International factors in the formation of refugee movements

The authors construct a theoretical framework for analyzing factors influencing international refugee movements. "On the basis of detailed case studies by the authors of the principal refugee flows generated in Asia, Africa, and Latin America from approximately 1960 to the present, it was found that international factors often intrude both directly and indirectly on the major types of social conflict that trigger refugee flows, and tend to exacerbate their effects. Refugees are also produced by conflicts that are manifestly international, but which are themselves often related to internal social conflict among the antagonists."     

Employment status, psychiatric disability and quality of life: comparison of men and women with schizophrenia in Malaysia

This study explores the association between employment opportunities, psychiatric disability and quality of life of male and female patients with schizophrenia. The data were collected from 100 male and 100 female patients and their primary caregivers through personal interviews. The Disability Assessment Schedule and the Quality of Life Interview were used to collect the data. The results of the present study indicate that a large number of both the men and women were unemployed, although they suffered from only mild psychotic symptoms and had no or only minimum psychiatric disability. However, in almost all areas and levels of psychiatric disability, a significantly higher number of men than women were employed. However, the subjective Quality of Life of the employed men was significantly lower than that of the unemployed. Keeping in mind these two results, the present study argues that there is minimal community recognition in Malaysia for the employment potential of people with schizophrenia. The study also argues that policy makers must legislate to create more appropriate workplaces for the mentally ill. People with schizophrenia are entitled to just and fair treatment, and workplaces should be made attractive to them.     

Long-term low-dose dehydroepiandrosterone replacement therapy in aging males with partial androgen deficiency

Dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA) and dehydroepiandrosterone sulfate (DHEAS) age-related withdrawal is very likely to be involved in the aging process and the onset of age-related diseases, giving rise to the question of whether preventing or compensating the decline of these steroids may have endocrine and clinical benefits. The aim of the present trial was to evaluate the endocrine, neuroendocrine and clinical consequences of a long-term (1 year), low-dose (25?mg/day) replacement therapy in a group of aging men who presented the clinical characteristics of partial androgen deficiency (PADAM). Circulating DHEA, DHEAS, androstenedione, total testosterone and free testosterone, dihydrotestosterone (DHT), progesterone, 17-hydroxyprogesterone, allopregnanolone, estrone, estradiol, sex hormone binding globulin (SHBG), cortisol, follicle stimulating hormone (FSH), luteinizing hormone (LH), growth hormone (GH) and insulin-like growth factor 1 (IGF-1) levels were evaluated monthly to assess the endocrine effects of the therapy, while β-endorphin values were used as a marker of the neuroendocrine effects. A Kupperman questionnaire was performed to evaluate the subjective symptoms before and after treatment.

The results showed a great modification of the endocrine profile; with the exception of cortisol levels, which remained unchanged, DHEA, DHEAS, androstenedione, total and free testosterone, DHT, progesterone, 17-hydroxyprogesterone, estrone, estradiol, GH, IGF-1 and β-endorphin levels increased significantly with respect to baseline values, while FSH, LH and SHBG levels showed a significant decrease. The Kupperman score indicated a progressive improvement in mood, fatigue and joint pain.

In conclusion, the present study demonstrates that 25?mg/day of DHEA is able to cause significant changes in the hormonal profile and clinical symptoms and can counteract the age-related decline of endocrine and neuroendocrine functions. Restoring DHEA levels to young adult values seems to benefit the age-related decline in physiological functions but, however promising, placebo-controlled trials are required to confirm these preliminary results.     

The next waves: migration theory for a changing world

In the last quarter of a century, migration theory has undergone fundamental change, moving from the classic "individual relocation" genre initiated by Ravenstein a century ago, to a variety of new approaches which nevertheless share important elements: they tend to be historical, structural, globalist, and critical. Historicization implies a constant modification of theoretical concerns and emphases in the light of changing social realities, and a commitment to a critical approach entails a view of research as 1 element in a broader project concerned with the elucidation of social and political conditions. The article uses elements from 2 major theoretical traditions - a modified world-systems approach and state theory - to project current trends. Global inequality is considered as a structural given. The article then reviews major topics, including the persistence of restrictive immigration policies as barriers to movement, changing patterns of exploitation of foreign labor, liberalization of exit from the socialist world, and the refugee crisis in the developing world. It concludes with a brief consideration of the normative implications of these trends.     

Conflicting visions in American art museums

Conclusion By their nature, American art museums are pluralistic institutions. They cannot be simply characterized as the hobbies of affluent amateurs, or ivory towers for research or, despite appearances, playgrounds for the people. To some extent they are all of these together, but with more or less emphasis on each, depending upon the support which each of the principal sets of actors is capable of mustering. Trustees, curators, and managers each possess a legitimacy which they have used to effect the pursuit of their unofficial goals, some of which converge with those of the institution itself. The level of success they attained is modified by trends external to the institution, including scholarly and professional developments, art market activity, pressure from aspiring elites, and the emergence of new funding sources.Collecting involves the transformation of material into symbolic capital and is, therefore, a process in which museums play a pivotal role. Since trustees and prospective donors are continuing and even increasing their involvement in art collecting, whether from aesthetic interest or for speculative purposes, external processes of elite formation will continue to affect the art museum. Its aesthetic policies will result in gains and losses for particular individuals or groups, whether in the museum, or aspiring to enter. As repositories of art, museums are, therefore, willy-nilly linked to an external market whose speculations impinge upon their collections and exhibitions. Since principal actors are never totally insulated from it, and are even recruited in part because of their knowledge of it, a position in a museum itself may advance the interests of the parties involved. This lack of insulation from markets and the relative accessibility of non-professionals to its information helps to explain why the parallels between museums and other institutions, such as universities and hospitals, are not more striking. Museum professionalism diverges from that found in educational or medical institutions, where laymen have a difficult time justifying their intervention in abstruse scientific decisions. Yet, in spite of their lack of expertise, occasions when they do intervene still occur. If there is lay interference even where professionalism and scientifically validated criteria are entrenched, then it is all the more understandable that it would arise where external disciplinary canons are relatively less established, and the gap between laymen and experts is not so great. Though development of scientific scholarship created new reference groups for curators, they are still more closely tied to wealthy collectors than are their European counterparts who may be more research-oriented and have existing collections with little likelihood of donations, since structural supports for altruism (e.g., tax deductions for donations) are minimal or lacking. Thus in spite of the existence of structures to isolate curators from trustees, they still compete among themselves for each other's support; the trustees for inclusion, the curators for pre-selection of works. But curator-trustee relations are not the only sensitive spots in art museums. With the growth of external public subsidies from federal and state governments and with the likelihood of their continuation into the future, although not necessarily at as rapid a rate of increase as in recent years, the balance of forces within the institution is likely to be shaken. Public support entails two requirements: organizational accountability and greater accessibility to large publics. Both of these demands emphasize the rising importance of bureaucratic managers. Like curators of the past, they have been the servants of the Board. But just as curators grasped at external developments in scholarship and professional organizations on which to base their legitimation, bureaucratic managers are following an analogous path. Eschewing aesthetic expertise, they try to run museums as rationally as they claim modern firms function: introducing methods of membership development (including advertisement), gaining control of local patronage markets, and lobbying for and trying to monopolize governmental funding sources. On the whole they have no power base within the museum, since they are resented by curatorial personnel, and are viewed as mere technicians by trustees. But the expertise that they bring to bear on organizational functioning is becoming a necessity for efficient operations and justification of the public funds received. Not surprisingly, schools of business administration and universities are offering specialized training in arts management. But the newly trained managers are likely to differ from the older. Since they are largely self-selected rather than drifting into cultural organizations, they may be more committed to the arts from the outset than their predecessors. Impressionistic evidence suggests that they are more likely to include women than is true in other bureaucracies.While it is impossible to predict precisely what the outcome of their entry into museums will be, it is likely that new alliances may emerge. If at the moment curatorial professionals are suspicious of administrators, preferring to cajole their friendly trustee to act on their behalf, they may find it in their interest to forge new alliances with managers, especially as managers gain influence through their ability to solicit government and foundation funding. Furthermore, managers are less tied to an institution than are curators, since their skills are more easily convertible to other organizations or government agencies, while curators face an overcrowded market in museums and universities. The post-professional era is shaped by their growing importance, but is not wholly determined by it. Rather, their presence heightens the perpetual state of tension inherent in the multi-purpose institution the art museum.

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