Anticiper ou temporiser : injonctions environnementales et recompositions des identités professionnelles en céréaliculture

Questions about the modernization of farming, given its environmental impact, are leading French farmers to rework their occupational identities. This is studied by comparing cereal growers who practice “integrated protection” — a form of agriculture that saves on input — with their “conventional” colleagues. Given the high degree of uncertainty about the standards that will be imposed, cereal farmers have adopted positions that contrast with regard to: the future (anticipating vs. stalling for time), “professional excellence” (whether or not to accept lower yields) and risks (whether to adopt strategies turned toward vigilance or toward insurance). The diffusion of innovative farming practices is limited owing to their lack of legitimacy, which leads farmers to explore the possibilities for obtaining legitimation from outside the profession.     

Consuming conventions: sustainable consumption, ecological citizenship and the worlds of worth

In light of the recognition that current patterns of consumption in the developed world are environmentally damaging, the question of sustainable consumption has become increasingly prominent in public and policy discourse. This paper joins an emerging body of work that critiques the behaviorist perspectives that currently dominate the field and specifically, a case is made for using conventions theory (Boltanski and Thévenot, 1991) to complement the ‘social practices’ approach to consumption, sustainability and everyday life. Drawing on a qualitative study of persons who identified themselves as attempting to live in ways that are environmentally more friendly, the analysis first explores the ways in which sustainable consumption intersects and overlaps with other practices and imperatives. Attention is paid to the competing demands of day to day living and the ways in which cultural conventions work - or not - to legitimate practices of sustainable consumption. The second part of the analysis discusses the citizenship relations that are articulated through practices of sustainable consumption and here, attention is paid to the conventions that underpin the imperative to reduce the environmental impacts of personal consumption. Taken together, I consider the possibility that environmental conventions might be emerging from the empirical material alongside the ways in which these might operate in support of sustainable consumption. To conclude I suggest that the experiments in practice encountered here are unlikely to generate the conventions through which sustainable forms of consumption can be normalized and integrated into everyday lives.     

Motivating talents in Thai and Malaysian service firms

Talent development in Thailand and Malaysian service firms has become a prioritized human resource management practice as these societies move toward knowledge-based economies. This paper discusses talent management in the social, organizational and managerial context of firms in Thailand and Malaysia, and argues that such structures often counterbalance investments made in talent development. The paper concludes that new human resource management practices do not produce a difference per se. It is the mindset and attitude of various managers that makes the difference. The learning for practitioners is that they need to adapt existing social and organizational structures to their new human resource management practices. The paper is based mainly on qualitative interviews with human resource managers from Thai and Malaysian service firms.     

透视新制度经济学视野中的国家法与民间法

新制度经济学关于正式制度与非正式制度的分类及对两者在制度结构、制度绩效、制度联动和制度变迁等方面关系的阐释,恰是用来释解我国学者语境中国家法与民间法论题的对应框架,并为我们提供了一种看待国家法与民间法关系的新颖理论智识,对在该论域研究的知识增量中吸纳国外先进经验和输入其他学科方法具有重要的借鉴和启发意义。     

浅析农村社会存在的违法行政问题--由"精神病人死得其‘锁''"引发的思考

农村存在大量违法行政现象的主要原因是由于行政执法者和农民的法律意识淡薄、农村社区的行政执法监督机制不健全、缺乏相应的物质条件等方面的因素,以及由此导致的执法存在乡村习俗与国家法的“合作”、执法过程中的“低成本”运作、以及由此导致的法律权威尚未树立等问题。从我国法治建设的进程、农村的经济发展和权力运行模式和农民主体意识的养成等方面看,农村通往法治的路仍然相当漫长。     

美国研究型大学本科生科研的实践与启示——以罗格斯大学为例

本科生参与科研是美国研究型大学本科生教育改革的一项重要措施。通过几十年的发展,本科生科研已成为美国几乎所有研究型大学的重要教学活动,相关的机制也得到不断地改进和完善。以美国罗格斯大学为例,介绍它本科生科研的实施机构、校外设施,特别是它在过去十年中逐步建立和完善的针对不同年级本科生的研究计划和辅助措施以及它们的实施情况,并通过分析从中得出一些对中国高校有价值的启示。     

Pollutant Ground Concentrations of Nonneutrally Buoyant Particles

A methodology is suggested for the estimation of the mass density and the cumulative ground deposition of a nonvolatile, nonneutrally buoyant, air pollutant (liquid or solid) released from a polluted column (following an explosion caused during routine operation in, e.g., the chemical industry or due to any kind of hostile act) and deposited on the ground via gravitational settling. In many cases, the deposited mass due to gravitational settling constitutes a significant fraction of the original inventory released from the source. Implementation of the methodology in preliminary risk assessments can serve as an efficient tool for emergency planning for both immediate and long‐term measures such as evacuation and decontamination. The methodology considers, inter alia, an estimation of the critical particle diameter, particle size, and mass distributions along the polluted column. This methodology was developed to apply in rural regions since proper application of relevant meteorological input data can be accomplished mainly for such areas.     

Kinship care or upbringing by relatives? The need for ‘new’ understandings in research

This article addresses knowledge production on formal kinship foster care. In spite of growing interest in this phenomenon, little attention has been paid to how kinship care should be understood in research – as a service under child protective services or as upbringing by relatives. Each of these understandings leads to different research questions and creates guidelines for what falls into or outwith the focus of research. In kinship care research, this phenomenon has primarily been studied as a service. Research that seeks to evaluate the effect of kinship care compared to non-kinship care is used as a case to discuss the implications for the type of knowledge that researchers produce. While we acknowledge the importance of this research, we demonstrate the many challenges it involves and why this should not be the primary focus in kinship care research. On the background of these limitations, we argue in favour of approaching kinship care as upbringing by relatives – as ways in which family life can be organised and structured. This can lead to relevant knowledge that will enable us to obtain a better understanding of what kinship care is and involves.     

Re-bounding EU citizenship from below: practices of healthcare for ‘(Il)legitimate EU Migrants’ in Italy

Since multiple crises are currently affecting Europe, interest on changes in intra-EU mobility patterns, policies and EU movers’ strategies of integration has re-emerged in academic debates. What seems to still lack to date is a focus on the chaining actors linking the macro level of policies and the micro level of individual strategies, that is, civil servants who are in charge of implementing national policies in their daily encounters with EU citizens. Through an in-depth qualitative analysis of formal policies and daily practices in the field of healthcare for EU citizens in Piedmont, in the North of Italy, this contribution analyses how EU citizens’ right to free movement and equal access to social protection is officially framed and concretely enacted within the boundaries of the Italian National Healthcare System and the role of health workers as de facto citizenship-makers. It suggests that, along with managerial orientations, different evaluations of the Italian economic and financial situation, and of EU citizens’ root motivations behind their decisions to move across Europe play a crucial role in shaping health workers’ assessments of EU citizens’ deservingness of healthcare.     

Impacts of child development accounts on parenting practices: evidence from a randomised statewide experiment

ABSTRACT

This study examines the impact of Child Development Accounts (CDAs) on parenting practices of mothers with young children in a statewide randomised experiment conducted in the United States. The experiment included 2704 primary caregivers of children born in Oklahoma during 2007: 1358 were randomly assigned to the treatment group and 1346 to the control group. Structural equation modelling suggests that the punitive-parenting score among treatment participants was .12 standard deviations smaller than that among control participants (p < . 05). Findings indicate that CDAs reduce punitive parenting, and may serve as an additional tool for positive parent–child interactions.