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This article develops the argument that a 'knowledge economy,' despite its cheerful optimism, is also an elegant incarnation of the demise of Western economies. An analysis of policy documents, research statements, and national accounts reveals this paradoxical coexistence of anxiety and progress in the discourse on knowledge economies. While the concept is often hailed as a temporal concept (superseding other forms of economic production), this article argues that a knowledge economy is best understood as a spatial concept – it is a way of contending with global reorganizations of production. This spatial approach is elaborated to tackle three paradoxes. (1) A knowledge economy enfolds defeat with progress. (2) A knowledge economy downplays the importance of industrial labor and simultaneously depends on it to materialize its ideas. (3) While seemingly intangible and ephemeral, a knowledge economy is fixed in place in national economies through government and corporate policy (including through the emergent phenomenon of 'knowledge-adjusted gross domestic products'). A spatial approach provides a view of the tenuous global interconnections and specific conditions that prop up a knowledge economy, and shows how the concept is mobilized to redraw the map so that endangered economies can regain their challenged sense of centrality in a world economy.

This essay is an attempt to think 'mobile peoples' as a political concept. I consider mobile peoples as a norm rather than an exception and as political subjects rather than subject peoples. After discussing the tension between 'mobile' and 'peoples', I draw on Ian Hacking's historical ontology for understanding how a people comes to be. For understanding how the people comes to be, or rather, how the tension between a people that constitutes itself as a whole and those peoples that remain as residual parts, I draw on Giorgio Agamben, Jacques Rancière, and Ernesto Laclau as authors who identified this tension as a fundamental problem of 'Western' political thought. Yet, their inattention to territory draws me to James Scott whose work on early states challenges how we have come to understand the people as sedentary in the first place. His account of how 'barbarians' (mobile peoples) came to be seen as a threat to sedentary peoples enables us to understand that tension. Then a path opens toward thinking about mobile peoples as a political concept. ; Leverhulme Doctoral Scholarship

Defenders of male circumcision increasingly argue that female 'circumcision' (cutting of the clitoral hood or labia) should be legally allowed in Western liberal democracies even when non-consensual. In his target article, Richard Shweder (2022) gives perhaps the most persuasive articulation of this argument to have so far appeared in the literature. In my own work, I argue that no person should be subjected to medically unnecessary genital cutting of any kind without their own informed consent, regardless of the sex characteristics with which they were born or the religious or cultural background of their parents. Professor Shweder and I agree that Western law and policy on child genital cutting is currently beset with cultural, religious and sex-based double standards. We disagree about what should be done about this. In this commentary, I argue that 'legalising' childhood FGC so as to bring it into line with current treatment of childhood MGC is not an acceptable solution to these problems. Instead, all medically unnecessary genital cutting of non-consenting persons should be opposed on moral and legal grounds and discouraged by all appropriate means.

BackgroundDespite health impact assessment (HIA) being increasingly widely used internationally, fundamental questions about its impact on decision-making, implementation and practices remain. In 2005 a collaboration between public health and local government authorities performed an HIA on the Christchurch Urban Development Strategy Options paper in New Zealand. The findings of this were incorporated into the Greater Christchurch Urban Development Strategy;MethodsUsing multiple qualitative methodologies including key informant interviews, focus groups and questionnaires, this study performs process and impact evaluations of the Christchurch HIA including evaluation of costs and resource use;ResultsThe evaluation found that the HIA had demonstrable direct impacts on planning and implementation of the final Urban Development Strategy as well as indirect impacts on understandings and ways of working within and between organisations. It also points out future directions and ways of working in this successful collaboration between public health and local government authorities. It summarises the modest resource use and discusses the important role HIA can play in urban planning with intersectoral collaboration and enhanced relationships as both catalysts and outcomes of the HIA process;ConclusionAs one of the few evaluations of HIA that have been published to date, this paper makes a substantial contribution to the literature on the impact, utility and effectiveness of HIA.

Electricity is an important resource for an economy and its demand for the last decade have witness a significant increase. This work has as aim to study the impact of electricity insecurity on the performance of small and medium scale businesses in Cameroon within the period of 1980 to 2018. The study made use of time series data within the period of the study and uses two methodological approaches; the time series data are analyze using a multiple linear regression for the first method of the work with statistical package SPSS, STATA for treatment. The work also made use of a survey analyzes which helps in the collection of field data which are treated using the statistical package SPSS version 27. The result showed that electricity consumption and petroleum consumption which both constitute elements of energy have a positive relationship with Gross domestic product (GDP) in Cameroon. Survey result from this study also showed that small and medium scale businesses in Cameroon perceive insufficient electricity supply from the energy company which render their business activities difficult. Based on findings from this work, it is suggested and recommended that, the government of Cameroon with the energy company should expand the source of energy to meet up the high electricity demand. A move to the renewable sources such as solar and wind energy will help to boost the energy sector and improve on the economic growth of the country. Key words: Electricity insecurity, SMEs performance, Electricity consumption, GDP

This year there are celebrations, around the world, of the 30th anniversary of the Ottawa Charter. We have seen similar celebrations five years (e.g., De Leeuw 2011, REFIPS 2012) and ten years ago (e.g., Baum 2007, Ridde, Guichard & Houeto 2007). The Charter remains visionary and inspirational, with a lasting legacy. But it has not delivered on its vision comprehensively. Two of its action areas stand out as having failed to show real evidence of success: the call to build healthy public policy, and the need to reorient health services for health promotion.'Healthy Public Policy' has now been replaced by 'Health in All Policies' (De Leeuw, Ståhl & Tang (2014). 'Reorientation of Health Services' still struggles. Both of these, in our assessment (de Leeuw 2017), suffer from the relative marginalisation of health promotion advocacy on the fringe of the mainstream medical-industrial complex. Clinical care and the pharma and biomedical technology sector continue to grow, while public health and health promotion remain on the resource and policy periphery. A partial solution to this challenge is for the global health promotion community to embrace a health political science (Bernier & Clavier 2011, Clavier & de Leeuw 2013). This would explain the political process for making choices in the public domain, and explicitly recognise issues of power, perception and trade-offs. The world of 2016 is very different from the world of 1986. Socialist states and Marxism-Leninism have all but disappeared from the face of the earth. Globalisation and its neoliberal market dictatorship is now the dominant and virtually unchallenged ideology (Labonté 2016). Progress has been made but it has not been shared by all. Humanity as a whole is doing better, but differences between populations and groups persist and grow, in terms of health, well-being, wealth and life opportunities. Knowledge, information and entertainment are available everywhere and anytime, at mind-numbing speeds, qualities and quantities. The gap in the ozone layer may have closed, and acid rain disappeared, but they have been replaced by the seemingly unstoppable advent of the slow disaster of climate change. Rampant population growth and (often disaster-driven) mobility have led to an urban planet with hundreds of millions living in camps, slums and on the fringe. The ecosystem services that buffer hardships for these people – fresh air, clean water, food, fuel, building materials, and protection from flooding – are collapsing. Against this backdrop, the government of the People's Republic of China with the World Health Organization is organising the Ninth Global Conference on Health Promotion in Shanghai in November 2016.In this world - is the Ottawa Charter still relevant? Is the Shanghai Declaration on Health Promotion going to have the visionary and lasting impact the Charter had?

Cette année nous assistons à des nombreuses célébrations, dans le monde entier, à l'occasion du 30ème anniversaire de la Charte d'Ottawa. Nous avons connu des manifestations similaires respectivement cinq ans (par exemple [ , ]) et dix ans auparavant (par exemple [ , ]). La Charte demeure un texte visionnaire et une source d'inspiration, à l'héritage durable. Toutefois, elle n'a pas accompli toutes les promesses que sa vision globale laissait miroiter. En particulier, deux de ses domaines d'action se distinguent comme ayant échoué à apporter une preuve réelle de leur efficacité : l'appel à construire des politiques publiques saines et la nécessité de réorienter les services de santé pour la promotion de la santé. Le terme même d'« Etablir une Politique Publique Saine » a maintenant été remplacé par celui de la « Santé dans Toutes les Politiques » [ ]. En ce qui concerne la réorientation des services de santé, nous sommes encore bien loin de la réussite. Dans notre évaluation [ ], les deux domaines d'action souffrent de la relative marginalisation du plaidoyer de promotion de santé, cantonné dans la périphérie lointaine du complexe médico-industriel. Les secteurs des soins cliniques, de la technologie biomédicale et pharmaceutique continuent de croître, alors que celui de la santé publique et de la promotion de la santé demeure en marge des ressources et des politiques publiques. Une solution partielle à ce défi consiste à ce que la communauté mondiale de promotion de la santé s'approprie une science politique de la santé [ , ]. Dotée de ce bagage méthodologique, elle serait alors apte à mieux comprendre les processus politiques visant à faire des choix dans le domaine public et à reconnaître explicitement les questions de pouvoir, de perception et de compromis ou de compensations mutuelles. Le monde de 2016 est très différent de celui de 1986. Les Etats socialistes et le marxisme-léninisme ont presque disparu de la surface de la terre. La mondialisation sous sa forme néolibérale est maintenant l'idéologie dominante et pratiquement incontestée. Des progrès ont été accomplis, mais ils n'ont pas été partagés par tous. L'humanité dans son ensemble se porte mieux, mais les différences entre les populations et les divers groupes, en termes de santé, de bien-être, de richesse et de la vie économique, persistent et empirent. Les connaissances, l'information et les divertissements sont disponibles partout et à tout moment, à des vitesses ahurissantes, en qualité étonnante et en quantités énormes. Le trou dans la couche d'ozone peut avoir été comblé et les pluies acides disparues, mais ils ont été remplacés par l'avènement apparemment inexorable de la catastrophe lente du changement climatique. La croissance démographique galopante et les mouvements de population (dont des catastrophes sont souvent à l'origine) ont conduit à une planète urbaine avec des centaines de millions des gens qui vivent dans des camps, des bidonvilles et dans l'habitat informel. Les services éco-systémiques qui sont à même de réduire les privations pour ces personnes en leur fournissant une bonne qualité de l'air, de l'eau propre, de la nourriture, des matières combustibles, des matériaux de construction, la protection contre les inondations, etc., sont en train de s'effondrer. Dans ce contexte, le gouvernement de la République Populaire de Chine et l'Organisation Mondiale de la Santé (OMS) ont organisé la Neuvième Conférence Mondiale sur la Promotion de la Santé à Shanghai en novembre 2016. Dans un tel monde, la Charte d'Ottawa est-elle toujours pertinente ? La Déclaration de Shanghai sur la Promotion de la santé va-t-elle avoir le même impact visionnaire et durable qu'a connu la Charte ?

The legislative agenda in most parliamentary systems is controlled tightly by the government and bills offered by individual members of parliament have low rates of success. Yet, members of parliament (MPs) do seek to present (private) members' bills even where the rate of adoption is very low. We argue that members' bills serve as an electoral connection but also as an opportunity for MPs to signal competence to their co-partisans. To demonstrate the presence of an electoral connection we take advantage of the random selection of private members' bills in the New Zealand House of Representatives and show that survey respondents approve more of electorate MPs whose bills were drawn on the ballot. In addition, we show that MPs respond to the incentives created by the voters and parties' willingness to reward legislative effort and, consequently, that electorally vulnerable legislators are more likely to place members' bills on the ballot.

Sejak tumbangnya rezim otoritarian Orde Baru yang kemudian dilanjutkan denganmunculnya semangat reformasi dengan membuka keran demokratisasi secara lebih luas,konflik dan kekerasan yang bernuansa ethnic dan keagamaan seolah tidak ada hentinyadialami oleh bangsa ini. Data dari sejumlah penelitian menunjukkan bahwa Jawa Baratmerupakan provinsi yang tingkat intoleransi dalam kehidupan beragama masih tinggi.Pemandangan yang berbeda ditemukan di desa Sindang Jaya, Cianjur. Masyarakat di desaini, meskipun memiliki populasi penduduk yang beragama Kristen cukup tinggi, tidakpernah terjadi konflik social keagamaan yang serius. Oleh karena itu, desa ini menarikuntuk diteliti. Penelitian bertujuan untuk mengetahui kegiatan kehidupan keberagamaanmasyarakat , interaksi sosial- keagamaan antar umat Islam dan Kristiani serta faktorfaktor yang melatarbelakanginya. Dilihat dari cara data atau informasi yang dihimpun,penelitian ini bisa disebut mixed method atau gabungan kualitatif dan kuantitatif. Dataatau informasi diperoleh melalui observasi, wawancara terbuka, angket serta studi teks.Seluruh data yang diperoleh melalui observasi, wawancara, dideskripsikan dan dianalisissecara kualitatif sedangkan data atau informasi yang diperoleh melalui pertanyaantertutup (angket) dianalisis secara kuantitatif. Penelitian ini menemukan bahwa kegiatankehidupan keberagamaan masyarakat Desa Sindang Jaya Kecamatan CiranjangKabupaten Cianjur merupakan kehidupan keagamaan yang rukun dan toleran. Interaksisosial-keagamaan antar ummat Muslim dan Kristiani di Desa Sindang Jaya KecamatanCiranjang Kabupaten Cianjur tergolong intensif. Banyak faktor pendukung yang melatarbelakangi landasan interaksi social keagamaan antar ummat Muslim dan Kristiani dalam melestarikan toleransi dan kerukunan hidup dalam sebuah pluralitas agama di DesaSindang Jaya Kecamatan Ciranjang Kabupaten Cianjur. Yang terpenting diantaranyaadalah : a) Faktor Historis b) Faktor Teologis c) Faktor Sosiologis c) Faktor Politis.Faktor historis disebabkan kedatangan orang Kristen di desa Sindangjaya yang sudahlebih dari satu abad yakni sejak tahun 1903 sehingga mereka sudah terbiasa hidup berbaurantara Muslim dan Kristiani sejak dari nenek moyang mereka. Faktor teologis, karenamereka pada umumnya memiliki pandangan teologi yang inklusif dan toleran. Faktorsosiologis , karena masyarakat desa Sindangjaya , tergolong masyarakat paguyuban.Faktor politis, karena dalam masyarakat di desa Sindangjaya ,tidak dijumpai pandangandan sikap politik yang berlawanan dengan kebijakan pemerintah dan negara. Merekasemuanya setuju dan siap mengikuti paraturan perundangan yang berlaku di Indonesia,termasuk perundangan yang mengatur kehidupan beragama. Penelitian ini jugamenemukan bahwa interaksi sosial keagamaan yang dipraktekkan di desa ini termasukinteraksi sosial keagamaan yang inklusif, toleran dan humanis.

Many gigalitres of groundwater have been extracted from the Condamine River Alluvial Aquifer (CRAA) since the 1960s. These groundwater withdrawals have stressed the system and locally altered the groundwater flow paths. Isotopes can provide powerful insights into recharge pathways, flow direction, and the sustainability of groundwater withdrawals from alluvial aquifers. To address some of the regional groundwater concerns we must characterise alluvial groundwater residence time.A total of 31 groundwater samples were collected from privately owned irrigation bores and Qld-DNRM government monitoring bores in the region between Condamine Plains and Dalby. Parameters analysed included: 3H, 14CDIC, 222Rn, 87Sr/86Sr, δ13CDIC, water δ2H and δ18O, sulfate δ34S and δ18O as well major, trace and REE elements.Distance from primary recharge areas (rivers) provides the main control on groundwater residence time in the CRAA. This is supported by the following observations:1) Groundwater between the Condamine River and its northern branch has low TDS (~400 mg/L), is Na-HCO3-type and has detectable 3H, indicating a proportion of modern recharge (<70 years);2) Groundwater east of the northern branch has higher TDS (~700 mg/L) and is Na-HCO3- -type with increasing eastern inputs. No 3H is detected and 14C shows sub-modern groundwater (~500 years);3) Groundwater along the eastern and western boundaries of the alluvium or samples retrieved from the Walloon Coal Measures (WCM) have high TDS (1,250-19,770 mg/L) and are Na-Cl-type. Residence times in the upper WCM increase along the flow path to the west from modern to 32,000 years on the western side.Groundwater residence time distributions provide a visualisation of recharge processes and delineate areas where groundwater withdrawals are less sustainable within the CRAA.

In order to meet climate goals, it will be necessary to significantly reduce the greenhouse gases emitted by homes. A key factor in the US is to reduce the on-site combustion of fossil fuels for heating end-uses and to replace this with use of electric heat pump technologies connected to a low-carbon grid. The replacement of natural gas furnaces with electric heat pumps is a key home decarbonization strategy. However, the potential for space heating electrification to reduce greenhouse gas emissions depends on the carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e) content of the electricity used by the heat pump. This varies considerably depending on the source of electricity, with large state to state variability. Furthermore, household energy costs are likely to be impacted by the electrification of space heating, because retail energy prices for both natural gas and electricity in each state vary by factors of seven and four, respectively. Contractors, energy programs, government and building code officials, as well as consumers need clear indications of the likely CO2e and energy cost impacts of proposed electrification projects, because these will affect decarbonization choices and rationales around scaled heating electrification. Government and utility programs also need to be aware of the likely outcomes of any supported/incentivized measures. In this paper, we investigate these effects by looking at new metrics to analyze the change in CO2e emitted and the cost to meet home heating loads when switching from a natural gas furnace to a heat pump for the contiguous 48 states of the mainland US.

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), customary female genital modification practices common in parts of Africa, South and Southeast Asia, and the Middle East are inherently patriarchal: they reflect deep-rooted inequality between the sexes characterized by male dominance and constitute an extreme form of discrimination against women. However, scholars have noted that while many societies have genital modification rites only for boys, with no equivalent rite for girls, the inverse does not hold. Rather, almost all societies that practice ritual female genital modification also practice ritual male genital modification, often for comparable reasons on children of similar ages, with the female rites led by women and the male rites led by men. In contrast, then, to the situation for boys in various cultures, girls are not singled out for genital modification on account of their sex or gender; nor do the social meanings of the female rites necessarily reflect a lower status. In some cases, the women's rite serves to promote female within-sex bonding and network building—as the men's rite typically does for males—thereby counterbalancing gendered asymmetries in political power and weakening male dominance in certain spheres. In such cases, and to that extent, the female rites can be described as counter-patriarchal. Selective efforts to discourage female genital modifications may thus inadvertently undermine women-centered communal networks while leaving male bonding rites intact. Scholars and activists should not rely on misleading generalizations from the WHO about the relationship between genital cutting and the social positioning of women as compared to men. To illustrate the complexity of this relationship, we compare patterns of practice across contemporary societies while also highlighting anthropological data regarding pre-industrial societies. Regarding the latter, we find no association between the presence of a female initiation rite and a key aspect of patriarchy as it is classically ...

Local and regional governments in the U.S. rely increasingly on voter-approved local option sales taxes (LOSTs) to fund transportation capital investments, maintenance, and operations. LOSTs typically present voters with lists of local transportation projects and programs to be funded by a ¼ to 1 percent sales tax increase. Most research on LOSTs are case studies, which make generalizations about LOSTs difficult. We conducted a comprehensive, multi-jurisdictional analysis of LOST measures in California, the U.S. state with the greatest number of LOST measures. We examined 76 LOST measures put to voters between 1976 and 2016 to assess factors associated with voter support. LOSTs in California are enacted by counties, which we examined in addition to smaller intra-county geographies using both regression models and case studies. We tested several explanatory variables for association with voter support including macroeconomic and political context, planned measure expenditures, voter characteristics, and spatial distribution of proposed projects. We found that funding dedicated to public transit and returned to local jurisdictions predicts support at the county level, and that LOSTs that create new taxes—as opposed to extending or renewing existing taxes—are less popular with voters, all else equal. Our analyses of sub-county geographies revealed that political party affiliation is the strongest predictor of local voter support for LOSTs and that voters living adjacent to funded projects tended to be more supportive of LOSTs.

12/05/15 NM ; In the UK, there are policy and regulatory concerns regarding the governance of care homes and healthcare provision within these homes. From a public health perspective, these issues can pose significant challenges to the provision of safe and quality medication use services to care home residents. The objective of this paper is to highlight an important and neglected issue for the growing population of institutionalized older adults. We reviewed relevant literature for the years 2000 to present and identified recent efforts undertaken to improve medication safety standards in UK care homes. We consider the limitations and reasons for the National Health Services restricted role and lack of leadership in providing medical services for this institutionalized population. The efforts taken by the Department of Health and other healthcare authorities targeting medication safety in care homes are also highlighted. In order to improve the quality of healthcare, specifically in areas related to medication safety and quality use of medicines, interventions need to be taken by the national government and similarly by local authorities and NHS commissioners.

Public clients are generally expected to consider health and safety (H&S) in the project procurement process. However, there is evidence that in many developing countries, public clients do not adequately consider H&S in the procurement of public projects. This study therefore sought to understand this issue by exploring the constraints that hinder public clients from adequately promoting H&S in public works procurement. Using both qualitative and quantitative methods, semi-structured interviews were conducted with public clients and contractors, and a survey was conducted with public clients, contractors, and consultants. The interview data was analysed using inductive thematic analysis, while the survey data was subjected to descriptive and inferential statistics. Nine themes of constraints including regulatory; budgetary; human resource constraints; lack of management commitment; lack of H&S knowledge and education; unethical procurement practices; political influence; absence of guidance materials; and poor attitude towards H&S were identified. Based on the findings, this study recommended strategic interventions to promote the consideration of H&S in public procurement. This study contributes to the broader research on H&S management by focusing specifically on public clients in developing countries and providing an in-depth understanding of the issues which have implications for both developing and developed countries.