Suchergebnisse

This thesis explores the workings of co-operation. It proceeds by way of a two-case comparative study, where the units of comparison are local consumer co-operatives: the Newcastle upon Tyne Co-operative Society Ltd., situated in the north-east of England, and Konsumentföreningen Solidar in Malmö, in the south-west of Sweden. We get to follow the two societies through minutes from member meetings, and from several other data sources, from their dates of birth to 1970. This material is utilised for cross-case and within-case comparisons as we follow the interaction between the societies and their environments, between organisational structure and decision-making, and between different factions within the societies. The primary purpose is to charter, understand, and explain the complexities brought out by the empirical inquiry. But in doing so, we also discern more general underlying principles for variations in the workings of co-operation. While this makes the thesis into an exploratory endeavour, it also contains an attempt to map the historiography of co-operation in Britain and Sweden: themes and research questions are construed so as to make a contribution to both literatures. One such contribution is the description and analysis of two separate organisational logics, of their dynamics, conditions, effects, and development over time.

Among the CIS countries Turkmenistan is known as one of the most closed state, information about which could hardly be found. At the same time these dates are contrary to each other. Meanwhile, Turkmenistan, a former Soviet Central Asian republic of almost 5 million people, has a lot of potential. It is rich in oil and gas. Proven gas reserves amount to at least 100 trillion cubic feet, and possibly 260 trillion, putting Turkmenistan among the world's top 10 countries in terms of such reserves. Untapped oilfields lie off the coast in the Caspian Sea, the size of which is yet to be quantified. Being among the richest countries in the world in terms of hydrocarbon resources, Turkmenistan represents unquestionable interest for European community as an oil and gas exporter and interests at the world's energy markets as well. The page gives some aspects of foreign economic activity based on analysis of the regional co-operation between Russian Federation and Turkmenistan. The paper puts to the center of research the following issues: a) classification of the Russia's regions according to the level of commodity circulation; b) peculiarity of the trade links between Russia and Turkmenistan at the oil and gas, food, chemical and mechanical engineering fields; c)to determine export/import oriented regions. The purpose of the page is to investigate the present level of Russia-Turkmenistan co-operation, find out the ways to be integrated to the European's energy markets.

In spite of the wealth of experience which co-operative societies now have behind them, they have not gained uniform recognition across Europe. Supranational authorities such as the European Commission, the UN and the ILO have highlighted the important contribution made by co-operative societies in the creation of employment and in the mobilization of resources particularly at the local level. For several years now, however, two different tendencies in the development of the European co-operative movement are becoming apparent and they are analysed in this study. One is towards the creation of growth processes through formulas which aim to bring under the same roof asset holders who by their very nature are a difficult fit, all the while trying to maintain certain cooperative principles. And on the other hand, a tendency towards the creation of micro-companies that act in local markets and allow for erritorial development by means of the mobilization of local resources, based on local allegiance of the partners and democratic participation.

Libraries for patients fulfil apart from health-specific tasks politico-cultural functions too. However, substantial savings in the health service sector affect also these institutions vital for the recovery of patients. The present work offers an overview on the libraries in the Viennese hospitals with respect to new tasks and challenges that librarians must face; and it demonstrates the different conditions for private as well as public hospitals. ; Patientenbüchereien erfüllen neben gesundheitsspezifischen auch kulturpolitische Funktionen. Doch massive Einsparungen im Gesundheitswesen betreffen auch diese für die Genesung der Patienten wichtigen Einrichtungen. Der Beitrag gibt einen Überblick über die Büchereien der Wiener Krankenhäuser unter dem Aspekt neuer Aufgaben und Herausforderungen, denen sich die Bibliothekare stellen müssen, und zeigt die unterschiedlichen Bedingungen für Privatspitäler und öffentliche Kliniken.

In 1938, in NLRB v. Mackay Radio & Telegraph Co., the Supreme Court offered one of its earliest interpretations of the National Labor Relations Act. Although the Court's holding provided that employers may not discriminate against employees for their union activity when the strike is over and workers are reinstated, dicta in the opinion also provided that under the NLRA employers enjoy an unrestricted right to replace strikers. In the 70 years since the Court's announcement, scholars remain baffled by the contradictions presented by the "Mackay doctrine"—a rule that forbids employers from discharging legally protected strikers while, at the same time, allows those employers to hire other workers to replace strikers. Such a rule seemingly upsets the neutrality toward the parties the NLRA was intended to embody. But as irreconcilable as these principles seem, the Mackay doctrine failed to attract sustained criticism until the 1960s. To account for this latter day criticism, the authors examine the history of the case, but more significantly, the developments in labor law and industrial relations in the years since Mackay was decided. Their analysis reveals some of the basic problems, tensions, and social understandings that underlie the NLRA. Ultimately, they conclude, Mackay reiterates the abiding need for worker solidarity in collective bargaining. The willingness of individuals to make cause with others, and make personal sacrifices for the common good, not only inform labor relations, but are central to the survival of any democracy.

Man is the measure of all things, an old saying goes. But it is a bad guide for understanding scientific and technological culture. Science and technology are not simply the means to reach human ends; they also actively shape human beings, their goals, meanings and social relations. This volume discusses the implications of this so-called 'co-production' of science, technology and society for our analytical as well as normative ideas about humanity, technology and the relations between both. Addressing issues such as cancer genetics, prenatal screening and ecological consequences of traffic and transport, contributors argue that technology has its own kind of sub-politics, which in turn calls for policies of technology: from steering and regulation to scenario studies, in order to achieve democratisation of technology.

Repeated demands by both the European Parliament and the EU Member States nonwithstanding, responsibility for European spatial development policy remains unclear. Spatial development on the European level is actually "treated" as a coincidental outcome of EU sector policies. No unit exists in the European Commission with which to co-ordinate the spatial effects of Community policies. It is obvious that the lack of co-ordination between Community policies causes complex problems – in regard to the effective assignment of financial subsidies as well as the goals of Community sector policies. The spatial effects of these policies do not automatically complement each other, along the line of a more balanced regional, respectively spatial, development among European Union Member States. In particular after the declaration of territorial cohesion as one of the core Community objectives in the Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe, co-ordination of Community policies is necessary more than ever. The European Spatial Development Perspective (ESDP), adopted by the Ministers for Spatial Planning at the Potsdam Council in 1999, was a milestone in this respect. However, in terms of the co-ordination of European policies, the ESDP has had a only minor impact. Therefore, further, more ambitious steps have to be undertaken. A co-ordinating body on the European level could help to duly consider the wide spectrum of aspects of spatial development. It offers the chance to raise sectoral policies to a higher level of spatial effectiveness and serves to promote the better use of financial assistance. In contrast, a co-ordination strategy based up on the assumption of a strong commitment of the member states via voluntary co-operation is also worthy of consideration. It is urgently necessary to discuss the type of organisation, the form and content of the co-ordination of spatially relevant policies in terms of sustainable and comprehensive European spatial development and to decide on how to approach their implementation. This is especially true against the backdrop of the eastern EU expansion and its associated challenges.

Policy relevant scientific information is increasingly sought after in the climate regime. Yet little analysis has been done exploring what this phrase means. Implicit in the policy demand for both an objective and relevant science, lies a paradox. In this paradox is the suggestion that scientific experts make judgments about what is objective but judgments about what is relevant lie with policy 'users'. The implication here is that science policy interaction is required in order to produce information that is neither entirely science nor policy but is a hybrid of the two. Yet interaction between these two communities is generally perceived as a blurring of boundaries that results in the politicization of science. The mandate of the IPCC to remain 'policy relevant but not policy prescriptive' has resulted in two hybrid products – the IPCC Working Group Summary for Policymakers (SPM) and the Synthesis report (SYR). Using a constructivist approach to examine the formal and informal processes that produce the former, the final SPM document, provides a more nuanced account of what it means to produce policy relevant scientific information.

This article analyses the frequency components of European business cycles using real GDP by employing multiresolution decomposition (MRD) with the use of maximal overlap discrete wavelet transforms (MODWT).Static wavelet variance and correlation analysis is performed, and phasing is studied using co-correlation with the euro area by scale.Lastly dynamic conditional correlation GARCH models are used to obtain dynamic correlation estimates by scale against the EU to evaluate synchronicity of cycles through time. The general findings are that euro area members fall into one of three categories: i) high and dynamic correlations at all frequency cycles (eg France, Belgium, Germany), ii) low static and dynamic correlations, with little sign of convergence occurring (eg Greece), and iii) low static correlation but convergent dynamic correlations (eg Finland and Ireland).

This report presents the findings of research commissioned by the Department for Employment and Learning, Northern Ireland (DELNI) and conducted by the Employment Research Institute (ERI) at Napier University, Edinburgh, with the support of the Business and Management ResearchInstitute at the University of Ulster.The research aimed to investigate best practice in inter-agency co-operation, both at the strategic level of partnership working between policy actors, and at the operational level, where local professionals work together to implement programmes. By sharing ownership of, and responsibility for, the content and management of employability programmes with local stakeholders, government can help develop and implement policies that are more responsive to local labour market needs, have credibility with communities and clients, and benefit from the 'buy-in' of key agencies and employers.

This article reviews the current state of the EU's development policy reform agenda. It suggests that the extension of the Open Method of Coordination (OMC) to this area of EU activity would offer significant advantages. It reviews the EU's experience with the OMC, identifies the strengths and weaknesses of this process and examines how it might relate to the current formulation and implementation of development policy.

In this paper, a first attempt is made to give more insight into the challenges for knowledge management of governance processes. Therefore a perspective on knowledge management inspired by complexity theory is developed and applied on a specific governance project in the Netherlands. It seems to be that complexity theory can offer interesting insights in order to understand the fundamental changes we can see in the way 'government governs' our society. After all, governance approaches are intended to mobilise different actors with different interests and frames of references in an interactive process that is located on the boundaries of traditional organisations and institutions. These processes are in essence self-organising (Pierry en Peters, 2000). In its applied form, complexity theory gives handsome insights to understand 'governance' (cf. Kiel, 1994). It gives us also insight in the way knowledge for governance is created and how knowledge management can be filled in, in situations of complexity and chaos. This perspective upon knowledge management for governance is in this paper confronted with two other perspectives, a rational and an argumentative perspective. An empirical illustration is given by analysing the Dutch Communities of Practice approach in spatial planning.

The growing Antwerp harbour on the left bank of the River Schelde has a considerable overlap with designated Birds and Habitats Directive areas (SPA and SAC). Harbour development projects threaten the favourable conservation status of the protected habitats and species. On the other hand the international conservation commitment hampers the harbour development. 'Co-habitation', the aim of the Flemish Government to maintain a balance between industrial and ecological needs is a key word in the present-day management of the region. The Deurganckdock case exemplifies possible problems and solutions for Natura 2000 in harbour development areas. Compliance with article 6 of the Habitats directive is the most complex issue. In this case it failed with respect to the assessment of adverse effects and several aspects of the compensation policy. Well defined conservation objectives and performance criteria are essential to the process and should be defined as soon as possible for any Natura 2000 site. Habitat creation/development as compensatory measure should start prior to and not simultaneously or after habitat destruction. Temporary compensations are no sustainable solutions and are only acceptable when an existing habitat is involved; temporary habitat creation is both an economic and ecological loss. Monitoring Natura 2000 sites is essential to successful adaptive management and the maintenance of a favourable conservation status, especially in highly dynamic areas such as harbour development areas.

The article is also published in: Carlsson, Ulla and von Feilitzen, Cecilia (eds): In the Service of Young People? Studies and Reflections on Media in the Digital Age.Yearbook 2005/2006. The International Clearinghouse on Children, Youth and Media, Nordicom, Göteborg University 2006.

One of the most devastating threats to the planet today is the degradation of the environment. Such problems are compounded by a second reality facing most societies: the questions concerning the best strategies to increase wealth and to alleviate poverty. Biologists, economists, elected officials, conservationists, business leaders, and academics all seek innovative responses to such challenges. For some societies, ecotourism has emerged as a novel option, with the potential both to preserve local wildlife and virgin rainforests and provide a critical source of economic development. Costa Rica is a country with tremendous natural resources similar to many countries in Central America; however, those resources of Costa Rica and throughout the world are threatened not only by deforestation by private industry but by the very tourists who desire to take pleasure in them and the governments which fail to regulate them. Ecotourism has emerged as a vital economic strategy for Costa Rica, yet the environment on which Costa Rica sustains itself may be eroding from the added pressures placed on it because of increased traffic. Many options are available to counter such degradation to ensure long-term sustainability, yet officials must be financially and physically willing to initiate new programs and implement regulations on those programs already in place. Using our observations and interviews which incorporate a series of comparative case studies in order to provide a backdrop, this study looks at challenges and opportunities regarding ecotourism in Costa Rica. Ultimately, Costa Rica's model for ecotourism may be used on an international scale in seeking ways to address the interdependent nature of two vital issues: the need simultaneously to reduce environmental degradation and increase the creation of new wealth in developing societies.