The Political Mobilization of the Arab Minority in Israel: Shifts in Political Demands and Activities

Previous scholarly work on the demands and political activities of the Arab minority in Israel have focused on studying Arab political parties and parliamentary participation, asserting that Arab demands fall into one of two categories: radical or adaptive. That is, in studying Arab participation, or lack thereof, in parliamentary processes, one can claim that Arabs want either complete separation from the state of Israel (radical demands) or complete integration into the state of Israel (adaptive demands). However, recent trends have witnessed a decrease in Arab Israelis’ interest in political parties and parliamentary participation, such as voting in Knesset elections and attempts to pass legislation. This disinterest is a direct result of the inability and inefficiency of parliamentary processes to make practical changes in the daily lives of the Arab minority, who are underprivileged, socio-economically, politically, and legally. However, disinterest in parliamentary processes does not translate into disinterest in political mobility, and consequently, Arab Israelis have turned to other means, particularly extra-parliamentary organization, to achieve their demands. This paper then takes a different approach in that I study extra-parliamentary organizations to explore the nature of Arab demands towards the Israeli government. In studying extra-parliamentary organization, I have found that the nature of Arab demands no longer fall within the radical-adaptive dichotomy proposed by previous scholars. Rather, the Arab minority’s demands can be described as being ethnoregional in nature. That is, the Arab minority in Israel demand collective national rights based on the fragmented geographical regions they occupy

Evolving game theory based decision making systems for NETA power market modelling, analysis and trading strategy development

In this thesis, current work carried out on analyzing the strategic behaviours in electricity trading is first reviewed. An intelligent decision-making and support technique, game theory, is often used in the market practice. Game theory is a discipline concerned with how individuals make decisions when they are partly aware of how their action might affect each other and when each individual might take this into account. Deficiencies and limitations of traditional game theory based methods developed for decision-making in electricity trading are also investigated. This research then explores to discover the impact of intelligent systems based trading strategies in the UK power markets. To model these behaviours and the New Electricity Trading Arrangements (NETA) system of the UK, traditional competitive and cooperative game theory strategies are taken into account in the work reported in this thesis. An improved methodology, “trigger price strategy”, is introduced to simulate power generation companies’ enhanced gaming strategies. Such modelling problem is, however, intractable and hence an extra-numerical search technique, Evolutionary Computation, is employed to solve the game theory based system modelling problem. An encoded Genetic Algorithm based technique is developed to search for an effective model for the complex decision-making process and to help decision-makers evaluate their strategies and bidding parameters. A novel and effective electricity trading simulation model is thus developed, where its design features are close to the NETA. The model scale is as close as possible to NETA. A complex and more realistic two-sided transaction mechanism with demand fully incorporated is incorporated in this model. These are a world first in this research area

Factors Behind Ruined Communication in Contemporary Marriages

Appreciating the significance of communication to every solid relationship, its importance to intimate relationship such as marital union can never be overemphasized.  In fact, A marriage without effective communication among the spouse is likely to crumble like a pack of cards.  Communication often regarded as the life wire of marital relationship is been threatens by some factors. This paper relied on existing literature to conceptually explicate the forces behind ruined communication in contemporary marriages. The contemporary world is seeing the evolvement of some forces that ruined effective communication flow in marriage.  Cultural friction, intercultural relationship, extended family influence, poor communication skills, language barrier, communication defects and distraction from ICT are some of the identified factors that can cause ruined communication in marriage.  Therefore, for couples to enjoy communication flow in their marital affairs, it is important that they understood these factors and how they can be avoided. Keywords: communication, interpersonal communication, marriage, and ruined communication DOI: 10.7176/NMMC/81-04 Publication date:June 30th 201

Role of Art in International Relations : Analysis of the key operational patterns on the example of French cultural cluster

Reflecting on the role of art in the socio-cultural context would be unfair not to notice its unconventional nature of the transformation, definition, and understanding, depending on the time, place, and society, which would start the dispute. Yet, there is still no one answer or guide on how does art work as a singular system, using multiple mediums for translating, spreading, and sharing values from one culture to the another, without destroying origins of the message, but organically adopting it for the new environment. Luckily there is a set of tendencies kept by centuries, analysis of which might bring a clear understanding of the key patterns, which allowed art to thrive to its full potential or at least release the conceived mission, depending on the circumstances. Nowadays, France is one of the few if not the only country which often associates with the “cradle of culture”, fine arts, and aesthetics, whether it happened due to the changes throughout the 17 - 18th centuries or was it forming along the way, followed by the nature of origins of art - would be the matter to explore. By analyzing the nature of the appearance of the first art institutions and representative agents in France, this thesis will study the evolution of the cultural cluster and its expansion throughout the borders, which afterward greatly contributed to the political image of modern France, influenced its growth, expansion and multiplying investment potential for the foreign partners

Unlocking Agility: Building Learning Capabilities Within A Consumer Healthcare Organization

Pharmaceutical companies are increasingly infusing the concept of agility to strive for continuous improvement. Significant exploration and research have focused on more technical-driven departments, like Information Technology and Research and Development. However, there has been little research with the focus on more process-driven functions, like Learning and Organizational Development. This action research study presents a case study of the implementation of a new training solution within a consumer healthcare organization from the lens of the project leader. Building upon the case study, this capstone includes a review of existing research and literature of agility with a focus on the healthcare sector, change management, adult learning, and organizational learning. The overall goal of this study is to explore the value of agility in building learning capacities within the pharmaceutical industry. Looking forward, the aim is to provide insights on how agility can be developed to facilitate an organization’s transformation to become a learning organization

Impact of Coaching by Extension Professionals on Rural Wellness Coalition Success

Objective: To quantitatively assess coaches perceived confidence in coaching rural wellness coalitions and to qualitatively determine barriers and facilitators to success in coaching rural wellness coalitions. Design: A mixed methods design was utilized with quantitative (scorecard) and qualitative (key informant interviews) methodologies. Setting: Six rural South Dakota wellness coalitions. Participants: Extension wellness coalition coaches (n=7), one previous and six current. Intervention: A component of the broader SDSU Extension 1416 Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program Education (SNAP-Ed) intervention. Analysis: STATA was utilized for the quantitative scorecard data by running paired ttests. NVivo was utilized in the analysis of the qualitative key informant interview data by coding transcript to themes and then using a query matrix. Results: Perceived confidence scores of coaches were found to be significantly different at post-intervention compared to pre-intervention (13.6 (8.6) vs 19.7 (9.3), P=0.02). Key facilitators for the Extension Coaches included: perception of coach role, Extension resources, community members, wellness coalition policy, systems, and environmental changes, and community champion community involvement and availability. One key barrier was lack of training when starting. Conclusions and Implications: Extension coaches can expect confidence in their coaching abilities to increase over time. This includes being better equipped to handle barriers and an understanding of facilitators to aid in coalition success. Future research should examine additional training for Extension coaches, particularly prior to facilitating wellness coalitions

Neo-Atlantis: Dutch Responses to Five Meter Sea Level Rise

What would happen to the Netherlands if, in 2030, the sea level starts to rise and eventually, after 100 years, a sea level of five meters above current level would be reached? Two socio-economic scenarios are developed from a literature review and by interviews with researchers and practicionersin the domains of social sciences, economics, civil engineering, and land use planning. One scenario describes what would happen in a future characterised by a trend towards further globalisation, marketisation and high economic growth, while the other scenario happens in a future under opposite trends. Under both scenarios, the Southwest and Northwest of the Netherlands – already now below seal level - would be abandoned because of sea level rise. Although most experts believe that geomorphology and current engineering skills allow to largely maintain the territorial integrity of the Netherlands, there are some reasons to assume that this is not likely to happen. Social processes that precede important political decisions – such as the growth of the belief in the reality of SLR and the framing of such decision in a proper political context (policy window) – evolve slowly. Although a flood disaster would speed up decision-making, the general expectation is that decisions would come too late in view of the rate of SLR and the possible pace of construction of works.Extreme sea level rise, The Netherlands, flood defences

Exploring Scientific Discourse on Marine Litter in Europe:Review of Sources, Causes and Solutions

Marine litter is a transboundary environmental issue that affects all the world’s oceans. Marine litter research is a young discipline but one that has exploded during the last five years. However, the increased knowledge of sources and underlying causes to marine litter, as well as knowledge regarding solutions, lack systematic review and synthesis. This study reviews the scientific discourses around plastic marine litter in Europe, and more specifically, in Norway and Denmark, and explores emerging discourse coalitions. Four main thematic storylines on the source-cause-solution causal relationship, as well as two emerging storylines within marine litter research, are found. This study concludes that in order to secure sustainability of solutions and to avoid risk transformation and greenwashing, more interdisciplinary research, including life cycle assessment, is needed. The data set contains three elements: *Full sample* contains all data (both excluded and included articles. Coloums can be sortet and filtered to focus on specific topics. Analysis concept based on PRISMA *Timeline* harvest relevant data from 'full sample' for table 4 in the article. Cross year topic-counts are used for figure 3 in the article. *Storyline-connections* harvest relevant data from 'full sample' for figure 3 in the articl

The Future of Digital Platform Design - The Case of the EU Platform Regulation Discourse

Digital platform research focuses on the mechanisms in digital platform ecosystems and the dynamics between platform owners, complementors, and end-users. Recent studies begin looking beyond the boundaries of narrow platform ecosystems. The development of the European Union’s Digital Markets Act (DMA) is a revelatory case to study this wider perspective of ecosystems and its dynamics. Hundreds of actors participated in discourses on the regulation, which aims to regulate so-called gatekeeper platforms that are alleged to be powerful, unfair to platform users, and incontestable for competitors. By means of a critical discourse analysis, we coded 1720 contributions on the proposed and adopted DMA between June 2020 and July 2022. We identify 72 positions and 16 narratives along 5 discourses. Our study creates a better understanding of a wider perspective of platform ecosystem structure that goes beyond the triangle of platform owner, complementors, and end users