Regulating Under Uncertainty: Newsboy for Exposure Limits

Setting action levels or limits for health protection is complicated by uncertainty in the dose-response relation across a range of hazards and exposures. To address this issue, we consider the classic newsboy problem. The principles used to manage uncertainty for that case are applied to two stylized exposure examples, one for high dose and high dose rate radiation and the other for ammonia. Both incorporate expert judgment on uncertainty quantification in the dose-response relationship. The mathematical technique of probabilistic inversion also plays a key role. We propose a coupled approach, whereby scientists quantify the dose-response uncertainty using techniques such as structured expert judgment with performance weights and probabilistic inversion, and stakeholders quantify associated loss rates.     

FATHERS,WORK AND FAMILY LIFE

This paper presents a policy analysis of fathers’ use of paternity leave, parental leave and flexible work practices across several industrialised countries. From the late 1990s there has been a rapid expansion of leave and flexible working provision targeted at fathers, especially in the Nordic countries. New evidence on predictors and patterns of fathers’ leave taking are reviewed. Findings suggest that paternal leave taking has the potential to boost fathers’ practical and emotional investment in infant care.     

Border crossings/translations: Resources of hope in community work with women in Greater Manchester

This article offers two case studies of community development work undertaken in Greater Manchester, United Kingdom, focusing on a Somali Women's Health Day and the work of a community arts project with Asian women, Black Issues in Community Arts/Karishma. The analysis of the operation of racialised borders and the role of women's work in mediating these definitions of community is taken as a critical aspect of community development. Theoretical development of ideas about community development across division and difference draws on recent feminist theory on themes of hybridity and community. In both the accounts of practice and the theoretical debates, translation is the central practice analysed. Este artículo ofrece estudios de dos trabajos de desarrollo comunitario que tuvieron lugar en Greater Manchester en el Reino Unido. Se centra en un Día de la Salud de Mujeres Somalias y en un proyecto artístico entre mujeres provenientes del subcontinente de India llamado ‘Temas de Raza Negra en Artes Comunitarias/Karishma’. Se considera que el análisis de la operación de fronteras racistas y del rol de las mujeres en mediar estas delimitaciones es un aspecto crítico de desarrollo comunitario. Se recurre a la teoría reciente femenista sobre temas de hibrididad y comunidad para el desarrollo teórico de ideas acerca del desarrollo comunitario a través de división y diferencia.     

The Place of Single Session Family Consultations: Five Years’ Experience in Canberra

Open Day, in the form of two half day single session family clinics, has operated weekly in the ACT Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service since April 1993 and over a thousand families have been seen. Clinicians are often resistant to the concept of single sessions and frequently overestimate the amount of assistance that clients feel they require. However in an era of sharply increasing demand for services, selective use of single family sessions for milder problems, screened by a telephone intake process, has value to both families and workers. Telephone follow-ups of 100 families in 1994 and 70 families in 1996 found that single session family interviews were well accepted by the large majority of families seen. Clinicians see the program as reducing pressure from clients for early attention, enhancing client motivation when seen at crisis times, providing readily available consultation support from peers, increasing learning opportunities and building inter-disciplinary team work.     

Rethinking the construction of welfare in Mexico: Going beyond the economic measures

This study utilized a multidimensional measure of social welfare composed of 26 social indicators integrated in nine categories: education, employment and social protection, income, health, housing conditions, subjective wellbeing, social capital, use of technology, and culture and leisure to help understand social welfare in Mexico. We also compared the integrated measure with the Human Development Index. Estimation was performed using the method. Our analysis indicated that the health and housing conditions categories contributed the most to social welfare across the 32 Mexican States. In relation to the indicators, income and trust in other people were associated with welfare. Further, results on the welfare ranking of Mexican states revealed variations between the two indices and the HDI). Specifically, only four states occupied the same position on both indices, ten recorded different positions on moving up or down from their levels of social welfare. Implications of observed correlations are presented.     

民族玩偶的伦理:在中国西南进行旅游研究

以中国西南地区彝族(Sani)的一些具有民族特色的符号装饰被使用于旅游产品的开发和旅游产品的生产和交换,以探讨"民族"是如何被装点在民族旅游活动当中的.     

Boundary Making and ‘Good’ Stem Cell Research (SCR) in Mainland China: Including Bioethics,Excluding Debate

This study probes into what public Chinese stem cell scientists involve in defining what is ‘good research practice’. Thomas Gieryn in 1983 argued that scientists draw up boundaries between the realm of ‘real science’ and that of ‘pseudoscience’ in order to claim and defend their own territory. The aim was to protect the autonomy of scientific research and to elicit financial support and political backup (Gieryn, American Sociological Review, 48(6), 781–795, 1983). This article builds on, redefines and extends Gieryn’s concept of ‘boundary-work’ to apply to and include boundaries between ethical and non-ethical science, while emphasising the global scope of boundary work. It shows how scientists use both ‘science’ and ‘bioethics’ boundaries to demarcate their own territory and to exclude certain publics from debate in the field. By elaborating Gieryn’s concept of boundary work in the new and different context of bioethical science regulation, the article shows how Chinese stem cell scientists, by using both kinds of boundaries—between science and pseudoscience and between ethical and non-ethical science—at the same time welcome and abhor bioethical research regulation. This article also indicates the need to understand this extended form of boundary making in terms of global science collaboration and competition. It shows how the self-awareness of scientists as global actors in stem cell science has led to a moral economy of science and ethics involving global boundaries rather than local conditions. Such boundary making does not just function to strengthen group identity and to elicit political support; it is also mobilised to direct and, in many cases, to ward off discussion with bioethicists and the public.     

A contingency theory of corruption: The effect of human development and national culture

Corruption is a world-wide problem that disproportionately affects those with the fewest personal and economic resources. It was hypothesized that human development restricts corruption, and the magnitude of such an effect is contingent upon the conditions of national culture. Measures were gathered for 68 countries that account for 80% of the world's population. Support was found for the main effect of human development on corruption. Consistent with contingency theory, results also indicate that the relation between human development and corruption is moderated by power distance and individualism. Implications for policy making to reduce corruption are discussed.