Making sense of HIV/AIDS: Pascal de Duve and the sensitive historian of education1

ABSTRACT

Since the 1990s historians, in general, have increasingly engaged in critical analyses of the emergence and development of what has come to be known as ‘the HIV/AIDS pandemic’. Historians of education have also become interested in the role-played by education in the history of HIV/AIDS. Although the existing educational histories have successfully examined the multiple and far-reaching power structures that helped shape the educational responses to the disease, I will argue that their focus on ideological and geopolitical power structures runs the risk of losing sight of the crucial and often sensorial responses of individuals who have played a part in the educational history of HIV/AIDS. One such individual is the Flemish philosopher Pascal de Duve, who was diagnosed with HIV in 1989. De Duve’s particular approach to the disease clearly illustrate the importance of the senses in how people attributed particular meanings to HIV/AIDS. Knowing that this approach would prove surprising to both his readership and to his wider television audience, de Duve employed sensory experiences and modes of communication (for instance, gesture) to educative ends. I conclude that an intersensorial approach to the past will render historians of education more sensitive to unexpected personal responses towards HIV/AIDS to unexpected personal responses towards HIV/AIDS.     

Developing Entrepreneurship in Social Work Through International Education. Reflections on a European Intensive Programme

This paper addresses the issue of introducing training on entrepreneurial skills in social work education and illustrates the opportunities offered for doing so by international courses. It presents a critical reflection on the concept of entrepreneurship in social work based on the case of a European Intensive Programme within the Erasmus scheme. It explores the potential of using active experiential learning methods in an international environment and of creating a situation where participants are confronted with ‘real world’ problems so that they can develop entrepreneurial skills. The paper argues that experiences of this kind provide new stimuli and contribute substantially to developing an entrepreneurial mentality, by which is meant innovative and proactive attitudes as well as skills to develop the resources with which to face social problems in an adverse context.     

Spatial Vulnerability of Network Systems under Spatially Local Hazards

A hazard is often spatially local in a network system, but its impact can spread out through network topology and become global. To qualitatively and quantitatively assess the impact of spatially local hazards on network systems, this article develops a new spatial vulnerability model by taking into account hazard location, area covered by hazard, and impact of hazard (including direct impact and indirect impact), and proposes an absolute spatial vulnerability index (ASVI) and a relative spatial vulnerability index (RSVI). The relationship between the new model and some relevant traditional network properties is also analyzed. A case study on the spatial vulnerability of the Chinese civil aviation network system is conducted to demonstrate the effectiveness of the model, and another case study on the Beijing subway network system to verify its relationship with traditional network properties.     

Political Modernisation and Policy Arrangements: A Framework for Understanding Environmental Policy Change

Since its emergence in the early seventies, the environmental policy domain has substantially changed in terms of its content, organisation and instrumentation. Hitherto these changes have been studied primarily as strategic responses of the actors involved. This article aims to conceive recent changes in environmental policies in terms of political modernisation on the one hand, and in terms of the renewal of policy arrangements on the other. Political modernisation refers to structural processes of changing interrelations between state, market and civil society, and to new conceptions and practices of governance. Policy arrangements refer to the substance and the organisation of policy domains in terms of policy discourses, coalitions, rules of the game and resources. This analytical framework aims to do justice to policy dynamics caused by both strategic and structural factors. It therefore provides new perspectives on the understanding of recent changes in environmental policy and also proves to be helpful in improving those policies. Professor Bas Arts holds the chair of the Forest and Nature Conservation Policy Group at Wageningen University, the Netherlands. Professor Pieter Leroy holds the chair of the Department of Political Sciences of the Environment at Radboud University Nijmegen, the Netherlands. Dr. J.P.M. van Tatenhove is Associate Professor at the Environmental Policy Group of Wageningen University, the Netherlands.     

Comments on “a generalization of fisher's exact test in pxq contingency tables using more concordant relations”

The purpose of this note is to criticize Nguyen (1985) for his account of the literature on the generalization of Fisher's exact test and to point out parallels with existing algorithms of the algorithm proposed by Nguyen. Subsequently we will briefly raise some questions on the methodology proposed by Nguyen.

Nguyen (1985) suggests that all literature on exact testing prior to Nguyen & Sampson (1985) is based on the “more probable” relation or Exact Probability Test (EPT) as a test statistic. This is not correct. Yates (1934 - Pearson's X²), Lewontin & Felsenstein (1965 - X²), Agresti & Wackerly (1977 - X², Kendall's tau, Kruskal & Goodman's gamma), Klotz (1966 - Wilcoxon), Klotz & Teng (1977 - Kruskall & Wallis' H), Larntz (1978 - X², loglike-lihood-ratio statistic G², Freeman & Tukey statistic), and several others have investigated exact tests with other statistics than the EPT. In fact, Bennett & Nakamura (1963) are incorrectly cited as they investigated both X² and G², rather than EPT. Also, Freeman & Halton (1951) are incorrectly cited for they generalized Fisher's exact test to pxq tables and not 2xq tables as stated. And they are even predated by Yates (1934) who extended the test to 2×3 tables.