Suchergebnisse

This report deals with various aspects, on countermeasures taken to diminish the impact of the Chernobyl accident, in critical fallout areas of Jämtland county, in order to reduce the contamination of the farmers produce and food stuff items with Cs-137 in the years 1986 – 1992. At the time of the Chernobyl radioactive fallout in Sweden the growing season had not yet started in Jämtland county (middle east Sweden), where two moun-tainous agriculture areas were critically contaminated with Cs-137. There was thus time for consideration if these areas, sensible for transfer of Cs-137 to crops, could be used for further agricultural produce, or had to be excluded. According-ly, the Swedish government delegated to Swedish radiation safety authority (SSI) to set up acceptable limits for contents Cs-137 in food stuff items, and to inform regional authorities (Agricultural boards) to facilitate the accomplishment of investigations and field research, which effectively could decrease the transfer of Cs-137 to agricultural crop and animal products. In Jämtland county, agriculture animal and soil advisers were to take part in the direct information of the farmers. Agr Dr I. Bjäresten, animal adviser, is initiator and head author of the report. She was much engaged on all levels of developing and testing the countermeasures to be employed by the farmers, and especially so in the years 1986 and 1987. Agr B. Jönsson, soil adviser is author of the supple-ment, where he re-ports about soil conditions and experiences from the field con-tamination areas investigated in years 1986-1990. Docent K. Rosén, research scientist in radioecology and soil sciences, SLU, is a staff member of research teams on the Jämtland county. He was engaged to get the report published. The report comprises a description of steps taken between the national authori-ties and the Jämtland county administration board in the unexpected situation after the Chernobyl serious fallout. The administration board made many delega-tions to the regional farming advisers, of which the latter in turn cooperated with the farmers concerned, of the "mysterious" radioactive fallout on their fields, and with university departments working with radioecology in Sweden. Their task was to estimate effective decrease of the different countermeasures recommend-ed and to a great extent implemented by the farmers on field and animal levels. The report can be considered as a narrative or account of experiences obtained by Bjäresten during her work with suitable countermeasures to decrease conta-mination of plant and animal products from the contaminated area considered.

Stratagems adopted by democratic leaders to try to insinuate, or anchor, a preferred course of action into the larger collective will have a variety of repercussions. Beyond the apparent success of the venture itself, the long-term integrity of the democratic fabric may be at stake if simmering rancour and discontent is left unheeded. These questions would seem particularly pertinent when studying the national side of the evolution of the European Union. The periodic shunting of competencies to European institutions is highly complex, so much so that popular legitimacy for the momentous changes is in effect something of an ephemeral commodity. The referendum, with its unique potential to determine the prevailing vox populi, has from time to time been employed to offset these problems, and lend continued credence to the relinquishment of sovereign power. The political entities that will be the powerhouses in this contest for the hearts and minds of the public are, inevitably, national political parties. They, too, are likely to pay whatever political price will be exacted as a consequence of this unusual form of battle – including the exposition and potential widening of internal rifts. Noticing a dearth of investigative tools that can help us unravel these processes, the author develops a structured framework of analysis specifically designed to "parse" strategic or tactical action, with the aim to gauge likely party-democratic fallout. She makes a first-level distinction between "convincing" strategies (basically conceptualised as compatible with deli¬berative-democratic tenets), and "persuading" strategies (closely associated with a subset of negotiation theory principles focusing on strategic action). While both strategies may lead to the desired short-term outcome – where leadership preferences are duly propagated – a convince/persuade analysis is shown to yield improved understanding of the concomitant, longer-term effects. The author studies the Swedish Social Democratic Party's internal handling of the debates leading up to two pivotal referenda – the EU membership referendum of 1994, and the EMU referendum of 2003. Reviewing a wealth of secondary sources and conducting more than 40 interviews with high-level party officials and other centrally positioned actors (representing both sides of the two issue divides), she is provided with a unique material, which is parsed through the framework (which at this point also proves to be a sound analytical instrument). The study is primarily qualitative in nature, but an entire chapter is devoted to a complementing quantitative analysis where an existing Discourse Quality Index (DQI) is used to determine the level of deliberation prevalent in four party congresses (two preceding the EU referendum; two preceding the EMU referendum). One "convince" sub-dimension, respect, proved to be the one most easily affected by external events, not to mention deadline imposed by the referendum. The qualitative analysis revealed a generally higher level of justification (another "convince" sub-dimension) in the EMU case than in the EU case, and the reverse was true for the respect dimension. In both instances, the party leadership acted to pacify [persuade] the debate, notably by prohibiting government ministers from being active in the respective no-campaigns. A preliminary hypothesis that "deliberative space" shrinks as the final deadline looms was in part corroborated, as turned out to be valid for the respect dimension.