Farm diversification, tenancy and CAP reform: Results from a survey of tenant farmers in England

Little work has considered explicitly the role of farm tenancy in influencing the uptake (or not) of diversification activities. The need to examine this link has been heightened because of the 2003 CAP reforms and the decision to tie Single Farm Payment (SFP) entitlement to the land rather than what is produced on that land. The main objective of this paper, therefore, is to examine the nature of diversification activities on tenant farms in England, which includes a consideration of how the introduction of the SFP and other CAP reforms may influence such restructuring processes. Results from a national postal survey, supported by tenant farmer/landlord interviews and a workshop, reveal high rates of farm diversification on farms with tenanted land. However, if one takes away contract/hire services the rate of diversification on tenant farms is much less. Tenant farms appear to favour more ‘traditional’ diversification activities and the results also demonstrate an increasing need to move towards more ‘encultured’ definitions of farm diversification. The second key finding to emerge from the research relates to the high levels of uncertainty and negativity surrounding the potential impacts of the CAP reforms, and SFP in particular, on farm business behaviour. Tenant farmers were more concerned about levels of SFP and entitlement than future investment decisions, including diversification.     

From coherence to coheritization: explaining the rise of policy coherence in EU external policy

ABSTRACT

Over the past decade, the external policy of the European Commission has become increasingly entangled by the notion of policy coherence. Previously ‘siloed’ policy areas such as trade, agriculture, and development are increasingly approached as challenges only effectively resolved by addressing their positive and negative interlinkages. While the EC is critical of fundamental incoherencies between different policy areas, it simultaneously calls to harness synergies between them. To explain this ambiguous approach, we combine insights from speech act theory and cultural political economy. We aim for methodological triangulation by employing social network analysis, an explanatory narrative, and expert interviews. We argue that the Commission’s approach towards coherence can be understood as a process that reshapes the actor landscape around the discourse on coherence. By gradually pushing out the most outspoken actors, the Commission discursively resolves the inherent contradictions of reconciling free trade and development of the Global South.     

Poultry and policy in Ghana: Lessons from the periphery of an agricultural policy system

We analyze poultry‐related policy documents from Ghana and ask how the problems identified and the actions proposed have changed over time. The analysis highlights the fact of limited and poor quality data, and associated uncertainty, ambiguity and poor specification of both problems and interventions. It also points to a long‐term commitment to intensive commercial production as the preferred pathway to deliver more animal protein. However, in the face of persistent feed constraints and economic liberalization, imports of frozen chicken have sky‐rocketed since the early 2000s, and a new pathway has come to dominate. We discuss this outcome and what it says more generally about policy around minor crops and livestock species.     

The regulatory breadth index: A new tool for the measurement and comparison of state-level charity regulation in the United States

The bulk of charity regulation in the United States occurs at the state level, yet state-level charity regulation remains relatively under-researched within nonprofit scholarship, particularly from a comparative perspective. The complexity and variation in statutory regulation, coupled with the large volume of legal research required to study state-level charity regulation systematically, has impeded scholarly progress toward a better understanding of the US charitable sector. We address this problem by deriving a state-level charity regulatory breadth index (RBI) that will enable nonprofit researchers to contextualize state-level charity research within a broader framework and to incorporate state-level regulation into analyses across states. Policymakers can also benefit from the ability to benchmark their regulatory regimes against their peers.     

A snapshot in time: Family policy and the United Nations International Year of the Family

Some of the special agendas and initiatives of the International Year of the Family (IYF), sponsored by the United Nations, are highlighted. After reviewing the history and structure of IYF, findings concerning salient areas and topics for nationally based policy and programs are presented. These findings are derived from a content analysis of materials assembled from 136 UN Member States, as well as analysis of other documents and discussions with the IYF Secretariat. The saliency of concerns is also presented by grouping countries according to their level of human suffering. Familycentric policy considerations are discussed, and implications are cited for universities, policy makers, and practitioners.     

New economic globalization,new industrial policy and late development in the 21st century: A critical analytical review

After having been put aside for three decades, industrial policy has reappeared in the research and policy debate on economic development in the Global South. However, it has also been argued that fragmented and decentralized value chains have foreclosed the traditional role of industrial policy. The article reviews three strands of thinking, exploring to what extent and how one can align the call for new industrial policy with the expansion of global value chains? It shows how the research agenda can be moved forward by realigning contributions from global value chain scholarship with researchers who take their point of departure concerning new industrial policy in structural transformation, technological capability and innovation system thinking.     

Perceptions of and Reactions to the Homeless: A Survey of Fourth-Grade,High School,and College Students in a Small Midwestern Community

A total of 459 fourth-graders, high school students, and undergraduates completed a Homelessness Questionnaire developed for use in this study. Although participants generally expressed positive and supportive attitudes toward the homeless, attributing homelessness to either social maladjustment (e.g., drug problem) or negative characteristics (e.g., laziness) within the homeless was positively associated with “fear of and anger toward the homeless” for all groups of participants. In addition, perceptions of and reactions to the homeless were influenced by both the participants’ gender and age group. Although high school and college students’ interest in helping the homeless was associated with various attitudes and reactions (e.g., feelings of sympathy/support), their indication that they had ever helped homeless people (either directly or indirectly) was consistently associated only with the acknowledgment that their mother and father had ever helped homeless people (either directly or indirectly). Among these older participants, homelessness in the United States was rated as a more serious problem at the end of the questionnaire than at the beginning.     

Victory and Beyond: A Historical Comparative Analysis of the Outcomes of the Abortion Movements in Sweden and the United States

Sociological Forum - What decides the paths of social policy and movement activity after movements “succeed”? This study compares the policy trajectories in Sweden and the United States...     

Bystander Attitudes to Prevent Sexual Assault: A Study of College Students in the United States,Japan, India,Vietnam, and China

College women are at a high risk of sexual assault. Although programs that aim to change bystander behaviors have been shown to be potentially effective in preventing sexual assault on campuses in the United States, little is known about bystander behaviors outside of the United States. The purpose of this study was to explore and compare factors affecting bystander behaviors regarding sexual assault intervention and prevention among undergraduate students in the United States, Japan, India, Vietnam, and China. A total of 1,136 students participated in a self-reported survey. Results demonstrate substantial variations across countries. Bystander behaviors are associated with multilevel factors, including gender, knowledge of individuals who have experienced a sexual assault, and knowledge about campus or community organizations.     

Women's entrepreneurship,neoliberalism and economic justice in the postfeminist era: A discourse analysis of policy change in Sweden

Since the early 1990s, there has been investment in women's entrepreneurship policy (WEP) in Sweden, which continued until 2015. During the same period, Sweden assumed neoliberal policies that profoundly changed the position of women within the world of work and business. The goals for WEP changed as a result, from entrepreneurship as a way to create a more equal society, to the goal of unleashing women's entrepreneurial potential so they can contribute to economic growth. To better understand this shift we approach WEP as a neoliberal governmentality which offers women ‘entrepreneurial’ or ‘postfeminist’ subject positions. The analysis is inspired by political theorist Nancy Fraser who theorized the change as the displacement of socioeconomic redistribution in favour of cultural recognition, or identity politics. We use Fraser's concepts in a discourse analysis of Swedish WEP over two decades, identifying two distinct discourses and three discursive displacements. Whilst WEP initially gave precedence to a radical feminist discourse that called for women's collective action, this was replaced by a postfeminist neoliberal discourse that encouraged individual women to assume an entrepreneurial persona, start their own business, compete in the marketplace and contribute to economic growth. The result was the continued subordination of women business owners, but it also obscured or rendered structural problems/solutions, and collective feminist action, irrelevant.     

Prostitution Ideology and Trafficking Policy: The Impact of Political Approaches to Domestic Sex Work on Human Trafficking Policy in Australia and the United States

Debates over the legitimacy and legality of prostitution have characterized human trafficking discourse for the last two decades. This article identifies the extent to which competing perspectives concerning the legitimacy of prostitution have influenced anti-trafficking policy in Australia and the United States and argues that each nation-state’s approach to domestic sex work has influenced trafficking legislation. The legal status of prostitution in each country and feminist influences on prostitution law reform have had a significant impact on the nature of the legislation adopted.     

‘..It takes a lot of brain space’: Understanding young carers’ lives in England and the implications for policy and practice to reduce inappropriate and excessive care work

This qualitative study, undertaken in England, explored young carers’ perspectives on the nature of their caring responsibilities. The findings are significant, particularly in the context of England's Care Act 2014, which seeks to prevent children engaging in ‘excessive’ or ‘inappropriate’ caring. Our research placed children at the heart of the debate on what constitutes appropriate care. The findings raise key questions regarding effective implementation of contemporary child policy, duties of care towards children in caring roles and priorities for child protection and family support policy and practices, with the potential to inform thinking around child's well-being in wider contexts.     

Family farmers and major retail chains in the Brazilian organic sector: Assessing new development pathways. A case study in a peri-urban district of São Paulo

The expansion of the organic sector in Brazil is seen as a leverage for the social emancipation of the small family farmers. Next to the traditional alternatives circuits of organic food and farming, new powerful capitalistic actors, such as supermarket chains, are rapidly entering the Brazilian organic arena. Can family farming benefit from the development of these “conventional” commercialisation circuits in the organic sector? Research undertaken in 2007, in a green belt rural community of São Paulo, shows how family farmers may have benefited from the implication of large retail chains in the organic sector and how an economically and ecologically outstanding agriculture may arise from these circumstances. However, we highlight the crucial role played by social regulation: only strong solidarity between farmers and the implication of technicians, militants and researchers in the process made it possible to counter the negative effects of the liberal logic governing the development of organic farming via the major retailers. Still, as tougher competition is expected on the regional organic market, the development of short supply chains involving “committed” consumers and the broader integration of the local farmers in networks of organic militancy appear crucial. It would guarantee a continuous enhancement of the local human and social capital, reinforce an emerging process of internal conversion and allow for a stronger social regulation of the future local development pattern.     

101 ways to improve health reporting: A comparison of the types and quality of health information in men's and women's magazines

This study's purpose was to investigate the types and quality of health information reported in Glamour and Men's Health magazines. While neither magazine was completely accurate when reporting results of medical journal articles, there were statistically significant differences with respect to accuracy between the two magazines. These findings suggest that health experts, PIOs, and journalists need to work more closely together in order to provide the public with accurate and clear health information.     

A presumption to disclose: new laws on the provision of information about child sex offenders to parents in England and Wales

In England and Wales, agencies managing child sex offenders in the community have long had the power to disclose information on those offenders to other agencies and sometimes to individual members of the public; this process has variously been referred to as ‘discretionary disclosure’ or ‘controlled disclosure’. In 2008, new laws were passed to strengthen this process and allow designated members of the public to request such information and imposed a new duty on agencies considering disclosure to conduct those considerations with a ‘presumption to disclose’. This article looks at the background to the new laws and how they might work in practice. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.