Suchergebnisse

Dying –or the possibility of death— is not a topic often addressed in modern medicine, especially in paediatrics. But when parents and children are faced with a life-threatening condition, difficult decisions may arise. How do parents and physicians navigate the field between care and end-of-life decisions? Knowledge about care and end-of-life decisions in children is very limited, especially for children between 1 and 12 years. In this thesis, various aspects of care, communication, suffering and decision-making for children (1-12y) with life-threatening conditions are explored. The need for knowledge was emphasized by developments in paediatric euthanasia. In 2014, the Belgian parliament amended their laws on euthanasia to include competent minors. This amendment sparked a debate in the Netherlands on paediatric euthanasia. In our study we found that some parents and physicians had witnessed unbearable suffering in children, and expressed a need for expanding regulations on active ending of life. In 2019, we reported our findings to the Dutch minister. Recently, the Minister announced to expand regulations on active life-ending to include children between the age of 1 and 12 in rare cases of unbearable suffering. However, active life-ending is merely a part of a larger context of care and decision-making. Parents and physicians express a need for clarity and guidance in all aspects of care and decision-making around the end of life. Care and decision-making can, and should be further developed to suit the needs of children with life-threatening conditions, in all stages of their illness.

Living near highways often comes with nuisances (noise, air pollution, barrier effects), but may also bring accessibility gains. This doctoral research provides insight in the impact of existing and planned highway infrastructure on residential satisfaction. The insights are based on a questionnaire among residents in seven highway locations in the Netherlands, complemented with in-depth interviews. Generally speaking, residential satisfaction appeared quite high at the studied locations, and mainly affected by highway proximity in case related positive and/or negative effects are perceived. Residents tradeoff the impact of highways with other residential characteristics. This highlights the importance of an integrated perspective, considering the highway as part of the local environment. The influence of highway projects on residential satisfaction is dependent on how residents tradeoff (expected) accessibility improvements with effects on the broader environment. This tradeoff is influenced by characteristics of projects (such as project-phase and -type) and of areas and residents. Residents who actively participate seem to be somewhat more negative compared to the ´silent´ majority. Considering representativeness, it would be worthwhile to also include opinions of the latter group in highway planning. The findings furthermore suggest that residents are more positive about projects when they are satisfied about provided information and participation possibilities. This satisfaction is related to the quality of what is provided, but also influenced by personal characteristics, such as interest in projects, trust in government, other information sources and socio-demographics. This indicates the importance to always provide a variety of information and participation possibilities.

This article offers a critical reading of three major biographies of the British novelist and philosopher Iris Murdoch. It considers in particular how a limited concern for gender issues has hampered their portrayals of Murdoch as a creator of images and ideas. The biographies are then contrasted to a biographical sketch constructed from Murdoch's philosophical writing. The assessment of the biographies is set against the larger background of the relation between women and philosophy. In doing so, the paper offers a critical response to Sally Haslanger's recent "Musings" (Haslanger 2008), which is contrasted to Virginia Woolf's A Room of One's Own (1929) and Michèle Le Doeuff's Hipparchia's Choice (2007).

AbstractThroughout the nineteenth century, the rural midlands of Ireland suffered from agrarian violence and intimidation through threatening notices. In the minds of the authorities, these outrages were committed by members of a secret society, called the "Ribbon Society", which was deemed to be the embodiment of a nation-wide conspiracy of Irish Catholics to exterminate all Protestants in the country (Beames 1982). However, present-day historians are divided in their opinion on the existence of such a society, as for example, Garvin (1982: 154), who claims that "local agrarian groups simply accepted the label wished upon them by magistrates, police and other outsiders". Thus, there is no consensus about the identity and existence of the "Ribbon Society" from an external point of view. This paper analyses how the identity of this socially marginalised group is constructed from an internal point of view through means of a CDA analysis of a collection of threatening notices written by those accused of membership of the Ribbon Society. I argue that the notices constitute a form of public discourse that is controlled by the labouring classes, and that through means of positive self and negative other representation the senders justify and legitimise their own actions and beliefs, while criminalising those of their intended targets, thus constructing an identity as defender of the labouring classes, and using the notices as a form of social protest.