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Political Aspects (political + aspect)
Selected AbstractsLessons for an ageing society: the political sustainability of social security systemsECONOMIC POLICY, Issue 38 2004Vincenzo Galasso SUMMARY Politics, ageing and pensions What is the future of social security systems in OECD countries? We suggest that the answer belongs to the realm of politics, and evaluate how political constraints and ageing shape the social security system. The increasing ratio of retirees to workers lowers the rate of returns of unfunded pay-as-you-go social security, and induces citizens to prefer smaller such systems and a larger role for private savings. An ageing electorate, however, increases the relevance of pension spending on the agenda of office-seeking policy-makers and tends to increase the size of unfunded pension systems. Calibrating the strength of these effects for France, Germany, Italy, Spain, the UK and the US, we find that the latter political aspect always outweighs the former. The relative size of the effects depends on country-specific characteristics and modelling details: when labour market distortions are accounted for the political effect still dominates but becomes less sizeable; the different redistributive character of pension systems and the strength of family ties also play a role in determining politico-economic outcomes. A higher effective retirement age always decreases the size of the system chosen by the voters, often increases its generosity, and may be the only viable solution to pension system problems in the face of population ageing. [source] Fundamental Rights: Between Morals and PoliticsRATIO JURIS, Issue 1 2001Gregorio Peces-Barba Martínez Starting from the impossibility of understanding fundamental rights from the standpoint of natural law doctrine or positivism, the author tackles the issue of rights from a realistic point of view, that is to say from the perspective of law and politics on the one hand, and from the perspective of public morality, on the other. Thus the foundation of fundamental rights is the meeting point of conceptions of social morality that are current in the modern world and the political aspect of the conception of pluralist democracy. Moreover, fundamental rights are considered an instrument to enable the social and moral development of human beings. [source] Models of policy-making and their relevance for drug researchDRUG AND ALCOHOL REVIEW, Issue 4 2010ALISON RITTER Abstract Introduction and Aims. Researchers are often frustrated by their inability to influence policy. We describe models of policy-making to provide new insights and a more realistic assessment of research impacts on policy. Design and Methods. We describe five prominent models of policy-making and illustrate them with examples from the alcohol and drugs field, before drawing lessons for researchers. Results. Policy-making is a complex and messy process, with different models describing different elements. We start with the incrementalist model, which highlights small amendments to policy, as occurs in school-based drug education. A technical/rational approach then outlines the key steps in a policy process from identification of problems and their causes, through to examination and choice of response options, and subsequent implementation and evaluation. There is a clear role for research, as we illustrate with the introduction of new medications, but this model largely ignores the dominant political aspects of policy-making. Such political aspects include the influence of interest groups, and we describe models about power and pressure groups, as well as advocacy coalitions, and the challenges they pose for researchers. These are illustrated with reference to the alcohol industry, and interest group conflicts in establishing a Medically Supervised Injecting Centre. Finally, we describe the multiple streams framework, which alerts researchers to ,windows of opportunity', and we show how these were effectively exploited in policy for cannabis law reform in Western Australia. Discussion and Conclusions. Understanding models of policy-making can help researchers maximise the uptake of their work and advance evidence-informed policy.[Ritter A, Bammer G. Models of policy-making and their relevance for drug research. Drug Alcohol Rev 2010] [source] A political approach to relationship marketing: case study of the Storsjöyran festivalINTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF TOURISM RESEARCH, Issue 2 2002Mia Larson Abstract This study is concerned with interorganisational aspects of relationship marketing, which, in turn, has led to a focus on political aspects, i.e. on interests, conflicts and power in a project network consisting of actors marketing a festival. A metaphor of a project network, the political market square (PSQ), is introduced and used in the analysis of a case study of the Storsjöyran Festival in Sweden. In order to understand the politics and the dynamics in the PSQ, actors' access is discussed. Moreover, interactions between actors, which are to be regarded as cooperative or characterised by power games, and the degree of change dynamics, contribute to understanding dynamic political processes. Identified political processes were gatekeeping, negotiations, coalition building, building of trust and identify building. These processes, and actors' entries and exits between the PSQ and a wider network, caused turbulence and changed the power structure of the PSQ. The turbulence fostered change and innovations that resulted in product development. However, actors' shared identities and a stable, positive image of the festival moderated the turbulence. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] Immigration and femininity in Southern Europe: A gender-based psychosocial analysisJOURNAL OF COMMUNITY & APPLIED SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY, Issue 5 2008J. M. González-González Abstract Despite the growing presence of female immigrants in Western countries, research on the subject highlights two important biases that hinder appropriate explanation of the migratory phenomenon and hence prevent adequate intervention. First, most of the research studies conducted so far focus on male migration; second, the macro-social perspective has prevailed in these areas of study since socio-economic and political aspects have taken centre stage in analyses on migratory phenomena, From a gender-based psychosocial perspective, this study addresses the migration project of 53 women from different South American countries, the Maghreb region and Eastern Europe now living in Southern Spain. For this purpose we conducted 23 in-depth interviews, and staged six discussion groups with the aim of elucidating to what extent gender-based psychosocial beliefs,stereotypes, ideology and identity,determine women's migration process. Our results suggest that the main stages in the process,deciding to emigrate, itinerary for social and labour integration in the host country, and general assessment of the migration experience,are strongly influenced by psychosociological constructs which arise as a result of female gender-typing or female profile. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] Threads from the labyrinth: therapy with survivors of war and political oppressionJOURNAL OF FAMILY THERAPY, Issue 2 2001Jeremy Woodcock War and political atrocity are endemic, and the denial of what has befallen survivors who become refugees has both therapeutic and human rights dimensions. The work described in this article considers the psychological and political aspects of the suppression of memory and culture and how psychotherapy engages with these processes. Narrative, in its customary form as the creation of stories, is discussed as one of the ways of enabling survivors to be given a voice that allows them to process events of atrocity, displacement and exile. The usefulness of psychoanalytic ideas and their integration with systemic practice is demonstrated. The interplay between difficult psychotherapeutic material, the patient or family and the therapist is shown and the use of supervision noted. The discussion is exemplified with descriptions of therapeutic work with individuals, families and small groups. The thinking that emerges is applicable not only to work with survivors but has general implications for systemic work in general as it struggles with its contemporary identity. [source] How Europe is portrayed in exhibitionsMUSEUM INTERNATIONAL, Issue 3 2001Jean-Yves Marin Jean-Yves Marin is director of the Museum of Normandy in Caen and president of the International Committee of the Museums of Archaelogy and History of ICOM. With a long international and European experience in the organization of exhibitions, he is also a renowned medievalist and general superintendent of a large number of archaelogical and history exhibitions. In this article, he describes the forces behind the growth in the European public's desire to know their shared past and understand their origins, and the corresponding trend to identify and recognize the intermixing of the peoples of Europe in all their complexity. He believes that this evolution encourages a revision of the concept of the history museum and recommends an example that would integrate objects and work with the historical dimension , including the delicate political aspects of the origins of modern Europe , to enable the creation of a global museographic discourse on European history. [source] Clinical psychologists do politics: Attitudes and reactions of Israeli psychologists toward the politicalPSYCHOTHERAPY AND POLITICS INTERNATIONAL, Issue 3 2009Nissim Avissar Abstract This article presents an analysis of a survey among Israeli clinical psychologists, examining their attitudes towards diverse political issues. The survey involved the distribution of 600 questionnaires, 115 of which were returned. Within this framework, psychologists were asked to relate to questions regarding political issues in psychotherapy and the ways of dealing with them, socio-political issues in psychology studies and training processes, socio-political involvement of psychologists as citizens or as professionals, and more. This inquiry enabled the current state of affairs to be portrayed with regard to common professional-political conceptions and stances toward political aspects of psychotherapeutic work. The survey's findings point to a divide within the Israeli psychologist community, as expressed by divergent and contradictory opinions that arise in response to a sizable portion of the issues examined. It is quite possible that this rift marks a process of change and indicates the decline of the conservative psychodynamic conceptual system. This theoretical perspective had, up until recently, a hegemonic position within the Israeli psychotherapeutic milieu. In most cases this standpoint was applied in a dogmatic manner, justifying a passive social-political stance in the name of anonymity and neutrality. It appears that still, today, this epistemic position is predominant within the Israeli psychotherapeutic culture. However, nowadays, a large minority of Israeli clinical psychologists seems to be sensitive to different political aspects of psychotherapy and favourable toward working in a politically informed and socially responsible manner. As political issues are almost entirely absent from psychology academic programs and clinical training processes, there is much confusion and helplessness as to how such issues and phenomena should be treated in therapy. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] The Recent Double Paradigm Shift in Restoration EcologyRESTORATION ECOLOGY, Issue 2 2007Vicky M. Temperton Abstract The fields of ecology and ecological restoration possess an enormous potential for cross-fertilization of ideas and information. Ecology could play a major role in informing practical restoration, whereas restoration projects, often situated in quite extreme environments, provide an excellent opportunity to test ecological theories. Efforts to base restoration on more of a scientific foundation, however, have recently started gathering momentum, following the call for such a link by Tony Bradshaw in 1987. On another level, as we gather more experience and information from restoration projects, it is becoming equally clear that often neglected socioeconomic and political aspects of restoration should not be forgotten in the overall approach to restoration. The two paradigm shifts in ecological restoration, toward more scientific foundation and better inclusion of socioeconomic limits and opportunities, locate restoration firmly in the transdisciplinary arena, with all the concomitant challenges and opportunities. In this sense, ecological restoration could be compared to the medical profession, where both a sound knowledge of science and human nature are a prerequisite for success in healing. [source] Front and Back Covers, Volume 22, Number 4.ANTHROPOLOGY TODAY, Issue 4 2006August 200 Front and back cover caption, volume 22 issue 4 Front cover Destruction and fertility meet in this photograph of a swidden ('slash and burn') field cultivated by the Rmeet in highland Laos, illustrating Guido Sprenger's article in this issue. After the secondary forest has been burned from the plots, fresh rice stalks grow between charred stumps during the weeding season in June. A field hut, built each year on the newly cleared plot, can be seen in the background. The author's main informant, one of Takheung's village elders, waits for the author to catch up on the slippery paths. Although denigrated as unsustainable by governments and development agencies worldwide, and hotly debated by agricultural experts and policy-makers, swidden agriculture persists in mountainous areas where wet rice cultivation is difficult. Swiddening involves much more than mere subsistence, and anthropologists have been concerned for many decades with questions of its sustainability, as it forms a central focus for a way of life that integrates all aspects of community life, from economy to cosmology and the reproduction of social relations, including families and marriage ties, ritual and exchange, relations between humans and spirits and also identity. Guido Sprenger seeks to remind those with the power to make decisions over swidden agriculture of the importance of being well informed, as their decisions may radically influence an entire way of life. Back cover Islamic Charities Islamic charities are found all over the world and are mostly uncontroversial. Our back cover shows an appeal, with detachable banker's order form, for the orphan programme of the Beit Al-Khair ('house of charity') Society, a domestic charity in the United Arab Emirates launched in 1989. Almost every Islamic charity operates an orphan programme. Islamic charities have been subjected to close scrutiny, especially by the US Treasury, since 9/11, and are the subject of two books recently published by the university presses of Yale (by Matthew Levitt) and Cambridge (by J. Millard Burr and Robert O. Collins), which belong to the genre of counter-terrorism studies. Such studies emulate the methods of police investigators and financial regulators, making ample use of intelligence websites and newspaper reports and seeking to identify associative networks of culpable individuals and entities. The drawback of these studies is that they do scant justice to the positive aspects of Islamic charities and often attribute guilt by association, since charities blacklisted by the US Treasury have only limited rights of defence and appeal, though very few have been successfully prosecuted. Scrupulous social research, by contrast, tries to understand the words and deeds of charities and charity workers in the widest context. The social research published so far on Islamic charities has focused on their political aspects, including Western-Islamic relations, divisions among Muslims, and connections with opposition movements. In this issue of ANTHROPOLOGY TODAY Jonathan Benthall, who has been studying Islamic charities for 13 years, turns his attention to analysing the special opportunities that international Islamic charities can take advantage of in majority Muslim countries. His article outlines the work of the British-based Islamic Relief in the north of Mali, one of the world's poorest countries, with the implicit suggestion that more in-depth residential ethnographic fieldwork in such settings could yield valuable insights. [source] | ||||||||||||||||