Traceability in global governance

An increasingly important challenge in global governance, which in some issue areas has been labelled ‘traceability’, has been to track the cross‐border travels of objects that are associated with positive or negative effects. However, the common properties and identifiable patterns of variation of traceability across issue areas or industries have been insufficiently explored. We identify key properties of traceability systems, including the variation and interactions between the physical properties of the traced object, the positive or negative effects with which it is associated, the monitoring technology, and the institutionalized power relations that activate and constrain traceability systems. We examine and compare traceability systems for food safety, conflict minerals, pharmaceuticals, carbon emissions, money laundering and financial transactions. Understanding traceability in this way is important not only for these cases, but also for understanding interactions between objects, infrastructures, as well as monitoring and political mechanisms in global governance more generally.     

Everybody In? The experience of disabled students in further education

The authors report on a study of student attitudes towards disabled students in three colleges of further education. They found that many non-disabled students were not aware of the various issues facing disabled students at the colleges. Social contact between disabled and non-disabled students was not extensive, although those who had attended school with disabled pupils were more likely to have friendships with disabled students at college. Whilst non-disabled students were strongly supportive of inclusive education in principle, many saw inclusion in the mainstream as conditional on the particular impairment of an individual. Disabled and non-disabled students supported the view that early social and educational contact results in greater mutual understanding, and is of benefit to all students.     

The ideology of social problems: gambling, a case study

Un problème social représente la géneralisation d'une déviation sérieuse par rapport au comportement normatif et comprend des aspects tant objectifs que subjectifs; c'est-à-dire, d'une part, des actes de transgression objectivement vérifiables et, d'autre part, la consience répandue quant à la nature et aux conséquences indésirables de ces comportements. Selon ces critères, le jeu d'argent est généralement considéré - par l'opinion professionnelle non moins que par la non-professionnelle - comme un problème social sésrieux. Un examen de la situation du jeu d'argent mene a la conclusion qu'il n'est pas un problème social et qu'une telle désignation ne répond pas à une analyse critique mais plutôt à un certain ensemble de croyances - une idéologie La conception publique du jeu est analogue à celle que l'on se fait d'autres phénomènes sociaux qui sont de la meme façon dévalues au plan moral. Les aspects problématiques de plusieurs tels phenomenes, surtout dans la ‘societé de masse,’ sont examinés brièvement dans le texte. Dans tous les cas, les données empiriques indiquent clairement que de telles activités constituent une adaptation sociale rationnelle de la part de groupes qui sont généralement des objets de stigmatisation. A social problem is understood to imply a generalized serious departure from normatively sanctioned behaviour, comprising objective as well as subjective aspects; the former manifest by means of objectively verifiable acts of transgression, and the latter consisting of a widespread awareness of the undesirable nature and consequences of the relevant conduct. On these criteria, gambling is by general assent - professional no less than lay - considered to qualify as a serious social problem. Examining the rightful status of gambling as a social problem, this paper concludes such designation does not stand up to critical analysis but derives from a particular set of beliefs - an ideology. The public concept of gambling is analogous to the view taken of other social phenomena, similarly morally devalued. The problematic aspects of several such phenomena, especially of ‘mass society,’ are briefly examined in the present paper. In all instances, empirical evidence clearly suggests such activities constitute socially adaptive rational behaviour for such social groups as generally find themselves the principal targets for stigmatization.     

Research,ideology and practice—a discontinuity

SUMMARY. This paper is concerned essentially with the influence of professional ideology on practice in the field of public child care. In recent years I have become increasingly aware of a discontinuity in the developing theoretical basis for such practice arising from research, and the actual outcomes of such practice as demonstrated by the same research. Whilst acknowledging that there will be an inevitable time lag in implementing some of those research findings, I am concerned that those of us involved in the public care of children, and particularly in the training of the carers, have not yet adjusted our ideological base to take account of the evidence and of certain important principles. By identifying the changing nature of research and examining some of the findings as they relate to factors such as the social context of child care, and the nature of agency policy and practice, I attempt to demonstrate the centrality of concepts such as partnership, consumerism and power sharing. However, I conclude that professional ideologies appear to experience great difficulty in encompassing such concepts     

Implementation of new technology: towards greater manufacturing flexibility

Changes in market characteristics over the past several years are forcing firms to eliminate/minimize dependency on costly buffers of capacity, lead time, or inventory. One way to accomplish this is via appropriate adaptation and enhancement of existing technological infrastructure. Recent technological advances present firms with a wide array of alternative technologies. In this paper, we discuss the impact of new technology on the manufacturing environment and the problems associated with its implementation. We present an integrated framework for implementing such technology based on a consistent hierarchy of organizational objectives and a general foundation of constraint theory.     

青少年饮酒:多种研究方法的综合应用

描述了综合运用定性和定量方法对中国青少年饮酒问题所进行的研究.使用文化人类学中的定量方法对三个已知可预测行为的心理学变量进行初步的小样本研究.这三个心理学变量是:青少年对饮酒行为后果的期望(饮酒期望),青少年对中国传统文化和西方文化所持的观点(文化取向),以及青少年在处理饮酒压力方面所表现的信心(自我效能).定性研究所获得的资料被用来设计问卷,测量饮酒期望,文化取向和自我效能.定量数据的调查在大样本青少年人群中进行.统计分析表明,这些问卷能够发现饮酒者和不饮酒者在饮酒期望、文化取向、自我效能方面的差别.对于调查数据进行深入分析的结果,将为政策的制订和健康教育项目的设计指明方向,降低青少年的饮酒风险.     

A NEW LEARNING APPROACH TO PROCESS IMPROVEMENT IN A TELECOMMUNICATIONS COMPANY

Redesigning and improving business processes to better serve customer needs has become a priority in service industries as they scramble to become more competitive. We describe an approach to process improvement that is being developed collaboratively by applied researchers at US WEST, a major telecommunications company, and the University of Colorado. Motivated by the need to streamline and to add more quantitative power to traditional quality improvement processes, the new approach uses an artificial intelligence (AI) statistical tree growing method using customer survey data to identify operations areas where improvements are expected to affect customers most. This AI/statistical method also identifies realistic quantitative targets for improvement and suggests specific strategies predicted to have high impart. This research, funded in part by the Colorado Advanced Software Institute (CASI) to stimulate profitable innovations, has resulted in a practical methodology used successfully at US WEST to help set process improvement priorities and guide resource allocation decisions throughout the company.     

AN ANALYSIS OF THE QUALITY DIFFERENTIALS IN MALE-FEMALE ACADEMIC PLACEMENTS

This paper attempts to determine if a significant differential existed in the quality of the academic placements of male and female economists for the period 1960 to 1974, and examines the factors at work in such placements. Several reduced form equations of a formal three equation model of the hiring process in the academic labor market are estimated by ordinary least squares regression analysis. The analysis indicates that males had a 22.2 percent advantage in placement quality over women for the period and most of this can be attributed to some form of discrimination.