Untangling the tolerance of socioeconomic inequality: Comparing Japan,the United States,South Korea,and the People's Republic of China

The last three decades have witnessed major institutional and structural transformations across both economically developed and developing countries. While many individuals and groups have benefited from these changes, they have simultaneously resulted in growing disparities between the haves and have-nots. The growing socioeconomic inequalities, however, have not been met with significant resistance and it has been even observed that people have become more tolerant of inequalities. This article explores the motivations behind tolerating socioeconomic inequality, and investigates how the tolerance of socioeconomic inequality has changed over the past 25 years, while also comparing it across very distinctive political and socioeconomic regimes. This study overcomes a gap in research by employing longitudinal, cross-sectional survey data to analyze temporal change in attitudes towards inequality. Fixed effects models are applied on five waves of World Values Survey data (1994–2020) on four distinctly different post-industrial countries: Japan, the People's Republic of China, South Korea, and the United States. The paper argues that, on an individual level, there is a tendency to accept inequality normalizing narratives and defend one's own self-interest, derived from one's structural position. This accounts for a considerable part of the variation in tolerance for socioeconomic inequality across these nations. The article concludes that trends in tolerating socioeconomic inequality have over time become more similar across these four countries with distinctly different political–economic regimes.     

Fertility treatment and organizational discourses of the non-reproductive female body

This paper contributes to debates on the intersections between organizations, the body, and reproduction by exploring how the non-reproductive female body is discursively (re)constructed by organizations which provide fertility treatment, such as private clinics and fertility magazines. Organization studies has neglected the non-reproductive body, despite a fair amount of research on its reproductive counterpart, especially pregnant and maternal bodies. Equally, these discussions privilege the employment relationship – for example, how women are enjoined to manage their bodies at work – whereas we concentrate on the marketplace, or the field of fertility treatment, and the organizations therein. These organizations, while focused on reproducing bodies, also influence, compound, and challenge notions of the bodies they are involved with. Through a Critical Discourse Analysis of texts produced by UK fertility organizations, we present three discourses of the non-reproductive female body that (re)generate subject positions where the absence of reproduction is a medical condition, an emotionally distressing experience, and something that needs to be cared for. Our argument suggests how the texts can operate as a form of Foucauldian governmental biopower, emphasizing how they hail the infertile female subject.     

The importance of paleodunes as nesting habitat for Northern Pine Snakes (Pituophis melanoleucus melanoleucus): risk from off-road vehicles in the New Jersey Pine Barrens

Human development and disturbances can be determinants of population viability of some vertebrates in human-impacted ecosystems. The effects on the behavior and population dynamics of reptiles are not well-studied in urban environments. This paper examines the importance of pine forest clearings, openings, and paleodunes for nesting pine snakes (Pituophis melanoleucus melanoleucus) in the New Jersey Pinelands, and the risk to nesting females and offspring from off-road vehicles (ORV). In this ms we 1) develop a rating scale for ORV activity that can be modified for evaluating risk to other vertebrates, 2) compare general habitat features of nesting areas used in the early 1980s with those used in 2020, and 3) examine the fate of nesting areas used in the 1980s and the intensity of ORV use in both time periods. In 2020, nests were located at only 2 of the 10 nesting areas used in 1983 (20%), and only one of the 10 was a paleodune. In comparison, in 2020, 9 of 13 new nesting areas were on paleodunes (69%). In 1983, ORV activity on nesting areas ranged from very low to medium. In the intervening years development and ORV activity increased markedly, and snakes abandoned most areas by 2020. ORV activity in those sites still utilized for nesting increased to high and very high. In 2020, ORV activity ranged from very low (7%) to very high (19%) of the 42 nests. With increasing urban development, nesting pine snakes are using mainly paleodunes deep in the forest, and are exposed to high or very high ORV activity (43%), suggesting concern for viable snake populations in the wake of continued human activity and ORV use.

     

Paired domination versus domination and packing number in graphs

Journal of Combinatorial Optimization - Given a graph $$G=(V(G), E(G))$$ , the size of a minimum dominating set, minimum paired dominating set, and a minimum total dominating set of a graph G are...     

Public policy towards immigrants in poland’s shrinking cities – The case study of the city of Lomza

Some regions and cities in Poland face challenges due to an accelerating depopulation. Simultaneously, Poland is host to more than 2 million immigrants who mitigate the negative consequences of the population outflow and ageing. While bigger Polish cities adopted particular local strategies and measures addressed to migrants, the situation of smaller cities and towns, especially the shrinking ones, has not yet been explored. Therefore, we took a closer look at Lomza, a downscaled middle-sized city in the east of Poland where two phenomena occur: the accelerating depopulation caused mainly by the outflow of its residents and an inflow of foreign migrants, both asylum seekers predominantly coming from Russia (Chechnya) and economic migrants mainly from Ukraine. We explored the state of the public policy towards immigrants in Lomza in order to see what a shrinking city can offer its newcomers when it cannot count on national strategy in this regard.     

COVID-19: Impact on children living in out-of-home care and their carers

Children enter out-of-home care (OOHC) having experienced significant childhood adversities and trauma. Little is known about the short-term impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on this vulnerable group. To gain some insights, we analysed the early impacts on the well-being and experiences of children in OOHC and their carers using the Pathways of Care Longitudinal Study data prior to and post the first lockdown restrictions. A total of 862 children, young people and their carers were interviewed either pre-COVID-19 restrictions (n = 567) (April 2019–March 2020) or post-COVID-19 restrictions (n = 295) (June–December 2020). While the two groups showed no significant differences in socio-emotional well-being, both the pre- and the post-COVID-19 restriction groups of children in OOHC had slight reductions in socio-emotional well-being. The interviews with the post-COVID-19 group showed that the pandemic restrictions affected children's well-being and behaviour, education, social and physical activities, as well as time spent with their birth family. Likewise, interviews with carers post-COVID-19 found a negative effect on carers' well-being, their ability to manage financially and their capacity to care and access services and support. The article contributes new evidence to inform OOHC policy and practice to support service systems facing unique challenges arising from a pandemic.     

Multiple Attribute Decision Making with Inexact Value-Function Assessment

A major issue in value-function assessment is the possibility of receiving an indefinite response from a decision maker to a question about preferences. The conventional treatment requires a single, definite response from the decision maker. This approach either assumes that response error is zero or accepts the final solution as only approximate, without knowing how approximate it might be. In this paper we examine the issue of indefinite responses, define it more precisely, and present a method for incorporating it into decision making. The method is adaptive in that it is iterative and interactive with the decision maker who, at each iteration, is provided with information regarding the potential advantage of answering more trade-off questions and/or answering questions more carefully to reduce response error. In contrast to other approaches that “force” rationality and decisiveness, we work with irrationality and indecisiveness on the part of the decision maker. The method is demonstrated for the case of concave, increasing value functions.