APA, all rights reserved).

  10. TB Notification from Private Health Sector in Delhi, India: Challenges Encountered by Programme Personnel and Private Health Care Providers

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Mahasweta Satpati

    2017-01-01

    Full Text Available Objective. To identify the challenges encountered by private health care providers (PHCP to notify tuberculosis cases through a programme developed web-based portal mechanism called “NIKSHAY.” Study Design. It is a descriptive qualitative study conducted at two revised national tuberculosis control programme (RNTCP districts of New Delhi. The study included in-depth interviews of PHCP registered with “NIKSHAY” and RNTCP programme personnel. Grounded theory was used to conceptualise the latent social patterns in implementation of tuberculosis case notification process and promptly identifying their challenges. Results. The analysis resulted in identification of three broad themes: (a system implementation by RNTCP: it emphasizes the TB notification process by the RNTCP programme personnel; (b challenges faced by PHCP for TB notification with five different subthemes; and (c perceived gaps and suggestions: to improvise the TB notification process for the private health sector. The challenges encountered by PHCP were mainly related to unsystematic planning and suboptimal implementation by programme personnel at the state and district level. The PHCP lacked clarity on the need for TB notification. Conclusion. Implementation of TB notification among private health care providers requires systematic planning by the programme personnel. The process should be user-friendly with additional benefits to the patients.

  11. Challenges encountered by critical care unit managers in the large intensive care units.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Matlakala, Mokgadi C; Bezuidenhout, Martie C; Botha, Annali D H

    2014-04-04

    Nurses in intensive care units (ICUs) are exposed regularly to huge demands interms of fulfilling the many roles that are placed upon them. Unit managers, in particular, are responsible for the efficient management of the units and have the responsibilities of planning, organising, leading and controlling the daily activities in order to facilitate the achievement of the unit objectives. The objective of this study was to explore and present the challenges encountered by ICU managers in the management of large ICUs. A qualitative, exploratory and descriptive study was conducted at five hospital ICUs in Gauteng province, South Africa. Data were collected through individual interviews from purposively-selected critical care unit managers, then analysed using the matic coding. Five themes emerged from the data: challenges related to the layout and structure of the unit, human resources provision and staffing, provision of material resources, stressors in the unit and visitors in the ICU. Unit managers in large ICUs face multifaceted challenges which include the demand for efficient and sufficient specialised nurses; lack of or inadequate equipment that goes along with technology in ICU and supplies; and stressors in the ICU that limit the efficiency to plan, organise, lead and control the daily activities in the unit. The challenges identified call for multiple strategies to assist in the efficient management of large ICUs.

  12. Challenges encountered by critical care unit managers in the large intensive care units

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Mokgadi C. Matlakala

    2014-04-01

    Full Text Available Background: Nurses in intensive care units (ICUs are exposed regularly to huge demands interms of fulfilling the many roles that are placed upon them. Unit managers, in particular, are responsible for the efficient management of the units and have the responsibilities of planning, organising, leading and controlling the daily activities in order to facilitate the achievement of the unit objectives. Objectives: The objective of this study was to explore and present the challenges encountered by ICU managers in the management of large ICUs. Method: A qualitative, exploratory and descriptive study was conducted at five hospital ICUs in Gauteng province, South Africa. Data were collected through individual interviews from purposively-selected critical care unit managers, then analysed using the matic coding. Results: Five themes emerged from the data: challenges related to the layout and structure of the unit, human resources provision and staffing, provision of material resources, stressors in the unit and visitors in the ICU. Conclusion: Unit managers in large ICUs face multifaceted challenges which include the demand for efficient and sufficient specialised nurses; lack of or inadequate equipment that goes along with technology in ICU and supplies; and stressors in the ICU that limit the efficiency to plan, organise, lead and control the daily activities in the unit. The challenges identified call for multiple strategies to assist in the efficient management of large ICUs.

  13. The politics of researching global health politics

    Science.gov (United States)

    Rushton, Simon

    2015-01-01

    In this comment, I build on Shiffman’s call for the global health community to more deeply investigate structural and productive power. I highlight two challenges we must grapple with as social scientists carrying out the types of investigation that Shiffman proposes: the politics of challenging the powerful; and the need to investigate types of expertise that have traditionally been thought of as ‘outside’ global health. In doing so, I argue that moving forward with the agenda Shiffman sets out requires social scientists interested in the global politics of health to be reflexive about our own exercise of structural and productive power and the fact that researching global health politics is itself a political undertaking. PMID:25905482

  14. Christianity and Political Thought

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Thomassen, Bjørn; Forlenza, Rosario

    2016-01-01

    This article engages with the thought of Augusto Del Noce (1910-1989), the most important Italian Catholic philosopher and political thinker of the twentieth century. The focus is on how Del Noce came to elaborate a Catholic ‘modernity,’ bridging a positive encounter between Catholicism, democracy......, and freedom. This philosophical project had a considerable impact on modern Italian culture and politics. At the theoretical level, the argument is embedded within a larger aim to recognize attempts within Catholic philosophy to articulate an Italian political trajectory that does not simply accept the tale...

  15. eParticipation for Political Education: Challenges and Opportunities

    Science.gov (United States)

    Maier-Rabler, Ursula; Neumayer, Christina

    This paper argues, that the incorporation of eParticipation into political education at schools will broaden the chances of young people for political and societal engagement and strengthen civil society of a country or state. Frustration with traditional party politics especially of the younger generation is increasing in contemporary society. Since the voting age in Austria was lowered to 16, new ways of learning for political education by utilizing information and communication technologies (ICTs) that have the potential to increase participation of young people are considered. However, Austrian young people are not yet educated in developing and expressing political perspectives and therefore not prepared for actively taking part in politics. Exemplified on the project Polipedia.at, a collaborative online textbook on political education, this paper aims to give recommendations from a social science perspective for integration of ICTs into political education in order to enhance political participation of youth.

  16. Talking politics in everyday family lives

    OpenAIRE

    Nolas, Sevasti-Melissa; Varvantakis, Christos; Aruldoss, Vinnarasan

    2017-01-01

    How do children encounter and relate to public life? Drawing on evidence from ethnographic fieldwork conducted between 2014 and 2016 for the ERC-funded Connectors Study on the relationship between childhood and public life, this paper explores how children encounter public life in their everyday family environments. Using the instance of political talk as a practice through which public life is encountered in the home, the data presented fill important gaps in knowledge about the lived experi...

  17. The genetics of politics: discovery, challenges, and progress.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hatemi, Peter K; McDermott, Rose

    2012-10-01

    For the greater part of human history, political behaviors, values, preferences, and institutions have been viewed as socially determined. Discoveries during the 1970s that identified genetic influences on political orientations remained unaddressed. However, over the past decade, an unprecedented amount of scholarship utilizing genetic models to expand the understanding of political traits has emerged. Here, we review the 'genetics of politics', focusing on the topics that have received the most attention: attitudes, ideologies, and pro-social political traits, including voting behavior and participation. The emergence of this research has sparked a broad paradigm shift in the study of political behaviors toward the inclusion of biological influences and recognition of the mutual co-dependence between genes and environment in forming political behaviors. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

  18. Socrates: Platonic Political Ideal

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Christopher P. Long

    2012-08-01

    Full Text Available This essay articulates the differences and suggests the similarities between the practices of Socratic political speaking and those of Platonic political writing. The essay delineates Socratic speaking and Platonic writing as both erotically oriented toward ideals capable of transforming the lives of individuals and their relationships with one another. Besides it shows that in the Protagoras the practices of Socratic political speaking are concerned less with Protagoras than with the individual young man, Hippocrates. In the Phaedo, this ideal of a Socrates is amplified in such a way that Platonic writing itself emerges as capable of doing with readers what Socratic speaking did with those he encountered. Socrates is the Platonic political ideal. The result is a picture of the transformative political power of Socratic speaking and Platonic writing both.

  19. Valuable yet Vulnerable-A review of the challenges encountered by older nurses in the workplace.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ryan, C; Bergin, M; Wells, J S

    2017-07-01

    As the global nursing workforce ages, developing a comprehensive understanding of the experiences, needs and values specific to older nurses is increasingly significant. This paper reviews the evidence with regard to the specific challenges encountered by older nurses in the workplace. A scoping review of the published literature was conducted using the electronic databases Medline, CINAHL, PsycINFO, Science Direct and Google Scholar. A total of 20 papers were included in this review, most of which were qualitative (n=14). Three quantitative studies were identified (including one study which combined a physical exam with survey methods) as well as three mixed method studies. The challenges faced by older nurses in their practice are synthesised across three primary domains: Nursing and the ageing body; Recognition and support of the older nurse and Demands associated with middle-age. As older nurses form a substantial proportion of the healthcare workforce in many countries, the development and implementation of strategies to address these challenges is of utmost importance. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

  20. [Political challenges facing the consolidation of the Sistema Único de Saúde: a historical approach].

    Science.gov (United States)

    Rodrigues, Paulo Henrique de Almeida

    2014-01-01

    This article investigates the circumstances in which Brazil’s sanitation reform was conceived and the Sistema Único de Saúde (SUS) was constructed. A brief analysis is conducted of Brazil’s political transition to democracy, focusing on three political challenges facing the consolidation of SUS: its weak support base amongst workers, competition with the private sector, and the fragmentation of its administration caused by its municipalization. Finally, the changes in the scenario caused by the weakening of neoliberalism since the 2008 crisis, the reemergence of a multipolar political scenario internationally, and the financing conditions of the Brazilian State are described.

  1. Wonderful Words: Stevie Wonder’s Musical Politics During the 1970s and 1980s

    OpenAIRE

    Kilman, Sandra Marie

    2017-01-01

    The problem of racial injustice in the United States continued to plague the nation during the 1970s despite the gains made by the Civil Rights Movement during the preceding decades. Under Republican administrations during the 1970s and 1980s, working Americans encountered new financial challenges as the lion’s share of economic growth benefitted the wealthiest citizens. As socially and politically conscious popular music faded in popularity, Stevie Wonder continued to express his concerns ab...

  2. Challenges for Social-Ecological Transformations: Contributions from Social and Political Ecology

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Christoph Görg

    2017-06-01

    Full Text Available Transformation has become a major topic of sustainability research. This opens up new perspectives, but at the same time, runs the danger to convert into a new critical orthodoxy which narrows down analytical perspectives. Most research is committed towards a political-strategic approach towards transformation. This focus, however, clashes with ongoing transformation processes towards un-sustainability. The paper presents cornerstones of an integrative approach to social-ecological transformations (SET, which builds upon empirical work and conceptual considerations from Social Ecology and Political Ecology. We argue that a critical understanding of the challenges for societal transformations can be advanced by focusing on the interdependencies between societies and the natural environment. This starting point provides a more realistic understanding of the societal and biophysical constraints of sustainability transformations by emphasising the crisis-driven and contested character of the appropriation of nature and the power relations involved. Moreover, it pursues a transdisciplinary mode of research, decisive for adequately understanding any strategy for transformations towards sustainability. Such a conceptual approach of SET is supposed to better integrate the analytical, normative and political-strategic dimension of transformation research. We use the examples of global land use patterns, neo-extractivism in Latin America and the global water crisis to clarify our approach.

  3. HRM Challenges in the Age of Globalisation

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Sugandha Agarwal

    2018-01-01

    Full Text Available Globalization has caused blurred international boundaries. On one hand, there is an open market for companies to seek talent on the other hand for employees a wide array of choices to work with, all because of globalization. But such types of open and globalized market exposes the firms to the challenges occurring in the prominent field of human resource. This paper is an attempt in understanding and analyzing the challenges existing and affecting the functioning of HRM while a company operates on global platform. The major encounters and worries of HR team, and the responses that HR managers need to make to such challenges with their increasing responsibilities in the globalized environment, have also been discussed in this paper. This is a communication and cross-sectional study based on descriptive arguments and analytical logic developed through the responses received from HR teams of companies belonging to different sectors. Effective leadership, managing diverse workforce, role of technology in HR functions like recruitment and selection, legal and political aspects, skill management, global mindset are some of the jostling issues encountered by human resource function in the retro of globalization.

  4. The Political Economy of Crisis and the Crisis of Political Economy: The Challenge of Sustainability

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Graham Murdock

    2015-10-01

    and renew the project of building a non-marketised public communications system, it also needs to ensure that its interventions mitigate rather than exacerbate the problem of climate instability and address social inequalities. The challenge is to develop models and practices that can sustain both social and environmental sustainability. About the Speaker Graham Murdock is Professor of Culture and Economy at Loughborough University. He has been a pioneer in the study of the political economy of media and culture. His recent publications include co-editorship of Money Talks: Media, Markets, Crisis (2015, The Handbook of Political Economy of Communication (2011, The Idea of the Public Sphere (2010, Digital Dynamics: Engagements and Discontinuities (2010. Cover image: By Alex Proimos from Sydney, Australia (E-Waste Recycling  Uploaded by russavia [CC BY 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0], via Wikimedia Commons

  5. Spellbinding and crooning: sound amplification, radio, and political rhetoric in international comparative perspective, 1900-1945.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Wijfjes, Huub

    2014-01-01

    This article researches in an interdisciplinary way the relationship of sound technology and political culture at the beginning of the twentieth century. It sketches the different strategies that politicians--Franklin D. Roosevelt, Adolf Hitler, Winston Churchill, and Dutch prime minister Hendrikus Colijn--found for the challenges that sound amplification and radio created for their rhetoric and presentation. Taking their different political styles into account, the article demonstrates that the interconnected technologies of sound amplification and radio forced a transition from a spellbinding style based on atmosphere and pathos in a virtual environment to "political crooning" that created artificial intimacy in despatialized simultaneity. Roosevelt and Colijn created the best examples of this political crooning, while Churchill and Hitler encountered problems in this respect. Churchill's radio successes profited from the special circumstances during the first period of World War II. Hitler's speeches were integrated into a radio regime trying to shape, with dictatorial powers, a national socialistic community of listeners.

  6. Safety challenges encountered during the operating life of the almost 40 year old research reactor BR2

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Koonen, E.; Joppen, F.; Gubel, P.

    2001-01-01

    The BR2 reactor is one of the major MTR-type research reactors in the world. Its operation started in the early 1960's. Two major refurbishment operations have been carried out since then. Several safety reassessments were carried out over the years in order to keep the safety level in line with modern standards and to enhance operational safety. This paper gives an overview of the safety challenges encountered over the years and how those were met. (author)

  7. Challenges in Swedish hydropower – politics, economics and rights

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Kristina Ek

    2017-10-01

    Full Text Available Two systems working in parallel have contributed to implementation difficulties in Swedish water governance. While the old system is designed to be predictable and stable over time, the new system is intended to be transparent and holistic, guided by the principles of Integrated Water Resource Management. The paper disentangles the challenges in Swedish water governance and proposes a blueprint for future research. The proposed research project is unique in the sense that it explores the imbalances between the new and the old water governance systems from a multi-disciplinary perspective, elaborating upon the clashes between the traditional, nationally based regulatory system and the new holistic water governance system from legal, political and economic perspectives.

  8. Encounters of Newly Qualified Teachers with Micro-Politics in Primary Schools in Zimbabwe

    Science.gov (United States)

    Magudu, Snodia; Gumbo, Mishack

    2017-01-01

    This article demonstrates, through the example of Zimbabwe, the complexities of micro-political learning during induction. It reports on the experiences of ten newly qualified teachers with micro-politics or power relations in their schools during induction and locates these experiences within the broader context of their professional development.…

  9. The space of togetherness--a caring encounter.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Holopainen, Gunilla; Kasén, Anne; Nyström, Lisbet

    2014-03-01

    Encounters in relation to the nurse-patient relationship are often discussed within nursing and caring literature without a reflection on the actual meaning of the concept. Assuming that an encounter is essential for nursing care, this article seeks to create a deeper understanding of the concept through a hermeneutic approach to texts by the philosophers Buber and Marcel. Presence, recognition, availability and mutuality seem to be essential prerequisites for an encounter. As these prerequisites are fulfilled within and between human beings who encounter each other, it is possible to speak of a space of togetherness, a mutual existence, where life's mystery shines forth and caring is realized. The challenge lies in creating these encounters within nursing care. © 2012 The Authors Scandinavian Journal of Caring Sciences © 2012 Nordic College of Caring Science.

  10. Engineering challenges encountered in the design of the ELMO BUMPY TORUS proof-of-principle fusion device

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Dillow, C.F.; Imster, H.F.

    1982-01-01

    This paper first provides a summary of the history and current status of the Elmo Bumpy Torus (EBT) fusion concept. A brief description of the EBT-P is then provided in which the many unique features of this fusion device are highlighted. This description will provide the technical background for the following discussions of some of the more challenging mechanical engineering problems encountered to date in the evolution of the EBT-P design. The problems discussed are: optimization of the device primary structure design, optimization of the superconducting magnet x-ray shield design, design of the liquid helium supply and distribution system, and selection of high vacuum seals and pumps and their protection from the high power microwave environment. The common challenge in each of these design issues was to assure adequate performance at minimum cost

  11. Intergalactic Encounters: Desire and the Political Immediacy of Children's Drawing

    Science.gov (United States)

    Schulte, Christopher M.

    2015-01-01

    The author of this article creates a semblance between Deleuze and Guattari's conception of a politics of desire and the four realities, as outlined by Brent and Marjorie Wilson. By making this theoretical move, the author advances the idea that children's drawing unfolds from one moment to the next through the assemblages of desire that are most…

  12. Understanding political behavior: Essays in experimental political economy

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Gago Guerreiro de Brito Robalo, P.M.

    2014-01-01

    Explaining individual political behavior is one of the big challenges in the social sciences. The work contained in this thesis uses the tools of experimental economics, game theory and decision theory to shed light on political choices. Relaxing the neoclassical assumptions of self-interested

  13. Researching local sports initiatives for young migrants from a political perspective: methodological and practical challenges

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Noemi García-Arjona

    2017-11-01

    Full Text Available The processes of incorporation of young migrants have been studied using a range of new approaches. Among them, sports and physical activity have been claimed as a space for social and cultural integration. To date, most research has been based mainly on ethnographic and grassroots perspectives to better understand the experiences of sports practices of migrants and their families. However, fewer contributions have focused on the political discourse on sports as a field of integration. This article explores methodological challenges arosen when choosing sports policies as a field of study. The main methodological challenges considered include the contested conceptualizations of the target population in sports initiatives and the development of comparative selection criteria for different levels of institutional participants. An indepth analysis of these methodological issues can help to reflect on the ideological constructs of sports as a field of integration and highlight the contribution of the political sociological perspective to existing migration studies.

  14. The Reluctant Fundamentalist: The Re-territorialisation of the Encounter between America and its Muslim 'Other(s'

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Nath Aldalala'a

    2012-11-01

    Full Text Available The Reluctant Fundamentalist, a novel by Mohsin Hamid, explores the encounter between America and its Muslim 'others'. Within the political processes and the intellectual and emotive climate that characterises the 'war on terror', this encounter is readily understood as one of confrontation. From the time of 9/11 to the recent killing of Osama bin Laden by American Special Forces on Pakistani soil, this sense of confrontation is reinforced by the rhetoric of Western governments and media representations. Hamid's novel, however, excavates the imbrications of the personal and political effects of 9/11 coupled with the specificities that place Pakistan at the hub of America's war, while foregrounding the increasing alienation of Muslim people within global discourses. This paper considers the processes of de-territorialisation and re-territorialisation in political and cultural terms through the interaction of literary forms and global realities. The Reluctant Fundamentalist is engaged in a particular form of postcolonial 'writing back' through its depiction of migrant experience that leads to a re-assertion of specific national and cultural boundaries that ultimately re-position the dynamics of the encounter between the West and its Muslim 'other'.

  15. Nuclear power: the political challenge

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Adam, G.

    2009-01-01

    A brief overview of the political and economical situation and nuclear energy problems in Europe is given. The author presented his opinion on topic such as need of nuclear power, Kozloduy NPP units 1-4 shutdown, climate change , energy security, environmental problems

  16. Taking evolution seriously in political science.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Lewis, Orion; Steinmo, Sven

    2010-09-01

    In this essay, we explore the epistemological and ontological assumptions that have been made to make political science "scientific." We show how political science has generally adopted an ontologically reductionist philosophy of science derived from Newtonian physics and mechanics. This mechanical framework has encountered problems and constraints on its explanatory power, because an emphasis on equilibrium analysis is ill-suited for the study of political change. We outline the primary differences between an evolutionary ontology of social science and the physics-based philosophy commonly employed. Finally, we show how evolutionary thinking adds insight into the study of political phenomena and research questions that are of central importance to the field, such as preference formation.

  17. Political Challenges in Times of the Maria da Penha Law

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Lilia Guimarães Pougy

    2010-06-01

    Full Text Available This article offers support to the debate about national policies to confront violence against women and strengthen feminine citizenship. The route adopted in treating political challenges will follow the analysis of the principal responses to the phenomena of gender violence and analyze the trends identified since the enactment of the Maria da Penha Law, including increased emphasis on the “courts,” “psychology” and “social work.” The first part of the article analyzes the conceptual and normative factors of policy concerning women. An analysis is then conducted of “judicialization” and its consequences for the theoretical debate. The article concludes by presenting current perspectives on care for women at Reference Centers.

  18. THE CHALLENGES POLITICAL LEADERSHIP FACES IN THE MODERN WORLD

    OpenAIRE

    T. N. Samsonova; E. S. Shpuga

    2016-01-01

    Political leadership is a concept central to understanding political processes and outcomes, yet its definition is elusive. The study of political leadership has a long history. Many disciplines have contributed to this study, including history, philosophy, political theory, psychology etc. Leadership is a process in which leaders and followers interact dynamically in a particular situation or context. Leaders must be able to connect with followers to understand their mood and their initiativ...

  19. Sustainability, energy policy, climatic change, world food supply. Political and legal challenges of the 21th century

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Haertel, Ines

    2014-01-01

    The book on sustainability, energy policy, climatic change, world food supply as political challenges in the 21th century includes contributions on the following topics: sustainability and environment, energy and climatic change, agriculture and world food supply.

  20. Challenges Encountered During the Veterinary Disaster Response: An Example from Chile

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Elena Garde

    2013-11-01

    Full Text Available Large-scale disasters have immeasurable effects on human and animal communities. Evaluating and reporting on the response successes and difficulties encountered serves to improve existing preparedness documents and provide support to those in the process of developing plans. Although the majority of disasters occur in low and middle income nations, less than 1% of the disaster literature originates from these countries. This report describes a response to a disease outbreak in domestic dogs in Dichato, Chile following the 2010 earthquake/tsunami. With no national plan coordinating the companion animal response, there was a chaotic approach among animal welfare organizations towards rescue, diagnosis, treatment and record-keeping. Similar to the medical response following the 1985 earthquake near Santiago, we experienced problems within our own teams in maintenance of data integrity and protocol compliance. Loss of infrastructure added complications with transportation, communications and acquisition of supplies. Similar challenges likely occur in most disasters, but can be reduced through pro-active planning at national and local levels. There is sufficient information to support the human and animal welfare benefits of including companion animals in national planning, and lessons learned through this and other experiences can assist planners in the development of comprehensive and locally relevant contingency plans.

  1. Hydrosocial territories: a political ecology perspective

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Boelens, Rutgerd; Hoogesteger, Jaime; Swyngedouw, Erik; Vos, Jeroen; Wester, Philippus

    2016-01-01

    We define and explore hydrosocial territories as spatial configurations of people, institutions, water flows, hydraulic technology and the biophysical environment that revolve around the control of water. Territorial politics finds expression in encounters of diverse actors with divergent spatial

  2. Shark Interactions With Directed and Incidental Fisheries in the Northeast Pacific Ocean: Historic and Current Encounters, and Challenges for Shark Conservation.

    Science.gov (United States)

    King, Jackie; McFarlane, Gordon A; Gertseva, Vladlena; Gasper, Jason; Matson, Sean; Tribuzio, Cindy A

    For over 100 years, sharks have been encountered, as either directed catch or incidental catch, in commercial fisheries throughout the Northeast Pacific Ocean. A long-standing directed fishery for North Pacific Spiny Dogfish (Squalus suckleyi) has occurred and dominated shark landings and discards. Other fisheries, mainly for shark livers, have historically targeted species including Bluntnose Sixgill Shark (Hexanchus griseus) and Tope Shark (Galeorhinus galeus). While incidental catches of numerous species have occurred historically, only recently have these encounters been reliably enumerated in commercial and recreational fisheries. In this chapter we present shark catch statistics (directed and incidental) for commercial and recreational fisheries from Canadian waters (off British Columbia), southern US waters (off California, Oregon, and Washington), and northern US waters (off Alaska). In total, 17 species of sharks have collectively been encountered in these waters. Fishery encounters present conservation challenges for shark management, namely, the need for accurate catch statistics, stock delineation, life history parameter estimates, and improved assessments methods for population status and trends. Improvements in management and conservation of shark populations will only come with the further development of sound science-based fishery management practices for both targeted and incidental shark fisheries. © 2017 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved.

  3. Awakening to the politics of food: Politicized diet as social identity.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Chuck, Chelsea; Fernandes, Samantha A; Hyers, Lauri L

    2016-12-01

    In this qualitative study, the process of developing a politicized identity around diet was explored through a social psychological lens. Applying one of the most influencial models of group identity development proposed by Cross (1978) in which an "encounter" experience spurs an awakening into a politicized identity, we asked 36 participants who followed alternative diets due to political reasons to describe their unique encounter experiences that brought them to their politicized awakening. Their self-identified diets included pescetarian, vegetarian, vegan, raw, non-GMO/organic, and reduced meat consumption. Participants described the rationale for their diets, their "encounter" or awakening to their politicized diets, and whether they viewed their diet as a part of their identity. Using thematic analysis, we identified four key types of encounters that sparked their politicization: a series of integrated events, exposure to educational materials, a direct visceral emotional experience, and guidance from a role model. We discuss the results with regard to the politics of food, the nature of the politicized dieter's identity as part of a minority food culture, and the difficulties of engaging in political action through one's diet. The underexplored benefits of applying social psychological theories of identity to research on dietary subcultures is also discussed. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

  4. The African Political Business Cycle: varieties of Experience

    OpenAIRE

    Mosley, P.; Chiripanhura, B.

    2012-01-01

    We seek to understand both the incidence and the impact of the African political business cycle in the light of a literature which has argued that, with major extensions of democracy since the 1990s, the cycle has both become more intense and has made African political systems more fragile. With the help of country-case studies, we argue, first, that the African political business cycle is not homogeneous, and is rarely encountered in so-called ‘dominant-party systems’ where a pre-election st...

  5. Clarity in Multimedia: The Role of Interactive Media in Teaching Political Science Theories

    Science.gov (United States)

    Cunningham, Alan

    2010-01-01

    The field of political science has encountered a unique obstacle in its development. Contemporary political theory has diverged in opposite paths, becoming more conceptual and abstract as well as focused and concrete. The unfortunate result of this has been a lack of clarity in communicating political theory to a new generation of political…

  6. Greetings and Politeness in Doctor-Client Encounters in Southwestern

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Akin Odebunmi

    2013-05-01

    Full Text Available Doctors and clients sometimes experience interactiveclashes during hospital meetings in South-western Nigerianhospitals because of their divergent culture-constrainedorientation to politeness cues. The goal of this paper is tounpack the discursive elements that characterize interactiveconfluence and divergence in selected consultativeencounters in the hospitals. The findings indicate thatinstitutional and cultural (disalignments occur in respect ofadjacency and non-adjacency pair greetings. In bothgreeting types, face support, threat and stasis are conjointlyco-constituted by doctors and Yoruba clients within theaffordances of the cultural, institutional and situationalcontext of the Southwestern Nigerian hospital setting.Adjacency pair greetings attract mutual interpretingsbetween the parties; interactive disalignments aredifferentially pragmatically accommodated by doctors andclients. In non-adjacency pair greeting, doctors’ threats areco-constituted as appropriate by both parties, theinstitutional power of doctor and shared Western culturalorientation playing significant roles.

  7. Reform despite politics? The political economy of power sector reform in Fiji, 1996–2013

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Dornan, Matthew

    2014-01-01

    Attempts to reform the electricity sector in developing countries have achieved mixed results, despite the implementation of similar reforms in many developed countries, and concerted effort by donors to transfer reform models. In many cases, political obstacles have prevented full and effective implementation of donor-promoted reforms. This paper examines the political economy of power sector reform in Fiji from 1996 to 2013. Reform has been pursued with political motives in a context of clientelism. Policy inconsistency and reversal is explained by the political instability of ethnic-based politics in Fiji. Modest success has been achieved in recent years despite these challenges, with Fiji now considered a model of power sector reform for other Small Islands Developing States (SIDS) in the Pacific. The experience demonstrates that reform is possible within difficult political environments, but it is challenging, takes time and is not guaranteed. The way in which political motives have driven and shaped reform efforts also highlights the need for studies of power sector reform to direct greater attention toward political drivers behind reform. - Highlights: • This is the first study of power sector reform in Fiji or other Small Island Developing States (SIDS) of the Pacific. • The clientelist nature of politics in Fiji is found to have both driven and shaped reform efforts. • There has been modest success in recent years despite these obstacles, with Fiji now considered a model for other SIDS. • The experience demonstrates that reform is possible within difficult political environments, but it is challenging, takes time and is not guaranteed

  8. Web-based versus face-to-face interprofessional team encounters with standardized patients.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Lempicki, Kelly A; Holland, Christine S

    2018-03-01

    Challenges exist in developing interprofessional education (IPE) activities including coordinating schedules and obtaining appropriate space for teams to work. Virtual worlds have been explored as a means to overcome some of these challenges. We sought to develop a web-based interprofessional team interaction with a standardized patient (SP), as compared to a face-to-face SP interaction, focusing on the competency area of interprofessional communication. Interprofessional teams of students were randomized to complete a web-based or face-to-face SP encounter. The web-based encounter was conducted via video conference that students accessed using their own electronic device. Interprofessional communication was evaluated by faculty observers and the SPs. Participants of the web-based encounter also completed a perceptions questionnaire. Interprofessional communication was rated as average/above average by the authors and SPs. Perceptions of the web-based encounter were mixed with not all students willing to complete such an encounter again despite finding it enjoyable and a positive learning experience. The need for adequate preparation was identified, including the opportunity to review the patient case before the encounter. The web-based SP encounter afforded students the opportunity to utilize communication technology to provide patient-centered care while collaborating as an interprofessional team. Video conferencing presents an opportunity to bypass some logistical challenges in scheduling IPE experiences and can be implemented as a co-curricular activity, avoiding course revisions. Additional studies are needed to further explore student and patient perspectives and clarify when, and with what level of trainees, the experiences are most valuable. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

  9. Political Leadership and Challenges of National Integration and Development in Nigeria: The Way Forward

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Akinbi Joseph Olukayode

    2015-04-01

    Full Text Available Concrete and genuine national integration and development have been elusive in Nigeria, which has been a thing of serious concern to scholars. The study interrogates why true integration and meaningful development have been elusive in the country? This constitutes the key problem of the study. The historical method of research and analysis was employed in the study as the paper under discussion covers the past, the present and likely implications on the future of the country. The major findings in the paper revealed various factors or challenges as been responsible for this abysmal state of affairsand which Nigerian political leaders have been battling with. The paper examines some of these challenges which among others include: the elusiveness of a national leader, corruption and mismanagement of material and human resources, lack of proper accountability on the part of Nigerian political leaders, the crushing economic depression which manifested in high cost of living, poverty, mass unemployment and dissatisfaction among the citizenry, problems of democratic consolidation, the Niger Delta environmental crisis, religious crisis and the recent Boko Haram scourge which had proved intractable for Nigerian government. The implication of the totality of all these factors has the effect of partly contributing to Nigeria perambulating at the same spot or even dancing backward rather than progressing, thereby making stability, true nation building, national integration and development elusive to the Nigerian nation. Recommendations proffered towards curbing the problems in the paper include: the need to learn from history, the need for improved electioneering culture, declaration of assets by political leaders to enhance accountability, respect for the secularity of Nigeria, creation of jobs and putting in place of people oriented programmes and the need for re-orientation of both leaders and followers in Nigeria.

  10. Theorising Nudist Equality: An Encounter between Political Fantasy and Public Appearance

    OpenAIRE

    Cooper, Davina

    2011-01-01

    This paper approaches in/equality theorising through the lens of social nudism. Its starting point is a left conception of inequality where systemic power and the politics of oppression displace liberal concerns with immutability, offence, and the removal of impediments. But if undoing inequality involves more than clearing away obstacles, what else is at stake? Refracted through nudist subordination, response takes two forms. The first addresses the criteria through which discrimination gets...

  11. THE CHALLENGES POLITICAL LEADERSHIP FACES IN THE MODERN WORLD

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    T. N. Samsonova

    2016-01-01

    Full Text Available Political leadership is a concept central to understanding political processes and outcomes, yet its definition is elusive. The study of political leadership has a long history. Many disciplines have contributed to this study, including history, philosophy, political theory, psychology etc. Leadership is a process in which leaders and followers interact dynamically in a particular situation or context. Leaders must be able to connect with followers to understand their mood and their initiative. There are essential and operational differences between a leader and a manager. Managerial effectiveness is related to an emphasis on rationality and organizational structure. Leadership effectiveness is linked to symbols and culture. The interactive nature of leader-followers-situation can help us better understand the changing nature of the leaderfollower relationship and the increasingly greater complexity of situations leaders and followers face in contemporary world. Good leadership makes a difference, and it can be enhanced through greater awareness of the important factors influencing the leadership process. The changes we are facing in today’s world demand a new breed of political leaders, new forms and mechanisms of leader-follower interaction that provide effective leadership. 

  12. Beyond Political Rhetoric and Discourse: What Type of Educational, Socio-Economic, and Political Change Should Educators Expect of President Barack Obama?

    Science.gov (United States)

    Orelus, Pierre W.

    2009-01-01

    This article critically analyzes Obama's singular political victory. The author begins by laying out current racial, socio-economic, educational and political challenges that await President-elect Obama. He goes on to analyze Obama's political discourse and then questions whether or not Obama would be able to meet these challenges. The author…

  13. Sustainability : Politics and governance

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Heinrichs, Harald; Biermann, Frank

    2016-01-01

    he article gives an overview of global sustainability policy and politics. It is shown how international policy making on sustainable development has progressed from environmental policy toward recent approaches of Earth system governance. Key challenges of international sustainability politics are

  14. Political, Economic, Socio-Cultural, and Educational Challenges of Administering a Sino-US Joint Venture Campus in China

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ozturgut, Osman

    2008-01-01

    This qualitative study explored the political, economic, socio-cultural, and educational challenges of administering a Sino-U.S. joint-venture campus in the People's Republic of China. China American University (CAU) is an educational joint venture between China Investment Company (CIC) and American University (AU) in the U.S. that resulted in…

  15. Civic Engagement in a Challenging Political Context: The Neighborhood Initiative at the American University of Beirut, Lebanon

    Science.gov (United States)

    Myntti, Cynthia

    2013-01-01

    This essay uses the experience of one community engagement program at the American University of Beirut (AUB), a prominent private university in Lebanon, to reflect on the value and challenges of civic engagement in a non-Western context. It describes the Lebanese sectarian political system, provides an overview of the AUB Neighborhood Initiative,…

  16. Political challenges for China at the beginning of the 21st century

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    A. V. Vinogradov

    2017-01-01

    Full Text Available The Chinese economic model, which paved the way to «Chinese economic miracle» is running out of its capabilities. The new generation of leadership led by Xi Jinping is facing an extremely complicated task that can be compared to the one Deng Xiaoping had solved at the turn of 1980’s – to elaborate a new model of development. Measures adopted by the new General secretary of the CPC Central Committee in order to concentrate powers and to strengthen personal power are justifi ed by the need to change political course. However, as a result of these steps, the system of institutional authoritarianism that for the past 40 years was being created and provided economic success to China has been signifi cantly demolished. Current challenges for China originate not only from the necessity to change the economic model, but also from the reaction of the authorities to this need. Amidst uncertainty of new reference points for the reforms, lack of obvious competitive advantages, strengthening of external challenges and deep changes in Chinese society, China has again appeared on the verge of serious challenges, the answer to which will help evaluate the effectiveness of the reforms not only from socio-economic but also from a historical perspective.

  17. The Governmentality of Meta-governance : Identifying Theoretical and Empirical Challenges of Network Governance in the Political Field of Security and Beyond

    OpenAIRE

    Larsson, Oscar

    2015-01-01

    Meta-governance recently emerged in the field of governance as a new approach which claims that its use enables modern states to overcome problems associated with network governance. This thesis shares the view that networks are an important feature of contemporary politics which must be taken seriously, but it also maintains that networks pose substantial analytical and political challenges. It proceeds to investigate the potential possibilities and problems associated with meta-governance o...

  18. The political and social barriers for contraception in pest birds: a case study of Ovocontrol (nicarbazin).

    Science.gov (United States)

    MacDonald, Alexander; Wolf, Erick

    2013-12-01

    In a joint program, Innolytics and the U.S. Department of Agriculture/Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service National Wildlife Research Center collaborated in the development of nicarbazin as an avian contraceptive, initially for resident Canada geese and subsequently for feral pigeons. Unfortunately, the introduction of the original goose product in 2005 was a commercial failure. Political and social barriers effectively thwarted attempts to establish the new technology with any meaningful market success. Although the market adoption of the pigeon contraceptive has been less difficult, the product still encounters significant social and political obstacles and opposition. Given the focus on instant results and gratification, the introduction of contraceptive technology for birds has been challenging and broad market acceptance remains elusive. Nevertheless, especially for short-lived and rapidly reproducing species, customers continue to replace outdated or ineffective techniques with the safer and more effective contraceptive tool.

  19. CSR as Corporate Political Activity

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Morsing, Mette; Roepstorff, Anne

    2015-01-01

    –image dynamics of political CSR’. Concretely, we describe in two vignettes how IKEA’s declared ‘apolitical and neutral’ CSR identity becomes entangled with national and international socio-political events that critically challenge the corporate engagement prior national understandings of citizenship rights....... In this process, IKEA’s CSR identity becomes defined as a political and non-neutral activity. Our article contributes by bringing attention to the organizational level dynamics of political CSR by offering a conceptualization of how global and local socio-political events may disturb the alignment between CSR...

  20. Establishing Political Deliberation Systems

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Rose, Jeremy; Sæbø, Øystein

    2008-01-01

    The extension and transformation of political participation is dependent on widespread deliberation supported by information and communication technologies.  The most commonly found examples of these eParticipation systems are political discussion forums.  Though much of the discussion...... of these technologies is conducted in the eGovernment and (particularly) the eDemocracy literature, political discussion forums present a distinct set of design and management challenges which relate directly to IS concerns. In this article we analyze problems in establishing political deliberation systems under five...... headings: stakeholder engagement, web platform design, web platform management, political process re-shaping and evaluation and improvement. We review the existing literature and present a longitudinal case study of a political discussion forum: the Norwegian DemokratiTorget (Democracy Square).  We define...

  1. Political Communication in Malaysia: A study on the Use of New Media in Politics

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Pauline Pooi Yin Leong

    2015-10-01

    Full Text Available To gain and retain political power, politicians use the media to persuade the masses to vote and support them, especially during elections. Barisan Nasional (BN has successfully used the media to maintain its power for the past 57 years, making it the longest-serving elected government in the world still currently in office. However, the emergence of the Internet has challenged the status quo. The purpose of the research was to investigate how new media has influenced the political process and communication strategies in Malaysia and its impact on the political landscape. The researcher interviewed 19 respondents: politicians, bloggers and media consultants from both sides of the political divide. The findings showed that new media, especially Web 2.0, has expanded the public sphere and enabled more Malaysians to participate in the democratic process, through information dissemination, mobilisation or crowd-sourcing. However, the cyber-war between BN and the opposition Pakatan Rakyat (PR has caused confusion and disinformation, affecting the quality of democratic decision-making. Nevertheless, new media has enabled more voices to emerge and challenge the political hegemony.

  2. Mainstreaming kink: the politics of BDSM representation in U.S. popular media.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Weiss, Margot D

    2006-01-01

    This article explores nonpractitioners' understandings of and responses to the increasingly mainstream representation of BDSM in U.S. media, focusing on the film Secretary (Shainberg, 2002). Survey, focus group, and interview data indicate that popular images of SM promote the acceptance and understanding of sexual minorities through two mechanisms: acceptance via normalization, and understanding via pathologizing. Rather than challenging the privileged status of normative sexuality, these mechanisms reinforce boundaries between protected/privileged and policed/pathological sexualities. Instead of celebrating increased representation, this article argues that political energy might be directed toward the desire that the popularity of BDSM representations signifies: the desire to encounter authentic, undisciplined, and noncommodified representations that would transgress the sexual norms of American postmodern consumer culture.

  3. A Political Campaign Strategy and Campaign Theme : How to Win a Political Campaign

    OpenAIRE

    河村, 直幸; Kawamura, Naoyuki

    2004-01-01

    The aim of this research paper is to introduce a political campaign strategy. A political campaign should do on a scientific system and needs effective strategy. Before political campaign begin, a candidate and its campaigner needs to analyze election district and sample voter opinion. An election campaign needs campaign theme. The creation of campaign theme needs careful and elaborate planning. A style of campaign varies according to incumbent or challenger. The developing of an effective po...

  4. Medical schools viewed from a political perspective: how political skills can improve education leadership.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Nordquist, Jonas; Grigsby, R Kevin

    2011-12-01

    Political science offers a unique perspective from which to inform education leadership practice. This article views leadership in the health professions through the lens of political science research and offers suggestions for how theories derived from political science can be used to develop education leadership practice. Political science is rarely used in the health professions education literature. This article illuminates how this discipline can generate a more nuanced understanding of leadership in health professions education by offering a terminology, a conceptual framework and insights derived from more than 80 years of empirical work. Previous research supports the premise that successful leaders have a good understanding of political processes. Studies show current health professional education is characterised by the influence of interest groups. At the same time, the need for urgent reform of health professional education is evident. Terminology, concepts and analytical models from political science can be used to develop the political understanding of education leaders and to ultimately support the necessary changes. The analytical concepts of interest and power are applicable to current health professional education. The model presented - analysing the policy process - provides us with a tool to fine-tune our understanding of leadership challenges and hence to communicate, analyse and create strategies that allow health professional education to better meet tomorrow's challenges. © Blackwell Publishing Ltd 2011.

  5. Nuclear test watchers feel political heat

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Marshall, E.

    1987-01-01

    One year after US citizen diplomats signed a remarkable pact with the Soviet Union to monitor nuclear bomb tests, they are running into some of the obstacles that regular diplomats encounter - political flak from the Pentagon and harassment by the Soviet military. But they have devised some technical solutions that they hope will get them around the roadblocks. These solutions are discussed

  6. Egypt: Security, Political, and Islamist Challenges

    Science.gov (United States)

    2007-09-01

    Islamist militance has been developing in a wide variety of social and economic settings, including England, France , 6 Germany, and elsewhere. We might...political wedge between the United States and Egypt led to Nasir’s nationalization of the Suez Canal. Britain then plotted with France and Israel...than the membership, which, at the time, came from the petit bourgeoisie , or were migrants to urban areas. Shukri Mustafa, leader of TWH, was

  7. The People Are Missing: Cramped Space, Social Relations, and the Mediators of Politics

    OpenAIRE

    Thoburn, Nicholas

    2016-01-01

    This article investigates the place of social relations in Deleuze and Guattari’s figure of ‘cramped space’, a figure integral to their ‘minor politics’. Against social and political theories that seek the source of political practice in a collective identity, the theory of cramped space contends that politics arises among those who lack and refuse coherent identity, in their encounter with the impasses, limits, or impossibilities of individual and collective subjectivity. Cramped space, as D...

  8. Incorporating Political Socialization Theory into Baccalaureate Nursing Education.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Brown, Sandra Godman

    1996-01-01

    Nurses must incorporate a political component into their professional role identity to meet the future challenges of the health care system. Political socialization theory can assist faculty in adding a political thread to the curriculum. (SK)

  9. Qualitative research and the politics of knowledge in an age of evidence: developing a research-based practice of immanent critique.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Mykhalovskiy, Eric; Armstrong, Pat; Armstrong, Hugh; Bourgeault, Ivy; Choiniere, Jackie; Lexchin, Joel; Peters, Suzanne; White, Jerry

    2008-07-01

    This paper offers an expository discussion of an approach to qualitative health research we call immanent critique. The central analytic move of immanent critique, as we have practiced it, is to explore how claims that are internal to authoritative discourse are experienced by those who have been excluded from their formulation. This paper contributes to the discussion of the politics of qualitative research methods in an age of evidence. We do so by responding to a recent call to move beyond the micro-politics of the qualitative research encounter to consider the overall political effects of qualitative research. We argue that the political effects of research are partly enabled by mundane practices internal to the research process. We explore how this is so by considering one formulation of immanent critique--a qualitative study of the introduction of continuous quality improvement in Ontario hospitals. We emphasize how practices internal to our research--trade union collaboration, our orientation to authoritative claims, and procedures for generating and representing health care workers' experiences--helped shape the political effects of our research. The latter include challenges to managerial claims about neo-liberal health reform and broadening the evidentiary terrain upon which interlocutors can participate in public debate about health care restructuring.

  10. Political Challenges and Opportunities to Climate Change Mitigation: A View from the Front Lines

    Science.gov (United States)

    Weaver, A. J.

    2014-12-01

    Subsequent to the release of the 2007 Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the Province of British Columbia in Canada became an international leader in the development and implementation of innovative climate change mitigation policies. These include, but are not limited to, the 2008 Greenhouse Gas Reductions Target Act, the 2008 Carbon Tax Act and the 2010 Clean Energy Act. British Columbia's Cleantech sector quickly responded to, and thrived as a result of, the signal sent by government to the market. But with a change in Premier in 2011 came a change in priorities. A number of the previous initiatives have either been weakened or no longer followed through with as the Province sets its vision of being a major exporter of Liquified Natural Gas. As a member of the British Columbia Climate Action Team set up by Premier Gordon Campbell in 2007 to provide advice to government on a variety of policy-related matters, I was fortunate to be able to watch first hand as the Province aggressively moved towards reducing its Greenhouse gas emissions. Rather than stand on the sidelines as the government lost its direction on the climate file I chose to run with the BC Green Party in the 2013 provincial election. I was subsequently elected as a Member of the Legislative Assembly representing the constituents of Oak Bay Gordon Head. While science can and should inform policy deliberations, in and of itself, science cannot and should not prescribe policy outcomes. Whether or not we deal with today's challenge of climate change boils down to a question of intergeneration equity. Does the present generation owe anything to future generations in terms of the quality of the environment that they inherit? Many of today's elected decision-makers are focused on short-term decision-making. Yet those who will be affected by the consequences of these decisions are not part of the decision making process — hence the political conundrum. In this presentation I detail

  11. Organised Cultural Encounters

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Christiansen, Lene Bull; Galal, Lise Paulsen; Hvenegård-Lassen, Kirsten

    2017-01-01

    The article introduces the special issue by presenting the concept of organised cultural encounters that are encounters organised to manage and/or transform problems perceived to originate in or include cultural differences. Inspired by Pratt’s conceptualisation of the contact zone, a critical...... perspective on the particular historical and spatial context of any encounter and how this context frames and mediates what takes place during an encounter is applied. While the articles of the issue present different varieties of organised cultural encounters, it is argued that they are not only of the same...

  12. Analyzing communication skills of Pediatric Postgraduate Residents in Clinical Encounter by using video recordings.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Bari, Attia; Khan, Rehan Ahmed; Jabeen, Uzma; Rathore, Ahsan Waheed

    2017-01-01

    To analyze communication skills of pediatric postgraduate residents in clinical encounter by using video recordings. This qualitative exploratory research was conducted through video recording at The Children's Hospital Lahore, Pakistan. Residents who had attended the mandatory communication skills workshop offered by CPSP were included. The video recording of clinical encounter was done by a trained audiovisual person while the resident was interacting with the patient in the clinical encounter. Data was analyzed by thematic analysis. Initially on open coding 36 codes emerged and then through axial and selective coding these were condensed to 17 subthemes. Out of these four main themes emerged: (1) Courteous and polite attitude, (2) Marginal nonverbal communication skills, (3) Power game/Ignoring child participation and (4) Patient as medical object/Instrumental behaviour. All residents treated the patient as a medical object to reach a right diagnosis and ignored them as a human being. There was dominant role of doctors and marginal nonverbal communication skills were displayed by the residents in the form of lack of social touch, and appropriate eye contact due to documenting notes. A brief non-medical interaction for rapport building at the beginning of interaction was missing and there was lack of child involvement. Paediatric postgraduate residents were polite while communicating with parents and child but lacking in good nonverbal communication skills. Communication pattern in our study was mostly one-way showing doctor's instrumental behaviour and ignoring the child participation.

  13. Difficult medical encounters and job satisfaction - results of a cross sectional study with general practitioners in Germany.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Goetz, Katja; Mahnkopf, Janis; Kornitzky, Anna; Steinhäuser, Jost

    2018-05-09

    In primary care 15% of patient encounters are perceived as challenging by general practitioners (GP). However it is unknown what impact these encounters have regarding job satisfaction. The aim of this study was to evaluate which encounters are perceived as challenging by German GPs and whether they were associated with job satisfaction. A total of 1538 questionnaires were sent to GPs in the federal state of Schleswig-Holstein, Germany. GPs should rate 14 medical conditions and 8 traits of patients on the perceived challenge using a Likert scale (1: 'not challenging at all' to 10: 'extremely challenging'). Job satisfaction was measured with the Warr-Cook-Wall job satisfaction scale. A linear regression analyses were used to explore potential associations between for the primary outcome variable 'overall job satisfaction'. Total response was 578 (38%). GPs perceived 16% of their patients as challenging. Psychiatric disorders such as somatization disorder (mean = 7.42), schizophrenia (mean = 6.83) and anxiety disorder (mean = 6.57) were ranked as high challenging while diabetes mellitus type 2 (mean = 4.87) and high blood pressure (mean = 3.22) were ranked as a rather low challenging condition. GPs were mostly satisfied with 'colleagues' (mean = 5.80) and mostly dissatisfied with their 'hours of work' (mean = 4.20). The linear regression analysis showed no association with challenging medical conditions and traits of patients but only with different aspects of job satisfaction concerning the outcome variable 'overall job satisfaction'. Especially psychiatric conditions are perceived as challenging the question arises, in what amount psychiatric competences are gained during the postgraduate specialty training in general practice and if GPs with a mandatory rotation in psychiatry perceive these conditions as less challenging. Interestingly this study indicates that challenging encounter in terms of challenging medical conditions and traits

  14. Homoeconomico-politicus, Scientific Consciousness, and the Defense of Fundamental Values in the Context of the Climate Change Crisis: The Challenge of Scientific Responsibility for the Future of Economic and Political Science

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Winston P Nagan

    2016-05-01

    Full Text Available The general framework of this paper is to focus on the evolution of scientific consciousness and the dramatic technological developments it has generated, which have vital and highly consequential consequences for social organization on a global basis. The central fact about the current technological revolution is the enormous challenges it provides for political and economic decision-making. The political and economic choices are often merged in a symbiotic wave of challenges. In politics, we have understood the background and challenges that confront homopoliticus. These challenges are even more pronounced as challenges for homoeconomicus. In short, homoeconomico-politicus is both an observer and a participator in the challenges of dramatic technological change. What ties these two concepts together is that they are fed by a form of scientific consciousness. Dramatic forces of change, now unleashed, literally require new paradigms of political and economic thinking to inform wise policy makers about sensible political and economic choices. Both economics and politics are dramatically interrelated and shaped by the philosophy of science known as Logical Positivism. The problem with this approach is that it demands a form of scientific objectivity that rigorously excludes the study of values in the science of politics and economics. But the broader level of scientific consciousness would virtually require that these disciplines adequately account for the value implications of their work. These generalized comments may be an appropriate introduction to a deeper understanding of the impact of technological changes on the organization of political economy at all levels of social organization from the local to the global. One of the issues that we seek to underscore in this paper is a better understanding of the idea of economic consciousness. It would seem to be obvious that economic consciousness influences economic theory and practice. In this

  15. Fleeing Identity: Toward a Revolutionary Politics of Relationship

    Science.gov (United States)

    Skott-Myhre, Hans

    2012-01-01

    This article explores relationship as foundational to multicultural praxis and theory. The question of who arrives in the encounter will be examined through the concept of identity politics. In their text Commonwealth Hardt and Negri state that "It is inevitable that identity should become the primary vehicle for struggle within and against the…

  16. MAPPING CHILDREN'S POLITICS: SPATIAL STORIES, DIALOGIC RELATIONS AND POLITICAL FORMATION.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Elwood, Sarah; Mitchell, Katharyne

    2012-03-01

    This article confronts a persistent challenge in research on children's geographies and politics: the difficulty of recognizing forms of political agency and practice that by definition fall outside of existing political theory. Children are effectively "always already" positioned outside most of the structures and ideals of modernist democratic theory, such as the public sphere and abstracted notions of communicative action or "rational" speech. Recent emphases on embodied tactics of everyday life have offered important ways to recognize children's political agency and practice. However, we argue here that a focus on spatial practices and critical knowledge alone cannot capture the full range of children's politics, and show how representational and dialogic practices remain a critical element of their politics in everyday life. Drawing on de Certeau's notion of spatial stories, and Bakhtin's concept of dialogic relations, we argue that children's representations and dialogues comprise a significant space of their political agency and formation, in which they can make and negotiate social meanings, subjectivities, and relationships. We develop these arguments with evidence from an after-school activity programme we conducted with 10-13 year olds in Seattle, Washington, in which participants explored, mapped, wrote and spoke about the spaces and experiences of their everyday lives. Within these practices, children negotiate autonomy and self-determination, and forward ideas, representations, and expressions of agreement or disagreement that are critical to their formation as political actors.

  17. ELECTORAL POLITICS AND CONFRONTING THE CHALLENGE OF BASQUE AND MORO NATIONALISM

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Teresa S. Encarnacion Tadem

    2010-12-01

    Full Text Available This article explores the similarities and differences concerning the extent to which electoral politics addresses the concerns of Basque and Moro nationalism. These demands mainly focus on the factors that have brought about their political, cultural and, for the Moros, also economic marginalization. In terms of similarities, electoral politics in the form of plebiscites and referendums are used to gauge the sentiments of the Basques and the Moros with regards to approving a national constitution with provisions affecting them as well as the establishment of an autonomous region for the Moros and the strengthening of a federal form of government in the case of the Basques. Elections are also used to choose their leaders at the local, provincial, regional and national levels. As for the differences, among the major ones are the following: One is that electoral politics in the Basque region mirrors the class divide in society and reflects the interests of the constituencies. This is not the case in Muslim Mindanao whereby patronage politics rules and electoral results are generally dictated by the Muslim elites who have close ties with the national elites. And secondly, the ideological bias of the elected leader and his political power in Spain has a direct impact on Basque nationalism. In the case of the Philippines, it is the personality of the elected leader that determines whether peace negotiations will be pursued or not. But this does not impact on national or local electoral politics as in the case of Spain.

  18. Cultural geography. Different encounters, encountering difference

    OpenAIRE

    Longhurst, Robyn

    2007-01-01

    In the first half of this paper it is argued that cultural geography is a dynamic and diverse field that extends well beyond a single branch of human geography. The boundaries between it and other sub-disciplines are often blurred. People have «different» encounters with cultural geography depending on their sub-disciplinary convergences. People also have different encounters with cultural geography depending on where they live and work. «Place matters» in the construction, production and rep...

  19. A Matter of Politics: The Effects of the Political Context on Social Work in Norway and Bolivia

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Svein Tuastad

    2017-04-01

    Full Text Available To which extent do dysfunctional political systems lead to everyday challenges for social workers? Moreover, how do social workers benefit from working in well-ordered democracies?  The purpose of this paper is to gain insights into how the interplay between the political context and social work actually operates. Our main question is: How do accountability and state capacity levels affect daily social work? This interplay frequently becomes associated with levels of democracy and redistribution. We also draw attention to how social workers’ are dependent on the capacity of the state to implement policies. We compare social work and the political and legal contexts in two widely different polities – Norway and Bolivia. Our primary findings indicate that the effects of generally unfavourable political conditions permeate the possibilities for effective social work in previously unforeseen ways. Coordination problems, clientelism and political rivalry lead to everyday challenges on the ground, as many problems seem to reflect the overall institutional system and political culture. In well-ordered political systems, these problems are hardly an issue. In our concluding discussion, we address how the nature of the institutional system and political culture apparently might call for a differentiated approach towards reform strategies. For instance, progressive politicians, citizens and social workers advocating a policy transfer could face severe hindrances in polities, thus comprising weak state capacities.

  20. Approaching Political Philosophy through the Critique of Liberalism

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Sørensen, Asger

    2014-01-01

    Understanding political philosophy as practical implies reflecting on principles as well as on material matters, on justice as well as on government. Liberalism is the main challenge to political philosophy, since its optimistic laissez faire attitude denies the legitimacy of political government...

  1. Mobile encounters

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Koefoed, Lasse Martin; Christensen, Mathilde Dissing; Simonsen, Kirsten

    2017-01-01

    The paper explores modes of encounters in the everyday practice of bus travel. Particularly, it addresses cross-cultural encounters located in the tension between familiarity and difference, between inclusion and exclusion. The paper is located in contemporary thoughts, approaching public transport...... not only as a moving device but also as a social arena. Furthermore, the bus is simultaneously perceived as a public space, at once composite, contradictory and heterogeneous, and as a meeting place involving ‘Throwntogetherness’. The encounters analysed are bodily, emotional charged and outspoken meetings...

  2. POLITICAL PSYCHOLOGY – NEW CHALLENGES IN ANALYZING FOREIGN POLICY

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Karin MEGHEȘAN

    2016-06-01

    Full Text Available The art of governance, the relationship between the governed and the governing, the impact of a social and political system on coherent foreign policy-building is significantly influenced by the distribution of power and the type of decisional unit existent within the state. New subjects of study, such as political psychology, have proved their utility both in theoretical and practical study of international relations. Being a frontier subject, political psychology tries to offer answers to a number of questions regarding different issues among which the way character features influence the decision maker’s behavior, the role of the operational code in foreign policy and the utility of psychological profiles in the international relationships and in intelligence. Leading from the types of power distribution and decisional units existent in the professional literature, the present paper narrows the narrative and focuses on examining the importance of the individual level of analysis in explaining foreign policy decisions, analyzing the decision of the Russian Federation to veto the intervention of the international community in the Syrian civil conflict.

  3. The Relationship between Islam and Democracy in Turkey: Employing Political Culture as an Indicator

    Science.gov (United States)

    Toros, Emre

    2010-01-01

    During the last decade the agenda of local and global politics is heavily marked by the encounter of two powerful currents, namely democracy and political Islam. On the one hand Islam as a religion itself is facing a cultural dialectic between a modern and an authentic form, producing a synthesis which is only to be criticized again by a new…

  4. Political communication research

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Nielsen, Rasmus Kleis

    2014-01-01

    The rise of new media and the broader set of social changes they are part of present political communication research with new challenges and new opportunities at a time when many think the field is at an intellectual impasse (e.g., Bennett & Iyengar, 2008). In this article, I argue that parts...... of the field’s problems are rooted in the way in which political communication research has developed since the 1960s. In this period, the field has moved from being interdisciplinary and mixed-methods to being more homogenous and narrowly focused, based primarily on ideas developed in social psychology......, certain strands of political science, and the effects-tradition of mass communication research. This dominant paradigm has contributed much to our understanding of some aspects of political communication. But it is struggling to make sense of many others, including questions concerning people’s experience...

  5. Cluster randomization and political philosophy.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Chwang, Eric

    2012-11-01

    In this paper, I will argue that, while the ethical issues raised by cluster randomization can be challenging, they are not new. My thesis divides neatly into two parts. In the first, easier part I argue that many of the ethical challenges posed by cluster randomized human subjects research are clearly present in other types of human subjects research, and so are not novel. In the second, more difficult part I discuss the thorniest ethical challenge for cluster randomized research--cases where consent is genuinely impractical to obtain. I argue that once again these cases require no new analytic insight; instead, we should look to political philosophy for guidance. In other words, the most serious ethical problem that arises in cluster randomized research also arises in political philosophy. © 2011 Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

  6. Memetics and political science. Chosen problems

    OpenAIRE

    Donaj, Łukasz; Barańska, Marzena

    2013-01-01

    Interdisciplinarity has increasingly become a determinant of the quality of research. A particular challenge faces political science, which in itself is an interdisciplinary area of study. Or else what is interdisciplinary research including the methodologies of political science and, for example, neuroscience to depend on? In this article, the authors try to identify what political science can gain by using such fields as memetics. The subject matter of the publication is a brief description...

  7. Preg-robbing of Gold by Carbonaceous Materials Encountered in ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    Processing of gold from refractory ores containing carbonaceous materials (CM) poses challenges due to the ability of the CM to preg-rob dissolved gold. Depending on the type and maturity of CM encountered, preg-robbing of aurocyanide ion can lead to reduction in gold recovery ranging from a few percentages to more ...

  8. 'They did to him whatever they pleased': The exercise of political ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    vis the urgent challenges facing the global community. One such challenge concerns the exercise of political power within the public arena. Throughout his narrative Matthew paints a vivid portrait of the political power brokers of Jesus' world ...

  9. The Politics of Reflexive Governance: Challenges for Designing Adaptive Management and Transition Management

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Jan-Peter Voß

    2011-06-01

    Full Text Available New concepts of governance take account of ambivalence, uncertainty, and distributed power in societal change. They aim for reflexivity regarding the limits of prognostic knowledge and actual control of complex processes of change. Adaptive management and transition management are two examples that evolved from the analysis of social-ecological and sociotechnical systems, respectively. Both feature strategies of collective experimentation and learning. In this paper, we ask how these two designs of reflexive governance consider politics. Based on a framework of different dimensions and levels of politics, we show that they are mainly concerned with problem solving by a focal process, but conflict and asymmetric power relations, as well as the embedding of processes within broader political contexts, are neglected. We suggest two routes for integrating politics into the design of reflexive governance: (1 recognize the politics of learning for sustainable development and develop safeguards against domination and capture by powerful actors, and (2 systematically consider the embedding of governance designs in political contexts and their ongoing dynamics for political fit.

  10. Legal and political obstacles to smoke-free regulation in Minnesota regions.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Cork, Kerry; Forman, Carolyn

    2008-12-01

    As communities move toward statewide smoke-free regulation, progress is often stymied by legal and political challenges that arise when multiple cities and counties share regulatory power within what is, for economic purposes, a single population center. Political challenges are exacerbated by legal inconsistencies and uncertainties, such as confusing and conflicting lawmaking power in boards of health, cities or counties, and diverse procedures and timelines for adopting and amending ordinances. Surprisingly little research is available about the legal and political obstacles communities face in regulating tobacco on a regional basis. Researchers used case study methodology to analyze legal and political challenges that seven multi-jurisdictional Minnesota regions faced in smoke-free ordinance campaigns between 2000 and 2006, to examine the approaches regulatory authorities took in each of these communities, and to identify strategies to help public health advocates, health organizations, policymakers, and legal professionals anticipate, avoid, and address these obstacles. Legal impediments included confusing rules for passing smoke-free laws via ballot measures (initiatives and referenda); distracting lawsuits; and conflicts over legal jurisdiction. Political challenges included the recurrent argument for regional consistency, protracted timelines, pending legislation and elections, and mayoral vetoes. Legal and political challenges similar to those in this study appear in smoke-free campaigns across the U.S. By recognizing the risks posed by these obstacles, advocates will be better prepared to advance smoke-free policies effectively.

  11. Thinking about the service encounter enhances encounter-related word-of-mouth

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Mattsson, Jan; Söderlund, Magnus

    ) the memorability of the service encounter and (b) the extent to which what had happened had been subject to rehearsal with the purpose of telling others about it. These findings should be seen in relation to the literature’s view that customer satisfaction, not thinking, is a dominant predictor of word-of-mouth......This study examines the impact of thinking about a service encounter, after it has been completed, on telling others about it (i.e., word-of-mouth). The main finding was that encounter-related thinking boosted word-of-mouth. We also found that the think-talk association was mediated by (a....... Our results, however, indicate that satisfaction’s contribution to the variation in talking about the encounter was modest (and customer satisfaction played only a minor role in explaining why an encounter is thought about)....

  12. MAPPING CHILDREN’S POLITICS: SPATIAL STORIES, DIALOGIC RELATIONS AND POLITICAL FORMATION

    Science.gov (United States)

    Elwood, Sarah; Mitchell, Katharyne

    2015-01-01

    This article confronts a persistent challenge in research on children’s geographies and politics: the difficulty of recognizing forms of political agency and practice that by definition fall outside of existing political theory. Children are effectively “always already” positioned outside most of the structures and ideals of modernist democratic theory, such as the public sphere and abstracted notions of communicative action or “rational” speech. Recent emphases on embodied tactics of everyday life have offered important ways to recognize children’s political agency and practice. However, we argue here that a focus on spatial practices and critical knowledge alone cannot capture the full range of children’s politics, and show how representational and dialogic practices remain a critical element of their politics in everyday life. Drawing on de Certeau’s notion of spatial stories, and Bakhtin’s concept of dialogic relations, we argue that children’s representations and dialogues comprise a significant space of their political agency and formation, in which they can make and negotiate social meanings, subjectivities, and relationships. We develop these arguments with evidence from an after-school activity programme we conducted with 10–13 year olds in Seattle, Washington, in which participants explored, mapped, wrote and spoke about the spaces and experiences of their everyday lives. Within these practices, children negotiate autonomy and self-determination, and forward ideas, representations, and expressions of agreement or disagreement that are critical to their formation as political actors. PMID:25642017

  13. Neo-Liberalism and the Politics of Higher Education Policy in Indonesia

    Science.gov (United States)

    Rosser, Andrew

    2016-01-01

    This paper examines Indonesia's experience with neo-liberal higher education reform. It argues that this agenda has encountered strong resistance from the dominant predatory political, military, and bureaucratic elements who occupy the state apparatus, their corporate clients, and popular forces, leading to continuation of the centralist and…

  14. Reparation, slavery and political realism: The challenge of ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    In agreeing with the moral validity of the claims, the paper probes further in a realistic manner and argue that African states in their present situation cannot make a serious case for reparation. The paper argues further that for African states to position themselves for genuine reparation struggles in this age of political realism, ...

  15. Bringing political ecology into critical medical anthropology: a challenge to biocultural approaches.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Baer, H A

    1996-12-01

    This essay presents an effort to incorporate the "environment" into critical medical anthropology. Rather than relying upon the multifactorial approach characteristic of medical ecology or biocultural approaches in medical anthropology, it urges critical medical anthropologists to turn to the burgeoning literature on eco-Marxism, eco-socialism, or political ecology in their efforts to develop a political ecology of health. Given that political ecologists generally advocate democratic eco-socialism as a meaningful alternative to the capitalist world system, this essay also presents a critical examination of the environmental record of post-revolutionary societies.

  16. The enemy within: Power and politics in the transition to nurse practitioner

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Lorna MacLellan

    Full Text Available Background: The period of transition from registered nurse to nurse practitioner is often challenging. While adjusting to their autonomous role, nurse practitioners need to create and define a distinct role for themselves within practice contexts that may be unfamiliar, sometimes unwelcoming and inhospitable. During this time of transition, nurses need well developed negotiation skills and personal attributes including resilience, tenacity, fortitude and determination. Purpose of the research: The purpose of the research reported in this paper was to explore the transition experiences of 10 newly endorsed nurse practitioners in Australia during their first year of practice. This paper focuses on power, control and political manoeuvring that negatively impacted the ׳nurse practitioners׳ transition. A qualitative approach using a modified version of Carspecken׳s five stage critical ethnography, informed by focused ethnography, was the methodology selected for this study. Methods included observations of practice, journaling, face to face and phone interviews which were recorded, transcribed and analysed thematically. Results: “The enemy within” emerged as a dominant theme highlighting issues of power, powerlessness and politics dominating the participant׳s experiences. Power struggles amongst nurses, both overt and covert, and the deliberate misuse of power were frequently encountered. Many of the participants felt powerless and ill-prepared to negotiate the challenging situations in which they found themselves. Many lacked the skills needed to address the negative behaviours they experienced. Conclusions: This paper reports on the experiences of 10 newly endorsed nurse practitioners during their transition to the nurse practitioner role. The impact of the political climate at the time of this study had an undeniable influence on many of the participants׳ transition experiences. Competition for the limited numbers of

  17. Argentines abroad: contemporary challenges posed by political inclusion in their country of origin

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Ana MARGHERITIS

    2017-10-01

    Full Text Available This paper explores the politics of intermittent and selective inclusion of Argentines abroad in home politics. It accounts for franchise reform initiatives and explains which factors influenced Argentine citizens in the exercising of their right to vote from abroad. It traces the unfolding and stalemate of an incipient diaspora engagement policy to explain the limits to effective political inclusion of Argentine citizens living abroad today. Thus, it contributes to our understanding of the politics and institutional dynamics of the process of reforming the franchise and citizenship in one of the least explored examples within the literature.

  18. Political communication in a high-choice media environment: a challenge for democracy?

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Van Aelst, P.; Strömbäck, J.; Aalberg, T.; Esser, F.; de Vreese, C.; Matthes, J.; Hopmann, D.; Salgado, S.; Hubé, N.; Stępińska, A.; Papathanassopoulos, S.; Berganza, R.; Legnante, G.; Reinemann, C.; Sheafer, T.; Stanyer, J.

    2017-01-01

    During the last decennia media environments and political communication systems have changed fundamentally. These changes have major ramifications for the political information environments and the extent to which they aid people in becoming informed citizens. Against this background, the purpose of

  19. Computational and Simulation Modeling of Political Attitudes: The 'Tiger' Area of Political Culture Research

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Voinea, Camelia Florela

    2016-01-01

    Full Text Available In almost one century long history, political attitudes modeling research has accumulated a critical mass of theory and method. Its characteristics and particularities have often suggested that political attitude approach to political persuasion modeling reveals a strong theoretical autonomy of concept which entitles it to become a new separate discipline of research. Though this did not actually happen, political attitudes modeling research has remained the most challenging area – the “tiger” – of political culture modeling research. This paper reviews the research literature on the conceptual, computational and simulation modeling of political attitudes developed starting with the beginning of the 20th century until the present times. Several computational and simulation modeling paradigms have provided support to political attitudes modeling research. These paradigms and the shift from one to another are briefly presented for a period of time of almost one century. The dominant paradigmatic views are those inspired by the Newtonian mechanics, and those based on the principle of methodological individualism and the emergence of macro phenomena from the individual interactions at the micro level of a society. This period of time is divided in eight ages covering the history of ideas in a wide range of political domains, going from political attitudes to polity modeling. Internal and external pressures for paradigmatic change are briefly explained.

  20. Encountering Materiality

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Svabo, Connie

    2016-01-01

    DHT researcher Connie Svabo and artist Charlotte Grum did a joint performance presentation titled Becoming Sheep, Becoming Animal at the international conference Encountering Materiality – Transdisciplinary Conversations, held in Geneve, Schwitzerland, June 23-25 2016.......DHT researcher Connie Svabo and artist Charlotte Grum did a joint performance presentation titled Becoming Sheep, Becoming Animal at the international conference Encountering Materiality – Transdisciplinary Conversations, held in Geneve, Schwitzerland, June 23-25 2016....

  1. Political discourse and climate change: the challenge of reconciling scale of impact with level of governance

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Lindseth, Gard

    2006-04-01

    The politics of climate change is viewed through a discourse perspective. Central to this perspective's understanding of the environment is that the lack of urgency about the problem cannot be attributed to the nature of the climate problem and human beings alone. Environmental problems are subject to discursive struggles. The concept of discourse analysis is not discussed in relation to other, related terms, but used in a pragmatic way, aiming to advance insights about the processes under study. Two main, competing perspectives are identified: 'National Action' and 'Thinking Globally'. The findings are foremost valid for the Norwegian context, although different aspects of the climate issue have broader implications. Two central contributions to the field of climate politics are put forth: Firstly, viewing climate change controversies in terms of 'scales' is an important asset to literature in the field. The understanding of 'scale' adopted is fluid and procedural, a concept that is socially constructed. In climate politics there is no perfect fit between the ecological dimensions of climate change and the institutional dimensions of the problem. The studies show how climate change as a political problem belongs to the local, regional, national, or global scales. It is argued that we misunderstand politics if we make clear distinctions between local or global politics. It is concluded that local and national actors have up-scaled the climate issue, seeing the climate issue as a global problem requiring global solutions, instead of local or national concerns. Second, and related to the first point, the way of viewing climate change as a global issue in a national or local context has consequences for the policy solutions that can be sought. The idea of thinking globally might work to distract attention from how actors at the different levels of governance can make a contribution to climate governance. A broader discussion about climate change as a concerted

  2. Political discourse and climate change: the challenge of reconciling scale of impact with level of governance

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Lindseth, Gard

    2006-04-15

    The politics of climate change is viewed through a discourse perspective. Central to this perspective's understanding of the environment is that the lack of urgency about the problem cannot be attributed to the nature of the climate problem and human beings alone. Environmental problems are subject to discursive struggles. The concept of discourse analysis is not discussed in relation to other, related terms, but used in a pragmatic way, aiming to advance insights about the processes under study. Two main, competing perspectives are identified: 'National Action' and 'Thinking Globally'. The findings are foremost valid for the Norwegian context, although different aspects of the climate issue have broader implications. Two central contributions to the field of climate politics are put forth: Firstly, viewing climate change controversies in terms of 'scales' is an important asset to literature in the field. The understanding of 'scale' adopted is fluid and procedural, a concept that is socially constructed. In climate politics there is no perfect fit between the ecological dimensions of climate change and the institutional dimensions of the problem. The studies show how climate change as a political problem belongs to the local, regional, national, or global scales. It is argued that we misunderstand politics if we make clear distinctions between local or global politics. It is concluded that local and national actors have up-scaled the climate issue, seeing the climate issue as a global problem requiring global solutions, instead of local or national concerns. Second, and related to the first point, the way of viewing climate change as a global issue in a national or local context has consequences for the policy solutions that can be sought. The idea of thinking globally might work to distract attention from how actors at the different levels of governance can make a contribution to climate governance. A broader

  3. Political discourse and climate change: the challenge of reconciling scale of impact with level of governance

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Lindseth, Gard

    2006-04-15

    The politics of climate change is viewed through a discourse perspective. Central to this perspective's understanding of the environment is that the lack of urgency about the problem cannot be attributed to the nature of the climate problem and human beings alone. Environmental problems are subject to discursive struggles. The concept of discourse analysis is not discussed in relation to other, related terms, but used in a pragmatic way, aiming to advance insights about the processes under study. Two main, competing perspectives are identified: 'National Action' and 'Thinking Globally'. The findings are foremost valid for the Norwegian context, although different aspects of the climate issue have broader implications. Two central contributions to the field of climate politics are put forth: Firstly, viewing climate change controversies in terms of 'scales' is an important asset to literature in the field. The understanding of 'scale' adopted is fluid and procedural, a concept that is socially constructed. In climate politics there is no perfect fit between the ecological dimensions of climate change and the institutional dimensions of the problem. The studies show how climate change as a political problem belongs to the local, regional, national, or global scales. It is argued that we misunderstand politics if we make clear distinctions between local or global politics. It is concluded that local and national actors have up-scaled the climate issue, seeing the climate issue as a global problem requiring global solutions, instead of local or national concerns. Second, and related to the first point, the way of viewing climate change as a global issue in a national or local context has consequences for the policy solutions that can be sought. The idea of thinking globally might work to distract attention from how actors at the different levels of governance can make a contribution to climate governance. A broader discussion about climate change as a concerted

  4. Domestic Politics and Nuclear Proliferation

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Kim, Chul Min; Yim, Man Sung [KAIST, Daejeon (Korea, Republic of)

    2016-05-15

    The external security threat is known as the most important factor of nuclear weapons program, the domestic politics situation can also affect the nuclear proliferation decision of a country. For example, when a leader wants nuclear weapons as an ultimate weapon, the domestic politics situation can determine the effectiveness of the weapons program of a country. This study analyzes the current knowledge of the relationship between domestic politics and nuclear proliferation and suggests the main challenges of the quantitative models trying to calculate nuclear proliferation risk of countries. The domestic politics status is one of the most important indicators of nuclear program. However, some variables have never been used in quantitative analyses; for example, number of veto players and the public opinion on nuclear weapons; despite they are considered to be important in various qualitative studies. Future studies should focus on how should they be coded and how can they be linked with existing domestic politics variables.

  5. Political liberalism and religious claims

    Science.gov (United States)

    2016-01-01

    This article gives an overview of 4 important lacunae in political liberalism and identifies, in a preliminary fashion, some trends in the literature that can come in for support in filling these blind spots, which prevent political liberalism from a correct assessment of the diverse nature of religious claims. Political liberalism operates with implicit assumptions about religious actors being either ‘liberal’ or ‘fundamentalist’ and ignores a third, in-between group, namely traditionalist religious actors and their claims. After having explained what makes traditionalist religious actors different from liberal and fundamentalist religious actors, the author develops 4 areas in which political liberalism should be pushed further theoretically in order to correctly theorize the challenge which traditional religious actors pose to liberal democracy. These 4 areas (blind spots) are: (1) the context of translation; (2) the politics of exemptions; (3) the multivocality of theology; and (4) the transnational nature of norm-contestation. PMID:28344375

  6. Domestic Politics and Nuclear Proliferation

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Kim, Chul Min; Yim, Man Sung

    2016-01-01

    The external security threat is known as the most important factor of nuclear weapons program, the domestic politics situation can also affect the nuclear proliferation decision of a country. For example, when a leader wants nuclear weapons as an ultimate weapon, the domestic politics situation can determine the effectiveness of the weapons program of a country. This study analyzes the current knowledge of the relationship between domestic politics and nuclear proliferation and suggests the main challenges of the quantitative models trying to calculate nuclear proliferation risk of countries. The domestic politics status is one of the most important indicators of nuclear program. However, some variables have never been used in quantitative analyses; for example, number of veto players and the public opinion on nuclear weapons; despite they are considered to be important in various qualitative studies. Future studies should focus on how should they be coded and how can they be linked with existing domestic politics variables

  7. Wind of Change or Wind of Challenges: Implementation factors regarding wind energy development, an international perspective

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Victoria Gartman

    2014-12-01

    Full Text Available Countries promoting renewable energies encounter a variety of phenomena that can challenge the implementation of further onshore wind energy development. Those challenges can be observed in many multi-level governance systems, as exhibited in the U.S., Germany, and Mexico, where various regulatory and institutional levels must agree on goals and responsibilities. This is a challenge, as both forms of governance (top-down and bottom-up dominated are present in wind energy planning and policy. (1 Political and market phenomena, (2 siting issues, (3 the green vs. green dilemma, and (4 social acceptance are selected challenges within the different levels of decision-making processes in wind energy implementation. (1 Political and financial factors can influence the development by implementing incentive- and market-based policies, command-and-control policies, and feed-in tariffs. However, success of these policy designs for renewable energies is based on different political environments, and their electricity markets nationally, regionally, or statewide. (2 Spatial limitations in planning are created based on limited land availability due to conflicts with other land uses such as aviation, nature reserves, residential areas, their respective buffers. (3 The "green vs. green" dilemma involves the incoherent relationship between policies promoting renewable energies with policies protection species and their environments, becoming a major point of concern during siting and operations of wind energy. (4 Lastly, while there is a general overall support for wind energy, social acceptance on a local level is influenced by institutional settings i.e. information availability, as well as public and stakeholder concerns. Involvement in decision-making as well as financial participation (e.g. community-ownership affects public participation and acceptance. This paper goes into detail on these phenomena and discusses case studies in Europe and North America

  8. What Future for Educational Research in Europe? Political, Epistemological and Ethical Challenges

    Science.gov (United States)

    Grimaldi, Emiliano

    2015-01-01

    This article reflects on the future of European educational research (EER) and its politics of knowledge. EER is interpreted as a field of power/knowledge, where a hegemonic epistemic framework is raised that assembles an evidence-based epistemology, a "what works" political rationality and a technocratic model of educational research.…

  9. The Ontological Politics of Evidence and Policy Enablement

    Science.gov (United States)

    Carusi, F. Tony; Rawlins, Peter; Ashton, Karen

    2018-01-01

    Ontological politics has received increasing attention within education policy studies, particularly as a support for the notion of policy enactment. While policy enactment offers serious challenges to traditional approaches toward policy implementation, this paper takes up ontological politics as a concept that extends beyond implementation and…

  10. "VEM PRA RUA": THE POLITICAL AND THE POLITICS ON THE WEB

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Benedito Fernando Pereira

    2014-12-01

    Full Text Available Considering the political and the social division of senses, this paper seeks to check how is the process of signification in a society increasingly challenged by electronic discourse and the ways in which political and policy find themselves affected by it. In order do that, we make the analysis of discursive statements “vem pra rua” and “somos a rede social” that were present in banners and posters in street protests in Brazil in 2013, which were organized and delivered, in large part, by virtual means. We observed that such utterances go through a process of appropriation and re-signification, with shifting meanings that run of market logic, go to the social politics and go back to the market logic. We had also observed how the urban environment is affected by the electronic discourse that now constitutes the ways it makes sense.

  11. Potentials and pitfalls of the encounter between leisure-time centers and primary schools

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Ringskou, Lea Thomsen; Gravesen, David Thore

    Our research offers a qualitative, in depth-perspective on the encounter between leisure-time centers and primary schools in Denmark. In our presentration we will, in a cross-cultural perspective, reappraise the roles of leisure-time pedagogues and discuss the potentials and pitfalls of the encou......Our research offers a qualitative, in depth-perspective on the encounter between leisure-time centers and primary schools in Denmark. In our presentration we will, in a cross-cultural perspective, reappraise the roles of leisure-time pedagogues and discuss the potentials and pitfalls...... of the encounter between leisure-time centers and primary schools. In 2014, the Danish Primary School was reformed. To a considerable extent, the reform can be understood in response to receding results in international tests (Knudsen 2010). The official aim of the reform is to challenge all pupils, regardless...... the encounter between leisure-time centers and primary schools?...

  12. Political Theology as critical theology

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Tanya van Wyk

    2015-08-01

    Full Text Available This article attempts to draw the scope and content of contemporary Political Theology, based on a review of the 2013 publication titled, Political Theology: Contemporary challenges and future directions, edited by Francis Schüssler Fiorenza, Klaus Tanner and Michael Welker. The book is a collection of contributions which explore the contemporary content and potential future of the subject discipline. ‘Political Theology’ as critical theology and as a ‘theology with its face towards the world’ is committed to ‘justice, peace and the integrity of creation’ and is multifaceted. It represents a discipline with which theologians reflect on political-theological objectives across continents and paradigms. The article concludes with a brief investigation of the implications of insights offered in the book for the South African context (as part of the African continent.

  13. Exploring Ethnic and Political Boundaries with ArcGIS

    Science.gov (United States)

    Mann, Matthew

    2018-01-01

    As students study the political organization of space in the Advanced Placement (AP) Human Geography classroom, they must understand forces behind the creation of modern nation states, challenges to the stability of modern states, and political developments such as supranationalism and devolution (Human Geography Course Description). In this two…

  14. “De-Casteing” India: How Dalit Women’s Rights Civil Society Organizations Tackle Caste Based Socio-Political & Religio-Cultural Challenges

    OpenAIRE

    Boateng, Godwin Festival; Matadamas, Erika; Sharma, Reesha; Winkler, Caroline

    2014-01-01

    Untouchability practices and caste based discrimination and injustices are under yet another siege after Ambedkar. In the past 50 years, India has seen tremendous mobilization by the lower caste members, specifically, vibrant women’s movements challenging the Indian caste society with the view of securing social change and abating caste based discrimination, violence and mistreatments. However, just like the era of Ambedkar, the anti-caste movements of today have the socio-political and relig...

  15. Economic Growth and the Rise of Political Extremism

    OpenAIRE

    Markus Bruckner; Hans Peter Gruner

    2011-01-01

    In many western democracies, political parties with extreme platforms challenge more moderate incumbents. This paper analyses the impact of economic growth on the support for extreme political platforms. We provide a theoretical argument in favor of growth effects (as opposed to level effects) on the support for extreme political parties and we empirically investigate the relationship between growth and extremist votes. Lower growth rates benefit right-wing and nationalist parties, but do not...

  16. The necessity for comparative risk analyses as seen from the political point of view

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Steger, U.

    1981-01-01

    The author describes the current insufficient utilization of risk analyses in the political decision process and investigates if other technologies encounter the same difficulties of acceptance as in the nuclear energy field. This being likely he is trying to find out which contribution comparative risk analyses could make to the process of democratic will-formation so that new technologies are accepted. Firstly the author establishes theses criticizing the recent scientific efforts made in the field of risk analyses and their usability for the political decision process. He then defines the criteria risk analyses have to meet in order to serve as scientific elements for consultative political discussions. (orig./HP) [de

  17. Experimental Challenges and Successes in Measuring Aerosol Concentrations at Prototypic Spray Conditions Encountered at the Hanford Waste Treatment and Immobilization Plant - 13327

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Bontha, J.R.; Gauglitz, P.A.; Kurath, D.E.; Adkins, H.E.; Enderlin, C.W.; Blanchard, J.; Daniel, R.C.; Song, C.; Schonewill, P.P.; Mahoney, L.A.; Buchmiller, W.C.; Boeringa, G.; Jenks, J. [Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, PO Box 999, Richland, Washington 99352 (United States)

    2013-07-01

    To date, majority of the work done on measuring aerosol releases from failure of process piping was done using simple Newtonian fluids and small engineered-nozzles that do not accurately represent the fluids and breaches postulated during accident analysis at the Hanford Waste Treatment and Immobilization Plant (WTP). In addition, the majority of the work conducted in this area relies on in-spray measurements that neglect the effect of splatter and do not yield any information regarding aerosol generation rates from this additional mechanism. In order to estimate aerosol generation rates as well as reduce the uncertainties in estimating the aerosol release fractions over a broad range of breaches, fluid properties and operating conditions encountered at the WTP, the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) has designed, commissioned, and tested two experimental test stands. The first test stand, referred to as the large-scale test stand, was designed specifically to measure aerosol concentrations and release fractions under prototypic conditions of flow and pressure for a range of breaches postulated in the hazard analysis for 0.076 m (3-inch) process pipes. However, the size of the large-scale test stand, anticipated fluid loss during a breach, experimental risks, and costs associated with hazardous chemical simulant testing limited the large-scale test stand utility to water and a few non-hazardous physical simulants that did not fully span the particle size and rheological properties of the fluids encountered at the WTP. Overcoming these limitations and extending the range of simulants used, required designing and building a smaller test stand, which was installed and operated in a fume hood. This paper presents some of the features of both test stands, the experimental challenges encountered, and successes in measuring aerosol concentration in both test stands over a range of test conditions. (authors)

  18. Image as Gesture: Notes on Aernout Mik's Communitas and the Modern Political Film

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Pisters, P.

    2015-01-01

    Walking through Aernout Mik’s exhibition Communitas, dwelling in the encounter with the people and situations in front of and on the screens, one is struck by the cinematic and political qualities of the gestures in these powerful video installations. In this article I will develop some

  19. Enhanced safety features of CHASHMA NPP UNIT-2 to encounter selected severe accidents, various challenges involved to prove the adequacy of severe accidents prevention/mitigation measures and to write management guidelines with one possible solution to these challenges

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Iqbal, Z.; Minhaj, A.

    2007-01-01

    This paper describes enhanced safety features of Chashma Nuclear Power Plant Unit-2 (C-2), a 325 MWe PWR to encounter selected severe accidents and discusses various challenges involved to prove the adequacy of severe accidents encountering measures and to write severe accident management guidelines (SAMGs) in compliance with the recently introduced national regulations based on the new IAEA nuclear safety standards. C-2 is being built by China National Nuclear Corporation (CNNC) for Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission (PAEC). Its twin, Unit-1 (C-1) also a 325 MWe PWR, was commissioned in 2000. Nuclear power safety with reference to severe accidents should be treated as a global issue and therefore the developed countries should include the people of developing countries in nuclear power industry's various severe accidents based research and development programs. The implementation of this idea may also deliver few other useful and mutually beneficial byproducts. (author)

  20. Universalist ethics in extraterrestrial encounter

    Science.gov (United States)

    Baum, Seth D.

    2010-02-01

    If humanity encounters an extraterrestrial civilization, or if two extraterrestrial civilizations encounter each other, then the outcome may depend not only on the civilizations' relative strength to destroy each other but also on what ethics are held by one or both civilizations. This paper explores outcomes of encounter scenarios in which one or both civilizations hold a universalist ethical framework. Several outcomes are possible in such scenarios, ranging from one civilization destroying the other to both civilizations racing to be the first to commit suicide. Thus, attention to the ethics of both humanity and extraterrestrials is warranted in human planning for such an encounter. Additionally, the possibility of such an encounter raises profound questions for contemporary human ethics, even if such an encounter never occurs.

  1. From NGO activism to party politics : the prospects for the emergence of an Indonesian Green Political Party.

    OpenAIRE

    Nerbråten, Gisle

    2005-01-01

    Politically, 2004 was an important year for Indonesia, the world s third largest, at least nominal, democracy. Faced with elections for the national Peoples Representative Assembly (DPR), the national Regional Representative Council (DPD), the Provincial and Regency/City Peoples Representative Assemblies (DPRDs), as well as two rounds of direct presidential elections, the country has in many ways shown political maturity. They have accomplished these challenges and avoided some of the pitfa...

  2. Plasma technology: a technical economical and political challenge

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Abreu, V.A. de; Vicente, L.C.; Bender, O.W.; Sanches Junior, O.

    1987-01-01

    To survey the State of the Art and Technic in Material, Process and Products by Plasma, it was needed to assemble economic, political and managerial variables that will affect the absortion and implantation of this technology in Brazil. Through a survey in industries, universities, research centers, energy agencies and financial and forster institutions it was possible to build a frame that gave us conditions to forecasting and suggest some mesures to Plasma sector. (author) [pt

  3. How Internal Political Efficacy Translates Political Knowledge Into Political Participation

    Science.gov (United States)

    Reichert, Frank

    2016-01-01

    This study presents evidence for the mediation effect of political knowledge through political self-efficacy (i.e. internal political efficacy) in the prediction of political participation. It employs an action theoretic approach—by and large grounded on the Theory of Planned Behaviour—and uses data from the German Longitudinal Election Study to examine whether political knowledge has distinct direct effects on voting, conventional, and/or unconventional political participation. It argues that political knowledge raises internal political efficacy and thereby indirectly increases the chance that a citizen will participate in politics. The results of mediated multiple regression analyses yield evidence that political knowledge indeed translates into internal political efficacy, thus it affects political participation of various kinds indirectly. However, internal political efficacy and intentions to participate politically yield simultaneous direct effects only on conventional political participation. Sequentially mediated effects appear for voting and conventional political participation, with political knowledge being mediated by internal political efficacy and subsequently also by behavioural intentions. The mediation patterns for unconventional political participation are less clear though. The discussion accounts for restrictions of this study and points to questions for answer by future research. PMID:27298633

  4. Nonpolitical images evoke neural predictors of political ideology.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ahn, Woo-Young; Kishida, Kenneth T; Gu, Xiaosi; Lohrenz, Terry; Harvey, Ann; Alford, John R; Smith, Kevin B; Yaffe, Gideon; Hibbing, John R; Dayan, Peter; Montague, P Read

    2014-11-17

    Political ideologies summarize dimensions of life that define how a person organizes their public and private behavior, including their attitudes associated with sex, family, education, and personal autonomy. Despite the abstract nature of such sensibilities, fundamental features of political ideology have been found to be deeply connected to basic biological mechanisms that may serve to defend against environmental challenges like contamination and physical threat. These results invite the provocative claim that neural responses to nonpolitical stimuli (like contaminated food or physical threats) should be highly predictive of abstract political opinions (like attitudes toward gun control and abortion). We applied a machine-learning method to fMRI data to test the hypotheses that brain responses to emotionally evocative images predict individual scores on a standard political ideology assay. Disgusting images, especially those related to animal-reminder disgust (e.g., mutilated body), generate neural responses that are highly predictive of political orientation even though these neural predictors do not agree with participants' conscious rating of the stimuli. Images from other affective categories do not support such predictions. Remarkably, brain responses to a single disgusting stimulus were sufficient to make accurate predictions about an individual subject's political ideology. These results provide strong support for the idea that fundamental neural processing differences that emerge under the challenge of emotionally evocative stimuli may serve to structure political beliefs in ways formerly unappreciated. Copyright © 2014 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

  5. Specifics of horizontal and vertical relations in Ukrainian political communication on the background of the party building’s process, political science theory and requirements to Ukrainian political context

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    K. Y. Odarchenko

    2016-10-01

    Full Text Available The specifics of horizontal and vertical relations in Ukrainian political communication on the background of the party building’s process has been analysed. Aims of this article are: 1 determination of the subjectivity of political communication; 2 disclosure of the main features of internal politics and communications; 3 setting the essential features of the political parties’ status after peaceful protests in Ukraine 2013-2014 year; 4 explanation of the actual gap that has horizontal and party political communication in Ukraine. Political modernization, capacity of Ukrainian political parties has been characterized. It has been shown that Maidan didn’t influenced tools of creating political parties and their typology greatly. Maidan as a political component was weak and did not respond to the challenges, which Ukrainian political system faced to. The weakness was in the fact that leaders of the oppositional political camp would rather keep old then implement real political change of the political system , which was adapted by the old oliharcial clan. Public sector was not able to identify their environment with new political leaders, nor with a mass movement, based on the creation of new organized political force. It has been found that in a democratic society communication is effective only if it is not only technically modern, interactive, two-way, but if it is consistent to other democratic demands, such as legal and moral control of society over the media, maintenance of basic pluralism, direct contact between senders and recipients of information, feeds decentralization, respect of freedom of expression and privat opinion. Summary of the political communication in Ukraine has to move away from thinking of policy and bureaucratic political consciousness. Otherwise, the simulation is effective and efficient for countries and regions where political communication can become a daily political farce communication in public space.

  6. Political representation and civil organisations: new forms of mediation and the challenges for legitimacy

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Adrián Gurza Lavalle

    2007-01-01

    Full Text Available This article examines the new forms of political representation civil organisations are constructing in their relation with the State, and some of the possible consequences for the quality of democracy. There are no historical or theoretical established models of representation which enable one to explore how civil organisations, in the absence of the elections or formal membership, can construct their political representativeness. For this reason, political representation by civil organisations has received little attention despite its growing importance. Extensive fieldwork in São Paulo, Brazil, reveals that political representation by civil organisations is closely connected to the dynamics of institutions of representative democracy. Furthermore, it reveals that alongside notions of representation that are clearly irreconcilable with democratic standards, a new notion of representation is emerging among civil organisations which is specifically political and compatible with democracy.

  7. Youth, Politics and the Media: Legitimacy Issues in Post ...

    International Development Research Centre (IDRC) Digital Library (Canada)

    Youth, Politics and the Media: Legitimacy Issues in Post-Revolutionary Tunisia. Since Tunisia's revolution in 2011, youth have represented a fundamental challenge for the country's political stability. For public authorities in the transition period, young Tunisians personify the interweaving of three strong trends: the ...

  8. CHALLENGES FOR TODAY’S RUSSIAN POLITICAL ELITE, AND WAYS TO ADDRESS THEM

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Ф И Шарков

    2017-12-01

    Full Text Available The authors aimed to conduct a study of the current state and prospects for the development of elitology in Russia, and to identify the public perception of political leaders, which is necessary for federal and regional elites and for improving the efficiency of the state personnel policy, mechanisms for interaction of elites in the social-political space and, thus, for increasing the transparency of power. The authors rely on the political, historical-legal, formal-legal, and structural-functional analytical approaches. Based on the results of the panel expert surveys conducted during the First All-Russian Elitological Congress “Elitology of Russia: The Current State and Prospects for the Development” (2013, Rostov-on-Don and the Second All-Russian Elitological Congress “Elitology and Strategies for the Development of Contemporary Russia” (2016, Rostov-on-Don, the authors reconstruct the general perception of Russian elites by the expert com-munity, and the dynamics of changes in the elite group; identify the public estimates of today’s regional political elites, and a discrepancy between elitism in the traditional sense and the real political power. The comparison of the results of the panel surveys conducted in 2013 and 2016 allowed to combine the findings in the groups: general perception of the Russian elites and the reliability of information about them; estimates of the dynamics of qualitative changes in the elites; measures to promote the development of inter-elite interaction and leadership. The authors made the following conclusions: both public and expert opinions underestimate the elite capital of the ruling groups; there are system symptoms of oligarchization of the elites that tend to use non-democratic means of holding power; there is an obvious task of changing the approaches to assessing and recruiting elites in the current social-political situation in Russia; in 2017, the Russian society is at the crossroads, and the

  9. Constitutionality Degree of Indonesia Local Regulation in Political Law Perspective

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Bambang Sutrisno

    2016-06-01

    Full Text Available The Politics of Law holds responsibility to give the surety of all regulations, including Local Regulation, for capable of reflecting the collective will of the public as the owner of the highest sovereignty. Politics of law is always working to bring together the ius constituendum and ius constitutum  at the encounter between realism and idealism. Local Regulation as subsystems of national law, is expected to serve as a guiding instrument and guard direction for development and continuous improvement of Local Government. Therefore the existence of local regulations holds a strategic role for legal certainty, which is a necessary to create a conducive business climate and stability of the country. How To Cite: Sutrisno, B. (2016. Constitutionality Degree of Indonesia Local Regulation in Political Law Perspective. Rechtsidee, 3(1, 41-52. doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.21070/jihr.v3i1.131

  10. Urbanization and its Political Challenges in Developing Countries

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Kemal ÖZDEN

    2012-11-01

    Full Text Available Developing countries in the twenty-first century is experiencing rapid urbanization with a high concentration of people in the urban areas while the population of people in the rural areas is decreasing due to the rise in rural-urban push which has adverse consequences on the economic and political development of developing countries, in particular African cities. Therefore, this study seeks to analyze the trends and nature of urbanization in Africa from the pre-colonial era to the contemporary period of globalization in order to ascertain the implications of rapid urbanization on the processes of democratic transitions, on the vagaries of food sufficiency and crisis as well as its multiplier effects on the escalating rate of poverty and insurgency in the cities. These problems stem from the lack of good governance, high rate of corruption and the misappropriation of state resources through diverse economic liberalizing reforms and development strategies. Thus, this study affirms that urbanization is a process that requires objective management and institutional role differentiations and performance to create the organizational synergy, moderation and frugality necessary for the equitable distribution of the common wealth for the greatest good of all peoples not only in the urban areas but also in the rural areas which invariably will bring about political and economic development in African cities, and reduce the high incidences of poverty, insurgency and food crisis.

  11. Cross-cultural care encounters in paediatric care: minority ethnic parents' experiences.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Tavallali, Azar Gashasb; Jirwe, Maria; Kabir, Zarina Nahar

    2017-03-01

    Because of worldwide migration, the healthcare staff in general as well as in paedi"atric care specifically is challenged increasingly by people from various ethnic backgrounds. The challenge is related to providing culturally competent care and effectively communicating with people from diverse cultural and ethnic backgrounds who have different health beliefs, practices, values and languages. This also applies to the Swedish society and to Swedish paediatric care. The purpose of this study was to describe the expectations and experiences of cross-cultural care encounters among minority ethnic parents in Swedish paediatric care. A qualitative design was used in the study. Data were collected using semi-structured interviews between October 2011 and March 2012. The sample consisted of 12 parents of minority ethnic backgrounds who had their child in a ward at a children's hospital in the Stockholm County Council. The interviews were analysed using manifest content analysis. The Regional Ethical Review Committee approved the study (Ref: Nr: 2011/927-31/5). The analysis of the interviews led to three categories: fundamentals in nursing, cultural sensitivity and understanding, and influencing conditions. Generic knowledge and skills of nurses outweighed the need for the nurses to have culture-specific knowledge of their patients or relatives in cross-cultural care encounters. Language skills and the availability of bilingual nurses in a multi-ethnic society can facilitate communication and increase parents' satisfaction in cross-cultural care encounters. © 2016 Nordic College of Caring Science.

  12. BOOK REVIEW: Democracy and Political Life in Nigeria | Wilson ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    In this review of Victor Dike's book - \\"Democracy and Political Life in Nigeria\\", Inam Wilson underscores the author's attempts to draw a connection between Nigeria's chequered political history and her present economic trajectory to explain why Nigeria is today facing numerous sociopolitical and economic challenges, ...

  13. Environmental Policy of Serbia and Challenges of Accession to Europe

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Darko Nadić

    2012-01-01

    Full Text Available This article analyzes the environmental policy of the Republic of Serbia within the context of accession conditions to the European Union. The main challenges of environmental integration of the environmental policies of Serbia are: economic challenges, the sustainable development challenge, administrative challenges, democratic deficiency challenges, and political challenges. These challenges, while flaws of the environmental policy in Serbia, are no different than the challenges faced by other Central Eastern European countries during the accession process. However, the influence of the global economic crisis, the constant political crisis and unclear definition of the political scene in Serbia, an incomplete vision of environmental education, as well as too much "green" marketing activities and a lack of true law implementation, are additional factors that make the process of environmental accession of Serbia to the EU even more difficult. Therefore, the harmonization of the Serbian environmental legal frame with the European one must be followed by the harmonization of actions of political institutions, social groups and individual citizens, and the overall democratization of society.

  14. Socio-technical Spaces: Guiding Politics, Staging Design

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Clausen, Christian; Yoshinaka, Yutaka

    2005-01-01

    This article addresses how insights from the social shaping tradition and political process theory may contribute to an understanding of the sociotechnical design and implementation of change. This idea is pursued through the notion of 'socio-technical spaces' and its delineation, with respect...... political concerns. The paper tentatively points to some analytical implications and to challenges and possibilities for the 'bridging' between spaces otherwise rendered distinct....

  15. Surveillance at sea: The transactional politics of border control in the Aegean.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Dijstelbloem, Huub; van Reekum, Rogier; Schinkel, Willem

    2017-06-01

    The relationship between vision and action is a key element of both practices and conceptualizations of border surveillance in Europe. This article engages with what we call the 'operative vision' of surveillance at sea, specifically as performed by the border control apparatus in the Aegean. We analyse the political consequences of this operative vision by elaborating on three examples of fieldwork conducted in the Aegean and on the islands of Chios and Lesbos. One of the main aims is to bring the figure of the migrant back into the study of border technologies. By combining insights from science and technology studies with border, mobility and security studies, the article distinguishes between processes of intervention, mobilization and realization and emphasizes the role of migrants in their encounter with surveillance operations. Two claims are brought forward. First, engaging with recent scholarly work on the visual politics of border surveillance, we circumscribe an ongoing 'transactional politics'. Second, the dynamic interplay between vision and action brings about a situation of 'recalcitrance', in which mobile objects and subjects of various kinds are drawn into securitized relations, for instance in encounters between coast guard boats and migrant boats at sea. Without reducing migrants to epiphenomena of those relations, this recalcitrance typifies the objects of surveillance as both relatable as well as resistant, particularly in the tensions between border control and search and rescue.

  16. Zora’s Politics: A Brief Introduction

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Ernest Julius Mitchell II

    2013-09-01

    Full Text Available In his introduction to reading Zora Neale Hurston’s politics, Mitchell argues that contemporary scholarship has misread Hurston in significant ways, distorting Hurston’s work and reputation to serve contesting political agendas; thus, in recent years, she has been associated with “a bewildering array of affiliations: republican, libertarian, radical democrat, reactionary conservative, black cultural nationalist, anti-authoritarian feminist, and woman-hating protofascist.” Recuperating Hurston from this impossible political melee of labels, Mitchell argues, requires a careful reading of Hurston’s work dating from her earliest pieces in the late 1920s, as well as surveying her many yet to be published manuscripts and letters; it requires recognition of the transnational and comparative lens through which she reported on political maneuvers and military histories, as well as reading not only her strong criticisms but also her silences, ironic phrasings, and nuanced critiques in her writings on global colonial enterprises. Mitchell’s introduction to the two Hurston essays here reprinted, “I Saw Negro Votes Peddled” (1950 and “Why the Negro Won’t Buy Communism” (1951—courtesy of the American Legion Magazine—is set in the larger frame of his assertion that Hurston’s work should be read with a deep appreciation of her staunch anticolonialism. Tracing her political philosophy through her views of how race and religion are used to valorize an international culture of violence that serves imperialistic and colonial ends, Mitchell takes his reader on a tour of Hurston’s transnational commentary—from the US occupation of Haiti, to the Spanish and British on the Florida peninsula; from Communist Russia and China, to election practices in the US—to set the stage for our encounters with these rarely read Hurston essays. Reading Mitchell’s “Zora’s Politics: A Brief Introduction” provides a firm foundation for a more

  17. 70 Challenge of Ethnicity, Politics by Identity and Prebendalism to ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    These factors have continued to generate tensions that sap the country of ... The struggle for political power, control and distribution of the country's resources ... inequality, disregard for fundamental human rights and rule of law are accepted ...

  18. Impact of Human Security Threats on Leadership and Political ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    Human security threats in contemporary Africa have become a major political challenge. Whether it involves sectional conflicts, kidnapping, human trafficking, armed robbery they have continued to exert a far reaching impact on the leadership and political stability in the region. This paper is therefore an attempt to examine ...

  19. Political rotations and cross-province acquisitions in China

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Muratova, Yulia; Arnoldi, Jakob; Chen, Xin

    2018-01-01

    The underdeveloped institutional framework and trade barriers between China’s provinces make cross-province acquisitions challenging. We explore how Chinese firms can mitigate this problem. Drawing on social network theory we propose that cross-province rotation of political leaders—a key element...... of the promotion system of political cadres in China—is a mechanism enabling growth through cross-province acquisitions. We conceptualize rotated leaders as brokers between two geographically dispersed networks. We contribute to the literature on the characteristics of Chinese social networks, the effect...... of political connections on firm strategy, and the impact of political rotations on firm growth in China’s provinces....

  20. The Politics of US Feminist Internationalism and Cuba: Solidarities and Fractures on the Venceremos Brigades, 1969-89

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Karen W. Tice

    2018-03-01

    Full Text Available Despite US travel bans to Cuba, a wide spectrum of US feminist and radical activists defied and crossed geo-political borders to participate in unique modes of solidarity activism and alliances with Cuba revolutionaries. Based on the narratives of US feminist political travellers who joined the Venceremos Brigades, an anti-imperialist radical education project, this article analyses the difficult conversations about feminism, gender politics, homophobia, racism, cultural imperialism, revolutionary priorities, social change strategies, and intersectionality as well as the productive organisational linkages that were generated by this political travel. This article highlights how political differences were both managed and/or silenced within transnational activist encounters, and concludes by suggesting the import of these debates for building and sustaining multi-issue and coalitional affinities within contemporary transnational feminist organising and solidarity delegations.

  1. Understanding metropolitan patterns of daily encounters.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Sun, Lijun; Axhausen, Kay W; Lee, Der-Horng; Huang, Xianfeng

    2013-08-20

    Understanding of the mechanisms driving our daily face-to-face encounters is still limited; the field lacks large-scale datasets describing both individual behaviors and their collective interactions. However, here, with the help of travel smart card data, we uncover such encounter mechanisms and structures by constructing a time-resolved in-vehicle social encounter network on public buses in a city (about 5 million residents). Using a population scale dataset, we find physical encounters display reproducible temporal patterns, indicating that repeated encounters are regular and identical. On an individual scale, we find that collective regularities dominate distinct encounters' bounded nature. An individual's encounter capability is rooted in his/her daily behavioral regularity, explaining the emergence of "familiar strangers" in daily life. Strikingly, we find individuals with repeated encounters are not grouped into small communities, but become strongly connected over time, resulting in a large, but imperceptible, small-world contact network or "structure of co-presence" across the whole metropolitan area. Revealing the encounter pattern and identifying this large-scale contact network are crucial to understanding the dynamics in patterns of social acquaintances, collective human behaviors, and--particularly--disclosing the impact of human behavior on various diffusion/spreading processes.

  2. Critical Pedagogy and Participatory Democracy: Creating Classroom Contexts That Challenge "Common Sense." A Response to "The Political Nuances of Narratives and an Urban Educator's Response"

    Science.gov (United States)

    Monzó, Lilia; Morales, P. Zitlali

    2016-01-01

    In this response to "The Political Nuances of Narratives and an Urban Educator's Response," the authors applaud Pearman's critical approach to deconstructing and challenging narratives of heroic figures who single-handedly change the world and agree with him that these narratives restrict the sense of agency that may propel citizens to…

  3. Innovative generativity of digital service encounters

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Henten, Anders; Sørensen, Jannick Kirk

    2018-01-01

    The research question examined in this chapter is how service encounters, based on digital interfaces, differ from face-to-face (f2f) encounters in terms of potential innovative generativity. New computer technologies facilitating big data processing and the development of advanced recommender...... systems and the recent developments of artificial intelligence with respect to cognitive and affective computing will certainly enhance the potential for innovations to be created on the basis of digital service encounters. However, the empathetic understanding of the needs and wants of the service users...... that can be part of the f2f service encounters cannot automatically result from digital service encounters. Digital tools can be developed and used to supplement the impressions that f2f encounters initiate. However, human interpretations and even human f2f encounters will also be needed to maintain...

  4. Political Consensus and Fiscal Outcomes

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Houlberg, Kurt; Holm Pedersen, Lene

    2015-01-01

    It is becoming difficult to maintain consensus in a period of economic austerity, and this possibly challenges the ability of democratic institutions to take decisions on tough economic questions. In order to find out how political consensus influences fiscal outcomes, this article sets out...

  5. Science, politics, and rationality in a partisan era

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kirchner, James W.

    2017-05-01

    Science plays an essential role in public policy by outlining the factual foundations of policy debates. As a result, science often becomes a political football, with partisans dismissing or misrepresenting scientific findings that conflict with their political views. Here I argue that scientists can most effectively speak out, not as activists supporting particular political causes, but instead as advocates for a fundamentally rational public discourse, one that starts from the facts—not from whatever one might choose to believe—and then explores how society should respond to the challenges that they pose.

  6. New Media and Political Advertising in Nigeria: Prospects and ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    This paper examines the new media as a tool for political advertising in Nigeria vis- a-vis, the challenges and prospects. The new media, especially the Internet and Global System for Mobile Telecommunication (GSM) have become important political campaign tools in Nigeria and the world over. This paper is guided by the ...

  7. Assessing the Influence of Political Parties on Public Opinion: The Challenge from Pretreatment Effects

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Slothuus, Rune

    2016-01-01

    Despite generations of research, political scientists have trouble pinpointing the influence of political parties on public opinion. Recently, scholars have made headway in exploring whether parties in fact shape policy preferences by relying on experimental designs. Yet, the evidence from...... this work is mixed. I argue that the typical experiment faces a design problem that likely minimizes the extent to which parties apparently matter. Because parties have policy reputations, experimental participants may already know from real-world exposure to political debate where the parties stand before...... they are told in the experiment—they are “pretreated.” This study investigates how real-world political context interferes with party cue stimulus in experiments. In two experiments I show that two types of “pretreatment” from outside the experiment—exposure-based and reputation-based—dramatically moderate...

  8. Sustainability, energy policy, climatic change, world food supply. Political and legal challenges of the 21th century; Nachhaltigkeit, Energiewende, Klimawandel, Welternaehrung. Politische und rechtliche Herausforderungen des 21. Jahrhunderts

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Haertel, Ines (ed.)

    2014-07-01

    The book on sustainability, energy policy, climatic change, world food supply as political challenges in the 21th century includes contributions on the following topics: sustainability and environment, energy and climatic change, agriculture and world food supply.

  9. AHP 21: Tibetans and Muslims in Northwest China: Economic and Political Aspects of a Complex Relationship

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Bianca Horlemann

    2012-12-01

    Full Text Available In the past and today, Tibetan-Muslim relations in Qinghai and Gansu are often associated with violent conflicts sparked by religious differences or 'interethnic hatred'. A more nuanced study of the history of Tibetan-Muslim relations, however, reveals complexity as well as considerable local difference with regard to how and when contacts were established, maintained, and broken off. Tibetan Muslim encounters were manifold and varied, including interethnic marriages, close business relations, political alliances, and armed conflicts. To illustrate this wide range of encounters, examples chosen for this paper, i.e., the relations between Amdo Tibetans and the Muslim Baoan nationality, the Muslim Ma warlords, and the Chinese xiejia institution, span different eras and localities. This study suggests that Tibetan-Muslim relations were predominantly shaped by socio-economic and political factors rather than by religious differences or 'interethnic hatred' as is often assumed.

  10. Regime Adaptability and Political Reconfigurations following the “Arab Spring”. New Challenges for EU Foreign Policies towards the Mediterranean

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Seeberg, Peter

    2015-01-01

    The article discusses the post-Arab Spring scenario in the MENA region and the EU policies in relation to the changing realities. I contend that the authoritarian states have demonstrated abilities to adapt to the new challenges. Through political reconfigurations the Arab states are able...... with the situation. The article concludes that an EU consensus in connection with the recent significant developments in the Arab Mediterranean states is only partly a reality and that to some degree this can be explained by the constant changes in the situation of several MENA states, all of which effectively seem...

  11. Pharmacy users' expectations of pharmacy encounters: a Q-methodological study.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Renberg, Tobias; Wichman Törnqvist, Kristina; Kälvemark Sporrong, Sofia; Kettis Lindblad, Asa; Tully, Mary P

    2011-12-01

    Pharmacy practice is evolving according to general health-care trends such as increased patient involvement and public health initiatives. In addition, pharmacists strive to find new professional roles. Clients' expectations of service encounters at pharmacies is an under-explored topic but crucial to understanding how pharmacy practice can evolve efficiently. To identify and describe different normative expectations of the pharmacy encounter among pharmacy clients. Q methodology, an approach to systematically explore subjectivity that retains complete patterns of responses and organizes these into factors of operant subjectivity. Eighty-five regular prescription medication users recruited at Swedish community pharmacies and by snowballing. Seven factors of operant subjectivity were identified, and organized into two groups. Factors that emphasized the physical drug product as the central object of the pharmacy encounter were labelled as independent drug shopping; logistics of drug distribution; and supply of individual's own drugs. Factors that emphasized personal support as desirable were labelled competence as individual support; individualist professional relations, just take care of me; and practical health-care and lifestyle support. The systematic Q-methodological approach yielded valuable insights into how pharmacy clients construct their expectations for service encounters. They hold differentiating normative expectations for pharmacy services. Understanding these varying viewpoints may be important for developing and prioritizing among efficient pharmacy services. Clients' expectations do not correspond with trends that guide current pharmacy practice development. This might be a challenge for promoting or implementing services based on such trends. © 2010 Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

  12. Chinese foreign direct investment in Brazil: motivations, challenges and prospects

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Yanyi Wang

    2013-08-01

    Full Text Available The objective of this research was to identify motivations presented as established by Chinese companies that perform foreign direct investment in Brazil, as well as the challenges encountered in this process and their future prospects. After a structured bibliography review of topics from foreign direct investment and Chinese investment in Latin America and Brazil, we conducted an empirical study on qualitative basis from the consultation to key informants, the methodological approach that has been used in international business studies that focus on containing China or with managers and / or Chinese managers as respondents. The procedures of data collection involved semi-structured interviews conducted, in person and by phone, in addition to questionnaires containing open questions, while processing the data followed the protocol of classical content analysis. The results of the empirical stage of the research highlight cultural and political issues that underlie strategic business decisions.

  13. Gender, religion and democratic politics in India.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hasan, Zoya

    2010-01-01

    This article examines the impact of identity politics on gender equality. More specifically it explores the paradoxical and complex relationship of religion and politics in a multi-religious society and the complicated ways in which women's activism has both reinforced and challenged their gender identities. Contrary to the argument that religious politics does not always negate gender equality, the article argues that the Hindu religious politics and women's activism associated with it provides a compelling example of the instrumentalisation of women to accomplish the political goals of the Hindu right. It also examines the approach and strategies of influential political parties, women's organisations and Muslim women's groups towards legal reform and the contested issue of a uniform civil code. Against those who argue that, in the current communal conjuncture, reform within Muslim personal laws or Islamic feminism is the best strategy for enhancing the scope of Muslim women's rights, the article argues that such an approach tends to freeze identities within religious boundaries. It shows how women's and minority rights are used within the politics of religion to sideline the agenda of women's rights.

  14. Encounters with immigrant customers

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Mygind, Anna; Espersen, Sacha; Nørgaard, Lotte Stig

    2013-01-01

    were not sufficiently assessed at the counter (n = 55, 65%), and that their latest encounter with an immigrant customer was less satisfactory than a similar encounter with an ethnic Danish customer (n = 48, 57%) (significantly more pharmacists than assistants: odds ratio, OR, 3.19; 95% confidence...

  15. Political boundary conditions for a reliable energy supply

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Majewski, O.

    1994-01-01

    The further course of energy policy in Germany is completely uncertain, especially in the light of the elections to be held in Germany in 1994. At the very last minute, the attempt at finding a long-term energy consensus failed although the positions held by the participants from politics, industry, and other groupings had already come much closer. Against the backdrop of a profound recession and a structural crisis of industry, on the one hand, and increasingly tougher international competition, on the other hand, the parameters of energy policy contribute greatly to the success or failure of future economic development. One of the objectives of the consensus talks had been to maintain an energy mix so as to spread more widely the economic, technical, political, and ecological risks that would be encountered. In particular, a permanent perspective was to be developed for the peaceful uses of nuclear power, on the one hand, by ensuring the politically undisturbed operation of the nuclear power plants currently in operation and, on the other hand, by creating a concrete, sustainable option for the development and operation of an advanced generation of nuclear reactors. (orig.) [de

  16. Politics and public health ethics in practice: right and left meet right and wrong.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Gollust, Sarah E; Baum, Nancy M; Jacobson, Peter D

    2008-01-01

    As public health practitioners are no doubt aware, public health practice and politics are closely linked. Although theoretical discussion of the emerging field of public health ethics has been rich, scholars have paid little attention to the relationship between ethical issues and politics in public health practice. We conducted semistructured interviews with 45 public health practitioners across a range of occupations (eg, health officers, medical directors, sanitarians, nurses, educators, and commissioners) working at 12 local health departments across Michigan and the state health department. Practitioners were asked to describe the ethical issues they faced in their daily practice. Ethical issues that resulted from the political environment emerged as one major category of ethical issues our interviewees described. This article illustrates how political issues engender ethical challenges in 4 main areas: public health agenda-setting, political pressures, political conflicts with best practices, and the scope of public health practice. The findings suggest that politics and public health ethics intrinsically intersect, because political pressures and priorities often impose ethical challenges that practitioners negotiate in their daily work.

  17. The Politics of African Industrial Policy

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Whitfield, Lindsay; Therkildsen, Ole; Buur, Lars

    in the early stages of capitalist transformation that also experience the pressures of elections due to democratization, this book provides four in-depth African country studies that illustrate the challenges to economic transformation and the politics of implementing industrial policies....

  18. Millennium Challenge Account

    National Research Council Canada - National Science Library

    Tarnoff, Curt

    2008-01-01

    .... foreign aid initiative. The Millennium Challenge Account (MCA) provides assistance through a competitive selection process to developing nations that are pursing political and economic reforms in three areas...

  19. Political Risk and Foreign Direct Investments in Kosovo

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    MSc. Neshat Podvorica

    2015-06-01

    Full Text Available The purpose of this paper is to present the importance of political risk and its impact on attracting investments, also to analyse policies made by the Kosovo institutions to reduce political risk and increase the FDIs. Attracting of the FDIs is complex because they depend on many factors, and one of the methods that measure political risk is the model used by the PRS Group that includes the flow of the economy through 12 components. Measuring political risk plays an important role in transitional countries, because these are countries that have problems in various fields and also the trust on by the investors is low. As a finding of this study is that Kosovo is estimated to have moderate political risk, and is close to joining the group of countries with low political risk. Challenges faced by Kosovo in reducing political risk are concentrated in several components, which are: socioeconomic, corruption and rule of law components. Kosovo has taken significant steps in improving the conditions for investment, government stability and positioning of the country facing internal and external conflicts.

  20. Stream Lifetimes Against Planetary Encounters

    Science.gov (United States)

    Valsecchi, G. B.; Lega, E.; Froeschle, Cl.

    2011-01-01

    We study, both analytically and numerically, the perturbation induced by an encounter with a planet on a meteoroid stream. Our analytical tool is the extension of pik s theory of close encounters, that we apply to streams described by geocentric variables. The resulting formulae are used to compute the rate at which a stream is dispersed by planetary encounters into the sporadic background. We have verified the accuracy of the analytical model using a numerical test.

  1. CHALLENGES OF INTERPRETING THE NOTION OF SOFTWARE COPYRIGHTS IN THE CURRENT ECONOMIC AND SOCIO-POLITICAL CONTEXT

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Ramona DUMITRAȘCU

    2018-05-01

    Full Text Available Every country has it’ s own interpretation and enforcement of copyrights. The challenge is in case of a conflict of interpretations to create a common structure accepted by all parties as a base of mutual understanding and agreement. ESCIA guidelines seek to provide a scalable assessment framework which in turn can be a tool for research and development of structures to deal with the different cultural and social economic circumstances of the different countries / the assessment of which system is dominant is an ongoing, ever-changing debate for which you need the guideline tools to steer the discussion in the right direction which is a challenge on it’s own.the digital economy is the most important part of the global economy.The digital transformation of international production requires regulation,governing, investor behaviour. The negative impact of manipulation of data obtained from consumers by global powerfull multinationals is to be considered a major insentive for a rigourus monitorization and regulation of international productions. The diversity of interests, political and finacial, make fair regulations covering all aspects of the situation, extremlely difficult, in addition to the ever chainging parameters governing the subject as such. The complexity of the matter should not prevent an indepth assassement and solution seeking policy.

  2. Political liberalism and religious claims: Four blind spots.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Stoeckl, Kristina

    2017-01-01

    This article gives an overview of 4 important lacunae in political liberalism and identifies, in a preliminary fashion, some trends in the literature that can come in for support in filling these blind spots, which prevent political liberalism from a correct assessment of the diverse nature of religious claims. Political liberalism operates with implicit assumptions about religious actors being either 'liberal' or 'fundamentalist' and ignores a third, in-between group, namely traditionalist religious actors and their claims. After having explained what makes traditionalist religious actors different from liberal and fundamentalist religious actors, the author develops 4 areas in which political liberalism should be pushed further theoretically in order to correctly theorize the challenge which traditional religious actors pose to liberal democracy. These 4 areas (blind spots) are: (1) the context of translation; (2) the politics of exemptions; (3) the multivocality of theology; and (4) the transnational nature of norm-contestation.

  3. Apathy or fear? The role of social workers in Zimbabwe's political ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    African Journal of Social Work ... The silence by the majority of Zimbabwean social work practitioners in particular, in the wake of the socio-political challenges currently bedeviling the country is worrying. ... The monograph proposes a number of strategies to increase political efficacy and engagement among social workers.

  4. The joy of discovery great encounters along the way

    CERN Document Server

    Thirring, Walter

    2011-01-01

    Walter Thirring is the last offspring of an Austrian family of scientists. In this moving narrative, he describes how he survived the Nazi occupation and became instrumental in reconstructing European science. Thirring is one of the last living physicists who worked on the greatest discoveries and with the greatest scientists of the 20th century. He recollects encounters with the old masters like Einstein, Schrodinger, Heisenberg, Pauli and others as well as his collaborations with the present stars like Murray Gell-Mann and Elliott Lieb. The book presents the challenges faced when one of the

  5. Combating political and bureaucratic corruption in Uganda: Colossal challenges for the church and the citizens

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Wilson B. Asea

    2018-05-01

    Full Text Available This article formulates a new approach to combating corruption in Uganda. In pursuit of this research, the author highlights the chronicity of corruption in Uganda, which is uniformly political and bureaucratic. Bureaucratic corruption takes place in service delivery and rule enforcement. It has two sides: demand-induced and supply-induced. Political corruption occurs at high levels of politics. There are ‘political untouchables’ and businessmen who are above the law and above institutional control mechanisms. The established institutions of checks and balances in Uganda have assiduously continued to have a limited bearing on corruption. Neither coherent anti-corruption norms nor severe formal sanctions are able to dishearten certain politicians and civil servants in Uganda from the deviant behaviour of structural corruption. Corruption is a spiritual departure from the law and standard of God. It is an action conceived in the human mind and carried out by the corrupt. Therefore, corruption deterrence not only lies in sound public financial management systems but depends to a large extent on having people with positive human character in all aspects of national life. This article thus provides the framework of corruption and discusses the manifestation of political and bureaucratic corruption in Uganda. It also exegetes the biblical stance regarding corruption. Finally, it proposes a panacea for combating political and bureaucratic corruption.

  6. The Art of the Encounter

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Éric Vautrin

    2013-03-01

    Full Text Available As the archives from the second half of Grotowski’s life were made available, this text focuses on the Polish master’s conceptions of theatre where he describes theatre as the art of the encounter. This paper simultaneously places this proposition in the context of questions of a specific time period, and reveals how this encounter is the anathema that will revert viewpoints both about the art of acting and the creation of theatrical relations. These researches on theatre as the art of the encounter continue today through the Open Program, one of the two groups of the Workcenter of Jerzy Grotowski and Thomas Richards, and, notably, their creations around American poet Allen Ginsberg, an author whose poetry intends, in a similar way, to encounter the other and the world.

  7. Stressing the Importance of Public Affairs Knowledge in an Era of Declining Political Interest.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Fife, Brian L.

    Public affairs instructors must routinely contend with the reality that stressing the importance of political knowledge is challenging in an era of declining student interest in politics and political institutions. Yet enhancing students' knowledge about public affairs can stimulate more interest and engagement in public affairs, particularly if…

  8. Unconventional politics of unconventional gas: Environmental reframing and policy change

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kear, Andrew Robert

    The present Rocky Mountain West natural gas boom, enabled by historic pro-resource-development political, institutional, economic, and cultural structures, is a politically contested battle over values. Volatile political action, unconventional coalitions, and unconventional politics engulf this unconventional gas boom -- especially at the state level. In this comparative case study of natural gas policy in Wyoming, Colorado, and New Mexico, I measure and compare these values, expressed as frames, through textual analysis of interest group public documents and state legislative bills and statutes from 1999-2008. By developing a new measure of state legislative framing, I test the relationship between interest group and institutional framing and also provide a viable measure of policy change useful to Narrative Policy Analysis theory. Results show that competing interest group and state legislative framing efforts are dynamic, measurably different, and periodically correlative. Competing interest groups rarely engage each other, except as the conflict matures when status-quo-supporters break their silence and engage the challengers' frames that have gained legislative traction. Environmental and land-use counter-framing ensues, but status-quo-supporters remain vigilant in their economic framing. Economic frames retain their institutional privilege within Wyoming and New Mexico, but natural gas policy undergoes a complete environmental reframe in the Colorado state legislature. Although the historically dominant economy frame based on "Old West" values remains largely intact, the respective state legislatures partially reframe policy (within 4 years) using environment, alternative land-uses, and democracy frames based on "New West" and long-extant but previously marginalized status-quo-challenger definitions. This reframing is not a strictly partisan issue, but rather it is influenced by political context, policy diffusion, and long-term interest group advocacy and

  9. A Good Turn Deserves Another: Political Stability, Corruption and Corruption-Control

    OpenAIRE

    Simplice A Asongu

    2015-01-01

    We build on existing literature and contemporary challenges to African development to assess the role of political stability in fighting corruption and boosting corruption-control in 53 African countries for the period 1996-2010. We postulate that on the one hand, an atmosphere of political instability should increase the confidence of impunity owing to less corruption-control. On the other hand, in the absence such impunity from corruption, political instability further fuels corruption. Our...

  10. Challenges in Exploratory Methods for Tuberculosis Research in South Africa.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Macdonald, Helen; Abney, Kate; Abrams, Amber; Truyts, Carina

    2016-07-01

    Haunted by a legacy of apartheid governance that left millions in material poverty, South Africa has among the highest tuberculosis (TB) morbidity and mortality rates in the world. Our Social Markers of TB research project shared a vision of working with ethnographic research methods to understand TB-infected persons, their families, care providers, and social networks. We argue that felt and enacted TB stigma and the related HIV-TB stigma impaired our ability to collect the necessary data for a full portrait of TB-infected persons and their lived conditions. To circumvent this limitation, each researcher improvised and augmented conventional anthropological methods with more creative, directed, and at times destabilizing methods. We present three case studies as useful illustrations of the complexities and challenges we encountered in our attempts to conduct ethically sound TB research. We discuss the implications of our call for "improvisation" for the politics of research and ethical oversight. © The Author(s) 2015.

  11. Encounter with comet Halley

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Sagdeev, R.Z.

    1989-01-01

    This paper reports on an international armada of six spacecraft which encountered the comet Halley and performed in-situ measurements. These encounters led to the discovery of a number of cometary plasma physics phenomena. Another important result was that a value for the average density of the cometary nucleus could be estimated, which is found to be compatible with snow ball models for the nucleus

  12. Ambivalence, equivocation and the politics of experimental knowledge: a transdisciplinary neuroscience encounter.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Fitzgerald, Des; Littlefield, Melissa M; Knudsen, Kasper J; Tonks, James; Dietz, Martin J

    2014-10-01

    This article is about a transdisciplinary project between the social, human and life sciences, and the felt experiences of the researchers involved. 'Transdisciplinary' and 'interdisciplinary' research-modes have been the subject of much attention lately--especially as they cross boundaries between the social/humanistic and natural sciences. However, there has been less attention, from within science and technology studies, to what it is actually like to participate in such a research-space. This article contributes to that literature through an empirical reflection on the progress of one collaborative and transdisciplinary project: a novel experiment in neuroscientific lie detection, entangling science and technology studies, literary studies, sociology, anthropology, clinical psychology and cognitive neuroscience. Its central argument is twofold: (1) that, in addition to ideal-type tropes of transdisciplinary conciliation or integration, such projects may also be organized around some more subterranean logics of ambivalence, reserve and critique; (2) that an account of the mundane ressentiment of collaboration allows for a more careful attention to the awkward forms of 'experimental politics' that may flow through, and indeed propel, collaborative work more broadly. Building on these claims, the article concludes with a suggestion that such subterranean logics may be indissociable from some forms of collaboration, and it proposes an ethic of 'equivocal speech' as a way to live with and through these kinds of transdisciplinary experiences.

  13. Political Ecology, Island Tourism Planning, and Climate Change Adaptation on Boracay, Philippines

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Virgilio Maguigad

    2015-12-01

    Full Text Available This research paper presents a case study of the island of Boracay, Philippines, utilising a political ecology approach to climate change adaptation. The research finds that the island’s political ecology, especially the relationships among stakeholders, is strained. This creates challenges for various urban planning processes that require good working relationships. Climate change is expected to highlight these divisions as interactions among stakeholders (fulfilling zoning ordinance obligations, climate change adaptation- compliant land use plans, etc. are dependent on good stakeholder relations. Stakeholders realise that climate change is real and that sea level rise is already challenging existing zoning ordinances on urban beach development. However, this realisation must be integrated into political decision-making processes involving tourism stakeholders. The research also shows that the political ecology approach and methodology is applicable to studying the dynamics of climate change adaptation and tourism urbanisation on small islands.

  14. Western Political Consulting Techniques and Post-Soviet Political Technology in Political Campaigns in Latvia

    OpenAIRE

    Bērziņa, Ieva

    2012-01-01

    Western Political Consulting Techniques and Post-Soviet Political Technology in Political Campaigns in Latvia Ieva Dmitričenko Keywords: political campaignsm political consulting, political technology, parties, marketing, media Political campaigning is an international phenomenon, because there is a free flow of information, knowledge and human resource among practitioners of political campaigning in various countries. As a result political campaigning techniques that have proven to ...

  15. The politics of Piketty: what political science can learn from, and contribute to, the debate on Capital in the twenty-first century.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hopkin, Jonathan

    2014-12-01

    Thomas Piketty's imposing volume has brought serious economics firmly into the mainstream of public debate on inequality, yet political science has been mostly absent from this debate. This article argues that political science has an essential contribution to make to this debate, and that Piketty's important and powerful book lacks a clear political theory. It develops this argument by first assessing and critiquing the changing nature of political science and its account of contemporary capitalism, and then suggesting how Piketty's thesis can be complemented, extended and challenged by focusing on the ways in which politics and collective action shape the economy and the distribution of income and wealth. Although Capital's principal message is that 'capital is back' and that without political interventions active political interventions will continue to grow, a political economy perspective would suggest another rather more fundamental critique: the very economic forces Piketty describes are embedded in institutional arrangements which can only be properly understood as political phenomena. In a sense capital itself - the central concept of the book - is almost meaningless without proper consideration of its political foundations. Even if the fact of capital accumulation may respond to an economic logic, the process is embedded in a very political logic. The examples of housing policy and the regulation, and failure to regulate, financial markets are used to illustrate these points. © London School of Economics and Political Science 2014.

  16. The Prediction of Political Competencies by Political Action and Political Media Consumption

    Science.gov (United States)

    Reichert, Frank

    2014-01-01

    Political competencies are often considered a precondition for political action; however, they are not independent of previous political participation, which may also include the frequency and the kind of political media consumption. My research aims at finding out the importance of participation in political activities in the past, as well as…

  17. Rehabilitating health services in Cambodia: the challenge of coordination in chronic political emergencies.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Lanjouw, S; Macrae, J; Zwi, A B

    1999-09-01

    The end of the Cold War brought with it opportunities to resolve a number of conflicts around the world, including those in Angola, Cambodia, El Salvador and Mozambique. International political efforts to negotiate peace in these countries were accompanied by significant aid programmes ostensibly designed to redress the worst effects of conflict and to contribute to the consolidation of peace. Such periods of political transition, and associated aid inflows, constitute an opportunity to improve health services in countries whose health indicators have been among the worst in the world and where access to basic health services is significantly diminished by war. This paper analyzes the particular constraints to effective coordination of health sector aid in situations of 'post'-conflict transition. These include: the uncertain legitimacy and competence of state structures; donor choice of implementing channels; and actions by national and international political actors which served to undermine coordination mechanisms in order to further their respective agendas. These obstacles hindered efforts by health professionals to establish an effective coordination regime, for example, through NGO mapping and the establishment of aid coordinating committees at national and provincial levels. These technical measures were unable to address the basic constitutional question of who had the authority to determine the distribution of scarce resources during a period of transition in political authority. The peculiar difficulties of establishing effective coordination mechanisms are important to address if the long-term effectiveness of rehabilitation aid is to be enhanced.

  18. The Social Media Paradox Explained: Comparing Political Parties’ Facebook Strategy Versus Practice

    OpenAIRE

    Kalsnes, Bente

    2016-01-01

    Political parties’ interaction strategy and practice on Facebook is the topic of this article. Political parties and individual politicians can use social media to bypass media and communicate directly with voters through websites and particularly social media platforms such as Facebook. But previous research has demonstrated that interaction on social media is challenging for political parties. This study examines the disparity between interaction strategy and online responsiveness and finds...

  19. Privacy encounters in Teledialogue

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Andersen, Lars Bo; Bøge, Ask Risom; Danholt, Peter

    2017-01-01

    Privacy is a major concern when new technologies are introduced between public authorities and private citizens. What is meant by privacy, however, is often unclear and contested. Accordingly, this article utilises grounded theory to study privacy empirically in the research and design project...... Teledialogue aimed at introducing new ways for public case managers and placed children to communicate through IT. The resulting argument is that privacy can be understood as an encounter, that is, as something that arises between implicated actors and entails some degree of friction and negotiation....... An argument which is further qualified through the philosophy of Gilles Deleuze. The article opens with a review of privacy literature before continuing to present privacy as an encounter with five different foci: what technologies bring into the encounter; who is related to privacy by implication; what...

  20. Politics of Science: Unwarranted Encounters.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kanchan, Tanuj; Krishan, Kewal

    2016-10-01

    This communication highlights a very pertinent and recent case of an erroneous representation of the Indian borders in an article 'India by the numbers' by Richard Van Noorden in Nature ( http://www.nature.com/news/india-by-the-numbers-1.17519 ) where a considerable part of the Jammu and Kashmir State of India is missing in the map incorporated in the article. The article received a series of comments showing disappointment on the issue and a need for the correction to the depicted Indian borders. The editor instead of making corrections to the map has issued a statement that 'the map shows land areas currently administered by the Indian Government', that in no way can be considered as an acceptable argument. We wish the focus of this well written article had remained on science rather than introducing unnecessary controversies.

  1. Design Challenges Encountered in a Propulsion-Controlled Aircraft Flight Test Program

    Science.gov (United States)

    Maine, Trindel; Burken, John; Burcham, Frank; Schaefer, Peter

    1994-01-01

    The NASA Dryden Flight Research Center conducted flight tests of a propulsion-controlled aircraft system on an F-15 airplane. This system was designed to explore the feasibility of providing safe emergency landing capability using only the engines to provide flight control in the event of a catastrophic loss of conventional flight controls. Control laws were designed to control the flightpath and bank angle using only commands to the throttles. Although the program was highly successful, this paper highlights some of the challenges associated with using engine thrust as a control effector. These challenges include slow engine response time, poorly modeled nonlinear engine dynamics, unmodeled inlet-airframe interactions, and difficulties with ground effect and gust rejection. Flight and simulation data illustrate these difficulties.

  2. Bridging Identity Gaps : Supporting Identity Performance in Citizen Service Encounters

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Borchorst, Nikolaj Gandrup; McPhail, Brenda; Smith, Karen Louise

    2012-01-01

    administrative processes and the quality and swiftness of the service they receive. As we bring to light in this paper, this “fitting in” with rigid bureaucratic procedures and IT systems interestingly requires a substantial collaborative effort between the receiver(s) of the service and a complex constellation...... of surrounding stakeholders and intermediaries. This collaboration and the performing of multiple identities raises challenges for the design of e-government systems aimed at supporting physical and digital citizen service provision, as well as issues regarding privacy, citizenship, and public service quality......This paper explores in situ citizen service encounters in government offices. Drawing upon ethnographically informed fieldwork in Canada and Denmark, we discuss the challenges to supporting citizens in constructing and performing identities in public service settings. Our data suggests...

  3. The political solidarity model of social change: dynamics of self-categorization in intergroup power relations.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Subasic, Emina; Reynolds, Katherine J; Turner, John C

    2008-11-01

    Social and political change involves a challenge to the status quo in intergroup power relations. Traditionally, the social psychology of social change has focused on disadvantaged minority groups collectively challenging the decisions, actions, and policies of those in positions of established authority. In contrast, this article presents a political solidarity model of social change that explores the process by which members of the majority challenge the authority in solidarity with the minority. It is argued that political solidarity as a social change process involves a contest between the authority and the minority over the meaning of a shared (higher order) identity with the majority. When identity ceases to be shared with the authority and becomes shared with the minority, majority challenge to authority in solidarity with the minority becomes possible. The model's contributions to existing social psychological approaches to social change are also discussed.

  4. World environmental policy. Conceptual approaches of German political science in response to the challenges of Global Change; Weltumweltpolitik - Global Change als Herausforderung fuer die deutsche Politikwissenschaft

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Biermann, F. [Potsdam-Institut fuer Klimafolgenforschung (PIK), Potsdam (Germany); Dingwerth, K. [Freie Univ. Berlin (Germany). Fachbereich Politik- und Sozialwissenschaften

    2001-12-01

    This paper describes, first, the international community of social scientists working on global change, and elaborates on possible contributions to this community by German political scientists. Second, the paper examines three new conceptual approaches to analysing global change, namely the Syndromes of Global Change approach, Earth System Analysis, and Sustainability Science. The paper then elaborates on a number of ways in which German political science could respond to the academic and political challenges posed by global change. It concludes by emphasizing the need for a new approach, focusing on 'world environmental policy analysis' that would bridge traditional (environmental) policy analysis, international relations research, and comparative politics. (orig.) [German] Der Aufsatz beschreibt die Wissenschaftslandschaft der internationalen sozialwissenschaftlichen Global-Change-Forschung mit besonderem Augenmerk auf moegliche Beitraege der deutschen Politologie. Mit den 'Syndromen des Globalen Wandels', der 'Erdsystemanalyse' und der 'Nachhaltigkeitswissenschaft' werden drei neuere konzeptionelle Innovationen vorgestellt, mit denen der Herausforderung des Globalen Wandels begegnet werden soll. Anschliessend werden Wege skizziert, wie die Politikwissenschaft auf die neuen gesellschaftlichen und wissenschaftlichen Probleme des Globalen Wandels reagieren koennte. Eine Schlussfolgerung ist ein Plaedoyer fuer die Entwicklung einer eigenstaendigen Weltumweltpolitik-Analyse an der Schnittstelle von traditioneller Policy-Analyse, Internationalen Beziehungen/Aussenpolitik sowie Komparatistik. (orig./CB)

  5. Feminists eminists at the World Social Forum: Challenges for a New Political Culture

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Lilian Celiberti

    2003-01-01

    Full Text Available The article deals with the ways of incursion of the feminist plurality’s significant expressions in the World Social Forum. These incursions express the changes in the subjectivities and in strategies of struggle that feminist movements in particular and social movements in general begin to develop, in the frame of a globalised world and in the new millennium. It’s an unprecedented process, that is promoting the development of new paradigms for collective action, that combines local and global issues, the interconnection of multiple agendas and the recovery of a more profound dimension of economic, social, cultural and symbolic justice, broadening, in this process, the concept of politics, the political and the power. The article sets discussion around the ways in which social movements converging in the Forum – that drag old dynamics and at the same time recreate new paradigms – work in politics and open the possibility of re-inventing an emancipation map and a social conception, capable of competing with neo-liberal consensus and with the single thought, recuperating diversity and plurality of social individuals and actors.

  6. Countering Political Risk in Colonial India

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Lubinski, Christina; Giacomin, Valeria; Schnitzer, Klara

    challenges, impacted the perception of racial lines of distinctions and re-casted the category “European business.” While internment was perceived and managed as a political risk, the case also shows that it created unexpected networking opportunities, generating a tight community of German businesspeople......Internment in so-called “enemy countries” was a frequent occurrence in the twentieth century and created significant obstacles for multinational enterprises (MNEs). This article focuses on German MNEs in India and shows how they addressed the formidable challenge of the internment...

  7. Ditching the Script: Moving beyond "Automatic Thinking" in Introductory Political Science Courses

    Science.gov (United States)

    Glover, Robert W.; Tagliarina, Daniel

    2011-01-01

    Political science is a challenging field, particularly when it comes to undergraduate teaching. If we are to engage in something more than uncritical ideological instruction, it demands from the student a willingness to approach alien political ideas with intellectual generosity. Yet, students within introductory classes often harbor inherited…

  8. Political challenges to implementing IWRM in Southern Africa

    Science.gov (United States)

    Swatuk, Larry A.

    Southern African states are undertaking comprehensive water sector reforms. While motives for reform are partially local, they are in large part driven by the interests and ideologies of Western states and civil societies. Within the Southern African Development Community (SADC), national (water, sanitation, irrigation) master plans are being written or revised. In several states, new Water Acts are in place and new institutions have been created to improve delivery. The stated goal of these activities is integrated water resources management (IWRM) defined simply as equitable, efficient and sustainable use of the resource. This article summarizes findings of social science-oriented scholarship on water management in the region, in particular that published in three special issues of Physics and Chemistry of the Earth (vol. 27, nos. 11-22; vol. 28, nos. 20-27; vol. 29, nos. 15-18). Evidence shows, among other things, that governments have been reluctant to devolve power to stakeholders; that rural dwellers are suspicious of the motives behind reform; that already empowered actors dominate new institutions touting broad-based participation; that efforts to fully recover costs in urban areas have been met with widespread civil resistance; and that new institutions have undermined existing forms of cooperation and conflict resolution, making matters worse not better. At the same time, these studies show the utility of decision support tools, capacity building exercises and research and knowledge production-all positive outcomes that should not be discounted. The paper argues that difficulties with reform reflect the highly political nature of the undertaking. Specifically, the new water architecture proposes a profound realignment of decision making power in already fragile, underdeveloped states. As a result, what may have started as a project now constitutes a context wherein differently empowered actors negotiate and renegotiate roles and rights to resources. Thus

  9. Theorizing political psychology: Doing integrative social science under the condition of postmodernity

    OpenAIRE

    Rosenberg, Shawn W.

    2003-01-01

    At the beginning of the 21st century, the field of political psychology; like the social sciences more generally, is being challenged. New theoretical direction is being demanded from within and a greater epistemological sophistication and ethical relevance is being demanded from without. In response, direction for a reconstructed political psychology is offered here. To begin, a theoretical framework for a truly integrative political psychology is sketched. This is done in light of the appar...

  10. German politics of genetic engineering and its deconstruction.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Gottweis, H

    1995-05-01

    Policy-making, as exemplified by biotechnology policy, can be understood as an attempt to manage a field of discursivity, to construct regularity in a dispersed multitude of combinable elements. Following this perspective of politics as a textual process, the paper interprets the politicization of genetic engineering in Germany as a defence of the political as a regime of heterogeneity, as a field of 'dissensus' rather than 'consensus', and a rejection of the idea that the framing of technological transformation is an autonomous process. From its beginning in the early 1970s, genetic engineering was symbolically entrenched as a key technology of the future, and as an integral element of the German politics of modernization. Attempts by new social movements and the Green Party to displace the egalitarian imaginary of democratic discourse into the politics of genetic engineering were construed by the political élites as an attack on the political order of post-World War II Germany. The 1990 Genetic Engineering Law attempted a closure of this controversy. But it is precisely the homogenizing idiom of this 'settlement' which continues to nourish the social movements and their radical challenge to the definitions and codings of the politics of genetic engineering.

  11. Finding the Words: Medical Students' Reflections on Communication Challenges in Clinic.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Braverman, Genna; Bereknyei Merrell, Sylvia; Bruce, Janine S; Makoul, Gregory; Schillinger, Erika

    2016-11-01

    Interpersonal communication is essential to providing excellent patient care and requires ongoing development. Although aspects of medical student interpersonal communication may degrade throughout career progression, it is unknown what specific elements pose challenges. We aimed to characterize clerkship students' perspectives on communication challenges in the outpatient setting to help inform curricular development. Third-year medical students in a required family medicine clerkship were asked to describe a communication challenge they encountered. Open-ended written responses were collected through a mandatory post-clerkship survey. Responses were qualitatively coded using an a priori framework for teaching and assessing communication skills (The SEGUE Framework for Teaching and Assessing Communication Skills) with data-derived additions to the framework, followed by a team-based thematic analysis. We collected 799 reflections written by 518 students from 2007-2014. Three dominant themes emerged from the analysis: challenges with (1) effectively exchanging information with patients, (2) managing emotional aspects of the patient encounter, and (3) negotiating terms of the encounter. Communication curricula focus on content and process of the medical interview, but insufficient time and energy are devoted to psychosocial factors, including aspects of the encounter that are emotionally charged or conflicting. While gaps in students' communication skillsets may be anticipated or observed by educators, this study offers an analysis of students' own perceptions of the challenges they face.

  12. Clinical Parameters and Challenges of Managing Cervicofacial ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    Introduction: Necrotizing fasciitis is a severe soft tissue infection. In our environment, patients presenting with this infection are usually financially incapacitated and, therefore, their management can be challenging. This paper aimed to document the pattern and challenges encountered in the management of cervicofacial ...

  13. Political Crowdfunding as concept of political technologies

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Valeria GOLKA

    2016-09-01

    Full Text Available Political crowdfunding is analyzed as a new concept of political science. The justification of use of crowdfunding technologies not only in business but also in the political sphere is argued. The efficiency, availability, low cost of the new forms of political investment through the development of information and communication technologies are noted. The typology of political crowdfunding is proposed. Political projects promoting domestic crowdfunding platforms are analyzed. Attention is drawn to the problem of legal gaps in the regulation of crowdfunding is studied. The foreign experience of organizing public support (mikroinvestment political projects. It is emphasized that in terms of political theory crowdfunding is based on solidarity. The crowdfunding properties of transforming social capital accumulated by social networks into financial capital are mentioned.

  14. Policy Responsiveness and Political Accountability in City Politics

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Anthony M. Sayers

    2017-03-01

    Full Text Available Peculiar patterns have emerged in municipal politics in Canada. Unlike at federal and provincial levels of government, party politics is weak or absent in cities. But looking at the entire history of municipal elections of three Western Canadian cities — Calgary, Edmonton and Vancouver — also finds that, again unlike politicians at higher levels, municipal representatives are increasingly more likely to win repeated re-elections, facing a much lower threat from any competitive challenge. In addition, the careers of municipal politicians are growing steadily longer, leading to relatively stable, almost static, city governments that tend to see change most commonly when councillors choose to step down, rather than being forced out. Such patterns, of course, run counter to the general presumption in lively democracies, including this one, that the responsiveness of government leaders (that is, following the wishes of their constituents and their accountability for the actions they take are best served by frequent turnovers in government: The need to throw politicians out every now and again to let new ones try and do things better. Whether the remarkable levels of stability and incumbency on city councils actually do serve the best interests of voters is unclear. More clear is that the lack of a party system at the city level seems to have contributed to this peculiar dynamic, and that city politicians have an interest in keeping it that way. While party affiliations provide a candidate some benefits in the form of campaign co-ordination, they also provide voters with increased clarity about what each candidate stands for policy-wise. That might be helpful to voters, but city politicians might find it more useful to blur their positions, leaving voters uncertain of exactly how to define a specific councillor’s stand, overall. The amount of information required to root through a councillor’s voting record, and the relatively light media

  15. Becoming stronger by becoming weaker: the hunger strike as a mode of doing politics

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Abrahamsson, Carl Sebastian; Danyi, Endre

    2018-01-01

    immigrants, we aim to achieve three things. First, we foreground physical bodies as political entities caught up in multiple modes of doing politics. Second, we show how such modes relate to one another, reinforcing citizenship, activism and party politics as specific performances of agency associated...... with liberal democracy. Finally, we argue that the Brussels hunger strike also challenges these performances by failing to meet certain expectations about what it is to be political/act politically. As the European refugee crisis is generating louder and louder voices, hunger strikes sensitise us to modes...

  16. ‘‘Why Should We Care about Marriage Equality?' : Political Advocacy as a Part of Corporate Responsibility

    OpenAIRE

    Wettstein, Florian; Baur, Dorothea

    2015-01-01

    More and more companies are publicly taking a stand on social and political issues such as gay marriage legislation. This paper argues that this type of engagement, which can be called ‘‘corporate political advocacy,'' raises new conceptual and normative challenges especially for theories of corporate responsibility. Furthermore, it poses practical challenges for managers who are confronted with it. This paper addresses all three challenges: first, it defines and conceptualizes corporate poli...

  17. Cultural, Political, and Social Dimensions of Identity among Student

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Rahmatollah Sedigh Sarvestani

    2010-01-01

    Full Text Available As various Iranian theorists emphasis, challenge between tradition and modernity is among the most affective phenomena on Iranian identity. Thus, in the present study, different dimensions of Student’s identity have been evaluated regarding this challenge. According to the main hypothesis, student’s identity is a hybrid of traditional and modern elements. Each dimension of identity (either modern or traditional has been studied from the social, cultural, and political aspects. The study has been carried using questionnaire in 6 universities in Tehran –including University of Tehran, Shahid Beheshti, Allameh Tabatabaei, Sharif University of Technology, Al-Zahra, and University of Applied Science and Technology. Results show that in social and cultural aspects, modern elements of identity prevail, while in the political aspect it is the traditional elements that prevail. In another word, religion-politics blend and authoritarianism play crucial role in students’ identity rather than tendency to civil society. In addition, students’ identity is not simply a one-dimensional structure, but a bi-dimensional construction within which both modern and traditional elements are involved.

  18. Political Attitudes Develop Independently of Personality Traits

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hatemi, Peter K.; Verhulst, Brad

    2015-01-01

    The primary assumption within the recent personality and political orientations literature is that personality traits cause people to develop political attitudes. In contrast, research relying on traditional psychological and developmental theories suggests the relationship between most personality dimensions and political orientations are either not significant or weak. Research from behavioral genetics suggests the covariance between personality and political preferences is not causal, but due to a common, latent genetic factor that mutually influences both. The contradictory assumptions and findings from these research streams have yet to be resolved. This is in part due to the reliance on cross-sectional data and the lack of longitudinal genetically informative data. Here, using two independent longitudinal genetically informative samples, we examine the joint development of personality traits and attitude dimensions to explore the underlying causal mechanisms that drive the relationship between these features and provide a first step in resolving the causal question. We find change in personality over a ten-year period does not predict change in political attitudes, which does not support a causal relationship between personality traits and political attitudes as is frequently assumed. Rather, political attitudes are often more stable than the key personality traits assumed to be predicting them. Finally, the results from our genetic models find that no additional variance is accounted for by the causal pathway from personality traits to political attitudes. Our findings remain consistent with the original construction of the five-factor model of personality and developmental theories on attitude formation, but challenge recent work in this area. PMID:25734580

  19. Political attitudes develop independently of personality traits.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hatemi, Peter K; Verhulst, Brad

    2015-01-01

    The primary assumption within the recent personality and political orientations literature is that personality traits cause people to develop political attitudes. In contrast, research relying on traditional psychological and developmental theories suggests the relationship between most personality dimensions and political orientations are either not significant or weak. Research from behavioral genetics suggests the covariance between personality and political preferences is not causal, but due to a common, latent genetic factor that mutually influences both. The contradictory assumptions and findings from these research streams have yet to be resolved. This is in part due to the reliance on cross-sectional data and the lack of longitudinal genetically informative data. Here, using two independent longitudinal genetically informative samples, we examine the joint development of personality traits and attitude dimensions to explore the underlying causal mechanisms that drive the relationship between these features and provide a first step in resolving the causal question. We find change in personality over a ten-year period does not predict change in political attitudes, which does not support a causal relationship between personality traits and political attitudes as is frequently assumed. Rather, political attitudes are often more stable than the key personality traits assumed to be predicting them. Finally, the results from our genetic models find that no additional variance is accounted for by the causal pathway from personality traits to political attitudes. Our findings remain consistent with the original construction of the five-factor model of personality and developmental theories on attitude formation, but challenge recent work in this area.

  20. The political implications of epigenetics.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Robison, Shea K

    2016-01-01

    Epigenetics, which is just beginning to attract public attention and policy discussion, challenges conventional understanding of gene-environment interaction and intergenerational inheritance and perhaps much more besides. Does epigenetics challenge modern political ideologies? I analyzed the narratives of obesity and epigenetics recently published in the more liberal New York Times and the more conservative Wall Street Journal. For the years 2010 through 2014, 50 articles on obesity and 29 articles on epigenetics were identified, and elements in their causal narratives were quantitatively analyzed using a well described narrative policy framework. The narratives on obesity aligned with the two newspapers' reputed ideologies. However, the narratives on epigenetics aligned with neither ideology but freely mixed liberal and conservative elements. This small study may serve as a starting point for broader studies of epigenetics as it comes to affect political ideologies and, in turn, public policies. The narrative mix reported here could yet prove vulnerable to ideological capture, or, more optimistically, could portend the emergence of a "third-way" narrative using epigenetics to question atomistic individualism and allowing for less divisiveness in public-health domains such as obesity.

  1. The Chernobyl effect. An investigation into the causes of political protest. Der Tschernobyl-Effekt. Eine Untersuchung ueber die Ursachen politischen Protests

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Opp, K.D.; Roehl, W. (Hamburg Univ. (Germany, F.R.))

    1990-01-01

    In what way and to what extent does an event like the Chernobyl reactor accident influence the citizen's attitudes and political commitment. This book evolves a number of theses on these questions dealing above all with the determinants of political protest. Two investigations are presented in order to verify those theses: in 1982 and 1987 (some nine months after the Chernobyl reactor accident), the same persons were interviewed. In addition, representative surveys in the Federal Republic of Germany are analysed, in order to assess in general the impact of Chernobyl. From the contents: explanation model for political protest; Chernobyl effect: effect of critical events on the mobilization of political protest; discontent with nuclear energy use, political alienation and protest; internal incentives for protest: norms, readiness for aggression, and entertainment quality of protest; resources as determinants of political protest; sanctions and protest; social nets and political protest; verification of a central model of political protest, and problems encountered by research. Appendix: investigation plan and random sampling of the panel of nuclear power opponents. (orig./HP).

  2. Russian-Saudian Political Interaction

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    G. G. Kosach

    2017-01-01

    Full Text Available The article analyzes the development of Russian-Saudi political interaction after the restoration (at that time of Soviet-Saudi relations of bilateral relations in September 1990. The article focuses on the role of the Russian Muslim community in shaping the Russian politics towards Riyadh in the 1990-2000s. The authors state there are both periods of “crises” and detente in the development of Russian-Saudi political interaction that were marked by events in Chechnya and former Yugoslavia in 1994-2000, “Arab Spring” 2011, the post-September 2015 era, the Russian anti-terrorist campaign in Syria. The alternation of these periods is the constant of Russian-Saudi political contacts, despite the similarity in the approaches of both sides to the ways and methods of solving crisis situations in the Middle East region, as well as the Saudi’s pro-Russian position regarding the change in the status of the Crimea and the situation in the east of Ukraine. The general attitude of both sides towards ISIS and Jabha al-Nusra as a source of terrorism, regional instability and the challenge of international security does not remove the two main contradictions that divide Moscow and Riyadh – attitude toward the official Syrian regime and the Iran’s regional policy. The study comes to the conclusion that Russia and Saudi Arabia are interested (albeit for various reasons in diversifying their foreign policy and foreign economic relations.

  3. Supervising away from home: clinical, cultural and professional challenges.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Abramovitch, Henry; Wiener, Jan

    2017-02-01

    This paper explores some challenges of supervising clinical work of trainees, known as 'routers', who live in countries with diverse cultural, social and political traditions, and the analysts who travel to supervise them. It is written as an evolving dialogue between the authors, who explore together the effects of their own culture of origin, and in particular the legacy and values of their own training institutes on the styles and models of analytic supervision. Their dialogue is framed around the meaning of home and experiences of homesickness for analysts working away from home in an interactive field of strangeness in countries where analytical psychology is a relatively new discipline. The authors outline the findings from their own qualitative survey, where other supervisors working abroad, and those they have supervised, describe their experiences and their encounters with difference. The dialogue ends with both authors discussing what they have learned about teaching and supervising abroad, the implications for more flexible use of Jungian concepts, and how such visits have changed their clinical practice in their home countries. © 2017, The Society of Analytical Psychology.

  4. Encounters in cancer treatment

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Høybye, Mette Terp; Tjørnhøj-Thomsen, Tine

    2014-01-01

    Based on extensive ethnographic material from in-depth interviews with Danish cancer patients after treatment, this study analyzes their stories to explore how interactions with the physician configures and situates a need for rehabilitation. We identify three themes in the illness stories: (1...... by this encounter. The significance of the social encounters in cancer treatment is elucidated through this analysis, and we demonstrate how the need for recognition of the complex effects of cancer on one's life is central to counter experiences of objectification and dehumanization....

  5. [A tale of two encounters].

    Science.gov (United States)

    Chanel, Marie-Paule

    The moving testimony of a patient shows the impact which a successful encounter can have. Beyond the positive clinical consequences, her rediscovered motivation and pleasure are the essential drivers which have guided her along the pathway of reconstruction. A tale of two encounters which have marked her life course. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Masson SAS. All rights reserved.

  6. Innovation from the ICT-based service encounter

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Henten, Anders

    2012-01-01

    The pupose of the paper is to develop a framework for analyzing the dynamics of innovations emanating from the ICT-based service encounters. Many innovations are based on the direct encounter between employees and customers, and the paper aims to extend the analysis of such encounters to ICT...

  7. Political Transmigrants: Rethinking Hmong Political Activism in America

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Nengher N. Vang, Ph.D

    2011-12-01

    Full Text Available Since the initial resettlement of the Hmong in the United States in the mid-1970s, they have maintained strong political and military relationships with the Lao People‘s Democratic Republic (LPDR. Yet, there is little research on that relationship and the involvement of the Hmong in the United States in political developments in Laos. Most works on Hmong political activism have focused on the electoral participation and representation of Hmong Americans in relation to American domestic politics. In this article, using archival, ethnographic, and interview data that I have collected between 2006 and 2009 in Laos, Thailand, and the United States, I describe and analyze the non-domestic or transnational form of Hmong American political expression and participation. I argue that Hmong political activism in America not only was transnational from the outset, but that their transnational involvement in political developments in Laos and their relations with the Lao PDR government also had a significant impact on their ethnic politics. Many Hmong political activists made their entry into ethnic politics through the door of transnational politics, and many were motivated by transnational political issues to participate in domestic American politics. By exploring their transnational involvement in political developments in Laos and their relations with the Lao PDR government, we get a more complete and dynamic understanding of Hmong political activism in the United States than is possible by focusing exclusively on domestic and electoral participation. Examining their transnational politics also allows us to see the transnationality of not only their culture, identity, and community but also that of their political activities and aspirations.

  8. ASRS Reports on Wake Vortex Encounters

    Science.gov (United States)

    Connell, Linda J.; Taube, Elisa Ann; Drew, Charles Robert; Barclay, Tommy Earl

    2010-01-01

    ASRS is conducting a structured callback research project of wake vortex incidents reported to the ASRS at all US airports, as well as wake encounters in the enroute environment. This study has three objectives: (1) Utilize the established ASRS supplemental data collection methodology and provide ongoing analysis of wake vortex encounter reports; (2) Document event dynamics and contributing factors underlying wake vortex encounter events; and (3) Support ongoing FAA efforts to address pre-emptive wake vortex risk reduction by utilizing ASRS reporting contributions.

  9. Challenges of Combining Perspectives.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Sundvall, Maria; Titelman, David; Bäärnhielm, Sofie

    2018-02-23

    Asylum seekers have increased risk of suicide and suicidal behavior, with differences related to origin, gender, and age. There are barriers to communication in clinical encounters between asylum seekers and clinicians. There is insufficient knowledge about how communication in the clinical encounter affects the suicide risk in female asylum seekers. To explore the documented communication between female asylum-seeking suicide attempters and clinicians and how it affects treatment. The medical records of 18 asylum-seeking women who had attempted suicide were analyzed with content analysis. Communication between patients and clinicians was affected by: the unbearable realities of the women; difficulties for clinicians in decoding languages of distress, and understanding trauma and subjective meanings of suicide; challenges of combining patients' and clinicians' perspectives; and a sense of shared powerlessness. The medical records did not give direct access to the patient's experience, only to the patient as documented by the clinician. The results suggest that clinicians working with asylum seekers who have attempted suicide need to develop an understanding of social and cultural factors and of trauma issues. A question for further study is how an enhanced integration of context and subjectivity in psychiatric practice would equip clinicians for the specific challenges encountered.

  10. Initial Encounters : The Lived Experiences of Buyers

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    G. Wright; J.J. Dekker

    2012-01-01

    The initial encounter between a buyer and a seller has received much attention among practitioners. The first time a buyer interacts with a seller is thought to be highly influential. The premise is that buyers form an opinion during this first encounter, or even the first minutes of this encounter.

  11. What’s Political about Solar Electric Technology? The User’s Perspective

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Chelsea Schelly

    2015-11-01

    Full Text Available Scholars in science and technology studies have debated the various ways in which technologies are (or are not political. Here, I examine how users themselves understand and articulate the politics of a specific technology—residential solar electric technology—and how understandings of politics interact with motivations to adopt. Based on interviews with 48 individuals in 36 households across the state of Wisconsin who have adopted residential solar electric technology, I consider the user’s perspective on the question: “What’s political about residential solar electric technology use?” These users were asked about the politics of this technology and how their understanding of the technology’s politics shaped their own motivation for adoption. These solar electric technology adopters saw solar electric technology as both imbued with political character based on the current national political scene and as inherently, innately political. They described how solar electric technology interacts with the politics of environmentalism, challengespolitics-as-usual” and can bring about decentralization and redistribution of wealth. In short, to the users of solar electric technology, this technological artifact is, indeed, political; it both interacts with, and offers an alternative to, current American political structures. Further, their perspectives on the politics of solar technology shaped their understandings of motivations for and limitations to adoption of this alternative technology.

  12. Greening of electricity in Europe: challenges and developments

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Midttun, Atle; Koefoed, Anne Louise

    2003-01-01

    Against the background of underlying ecological challenges and rapid de-regulation of energy markets, the article explores commercial and political dimensions of greening of electricity in Europe. The article has a dual economic and political focus: From a commercial point of view it argues that the European green electricity approaches can be sorted into two types based on a classical distinction between standardised commodification and specialised segmentation. From a political point of view, it argues that the European green electricity approaches can be sorted into two categories, EU- and nationally-orientated renewable energy policies. Drawing on examples from the other case studies presented in this volume, supplemented with other material, the article analyses greening of electricity industry under various market-politics combinations and discusses strengths and weaknesses of each approach as it is applied in the European context. In a final section the article relates the discussion of political and commercial organisation of greening of electricity industry to underlying ecological challenges and the need for a locational differentiation of greening policies

  13. Money and Politics: Who Owns Democracy? NIF Report on the Issues, 2001.

    Science.gov (United States)

    National Issues Forums, Dayton, OH.

    National Issues Forums (NIF) bring together citizens to deliberate and make choices about challenging social and political issues of the day. These forums have addressed issues such as the economy, education, health care, foreign affairs, and crime. This report is an analysis of what happened in a forum on "Money and Politics" that took…

  14. Negotiating health and life: Syrian refugees and the politics of access in Lebanon.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Parkinson, Sarah E; Behrouzan, Orkideh

    2015-12-01

    In the context of ongoing armed conflicts in Libya, Syria, Yemen, and Iraq, it is vital to foster nuanced understandings of the relationship between health, violence, and everyday life in the Middle East and North Africa. In this article, we explore how healthcare access interacts with humanitarian bureaucracy and refugees' daily experiences of exile. What are the stakes involved with accessing clinical services in humanitarian situations? How do local conditions structure access to healthcare? Building on the concept of "therapeutic geographies," we argue for the integration of local socio-political context and situated knowledge into understandings of humanitarian healthcare systems. Using evidence gathered from participant observation among Syrian and Palestinian refugees in Lebanon, we demonstrate how procedures developed to facilitate care-such as refugee registration and insurance contracting-can interact with other factors to simultaneously prevent and/or disincentivize refugees' accessing healthcare services and expose them to structural violence. Drawing on two interconnected ethnographic encounters in a Palestinian refugee camp and in a Lebanese public hospital, we demonstrate how interactions surrounding the clinical encounter reveal the social, political, and logistical complexities of healthcare access. Moreover, rather than hospital visits representing discrete encounters with the Lebanese state, we contend that they reveal important moments in an ongoing process of negotiation and navigation within and through the constraints and uncertainties that shape refugee life. As a result, we advocate for the incorporation of situated forms of knowledge into humanitarian healthcare practices and the development of an understanding of healthcare access as nested in the larger experience of everyday refugee life. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

  15. Moral forces: interpreting ethical challenges in military operations

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    de Graaff, Miriam

    2017-01-01

    The studies presented in this dissertation reveal three broad types of ethical challenges during military operations at an individual level that are caused by social interactions of military personnel, regardless of rank. The first encompasses ethical challenges related to encounters with other

  16. Dealing with Moms and Dads: Family Dilemmas Encountered by Youth Program Leaders

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Aisha Griffith

    2014-06-01

    Full Text Available The leaders of youth programs encounter a range of challenging situations that involve youth’s parents or families. This qualitative study obtained data on the variety and nature of these family-related “dilemmas of practice.” Longitudinal interviews with leaders of 10 high quality programs for high-school-aged youth yielded narrative information on a sample of 32 family dilemmas that they had encountered. Grounded theory analysis identified four categories of family dilemmas: 1 problems at home that become a concern to the leader, 2 parents’ expectations are incongruent with program norms or functioning, 3 parents do not support youth’s participation in the program or an aspect of the program, and 4 communicating with parents on sensitive matters. Each of these categories of dilemmas entailed distinct considerations and underlying issues that effective leaders need to be able to understand.

  17. Politics or Technocracy - What Next for Global Health? Comment on "Navigating Between Stealth Advocacy and Unconscious Dogmatism: The Challenge of Researching the Norms, Politics and Power of Global Health".

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kickbusch, Ilona

    2015-12-12

    Politics play a central part in determining health and development outcomes as Gorik Ooms highlights in his recent commentary. As health becomes more global and more politicized the need grows to better understand the inherently political processes at all levels of governance, such as ideological positions, ideas, value judgments, and power. I agree that global health research should strengthen its contribution to generating such knowledge by drawing more on political science, such research is gaining ground. Even more important is - as Ooms indicates - that global health scholars better understand their own role in the political process. It is time to acknowledge that expert-based technocratic approaches are no less political. We will need to reflect and analyse the role of experts in global health governance to a greater extent and in that context explore the links between politics, expertise and democracy. © 2016 by Kerman University of Medical Sciences.

  18. The Mediterranean solar plan: the momentum and challenges of a project of cooperation in politics, industry and energy

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Lorec, Ph.; Schramm, Ch.

    2009-01-01

    Launched by the French President on 13 July 2008, the Union for the Mediterranean (UfM) seeks to inaugurate an era of cooperation between lands to the north, south and east of the Mediterranean by carrying out concrete projects in response to the challenges that this region must address. The UfM applies, we might say, the 'Monnet method' to the Mediterranean Basin. In this region as in post-war Europe, energy is a major issue that, if left unsettled, might generate major risks but that, if addressed for the sake of a new political and economic partnership, could represent a major opportunity. The Mediterranean Solar Plan has this precise objective. It seeks to activate the de facto solidarity between lands around the Mediterranean and to bring them to cooperate on energy, industrial, economic and social projects. (authors)

  19. The challenges encountered in the integration of an early test wafer surface scanning inspection system into a 450mm manufacturing line

    Science.gov (United States)

    Lee, Jeffrey; McGarvey, Steve

    2013-04-01

    standpoint of the generations of hundreds of SSIS recipes for the global member companies of ISMI, it is simply not economically viable to create all recipes based on PSL based light scattering response curves. This paper will explore the challenges/end results encountered with the PSL based SSIS recipe generation and compare those against the challenges/end results of SSIS recipes generated based strictly upon theoretical Bidirectional reflectance distribution function (BRDF) light scattering modeling. The BRDF modeling will allow for the creation of SSIS recipes without PSL deposition, which is greatly appealing for a multitude of both technical and commercial considerations. This paper will also explore the technical challenges of SSIS recipe generation based strictly upon BRDF modeling.

  20. Cultural, Social and Political Perspectives in Science Education

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    education research to question whether conventional research approaches, foci and theoretical approaches are sufficient in a world of science education that is neither politically neutral, nor free of cultural values. Attention is not only on the individual learner but on the cultural, social and political......This book presents a collection of critical thinking that concern cultural, social and political issues for science education in the Nordic countries. The chapter authors describe specific scenarios to challenge persisting views, interrogate frameworks and trouble contemporary approaches...... to researching teaching and learning in science. Taking a point of departure in empirical examples from the Nordic countries the collection of work is taking a critical sideways glance at the Nordic education principles. Critical examinations target specifically those who are researching in the fields of science...

  1. Beyond the Embodied Digital Service Encounter

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Sørensen, Jannick Kirk

    2018-01-01

    When a digital service encounter develops differently than anticipated, the client becomes a user. This transformation reveals the ambiguous nature of digital service encounter being neither well-functioning tools, nor having the same sensitivity to and tolerance for service failures as in human ...

  2. Feminism: Political Actions and Power Authorities

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Edna Maria Santos Roland

    2000-01-01

    Full Text Available The concept of advocacy encompasses manifold and complex activities and represents many challenges. The principal challenge is political and ethical in nature. Internationalization accelerates the rhythm of work, increasing the demands and the level of requirements on leaderships and generating contradictions between the internationalized sectors of the movement and those who face greater difficulties in linking their everyday actions to the logic produced by the new communication, management and administrative techniques. A core problem is the representativeness of leadership which, in order to be addressed, requires giving up the pre-modern control over bodies and constructing relationships among juridical subjects.

  3. Termite: Emulation Testbed for Encounter Networks

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Rodrigo Bruno

    2015-08-01

    Full Text Available Cutting-edge mobile devices like smartphones and tablets are equipped with various infrastructureless wireless interfaces, such as WiFi Direct and Bluetooth. Such technologies allow for novel mobile applications that take advantage of casual encounters between co-located users. However, the need to mimic the behavior of real-world encounter networks makes testing and debugging of such applications hard tasks. We present Termite, an emulation testbed for encounter networks. Our system allows developers to run their applications on a virtual encounter network emulated by software. Developers can model arbitrary encounter networks and specify user interactions on the emulated virtual devices. To facilitate testing and debugging, developers can place breakpoints, inspect the runtime state of virtual nodes, and run experiments in a stepwise fashion. Termite defines its own Petri Net variant to model the dynamically changing topology and synthesize user interactions with virtual devices. The system is designed to efficiently multiplex an underlying emulation hosting infrastructure across multiple developers, and to support heterogeneous mobile platforms. Our current system implementation supports virtual Android devices communicating over WiFi Direct networks and runs on top of a local cloud infrastructure. We evaluated our system using emulator network traces, and found that Termite is expressive and performs well.

  4. Politically Active Home Economists: Their Socialization to Politics.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ley, Connie J.

    1980-01-01

    A nationwide study identified a pattern of political socialization for home economists who were politically active. The most outstanding feature of the politically active subjects was their perception that political activity is a professional role. (SK)

  5. A Review of "The Politics of Sustainability: Philosophical Perspectives"

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    José Goldemberg

    2015-01-01

    Full Text Available Concerns about sustainable development are not a recent phenomenon. Societal problem-solving efforts within this realm have focused on concrete problems such as the preservation of fisheries, forests and national reserves. 'The Politics of Sustainability' has been discussed extensively in  literature, particularly after the publication of the Brundtland Commission's 'Our Common Future' report in 1987 [1] emphasizing inter-generational responsibilities involving economic, environmental and social aspects. Among other areas, the authors of the report highlighted the challenge of global climate change resulting from, amongst other things, unsustainable patterns of consumption. 'The Politics of Sustainability: Philosophical Perspectives', edited by Dieter Birnhacher and May Thorseth, brings  a new angle into the discussion of the politics of sustainable development: ethical considerations.

  6. Deliberative Political Leaders: The Role of Policy Input in Political Leadership

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Jennifer Lees-Marshment

    2016-06-01

    Full Text Available This article provides a fresh perspective on political leadership by demonstrating that government ministers take a deliberative approach to decision making. Getting behind the closed doors of government through 51 elite interviews in the UK, US, Australia, Canada and New Zealand, the article demonstrates that modern political leadership is much more collaborative than we usually see from media and public critique. Politicians are commonly perceived to be power-hungry autocratic, elite figures who once they have won power seek to implement their vision. But as previous research has noted, not only is formal power circumscribed by the media, public opinion, and unpredictability of government, more collaborative approaches to leadership are needed given the rise of wicked problems and citizens increasingly demand more say in government decisions and policy making. This article shows that politicians are responding to their challenging environment by accepting they do not know everything and cannot do everything by themselves, and moving towards a leadership style that incorporates public input. It puts forward a new model of Deliberative Political Leadership, where politicians consider input from inside and outside government from a diverse range of sources, evaluate the relative quality of such input, and integrate it into their deliberations on the best way forward before making their final decision. This rare insight into politician’s perspectives provides a refreshing view of governmental leadership in practice and new model for future research.

  7. Bangladesh Midlife Women's Health Study (BMWHS): methods, challenges and experiences.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Islam, Rakibul M; Bell, Robin J; Hossain, Mohammad B; Davis, Susan R

    2015-01-01

    To understand the challenges and experiences encountered during data collection for Bangladesh Midlife Women's Health Study (BMWHS) that investigated the low uptake of cervical cancer (CCa) screening barriers, understanding of breast cancer (BCa) knowledge and practices, the prevalence of urinary and fecal incontinence and menopausal symptoms. A multistage cluster sampling technique was used to recruit women from the 32 districts of Bangladesh that had offered CCa screening. Female interviewers were trained to undertake structured face-to-face interviews that incorporated both non-validated and several validated questionnaires, such as Question for Urinary Incontinence Diagnosis, Pelvic Organ Prolapse Distress Inventory, Colorectal-Anal Distress Inventory and Menopause-Specific Quality of Life. We completed surveys of 1590 women, estimated age 30-59 years, between September 2013 and March 2014. We implemented several strategies to deal with low literacy and used the temporal relationship between marriage and childbirth, and the average age of onset of menarche, to estimate age. Cultural and religious sensitivities and personal security were managed by engaging community leaders, limiting activities to daylight hours, adopting local codes of dress, such as the wearing of head scarves. Our major challenges and experiences included difficulties in age determination, selection of and access to households, interview privacy, lack of basic and health literacy, transportation, political unrest and security of the interviewers. By anticipating challenges, we have been able to comprehensively survey a representative sample of Bangladeshi women. Disseminating information about the field challenges and experiences from the BMWHS should assist other researchers planning to conduct surveys about women's health issues in similar context. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.

  8. Transformative Possibilities: Politics and Cosmetic Surgery in the Bolivarian Revolution.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Gulbas, Lauren E

    2017-10-01

    I examine the intersection of politics and aesthetics in a public hospital in Caracas, Venezuela in the first years of the twenty-first century. Given Venezuela's long-standing embrace of physical enhancement and the contradictions of the medical values of cosmetic surgery with those of Bolivarian socialism, the changing surgical practices at a well-established public site offer a significant case for considering how different actors negotiate the dialectics of care. In the face of increasing resource shortages, negotiations of aesthetic care contributed to tensions in the clinical encounter as patients creatively pushed Bolivarian policies to support their pursuits of aesthetic self-improvement.

  9. The social and political lives of zoonotic disease models: narratives, science and policy.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Leach, Melissa; Scoones, Ian

    2013-07-01

    Zoonotic diseases currently pose both major health threats and complex scientific and policy challenges, to which modelling is increasingly called to respond. In this article we argue that the challenges are best met by combining multiple models and modelling approaches that elucidate the various epidemiological, ecological and social processes at work. These models should not be understood as neutral science informing policy in a linear manner, but as having social and political lives: social, cultural and political norms and values that shape their development and which they carry and project. We develop and illustrate this argument in relation to the cases of H5N1 avian influenza and Ebola, exploring for each the range of modelling approaches deployed and the ways they have been co-constructed with a particular politics of policy. Addressing the complex, uncertain dynamics of zoonotic disease requires such social and political lives to be made explicit in approaches that aim at triangulation rather than integration, and plural and conditional rather than singular forms of policy advice. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

  10. Strategic political postures and political market orientation

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Ormrod, Robert P.; Henneberg, Stephan C.

    2010-01-01

    by developing an integrated concept of political marketing strategy using two complementary frameworks, namely Strategic Political Postures (SPP) and Political Market Orientation (PMO). We introduce the two main concepts and derive for each of the strategic posture-specific PMO profiles as well as inter......Recently, the areas of strategic political marketing and political market orientation have been the subject of several conceptual articles which have provided the theoretical foundations for further empirical work. However, despite the close conceptual relatedness of the proposed concepts......, these have yet to be integrated to provide a more nuanced framework which both researchers and political marketing practitioners can utilise in the development of strategies and offerings with which to achieve their organizational goals. The aim of this conceptual paper is to address this deficit...

  11. What Is Political about Bureaucratic-Collegial Decision-Making?

    Science.gov (United States)

    Childers, Marie E.

    1981-01-01

    A fundamental assumption that bureaucratic, collegial, and political models of administration are independent and distinct is challenged, and process and structure within higher education institutions are differentiated as they describe role and power relationships and lines of authority. Survey results are cited as evidence and implications are…

  12. Challenges and Strategies for Building and Maintaining Effective Preceptor-Preceptee Relationships among Nurses

    OpenAIRE

    Matua, Gerald A.; Seshan, Vidya; Savithri, Raman; Fronda, Dennis C.

    2014-01-01

    Objectives: This study aimed to determine the challenges encountered and strategies used by nurse preceptors to build effective professional relationships during the preceptorship of final year nursing students. Methods: This study was conducted in November 2012 at the College of Nursing in Sultan Qaboos University, Muscat, Oman. A qualitative research design consisting of focus group discussions was used to investigate the challenges that preceptors encounter and the strategies that they use...

  13. CHALLENGES ENCOUNTERED DURING THE PROCESSING OF THE BNL ERL 5 CELL ACCELERATING CAVITY

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    BURRILL,A.

    2007-06-25

    One of the key components for the Energy Recovery Linac being built by the Electron cooling group in the Collider Accelerator Department is the 5 cell accelerating cavity which is designed to accelerate 2 MeV electrons from the gun up to 15-20 MeV, allow them to make one pass through the ring and then decelerate them back down to 2 MeV prior to sending them to the dump. This cavity was designed by BNL and fabricated by AES in Medford, NY. Following fabrication it was sent to Thomas Jefferson Lab in VA for chemical processing, testing and assembly into a string assembly suitable for shipment back to BNL for integration into the ERL. The steps involved in this processing sequence will be reviewed and the deviations from processing of similar SRF cavities will be discussed. The lessons learned from this process are documented to help future projects where the scope is different from that normally encountered.

  14. Challenges Encountered during the Processing of the BNL ERL 5 Cell Accelerating Cavity

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    A. Burrill; I. Ben-Zvi; R. Calaga; H. Hahn; V. Litvinenko; G. T. McIntyre; P. Kneisel; J. Mammosser; J. P. Preble; C. E. Reece; R. A. Rimmer; J. Saunders

    2007-08-01

    One of the key components for the Energy Recovery Linac being built by the Electron cooling group in the Collider Accelerator Department is the 5 cell accelerating cavity which is designed to accelerate 2 MeV electrons from the gun up to 15-20 MeV, allow them to make one pass through the ring and then decelerate them back down to 2 MeV prior to sending them to the dump. This cavity was designed by BNL and fabricated by AES in Medford, NY. Following fabrication it was sent to Thomas Jefferson Lab in VA for chemical processing, testing and assembly into a string assembly suitable for shipment back to BNL and integration into the ERL. The steps involved in this processing sequence will be reviewed and the deviations from processing of similar SRF cavities will be discussed. The lessons learned from this process are documented to help future projects where the scope is different from that normally encountered.

  15. Exploring Women's Understanding of Politics, Political Contestation ...

    International Development Research Centre (IDRC) Digital Library (Canada)

    Exploring Women's Understanding of Politics, Political Contestation and Gender ... First, researchers will explore women's political leadership and the extent to ... Sign up now for IDRC news and views sent directly to your inbox each month.

  16. Political symbols and political transitions

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Herrero de Miñón, Miguel

    2006-11-01

    Full Text Available Politics, Law and Psychology are fields that come together in the symbolic. This text takes evidence from those three areas to develop an analysis of political symbols and political transitions. The development of the analysis goes through three stages. The first succinctly describes the concept of transition and its meaning. The second closely examines the notion of the symbol, in terms of its definition, to explain aspects that allow us to understand it, characterise it and make its functions clear. Finally, from the author's experience as a witness and as an actor, I suggest three ways of understanding symbols in the processes of political transition: as symbols of change, as symbols of acknowledgment, and as symbols of support.

  17. Global Diabetes Encounters

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Juul Nielsen, Annegrete; Langstrup, Henriette

    2014-01-01

    As already recognized, though little theorized within International Relations, the capacity of technology to ensure the achievement of preset policy goals is often grossly overrated. Drawing on Science and Technology Studies, this chapter proposes a lens to investigate global encounters, which ta...

  18. Political Education as a Means of Political Socialization.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Grabe, Weronika; Knobelsdorf, Wodzimierz

    1980-01-01

    This essay describes the dimensions of political socialization with systematic political education as a major component. Both promote individual acceptance of political norms--particularly where government and school systems are tightly linked. The authors argue that political socialization should promote effective citizenship rather than simply…

  19. Political Challenges in Complex Place-Based Health Promotion Partnerships: Lessons From an Exploratory Case Study in a Disadvantaged Area of Queensland, Australia.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Del Fabbro, Letitia; Rowe Minniss, Fiona; Ehrlich, Carolyn; Kendall, Elizabeth

    2016-01-01

    Settings-based health promotion involving multiple strategies and partners is complex, especially in disadvantaged areas. Partnership development and organizational integration are examined in the literature; however, there is more to learn from the examination of practice stakeholders' experience of intersectoral partnership processes. This case study examines stakeholder experiences of challenges in new partnership work in the context of a culturally diverse and socioeconomically disadvantaged region in Queensland, Australia. Health promotion staff and community representatives participated in interviews and focus groups, and the thematic analysis included observations and documentary analyses. Our findings highlight the retrogressive influence of broader system dynamics, including policy reform and funding changes, upon partnership working. Partnership enablers are disrupted by external political influences and the internal politics (individual and organizational) of health promotion practice. We point to the need for organization level commitment to a consistent agreed vision specifically accounting for place, as a cornerstone of intersectoral health promotion partnership resilience. If organizations from diverse sectors can embed a vision for health that accounts for place, complex health promotion initiatives may be less vulnerable to broader system reforms, and health in all policy approaches more readily sustained.

  20. Cultural, Social and Political Perspectives in Science Education

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    This book presents a collection of critical thinking that concern cultural, social and political issues for science education in the Nordic countries. The chapter authors describe specific scenarios to challenge persisting views, interrogate frameworks and trouble contemporary approaches to resea......This book presents a collection of critical thinking that concern cultural, social and political issues for science education in the Nordic countries. The chapter authors describe specific scenarios to challenge persisting views, interrogate frameworks and trouble contemporary approaches...... to researching teaching and learning in science. Taking a point of departure in empirical examples from the Nordic countries the collection of work is taking a critical sideways glance at the Nordic education principles. Critical examinations target specifically those who are researching in the fields of science...... conditions and contexts in science education. The different chapters review debates and research in teacher education, school teaching and learning including when external stakeholders are involved. Even though the chapters are contextualized in Nordic settings there will be similarities and parallels...

  1. A Political Economy Analysis of Domestic Resource Mobilization in Uganda

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Kjær, Anne Mette; Ulriksen, Marianne Sandvad

    -building with regard to mobilizing resources for social development. In the paper we analyse how political economy factors affect revenue raising and social spending priorities in Uganda. We establish a theoretical framework based on the political settlement theory, within which we explore instances of revenue bargain......-making. The first two instances relate to the actual mobilization of resources, whereas the third example focuses on bargains over spending priorities within a given revenue base. We find that in Uganda, a low-income country with competing political factions, there are specific challenges to mobilizing resources......This synthesis paper brings together the research findings from four papers prepared by the Uganda team as a part of the UNRISD Politics of Domestic Resource Mobilization for Social Development project, which addresses three broad themes: bargaining and contestation, key relations, and institution...

  2. BOOK REVIEW OF "CHESAPEAKE BAY BLUES: SCIENCE, POLITICS, AND THE STRUGGLE TO SAVE THE BAY"

    Science.gov (United States)

    This is a book review of "Chesapeake Bay Blues: Science, Politics, and the Struggle to Save the Bay". This book is very well written and provides an easily understandable description of the political challenges faced by those proposing new or more stringent environmental regulat...

  3. Political party affiliation, political ideology and mortality.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Pabayo, Roman; Kawachi, Ichiro; Muennig, Peter

    2015-05-01

    Ecological and cross-sectional studies have indicated that conservative political ideology is associated with better health. Longitudinal analyses of mortality are needed because subjective assessments of ideology may confound subjective assessments of health, particularly in cross-sectional analyses. Data were derived from the 2008 General Social Survey-National Death Index data set. Cox proportional analysis models were used to determine whether political party affiliation or political ideology was associated with time to death. Also, we attempted to identify whether self-reported happiness and self-rated health acted as mediators between political beliefs and time to death. In this analysis of 32,830 participants and a total follow-up time of 498,845 person-years, we find that political party affiliation and political ideology are associated with mortality. However, with the exception of independents (adjusted HR (AHR)=0.93, 95% CI 0.90 to 0.97), political party differences are explained by the participants' underlying sociodemographic characteristics. With respect to ideology, conservatives (AHR=1.06, 95% CI 1.01 to 1.12) and moderates (AHR=1.06, 95% CI 1.01 to 1.11) are at greater risk for mortality during follow-up than liberals. Political party affiliation and political ideology appear to be different predictors of mortality. Published by the BMJ Publishing Group Limited. For permission to use (where not already granted under a licence) please go to http://group.bmj.com/group/rights-licensing/permissions.

  4. Politics Backstage - Television Documentaries, Politics and Politicians

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Ib Bondebjerg

    2006-09-01

    Full Text Available This article deals with "the transformation of visibility" in political discourse on and representation of politics and politicians in resent Dansih television documentaries. Drawing on the theories of Habermas, Meyrowitz and John B. Thompson, it is argued that the political persona on television is moved closer to the individual citizen, creating a sort "mediated quasi-inter- action" giving mediated communication a stronger element of face-to-face interaction. Together with the more pervasive "live" coverage of politics and politicians, this expands media coverage to both the backstage of political processes and the private and personal backstage of politicians, changing the form of democracy and public debate.

  5. Frontcountry encounter norms among three cultures

    Science.gov (United States)

    Jerry J. Vaske; Maureen P. Donnelly; Robert M. Doctor; James P. Petruzzi

    1995-01-01

    Existing normative studies have focused on backcountry encounter norms reported by North Americans. This study extends previous research by comparing encounter norms reported by three different cultures - North Americans, Europeans, and Japanese - in a frontcountry day use recreation area. Data were obtained from on-site surveys distributed at the Columbia Icefield in...

  6. E-cigarettes: scientific and political controversies

    OpenAIRE

    Yussuf Saloojee

    2018-01-01

    Background and challenges to implementation The e-cigarette is touted as a disruptive technology that could make combustible cigarettes obsolete. The product, its science and politics though are controversial. Intervention or response Published journal articles, reports and conference presentations on e-cigarettes were located using PubMed, plus conference, industry and other websites. These were critically reviewed. Results and lessons learnt A number of contenti...

  7. Politics and Power in Global Health: The Constituting Role of Conflicts: Comment on "Navigating Between Stealth Advocacy and Unconscious Dogmatism: The Challenge of Researching the Norms, Politics and Power of Global Health".

    Science.gov (United States)

    Askheim, Clemet; Heggen, Kristin; Engebretsen, Eivind

    2015-10-15

    In a recent article, Gorik Ooms has drawn attention to the normative underpinnings of the politics of global health. We claim that Ooms is indirectly submitting to a liberal conception of politics by framing the politics of global health as a question of individual morality. Drawing on the theoretical works of Chantal Mouffe, we introduce a conflictual concept of the political as an alternative to Ooms' conception. Using controversies surrounding medical treatment of AIDS patients in developing countries as a case we underline the opportunity for political changes, through political articulation of an issue, and collective mobilization based on such an articulation. © 2016 by Kerman University of Medical Sciences.

  8. Cosmopolitan encounters

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Plage, Stefanie; Willing, Indigo; Woodward, Ian

    2017-01-01

    This study contributes to the growing research on everyday cosmopolitanism in diverse societies. We employ a cosmopolitan encounters framework to explore the reflexive openness people perform and the ethical reasoning they draw on to get along with each other. In particular, we look beyond....... The ethical framework we propose is grounded in reflexive acts of sharing going beyond notions of giving and performing hospitality within a host/guest dyad....

  9. Due Regard Encounter Model Version 1.0

    Science.gov (United States)

    2013-08-19

    Note that no existing model covers encoun- ters between two IFR aircraft in oceanic airspace. The reason for this is that one cannot observe encounters...encounters between instrument flight rules ( IFR ) and non- IFR traffic beyond 12NM. 2 TABLE 1 Encounter model categories. Aircraft of Interest Intruder...Aircraft Location Flight Rule IFR VFR Noncooperative Noncooperative Conventional Unconventional CONUS IFR C C U X VFR C U U X Offshore IFR C C U X VFR C U

  10. Problems Facing Disabled People in Malawi : A Critical Reflection on My Encounter with a Disabled Woman in a Rural Area in Malawi

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Memory J. Tembo

    2015-03-01

    Full Text Available This critical reflection is based on my encounter with a disabled woman in a district in Malawi, and how I have reflected and analyzed the encounter using social work theories. The essay reflects on the story of the disabled woman and my own perception at that time, in addition to my analysis of these perceptions using different perspectives in social work based on my current understanding of these perspectives. In line with Fook’s (2002; 68 critical reflection techniques, social work theories will be applied to deconstruct and reconstruct the critical incident. The essay highlights the challenges and dilemmas I encountered in attempting to make meaning out of this encounter, which left me helpless and powerless, as I could not offer her any sustainable help at the time.

  11. Expertise in the Age of Post-Factual politics

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Berling, Trine Villumsen; Bueger, Christian

    2017-01-01

    What has become known as post-factual politics poses particular challenges to the role of expertise, calling for a new type of reflexivity able to inform scholarly strategies towards policy. Taking recent literature on the ‘practice turn’ as our point of departure, we argue for introducing a sens...

  12. Challenges encountered when expanding activated sludge models: a case study based on N2O production

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Snip, Laura; Boiocchi, Riccardo; Flores Alsina, Xavier

    2014-01-01

    (WWTPs). As a consequence, these experiments might not be representative for full-scale performance, and unexpected behaviour may be observed when simulating WWTP models using the derived process equations. In this paper we want to highlight problems encountered using a simplified case study: a modified......: problems related to the overall mathematical model structure and problems related to the published set of parameter values. The paper describes the model implementation incompatibilities, the variability in parameter values and the difficulties of reaching similar conditions when simulating a full...

  13. High-velocity runaway stars from three-body encounters

    Science.gov (United States)

    Gvaramadze, V. V.; Gualandris, A.; Portegies Zwart, S.

    2010-01-01

    We performed numerical simulations of dynamical encounters between hard, massive binaries and a very massive star (VMS; formed through runaway mergers of ordinary stars in the dense core of a young massive star cluster) to explore the hypothesis that this dynamical process could be responsible for the origin of high-velocity (≥ 200 - 400 km s-1) early or late B-type stars. We estimated the typical velocities produced in encounters between very tight massive binaries and VMSs (of mass of ≥ 200 M⊙) and found that about 3 - 4% of all encounters produce velocities ≥ 400 km s-1, while in about 2% of encounters the escapers attain velocities exceeding the Milky Ways's escape velocity. We therefore argue that the origin of high-velocity (≥ 200 - 400 km s-1) runaway stars and at least some so-called hypervelocity stars could be associated with dynamical encounters between the tightest massive binaries and VMSs formed in the cores of star clusters. We also simulated dynamical encounters between tight massive binaries and single ordinary 50 - 100 M⊙ stars. We found that from 1 to ≃ 4% of these encounters can produce runaway stars with velocities of ≥ 300 - 400 km s-1 (typical of the bound population of high-velocity halo B-type stars) and occasionally (in less than 1% of encounters) produce hypervelocity (≥ 700 km s-1) late B-type escapers.

  14. Sector-based political analysis of energy transition: Green shift in the forest policy regime in France

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Sergent, Arnaud

    2014-01-01

    This article examines energy transition political process from a sector-based approach, through the analysis of recent shift in the French forest policy regime. We demonstrate that, since 2007, energy transition policies have led to a harvesting turn within the French forest policy framework, meaning that priority is given to wood mobilisation, mainly for biomass uses. In addition, our findings suggest that the political authority wielded by the state over forest policy has shifted from forest administrative services to energy agencies and local authorities. Finally, we show that, although implementation of the harvesting turn is a cause of sectoral and inter-sectoral tensions, energy transition challenge also contributes to a process of (re)institutionalisation of mediation relationships among forestry stakeholders and wood-based industries representatives. The article concludes by arguing that sectors should retain relevant institutional frameworks for actors when choosing political arrangements required for implementing energy transition policy. - Highlights: • Implementing energy transition policy potentially challenges sector-based politics. • We propose a policy regime framework and socio-political investigations. • We analyse the political impact of energy transition policy on French forest sector. • Shifts occur in sectoral policy framework, authority, and mediation relationships

  15. CONFLICT AS A WAY OF BEING OF POLITICS. MACHIAVELLIAN CONTRIBUTION TO THINK THE POWER

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Ignacio Luis Moretti

    2015-06-01

    Full Text Available The conceptual challenge of thinking politics refers to the attempt - always, by definition, precarious, fragile and destined to failure- to grasp an intrinsically polysemic object and action defies straitjacket or limitation. This article will propose a deliberate code reading; a specific interpretive framework for thinking about politics; understanding the conflict as its hopelessly constitutive category. With this purpose, we will consider the work of Nicholas Machiavelli enjoying fertility to think this troubled specificity of the political.The methodological approach was purely theoretical, through an exercise of exegesis of texts Machiavellian and enhancement of its contemporary political thinking.

  16. "But the Pension Fund Was Just "SITTING" There...": The Politics of Teacher Retirement Plans

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hess, Frederick M.; Squire, Juliet P.

    2010-01-01

    The tension at the heart of pension politics is the incentive to satisfy today's claimants in the here and now at the expense of long-term concerns. Teacher pensions, in particular, pose two challenges. The first is that political incentives invite irresponsible fiscal stewardship, as public officials make outsized short-term commitments to…

  17. Processing changes across reading encounters.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Levy, B A; Newell, S; Snyder, J; Timmins, K

    1986-10-01

    Five experiments examined changes in the processing of a text across reading encounters. Experiment 1 showed that reading speed increased systematically across encounters, with no loss in the extensiveness of analyses of the printed text, as indicated by the ability to detect nonword errors embedded within that passage. Experiment 2 replicated this improved reading fluency with experience and showed that it occurred even with typescript changes across trials, thus indicating that a primed visual operations explanation cannot account for the effect. The third and fourth experiments then extended the study of the familiarity effect to higher level processing, as indicated by the detection of word errors. Familiarity facilitated the detection of these violations at the syntactic-semantic levels. Finally, Experiment 5 showed that these higher level violations continued to be well detected over a series of reading encounters with the same text. The results indicate that prior experience improves reading speed, with no attenuation of analysis of the printed words or of the passage's message.

  18. Ethical challenges in assessment centres in South Africa

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Vuyani R. Muleya

    2017-09-01

    Full Text Available Orientation: Assessment Centres (ACs are used globally for the selection and development of candidates. Limited empirical evidence exists of the ethical challenges encountered in the use of ACs, especially in South Africa (SA. Research purpose: Firstly, to explore possible ethical challenges related to ACs in SA from the vantage point of the practitioner and, secondly, to search for possible solutions to these. Motivation for the study: Decisions based on AC outcomes have profound implications for participants and organisations, and it is essential to understand potential ethical challenges to minimise these, specifically in the SA context, given its socio-political history, multiculturalism, diversity and pertinent legal considerations. Research design, approach and method: A qualitative, interpretative research design was chosen. Data were collected by means of a semi-structured survey that was completed by 96 AC practitioners who attended an AC conference. Content analysis and thematic interpretation were used to make sense of the data. The preliminary findings were assessed by a focus group of purposively selected subject-matter experts (n = 16 who provided informed insights, which were incorporated into the final findings. The focus group suggested ways in which specific ethical challenges may be addressed. Main findings: The findings revealed many ethical challenges that can be better understood within a broad framework encompassing 10 themes: Universal ethical values; multicultural global contexts; the regulatory-legal framework for ACs in SA; characteristics of the assessor; psychometric properties of the AC; characteristics of the participant; bias and prejudice; governance of the AC process; ethical culture of the employer organisation and the evasive nature of ethics as a concept. Practical and managerial implications: Considerable risk exists for the unethical use of ACs. An awareness of possible areas of risk may assist AC

  19. Energy Revolution, Political Revolutions?

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Maisonneuve, Cecile; Boncourt, Maite de

    2015-01-01

    As epicentres of the production of hydrocarbon, the Gulf States must adapt to an energy scene upset by the arrival of new resources on the market and by the historic reversal of demand in European countries. Consuming less energy and developing alternative sources in order to reserve hydrocarbon for exports: such is the huge challenge for countries whose social contract is based on unlimited consumption of subsidized energy. In the long term, their economic, social and political stability is at stake, together with their ability to remain key actors of the world energy system

  20. Political Science and Political Geography: Neglected Areas, Areas for Development.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Laponce, J. A.

    1983-01-01

    Since at least the 1950s, political scientists have tended to ignore the possible contributions of political geography to political science because of a move away from considering spatial factors on political structure. Political scientists need to use more information from geography to enhance their understanding of political power and conflict.…

  1. Effects of Political Knowledge on Political Tolerance

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hall, John Powell

    2018-01-01

    Sexual orientation continues to be an explosive issue in American classrooms. Increasing the political knowledge of students can reduce the volatility of this explosive issue by increasing tolerance toward the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender community. This relationship between political knowledge and political tolerance has been…

  2. The Political Future of Social Medicine: Reflections on Physicians as Activists.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Geiger, H Jack

    2017-03-01

    The academic discipline of social medicine has always had a political and policy advocacy component, in addition to its core functions of research and teaching. Its origins lie in the 18th and 19th centuries, in the work of Johann Peter Frank and Rudolph Virchow, among others. Virchow's dictum that "politics is nothing else but medicine on a large scale" highlights that most social determinants of health are politically determined and shape population health. Yet despite intense epidemiological and sociological research on the social determinants of health, less attention has been paid to this political and policy dimension.During the 1960s, the author and many other clinicians were directly involved in attempts to use health care institutions to foster structural change. However, the author argues that efforts to assist individual patients and more effectively manage their interactions with the health care system, as described in the articles in this issue's special collection on "structural competency," while worthy and useful, do not confront root causes. Going forward, efforts to effect structural change must take place outside the arena of the clinical encounter and involve interprofessional teams and collaborations with nongovernmental organizations. They should intervene directly on the structures that contribute to illness such as poor housing, income and wealth inequality, inferior education, racism and residential segregation, and toxic concentrations of extreme poverty in urban areas. Collectively, these efforts-within and outside the spheres of medicine-represent the real operative form of structural competency.

  3. Politics or Technocracy – What Next for Global Health?; Comment on “Navigating Between Stealth Advocacy and Unconscious Dogmatism: The Challenge of Researching the Norms, Politics and Power of Global Health”

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Ilona Kickbusch

    2016-03-01

    Full Text Available Politics play a central part in determining health and development outcomes as Gorik Ooms highlights in his recent commentary. As health becomes more global and more politicized the need grows to better understand the inherently political processes at all levels of governance, such as ideological positions, ideas, value judgments, and power. I agree that global health research should strengthen its contribution to generating such knowledge by drawing more on political science, such research is gaining ground. Even more important is – as Ooms indicates – that global health scholars better understand their own role in the political process. It is time to acknowledge that expert-based technocratic approaches are no less political. We will need to reflect and analyse the role of experts in global health governance to a greater extent and in that context explore the links between politics, expertise and democracy.

  4. Complicated and messy politics of inclusion: Michfest and the Boston Dyke March.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Trigilio, Jo

    2016-01-01

    To illustrate the challenge of political organizing that grapples with identity politics and inclusion, I focus on two women-centered annual events with very different politics of inclusion: the Michigan Womyn's Music Festival and the Boston Dyke March. (1) arguments made by marginalized people for inclusion into established oppressed identity groups must be constructed with due care to avoid further marginalizing yet other liminal identities; (2) protesting/boycotting other oppressed groups for the purpose of achieving inclusion is often a problematic strategy; (3) the most effective strategy for honoring all people is to support organizations committed to the ideal of inclusion.

  5. Dental Encounter System (DES)

    Data.gov (United States)

    Department of Veterans Affairs — Dental Encounter System (DES) is an automated health care application designed to capture critical data about the operations of VA Dental Services. Information on...

  6. Practice versus politics in Danish day-care centers

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Clasen, Line; Jensen de López, Kristine M.

    2016-01-01

    It is essential that early educators in day-care services possess adequate pedagogical tools for supporting children’s communicative development. Early literacy programmes (ELPs) are potential tools. However, studies investigating the effects of ELPs seldom address implementation processes......’ (NNS) political statements on early learning. This study presents results from 18 pre-programme interviews with pedagogues and illustrates their daily practices prior to the ELP implementation. Results suggest that: (1) there is a potential gap between practice and politics concerning Danish practices...... for promoting early learning; and (2) certain aspects related to existing pedagogical practices may be foreseen as potential challenges for the implementation of structured ELPs....

  7. POLITICAL COMMUNICATION DURING THE 2014 PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN: ONLINE MEDIA COVERAGE

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Cristina Cîrtiţă-Buzoianu

    2015-12-01

    Full Text Available The election campaign has lately become a real challenge where all the political actors display their skills, the communication ones, but also those related to the electoral marketing and public relations which play a vital role in creating the image of a particular candidate. The interest that the public manifest towards the presidential debates, as well as towards all the means of political communication used by the actors involved represents a reference point in the construction of an election campaign. Our paper aims to achieve a quantitative analysis of the communicational messages sent during the 2014 presidential campaign in the online media. In this respect, we are going to conduct a media monitoring on two central newspapers, namely “Evenimentul Zilei” (“Daily Event” and “Jurnalul Național” (“National Journal”, to track the online media visibility of the political communication starting from several indicators predefined in order to measure the efficiency of the political communication. Thus, our approach considers the influence of political communication in the election campaign as it appears in the online press in Romania.

  8. Assessing Political Dynamics in Contemporary Malaysia: Implications for Democratic Change

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Surain Subramaniam

    2012-01-01

    Full Text Available This article examines political dynamics in Malaysia and assesses the prospects for change in the direction of greater political liberalization. It focuses on the 12th General Election of 2008 and its implications for opportunities and challenges for liberal democratic change in Malaysia. It discusses the role of the internet-based new media in shaping an emerging public sphere, and some factors affecting the changing role of non-Malay voters in the political process. This article argues that democratization in Malaysia is already occurring, albeit at a gradual pace; it is being pushed by the new political forces of civil society actors, newly empowered opposition parties, and the internet-based media. The boundaries of this emerging democratic space is simultaneously being shaped and contested by the political competition between status-quo and reformist forces in this society. Some institutional changes have expanded the parameters of democratic space, although the entrenched dominant institutions of the ruling regime continue to wield sufficient amounts of institutional capacity to subvert any consolidation of these democratic changes for now.

  9. Zimbabwean Politics in the Post-2013 Election Period

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Brian Raftopoulos

    2014-01-01

    Full Text Available The 2013 elections in Zimbabwe confirmed the grip of Mugabe and ZANU-PF on Zimbabwean politics. The electoral outcome was the result of a combination of factors that included not only the longterm legacy of ZANU-PF’s coercive politics, constructed through a radical nationalist discourse, but also the changes in the social structure of the country as a result of the reconfiguration of Zimbabwe’s political economy since the late 1990s. In the aftermath of the 2013 elections, the enormous economic constraints confronting the country have forced the Mugabe regime to take a more conciliatory tone as it seeks to re-engage with the West in the search for economic assistance. In its attempts to find a path through these economic challenges, ZANU-PF must also contend with the growing battle for succession within the party as Mugabe’s rule draws to an end.

  10. The Politics of Civil Society Organizations (CSOs Post-Reformation 1998

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Aditya Perdana

    2016-01-01

    . Even though CSOs have used these political opportunities, these organizations faced seriously challenges in political field such as the fragmented of CSOs to endorse many policy reform and changes. In addition, there is lack of supporting changes in political culture structures which are still continuing patronage relations legacies among political actors. This study strengthens Aspinall (2013a and Mietzner (2013 arguments about how the CSOs take political opportunity after Reformasi and their challenges and response in order to adapt in Suharto’s political legacy in two political arenas: the policy making process and electoral politics. Moreover, Indonesian CSOs are fragmented and weakened for endorsing some progressive issues in law making process in the House and their weakness to gain electoral support for winning the CSOs candidates in election. To gather relevant data about CSOs political activities in these arenas, this study applies process tracing method. The study’s findings confirm that even though there is more openness on political opportunity to participate in political arena, however, it seems that there are no supporting changes in political structures which are patronage relations among political actors. Therefore, Indonesian CSOs are fragmented and weakened for endorsing some progressive issues in law making process in the House and their weakness to gain electoral support for winning the CSOs candidates in election.  

  11. Fossil fuels: technical, economical and political challenges for 2030-2050

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    2004-01-01

    This panorama takes stock on the international energy actuality in 2003 and discusses the instability of the geo-political context of the energy and the part of the fossil fuels for the future years 2030-2050. The following topics were presented: activities and market for the exploration-production, refining and petrochemistry, the world gas trade situation, the petroleum supply and demand, the Iraq, the diesel in the USA, the investments and the depletion, long-dated evolutions of motors and fuels, implementing of the european directive concerning the market of tradable permits of CO 2 , the carbon sequestration, hydrogen the energy of the future and the biofuels in Europe. (A.L.B.)

  12. Contemporary Political Paranoia, a Case of Political Gnosticism

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Antonio Rivera García

    2017-10-01

    Full Text Available This article puts forward the concept of political paranoia as a useful category to understand some contemporary manifestations of the pathologies of power. For this aim an interdisciplinary approach has been used, namely, the knowledge provided by psychoanalysis, political philosophy, theology and literary or aesthetic studies. Freud’s and Lacan’s psychoanalysis allows us to understand why the paranoid subject is a megalomaniac and hyperrational subject who wants to be in control of everything. It is a sovereign subject, who has adapted not only to the Society of Control initially defined by Deleuze, but also to a conception of philosophy that aims for totality. After dealing with the close relationship between paranoia and conspiratorial political theory, the article explains the reason why contemporary political paranoia represents a case of the most radical political theology: political Gnosticism. This term stands for a conception of politics that reduces the Other to the condition of an absolute enemy that needs to be eliminated. Lastly, the article establishes a close link between the cure for political paranoia and the assumption of an ontology of incompleteness

  13. Determinants of customer satisfaction with service encounter

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Ariana Nefat

    2008-12-01

    Full Text Available Service encounters are the focal point of a customer’s perception of a service in terms of its quality, value and customer satisfaction. The paper researches the influence of the components of a service encounter on customer satisfaction. Among several factors that determine customer satisfaction the quality of service, which is related to the characteristics of service, plays an important role. However, a direct insight into the reasons that make a service encounter satisfactory or unsatisfactory is provided by the critical incident technique, where causes of dis/satisfaction differ primarily depending on whether they derive from interpersonal contact or from contact with technology. The evidence of service, which includes people, process and the physical evidence, plays a critical role in a customer’s dis/satisfaction. The influence of these elements cannot be observed separately; it must be observed in their interaction during the delivery of service and their strongest effect is achieved during face-to-face service encounters that have the characteristics of a theatre metaphor. Even though a high level of satisfaction may be achieved after the recovery of a service, enterprises should aim to conduct excellent service encounters right from the start.

  14. Teaching Email Politeness in the EFL/ESL Classroom

    Science.gov (United States)

    Economidou-Kogetsidis, Maria

    2015-01-01

    Writing status-congruent emails is a skill that requires high pragmatic competence and awareness of the politeness conventions and email etiquette that need to be followed. Planning and composing such emails pose a greater challenge for EFL learners who use English in "lingua franca" communication (ELF), as they not only often struggle…

  15. Exploring the Managerial Dilemmas Encountered by Advanced Analytical Equipment Providers in Developing Service-led Growth Strategies

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Raja, Jawwad; Frandsen, Thomas; Mouritsen, Jan

    2017-01-01

    This paper examines the dilemmas encountered by manufacturers of advanced analytical equipment in developing service-led growth strategies to expand their business in pursuit of more attractive revenue models. It does so by adopting a case-based research approach. The findings detail the challenges...... faced in providing advanced services to customers’ R & D functions, while simultaneously attempting to scale up these services for a production context. The emergent complexities of operating in multiple arenas in order to explore and exploit technologies in different contexts—along the three...... trajectories of serviceability, scalability and solutions—with a view to expanding markets and developing solution-based business models, are discussed. It is argued that manufacturers of analytical equipment encounter certain dilemmas, as managing the different trajectories involves different needs...

  16. Some may beg to differ: individual beliefs and group political claims.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Lipscomb, Martin

    2013-10-01

    While nurses can and do behave as intentional political agents, claims that nurses collectively do (empiric), should (normative) or must (regulatory) act to advance political objectives lack credibility. This paper challenges the coherence and legitimacy of political demands placed upon nurses. It is not suggested that nurses ought not to contribute to political discourse and activity. That would be foolish. However, the idea that nursing can own or exhibit a general political will is discarded. It is suggested that to protect and advance political discussion, to aid explanatory adequacy and clarity, the form in which nursing associates itself with political claims merits critical appraisal. Thus significant numbers of nurses probably reject or disagree with many of the political claims that attach to them--claims often made on their behalf. More specifically, the individual beliefs and goals of nurses can be in conflict with the political pronouncements of nursing scholars and organizations (group agents). It is proposed that nurses need not share substantive normative beliefs/goals and, if this proposal holds, group descriptors such as 'nurses' and 'nursing' cannot meaningfully or easily attach to political claims. Shared value theory is linked to the fallacy of composition and the concept of collective ascription error is introduced to explore the implausibility of using group descriptors such as 'nurses' and 'nursing' to refer to the beliefs/goals of all nurses. © 2013 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

  17. Is the political animal politically ignorant? Applying evolutionary psychology to the study of political attitudes.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Petersen, Michael Bang; Aarøe, Lene

    2012-12-20

    As evidenced by research in evolutionary psychology, humans have evolved sophisticated psychological mechanisms tailored to solve enduring adaptive problems of social life. Many of these social problems are political in nature and relate to the distribution of costs and benefits within and between groups. In that sense, evolutionary psychology suggests that humans are, by nature, political animals. By implication, a straightforward application of evolutionary psychology to the study of public opinion seems to entail that modern individuals find politics intrinsically interesting. Yet, as documented by more than fifty years of research in political science, people lack knowledge of basic features of the political process and the ability to form consistent political attitudes. By reviewing and integrating research in evolutionary psychology and public opinion, we describe (1) why modern mass politics often fail to activate evolved mechanisms and (2) the conditions in which these mechanisms are in fact triggered.

  18. Challenges to State Legitimacy and Institutional Channels of ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    This article engages the debate on state legitimacy and fragility in Africa. It analyses the historical and empirical challenges to state legitimacy and how they relate to constructions of institutional channels of political participation on the continent. The study challenges mainstream westerncentric explanations that sweepingly

  19. Defining Political Marketing

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Ormrod, Robert P.

    ’ and ‘narrow’ interpretations of political marketing, the nature of the political marketing exchange, political relationship marketing and how one can integrate the stakeholder concept into an understanding of political marketing. Finally, we propose a definition of political marketing that differs from......The aim of this working paper is to develop a definition of political marketing that builds on the political rather than commercial marketing literature. This aim is motivated by the need to make explicit our understanding of what political marketing is, a necessary exercise when discussing theory......, concepts and empirical methods in political marketing. We first present five existing definitions of political marketing that have been selected to represent advances in research from the origins of academic research into political marketing in the mid-1970’s to the present day. After this we discuss ‘wide...

  20. Social Movements and Political Agency in the Digital Age: A Communication Approach

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Anastasia Kavada

    2016-08-01

    Full Text Available Digital media pose a dual challenge to conventional understandings of political agency. First, digital media destabilize long-held assumptions about the nature of collective action, about social movements and their capacity to effect change. This is because digital media are thought to facilitate more decentralized, dispersed, temporary and individualized forms of political action that subvert the notion of the collective as singular, unified, homogeneous, coherent, and mass. One way of resolving this challenge is to view the collective in looser terms, as a process rather than as a finished product, a conceptualization that can be influence our understanding not only of social movements, but also of other political actors and of society as a whole. Second, digital media highlight the need to take communication seriously in how we conceptualize both collective action and political agency. Placing communication at the centre allows us to develop this looser and more processual understanding of the collective by studying it as a process that is constituted in and through communication. Inspired by organizational communication and particularly the work of Taylor and van Every (2000, this essay proposes a conception of collective action as emerging in conversations and solidified in texts. This conceptualization allows for a more multiplex and variegated view of political agency that takes into account the specific context where agency is exercised and the power that different actors can exert in a communicative process of negotiation, persuasion and claim-making.

  1. The challenge of the radioactive waste management

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Dupuis, M. C.

    2008-01-01

    The problem of waste management has gained relevance with the development of electronuclear production and the increased social awareness on the need to protect the environment. While most developed countries have found solutions for the disposal of waste of low intensity and duration, the storage of used fuel and other kind of waste of higher intensity and duration is one of the main challenges for the next decade. Scientific research focuses on long term safety, while questions on the need for new governance are raised at the socio political level. Organizations such as the AEN have strengthened international cooperation to overcome the scientific, technical and socio-political challenges related to the nuclear waste management. (Author) 15 refs

  2. Performing Politics

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Troy R. E. Paddock

    2016-01-01

    Full Text Available Walter Benjamin’s observation that fascism turns politics into aesthetics is, by now, a well-worn idea. This article argues that Benjamin’s critique of politics can apply just as much to the modern democratic politics of the United States. Borrowing from Benjamin, Jürgen Habermas, and Carl Schmitt, this article suggests that modern political discourse in the United States does not follow the classical liberal ideal of rational discourse in the marketplace of ideas within the public sphere. Instead, contemporary politics has become spectacle where images and slogans replace thought and debate in a 24/7 news cycle and political infotainment programs. The result is that progressives and conservatives have their own political “ecospheres” which enable them to have their own perspective reinforced, and debate is replaced by straw man arguments and personal attacks.

  3. Generating evidence for health policy in challenging settings: lessons learned from four prevention of mother-to-child transmission of HIV implementation research studies in Nigeria.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Sam-Agudu, Nadia A; Aliyu, Muktar H; Adeyemi, Olusegun A; Oronsaye, Frank; Oyeledun, Bolanle; Ogidi, Amaka G; Ezeanolue, Echezona E

    2018-04-17

    Implementation research (IR) facilitates health systems strengthening and optimal patient outcomes by generating evidence for scale-up of efficacious strategies in context. Thus, difficulties in generating IR evidence, particularly in limited-resource settings with wide disease prevention and treatment gaps, need to be anticipated and addressed. Nigeria is a priority country for the prevention of mother-to-child transmission of HIV (PMTCT). This paper analyses the experiences of four PMTCT IR studies in Nigeria, and proffers solutions to major challenges encountered during implementation. Multicentre PMTCT IR studies conducted in Nigeria during the Global Plan's assessment period (2011 to 2015) were included. Four studies were identified, namely The Baby Shower Trial, Optimizing PMTCT, MoMent and Lafiyan Jikin Mata. Major common challenges encountered were categorised as 'External' (beyond the control of study teams) and 'Internal' (amenable to rectification by study teams). External challenges included healthcare worker strikes and turnover, acts and threats of ethnic and political violence and terrorism, and multiplicity of required local ethical reviews. Internal challenges included limited research capacity among study staff, research staff turnover and travel restrictions hindering study site visits. Deliberate research capacity-building was provided to study staff through multiple opportunities before and during study implementation. Post-study employment opportunities and pathways for further research career-building are suggested as incentives for study staff retention. Engagement of study community-resident personnel minimised research staff turnover in violence-prone areas. The IR environment in Nigeria is extremely diverse and challenging, yet, with local experience and anticipatory planning, innovative solutions can be implemented to modulate internal challenges. Issues still remain with healthcare worker strikes and often unpredictable insecurity

  4. Moving Encounters

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Ann Deslandes

    2011-04-01

    Full Text Available This essay explores my experience of losing an authoritative speaking position – that is, ‘falling on my face’ in a research encounter with the Brazilian Landless Worker’s Movement (O Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais sem Terra, or MST.  My specific movements through this locale invoke Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak’s concept of ‘unlearning one’s privilege as a loss’; and Sara Ahmed’s theory of ‘stranger fetishism’.  In writing my brief loss, I also; of course, recover my speaking position, meaning that I can always efface the loss by re-writing it as a source of ethnographic authority.  This essay is written in two voices in order to reflect this paradox: one which describes the encounter, and one that critically ruminates upon it.  I note, for example, that the MST as a variegated conglomerate of people takes the form of particular ‘Others’ when they are represented in the scholarship and polemic of ‘first world’ activists in the so called ‘global justice movement’.  ‘Falling on my face in the street’ of these Others locates particular processes of fetishization within the global justice movement and the relationships across power and difference that are contained herein; processes that impact on the idea of a ‘global’ solidarity against systemic ‘global’ oppressions.

  5. Customer-sales employee encounters: a dyadic perspective.

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Dolen, van W.; Lemmink, J.G.A.M.; Ruyter, de J.C.; Jong, de A.

    2003-01-01

    Although researchers have suggested that the performance of the salesperson during sales encounters is critical, many of the underlying mechanisms that govern the interaction between salespersons and customers are still unclear. In this research, we investigate sales encounters from a new approach

  6. Politics as Culture: Contribution of Political Science to Democratic Maturity

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Ivan Padjen

    2014-01-01

    Full Text Available The article discusses the contribution of Croatian political science to the development of democracy in Croatia. The focus of the analysis is the concept of culture which author talks about in five steps. In the first step it is understood in the modern key, in the second step as different for nature and in the third as different from society. In the fourth step author differentiates political culture from political economy and political institutions, but in the fifth part there is an attempt to show culture as a fundamental part of politics, policy and polity. On the basis of these insights author shows that the matrix of Croatian political science is more and more devoted to scientific investigation of politics as culture as both study of political culture and as a source of development as politics as culture.

  7. Modeling time-series count data: the unique challenges facing political communication studies.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Fogarty, Brian J; Monogan, James E

    2014-05-01

    This paper demonstrates the importance of proper model specification when analyzing time-series count data in political communication studies. It is common for scholars of media and politics to investigate counts of coverage of an issue as it evolves over time. Many scholars rightly consider the issues of time dependence and dynamic causality to be the most important when crafting a model. However, to ignore the count features of the outcome variable overlooks an important feature of the data. This is particularly the case when modeling data with a low number of counts. In this paper, we argue that the Poisson autoregressive model (Brandt and Williams, 2001) accurately meets the needs of many media studies. We replicate the analyses of Flemming et al. (1997), Peake and Eshbaugh-Soha (2008), and Ura (2009) and demonstrate that models missing some of the assumptions of the Poisson autoregressive model often yield invalid inferences. We also demonstrate that the effect of any of these models can be illustrated dynamically with estimates of uncertainty through a simulation procedure. The paper concludes with implications of these findings for the practical researcher. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

  8. Burkholderia pseudomallei: Challenges for the Clinical Microbiology Laboratory.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hemarajata, Peera; Baghdadi, Jonathan D; Hoffman, Risa; Humphries, Romney M

    2016-12-01

    Melioidosis is a potentially fatal infection caused by the bacterium Burkholderia pseudomallei Clinical diagnosis of melioidosis can be challenging since there is no pathognomonic clinical syndrome, and the organism is often misidentified by methods used routinely in clinical laboratories. Although the disease is more prevalent in Thailand and northern Australia, sporadic cases may be encountered in areas where it is not endemic, including the United States. Since the organism is considered a tier 1 select agent according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the U.S. Department of Agriculture Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, clinical laboratories must be proficient at rapidly recognizing isolates suspicious for B. pseudomallei, be able to safely perform necessary rule-out tests, and to refer suspect isolates to Laboratory Response Network reference laboratories. In this minireview, we report a case of melioidosis encountered at our institution and discuss the laboratory challenges encountered when dealing with clinical isolates suspicious for B. pseudomallei or clinical specimens from suspected melioidosis cases. Copyright © 2016, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.

  9. Maasai Mara - the Challenges of a World Unique Ecosystem

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    The report describes the complex challenges of the Maasai Mara in Kenya. The report is based on stakeholder and research inputs from the Maasai Mara Science and Development Summit in April 2015 at the Maasai Mara University, arranged by the Maasai Mara Science and Development Initiative. The emer....... The emerging challenges are categorized into: (1) land use and climate challenges: (2) ecosystem challenges; (3) political and economic challenges; (4) human and cultural challenges....

  10. Intimate Encounters: Affective Economies in Cuba and the Dominican Republic

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Amalia L. Cabezas

    2011-10-01

    Full Text Available Drawing on research in Cuba and the Dominican Republic this paper explores the uses of intimacy in both the corporate sector and in romantic relationships. I use research with hotel workers and with people involved in sexual-affective exchanges connected to tourism to link intimacy to the political economic structures of transnational tourism. These are new spaces of analysis that present practices of transnational corporategenerated intimacy that combine love – or the exploitation of worker’s emotions − and labour. The central aim is to intertwine the intimate with the global, from the formal customer service policies of transnational hotels with the informal, on-the-ground, intimate encounters between tourists and hospitality workers. The commercialization of intimacy, including sexual-affective relations in the delivery of hospitality services, is linked to political and economic processes that are part of transnational tourism practices. This paper challenges the notion that sex tourism and sex work are individualistic practices that exist outside of the spaces of corporate global profit. It further posits that relationships where money is exchanged are not necessarily devoid of care and intimacy.Resumen: Encuentros íntimos: economías afectivas en Cuba y República Dominicana A partir de investigaciones en Cuba y la República Dominicana, este trabajo explora los usos de la intimidad, tanto en el sector empresarial como en las relaciones románticas. Se hicieron investigaciones entre trabajadores de hostelería y personas involucradas en el intercambio afectivosexual relacionado con el turismo con el fin de vincular la intimidad de las estructuras políticoeconómicas del turismo transnacional. Estos son nuevos espacios de análisis que las prácticas de las empresas transnacionales generan por el uso de la intimidad que combinan el amor – o la explotación de las emociones del trabajador – y la mano de obra. El objetivo central

  11. Political psychology.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Stone, Susanna; Johnson, Kate M; Beall, Erica; Meindl, Peter; Smith, Benjamin; Graham, Jesse

    2014-07-01

    Political psychology is a dynamic field of research that offers a unique blend of approaches and methods in the social and cognitive sciences. Political psychologists explore the interactions between macrolevel political structures and microlevel factors such as decision-making processes, motivations, and perceptions. In this article, we provide a broad overview of the field, beginning with a brief history of political psychology research and a summary of the primary methodological approaches in the field. We then give a more detailed account of research on ideology and social justice, two topics experiencing a resurgence of interest in current political psychology. Finally, we cover research on political persuasion and voting behavior. By summarizing these major areas of political psychology research, we hope to highlight the wide variety of theoretical and methodological approaches of cognitive scientists working at the intersection of psychology and political science. WIREs Cogn Sci 2014, 5:373-385. doi: 10.1002/wcs.1293 For further resources related to this article, please visit the WIREs website. The authors have declared no conflicts of interest for this article. © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

  12. Politics for cities, cities for the political. About possibility (and necessity of radical urban politics

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Wiktor Marzec

    2010-01-01

    Full Text Available Essay faces the problem of determinacy of global capitalism processes for the reality of urban political life. The city is naturally communitarian form of human life and seems to be the place where radical pro-community politics could be undertaken. Already existing and operating forms of power could fruitfully influence the city social relations. Values and norms of conduct are broadly delegated on the urban space and materiality, thus conscious shaping of city space has severe consequences for community life. If a crisis of the political partly has its roots in metamorphoses of the cities, then also remedies, rising from the urban materiality and reestablishing political subjects, could be thought. City, as most real place of political life could be either reduced to the aggregate of consumers or reestablished as a political community. Due to this is the place where undesired course of action could be stopped, hence precisely here the radical democratic politics can emerge.

  13. Customer-to-customer roles and impacts in service encounters

    OpenAIRE

    Lee, Linda

    2016-01-01

    This thesis investigates customer-to-customer roles and impacts in the context of service encounters. This topic is studied from two angles: customer interactions during group service encounters and customer perceptions post service encounters. The first angle is a focus on group service encounters that addresses the lack of research on customer-to-customer interactions that occur in customer-to-customer interaction-intensive contexts. These are contexts where the interactions between custome...

  14. A Lakatosian Encounter

    Science.gov (United States)

    Chick, Helen

    2010-01-01

    There is much to be learned and pondered by reading "Proofs and Refutations," by Imre Lakatos. It highlights the importance of mathematical definitions, and how definitions evolve to capture the essence of the object they are defining. It also provides an exhilarating encounter with the ups and downs of the mathematical reasoning process, where…

  15. Political Values or the Value of Politics

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Simoska, Emilija

    2016-04-01

    Full Text Available This essay was motivated by the gap between proclaimed democratic principles and the perceptions of politics which are exhibited by the citizens in transitional countries -more specifically in the Republic of Macedonia. It is based on research data collected in the past few decades, which illustrate that, in their political actions, the citizens are highly motivated by personal benefits and profits, rather than by their internalized values and ideologies. Non-democratic, authoritarian values prevail, while politics is perceived as a value itself, in the most materialistic meaning of the word. It creates a suitable milieu for growth of corruption, nepotism and clientelism. The authors conclude that such a circulus vitsiosus is a corner stone of the Macedonian political regime, and an enormous obstacle for the advancement of the participative, democratic political culture in reality, in spite of its formal acceptance.

  16. The changing demographic, legal, and technological contexts of political representation.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Forest, Benjamin

    2005-10-25

    Three developments have created challenges for political representation in the U.S. and particularly for the use of territorially based representation (election by district). First, the demographic complexity of the U.S. population has grown both in absolute terms and in terms of residential patterns. Second, legal developments since the 1960s have recognized an increasing number of groups as eligible for voting rights protection. Third, the growing technical capacities of computer technology, particularly Geographic Information Systems, have allowed political parties and other organizations to create election districts with increasingly precise political and demographic characteristics. Scholars have made considerable progress in measuring and evaluating the racial and partisan biases of districting plans, and some states have tried to use Geographic Information Systems technology to produce more representative districts. However, case studies of Texas and Arizona illustrate that such analytic and technical advances have not overcome the basic contradictions that underlie the American system of territorial political representation.

  17. Ritual encounters of the queer kind: a political analysis of jewish lesbian ritual innovation.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Brettschneider, Marla

    2003-01-01

    SUMMARY Jewish feminist and queer engagement in Jewish life and Judaism are transforming the practices and foundational orientations of traditional modes. Jewish feminist, queer ritual innovation in particular is inspired by an array of secular and radical critical theories as much as it is by the historic concrete experiences of a diversity of Jews in different Jewish communities. It is important to hold all of us who are involved in religious ritual innovation responsible to the knowledges we have developed and learned in critical theory or we risk, even with the best of intentions and creativity, re-inscribing some of the very problems of traditional ontological norms that we might have originally sought to disrupt and subvert. This article looks specifically at examples of new "coming out" rituals for Jewish queers explored over time in the Jewish Queer Think Tank: honoring them as well as offering tools from secular critical theory to assist our work in keeping them accountable to our aspirations to both love and fundamentally transform Jewishness. Here I redefine the function of religious ritual itself in political terms as an identity-producing performance. As such I utilize social constructionist queer theories (i.e., Shane Phelan and Judith Butler), anarchists (i.e., Emma Goldman), and those involved in radical theatre (i.e., Augusto Boal) to articulate the revolutionary potential of ritual innovation.

  18. A Political Philosophy Approach to Teaching American Politics.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Bailey, Kevin E.

    1982-01-01

    Suggests an alternative to the civic training, political indoctrination, and descriptive presentation approaches used to teaching American government courses. Recommends a political philosophy approach within a framework of elite theory to help students develop a critical perspective on American politics. (DMM)

  19. Review: Dirk Michel (2009. Politisierung und Biographie. Politische Einstellungen deutscher Zionisten und Holocaustüberlebender [Political Socialization and Biography: German Zionists and Holocaust Survivors and Their Political Attitudes

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Susanne Bressan

    2012-07-01

    Full Text Available How do extraordinary experiences, especially during childhood and adolescence, affect political attitudes? Most studies focusing on political movements only implicitly address the connection between biographical experiences and political attitudes. Moreover, a detailed understanding of these impacts often remains merely hypothetical. Biographical studies increasingly address the relationship between politics and biography through empirical and hermeneutic approaches. For his doctoral thesis, Dirk MICHEL conducts autobiographical narrative interviews with 20 Jewish Israelis. Based on their extraordinary biographical experiences, MICHEL categorized the interviewees into two groups—the "German Zionists" and the "German Holocaust survivors." He then conducts semi-structured interviews with each of the participants with the aim of analyzing their political attitudes. However, the conceptual categorization of the interviewees, the empirical investigation of the research question and the subsequent analysis all challenge the underpinning theoretical and methodological concepts of the study. URN: http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:0114-fqs1203165

  20. Water, Politics and Development: Framing a Political Sociology of Water Resources Management

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Peter P. Mollinga

    2008-06-01

    Full Text Available The first issue of Water Alternatives presents a set of papers that investigates the inherently political nature of water resources management. A Water, Politics and Development initiative was started at ZEF (Center for Development Research, Bonn, Germany in 2004/2005 in the context of a national-level discussion on the role of social science in global (environmental change research. In April 2005 a roundtable workshop with this title was held at ZEF, sponsored by the DFG (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft/German Research Foundation and supported by the NKGCF (Nationales Komitee für Global Change Forschung/German National Committee on Global Change Research, aiming to design a research programme in the German context. In 2006 it was decided to design a publication project on a broader, European and international basis. The Irrigation and Water Engineering Group at Wageningen University, the Netherlands joined as a co-organiser and co-sponsor. The collection of papers published in this issue of Water Alternatives is one of the products of the publication project. As part of the initiative a session on Water, Politics and Development was organised at the Stockholm World Water Week in August 2007, where most of the papers in this collection were presented and discussed. Through this publication, the Water, Politics and Development initiative links up with other initiatives simultaneously ongoing, for instance the 'Water governance – challenging the consensus' project of the Bradford Centre for International Development at Bradford University, UK. At this point in time, the initiative has formulated its thrust as 'framing a political sociology of water resources management'. This, no doubt, is an ambitious project, methodologically, theoretically as well as practically. Through the compilation of this collection we have started to explore whether and how such an endeavour might make sense. The participants in the initiative think it does, are quite

  1. Political “genotype” as a structural element of political culture

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    N. V. Karpova

    2016-01-01

    Full Text Available The article is devoted to the issue of genetic foundations of political culture in the context of the socio-political system changes. The author elaborates the concept of “political genotype” as a sustainable structural element of political culture that determines its content and the possibility of permissible variation. In this paper the main forms of existence of political genotype and its functions are also investigated; and “genetic” mechanism of political culture succession is explored.

  2. Women, Gender, and Politics in Morocco

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Moha Ennaji

    2016-11-01

    Full Text Available This article analyzes the intersection of gender, women’s activism, and political participation in Morocco in a socio-political approach. The emergence of women’s activism is an answer to the gender-based discrimination in the country. Women’s non-government organizations (NGOs struggle for women’s rights and participate actively in the feminization and democratization of the public sphere to ensure sustainable development. They create progressive social change through the mobilization and participation of women. The role of women’s NGO’s (liberal and Islamic alike in the struggle against gender inequalities is remarkable in regard of their efforts to consolidate democracy and social justice and to challenge traditional thinking and inequitable, oppressive, undemocratic, sexist practices of governance. Despite the different approaches, they act together to achieve women’s rights in a variety of places.

  3. Festival as embodied encounters

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Simonsen, Kirsten; Koefoed, Lasse Martin; Neergaard, Maja de

    2017-01-01

    This article is part of a project on Paradoxical Spaces: Encountering the Other in public space which explores how cultural difference is experienced, practiced and negotiated in public space. Specifically, it explores the ‘multicultural’ festival Kulturhavn taking place yearly along the harbour...... of Copenhagen. Multicultural festivals are seen as places for on-going identity negotiations, where individuals and groups define meaningful concepts of identity along with notions of exclusion. In the paper, we adopt a performative approach abandoning the distinction between bodies and space and embracing...... ideas of ‘embodiment’ and ‘rhythm’. We explore participant engagement emphasizing bodily practices as well as sensuous experiences, but also differential processes and orientalist images produced in, and through, encounters. Among the range of activities at the festival, we focus on three: food; dance...

  4. Transformative Theatre: A Promising Educational Tool for Improving Health Encounters With LGBT Older Adults.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hughes, Anne K; Luz, Clare; Hall, Dennis; Gardner, Penny; Hennessey, Chris Walker; Lammers, Lynn

    2016-01-01

    Lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender (LGBT) older adults are often unaware or fearful of aging services that contribute to greater vulnerability, isolation, and risk when services are needed. In addition, they may perceive or experience bias in health care encounters. Providers may not recognize their own biases or their impact on such encounters. In response, a group of LGBT community activists, aging professionals, researchers, and a theatre ensemble developed an interactive theatre experience, described herein, that portrays challenges faced by LGBT older adults needing services. Goals included raising awareness among LGBT older adults and providers about issues such as the limited legal rights of partners, limited family support, and fear of being mistreated as a result of homophobia. Evaluations and feedback reflected the potential of interactive theatre to engage people in sensitive discussions that can lead to increased awareness, reduced bias, practice change, and ultimately improved care for LGBT older adults.

  5. [Political psychology].

    Science.gov (United States)

    Resch, Mária; Bella, Tamás

    2013-04-21

    In Hungary one can mostly find references to the psychological processes of politics in the writings of publicists, public opinion pollsters, philosophers, social psychologists, and political analysts. It would be still important if not only legal scientists focusing on political institutions or sociologist-politologists concentrating on social structures could analyse the psychological aspects of political processes; but one could also do so through the application of the methods of political psychology. The authors review the history of political psychology, its position vis-à-vis other fields of science and the essential interfaces through which this field of science, which is still to be discovered in Hungary, connects to other social sciences. As far as its methodology comprising psycho-biographical analyses, questionnaire-based queries, cognitive mapping of interviews and statements are concerned, it is identical with the psychiatric tools of medical sciences. In the next part of this paper, the focus is shifted to the essence and contents of political psychology. Group dynamics properties, voters' attitudes, leaders' personalities and the behavioural patterns demonstrated by them in different political situations, authoritativeness, games, and charisma are all essential components of political psychology, which mostly analyses psychological-psychiatric processes and also involves medical sciences by relying on cognitive and behavioural sciences. This paper describes political psychology, which is basically part of social sciences, still, being an interdisciplinary science, has several ties to medical sciences through psychological and psychiatric aspects.

  6. The Pragmatics of Political Apology in Ghana's Contemporary Politics

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    The paper discusses political apology in the 4th republic of Ghanaian contemporary politics from 2013 to 2015. It taps its data from apologetic speeches by political officials and from apologies rendered to politicians. The paper discusses the semantics and pragmatics of political apology. It examines the use of the language ...

  7. Tackling Dependency: The EU and its Energy Security Challenges

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Larsson, Robert L

    2007-10-15

    Europe is facing a future of augmenting energy demands, domestic depletion, high prices and other energy-political challenges. Climate change, infrastructure resilience, producers' coercive energy policy and the EU's internal market failures have put stress on the EU's emerging energy policy and inspired the union to address its challenges with greater enthusiasm than before. Some of the EU's challenges call for strategic choices of a magnitude that EU is not used to handle. The aim of this report is therefore to identify, analyse and assess the political side of Europe's energy predicament and import dependency. Against the background of increasing dependence on energy imports, the report tries to answer questions: what are the key dimensions of Europe's energy security and what are their consequences?

  8. Tackling Dependency: The EU and its Energy Security Challenges

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Larsson, Robert L.

    2007-10-01

    Europe is facing a future of augmenting energy demands, domestic depletion, high prices and other energy-political challenges. Climate change, infrastructure resilience, producers' coercive energy policy and the EU's internal market failures have put stress on the EU's emerging energy policy and inspired the union to address its challenges with greater enthusiasm than before. Some of the EU's challenges call for strategic choices of a magnitude that EU is not used to handle. The aim of this report is therefore to identify, analyse and assess the political side of Europe's energy predicament and import dependency. Against the background of increasing dependence on energy imports, the report tries to answer questions: what are the key dimensions of Europe's energy security and what are their consequences?

  9. Political Parties, Clientelism, and Bureaucratic Reform

    OpenAIRE

    Cruz, Cesi; Keefer, Philip

    2015-01-01

    The challenge of public administration reform is well-known: politicians often have little interest in the efficient implementation of government policy. Using new data from 439 World Bank public sector reform loans in 109 countries, we demonstrate that such reforms are significantly less likely to succeed in the presence of non-programmatic political parties. Earlier research uses evidence from a small group of countries to conclude that clientelistic politicians resist reforms that restrict...

  10. Institutional Design and Irish Political Reform

    OpenAIRE

    Hardiman, Niamh

    2010-01-01

    Part of Symposium: Resolving Ireland's Fiscal Crisis (read before the Society, 26th November 2009) The financial and economic crisis that erupted in 2008 exposed significant weaknesses in Irish decision-making and policy implementing processes. In contrast with other European countries in the grip of crisis, the political system was not fundamentally challenged and the incumbent government held onto power. But confidence in government?s capacity to respond adequately fell to historically l...

  11. Censoring the Imagination: Challenges to Children's Books.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Saltman, Judith

    1998-01-01

    Presents a brief history of the censorship of children's books, and then focuses on recent challenges. The view of literature as a socializing force is discussed, and examples of challenged books in the United States and Canada are provided, illustrating different reasons for censorship on both sides of the political and social spectrum. (AEF)

  12. Political News and Political Consciousness

    Science.gov (United States)

    Schertges, Claudia

    2007-01-01

    This article deals with mass media in modern democratic societies, using the example of Israeli news reports in German television (TV) news. Central to this interest are processes of mediating politics: political socialisation and education; that is to say, empowering citizens via TV news to participate in democratic processes. The article…

  13. Thinking Globally, Acting Locally: Joel Wegmeister and Modern Hasidic Politics in Warsaw

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    François Guesnet

    2011-10-01

    Full Text Available This contribution investigates how the emergence of the first modern Jewish metropolis in Warsaw in the second half of the 19th century challenged traditional visions of community cohesion. It argues that the acceleration of political and societal change within the Jewish community allowed observant elites to achieve political and cultural hegemony in Warsaw, and thus offers a sui generis pathway of Jewish metropolitan modernization. This claim is substantiated by following the communal and political involvement of a leading Hasidic civil leader, Joel Wegmeister (1837-1919, co-founder of the first outlets of the Agudat Israel in the Kingdom of Poland before World War One

  14. Rethinking Prefigurative Politics: Introduction to the Special Thematic Section

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Flora Cornish

    2016-05-01

    Full Text Available This special thematic section responds to the 21st century proliferation of social movements characterised by the slogans ‘another world is possible’ and ‘be the change you want to see’. It explores prefigurative politics as a means of instantiating radical social change in a context of widening global inequalities, climate change, and the crises and recoveries of neoliberal global capitalism. ‘Prefigurative politics’ refers to a range of social experiments that both critique the status quo and offer alternatives by implementing radically democratic practices in pursuit of social justice. This collection of articles makes the case for psychologists to engage with prefigurative politics as sites of psychological and social change, in the dual interests of understanding the world and changing it. The articles bridge psychology and politics in three different ways. One group of articles brings a psychological lens to political phenomena, arguing that attention to the emotional, relational and intergroup dynamics of prefigurative politics is required to understand their trajectories, challenges, and impacts. A second group focuses a political lens on social settings traditionally framed as psychological sites of well-being, enabling an understanding of their political nature. The third group addresses the ‘border tensions’ of the psychological and the political, contextualising and historicising the instantiation of prefigurative ideals and addressing tensions that arise between utopian ideals and various internal and external constraints. This introduction to the special section explores the concept and contemporary debates concerning prefigurative politics, outlines the rationale for a psychological engagement with this phenomenon, and presents the articles in the special thematic section. The general, prefigurative, aim is to advance psychology’s contribution to rethinking and remaking the world as it could be, not only

  15. The accusation of 'world disturbers' (Acts 17:6 in socio-political context

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Jeremy Punt

    2016-03-01

    Full Text Available �Acts 17:1�9 presents a narrative of the consequences of Paul�s engagements in Thessalonica�s synagogue. Following Paul and Silas� reported successful 3-week mission, some Jews hauled Paul and Silas� host, Jason, and a number of Jesus followers before the authorities. The threefold accusation was that Paul and Silas turned the world upside down, acted against Caesar�s decrees and claimed another king, Jesus. This incident is investigated from the perspective of Acts� presentation of competing missions, in the context of the intersectionality of religion and politics in the 1st century CE. The article challenges a narrow theological interpretation of Acts 17, insisting on the need for and value of a socio-political interpretive lens to make sense of the rhetoric of this chapter.Intradisciplinary and/or interdisciplinary implications: The article challenges a narrow theological interpretation of Acts 17, insisting on the need for and value of a socio-political interpretive lens to make sense of the rhetoric of this chapter.

  16. Agonizing care: care ethics, agonistic feminism and a political theory of care.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Cloyes, Kristin G

    2002-09-01

    'Care' is central to nursing theory and practice, and has been described in a variety of ways. Intense conversations about care have been developing in other fields of study as well, from the social sciences to the humanities. Care ethics has grown out of intellectual exchange between feminist thought, moral theory and the critique of traditional western political philosophy. However, care ethics is not without its critics, as these accounts of care have also sparked vigorous challenges. This paper traces the construct of care through nursing theory, care ethics, feminist critiques of moral and political theory and agonistic feminism to outline a set of problematics that a political theory of care should engage. It discusses how care is conventionally posited in more or less essentialist, universalizing and naturalizing terms. It introduces the ideas of feminist theorists who resist dichotomizing care and the political, and situate care in the context of power and politics. The tensions between care feminism and agonistic feminism are highlighted in order to explore the potential of theorizing both care and nursing in political terms.

  17. How superdiffusion gets arrested: ecological encounters explain shift from Lévy to Brownian movement

    Science.gov (United States)

    de Jager, Monique; Bartumeus, Frederic; Kölzsch, Andrea; Weissing, Franz J.; Hengeveld, Geerten M.; Nolet, Bart A.; Herman, Peter M. J.; van de Koppel, Johan

    2014-01-01

    Ecological theory uses Brownian motion as a default template for describing ecological movement, despite limited mechanistic underpinning. The generality of Brownian motion has recently been challenged by empirical studies that highlight alternative movement patterns of animals, especially when foraging in resource-poor environments. Yet, empirical studies reveal animals moving in a Brownian fashion when resources are abundant. We demonstrate that Einstein's original theory of collision-induced Brownian motion in physics provides a parsimonious, mechanistic explanation for these observations. Here, Brownian motion results from frequent encounters between organisms in dense environments. In density-controlled experiments, movement patterns of mussels shifted from Lévy towards Brownian motion with increasing density. When the analysis was restricted to moves not truncated by encounters, this shift did not occur. Using a theoretical argument, we explain that any movement pattern approximates Brownian motion at high-resource densities, provided that movement is interrupted upon encounters. Hence, the observed shift to Brownian motion does not indicate a density-dependent change in movement strategy but rather results from frequent collisions. Our results emphasize the need for a more mechanistic use of Brownian motion in ecology, highlighting that especially in rich environments, Brownian motion emerges from ecological interactions, rather than being a default movement pattern. PMID:24225464

  18. How superdiffusion gets arrested: ecological encounters explain shift from Lévy to Brownian movement.

    Science.gov (United States)

    de Jager, Monique; Bartumeus, Frederic; Kölzsch, Andrea; Weissing, Franz J; Hengeveld, Geerten M; Nolet, Bart A; Herman, Peter M J; van de Koppel, Johan

    2014-01-07

    Ecological theory uses Brownian motion as a default template for describing ecological movement, despite limited mechanistic underpinning. The generality of Brownian motion has recently been challenged by empirical studies that highlight alternative movement patterns of animals, especially when foraging in resource-poor environments. Yet, empirical studies reveal animals moving in a Brownian fashion when resources are abundant. We demonstrate that Einstein's original theory of collision-induced Brownian motion in physics provides a parsimonious, mechanistic explanation for these observations. Here, Brownian motion results from frequent encounters between organisms in dense environments. In density-controlled experiments, movement patterns of mussels shifted from Lévy towards Brownian motion with increasing density. When the analysis was restricted to moves not truncated by encounters, this shift did not occur. Using a theoretical argument, we explain that any movement pattern approximates Brownian motion at high-resource densities, provided that movement is interrupted upon encounters. Hence, the observed shift to Brownian motion does not indicate a density-dependent change in movement strategy but rather results from frequent collisions. Our results emphasize the need for a more mechanistic use of Brownian motion in ecology, highlighting that especially in rich environments, Brownian motion emerges from ecological interactions, rather than being a default movement pattern.

  19. Intermediacy between political control and institutional autonomy: A transformative approach

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Nirmala Dorasamy

    2015-06-01

    Full Text Available The public sector is about providing services, managing resources efficiently and securing a return on investment. Producing results and managing performance depends on adaptation, flexibility and creativity. While one may argue for greater control to achieve performance indicators, this has to be underpinned by managerial control systems both internally and externally. Post NPM reforms have tried to respond to the problem of single purpose organisations that have distanced political control. While post NPM reforms tipped the scale toward more political control, it did not restore the balance between control and autonomy. In view of the NPM and post NPM reforms and the accompanying challenges, the paper argues that it is not possible to device a “one size fits all” response to these challenges. In trying to analyse the dilemma of balancing political control and institutional autonomy an institutional theoretical perspective is used by analysing structural and instrumental features (national political environment, cultural features (historical administrative traditions and external constraints (technical and institutional environments. It needs to be recognised that the aforementioned features have constraints. The structural and instrumental features specify the formal constraints on leaderships decisions. These constraints may give political leaders strong hierarchical control or may not give them much direction, but a lot of potential discretionary influence. The cultural features specify that public organisations develop informal norms and values which lead to a distinct institutional culture. While these informal norms and values are infused in formal structures and decision making, it may be inconsistent with the sub-culture, thereby giving it less systemic influence. The technical and institutional environment which focuses on efficiency production and internal culture may develop beliefs over time that cannot be ignored. Christensen

  20. Critical prophecy and political leadership in biblical, African and Islamic worldviews

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    P.O. Abioje

    2010-07-01

    Full Text Available This article examines the socio-political influence of prophecy in traditional African and the biblical perspectives, in order to challenge contemporary African religious men and women to serve as the conscience of society. There is hardly any doubt that political leaders are usually prone to abuse of their positions and they need to be reprimanded and lampooned. A discussion on Islam is included, because, together with Christianity, it dominates, to a large extent, socio-political and economic leadership in Africa. It is the view of many scholars that neither Christianity nor Islam have been applied sufficiently to political leadership in Africa to have an impact on mass socio-political and economic welfare, although some heroic individual exceptions are noted. The materials were gathered through a literature study. The study is comparative in the sense that it compares prophecy in traditional Africa with what is obtained from the Bible and the church as we know it today. The study recommends critical prophecy in the two dominant Old Testament religions, namely Christianity and Islam, and in African Traditional Religion, for improved political leadership and development in Africa.

  1. The political reference point: How geography shapes political identity.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Feinberg, Matthew; Tullett, Alexa M; Mensch, Zachary; Hart, William; Gottlieb, Sara

    2017-01-01

    It is commonly assumed that how individuals identify on the political spectrum-whether liberal, conservative, or moderate-has a universal meaning when it comes to policy stances and voting behavior. But, does political identity mean the same thing from place to place? Using data collected from across the U.S. we find that even when people share the same political identity, those in "bluer" locations are more likely to support left-leaning policies and vote for Democratic candidates than those in "redder" locations. Because the meaning of political identity is inconsistent across locations, individuals who share the same political identity sometimes espouse opposing policy stances. Meanwhile, those with opposing identities sometimes endorse identical policy stances. Such findings suggest that researchers, campaigners, and pollsters must use caution when extrapolating policy preferences and voting behavior from political identity, and that animosity toward the other end of the political spectrum is sometimes misplaced.

  2. Reflections on the Cultural Encounter between the Jews and the Greeks and Romans in Jewish Coin Iconography of the Hellenistic-Roman Period

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Lykke, Anne

    2017-01-01

    Contrary to the written and archaeological sources, the numismatic material from the Persian, Hellenistic, and particularly the Roman Imperial periods in Palestine constitutes an almost uninterrupted material source from which detailed knowledge can be drawn concerning the political, cultural and......—by extension—even social processes. In this article examples reflecting the results of the cultural encounter between the Jewish and the Greco-Roman world are discussed, which are well illustrated by the differences in the iconography of the Jewish coinages of the first century BCE and first century CE...

  3. The EU's Normative Power in Changing World Politics

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Manners, Ian

    2009-01-01

    global order: 1) what is the concept of normative power in world politics?; 2) what is an effective EU toolbox for tackling new challenges?; 3) how does the EU go beyond self-perception and rhetoric?; 4) what is the raison d'etre of the EU?; and 5) how might normative power in EU external policies lead...

  4. Challenges in conducting research in pediatric long-term care facilities.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Larson, Elaine L; Cohen, Bevin; Murray, Meghan; Saiman, Lisa

    2014-10-01

    Children residing in long-term care facilities (LTCFs) have complex medical problems and unique care needs, yet research in this setting is rare. As part of an intervention study to improve patient safety (Keep It Clean for Kids [KICK]), we describe the challenges encountered and recommend approaches to build a successful and sustained collaborative relationship between pediatric LTCFs and the research team. We implemented a program with 5 components: leadership commitment, active staff participation by the creation of KICK teams, workflow assessments, staff training in the World Health Organization's "5 Moments for Hand Hygiene," and electronic monitoring and feedback to staff regarding hand hygiene practices. Major challenges encountered were establishing trust, building research teams, enhancing staff participation, and engaging families and visitors. Approaches to deal with these challenges are discussed. Conducting research in pediatric LTCFs requires sustained commitment to dealing with challenges and establishing collaborative relationships with administrative and frontline staff. © The Author(s) 2014.

  5. Co-creation of Innovations in ICT based service encounters

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Sørensen, Jannick Kirk; Henten, Anders

    2014-01-01

    Innovations in services often emanate from service encounters (i.e. the touch points between the service producers and the customers). Two different types of service encounters are dealt with: face-to-face and ICT-based service encounters. The aim of the chapter is to examine the specific...

  6. A corpus-based Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) of the linguistic ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    Additionally, nominalisation-cum-thematisation of discourse topics, intertextuality, citation of views by experts and officials, the local nomenclature of HIV and AIDS and Shona for Specific Purposes (SSP) motivated by politeness, were variously used to reveal advances and challenges encountered regarding activities ...

  7. Uncovering the political in non-political young muslim immigrant identities

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Niels Nørgaard Kristensen

    2011-01-01

    Full Text Available The theme of this paper is political identity and participation amongMuslim migrant young people in Denmark. Political identity is analysedby examining students’ political interests and perception of themselves as participants in politics, as well as their rationalities for politics. In order to address the research question ‘What characterizes political identities among Muslim immigrant young people in schools?’ we interviewed eight Muslim students from a Danish upper secondary school and from different national origins. The students’ political orientations seemed quite contradictory, even among those who might readily have been identified as a-political. Despite moderate political interest, all students showed some inclinations to participate in elections or in particular issues. However, they emphasized that their social studies classes primarily provided them with factual knowledge experience, and some students found this knowledge useful. None of the students seemed to experience school as an arena for participation. Consequently, there is first a need to emphasize the significance of a dynamic perspective on the phenomenon of political identity, and second, we need to know how students in school should be regarded as citizens in ‘the making’ or as equal citizens in a participatory arena.

  8. Resilient development and environmental justice in divided territory: political ecology in the San Diego-Tijuana bioregion.

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    K. Haines

    2015-04-01

    Full Text Available This paper explores issues in the expansion of environmental justice rhetoric to the developing world, and propose insights from resilience theory, political ecology, and bioregionalism as supplements. I do this from the frame of the San Diego-Tijuana region, where regional inequalities are stark and global processes have a heavy local footprint. Sharing a broadly-defined natural region, the growing evidence of ecological crisis increasingly calls for collaboration between two communities which often perceive themselves as relatively disconnected. Understanding challenges to social-ecological resilience and environmental justice in the San Diego-Tijuana region, however, also requires understanding it as an inflection point for global economic, military, and human migration flows occurring at many scales. It is in the context of building effective regional collaboration that environmental justice must engage the analyses of scale and political economy contained in political ecology as a challenge. I suggest, however, that any environmental justice discourse informed by political ecology cannot remain abstract from the local context. A “bioregional” community forged around shared ecological systems may serve as an important resource for creating social-ecological resilience in politically divided territory.

  9. The effect of political generation on identity and social change: Age cohort consequences.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Brown, Robyn Lewis; Rohlinger, Deana A

    2016-01-01

    In this article, we explore how political generation affects the ways in which diverse individuals come together and change their social and personal identities. Drawing on 52 in-depth interviews with members of the Red Hat Society, we show that women draw on their political generation, and the gains of the women's movement specifically, to oppose cultural constructions of aging. The Red Hat Society provides a "free space" for women to foster a collective identity that both visibly challenges aging norms and provides its members new standards for self-approval. We conclude by highlighting the importance of focusing on political generation to understand collective action over the life course and call for more scholarship on the function of political generation in social change.

  10. [Public spheres, political crisis and the Internet: the rise of the Podemos party].

    Science.gov (United States)

    Jerez, Ariel; Maceiras, Sergio D'Antonio; Maestu, Enrique

    2015-12-01

    The rise of the political party Podemos, within the context of a crisis in political representation, can be explained from a perspective of transformative interactions between public spheres, social movements and new technologies. The emergence of the 15M movement allowed Podemos to offer a new diagnosis of politics that has been actively promoted on social media, which represent a true campaign platform for low-budget parties. An analysis of Twitter and Facebook reveals the rapid growth of Podemos, its prominence on social networks, the profile of its followers and its most influential publications in these new discourses. Lastly, we analyze the challenges for this type of party in terms of incorporating into the political panorama in Spain and in Europe.

  11. Encounters with medicines among ethnic minorities with chronic conditions

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Mygind, Anna

    of the study was to explore the challenges of encounters with medicines among ethnic minorities with chronic conditions in Denmark, exemplified by policy, professional and patient perspectives. Implications for community pharmacies was a particular focus. Methods: The study drew on different methods, types...... analysis of interviews with people with Pakistani background, type 2 diabetes and at least one other chronic condition, focusing on lived experiences with medicine use during Ramadan, reasons for fasting, and experiences with counselling on medicines. Sub-study IV encompassed an analysis of interviews......-study I. Most documents agreed that skin colour and skin covering were part of the definition of ethnic minorities at risk. Major discrepancies were found regarding the importance attributed to the Islamic religion, other traditions, immigration, gender and age, and an evolutionary explanation...

  12. Political Culture and the Nature of Political Participation in Egypt.

    Science.gov (United States)

    1980-06-01

    political socialization . Political-cultural values are gradually internalized within the society and political behavior is largely reflective of...the extent to which the regime used education as a means of political socialization : Socialism is articulated as a Muslim theory of socialism. The head... political socialization except for a brief period during the mobilization program of Ali Sabri. Egypt’s party system has been more relevant for

  13. Redistributive Politics in a Political Union

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Citi, Manuele; Justesen, Mogens Kamp

    One of the main functions of centralized budgets in federal and political unions is to act as an equalizing mechanism to support economic cohesion. This is also the case with the European Union’s budget, which operates as a redistributive mechanism that counteracts the cross-national and cross...... remarkably over the last decades. In this paper, we investigate how and why the net fiscal position of each member state towards the rest of the EU changes over time. Using a novel panel dataset (1979-2014), we study how some key national and EU-level political and economic variables affect the EU...... find that the political orientation of national governments does not per se influence redistributive politics with in the EU. However, when the unemployment rate is rising, right-wing governments are able to extract significantly larger budgetary benefits....

  14. Political Mechanisms for Long-Range Survival and Development

    Science.gov (United States)

    Marshall, W.

    As the first species aware of extinction and capable of proactively ensuring our long-term survival and development, it is striking that we do not do so with the rigor, formality, and foresight it requires. Only from a reactive posture have we responded to the challenges of global warfare, human rights, environmental concerns, and sustainable development. Despite our awareness of the possibility for extinction and apocalyptic set-backs to our evolution, and despite the existence of long-range studies-which must still be dramatically increased-proactive global policy implementation regarding our long-term survival and development is arguably non-existent. This lack of long-term policy making can be attributed in part to the lack of formal political mechanisms to facilitate longer-range policy making that extends 30 years or more into the future. Political mechanisms for infusing long-range thinking, research, and strategic planning into the policy-making process can help correct this shortcoming and provide the motivation needed to adequately address long-term challenges with the political rigor required to effectively establish and implement long-term policies. There are some efforts that attempt to address longer-range issues, but those efforts often do not connect to the political process, do not extend 30 or more years into the future, are not well-funded, and are not sufficiently systemic. Political mechanisms for long-range survival and prosperity could correct these inadequacies by raising awareness, providing funding, and most importantly, leveraging political rigor to establish and enforce long-range strategic planning and policies. The feasibility of such mechanisms should first be rigorously studied and assessed in a feasibility study, which could then inform implementation. This paper will present the case for such a study and suggest some possible political mechanisms that should be investigated further in the proposed study. This work is being further

  15. When Are Students Ready for Research Methods? A Curriculum Mapping Argument for the Political Science Major

    Science.gov (United States)

    Bergbower, Matthew L.

    2017-01-01

    For many political science programs, research methods courses are a fundamental component of the recommended undergraduate curriculum. However, instructors and students often see these courses as the most challenging. This study explores when it is most appropriate for political science majors to enroll and pass a research methods course. The…

  16. Development of indigenous irradiator - current progress and challenges

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Anwar A Rahman; Mohd Arif Hamzah; Muhd Nor Atan; Aznor Hassan; Fadil Ismail; Julia A Karim; Rosli Darmawan

    2009-01-01

    The development of indigenous irradiator is one of Prototype Development Center main project to support Nuclear Malaysia services. Three (3) projects have been identified and currently the status is in final stage of design. There are some issues and challenges encountered, which delayed the project progress. The paper will discuss the current progress of development and challenges faced in designing the irradiator. (Author)

  17. Value creation and knowledge development in tourism experience encounters

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Sørensen, Flemming; Jensen, Jens Friis

    2015-01-01

    It has been argued that service encounters between front-line employees and users support the development of knowledge about users' needs. However, the potential for this often remains unused, not least in tourism. This article argues that if tourism service encounters are changed into ‘experience...... encounters’ by integrating them into the tourism experience to which they are related, this will create added experiential value for tourists and increase the creation of knowledge about users. This is illustrated in an innovation field experiment in a retro design boutique hotel in which service encounters...... were developed into experience encounters. The experiment illustrates the potential that experience encounters have to create knowledge and value, but also suggests some barriers that need to be overcome....

  18. The political reference point: How geography shapes political identity

    Science.gov (United States)

    Feinberg, Matthew; Tullett, Alexa M.; Mensch, Zachary; Hart, William; Gottlieb, Sara

    2017-01-01

    It is commonly assumed that how individuals identify on the political spectrum–whether liberal, conservative, or moderate–has a universal meaning when it comes to policy stances and voting behavior. But, does political identity mean the same thing from place to place? Using data collected from across the U.S. we find that even when people share the same political identity, those in “bluer” locations are more likely to support left-leaning policies and vote for Democratic candidates than those in “redder” locations. Because the meaning of political identity is inconsistent across locations, individuals who share the same political identity sometimes espouse opposing policy stances. Meanwhile, those with opposing identities sometimes endorse identical policy stances. Such findings suggest that researchers, campaigners, and pollsters must use caution when extrapolating policy preferences and voting behavior from political identity, and that animosity toward the other end of the political spectrum is sometimes misplaced. PMID:28207906

  19. The political reference point: How geography shapes political identity.

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Matthew Feinberg

    Full Text Available It is commonly assumed that how individuals identify on the political spectrum-whether liberal, conservative, or moderate-has a universal meaning when it comes to policy stances and voting behavior. But, does political identity mean the same thing from place to place? Using data collected from across the U.S. we find that even when people share the same political identity, those in "bluer" locations are more likely to support left-leaning policies and vote for Democratic candidates than those in "redder" locations. Because the meaning of political identity is inconsistent across locations, individuals who share the same political identity sometimes espouse opposing policy stances. Meanwhile, those with opposing identities sometimes endorse identical policy stances. Such findings suggest that researchers, campaigners, and pollsters must use caution when extrapolating policy preferences and voting behavior from political identity, and that animosity toward the other end of the political spectrum is sometimes misplaced.

  20. Politics Backstage - Television Documentaries, Politics and Politicians

    OpenAIRE

    Ib Bondebjerg

    2006-01-01

    This article deals with "the transformation of visibility" in political discourse on and representation of politics and politicians in resent Dansih television documentaries. Drawing on the theories of Habermas, Meyrowitz and John B. Thompson, it is argued that the political persona on television is moved closer to the individual citizen, creating a sort "mediated quasi-inter- action" giving mediated communication a stronger element of face-to-face interaction. Together...

  1. Resource Windfalls, Political Regimes, and Political Stability

    OpenAIRE

    Francesco Caselli; Andrea Tesei

    2011-01-01

    We study theoretically and empirically whether natural resource windfalls affect political regimes. We document the following regularities. Natural resource windfalls have no effect on the political system when they occur in democracies. However, windfalls have significant political consequences in autocracies. In particular, when an autocratic country receives a positive shock to its flow of resource rents it responds by becoming even more autocratic. Furthermore, there is heterogeneity in t...

  2. Administrative encounters in general practice: low value or hidden value care?

    Science.gov (United States)

    Trevena, Lyndal J; Harrison, Christopher; Britt, Helena C

    2018-02-19

    To determine the frequency of general practice administrative encounters, and to determine whether they represent low value care. Secondary analysis of data from the Bettering Evaluation and Care of Health (BEACH) dataset. 1 568 100 GP-patient encounters in Australia, 2000-01 to 2015-16. An annual nationally representative random sample of about 1000 GPs, who each recorded the details of 100 consecutive encounters with patients. Proportions of general practice encounters that were potentially low value care encounters (among the patient's reasons for the encounter was at least one administrative, medication, or referral request) and potentially low value care only encounters (such reasons were the sole reason for the encounter). For 2015-16, we also examined other health care provided by GPs at these encounters. During 2015-16, 18.5% (95% CI, 17.7-19.3%) of 97 398 GP-patient encounters were potentially low value care request encounters; 7.4% (95% CI, 7.0-7.9%) were potentially low value care only encounters. Administrative work was requested at 3.8% (95% CI, 3.5-4.0%) of GP visits, 35.4% of which were for care planning and coordination, 33.5% for certification, and 31.2% for other reasons. Medication requests were made at 13.1% (95% CI, 12.4-13.7%) of encounters; other health care was provided at 57.9% of medication request encounters, counselling, advice or education at 23.4%, and pathology testing was ordered at 16.7%. Referrals were requested at 2.8% (95% CI, 1.7-3.0%) of visits, at 69.4% of which additional health care was provided. The problems managed most frequently at potentially low value care only encounters were chronic diseases. Most patients requested certificates, medications and referrals in the context of seeking help for other health needs. Additional health care, particularly for chronic diseases, was provided at most GP administrative encounters. The MBS Review should consider the hidden value of these encounters.

  3. Citizenship education, national identity and political trust: The Case of Sweden

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Hans Lödén

    2014-12-01

    Full Text Available The challenging effects of globalization upon the nation-state have been a recurrent theme in the social science discourse since the 1990’s. Nationally organized education is also seen as challenged by new demands originating from globalization. In this article it is argued that ‘nation-state’ and ‘national identity’ are highly relevant concepts when discussing a citizenship education that seeks to develop a civic ethos with, potentially, a global reach. It is further argued that the understanding of such an ethos would benefit significantly from incorporating the role of political trust since trust has been identified as a main feature of the social capital that makes democracy work. Three themes are brought together: national identity and identification, the importance for democracy of political trust and the challenges citizenship education face when carried out in a national context but intended to manage issues that go far beyond the reach of the nation-state. The importance of citizenship education is discussed using recent research on the Swedish citizenship education classroom

  4. Health system strengthening in Myanmar during political reforms: perspectives from international agencies.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Risso-Gill, Isabelle; McKee, Martin; Coker, Richard; Piot, Peter; Legido-Quigley, Helena

    2014-07-01

    Myanmar has undergone a remarkable political transformation in the last 2 years, with its leadership voluntarily transitioning from an isolated military regime to a quasi-civilian government intent on re-engaging with the international community. Decades of underinvestment have left the country underdeveloped with a fragile health system and poor health outcomes. International aid agencies have found engagement with the Myanmar government difficult but this is changing rapidly and it is opportune to consider how Myanmar can engage with the global health system strengthening (HSS) agenda. Nineteen semi-structured, face-to-face interviews were conducted with representatives from international agencies working in Myanmar to capture their perspectives on HSS following political reform. They explored their perceptions of HSS and the opportunities for implementation. Participants reported challenges in engaging with government, reflecting the disharmony between actors, economic sanctions and barriers to service delivery due to health system weaknesses and bureaucracy. Weaknesses included human resources, data and medical products/infrastructure and logistical challenges. Agencies had mixed views of health system finance and governance, identifying problems and also some positive aspects. There is little consensus on how HSS should be approached in Myanmar, but much interest in collaborating to achieve it. Despite myriad challenges and concerns, participants were generally positive about the recent political changes, and remain optimistic as they engage in HSS activities with the government.

  5. Awkward Encounters and Ethnography

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Koning, Juliette; Ooi, Can-Seng

    2013-01-01

    from these encounters. Un-paralyzing reflexivity means to include the awkward, the emotional, and admit the non-rational aspects of our ethnographic experiences; such inclusive reflexivity is incredibly insightful. Research limitations/implications – Inclusive reflexivity not only allows room...

  6. The politics and anti-politics of social movements

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Burchardt, Marian; Patterson, Amy S.; Mubanda Rasmussen, Louise

    2013-01-01

    's poverty. Religious HIV/AIDS activities must be analysed in a conceptual space between a civil society/politics approach and a service-provider/anti-politics framework. That is, religious mobilisation may at times seek to engage the public realm to shape policies, while at other times it may shun politics...

  7. Navigating the Challenges Arising from University-School Collaborative Action Research

    Science.gov (United States)

    Yuan, Rui; Mak, Pauline

    2016-01-01

    Despite increasing evidence showing the benefits language teachers can reap from university-school collaborative action research (CAR), scant attention has been given to how university researchers collaborate with language teachers, what challenges they might encounter, and how they navigate such challenges in CAR. To fill the gap, this study…

  8. Facebook, Political Narrative, and Political Change: A Case Study of Palestinian Youth

    OpenAIRE

    Kenderes, Amanda

    2012-01-01

    In this dissertation I aim to advance political narrative theory by exploring the use of political narrative on Facebook and the possibility for Facebook to be used among Palestinian youth for political change. To examine the concepts of political narrative and political change, I developed a model for political change based on the changing political narratives which in part prompted the 2011 Egyptian revolution. The model, Political Narrative Perspectives (PNPs), identifies individual and re...

  9. Innovation networking between stability and political dynamics

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Koch, Christian

    2004-01-01

    of the contribution is to challenge and transcend these notions and develop an understanding of innovation networks as an interplay between stable and dynamic elements, where political processes in innovation are much more than a disruptive and even a counterproductive feature. It reviews the growing number...... of studies that highlight the political aspect of innovation. The paper reports on a study of innovation processes conducted within the EU—TSER-programme and a study made under the banner of management of technology. Intensive field studies in two constellations of enterprises were carried out. One......This contribution views innovation as a social activity of building networks, using software product development in multicompany alliances and networks as example. Innovation networks are frequently understood as quite stable arrangements characterised by high trust among the participants. The aim...

  10. "What's Positive about Positive Rights?" Students' Everyday Understandings and the Challenges of Teaching Political Science

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ekström, Linda; Lundholm, Cecilia

    2018-01-01

    A review of research into teaching and learning in political science education concludes that this literature emphasizes student outcomes and "show and tell" descriptions of pedagogical interventions (Craig 2014). The present study instead aims to open the "black box" of conceptual learning in political science, illustrating…

  11. The politics of home birth in the United States.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Declercq, Eugene

    2012-12-01

    Home birth has emerged as a political issue in several states in the United States, and this essay examines two aspects of home births politics. First, legislative battles over home birth policy do not conform to our typical models of partisan (i.e., Democratic vs Republican) politics, and attempts at advocacy cannot rely on classical strategies of alignment with a dominant party in a state. Second, the debates over home birth have increasingly begun to parallel current partisan battles in their emotion and intensity with the related gridlock and reluctance to consider compromises that are often necessary to achieve policy goals. This essay calls for a greater willingness for all sides to approach home birth less as an ideological mission and more as a health policy challenge to support consumers interested in an integrated system of care. © 2012, Copyright the Authors Journal compilation © 2012, Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

  12. 'Grounded' Politics

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Schmidt, Garbi

    2012-01-01

    play within one particular neighbourhood: Nørrebro in the Danish capital, Copenhagen. The article introduces the concept of grounded politics to analyse how groups of Muslim immigrants in Nørrebro use the space, relationships and history of the neighbourhood for identity political statements....... The article further describes how national political debates over the Muslim presence in Denmark affect identity political manifestations within Nørrebro. By using Duncan Bell’s concept of mythscape (Bell, 2003), the article shows how some political actors idealize Nørrebro’s past to contest the present...... ethnic and religious diversity of the neighbourhood and, further, to frame what they see as the deterioration of genuine Danish identity....

  13. Annual Research Review: The experience of youth with political conflict--challenging notions of resilience and encouraging research refinement.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Barber, Brian K

    2013-04-01

    Drawing on empirical studies and literature reviews, this paper aims to clarify and qualify the relevance of resilience to youth experiencing political conflict. It focuses on the discordance between expectations of widespread dysfunction among conflict-affected youth and a body of empirical evidence that does not confirm these expectations. The expectation for widespread dysfunction appears exaggerated, relying as it does on low correlations and on presumptions of universal response to adversity. Such a position ignores cultural differences in understanding and responding to adversity, and in the specific case of political conflict, it does not account for the critical role of ideologies and meaning systems that underlie the political conflict and shape a young people's interpretation of the conflict, and their exposure, participation, and processing of experiences. With respect to empirical evidence, the findings must be viewed as tentative given the primitive nature of research designs: namely, concentration on violence exposure as the primary risk factor, at the expense of recognizing war's impact on the broader ecology of youth's lives, including disruptions to key economic, social, and political resources; priority given to psychopathology in the assessment of youth functioning, rather than holistic assessments that would include social and institutional functioning and fit with cultural and normative expectations and transitions; and heavy reliance on cross-sectional, rather than longitudinal, studies. Researchers and practitioners interested in employing resilience as a guiding construct will face such questions: Is resilience predicated on evidence of competent functioning across the breadth of risks associated with political conflict, across most or all domains of functioning, and/or across time? In reality, youth resilience amidst political conflict is likely a complex package of better and poorer functioning that varies over time and in direct

  14. Introduction: A Crisis of Stateness and a Challenge to Political Participation

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Lavdas, A. Kostas

    2017-04-01

    Full Text Available Since 2009 Greece has undergone a process of change, involving a far-reaching metamorphosis in some areas, an acute crisis and tremendous depletion of resources in others, and many instances of successful resistance by die-hard supporters of the old ways. This collection of essays on Greeks politics and policy aims to focus more on the development of processes and institutions. It addresses (mostly directly, on occasion also indirectly issues of policy change and – more generally – of stateness in crisis. In ‘stateness’ political scientists and international relations experts recognize a concept that has actually travelled a lot since it was first introduced in its modern incarnation in the 1960s by Nettl in a rightly famous article on “stateness as a conceptual variable” (Nettl, 1968, and was taken over more recently by scholars like Fukuyama. Stateness is again, as it used to be in the past, a fascinating concept with which to approach the problems in today’s Europe; it is a concept that involves a combination of a number of different dimensions of actual state practice and state behavior. It involves the proactive, the coercive, as well as infrastructural aspects of states’ existence and behavior and the main question therefore is: what has the European integration project done to stateness—what is the impact of EU integration on stateness? Not just on particular states, say on France or Germany or Italy or Greece but on stateness as such in today’s Union (see Lavdas 2015 and the references therein.

  15. When Worldviews Collide: What Linguistic Style Matching and Distal Language Reveal about Deception in Political Discourse

    Science.gov (United States)

    Booker, Lucille M.

    2012-01-01

    Political discourse is an observable, measurable, and testable manifestation of political worldviews. However, when worldviews collide, notions of truth and of lies are put to the test. The challenge for researchers is how to establish confidence in their analysis. Despite the growing interest in deception research from a diversity of fields and…

  16. Political entrepreneurship and bidding for political monopoly

    OpenAIRE

    Michael Wohlgemuth

    2000-01-01

    An analytical framework for dealing with political entrepreneurship and reform is proposed which is based on some new combinations of Schumpeterian political economy, an extended version of Tullock's model of democracy as franchise-bidding for natural monopoly and some basic elements of New Institutional Economics. It is shown that problems of insufficient award criteria and incomplete contracts which may arise in economic bidding schemes, also - and even more so - characterise political comp...

  17. The role of cybersecurity in world politics

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Vladimir Tigranovich Tsakanyan

    2017-12-01

    Full Text Available The purpose of this paper is to investigate a significant and increasing role of cybersecurity in world politics. Cybersecurity threats are one of the main national security, public safety, and economic challenges every nation faces in XXI century. Cyberspace is a defining feature of modern life. Individuals and communities worldwide connect, socialize, and organize themselves in and through cyberspace. The existence of numerous cyber security issues on various spheres of life naturally increase political interest in resolving them. The need for cybersecurity is growing ranging from particular cases to national and international - becoming the main problem of diplomacy and world politics. Based on the different national approaches, cybersecurity is seen as the instrument to gain national interests. All countries believe that cybersecurity is an instrument to achieve state’s national interest, since more of the modern theories are focus in the material gain. Meanwhile, some countries see cybersecurity as the tool to influence the adversaries’ perception. This condition build based on the enormous destruction power of cyberattacks. In contrast with the two main approaches, the national security institutions emphasize to the idea, not the material gain. The difference between these national security approaches is the way to use this instrument is used in order to gain the objectives. Indeed, cybersecurity has an important and special role in the world politics.

  18. Fair Biodiversity Politics With and Beyond Rawls

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    John Bernhard Kleba

    2013-09-01

    Full Text Available The access and benefit-sharing regime (ABS of the Convention on Biological Diversity has been criticised for focusing on entitlements and asset exchanges. In this regard, the Nagoya Protocol provides little advance. This work introduces new paths of research and reasoning debating the tensions between the Rawlsian concept of justice and the realm of ABS. A new original position to debate fair biodiversity politics would include the concepts of justice of non-Western cultures. Taking the case of indigenous and traditional peoples, the issue of cultural minority rights is raised, challenging the institutionalisation of legal pluralism and political recognition. Against Bell, and with and beyond Rawls, arguments are provided favouring an environmental constitutionalism. The least advantaged concept shifts from an economical focus towards realising citizenship and applied to the ABS regime. Concerning the destination of benefits in ABS agreements, I advocate a complement between entitlements and the systemic aims of the Convention, prioritising the latter. Finally, controversies about the equity of benefit sharing are examined. Whereas the difference principle is helpful in tackling the economical and political asymmetries in ABS negotiations, it leaves core questions open. The Nagoya Protocol has advanced in providing legal tools to realise citizenship. However, political justice demands more. Concerns to benefit the least advantaged should be included in policy, bioprospecting project design and ABS contracts.

  19. Pirate political parties: New democracy or political utopia

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Karanović Bojana

    2012-01-01

    Full Text Available Modern society is changing under the influence of IT technologies, more and more we talk about 'digital revolution', and political and economic developments are shaped by computer networks. Undeniably, the Internet has opened new possibilities for socio-political expansion, networking and mobilization. Besides the political establishment, many social movements found their chance in cyberspace recognizing the IT technology as a platform for the development and improvement of their internal and external communication. In this article we will focus on the Pirate Party, movement that has been seriously growing on the European political stage for last several years. Following the example of German Pirate Party we will try to explain the characteristics of the movement, its goals and communication strategies, and political dilemmas which it brings.

  20. Tackling Dependency: The EU and its Energy Security Challenges

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Larsson, Robert L.

    2007-10-15

    Europe is facing a future of augmenting energy demands, domestic depletion, high prices and other energy-political challenges. Climate change, infrastructure resilience, producers' coercive energy policy and the EU's internal market failures have put stress on the EU's emerging energy policy and inspired the union to address its challenges with greater enthusiasm than before. Some of the EU's challenges call for strategic choices of a magnitude that EU is not used to handle. The aim of this report is therefore to identify, analyse and assess the political side of Europe's energy predicament and import dependency. Against the background of increasing dependence on energy imports, the report tries to answer questions: what are the key dimensions of Europe's energy security and what are their consequences?

  1. Thriving on Pressure: A Factor Mixture Analysis of Sport Performers' Responses to Competitive Encounters.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Brown, Daniel J; Arnold, Rachel; Standage, Martyn; Fletcher, David

    2017-12-01

    Although considerable research exists on performers' responses to sporting encounters, little is known about thriving in sport contexts. The current study examined if distinct response patterns existed between sport performers who thrived in competitive encounters compared with those who did not. Participants were 535 sport performers (134 women; M age  = 23.60 years, SD age  = 8.08; M competing  = 11.84 years, SD competing  = 7.11). Results of factor mixture analysis supported a four-profile solution comprising a thriving group (n = 146), a low-functioning group (n = 38), and two groups characterized by scores marginally above (n = 131) and below (n = 209) the sample mean. Profile membership was found to be predicted by personal enablers (viz., personal resilient qualities, psychological skills use) and process variables (viz., basic psychological need satisfaction and frustration, challenge appraisal). This examination of thriving in sport performers offers significant implications for research and practice.

  2. Being a Mathematics Teacher Educator in China: Challenges and Strategic Responses

    Science.gov (United States)

    Wu, Yingkang; Hwang, Stephen; Cai, Jinfa

    2017-01-01

    In this exploratory study, we developed a portrait of the challenges and strategic responses of secondary mathematics teacher educators (MTEs) in Chinese universities. The MTEs reported encountering more challenges when teaching pedagogical courses and supervising student teachers than when teaching college mathematics courses and teaching…

  3. Lifelong Political Socialization, Consciousness and Political Agency in Israel Today

    Science.gov (United States)

    Michel, Dirk

    2007-01-01

    This article deals with the nexus between biographical experiences in political extraordinary times of crisis, disaster and terror and their influence on political orientations. At the centre of interest is the reconstruction of political orientations related to two different historical-political groups of Jewish Germans who had immigrated or…

  4. New social movements and political process: The politics of hydroelectric power in Switzerland

    Science.gov (United States)

    Lehmann, Luzia M.

    This dissertation analyzes the mobilization and impact of the ecology movement mobilizing against and challenging hydroelectric power plants in the Alps. It argues that the political process model is the most fruitful framework for such a study, linking a political system's structural constraints and opportunities to movement action via organizational resources. The mobilization process resulting in movement impact is conceived as an interactive process among social movements, authorities, other opponents, and potential counter movements. The case study method is then used to analyze three action campaigns launched against hydro power plants in Graubunden since the 1970s: Ilanz I and II, Greina, and Curciusa. In terms of the movement's narrow goal of preventing a plant, Ilanz I and II is a failure, Greina a success, and Curciusa ambiguous. Yet the author defines movement impact more broadly, including procedural, reactive and proactive substantive impact, and structural impact, changes in the alliance/conflict system, and social learning. Based on the evidence from the case studies, these factors affect movement outcome positively: visibility in the media and framing the debate, adjusting the target level and movement repertoire to the opportunity structure and the spatial concentration of the issue, proactivity, and organizational resources with a well developed division of labor, internal communication, and a non-partisan alliance system at all levels. There are two main conceptual contributions. First, the author analyzes the political opportunity structure at all levels of the federal polity--the national, cantonal, and communal--as well as the interplay among the levels. The fact that the cantonal and communal levels exhibit more elements of closure than the national level helps explain differences in movements' organizational resources, movement repertoire, targeting of movement action, and thus movement impact. Second, the author develops the spatial

  5. [Health and politics in France].

    Science.gov (United States)

    Tabuteau, Didier

    2012-06-01

    be regarded as priorities for public actions because of social and humanitarian challenges they represent, but also the new political and bioethical questions they give rise to.

  6. Politics, Security, Theory

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Wæver, Ole

    2011-01-01

    theory is found to ‘act politically’ through three structural features that systematically shape the political effects of using the theory. The article further discusses – on the basis of the preceding articles in the special issue – three emerging debates around securitization theory: ethics......This article outlines three ways of analysing the ‘politics of securitization’, emphasizing an often-overlooked form of politics practised through theory design. The structure and nature of a theory can have systematic political implications. Analysis of this ‘politics of securitization......’ is distinct from both the study of political practices of securitization and explorations of competing concepts of politics among security theories. It means tracking what kinds of analysis the theory can produce and whether such analysis systematically impacts real-life political struggles. Securitization...

  7. Close stellar encounters in globular clusters

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Bailyn, C.D.

    1989-01-01

    Stellar encounters are expected to produce a variety of interesting objects in the cores of globular clusters, either through the formation of binaries by tidal capture, or direct collisions. Here, I describe several attempts to observe the products of stellar encounters. In particular, the use of color maps has demonstrated the existence of a color gradient in the core of M15, which seems to be caused by a population of faint blue objects concentrated towards the cluster center. (author)

  8. The Political Parties and Political Participation in Rivers State, Nigeria

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    The Political Parties and Political Participation in Rivers State, Nigeria: A Case Study of 2015 General Elections. Goddey Wilson. Abstract. The study reviewed the activities of the political parties and its impact on voters' participation in the political activities in Rivers State. In pursuit of this objective, the study generated ...

  9. Challenges Encountered by Vietnamese Nurses When Caring for Patients With Cancer.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Thuy Nguyen, Ly; Clemenceau Annoussamy, Lourdes; LeBaron, Virginia T

    2017-03-01

    Providing holistic care is acknowledged as central to providing quality care for patients with cancer, but providing competent nursing care consistent with these approaches remains a challenge for nurses in Vietnam. Obstacles for Vietnamese oncology nurses include their low status, the limited scope of nursing practice, work overload in a hierarchical system, and cultural beliefs that view death and dying as taboo. Additional research to support oncology nurses in Vietnam must acknowledge the merits of improving nursing education as an important strategy for enhancing nursing autonomy, quality of care, and outcomes for the increasing number of patients with cancer in low- and middle-income countries.

  10. Questioning ‘drought displacement’: environment, politics and migration in Somalia

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Anna Lindley

    2014-02-01

    Full Text Available The role of the recent drought in producing migration cannot be understood in isolation from human practices and past and concurrent political processes. The environmental dimensions of recent displacement prompt a series of policy challenges in relation to prevention, response and rights protection.

  11. Participation, politics and technology : agrarian development in post-neoliberal Bolivia

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Córdoba Blandón, D.M.

    2014-01-01

    The election of Morales – an indigenous and cocalero leader – and his Movement Toward Socialism (MAS) party became the most important political milestone in Bolivia’s recent history. The MAS promised to represent the most excluded sectors of the country, challenging the foundations of liberal

  12. School Consolidation and the Politics of School Closure across Communities

    Science.gov (United States)

    Karanxha, Zorka; Agosto, Vonzell; Black, William R.; Effiom, Claudius B.

    2013-01-01

    This case involves dilemmas for educational leaders who may face the process of school consolidation brought on by decreased funding and demands for accountability. We highlight the challenges and opportunities to collaborate within and across diverse communities and schools with varying expressions of cultural, political, ethical, and…

  13. Rituals between religion and politics: the case of VHP’s 2001-2002 Ayodhya-campaign

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Erik Reenberg Sand

    2003-01-01

    Full Text Available The present paper deals with rituals in a political discourse, namely the rituals employed by the right wing, Hindu nationalist movement, Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP, in its campaign for a Rama temple in the north Indian town of Ayodhya. As is probably well-known, VHP is part of a group of organizations known as the Sangh Parivar, or sangh family, which also includes the presently ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP, and the ultranationalistic organization Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, or RSS. The rituals of VHP are instruments of the construction of an ideal Hindu society and part of an encounter between Hindu-nationalist tenets and the secular, political establishment. However, the rituals employed by VHP can not be said to represent a separate ritual genre, since they are not different from similar, traditional Hindu rituals. What makes them different is their context and their motives, the fact that they do not serve ordinary material, eschatological, or soteriological aims, but rather political aims, as well as the fact that the ritual agents in this case do not seem to have a satisfactory juridical legitimacy to perform the rituals.

  14. Feminist Challenges to the Reframing of Equality and Social Justice

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Siim, Birte

    2016-01-01

    Global mobility and the present economic, political and refugee crisis have resulted in political contestations and new theoretical challenges. Inspired by several European research projects, in this paper I reflect upon feminist activism and the challenges to reframing equality and social justice...... in contemporary society (see Siim & Mokre, 2013; Lazaridis et al., 2016). I first discuss intersectional relations between anti-racist activism and feminist activism in the Danish context. Then I discuss how feminist theorists can contribute to the reframing of (gender) equality and social justice in contemporary...... for a transnational approach to social justice, premised on redistribution, recognition and participatory parity. I argue that both need to be adapted in order to contribute to an understanding of the feminist challenges in the particular Nordic contexts....

  15. Political communication in Malaysia: a study on the use of new media

    OpenAIRE

    Leong, Pauline Pooi Yin

    2017-01-01

    To gain and retain political power, politicians utilise the mass media to persuade the polity to support them, especially during elections. The Barisan Nasional (BN) coalition has successfully manipulated the mass media in Malaysia to maintain power for the past 57 years, making it one of the longest serving government in the world. The emergence of new media, however, has challenged this status quo. The purpose of this thesis was to investigate how new media has influenced the political proc...

  16. The politics of harm reduction in federal prisons.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Watson, Tara Marie

    2014-09-01

    We need to understand better the political barriers to prison-based harm reduction programs. In this paper, I examine the situation in the Correctional Service of Canada (CSC), a federal prison agency with a zero-tolerance drug policy and general opposition to prison needle and syringe programs (PNSPs) and safer tattooing initiatives. This study draws on 16 interviews with former CSC senior officials, former frontline staff, and external stakeholders; CSC policy and practice documents; and testimony from a House of Commons Standing Committee public study. Thematic coding and comparison of texts were used to examine emergent themes of interest. Four interrelated issues were central for understanding the political barriers: a narrower definition of harm reduction used in corrections, both in principle and practice; the Conservative government's tough-on-crime agenda; strong union opposition; and stakeholder perceptions that political constraints will likely persist, including the view that litigation may offer the only way to introduce PNSPs. The system is at an impasse and key questions remain about the importability of harm reduction services into federal prisons. Despite a highly challenging policy environment, moving forward will demand asking new, critical questions and devising more strategic ways of entering the political-operational dialogue that opposes evidence-based programs. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

  17. Shouting in a Desert: Dutch missionary encounters with Javanese Islam, 1850-1910 : Dutch missionary encounters with Javanese Islam, 1850-1910

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    M.J. Kruithof (Maryse)

    2014-01-01

    markdownabstract__Abstract__ ‘‘Shouting in a desert’ Dutch missionary encounters with Javanese Islam’ concentrates on the shifts and developments in the Dutch mission discourse within the period from 1850 to 1910. It explores the Dutch missionary encounter with local communities and is conducted

  18. Political innovations

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Sørensen, Eva

    2017-01-01

    are mainly interested in assessing and promoting innovations in public service delivery, but have paid little or no attention to the need for innovations in polity, politics and policy. This article develops a research agenda for studying innovations in political institutions, in the political process...... and in policy outputs. It proposes a number of research themes related to political innovations that call for scholarly attention, and identifies push and pull factors influencing the likelihood that these themes will be addressed in future research....

  19. Putting politics first.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hacker, Jacob S

    2008-01-01

    The greatest lesson of the failure of comprehensive health reform in the early 1990s is that politics comes first. Even the best-laid policy plans are worthless if they lack the political support to pass. Putting politics first means avoiding the overarching mistake of the Clinton reformers: envisioning a grand policy compromise rather than hammering out a real political compromise. It also means addressing the inevitable fears of those who believe that they are well protected by our eroding employment-based system. And it means formulating political strategies that are premised on the contemporary realities of the hyperpolarized U.S. political environment, rather than wistfully recalled images of the bipartisan politics of old.

  20. Religion and Politics

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Bandak, Andreas

    2018-01-01

    Religion and politics provide an interesting juxtaposition. On the one hand, both may initially come across as rather self-evident categories, with religion dealing with human perceptions and what people hold as sacred, and politics addressing the control and governance of fellow human beings....... Nonetheless, such a simple opposition should only work as a starting point for an interrogation of both terms and how they have come to look and function as empirical and analytical categories. Focusing on the ways that religion is played out in relation to politics reveals different historical and cultural...... constellations and positions, which can be highlighted as variations of religion as politics, religion in politics, religion out of politics, and religion not politics....

  1. Common Factors Among Family Medicine Residents Who Encounter Difficulty.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Binczyk, Natalia M; Babenko, Oksana; Schipper, Shirley; Ross, Shelley

    2018-04-01

    Residents in difficulty are costly to programs in both time and resources, and encountering difficulty can be emotionally harmful to residents. Approximately 10% of residents will encounter difficulty at some point in training. While there have been several studies looking at common factors among residents who encounter difficulty, some of the findings are inconsistent. The objective of this study was to determine whether there are common factors among the residents who encounter difficulty during training in a large Canadian family medicine residency program. Secondary data analysis was performed on archived resident files from a Canadian family medicine residency program. Residents who commenced an urban family medicine residency program between the years of 2006 and 2014 were included in the study. Five hundred nine family medicine residents were included in data analysis. Residents older than 30 years were 2.33 times (95% CI: 1.27-4.26) more likely to encounter difficulty than residents aged 30 years or younger. Nontransfer residents were 8.85 times (95% CI: 1.17-66.67) more likely to encounter difficulty than transfer residents. The effects of sex, training site, international medical graduate status, and rotation order on the likelihood of encountering difficulty were nonsignificant. Older and nontransfer residents may be facing unique circumstances and may benefit from additional support from the program.

  2. Facebook, Political Narrative, and Political Change: A Case Study of Palestinian Youth

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kenderes, Amanda M.

    2012-01-01

    In this dissertation I aim to advance political narrative theory by exploring the use of political narrative on Facebook and the possibility for Facebook to be used among Palestinian youth for political change. To examine the concepts of political narrative and political change, I developed a model for political change based on the changing…

  3. Political Socialization and Political Interest: The Role of School Reassessed

    Science.gov (United States)

    Koskimaa, Vesa; Rapeli, Lauri

    2015-01-01

    There is a growing concern about the lack of political interest and engagement among Western youth. This has led to a revival of political socialization studies. One recent finding is that (late) adolescence is key to understanding the development of interest for politics. This study builds on this finding by examining political interest among…

  4. Exploring Political Alternatives

    Science.gov (United States)

    Denhardt, Robert B.

    1975-01-01

    The author distinguishes between the concepts of political socialization and political education. He argues that political socialization has come to dominate both our thinking and our teaching in the area of civic education. Suggestions for promoting political education are included. (DE)

  5. The Pragmatics of Political Apology in Ghana’s Contemporary Politics

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Kofi Agyekum

    2015-05-01

    Full Text Available The paper discusses political apology in the 4 the republic of Ghanaian contemporary politics from 2013 to 2015. It taps its data from apologetic speeches by political officials and from apologies rendered to politicians. The paper discusses the semantics and pragmatics of political apology. It examines the use of the language of apology, paying attention to expressives, commissives and persuasion, by drawing on the speech act of apology and political discourse analysis (PDA. It concludes that the obligation on the part of the offender to apologise and for the offended to accept the apology and to forgive for socio-political harmony is driven by both the social pact and the Ghanaian communalistic context.

  6. Politics in evaluation: Politically responsive evaluation in high stakes environments.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Azzam, Tarek; Levine, Bret

    2015-12-01

    The role of politics has often been discussed in evaluation theory and practice. The political influence of the situation can have major effects on the evaluation design, approach and methods. Politics also has the potential to influence the decisions made from the evaluation findings. The current study focuses on the influence of the political context on stakeholder decision making. Utilizing a simulation scenario, this study compares stakeholder decision making in high and low stakes evaluation contexts. Findings suggest that high stakes political environments are more likely than low stakes environments to lead to reduced reliance on technically appropriate measures and increased dependence on measures better reflect the broader political environment. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

  7. The Porter Douglass Case: Examining the Impact of Power, Politics, and the Press on Academic Decision-Making

    Science.gov (United States)

    Jaeger, Audrey J.; Grantham, Ashley; Lynch, Terry

    2014-01-01

    Mixing political appointments and university operations can prove challenging and, in this case, caused the resignation of three senior officials at State University. Bolman and Deal's four frames provide a structure for analyzing this complex case. The political frame and issues of power and coalitions offer a particularly useful lens to…

  8. Service encounters as bases for innovation

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Sundbo, Jon; Sundbo, Donna; Henten, Anders

    2015-01-01

    customers with the innovating organization. Based on literature studies and pilot case studies, seven propositions are proposed and tested in a qualitative, hermeneutic way in field experiments in nine service organizations. Important new results are that encounter-based innovation requires mutual empathy...... between employees and customers, employees investing stubbornness and time can be a driver for innovation, and several layers of management can be a barrier. In the field experiments three new factors for encounter-based innovation were found: translation, multitasking, and hyper-professionalism. The two...

  9. Predator-prey encounters in turbulent waters

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Mann, J.; Ott, Søren; Pécseli, H.L.

    2002-01-01

    With reference to studies of predator-prey encounters in turbulent waters, we demonstrate the feasibility of an experimental method for investigations of particle fluxes to an absorbing surface in turbulent flows. A laboratory experiment is carried out, where an approximately homogeneous and isot......With reference to studies of predator-prey encounters in turbulent waters, we demonstrate the feasibility of an experimental method for investigations of particle fluxes to an absorbing surface in turbulent flows. A laboratory experiment is carried out, where an approximately homogeneous...

  10. Plankton motility patterns and encounter rates

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Visser, Andre; Kiørboe, Thomas

    2006-01-01

    measure of run length to reaction distance determines whether the underlying encounter is ballistic or diffusive. Since ballistic interactions are intrinsically more efficient than diffusive, we predict that organisms will display motility with long correlation run lengths compared to their reaction...... distances to their prey, but short compared to the reaction distances of their predators. We show motility data for planktonic organisms ranging from bacteria to copepods that support this prediction. We also present simple ballistic and diffusive motility models for estimating encounter rates, which lead...

  11. The Effects of Majoring in Political Science on Political Efficacy

    Science.gov (United States)

    Dominguez, Casey B. K.; Smith, Keith W.; Williams, J. Michael

    2017-01-01

    This study tests, and finds support, for the hypotheses that a student who majors in political science will have stronger feelings of political competence and will be more willing to engage in hypothetical political actions than two peer groups: (a) those who major in other fields and (b) those who show an interest in politics but have not studied…

  12. The Politico-Economic Challenges of Ghana's National Health Insurance Scheme Implementation.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Fusheini, Adam

    2016-04-27

    National/social health insurance schemes have increasingly been seen in many low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) as a vehicle to universal health coverage (UHC) and a viable alternative funding mechanism for the health sector. Several countries, including Ghana, have thus introduced and implemented mandatory national health insurance schemes (NHIS) as part of reform efforts towards increasing access to health services. Ghana passed mandatory national health insurance (NHI) legislation (ACT 650) in 2003 and commenced nationwide implementation in 2004. Several peer review studies and other research reports have since assessed the performance of the scheme with positive rating while challenges also noted. This paper contributes to the literature on economic and political implementation challenges based on empirical evidence from the perspectives of the different category of actors and institutions involved in the process. Qualitative in-depth interviews were held with 33 different category of participants in four selected district mutual health insurance schemes in Southern (two) and Northern (two) Ghana. This was to ascertain their views regarding the main challenges in the implementation process. The participants were selected through purposeful sampling, stakeholder mapping, and snowballing. Data was analysed using thematic grouping procedure. Participants identified political issues of over politicisation and political interference as main challenges. The main economic issues participants identified included low premiums or contributions; broad exemptions, poor gatekeeper enforcement system; and culture of curative and hospital-centric care. The study establishes that political and economic factors have influenced the implementation process and the degree to which the policy has been implemented as intended. Thus, we conclude that there is a synergy between implementation and politics; and achieving UHC under the NHIS requires political stewardship. Political

  13. Cosmopolitan political science.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Grande, Edgar

    2006-03-01

    Until recently, the term cosmopolitism could rarely be found in modern political science literature. It was only in the 1990s that the term was rediscovered by political scientists in the critical discourse on globalization. In this article, I will explore the full potential of cosmopolitism as an analytical concept for empirical political science. I will argue that the concept of cosmopolitism should not be restricted to the analysis of global politics. Indeed, cosmopolitism has much more to offer for political scientists. Properly understood, it enables--and necessitates--a re-invention of political science in the age of globalization, comparable to the behavioural revolution in political science in the 1950s. Such a paradigmatic shift should be based on a twofold transformation of existing disciplinary boundaries: A removal of the boundary between national (and comparative) and international politics on the one hand; and a re-definition of the boundaries between empirical and normative approaches on the other. As a result, cosmopolitism may serve as a new, critical theory of politics based on the integration of hitherto separated fields and sub-fields.

  14. Political Leadership in Issue Networks : How Mayors Rule Their World?

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Denters, Sebastianus A.H.; Steyvers, Kristof; Klok, Pieter-Jan; Cermak, Daniel; Heinelt, Hubert; Magnier, Annick; Cabria, Marcello; Reynaert, Herwig

    2018-01-01

    In his controversial book If Mayors Ruled the World, US political theorist Benjamin Barber argued that mayors can and do play a major role in solving today’s grand societal challenges in domains like social inclusion and poverty, climate change and sustainability and safety and public order. It is

  15. Encountering whales: How encounter rates became the basis for managing whaling

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Tim D Smith

    2009-09-01

    Full Text Available Declining rates of encountering whales, including both sighting and catching, were noted by whalers throughout the 19th century, and these declines became the first indication that whaling was adversely affecting whale abundance. The interpretation of declines in both sighting and catch rates proved to be a difficult scientific task. Satisfactory quantitative methods of interpreting changes in whale encounter rates were not developed until the second half of the 20th century. Rates of encountering whales played a key role in the International Whaling Commission (IWC Scientific Committee from its beginning in the early 1950s, as well as in the US in implementing its Marine Mammal Protection Act beginning in the early 1970s. The development of methods of collecting and interpreting sighting and catch data was intimately interwoven with the development of themanagement of whaling and cetacean by-catches in fisheries throughout the world, but especially within the context of the Scientific Committees of the IWC and the North Atlantic Marine Mammal Commission (NAMMCO. Although overfishing of whales was initially identified through the use of sighting rate data, catch rate data provided the IWC’s Committee its first firm footing for management advice. However, it was sighting rate data that ultimately became the basis for the scientific advice on whaling and for management advice in other settings. This led to the development of large scale cetacean sighting programmes, such as the IWC’s International Decade of Cetacean Researchsurveys in Antarctic aboard Japanese ships, the North Atlantic Sighting Surveys (NASS aboard Norwegian, Icelandic, Spanish, Greenlandic and Faroese vessels and aircraft (coordinated by NAMMCO through its Scientific Committee from 1995, and surveys under the US’s Marine Mammal Protection Act and the European Union’s Small Cetacean Abundance in the North Sea (SCANS programme. Fishery independent cetacean sighting surveys

  16. Political Anthropology and Anthropology of Politics: An Overview

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Suresh Dhakal

    2012-06-01

    Full Text Available In this short review, I have tried to sketch an overview of historical development of political anthropology and its recent trends. I was enthused to prepare this review article as there does not exist any of such simplified introduction of one of the prominent sub-fields in cultural anthropology for the Nepalis readers, in particular. I believe this particular sub-field has to offer much to understand and explain the recent trends and current turmoil of the political transition in the country. Political anthropologists than any other could better explain how the politics is socially and culturally embedded and intertwined, therefore, separation of the two – politics from social and cultural processes – is not only impossible but methodologically wrong, too. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.3126/dsaj.v5i0.6365 Dhaulagiri Journal of Sociology and Anthropology Vol. 5, 2011: 217-34

  17. Teaching gender and politics: Feminist methods in political science

    OpenAIRE

    Krook, Mona Lena

    2009-01-01

    Feminist research in political science is marked by two major contributions: (1) introducing the concept of “gender” and (2) expanding the definition of “politics.” Given its origins in feminist theory and activism, it is guided by scholarly and political aims to transform the study and the practice of politics (cf. Hawkesworth 2006). These commitments enable feminist scholars to identify new research questions, as well as to approach traditional topics in novel ways, using a variety of resea...

  18. Bolivia: New Presidential Electoral System and Political Parties Coordination

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Mario Torrico

    2015-01-01

    Full Text Available This article analyzes the incentives generated by presidential electoral systems in Bolivia. The system that was in place until 2005 led to the formation of coalition governments that aimed at giving the Executive the majority in Congress. However, these coalitions gradually lost the electorate confidence, and citizens sought alternative political options to major parties from the early nineties on, giving rise to a social dissatisfaction with democracy. This, in turn, led to the resignation of Sánchez de Lozada and, later, to the triumph of Evo Morales. The new electoral system for electing the president, included in the 2009 Constitution, increases the likelihood that the elected government does not have a majority in Congress. Similar situations in the past led to political crisis and anticipation of elections. In a more favorable context characterized by greater satisfaction with democracy and their parties, the challenge is to take decisions inclusively, something unprecedented in Bolivian politics.

  19. The political spectacle phenomenon on the political scene of Bosnia and Herzegovina

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Vučetić Vuk

    2013-01-01

    Full Text Available This paper will examine the phenomenon of political spectacle in BiH. Our goal is to recognize the structure of political spectacle in BiH political scene and point out the functions and objectives of this relatively new term in the media and the political sphere. In this regard, we have observed a political spectacle as a method of political communication of the rulers to the ruled. A very important element of the political spectacle is the media. With the media promotion of this method of political communication achieves its full capacity. The final outcome of the political spectacle is reflected in manipulating the public. In this way the politicians try to remain in power as long as they can.

  20. Office Politics

    Science.gov (United States)

    Storm, Paula; Kelly, Robert; deVries, Susann

    2008-01-01

    People and organizations are inherently political. Library workplace environments have zones of tension and dynamics just like any corporation, often leading to the formation of political camps. These different cliques influence productivity and work-related issues and, at worst, give meetings the feel of the Camp David negotiations. Politics are…

  1. Language and Politics.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Chimombo, Moira

    1999-01-01

    Surveys the interrelationship between language and politics. Touches on the context of political discourse, or political culture and ideology in new and old democracies and the reemerging manifestations of totalitarianism, censorship, and linguistic imperialism; then examines selected linguistic features of political discourse and their…

  2. Give in or Get out? Responding to Professional Challenges

    Science.gov (United States)

    Young, Robert B.

    2011-01-01

    In this chapter, the author offers some themes that emerged from a set of conversations that he had with six student affairs leaders. The leaders faced an array of challenges involving athletics, academic discipline, cultural identity, institutional image, personal attributes, policy, residence life, and state politics. Their challengers were…

  3. Addressing socioeconomic and political challenges posed by climate change

    Science.gov (United States)

    Fernando, Harindra Joseph; Klaic, Zvjezdana Bencetic

    2011-08-01

    NATO Advanced Research Workshop: Climate Change, Human Health and National Security; Dubrovnik, Croatia, 28-30 April 2011; Climate change has been identified as one of the most serious threats to humanity. It not only causes sea level rise, drought, crop failure, vector-borne diseases, extreme events, degradation of water and air quality, heat waves, and other phenomena, but it is also a threat multiplier wherein concatenation of multiple events may lead to frequent human catastrophes and intranational and international conflicts. In particular, urban areas may bear the brunt of climate change because of the amplification of climate effects that cascade down from global to urban scales, but current modeling and downscaling capabilities are unable to predict these effects with confidence. These were the main conclusions of a NATO Advanced Research Workshop (ARW) sponsored by the NATO Science for Peace and Security program. Thirty-two invitees from 17 counties, including leading modelers; natural, political, and social scientists; engineers; politicians; military experts; urban planners; industry analysts; epidemiologists; and health care professionals, parsed the topic on a common platform.

  4. Democracy, political participation and good governance in Nigeria

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Dare E. Arowolo

    2012-12-01

    Full Text Available The practice of democracy in Nigeria over a decade ago has not yielded much needed good governance. This is because democracy is practiced in such a way that responsible and competent people are scared away. Scholars and keen observers have attempted at unraveling the factors militating against translating democracy into good governance. The paper revealed that democratisation in Nigeria is pervaded by electoral violence, manipulation of election results and political participation constraints. These identified challenges have made it impossible to attain consolidated democracy that can, in turn, facilitate good governance. Democracy is a catalyst for accountability, transparency and responsive government which brings about good governance. The paper insisted that governance collapse in Nigeria is reflexive of the perfunctory role of the political actors and it adopted elite theory to reinforce this argument. The paper adopted content analysis as a means of data gathering. It dwelt extensively on the synergy between democracy, political participation and good governance but queried the artificial gulf between them in Nigeria. It concluded by putting forth viable and pragmatic way forward.

  5. Theorising Media, Power and Politics in Discourse Theory and Framing Studies

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Dindler, Camilla; Roslyng, Mette Marie

    The development of digital media has profound consequences for social and political interaction and, therefore, a new radical interactivity also influences the way in which media can be theorised and analysed? (Couldry, 2012, p. 2). As pointed out by Hall (2006) and others, media discourse may...... either contribute to or challenge the current status quo. Likewise, media framing studies indicate that the media may play an independent political role in terms of raising, shaping and morally judging issues of civic relevance (Entman, 2004). Framing and discourse theory have overlapping as well...... as different trajectories in empirical studies of mediated political communication. Both perspectives bear upon constructivist and critical thinking concerning the role of media in society (Gitlin 1980) and previous studies of media content have even sometimes conflated the terms discourse and frame...

  6. Political legitimacy and approval of political protest and violence among children and adolescents.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Funderburk, C

    1975-06-01

    A question of general theoretical relevance for political socialization research concerns the role played by basic political orientations in structuring specific political opinions. This report investigates the relationship between beliefs in the legitimacy of political objects and approval of political protest and violence among a sample of children and adolescents. The setting for the research was a Florida town. Four aspects of political legitimacy are defined and measured. Measures of approval of political protest and political violence are distinguished conceptually and empirically. Beliefs in political legitimacy are shown to be of considerable importance in structuring opinions about political violence but have little impact on opinions about protest.

  7. Brazilian women in politics.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Sanders, T G

    1987-01-01

    Women are gradually gaining influence in Brazilian politics, especially since recent advances in the women's movement, but they still play a limited role. There have been journals devoted to feminism and some notable feminists since 1850. In 1932 suffragettes in Brazil gained women the right to vote. Women's associations burgeoned in the 1940s and 1950s, culminating in a peak in number of women in national elected positions in 1965. A repressive military regime reversed the process, which resumed in 1975. 1975 was also significant for the Brazilian women's movement because of the U.N. Women's Year. Several large, influential feminist political action groups were formed, typically by upper class women with leftist views, although some church and union groups from lower classes also appeared. In 1979-1981, the coherence of these groups fell into schism and fragmentation, because of disagreements over the feminist political doctrines and roles, views on legality of abortion, and special interest groups such as lesbians. Another bitter dispute is opposition by leftist women to BEMFAM, the Brazilian Society of Family Welfare, which provides family planning for the poor: leftists oppose BEMFAM because it is supported by funds from "imperialist" countries such as the U.S. There are several types of feminists groups: those that emphasize health, sexuality and violence; those composed of lesbians; those originating from lower classes and unions; publicly instituted organizations. Brazilian law forbids discrimination against women holding public office, but in reality very few women actually do hold office, except for mayors of small towns and a few administrators of the Education and Social Security ministries. Political office in Brazil is gained by clientism, and since women rarely hold powerful positions in business, they are outsiders of the system. Brazilian women have achieved much, considering the low female literacy rate and traditional power system, but their

  8. Reimagining Communities and Implementing Social Learning: Contemporary Community Theatre Development in Taiwan, Hong Kong and Singapore

    Science.gov (United States)

    Wang, Wan-Jung

    2014-01-01

    Since the 1990s, Hong Kong, Singapore and Taiwan have encountered political, social, economic and cultural challenges. During this period, their community theatres have played distinctive roles in activating their public space to reimagine their communities, form dialogues with their governments and construct learning experiences amongst various…

  9. Mind the Gap: Political Science Education in Community Colleges

    Science.gov (United States)

    Yanus, Alixandra B.; O'Connor, Karen; Weakley, Jon L.

    2012-01-01

    Community colleges occupy a growing role in the American education system. Their unique cross-section of students poses a challenge for teachers of political science. This paper uses information from a survey completed by over 2,000 students at 20 colleges and universities across the United States to shed light on some of the most significant…

  10. Brain systems underlying encounter expectancy bias in spider phobia.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Aue, Tatjana; Hoeppli, Marie-Eve; Piguet, Camille; Hofstetter, Christoph; Rieger, Sebastian W; Vuilleumier, Patrik

    2015-06-01

    Spider-phobic individuals are characterized by exaggerated expectancies to be faced with spiders (so-called encounter expectancy bias). Whereas phobic responses have been linked to brain systems mediating fear, little is known about how the recruitment of these systems relates to exaggerated expectancies of threat. We used fMRI to examine spider-phobic and control participants while they imagined visiting different locations in a forest after having received background information about the likelihood of encountering different animals (spiders, snakes, and birds) at these locations. Critically, imagined encounter expectancies modulated brain responses differently in phobics as compared with controls. Phobics displayed stronger negative modulation of activity in the lateral prefrontal cortex, precuneus, and visual cortex by encounter expectancies for spiders, relative to snakes or birds (within-participants analysis); these effects were not seen in controls. Between-participants correlation analyses within the phobic group further corroborated the hypothesis that these phobia-specific modulations may underlie irrationality in encounter expectancies (deviations of encounter expectancies from objective background information) in spider phobia; the greater the negative modulation a phobic participant displayed in the lateral prefrontal cortex, precuneus, and visual cortex, the stronger was her bias in encounter expectancies for spiders. Interestingly, irrationality in expectancies reflected in frontal areas relied on right rather than left hemispheric deactivations. Our data accord with the idea that expectancy biases in spider phobia may reflect deficiencies in cognitive control and contextual integration that are mediated by right frontal and parietal areas.

  11. Political Budget Cycles

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Aaskoven, Lasse; Lassen, David Dreyer

    2017-01-01

    The political budget cycle—how elections affect government fiscal policy—is one of the most studied subjects in political economy and political science. The key theoretical question is whether incumbent governments can time or structure public finances in ways that improve their chances of reelec......The political budget cycle—how elections affect government fiscal policy—is one of the most studied subjects in political economy and political science. The key theoretical question is whether incumbent governments can time or structure public finances in ways that improve their chances...... on political budget cycles have recently focused on conditions under which such cycles are likely to obtain. Much recent research focuses on subnational settings, allowing comparisons of governments in similar institutional environments, and a consensus on the presences of cycles in public finances...

  12. The issue of political behaviour in contemporary bio-political discourse

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    A. Y. Kravets

    2016-11-01

    Full Text Available The main topic of the article is the political. During the study it has been found tested that political behaviour is the difficult question to analyse as in bio-politics there are a lot of discussions about genetics and social origins of political behaviour. An integration model of bio-political view of political behaviour has been suggested at the article, which includes both genetics (adaptation, domination and subordination and social factors (education, socialization, the evolution of consciousness. «Homo Politicus» is genetically related with another biological Wight and this definitely influences his behavior in social and political spheres. For instance, every human being as any social primates has genetic inclination to adaptation, domination, subjugation. In case with «Homo Sapiens» this has a form of genetic and social adaptation, political domination and subjugation. The inclination to the domination from one side and to the subjugation to another side is genetically «imprinted» into the nature of the «Homo Politicus». Particularly this two features lie is the basis of his political behavior. However, it is important to mention that, nevertheless the «Homo Sapiens» shares inclination of social primates for hierarchical social organization at the same time he has developed the following capabilities, which are unique in animal world, such as: language, culture and morale. Thus, ideas and values created by the human being have commenced changing of his behavior in social and political sphere. It is important to underline that in above mentioned dichotomy «genetic – culture/morale» such very core analysis element as human brain is absent. According to this, it is has to be mentioned that we keep in mind that the human brain participates in formation of every act or idea, what is fulfilled in the process of the political supervision of subject of management, as well as in the process of social action of management object

  13. O desafio político do desenvolvimento sustentado The political challenge of sustainable development

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Roberto P. Guimarães

    1995-01-01

    Full Text Available A unanimidade que hoje parece haver em favor do desenvolvimento sustentado contrasta com a ausência de iniciativas políticas significativas para transformar as instituições econômicas, sociais e políticas que estão comprometidas com o estilo vigente de desenvolvimento. Em particular, há uma patente contradição entre o discurso antiestatista hegemônico e as exigências do desenvolvimento sustentado, que incluem um Estado ainda mais forte, em suas capacidades reguladoras e de planificação, que o Estado intervencionista do passado.The seeming unanimity in favour of sustainable development stands in contrast to the absence of meaningful political initiatives in order to change the economic, social and political intitutions linked to the ongoing style of development In particular there is a patent contradiction between the hegemonic antistatist discourse and the requirements for sustainable development, including a state with even more regulatory and planning powers than the interventionist state of the past.

  14. Young People's Voluntary and Campaigning Activities as Sources of Political Education.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Roker, Debi; Player, Katie; Coleman, John

    1999-01-01

    Discusses political apathy and alienation among youth, challenging this negative image. Describes empirical research that demonstrates a high level of engagement by young people in social activism and community activities, focuses on factors influencing young people's participation, and demonstrates that volunteering and campaigning affect young…

  15. Nuclear challenges for the 21. century in Asia

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Farghen, Morgane

    2015-01-01

    The author proposes an analysis of the issues of nuclear proliferation and nuclear weapons in Asia. She notices a new trend under the form of a strategic arms race under the influence of different factors, notably the increasing political, economic and military power of China. She analyses how this increasing power is present at the international level, impacts the Asian political environment, how nuclear deterrence acts, and how China can use this power to provoke tensions with Japan about territorial disputes. She comments the more traditional issues of proliferation related to North Korea and Pakistan, the challenge that regional disarmament raises for the international community, the challenges raised for deterrence by the re-sizing of strategic forces in Asia, programme diversification and technological competition

  16. Perceived Organisational Politics, Political Behaviour and Employee ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    facing both private and public sector organisations (Nidhi & Prerna, 2015;. Gotsis & Kortezi ... These studies suggest that organisational politics often interfere with normal ..... Rawls's (1971) theory of justice provides a theoretical foundation for the relationship between ..... Ethical considerations in organisational politics: ...

  17. Exploring Women's Understanding of Politics, Political Contestation ...

    International Development Research Centre (IDRC) Digital Library (Canada)

    Exploring Women's Understanding of Politics, Political Contestation and Gender Transformation in the Caribbean. IDRC's Democratic Governance, Women's Rights and Gender Equality initiative is supporting a body of comparative research on whether and how democratic processes and institutions are responding to ...

  18. Moral politics

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Rapp, Carolin; Traunmüller, Richard; Freitag, Markus

    2014-01-01

    This article combines the research strands of moral politics and political behavior by focusing on the effect of individual and contextual religiosity on individual vote decisions in popular initiatives and public referenda concerning morally charged issues. We rely on a total of 13 surveys with 1...... American research on moral politics, direct democracies, and the public role of religion....

  19. Strange culinary encounters:

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Leer, Jonatan; Kjær, Katrine Meldgaard

    2015-01-01

    In this article, we examine the ways in which the encountering of 'other' food cultures is played out in the two travelogue cooking shows Gordon's Great Escape and Jamie's Italian Escape. We investigate how the two protagonist chefs Jamie Oliver and Gordon Ramsay imagine, meet and evaluate the ‘o...... approach to meeting the other (culinary culture), ultimately, their respective culinary adventures work to re-affirm a social hierarchy in their favor....

  20. Union Underground: Political Issues. Comparing Political Experiences, Experimental Edition.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Gillespie, Judith A.; Lazarus, Stuart

    This is the third unit to the second-semester "Comparing Political Experiences" course which focuses on a specific, controversial, political issue. The unit analyzes the concept of political maintenance by studying the United Mine Workers of America (UMWA) between 1918 and 1975 and its fight to secure mine safety standards. A documentary…

  1. Beyond takeovers: politics comes to corporate control.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Pound, J

    1992-01-01

    In the 1990s, politics will replace takeovers as the defining tool for corporate governance challenges, and a marketplace of ideas will replace the frenzied activity that once dominated the financial marketplace in the 1980s. In the transaction-driven market of the past, corporate raiders used junk bonds and other financial tools to take control of their targets. In the new marketplace of ideas, debate will replace debt as active shareholders press specific operating policies for their target corporations in a new politicized market for corporate control. John Pound, associate professor of public policy at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard, reports that investors are already using shadow management committees, independent director slates, and outside experts to influence management policy. Pound cites Carl Icahn's battle for control of USX as an example of the emerging trend. What began as a hostile takeover ended with a negotiated solution in which many constituencies ultimately played a role in the restructuring of the company. This political approach to governance gives management a chance to embrace a bargain that is in its long-term interest. By promoting politically based tactics, managers can generate political capital with their major investors. Managers in companies as diverse as Avon and Lockheed now meet regularly with investors, seeking their input on both financial and strategic decisions. In the new politicized market for corporate control, striking a bargain with long-term investors is ultimately in the best interest of the corporation.

  2. Political Culture and Covalent Bonding. A Conceptual Model of Political Culture Change

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Camelia Florela Voinea

    2015-01-01

    Full Text Available Our class of models aims at explaining the dynamics of political attitude change by means of the dynamic changes in values, beliefs, norms and knowledge with which it is associated. The model constructs a political culture perspective over the relationship between macro and micro levels of a society and polity. The model defines the bonding mechanism as a basic mechanism of the political culture change by taking inspiration from the valence bonding theory in Chemistry, which has inspired the elaboration of the mechanisms and processes underlying the political culture emergence and the political culture control over the relationship between macro-level political entities and the micro-level individual agents. The model introduces operational definitions of the individual agent in political culture terms. The simulation model is used for the study of emergent political culture change phenomena based on individual interactions (emergent or upward causation as well as the ways in which the macro entities and emergent phenomena influence in turn the behaviors of individual agents (downward causation. The model is used in the ongoing research concerning the quality of democracy and political participation of the citizens in the Eastern European societies after the Fall of Berlin Wall. It is particularly aimed at explaining the long-term effect of the communist legacy and of the communist polity concept and organization onto the political mentalities and behaviors of the citizens with respect to democratic institutions and political power. The model has major implications in political socialization, political involvement, political behavior, corruption and polity modeling.

  3. Parenting and Politics: Exploring Early Moral Bases of Political Orientation

    OpenAIRE

    Janoff-Bulman, Ronnie; Carnes, Nate C.; Sheikh, Sana

    2014-01-01

    Based on Lakoff’s (2002) Strict Father and Nurturant Parent metaphors for political conservatism and liberalism respectively, two studies explored parenting styles, political ideology, and the moral orientations that might link the two. Restrictive parenting (by both mother and father) predicted political conservatism, and this path was mediated by a strong Social Order orientation (Study 1) reflecting, more broadly, an inhibition-based proscriptive morality (Study 2). Political liberalism wa...

  4. Education and Political Development

    Science.gov (United States)

    Massialas, Byron G.

    1977-01-01

    Considers how education is related to politics with the focus on political socialization, political recruitment, i.e., the selection and training of political elites, and political integration or nation building of groups of people. (Author/RK)

  5. Applying theories to better understand socio-political challenges in implementing evidence-based work disability prevention strategies.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ståhl, Christian; Costa-Black, Katia; Loisel, Patrick

    2018-04-01

    This article explores and applies theories for analyzing socio-political aspects of implementation of work disability prevention (WDP) strategies. For the analysis, theories from political science are explained and discussed in relation to case examples from three jurisdictions (Sweden, Brazil and Québec). Implementation of WDP strategies may be studied through a conceptual framework that targets: (1) the institutional system in which policy-makers and other stakeholders reside; (2) the ambiguity and conflicts regarding what to do and how to do it; (3) the bounded rationality, path dependency and social systems of different stakeholders; and (4) coalitions formed by different stakeholders and power relations between them. In the case examples, the design of social insurance systems, the access to and infrastructure of healthcare systems, labor market policies, employers' level of responsibility, the regulatory environment, and the general knowledge of WDP issues among stakeholders played different roles in the implementation of policies based on scientific evidence. Future research may involve participatory approaches focusing on building coalitions and communities of practice with policy-makers and stakeholders, in order to build trust, facilitate cooperation, and to better promote evidence utilization. Implications for Rehabilitation Implementation of work disability prevention policies are subject to contextual influences from the socio-political setting and from relationships between stakeholders Stakeholders involved in implementing strategies are bound to act based on their interests and previous courses of action To promote research uptake on the policy level, stakeholders and researchers need to engage in collaboration and translational activities Political stakeholders at the government and community levels need to be more directly involved as partners in the production and utilization of evidence.

  6. Guest-Host Encounters in Diaspora-Heritage Tourism: The Taglit-Birthright Israel Mifgash (Encounter)

    Science.gov (United States)

    Sasson, Theodore; Mittelberg, David; Hecht, Shahar; Saxe, Leonard

    2011-01-01

    More than 300,000 diaspora Jewish young adults and tens of thousands of their Israeli peers have participated in structured, cross-cultural encounters--"mifgashim"--in the context of an experiential education program known as Taglit-Birthright Israel. Drawing on field observations, interviews, and surveys, the formal and informal…

  7. Theme and variations: The development of differences in Polynesian socio-political organizations

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Martin A. van Bakel

    2008-12-01

    Full Text Available This article discusses the development of differences in the socio-political organization on the various Polynesian islands. Such differences were observed by early European visitors. Most of their descriptions date from the last quarter of the eighteenth century, but a few sources date back to the early seventeenth century, including the journals of the Dutch voyagers Schouten and Le Maire, Tasman, and somewhat later Roggeveen. The voyagers’ logs and journals often contain lengthy and detailed descriptions of the Polynesian peoples and cultures they encountered. And, though they often did not understand what they observed, they carefully described what they saw — or what they thought they saw.

  8. Media practices and the challenge of political asymmetries

    OpenAIRE

    Pleyers, Geoffrey; Suzina, Ana

    2016-01-01

    In contemporary democracies, the establishment of a public space which is more open and accessible to disadvantaged groups, popular movements and communities is a major challenge. The media are both part of the problem and the solution. On the one hand, they strengthen or even produce divisions and the fragmentation of the public space. On the other, their use by social movements and civil society can establish connections between different social groups, include marginalized populations and ...

  9. The Impact of Value-Orientations on Cross-cultural Encounters and ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    encounters and mediation in the Tanzanian educational system. The purpose of the article is to give an emic perspective on value-orientations in crosscultural encounters and mediation situations in the educational system, to improve understanding of the conflictive aspects of these encounters. To achieve this purpose, the ...

  10. Celebrity politics: the politics of late modernity?

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Marsh, D.; t Hart, P.; Tindall, K.

    2010-01-01

    The academic literature on celebrity politics is rarely systematic; more often it is superficial and anecdotal. In addition, most of the literature focuses either upon classifying different types/categories of celebrity politicians and their roles in politics, or upon the question of whether the

  11. A trauma-like model of political extremism: psycho-political fault lines in Israel.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Laor, Nathaniel; Yanay-Shani, Alma; Wolmer, Leo; Khoury, Oula

    2010-10-01

    This study examines a trauma-like model of potentially violent political extremism among Jewish Israelis. We study the psychosocial characteristics of political extremists that may lie at the root of sociopolitical instability and assess personal (gender, stressful life events, Holocaust family background, and political activism) and psychological parameters (self- and political transcendence, perceived political threats, in/out-group identification ratio) that may predict readiness to engage in destructive political behavior. We examine the ideological zeal of various political groups, the relationship between the latter and perceived political threats, and the predictors of extreme political activism. Results showed that the extreme political poles displayed high level of ideological and morbid transcendence. Right extremists displayed higher perceived threats to physical existence and national identity. Left extremists scored highest on perceived moral integrity threat. Higher perceived threats to national identity and moral integrity, risk, and self-transcendence statistically explain morbid transcendence. When fear conjures up extremely skewed sociopolitical identifications across political boundaries, morbid transcendence may manifest itself in destructive political activity. © 2010 Association for Research in Nervous and Mental Disease.

  12. Challenges: a state and compact perspective

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Brown, H.

    1987-01-01

    The challenges facing states and compacts in their efforts to implement the Low-Level Waste Policy Amendments Act are described. Institutional challenges include: small-volume sites; compact maintenance; shifting agencies and changing personnel; and timing of progress. The technical challenge lies in the enormous number of plans, procedures, and regulations that have to be developed over the next four years. There are two main fiscal challenges: funding of day-to-day operations of compact commissions; and financing the siting and construction of new disposal sites. There are also two main regulatory challenges: host states must develop regulations for siting and selection of technology; and all states have to await federal regulations to be completed. The final challenge is political: whether a region can overcome public opposition and actually site a facility

  13. Financial liberalisation and political variables: A response to Abiad and Mody

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Burgoon, B.; Demetriades, P.; Underhill, G.

    2008-01-01

    We challenge recent findings by Abiad and Mody (2005) which suggest that financial liberalization has little to do with political variables. This analysis is at odds with some of the established literature, and only with difficulty comes to terms with the considerable cross-national variation in the

  14. Analysing Everyday Online Political Talk in China: Theoretical and Methodological Reflections

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Wright, Scott; Graham, Todd; Sun, Yu; Yang Wang, Wilfred; Luo, Xiantian; Carson, Andrea

    2016-01-01

    This article explores the theoretical and methodological challenges of collecting and analysing everyday online political talk in China, and our approach to defining and coding such talk. In so doing, the article is designed to encourage further research in this area, taking forward a new agenda for

  15. The Militant Nun as Political Activist and Feminist in Martial Law Philippines

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Mina Roces

    2004-01-01

    Full Text Available During the martial law era (1972-1986, the militant nuns were the most visible symbols of political activism: they dominated the Task Force Detainees, they were active in the underground press, and were present in the labour strikes and demonstrations. But, in becoming political activists, they discovered the potential of moral power as women religious figures. During the People Power revolution, for example, the nuns – armed only with rosaries, confronted the military (the supreme example of machismo politics and triumphed. In the process of attacking political oppression, these nuns also began to challenge cultural constructions of the feminine – becoming the first overt feminists to do so in Philippine history. This paper explores how martial law transformed these women into militant activists and feminists. Although driven by their struggle to protect the victims of martial law, they also succeeded in empowering themselves. This new ‘moral power’ has since been harnessed for women’s issues.

  16. Spiritual Politics

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Frédéric Rambeau

    2015-01-01

    Full Text Available According to Foucault, the uprising of the Iranian people in the seventies reveals how much the political force of Islam is due precisely to the fact that it is not principally located in the field of politics, but in that of ethics. Religion (Shiite Islam appears as the guarantee of real change in the very mode of existence. This spiritual politics is marginalized by Marxism, where it is understood as a discontinuity in relation to proper politics, given that the latter is necessarily linked to a strategic rationalization. By indicating, at this juncture of what is intolerable, the living source and the critical impulse of the Foucauldian ethics, this spiritual politics also leads to recognize in the concept of “subjectivation” a dimension that might escape the circle of freedom as determined by a total immanence to power. This conceptual possibility is highly present in the aporias of the Foucauldian concept of the “relation to oneself”, both as a first condition of governmentality and the ultimate point of resistance against any governmentality. It thus reveals the difficulties in relating political to ethical subjectivation.

  17. The Challenge of Recognizing Diversity from the Perspective of Gender Equality:

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Siim, Birte

    2007-01-01

    The objective of this article is to analyse the tension between diversity and gender equality, looking at problems and potentials for inclusion of minority women in the Danish citizenship model. It addresses the intersection of gender and ethnicity focusing on two main themes: One is the gender......-political challenge of combining the discourse and politics of gender equality with respect for diversity in cultural values, family forms and gender equality norms. This theme explores the extent to which the dominant understanding of gender equality in public and private life is a potential or barrier...... for recognising diversities among women, and it discusses how to empower minority women in their daily lives. The other is the democratic challenge of including the voices of minority women in politics and combine equal rights of ethnic minorities with respect for cultural diversity. This theme explores...

  18. About green political parties

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Orlović Slobodan P.

    2015-01-01

    Full Text Available In this work the author refers to some legal and political questions in connection with green political parties. Those questions cover: the ideology of green political parties, their number and influence, both in general and in Serbia. The first part of work is generally speaking about political parties - their definition, ideology, role and action. Main thesis in this work is that green political parties, by their appearance, were something new on the political scene. But quickly, because of objective and subjective reasons, they were changing original ideas and were beginning to resemble to all other political parties. In this way, they lost their vanguard and political alternativeness.

  19. The Politico-Economic Challenges of Ghana’s National Health Insurance Scheme Implementation

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Adam Fusheini

    2016-09-01

    Full Text Available Background National/social health insurance schemes have increasingly been seen in many low- and middle-income countries (LMICs as a vehicle to universal health coverage (UHC and a viable alternative funding mechanism for the health sector. Several countries, including Ghana, have thus introduced and implemented mandatory national health insurance schemes (NHIS as part of reform efforts towards increasing access to health services. Ghana passed mandatory national health insurance (NHI legislation (ACT 650 in 2003 and commenced nationwide implementation in 2004. Several peer review studies and other research reports have since assessed the performance of the scheme with positive rating while challenges also noted. This paper contributes to the literature on economic and political implementation challenges based on empirical evidence from the perspectives of the different category of actors and institutions involved in the process. Methods Qualitative in-depth interviews were held with 33 different category of participants in four selected district mutual health insurance schemes in Southern (two and Northern (two Ghana. This was to ascertain their views regarding the main challenges in the implementation process. The participants were selected through purposeful sampling, stakeholder mapping, and snowballing. Data was analysed using thematic grouping procedure. Results Participants identified political issues of over politicisation and political interference as main challenges. The main economic issues participants identified included low premiums or contributions; broad exemptions, poor gatekeeper enforcement system; and culture of curative and hospital-centric care. Conclusion The study establishes that political and economic factors have influenced the implementation process and the degree to which the policy has been implemented as intended. Thus, we conclude that there is a synergy between implementation and politics; and achieving UHC under

  20. Comparing Political Journalism

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Comparing Political Journalism is a systematic, in-depth study of the factors that shape and influence political news coverage today. Using techniques drawn from the growing field of comparative political communication, an international group of contributors analyse political news content drawn...... Comparing Political Journalism offers an unparalleled scope in assessing the implications for the ongoing transformation of Western media systems, and addresses core concepts of central importance to students and scholars of political communication world-wide....... from newspapers, television news, and news websites from 16 countries, to assess what kinds of media systems are most conducive to producing quality journalism. Underpinned by key conceptual themes, such as the role that the media are expected to play in democracies and quality of coverage...

  1. Health disparities among health care workers.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Mawn, Barbara; Siqueira, Eduardo; Koren, Ainat; Slatin, Craig; Devereaux Melillo, Karen; Pearce, Carole; Hoff, Lee Ann

    2010-01-01

    In this article we describe the process of an interdisciplinary case study that examined the social contexts of occupational and general health disparities among health care workers in two sets of New England hospitals and nursing homes. A political economy of the work environment framework guided the study, which incorporated dimensions related to market dynamics, technology, and political and economic power. The purpose of this article is to relate the challenges encountered in occupational health care settings and how these could have impacted the study results. An innovative data collection matrix that guided small-group analysis provided a firm foundation from which to make design modifications to address these challenges. Implications for policy and research include the use of a political and economic framework from which to frame future studies, and the need to maintain rigor while allowing flexibility in design to adapt to challenges in the field.

  2. Political representation for social justice in nursing: lessons learned from participant research with destitute asylum seekers in the UK.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Cuthill, Fiona

    2016-09-01

    The concept of social justice is making a revival in nursing scholarship, in part in response to widening health inequalities and inequities in high-income countries. In particular, critical nurse scholars have sought to develop participatory research methods using peer researchers to represent the 'voice' of people who are living in marginalized spaces in society. The aim of this paper is to report on the experiences of nurse and peer researchers as part of a project to explore the experiences of people who find themselves destitute following the asylum process in the UK. In seeking to explore social injustice, three challenges are identified: lack of a robust political theory, institutional/professional constraints and an absence of skills to engage with the politics of social (in)justice. Each challenge is presented, opposing voices outlined and some possible solutions are suggested. The work of political theorist Nancy Fraser is used as a conceptual framework, in particular her focus on mis/framing and political representation for social justice. In addition, it is suggested that social justice needs to be further embedded in nursing policy and curriculum. Finally, nurses are encouraged to develop practical political skills to engage with both politics and the media in a neoliberal globalizing world. © 2016 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

  3. Politics of Representation: construction and marketing of the new identities in the political mediaspace

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Liliana Suárez Navaz

    2011-09-01

    Full Text Available This article explores some premilinary findings of the research on “Politics of Representation in the Transnational Migratory Field: Production, Distribution and Consumption of Media in Migratory Context” (CSO2008-03022. From an initial theoretical reflection on the main challenges Anthropology finds in the globalization context, we describe and analyze the recent burst of mass media oriented towards immigrant population in Spain. I delve into the analysis of content of these media, based on a quantitative and qualitative research, comparing briefly the results with dominant media. I analyze the construction of the “news” in migratory, transnational and cultural dimensions, exploring the emergence of a new ethnocultural category new in Spain, that of “Latin@s”. I finally offer three Ideal Types of the articulation of Latin American journalist with their audiences and their sociological grass roots organizations and communities: instrumental, clientelist, and organic. I then conclude through a series of considerations about the importance of the ethnographic work on the public space through a transnational perspective that deals with political communication processes in the new mediaspaces which shape our social world as citizens.

  4. The Germans revisiting Gakovo: Encounters, cooperation and reconciliation of the former and present local populations

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Krel Aleksandar

    2015-01-01

    Full Text Available This paper presents a case study about a reunion of the evicted members of the German national minority in Vojvodina, who after almost five decades came to visit their homeland, and the local population in Gakovo. The case study attests about lengthy and very complicated process in resolving post-conflict situations. The process’ launch is dependent on the willingness of the individuals involved to face not only one’s own pain caused by the enemy, but also on ability to comprehend, during an encounter with “the dark side of one’s past”, sufferings and humiliation experienced by the adversary. Awareness and acceptance of one’s own responsibility in the conflict are a prerequisite for forgiveness and reconciliation of the opposing parties. The outcome of this process is uncertain to the very end and conditioned upon the entire network of interlocking political, economic and cultural factors.

  5. Politics, Economy, and Ideology in Iraqi Kurdistan since 2003: Enduring Trends and Novel Challenges

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Leezenberg, M.

    2015-01-01

    Since the 2003 war, the Kurdistan Region of Iraq has followed a distinct trajectory, the roots of which lie in its emergence as a de facto autonomous entity in the wake of the 1991 Gulf War. This paper traces the development between 2003 and 2013 of the main political, economic, and ideological

  6. Usage of marketing in politics

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Marić Ivana

    2014-01-01

    Full Text Available Multi-party political system led to competition between political parties which caused the need for marketing in politics that improves political reputation. Politics, based on rich experience of political practice, used existing, developed methods and techniques of commercial marketing. Political marketing openly admits that politics and politicians are simply goods that are being sold on a political market. Political marketing is a whole way of operation by political parties which ask these questions: how do the voters choose; what affects their preference and how that preference can be influenced. Usage of political marketing in Bosnia and Herzegovina is still not on a satisfactory level but the knowledge about the importance of political marketing is increasing.

  7. 5. heat pump forum. Politics, market, finances, marketing and sales. Proceedings

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    2007-01-01

    The increased use of renewable energy resources constitutes one of the greatest challenges of the 21st century. Soaring oil and gas prices have caused renewable energy resource to move into the focus of public interest. Today the majority of the population is in favour of renewable energy resources, demanding that decision makers from politics and industry make a greater commitment to their promotion and growth. Heat pumps count among the best heating technologies available today, and not only on account of their primary energy balance. However, there is a need for favourable political framework conditions and a clear positioning of this product on the market in order to provide an environment conducive to sound market growth. For this reason the Heat Pump Forum has this time focussed on the topics of political recognition, development of market and technology and marketing and sales. It also addresses the political framework conditions governing the rapidly growing heat pump market and offers hard practical information ranging from solutions for old building to the exchange of practical experiences

  8. Global challenges in energy

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Dorian, James P.; Franssen, Herman T.; Simbeck, Dale R. MD

    2006-01-01

    Environmental and security concerns are stimulating global interest in hydrogen power, renewable energy, and advanced transportation technologies, but no significant movement away from oil and a carbon-based world economy is expected soon. Over the longer-term, however, a transition from fossil fuels to a non-carbon-based economy will likely occur, affecting the type of environment future generations may encounter. Key challenges will face the world's energy industry over the next few decades to ensure a smooth transition-challenges which will require government and industry solutions beginning as early as today. This paper identifies four critical challenges in energy and the choices which will have to be made on how best to confront growing pollution caused by fossil fuels and how to facilitate an eventual revolutionary-like transition to a non-carbon-based global economy

  9. Emotions in relation to healthcare encounters affecting self-esteem.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Räty, Lena; Gustafsson, Barbro

    2006-02-01

    This study identifies emotions in patients with epilepsy as a result of confirming and disconfirming healthcare experiences. A discussion of emotions as a motive for patients' goal-directed actions was a further aim of this study. The critical incident method was used for data collection. Emotions occurring in confirming and disconfirming healthcare encounters were analyzed using the Belief-Desire Theory of Emotions and were categorized as basic, complex, or self-evaluating. Confirming encounters aroused emotions like hope, a feeling of security, joy, relief, and pride, while disconfirming encounters aroused emotions like despair, fear, unrest, resignation, shame, and guilt. The emotions identified in the healthcare encounters were recognized as motives for action. An emotion such as a feeling of security aroused a desire in the patients to strengthen their positive self and motivated them to have a constructive and sympathetic attitude toward the healthcare experience. An emotion such as anger caused patients to strive to maintain their self-respect either by avoiding difficult situations and ignoring the problem (patients with a low self-esteem) or by trying to re-create a positive self-image (patients with a high self-esteem). Healthcare encounters between patient and caregiver considerably affect the patient's emotional status and thereby his or her well-being. The importance of establishing healthcare encounters that evoke positive emotions that strengthen patients' resources must be addressed in future nursing care.

  10. Public sphere of politics: between classical grounds and new political actuality

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    O. A. Tretyak

    2016-10-01

    Full Text Available The public sphere of politics as a theoretical concept of modern political science has been discussed in the article. The reasons of the increasing interest to the public sphere is a dominating subject. Studied The phenomenon of the public sphere being a tool of theoretical and methodological definition of the political world’s boundaries has been studied. The value aspects of media activity in the contemporary politics has been investigated. An attempt has been made to establish the potential of political publicity for the qualitative understanding of participatory democracy. The potential of the public sphere in the development of civil society and social capital has been described. The distinction between the public sphere of politics and political communication in the specific conditions of modern transformational societies has been reasonably grounded. The importance of the presence of state power in all spheres of life of the transformational society has been stressed. Such transformation has not been stoped after the liberal market reforms, which had to ensure the existence of a formal representative democracy. The influence of the elite and expert groups being the reason of the absence of really functioning future civil society has been considered. The features of the formation of civil and social activities as a precondition for the democratic political class’ functioning have been studied. The specifics of public political activity being the prerogative of the competent entities’ political broadcasting have been analyzed. The gradual formation of cyber public sphere and its political branch segment has been revealed. Thorough attention has been given to the processes of the public sphere’s politicization which are usual for primarily authoritarian and closed societies.

  11. Changes in Business Structures: Challenges for Management of Libyan Industry

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Abouazoum, Alafi; de Bruijn, E.J.; Steenhuis, H.J.; Kaynak, E.; Harcar, T.D.

    2008-01-01

    Libya has become a transition economy due to global industrial and political changes in the past decades. Being for long time under government control has created a number of challenges for the management of the SOEs. The most challenging aspect is firm performance improvement. Based on a pilot

  12. How great is Latvia's success story? The economic, social and political consequences of the recent financial crisis in Latvia

    OpenAIRE

    Austers, Aldis

    2014-01-01

    The current state of Latvia can be best described in medical terms: the patient is pale, but alive. The financial woes have been successfully resolved, but economic, social and political challenges remain. The crisis is continuing to affect the fabric of social and political life in Latvia. This paper looks at the economic, social and political consequences of the recent financial crisis and the ensuing economic collapse in Latvia and suggests some remedial actions.

  13. The Challenges of Modernity: The Case of Political Islam

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Amineh, M.P.

    2007-01-01

    Since the Industrial Revolution in the late eighteenth century in England, all traditional cultures at one point in history have been challenged by modernity. This happened first in Europe and later in the rest of the world as a result of the late nineteenth century expansion of European capitalism

  14. The socio-political economy of nuclear power development in Japan and South Korea

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Valentine, Scott Victor; Sovacool, Benjamin K.

    2010-01-01

    This paper analyzes the socio-cultural, political and economic conditions prevalent during the inception of nuclear power programs in Japan and South Korea in order to identify commonalities which support nuclear power program expansion. The study identifies six factors as having a clear influence on supporting nuclear power development: (1) strong state involvement in guiding economic development; (2) centralization of national energy policymaking and planning; (3) campaigns to link technological progress with national revitalization; (4) influence of technocratic ideology on policy decisions; (5) subordination of challenges to political authority, and (6) low levels of civic activism. The paper postulates that insights from this study can be used to assess the propensity of nations which have the emergent capacity to support nuclear power development to actually embark on such programs. - Research highlights: → The study identifies six factors as having a clear influence on supporting nuclear power development in Japan and South Korea: (1) strong state involvement in guiding economic development; (2) centralization of national energy policymaking and planning; (3) campaigns to link technological progress with national revitalization; (4) influence of technocratic ideology on policy decisions; (5) subordination of challenges to political authority.

  15. Turkish Political Market and the Perception of Political Parties

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Cihat Polat

    2015-06-01

    Full Text Available This study attempts to describe the Turkish political market and determine where and how Turkish political parties are perceived by voters. The study uses a two-dimensional map to determine the voter perceptions of the parties in the Turkish political market based on a survey questionnaire applied to 400 young voters. It also investigates whether there are any major differences in the perception of parties in the political space based on voter ideologies. The study finds that young voters have clear perceptions of the positions of Turkish parties. It also finds that voter perceptions of parties vary based on voters’ ideological positions.

  16. Global Health Governance Challenges 2016 - Are We Ready?

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kickbusch, Ilona

    2016-02-29

    The year 2016 could turn out to be a turning point for global health, new political realities and global insecurities will test governance and financing mechanisms in relation to both people and planet. But most importantly political factors such as the global power shift and "the rise of the rest" will define the future of global health. A new mix of health inequity and security challenges has emerged and the 2015 humanitarian and health crises have shown the limits of existing systems. The global health as well as the humanitarian system will have to prove their capacity to respond and reform. The challenge ahead is deeply political, especially for the rising political actors. They are confronted with the consequences of a model of development that has neglected sustainability and equity, and was built on their exploitation. Some direction has been given by the path breaking international conferences in 2015. Especially the agreement on the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the Paris agreement on climate change will shape action. Conceptually, we will need a different understanding of global health and its ultimate goals - the health of people can no longer be seen separate from the health of the planet and wealth measured by parameters of growth will no longer ensure health. © 2016 by Kerman University of Medical Sciences.

  17. Political Campaigns

    OpenAIRE

    Lilleker, Darren

    2017-01-01

    Political campaigns are orchestrated attempts by political organizations to garner public support through persuasive communication in order to influence public policy in their favor. This broad definition encapsulates all forms of campaigns from those of neighborhood organizations seeking to influence local politicians to the campaigns of political parties and candidates who seek election to office in order to shape policy themselves. In pluralist democracies, campaigns are crucial for repres...

  18. Jamming the Works: Art, Politics and Activism Introduction

    OpenAIRE

    Linda Dittmar; Joseph Entin

    2014-01-01

    As we enter the second decade of the 21st century, art that aims to actively challenge the social order continues to spark controversy and encounter resistance. In one recent instance, the University of California at San Diego threatened to revoke the tenure of Ricardo Dominguez, a professor of visual art, who developed what he calls “transborder immigrant tools”—recycled cell phones loaded with GPS software that point border-crossers to caches of fresh water in the desert. Dominquez has call...

  19. Challenges encountered during an accelerated cogeneration plant construction and commissioning schedule

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Good, R.L.; Cox, T.P.; Vallejo, J.M.

    1988-01-01

    A decision was made in 1986 to proceed with a 110 magawatt grassroots cogeneration plant to supply the steam and electrical requirements of a large, integrated petrochemical manufacturing facility. Though some preliminary engineering had been done and long delivery equipment purchase orders had been let in the summer of 1986, detailed engineering did not commence until late October and construction until mid-December, 1986. Federal income tax consideration required that the project be in service prior to the end of 1987. This eleven month construction, commissioning, and start up schedule was achieved with 100 per cent operation occurring on December 22, 1987. Numerous challenges were met by the lean Project Team during this accelerated schedule. This paper discusses the development of: Project Team Staffing, Operator and Maintenance Staffing and Training, Commissioning Schedules and Staffing, solutions to Significant Technical Problems

  20. Live Aircraft Encounter Visualization at FutureFlight Central

    Science.gov (United States)

    Murphy, James R.; Chinn, Fay; Monheim, Spencer; Otto, Neil; Kato, Kenji; Archdeacon, John

    2018-01-01

    Researchers at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) have developed an aircraft data streaming capability that can be used to visualize live aircraft in near real-time. During a joint Federal Aviation Administration (FAA)/NASA Airborne Collision Avoidance System flight series, test sorties between unmanned aircraft and manned intruder aircraft were shown in real-time at NASA Ames' FutureFlight Central tower facility as a virtual representation of the encounter. This capability leveraged existing live surveillance, video, and audio data streams distributed through a Live, Virtual, Constructive test environment, then depicted the encounter from the point of view of any aircraft in the system showing the proximity of the other aircraft. For the demonstration, position report data were sent to the ground from on-board sensors on the unmanned aircraft. The point of view can be change dynamically, allowing encounters from all angles to be observed. Visualizing the encounters in real-time provides a safe and effective method for observation of live flight testing and a strong alternative to travel to the remote test range.