Squashed dreams and rare breeds: ableism and the arbiters of life and death

The week beginning 29 June 2015 is not just historic for the closure of the Independent Living Fund in the United Kingdom, but for me was the week they decided that my life is not worth investing in; they being NHS England, NICE and, with them, the Department of Health. They chose not to support the enzyme replacement therapy that has been not only keeping me alive, but giving me a quality of life – enabling me to return to finish my Disability Studies PhD exploring how Christian leaders explain disability, where ethics have become the main topic, and to rebuild my career – or so I thought.     

社会发展内涵探析

作为马克思主义哲学研究的社会发展，不是对具体的社会发展问题进行实证研究，而主要是运用逻辑手段，对复杂的社会发展现象进行抽象、概括，揭示出社会整体发展的普遍本质和一般规律。为了对社会发展有一个较为全面的理解，从社会、社会革命、社会变迁、社会转型与社会发展之间的关系入手进行了探讨。     

Social work students' conception on roles within the family in Greece

The present article is based on a small-scale research that took place with third-year students in the department of social work at Technological Educational Institute of Patras. During class the students, who undertake the laboratory course ‘Social Work with Families’, were asked to discuss family roles and depict them on drawings. Analysing their drawings in a qualitative approach the findings suggest that students adopt traditional views on family issues and the family roles. Various gender stereotypes and prejudices were reflected in students' drawings and this is alarming for both social work education and practice.     

试述马克思主义大众化传播应坚持的四个基本原则

马克思主义大众化传播是一个极其复杂、艰巨的社会系统工程。学术界对于马克思主义大众化传播应该坚持什么样的原则和方法也是众说纷纭。从当代世界和中国现实情况、信息传播技术飞速发展的时代背景,以及马克思主义理论创新发展的内在规律出发,马克思主义大众化传播应坚持指导思想一元和文化价值多元的统一、理论逻辑和生活逻辑的统一、科学性与通俗性的统一、传承性和开放性的统一等四个基本原则。     

调整和优化我国社会结构的机制路径选择

改革开放以来，我国社会获得前所未有的飞跃发展，而社会结构却明显滞后于经济结构，社会管理中的各种问题和矛盾日益凸显，社会结构基本呈现亚稳态特征。当今社会建设的核心是创新社会管理机制，优化调整社会结构。     

Spectacles of intimacy? Mapping the moral landscape of teenage social media

This paper explores young people's expressed concerns about privacy in the context of a highly mediated cultural environment, mapping social media practices against axes of visibility and participation. Drawing on interdisciplinary conceptual resources from both the humanities and social sciences, we use ‘spectacles of intimacy’ to conceptualise breaches of privacy, mapping an emergent moral landscape for young people that moves beyond concerns with e-safety to engage with the production and circulation of audiences and value. The paper draws on data from a methodological innovation project using multi-media and mixed methods to capture lived temporalities for children and young people. We present a model that captures a moral landscape shaped by emotional concerns about social media, the affordances of those media and affective discourses emerging from young people's use of the media.     

A new financial stress index model based on support vector regression and control chart

Financial stress index (FSI) is considered to be an important risk management tool to quantify financial vulnerabilities. This paper proposes a new framework based on a hybrid classifier model that integrates rough set theory (RST), FSI, support vector regression (SVR) and a control chart to identify stressed periods. First, the RST method is applied to select variables. The outputs are used as input data for FSI–SVR computation. Empirical analysis is conducted based on monthly FSI of the Federal Reserve Bank of Saint Louis from January 1992 to June 2011. A comparison study is performed between FSI based on the principal component analysis and FSI–SVR. A control chart based on FSI–SVR and extreme value theory is proposed to identify the extremely stressed periods. Our approach identified different stressed periods including internet bubble, subprime crisis and actual financial stress episodes, along with the calmest periods, agreeing with those given by Federal Reserve System reports.     

Feminist and empowerment theory and social work practice

Feminist and empowerment theories are especially important to the understanding of individual and sociopolitical levels of social work assessment and intervention. Incorporating feminist and empowerment approaches in practice will provide social workers with the knowledge, values and skills most likely to promote human rights and social justice. In this paper, we present an overview of both theories and illustrate them with a case example.     

Field of study variation throughout the college pipeline and its effect on the earnings gap: Differences between ethnic and immigrant groups in Israel

This study demonstrates the analytical leverage gained from considering the entire college pipeline—including the application, admission and graduation stages—in examining the economic position of various groups upon labor market entry. The findings, based on data from three elite universities in Israel, reveal that the process that shapes economic inequality between different ethnic and immigrant groups is not necessarily cumulative. Field of study stratification does not expand systematically from stage to stage and the position of groups on the field of study hierarchy at each stage is not entirely explained by academic preparation. Differential selection and attrition processes, as well as ambition and aspirations, also shape the position of ethnic groups in the earnings hierarchy and generate a non-cumulative pattern. These findings suggest that a cross-sectional assessment of field of study inequality at the graduation stage can generate misleading conclusions about group-based economic inequality among workers with a bachelor’s degree.     

历史变局、国家兴衰与发展之路——三次千年变局叠加下的中国特色社会主义发展道路

每当先进的发展制度开始取代落后的发展制度时，整个世界格局就会进入重大的转换阶段。在中国五千年的发展历史中，有两次重大的历史变局完全改变了中国历史发展轨迹并深远地影响了当前中国的发展模式。新时代下的中国作为前两次历史变局影响的客体，曾经既是先进发展制度取代落后发展制度的受益者，也经历过作为落后发展制度主体而被先进发展制度冲击的过程。目前世界正处于第三次先进发展制度与落后发展制度交替的历史变局阶段，作为第三次重大历史变局的主体，在三次千年历史变局叠加的背景下，能否有效地认识、适应并改造利用前两次历史变局的经验与教训，构建系统性、科学性、可行性、领先性的中国特色社会主义制度，将决定中国在本次历史变局中能否顺利成为先进发展制度的主体从而实现民族复兴。