Suchergebnisse

In Master's degree paper was provided the analysis of juridical status of important institute of local public authority, i.e. municipality's administration. In the first part of this work the development of institutions of the local self-administration is disclosed since reinstatement of independence in Lithuania to nowadays. In theoretical part of the work legally enforceable enactments are analyzed that regulate administration of municipality and because of limitations of extent of the paper legislative and ancillary acts of three spheres of implementation activity of administration are analyzed: of organizing budget of municipality, submitting the licenses for building and giving original legal services. The concrete Mažeikių region municipality's administration is taken as an example either valuation of its' juridical situation and this paper discuss these problems that are impacted within it. At the time of research methods of analysis of scientific literature, of legally enforceable enactments, immanent documents of Mažeikių region municipality were selected and adopted both logic and systematic methods of interviewing. The research of the mentioned questions comes to a conclusion that at present all required municipal institutions are established and the situation of municipality's administration is regulated in details by legislative and ancillary acts, nevertheless in practice there upraise some problems concerning submitting the licenses for building or refusal for giving them; this exhibit magisterial issues analyzed in this paper and from statistical data it becomes clear that there are opportunities to improve giving of original legal services in Mažeikių region municipality and the help is self-supporting budget of municipality.

The aim of this article is to describe which of the different available discourses women relate to as revealed in the way they talk about menopause. We use a discourse analytic approach, which implies that meaning is ascribed to things according to how we talk about them. Twenty-four menopausal women from Denmark were interviewed. They were selected to cover a broad spectrum of Danish women with different menopausal experiences and social background factors. Seven previously identified discourses could be found in the interviews, though to varying degrees from woman to woman. Nearly all women used terms from the biomedical sphere like `a period of decline and decay', even if they did not necessarily agree with this view. Also the existential discourse permeated most of the interviews, especially when the conversation turned to the ageing process, femininity and self-development. The way the menopause was talked about almost became kaleidoscopic when images speedily changed from the decrepit osteoporotic woman or a woman with lack of vitality and sex-appeal to a healthy and strong woman with control over her body and self. Since many women contact doctors in relation to menopause, and since the way doctors talk about menopause is influential, doctors should carefully consider which words and images they use in the counselling. The medical way of perceiving menopause is just one of many, and doctors must be aware that there are other different and partially contradicting discourses at play in society and in the women's universes.

At the start of the 1990s, Great Britain implemented a national programme of speed checks that includes more than 5000 check locations. The coverage of the road network then allows increased surveillance of users. The deployment of this system constitutes a `technical revolution' in the manner of operating the checks. The results are convincing; a reduction in traffic speeds and an improvement in the road casualty toll. The system is also based on an original concept: local partnerships coordinated by a national office that must self-finance their operations. The speed camera programme is thus also an example of the implementation of a policy influenced by New Public Management. In fact, there are obvious parallels between the operation of the new automatic speed equipment and that of the traffic police tasks provided by police forces. In summary, the technical revolution will be combined with administrative continuity.Points for practitionersThe introduction of automatic speed checks in Great Britain is a practical example of the implementation of automatic equipment replacing roles previously provided by other organizations, which will attract the interest of practitioners working on institutional change. It also allows us to discern the consequences of the introduction of a tool arising from new technologies, to understand its implementation into existing administrative practices and the change in relations with users. Finally, the operating methods for the equipment organization, divided between a centre responsible for strategy and local partnerships responsible for operational implementation within a financial framework requiring self-financing, are an original example of taking over an activity traditionally devolved to police organizations.

AbstractOur objective was to examine the overlap between autistic traits and other behavioral problems in a general population sample, and explore the extent to which this overlap is due to genetic or environmental factors. Youth Self Report (YSR) data were collected in a general population sample of 424 twin pairs at 18 years of age, and their nontwin siblings. In 197 of these twin families, self-report ratings on the Autism-spectrum Quotient (AQ) were collected. Stepwise backward regression analyses revealed that of all 8 YSR syndrome scales, the Withdrawn Behavior (WB) and Social Problems (SOC) scale were the most important predictors of AQ scores, and together with sex, explained 23% of the variance in AQ scores. Genetic structural equation modeling showed that the overlap between AQ and WB and SOC was mainly due to genetic effects. About half of the genetic variance in AQ scores was specific to the AQ, with the remaining half shared with genetic variance in WB and SOC. Endorsement of autistic traits in a general population sample is associated with social and withdrawn behavioral problems and these problems partly share a common genetic etiology with autistic traits. However, most of the variance in AQ scores remains unexplained by YSR scores, and half of the genetic variance in AQ is unshared with WB and SOC. These results indicate that autistic traits have specific characteristics that are substantially genetically independent from other common but related behavioral domains such as social problems and withdrawn behavior.

The `international' today should be approached in an evolutionary way. The fixed categories of neo-realism that served well in the past for analysis of the Cold War are no longer adequate in the fluidity of change today. Nor does the Cartesian perspective of an objective world observed by the analyst correspond to reality. In the evolution of world order, the self-organization of social and political power relations has to be understood as a process of evolving consciousness — the ways in which people understand the world they live in and communicate with each other about it. The greatest danger in this process of transformation of mentalities lies in the absolutist thinking encouraged in the extreme versions of monotheistic religion. The evolving historical structures of (American) `Empire', the pluralism of civilizations in the surviving state system and the movement in civil society towards the creation of new forms of structuring social power compete in the process of self-organization of global governance. Legitimacy is the weak point. Efforts at imposing order through `passive revolution' are doomed to fail for lack of legitimacy. A legitimate world order would have to achieve consensus on stopping the destruction of the material, ecological basis of human life; it would have to be based on acceptance of the fact that different world views can coexist; and to gain legitimacy it would have to work towards moderating the existing disparities in life opportunities among peoples so as to give a material basis for coexistence in diversity.

In an article published in this Journal, we have examined whether American welfare recipients possess beliefs and attitudes that differ from mainstream public opinion. Although our findings cast doubt on the existence of a widespread 'culture of dependence', we do show that programme beneficiaries exhibit self-interested support for government policies that provide assistance to needy segments of the population. However, our analysis – like most others on this topic – assumes that welfare participation affects opinions and not vice versa. This is problematic because there are theoretical reasons to believe that influences flow in the opposite direction, as well. Therefore, some important questions remain to be answered: is it really the case that welfare participation, itself, shapes the outlook of programme beneficiaries? Or do political attitudes affect reliance on public assistance in the first place?In this Research Note, we examine the underlying structure of the relationship between welfare participation and attitudes towards government activity. Our analysis uses the 1992 Center for Political Studies (CPS) National Election Study, the same dataset employed in the earlier article. But, we test a statistical model that allows for reciprocal influences between welfare and public opinion. The empirical results reinforce the earlier conclusion that welfare participation has an impact on mass attitudes. Conversely, political attitudes have no effect on whether citizens use public aid. Mirroring our earlier work, we find that people who rely on governmental assistance take rational, self-interested positions on the public policy issues which operate to their own direct benefit.

Persistent differences in the level of business ownership across countries have attracted the attention of scientific as well as political debate. Cultural as well as economic influences are assumed to play a role. This paper deals with the influence of cultural attitudes towards uncertainty on the rate of business ownership across 21 OECD countries. First, the concepts of uncertainty and risk are elaborated, as well as their relevance for entrepreneurship. An occupational choice model is introduced to underpin our reasoning at the macro-level. Second, regression analysis using pooled macro data for 1976, 1990 and 2004 and controlling for several economic variables, yields evidence that uncertainty avoidance is positively correlated with the prevalence of business ownership. According to our model, a restrictive climate of large organizations in high uncertainty avoidance countries pushes individuals striving for autonomy towards self-employment. Regressions for these 3 years separately show that in 2004, this positive correlation is no longer found, indicating that a compensating pull of entrepreneurship in countries with low uncertainty avoidance may have gained momentum in recent years. Third, an interaction term between uncertainty avoidance and GDP per capita in the pooled panel regressions shows that the historical negative relationship between GDP per capita and the level of business ownership is substantially weaker for countries with lower uncertainty avoidance. This suggests that rising opportunity costs of self-employment play a less important role in this cultural environment, or are being compensated by increasing entrepreneurial opportunities.

Clara Sereni (Rome, 1946) and Aldo Zargani (Turin, 1933) share a number of appartenenze, the word used in contemporary Italian discourses on 'identity' to denote conscious belonging to one or more ethnic groups, religious faiths, regional origins, political allegiances. Both are non-practicing Jews and left-wing public intellectuals. Both have written autobiographical books, essays, articles, lectures and stories: cumulatively, they constitute two macrotexts, where each text positions itself against the background of the previous texts and is linked to them by numerous cross-references. Zargani, who lived through the Shoah as a child, writes mainly in order to explain to his – mostly non-Jewish – readers issues connected with the problmatic notion of 'Jewish identity'. Sereni, whose formative years were the late Sixties and early Seventies, places herself at the intersection of four appartenenze: as a Jew, a woman, a 'handicapped mother' and a political utopian. Drawing on Nancy K. Miller's distinction between 'speaking as a .' (as an individual who identifies specifically as one thing in a specific context) and 'speaking for' (representing a group and speaking on its behalf), I examine aspects of both macrotexts with a particular focus on the connections between self-representation, public contexts and Jewishness. I also, drawing mainly on Linda Hutcheon (1994), look at the way Sereni and Zargani use irony – particularly self-deprecating irony – to emphasize their unfulfilled political expectations and their status as insiders or outsiders according to whom and in which public situations they speak 'as' and 'for'.

Published in: Revista administración y ciudadanía, vol 2, número 1, 2007. Abril 2007 ; In 2003, Adele Clarke argued that the Western world was facing an increasingly pervasive social, cultural and political phenomenon named biomedicalisation, which was transforming the concept of 'health' into an individual responsibility to be fulfilled through improved access to knowledge, self surveillance and the consumption of self help biomedical goods and services. More recently, Petersen has detected a parallel genetisation of health, reproduction and identity, which is allegedly encouraging the diffusion of genetic reductionism. The combined interaction of biomedicalisation and genetisation is promoting the emergence of new health care policies based on the idea of individual free choice and anchored to a controversial 'right to be free from diseases'. In fact, the interactions of these factors may give rise to new forms of genetic discrimination, whose ultimate risk is the endorsement of so called 'weak eugenics' selection processes. In spite of the clear social and political dimensions, the present approaches to the regulation of medical biotechnologies are generally based either on bioethical considerations, usually confined to normative issues and individual rights discourse, or on technical discussions, usually focused on the delivery of professional guidelines to secure international high quality standards of the biomedical products. This article, in contrast, suggests that it is urgent and necessary to broaden the normative approach of the bioethical committees so as to include new insights from empirical studies on the social and political impact of a large-scale implementation of the new biomedical technologies. ; Peer reviewed

OBJECTIVE To measure change in adult non-smokers' exposure to secondhand smoke in public and private places after smoke-free legislation was implemented in Scotland. DESIGN Repeat cross sectional survey. SETTING Scotland. PARTICIPANTS Scottish adults, aged 18 to 74 years, recruited and interviewed in their homes. INTERVENTION Comprehensive smoke-free legislation that prohibits smoking in virtually all enclosed public places and workplaces, including bars, restaurants, and cafes. OUTCOME MEASURES Salivary cotinine, self reported exposure to smoke in public and private places, and self reported smoking restriction in homes and in cars. RESULTS Overall, geometric mean cotinine concentrations in adult non-smokers fell by 39% (95% confidence interval 29% to 47%), from 0.43 ng/ml at baseline to 0.26 ng/ml after legislation (P<0.001). In non-smokers from non-smoking households, geometric mean cotinine concentrations fell by 49% (40% to 56%), from 0.35 ng/ml to 0.18 ng/ml (P<0.001). The 16% fall in cotinine concentrations in non-smokers from smoking households was not statistically significant. Reduction in exposure to secondhand smoke was associated with a reduction after legislation in reported exposure to secondhand smoke in public places (pubs, other workplaces, and public transport) but not in homes and cars. We found no evidence of displacement of smoking from public places into the home. CONCLUSIONS Implementation of Scotland's smoke-free legislation has been accompanied within one year by a large reduction in exposure to secondhand smoke, which has been greatest in non-smokers living in non-smoking households. Non-smokers living in smoking households continue to have high levels of exposure to secondhand smoke.

Straipsnyje bandoma eksponuoti ir paaiškinti jaunystės sąvoką. Tai atliekama pasitelkus du literatūros kūrinius: J. D. Salingerio romaną "Rugiuose prie bedugnės" bei W. Shakespeare'o tragediją "Romeo ir Džuljeta". Eksplikacijoje kertinė yra įrodymo sąvoka, kuri gretinama su jos taikymu matematikoje. Analizėje žymios paralelės tarp Wittgensteino matematikos filosofijos bei konceptualios jaunystės sąvokos analizės. Galiausiai apibrėžiama, kad jaunystė, suvokiama kaip savęs paties įrodymas, visai nėra apibrėžiama biologiškai. Pavyzdžiui, šio straipsnio autorė pati save įrodo epistoline rašymo praktika. Straipsnyje tyrinėjama riba tarp fikcijos ir tikrovės. Parodoma, kaip dažnai fikcijos mūsų gyvenimuose atlieka tikrovės vaidmenį. Pagrindiniai žodžiai: jaunystė, maištas, meilė, įrodymas, fikcija, tikrovės forma.Letters to Houlden: Philosophical Interpretation of the Concept of YouthSaulenė Pučiliauskaitė
Summary The article exposes and explains the concept of 'youth'. This aim is achieved by analysing two works of literature: the novel of J. D. Salinger 'The Catcher in the Rye' and W. Shakespeare's tragedy 'Romeo and Juliet'. The key-concept of the explication is the concept of 'proof', the explication being compared with the application of the concept of 'proof' in mathematics. The parralel with Wittgenstein's mathematical philosophy is advanced and continued. In the end it is defined that the youth is the proof of one's self, which is not defined biologically. The practice of writing is revealed as the way to prove the author's self. The article investigates the limit between fiction and reality and shows how often fictions play the role of 'real reality' in our lives.Keywords: youth, revolt, love, proof, fiction, form of reality.>

Abstract:  In this paper I examine river governance or river policy in Japan through the process of modernization over one century and analyze three hidden paradigms, "modern technicism", "nature conservationism" and "life environmentalism", with the theory of environmental value. Japanese rivers were governed traditionally by local people (life environmentalism) but the river management was put under the control of administration and the specialist (modern technicism) in the tide of modernization, and in order to confront this situation a new paradigm of "nature conservationism" was born. In the analysis of the stages of river policy development, the development of economic and political power will be traced according to an environmental sociology point of view. This means analyzing people's initiatives resulting from their recognition and value in the political and economical arena. Structuring of river governance through the interactive process of "government and self‐government" is also analyzed by putting an emphasis on local residents as a political body and second, I will describe the theoretical direction of environmental sociology. Lake Biwa and The Yodo River Basin system, which have historical importance in Japanese river policy, will be taken as an example. From the position of environmental sociology, river governance as an interactive process of "government and self‐governance" based on independence of people, is one practical model that can give us important keys for the new river governance, transcending difference of social conditions. Consider learning the spirit of traditional communal structure as a process of practice for building a new communalism, life environmentalism model, which fits today's society.

The "comply or explain" principle adopted by the UK's Combined Code on Corporate Governance has now been in operation for 12 years. In this paper we focus on two aspects of this regime. The first is the nature of the explanations that have been given by companies with an established record of non‐compliance ("serial non‐compliers") and the role of the market in permitting deviations from the Combined Code. In particular, we consider the significance of share price performance as a factor that is relevant in justifying non‐compliance and the extent to which investors appear to rely on this indicator rather than engage in the more difficult task of judging the relative merits of the Code provisions against alternatives. Our approach differs from much of the research linking corporate governance with financial performance in that it focuses on the potential influence of financial performance (as measured by share price) on governance structure rather than vice versa. Our study of FTSE 100 serial non‐compliers suggests that there is a prima facie link between share price performance and investors' tolerance of non‐compliance with the Combined Code. The second issue we examine is the link between the principle of "comply and explain" and the self‐regulatory status of the Code. We conclude that the benefits of flexibility generally associated with the self‐regulatory status of the Code are overstated and that the Code could be integrated into mainstream company law.