Towards a theory of upbringing in foster care in Europe

Across Europe, foster care is the preferred intervention for children who cannot live with their birth families, yet just what states look for from foster care is rarely articulated. Its use and intended purpose can reflect not only historical peculiarities but also the nature of the welfare regime existing in a particular country. This article reports on a preliminary exploration of fostering across 11 European countries, reflecting different care and education traditions. Irrespective of variations in history and welfare ideology, and any specialist tasks, we argue that foster care, by its nature, fulfils elements of what might be described as an upbringing role on behalf of society. What is meant by upbringing and how might it be theorised? In this article we draw upon the work of the German social pedagogue, Klaus Mollenhauer, to develop a model of upbringing that might help elucidate what is involved in bringing up children, including those in state care. The idea of passing on a valued cultural heritage is central to Mollenhauer's understanding of upbringing. This happens regardless of social policy intent merely by virtue of shared daily living and the development of pedagogical relationships. We argue that a concept of upbringing might offer an integrating cross-generational theoretical framework for foster care across different welfare regimes.     

LGBTQ + community organizations under neoliberalism in Ontario,Canada: Contradictions and disconnects

Abstract

This study examines the impact of neoliberal policy—which introduces competition for funding and pressure to professionalize and bureaucratize—on the working conditions and precarity of a purposive sample of southern Ontario (Canada) organizations dealing with LGBTQ?+?health. Findings from semi-structured, in-depth interviews with 20 community-based organization stakeholders and government bureaucrats confirmed that neoliberal policy pressures these organizations to professionalize and bureaucratize, while restricting political advocacy. Queer Liberation Theory’s three central tenets of anti-assimilationism, solidarity across movements, and the political economy of queer health are used to understand the situation and possible futures for third-sector organizations within the LGBTQ?+?movement.     

Building a National Strategy for Digital Preservation: Issues in Digital Media Archiving

Abstract

Workflow mapping can yield valuable results wherever complex processes are used. Some of its many benefits include knowledge retention, identification of inefficiencies, and more effective decision making. However, despite the promise of improved productivity and stewardship of library resources, tackling diagrams of complex and often long-unexamined workflows can seem too daunting a task to even attempt—at least without the right tool. This review takes a look at the robust features for flowchart creation offered by Lucidchart, a free online software that greatly reduces the challenges of constructing complicated diagrams. Lucidchart’s intuitive interface and built-in library of templates and design elements bring the benefits of visual mapping well within the reach of busy librarians and managers attempting to chart, understand, and streamline workflows in their units.     

Introduction to the special issue on welfare conditionality in Australia

Conditionality in Australia’s welfare state has sustained a significant academic critique, including the critique published in this journal. In this Special Issue of the Australian Journal of Social Issues, we contribute to the existing critical literature on welfare conditionality. This Special Issue aimed to provide empirical scrutiny into welfare reform and conditionality in Australia. The articles extend our understanding of welfare conditionality’s underpinnings and its lived effects. These case studies illuminate the aspects of welfare conditionality that have not received enough attention: the role of technology, the question of mobility, the relationship with housing and the little thought given to the state’s role in mutual obligation. What is clear is that the individualisation of structural problems is not just a theoretical and political misstep ripe for critique, but leads to the formulation of policies that impact marginalised people’s capacity to shape life on their own terms. Through different empirical foci, all papers in this Special Issue demonstrate how welfare conditionality is put forward as a solution to address the consequences of structural disadvantage.     

Potential Climate Change Health Risks from Increases in Heat Waves: Abnormal Birth Outcomes and Adverse Maternal Health Conditions

We investigate the risks presented by heat waves for adverse health conditions for babies and expectant mothers when these mothers have been exposed to heat waves during gestation or during the period just prior to conception. Rather than just birth weight and gestational age, we focus on less common metrics such as abnormal conditions in the newborn (fetal distress, reliance on a ventilator, and meconium aspiration) and adverse health conditions in the mother (pregnancy‐related hypertension, uterine bleeding during pregnancy, eclampsia, and incompetent cervix). We use monthly panel data for over 3,000 U.S. counties, constructed from the confidential version of the U.S. Natality Files for 1989–2008. Our models control for sociodemographic factors and include county, month, and state‐by‐year fixed effects to control for unobserved spatial and timewise heterogeneity in the data. Even within the United States, where there is widespread access to air conditioning, heat waves increase the fraction of babies with abnormal conditions related to maternal stress, as well as the fraction of mothers who experience pregnancy‐related adverse health conditions. The scope for these risks in developing countries is likely to be even greater.     

Modeling Quality-Adjusted Life Expectancy Loss Resulting from Tobacco use in the United States

Purpose  To describe the development of a model for estimating the effects of tobacco use upon Quality Adjusted Life Years (QALYs) and to estimate the impact of tobacco use on health outcomes for the United States (US) population using the model. Method  We obtained estimates of tobacco consumption from 6 years of the National Health Interview Survey (NHIS). In addition, NHIS data were used to impute the Quality of Well-Being (QWB) Scale using a new methodology known as QWBX1. The QWB places health status on a continuum ranging from death (0.0) to full functioning without symptoms (1.0). The method allows the adjustment of life expectancy for reduced quality of life associated with health conditions. NHIS data were matched to the National Death Index for 14,464 deaths occurring by December 31, 1997. The analysis is limited to adults between the ages of 18 and 70 years. Results  Quality of Well-Being scores were broken down by age and for six smoking categories: (1) non-smokers, (2) those who smoke 1–10 cigarettes per day, (3) 11–20 cigarettes per day, (4) 21–30 cigarettes per day, and (5) 31–40 cigarettes per day, and (6) 40 or greater cigarettes per day. There was a systematic relationship between current tobacco use and health-related quality of life at each point along the age spectrum and there was a clear and systematic separation of quality-adjusted life expectancy by number of cigarettes smoked per day. Teenagers who continue to smoke loose 3.5 QALYs between ages 18 and 70 in comparison to non-smokers. A greater portion in the loss in QALE is attributable to quality of life than to shorten life expectancy. Conclusions  The overall goal of Healthy People 2010 is to increase Years of Healthy Life (or QALE) in the United States. Each year, tobacco use results in hundreds of thousands of quality-adjusted life years lost. Combined models of morbidity and mortality incorporating a range of tobacco consumption levels are required to best represent the impact of tobacco use. Supported by a Grant 11RT-0243 from the Californian Tobacco Related Disease Research Program (TRDRP)     

Valuing publicly sponsored research projects: Risks,scenario adjustments,and inattention

Survey-based choice scenarios used to value non-market public goods typically preclude any risk that the benefits described may not be delivered. Our survey specifies explicit risks of (a) outright program failure and (b) program redundancy due to possible private sector substitutes. Additionally, most analyses assume that survey subjects fully accept these scenarios and that all provided information receives their complete attention. Our discounted expected utility model of choice accommodates both these objective risks and the possibility of subjective scenario adjustment or selective inattention by respondents. We then counterfactually simulate willingness-to-pay in the absence of these distortions.

Twelve-Step Facilitated Versus Mapping-Enhanced Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy for Pathological Gambling: A Controlled Study

This study examined the efficacy of two group treatments for pathological gambling, a node-link mapping-enhanced cognitive-behavioral group therapy (CBGT-mapping) and twelve-step facilitated (TSF) group treatment. Forty-nine participants meeting criteria for pathological gambling were recruited from local newspaper advertisements. These participants were randomly assigned to one of three conditions: TSF (n = 11), CBGT-mapping (n = 18), and Wait-List control (n = 9); 11 refused treatment prior to randomization. Outcome measures included number of DSM-IV criteria met, perception of control/self-efficacy, desire to gamble, and frequency of gambling episodes. Analyses revealed a significant treatment group × time interaction (η2_partial = .39). Specifically, the group treatments resulted in significant improvements in the dependent measures, while the Wait-List group remained relatively stable. Overall, CBGT-mapping and TSF had no significant differences on any outcome measure at follow-up assessments. Analysis of post-treatment and 6-month follow-up reveal a significant improvement in gambling outcomes (i.e., fewer DSM-IV criteria met, greater self-efficacy, and fewer gambling episodes (η2_partial = .35), with treatment gains maintained at 6 months. These results are consistent with previous research for group treatment for pathological gambling and provide support for the utility of TSF and a mapping-based CBT therapy as viable intervention for pathological gambling.     

Achievable Hierarchies In Voting Games

Previous work by Diffo Lambo and Moulen [Theory and Decision 53, 313–325 (2002)] and Felsenthal and Machover [The Measurement of Voting Power, Edward Elgar Publishing Limited (1998)], shows that all swap preserving measures of voting power are ordinally equivalent on any swap robust simple voting game. Swap preserving measures include the Banzhaf, the Shapley–Shubik and other commonly used measures of a priori voting power. In this paper, we completely characterize the achievable hierarchies for any such measure on a swap robust simple voting game. Each possible hierarchy can be induced by a weighted voting game and we provide a constructive proof of this result. In particular, the strict hierarchy is always achievable as long as there are at least five players.