Israel's military public diplomacy evolution: Historical and conceptual dimensions

This study provides an historical overview of the IDF Spokesperson’s Unit (ISU) from the early years of the State of Israel until 2009. Analyzing five periods during which the ISU played a key role in Israel's public diplomacy, this research sheds light on the challenges the ISU faced in different periods and circumstances and examines how the ISU tried to modify its methods and actions in response to geopolitical changes and media development, albeit not always successfully. The study suggests better understanding the adaptation process by applying a three-layer framework for analysis: the tactical layer, the strategic layer and the perceptional layer. The findings of this work demonstrate that in adapting to new circumstances, the ISU focused mainly on the tactical response level, with the result that it did not undertake any review or debate over the need for deeper perceptional changes in ISU policies.     

对外政治话语中隐喻的功能及其英译

目前对隐喻翻译的讨论普遍聚焦喻体等值转换或意象投射等问题，模糊了隐喻认知与修辞隐喻的差异。在综述隐喻的话语功能基础上，对党和国家领导人的发言和政府工作报告中所使用的隐喻及其对应译文进行较为深入的分析，认为政治话语中的隐喻具有阐释与劝说功能。为了发挥政治话语中隐喻的对外阐释与说服功能，翻译应技巧性地选择相应的翻译策略，根据隐喻的功能采用直译、直译加注、转换喻体、换以明喻以及释译喻义等方法进行隐喻翻译，以便更好地提高对外话语的传播效果。     

Disaster Relief as Social Action: A Weberian Look at Postdisaster Donation Behavior

Disaster relief involves a broad range of participants, which often results in a disjunction between actual disaster needs and the perception of appropriate strategies in relief provision. This research examines data collected through interviews with donation drive operators responding to Superstorm Sandy in 2012 and the May 2013 Oklahoma tornadoes. Using Weber's ideal types of social action to understand motivations for engaging in disaster relief, this article argues that motivations for participating in and organizing such drives influence donation strategies, and these motivations can be used to explain persistent donation of nonuseful materiel items. Findings indicate several different motivations for involvement and that donation type appeared linked to motivation. We suggest that motivation for engaging in social action is a valuable approach to better understanding donation behavior and, consequently, addressing the social problem of materiel convergence in the postdisaster environment.     

An empirical assessment of the operational performance through internal benchmarking: a case of a global logistics firm

This article solves an operational performance measurement problem of a global logistics firm through an internal benchmarking tool. The intended impact is to enable logistics firms to form a deeper understanding of their own internal processes and metrics. The methodology of this in-depth action research involves a sequential approach with a series of interviews, questionnaire-based surveys, operations data collated through observations and process mapping yielding real-world data. A series of statistical tests are conducted to analyse the collated data. Strategic priorities of the firm are integrated with the firm’s operational performance to ascertain the effective performance by considering both the tangible and intangible measures. The outcomes inform both practitioners and academics how the firm could improve its freight forwarding business’s profitability by ensuring that its operations meet the prioritised criteria. The ‘best practice’ derived from internal benchmarking forms an intermediate step towards external benchmarking. The outcomes facilitate investigating the current business strategy, the standard operating procedures and the scope of improving those.     

Use of Redundant Industrial Buildings as Injections into the Cultural Sector in Norway

Prime aim is to examine the way the culture sector reuses industrial buildings to instigate cultural activities in the municipalities. The discussion of various actors’ motivation for engagement is based on results from a case study, supplemented with findings from a coarse-meshed telephone survey. At national level overarching political guidelines can be traced back to white papers concerning cultural policy, urban transformation and cultural heritage, and the municipalities’ cultural policies mirror these guidelines. What tends to decide if such initiatives are considered successful are local abilities to cross sectorial divisions and instigate cooperation between municipal planners, private entrepreneurs and NGOs.     

When implicit prejudice does not predict explicit prejudice: Spanish version of the Concern with Acting Prejudiced scale / Cuando el prejuicio implícito no predice el explícito: versión española de la escala Concern with Acting Prejudiced

The aim of this research was to adapt and validate the Concern with Acting Prejudiced (CAP) scale for a Spanish sample. This measure evaluates concern about appearing prejudiced to others or oneself and the motivation not to deviate from personal egalitarian standards. First, we completed the translation and an item content validity analysis. Then, in Study 1 (N = 198), we conducted an exploratory factor analysis. In Study 2 (N = 383), we conducted a confirmatory analysis of the unifactorial structure of the Spanish version of the scale and examined its validity. In Study 3 (N = 89), we explored the moderating role of participants’ concern with acting prejudiced in the relation between implicit prejudice and explicit prejudice. The results confirmed the unifactorial structure of the scale, its appropriate psychometric properties and its predictive validity. Moreover, we confirmed that the CAP moderated the relation between implicit and explicit prejudice. In participants with a low concern with acting prejudiced, implicit prejudice was positively related with modern prejudice; in participants with a high concern with acting prejudiced, these variables were not related.     

Harm reduction for cannabis: Factor analysis of a protective behavioral strategies survey

Objective: To examine the psychometric properties of a measure of cannabis-specific Protective Behavioral Strategies (PBS), which assesses ways in which students may reduce cannabis-related risk. Participants: Respondents to the American College Health Association – National College Health Assessment II (N = 580) during Spring 2015. Methods: Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) and Exploratory Structural Equation Modeling (ESEM) were used to identify and replicate the factor structure of the measure. Results: Results support a four-factor model (Respiratory Health, Frequency/Quantity, Socializing, and General Health) with close approximate fit (Χ² (310) = 565.96, p < .001, RMSEA = .038 (.033, .043; 90% CI), CFI = .961, TLI = .929, SRMR = .033). Support for the convergent validity and construct validity of the measure was also found. Conclusions: This is the initial step in the development of a standard, psychometrically validated measure of cannabis PBS that has the potential to inform future research and interventions.     

Displaying Gender: Transgender People's Strategies in Everyday Life

Drawing upon data from in‐depth interviews with transgender people in Portugal and in the United Kingdom, this article critically reflects upon different ways through which transgender people recreate their gender displays, particularly in terms of gender embodiment and aesthetics, in order to navigate their everyday lives. I focus on four strategies of articulating gender displays with one's own gender subjectivities: “blending in,” “masking,” “naturalizing,” and “subverting.” These strategies are not exclusive of one another. They are used differently throughout the participants' own lives in accordance to the social contexts they were in.     

Teaching technologies for immigrant children: an exploratory study of elementary school teachers in Russia*

ABSTRACT

Educational institutions are an important setting where psychological, pedagogical, sociocultural, and language adaptation of immigrant children occurs. A number of teaching strategies, practices, approaches, and methods have been described in the literature. In the Russian context, such strategies have been called ‘technologies’. The purpose of the present exploratory study was to describe teaching technologies used by teachers in Russia when working with immigrant students in elementary schools. Responses of forty-five elementary school teachers to open-ended questions describing technologies they use when teaching children with migration backgrounds were analyzed using content analysis. Findings suggest that Russian elementary school teachers used ethno-cultural group, communicative technologies, games, individualized instruction, and differentiated teaching. Many approaches mentioned can be used inclusively with groups of immigrant and non-immigrant students. Importantly, while teachers supplemented classroom instruction with additional Russian language lessons, none mentioned specific techniques for teaching Russian as a non-native language. These findings are discussed in relation to teaching strategies described in the international literature focused on migrant students. Finally, implications for further research are discussed.     

Monitoring S3: Key dimensions and implications

Our work analyses the implications of a smart specialisation strategy (S3) monitoring model based on a system that considers three main axes linked to the logic of the strategies: output/results, smart specialisation process, and a learning component, on which we build our main approach. This strategic learning is based on the logic that S3 presents a new paradigm within the innovation policy scope that requires the inclusion of monitoring schemes that integrate the assessment of the dynamic process under which both public administration and other innovation stakeholders learn and improve their activities (within and without the strategy) thanks to the learning gathered throughout S3 (and its instruments and projects) implementation. The article also discusses this logic within the current and the next programming period for S3, and the role monitoring has or will have, while analysing the opportunities and challenges it presents.