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This article offers a relational analysis of the use of armed drones in the 'war on terror'. Drawing from Erin Manning's writings on movement, relations, and the posthuman, I explore how bodies and spaces are read as digitised data in the processes of the drone assemblage, reducing movement to displacement and undoing relations of becoming. The drone's violence lies in its crippling of bodies' capacity to respond to their immediate environments and relations. The point of departure for this article is the concept of the 'virtual' as drawn out by Manning: the indeterminate potential of movement which moves bodies and relations. My analysis revisits the transcripts of Uruzgan drone attack in Afghanistan in 2010, a case that has been extensively studied in the critical literature on drones to offer conceptions of what it means for the drone to be a posthuman entity. Instead of situating the drone as a posthuman object, I examine it from a posthuman methodology where the focus is on relations, rather than determinate actors or outcomes. My intervention here is twofold: to propose a framework for understanding the drone's violence in its processes of disrupting and undoing relations, and relatedly to argue for the methodological and theoretical value of the posthuman.

In our daily life we see many children under the age of 14 working on the streets, which is school going age, but due to lack of resources, huge family size, illiteracy, poverty and other reason they are compel to work rather than going school. The purpose of the research was to determine the status of child labor in District Malir. Study shows out that most of the children belong to Sindhi and Balochi ethnic group. Majority of children were boys. Majority of the children were illiterate and belong to those families where their parents are labor, disable, drug addicted, bagger, unemployed and elderly. In few cases the children were orphans and they didn't have any other source of income that's why they were compelled to do their work and play the part of bread winner for their families. Due to working environment and working hour these children don't have the time for playing game and other physical healthy activities. Not only government but also different NGO's are working for the welfare of these children at the national level. Overall scenario shows children are in bad condition. Education is the crucial need that should be considered.

International audience ; This study examines the impact of overall business climate on the environmental sustainability factor by specifically considering the ASEAN countries named as Philippines, Malaysia, Vietnam and Singapore. This paper fills the gap of the previous researches by majorly considering the trade openness, competitiveness and ease of doing business as independent variables, environmental sustainability as a dependent variable, while GDP and inflation are studied as controlling variables. All the variables data are collected from the country's official sites over the period of 2000-2015. The long-run equilibrium relationship between the tested variables is confirmed by Kao and Pedroni based panel cointegration tests. According to the fully modified ordinary least square (FMOLS) results, the trade openness, ease of doing business, and GDP cause a significant negative influence on the environmental sustainability within the selected states as compared to competitiveness based independent variables. This paper is an informative approach in front of their state's business community, government, policymakers, natives, and other related ones to consider the negative influence of overall business climate on the environment. In addition, there are some limitations like if industrialization and population growth are considered as controlling variables then more significant and authentic outcomes will be generated.

The COVID-19 pandemic raises questions on the ever-growing urban concentration that characterizes our society and various experts are pointing out the need to rethink our cities. At the same time, a number of voices advocate for a rediscovery of the rural. However naive they may sound, these claims have the merit to call for a thorough reflection on the challenges and potentials that alternative modes of urbanisation could bring along. In order to provide a contribution in this direction, the article introduces the challenges that the present sanitary emergency raises for contemporary urban environments, to then reflect on the reasons behind the progressive abandonment of remote rural areas, and especially on the increasingly scarce accessibility to services they offer to their inhabitants. The authors argue that policies dedicated to counteract these trends are needed, in order to enhance the overall resilience of our societies. In this concern, the National Strategy for Inner Areas, promoted by the Italian Government to trigger place-based territorial development in the remote areas of the country, is a promising way forward, and the present crisis constitutes a window of opportunity to further strengthen and refine its approach in the view of the coming EU programming period.

To avoid chaos and disconnect with learning activities, governments decided to switch to virtual learning environment and urged all educational institutes to adopt virtual learning strategies to facilitate student learning process during COVID-19. The government of Pakistan, in the attempt to contain the virus instructed educational institutes to explore virtual space to continue learning process. The University of Lahore was one of the few universities in Pakistan that took the lead and decided to serve the learning purpose. It is, however, difficult in Pakistan to switch to online learning easily because of cultural differences as education system in Pakistan is mainly based on traditional learning but the University of Lahore has crossed a milestone and emerged as a model for other universities across country. The virtual learning strategies that have been adopted by the University are no less than international standards and the administration have been working tirelessly to ensure the smooth running of this digital education system. Based on the student survey and faculty interviews, this study recommends regular virtual trainings by educational institutes and to overcome the issues of internet connectivity and electricity to better deal with the challenges lie ahead.

Between the late 1960s and the early 1970s, the British government forcibly removed about 15,000 Chagossians from the Chagos Archipelago. Current legislation based on the declaration of the Chagos-Marine Protected Area (MPA) plays a crucial role in preventing the Chagossians from returning to their homeland. In this particular case study, the article aims to analyze discourses related to the establishment of the Chagos-MPA using an environmental justice framework, to consider the implications for international social work practice. Materials from court rulings, official government reports, and academic/journalist publications on the MPA, as well as from seven semi-structured interviews with key informants from three Chagossian communities based in Mauritius, Seychelles, and the United Kingdom were analyzed using ATLAS-ti 8.4 software. The main findings of the deductive critical discourse analysis are discussed concerning substantive, distributive, and procedural environmental justice for the Chagossian community (This term is used for referring different Chagossian communities from Mauritius, Seychelles, and the United Kingdom as a single homogenous group). This article calls for international social work interventions through transnational alliances between international organizations in challenging the socio-political forces that are having deleterious impacts upon the marginalized and disenfranchised populations and their biophysical environment.

Waste is an area regulated by a large number of legislations at both international and European Union level. Building waste was recognized as a special waste stream in the 1990s and identified as a priority waste stream. This recognition for this waste stream was necessary because of the large proportion of this waste in proportion to the total amount of waste, but also the huge potential for reuse and recycling contained. The term used in Cyprus Legislation is Excavation, Construction and Demolition Waste, which includes waste from the construction and civil engineering works, and of natural and technological disasters. The aforementioned waste is also produced by the demolition of existing buildings as well as from renovation and maintenance work. They contain various ingredients-hazardous or not, and problems arise when their management doesn't take into account the protection of the environment and public health. This paper deals with the management of Construction and Demolition Waste considering the Cycle economy, with a special focus on Cyprus, as well as the analysis of the existing strategy and policy on the national level. On this basis, solutions are proposed, and recommendations are noted where needed as to revising, updating and strengthening the existing policy.

Marine Spatial Planning (MSP) is a key tool in managing the interaction of activities in the coastal and marine environment. It analyzes and allocates human activities to achieve the ecological, economic, and social goals established through a political process. Under this project, data was collected for various activities such as tourism, aquaculture, fisheries, renewable energy, ship routes, etc. This study focuses on the data referring to ship detection. Ship routes in Cyprus EEZ were created using position signals of ships in the EEZ for a temporal resolution of 15 minutes. These signals are compared to the positions of these ships using the radar backscatter derived from Sentinel-1A and Sentinel1B satellite images, which have a temporal resolution of 6 days. The radar backscatter for a certain period calculated using the Google Earth Engine platform, was then compared to the ship signals provided. This research is supported by the project entitled "Cross border Cooperation for Implementation of Marine Spatial Planning referred as THAL-CHOR 2"and is Co-funded by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and by national funds of Greece and Cyprus under the Cooperation Programme Interreg V-A Greece-Cyprus 2014-2020.

Marine Spatial Planning (MSP) is a key tool in managing the interaction of activities in the coastal and marine environment. It analyzes and allocates human activities to achieve the ecological, economic, and social goals established through a political process. Under this project, data was collected for various activities such as tourism, aquaculture, fisheries, renewable energy, ship routes, etc. This study focuses on the data referring to ship detection. Ship routes in Cyprus EEZ were created using position signals of ships in the EEZ for a temporal resolution of 15 minutes. These signals are compared to the positions of these ships using the radar backscatter derived from Sentinel-1A and Sentinel-1B satellite images, which have a temporal resolution of 6 days. The radar backscatter for a certain period calculated using the Google Earth Engine platform, was then compared to the ship signals provided. This research is supported by the project entitled "Cross border Cooperation for Implementation of Marine Spatial Planning referred as THAL-CHOR 2" and is Co-funded by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and by national funds of Greece and Cyprus under the Cooperation Programme Interreg V-A Greece-Cyprus 2014-2020.

Sustainable municipal solid waste management (MSWM) is a major challenge in urban areas throughout the world, with the situation getting worse in most developing countries. This paper evaluates MSWM performance in Ghana, using the Wa Municipality as a case study. The policy and legal, institutional, and financial frameworks, as well as the technical capacity for waste management, were examined. The methodology and research design for the study was an exploratory and interpretive case study that was analysed through both qualitative and quantitative research methods. The study findings indicate that Ghana has a good institutional framework, sufficient and robust legislation, existing bylaws, policies and programmes regarding MSWM. However, the challenge is the non-enforcement of and non-compliance with the laws and regulations governing MSWM. Also, the emphasis on stakeholders' involvement in MSWM in the country is focused mainly on waste collection, and no attention paid to waste reduction, treatment and final disposal. Additionally, waste management financing and the technical capacity for waste management are woefully inadequate. Thus, improving the enabling environment for sustainable MSWM with a focus on the examined indicators could scale up MSWM performance in Ghana for the attainment waste management goals.

Housing units of around 20 million need to be constructed in India by 2022. One key challenge for government and industry is high demand for sustainable and affordable housing. This paper introduces the results of an industry focus group meeting with Indian Concrete Institute (ICI) and industrial associates, regarding needs for housing construction, novel products design and service life increase. Results show that present design methods for buildings and structures in India need improvement, from a whole life energy use perspective at a material and system level, service life improvement and real monitoring of buildings and structures. More than 50% of respondents are not happy with the existing buildings design codes as they do not help on energy use minimisation. Materials inefficiency in design, disconnection with real operational use and lack of durability tend to increase with high construction speed. It is highlighted that many of the technologies are not proven in local environments which is inhibiting their use, including reusing of blended ashes from agro-industry waste. Almost 240 million tonnes of CO2eq are emitted per year by Indian agricultural industry, which justify their re-use. Precast components are highlighted as a suitable solution in modular housing construction.

Gender norms serve to normalise gender inequalities and constrain girls' agency. This paper examines how girls' agency, along a continuum, is influenced by the interplay between constraining and enabling influences in the girls' environments. We analyse data from a qualitative study nested within a cluster randomised evaluation of Samata, a multi-layered programme supporting adolescent girls to stay in school and delay marriage in Karnataka, South India. Specifically, we compare agency among 22 girls from intervention communities and 9 girls in control communities using data from the final round of interviews in a qualitative cohort. Using the concept of 'thin' and 'thick' agency on a continuum, we identified shocks like mothers' death or illness, poverty stress, gender norms and poor school performance as thinning influences. Good school examination results; norms in support of education; established educational aspirations; supportive parents, siblings and teachers; and strategic government and Samata resources enabled thicker agency. The intervention programme's effect increased in parallel to the gradient from thin to thicker agency among girls in progressively supportive family contexts. Engagement with the programme was however selective; families adhering to harmful gender norms were not receptive to outreach. In line with diffusion theory, late adopters required additional peer encouragement to change norms.

Cats are one of the most popular companion animals around the world, but they are also one of the most invasive species. In New Zealand alone cats are responsible for the extinction of several native species. However, management of cat populations and the effect they have on the environment is confounded by people's emotional attachment to cats, and the many health and social benefits cats provide. In New Zealand, anti-cat sentiment is putting pressure on local councils to increase regulation of cat ownership in order to control cat populations and reduce their impact on native wildlife. Regulations and policies concerning cats have so far been developed by individual local councils, and as such there is considerable variation in how cats are managed throughout New Zealand. While there are national guidelines for care of companion animals, it is worth investigating whether it is time for stronger national regulations and direction on cats. As such, desktop research on cat management in New Zealand was conducted, including analysis of various central and local government policies, along with academic studies and news articles from around New Zealand. This article concludes that stronger national direction is needed and discusses what exactly should be included in such national direction.

INTRODUCTION: The aim of this study was to rank capabilities and suggest a relevant set of capabilities for the Swedish context to inform the development of capability-adjusted life years (CALYs). CALYs is a quality of life measure for policy making based on the capability approach by Amartya Sen. MATERIALS AND METHODS: A Swedish governmental review proposed the following 10 relevant capabilities: time, financial situation, mental/physical health, political resources, knowledge, living environment, occupation, social relations, security, and housing. Researchers in health-related disciplines from 5 universities ranked these capabilities from 1 to 10 (most to least important) in a web-based cross-sectional survey; 115 of 171 responses were eligible. RESULTS: Health, social relations, and financial situation were deemed most important. Stratification by gender, research field, and age group revealed few differences. We found that it was possible to rank capabilities and that health, social relations, and financial situation were ranked highest by a non-representative sample of researchers and doctoral students from health-related disciplines at five Swedish universities. CONCLUSIONS: The revealed ranking is dependent on the metric and must be further explored. The findings support continued development of CALYs for monitoring and evaluating outcomes in public health and social-welfare interventions.

Many countries are facing the increasing cost of healthcare services and the low efficiency of public hospitals. These issues are also evident in China. This paper offers a comprehensive assessment of the efficiency of public hospitals operating in China's 31 regions. The impact of the third round of reform of the health system in 2009 is assessed based on the three-stage data envelopment analysis procedure. The time period from 2011 to 2018 is covered in this study. Due to different functions performed by the public hospitals and other ones, the number of patients with infectious diseases is incorporated as an output variable reflecting the social function. The outpatient visits and inpatient visits are considered to reflect the outputs related to the private functions. The results imply an increase in the mean efficiency of public hospitals from 0.927 to 0.981 after taking the impact of environmental variables and statistic noise into account. These results indicate that the efficiency of public hospitals is dependent in the operational environment. There are 11 regions whose hospitals operate on the efficiency frontier during the whole period covered. Therefore, the Chinese government should reasonably design and apply the regulatory tools to improve the efficiency of public hospitals.