6,205 research outputs found

    Annual report of the officers of the town of Jackson, New Hampshire for the fiscal year ending December 31, 2022.

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    This is an annual report containing vital statistics for a town/city in the state of New Hampshire

    Perceptions of surveillance: exploring feelings held by Black community leaders in Boston toward camera enforcement of roadway infractions

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    Roadway camera enforcement programs have been found to effectively reduce vehicle travel speeds, as well as decrease the number and severity of collisions. Despite a wealth of evaluative research confirming this enforcement approach's aptitude at promoting safer roadway behavior, fewer than 50 % of US states currently host camera-based programs. Public opposition is frequently cited as the cause for the slow proliferation of this enforcement strategy. However, with public demand for police reform having an increasing presence on the national political stage, how might feelings toward camera technology currently stand among groups most marginalized by existing enforcement systems, and how might those feelings vary by type of enforcement application? Through a series of focus groups, this work centers Black voices on matters of surveillance and roadway enforcement by discussing sentiment toward camera programs with Black community leaders. This discussion is contextually situated in Boston, Massachusetts, where legislation that would allow for camera enforcement of roadway infractions is actively being deliberated in the State Senate. Findings culminate in a list of right-sizing and procedural recommendations for policy makers hoping to gain support for camera enforcement, improve roadway safety, and advance racial equity in our systems of policing and governance

    The value of local food partnerships: Covid and beyond

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    The Covid-19 pandemic, and – more recently – soaring food prices have focused attention on how local areas meet the challenges of a fractured food system. This report examines the impacts andachievements of Local Food Partnerships (LFPs) and how LFPs embed and amplify their work to deliver both local and national food priorities. LFPs have been uniquely placed to provide systems leadership and practical solutions through the strategic direction and support of the UK-wide Sustainable Food Places (SFP) programme, established a decade prior to the pandemic. LFPs have been able to pivot to respond with agility to an extended period of national crisis and have moved forward to offer a coherent framework for the transition of local food system. The four dimensions of ‘effectiveness’,‘efficiency’, ‘engagement’, and ‘equity’ highlight the value of LFPs to fill the leadership gap on local food issues

    TOWARDS AN UNDERSTANDING OF EFFORTFUL FUNDRAISING EXPERIENCES: USING INTERPRETATIVE PHENOMENOLOGICAL ANALYSIS IN FUNDRAISING RESEARCH

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    Physical-activity oriented community fundraising has experienced an exponential growth in popularity over the past 15 years. The aim of this study was to explore the value of effortful fundraising experiences, from the point of view of participants, and explore the impact that these experiences have on people’s lives. This study used an IPA approach to interview 23 individuals, recognising the role of participants as proxy (nonprofessional) fundraisers for charitable organisations, and the unique organisation donor dynamic that this creates. It also bought together relevant psychological theory related to physical activity fundraising experiences (through a narrative literature review) and used primary interview data to substantiate these. Effortful fundraising experiences are examined in detail to understand their significance to participants, and how such experiences influence their connection with a charity or cause. This was done with an idiographic focus at first, before examining convergences and divergences across the sample. This study found that effortful fundraising experiences can have a profound positive impact upon community fundraisers in both the short and the long term. Additionally, it found that these experiences can be opportunities for charitable organisations to create lasting meaningful relationships with participants, and foster mutually beneficial lifetime relationships with them. Further research is needed to test specific psychological theory in this context, including self-esteem theory, self determination theory, and the martyrdom effect (among others)

    A cosmopolitan international law: the authority of regional inter-governmental organisations to establish international criminal accountability mechanisms

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    The overall aim of this thesis is to investigate the potential role of regional inter-governmental organisations (RIGOs) in international criminal accountability, specifically through the establishment of criminal accountability mechanisms, and to make a case for RIGOs’ active involvement. The thesis proceeds from the assumption that international criminal justice is a cosmopolitan project that demands that a tenable conception of state sovereignty guarantees humanity’s fundamental values, specifically human dignity. Since cosmopolitanism emphasises the equality and unity of the human family, guaranteeing the dignity and humanity of the human family is therefore a common interest of humanity rather than a parochial endeavour. Accountability for international crimes is one way through which human dignity can be validated and reaffirmed where such dignity has been grossly and systematically assaulted. Therefore, while accountability for international crimes is primarily the obligation of individual sovereign states, this responsibility is ultimately residually one of humanity as a whole, exercisable through collective action. As such, the thesis advances the argument that states as collective representations of humanity have a responsibility to assist in ensuring accountability for international crimes where an individual state is either genuinely unable or unwilling by itself to do so. The thesis therefore addresses the question as to whether RIGOs, as collective representations of states and their peoples, can establish international criminal accountability mechanisms. Relying on cosmopolitanism as a theoretical underpinning, the thesis examines the exercise of what can be considered as elements of sovereign authority by RIGOs in pursuit of the cosmopolitan objective of accountability for international crimes. In so doing, the thesis interrogates whether there is a basis in international law for such engagement, and examines how such engagement can practically be undertaken, using two case studies of the European Union and the Kosovo Specialist Chambers and Specialist Prosecutor’s Office, and the African Union and the (proposed) Hybrid Court for South Sudan. The thesis concludes that general international law does not preclude RIGOs from exercising elements of sovereign authority necessary for the establishment of international criminal accountability mechanisms, and that specific legal authority to engage in this regard can then be determined by reference to the doctrine of attributed/conferred powers and the doctrine of implied powers in interpreting the legal instruments of RIGOs. Based on this conclusion, the thesis makes a normative case for an active role for RIGOs in the establishment of international criminal accountability mechanisms, and provides a practical step-by-step guide on possible legal approaches for the establishment of such mechanisms by RIGOs, as well as guidance on possible design models for these mechanisms

    Intersectionality as a tool to adjudicate human rights law; A case study on the Inter-American System of Human Rights

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    Intersectionality is currently used in international human rights law adjudication primarily due to the influence of feminist approaches to international law. The application of intersectionality ranges from being included in soft law to being used as a tool in adjudicative processes. However, there is no clear understanding of how intersectionality is being conceptualised in human rights, nor is there any clear understanding as to how, when, and why intersectionality is being used as a tool to adjudicate rights. Nowadays, the use of intersectionality in human rights law is being developed independently of the discussions and debates of the same theory that are taking place amongst feminist scholars. Using the works of Kimberlé Crenshaw and other key contemporary intersectional feminist scholars, this thesis critically analyses the concept of intersectionality as used both in feminist theory and in international human rights law as a means through which to better understand the use of the concept in international human rights law. The concept of intersectionality currently applied in human rights law is reworked to provide a clearer understanding of what this theory can and should entail when applied at law. Seeking to understand the implications of the concept as applied, the present work proposes an operationalisation process of intersectionality to be used in adjudicative processes. With a special focus on the Inter-American System of Human Rights and drawing on two key case studies, the research demonstrates how human rights adjudicative processes can benefit from using intersectionality as a tool to assess the different qualitative experience of harm of a victim oppressed by different systems simultaneously. This thesis contributes to knowledge through its analysis of intersectionality as understood in both human rights law and within applied feminist theory and provides a model of how intersectionality can be better understood and used to better deliver justice

    Intervening on hypertension in Zambia: development of a culturally sensitized lifestyle programme to reduce disease incidence in urban areas

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    Background/purpose: Hypertension, like other non-communicable diseases, is becoming a major public health problem for Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). Its increasing prevalence is driven by an epidemiological transition with more people leading unhealthy lifestyles, including poor diet and physical inactivity. This project aimed to explore the use of participatory methods with an urban community in Zambia in co-developing a culturally sensitized hypertension prevention intervention. Methods: The intervention development study was divided into four phases. I scoped and synthesized existing literature on risk factors (non-modifiable and modifiable) for hypertension in SSA in Phase One. The identified risk factors and their drivers informed Phase Two community members focus group discussions and stakeholder interviews to explore the local context in the study site to clarify the problem, identify which hypertension risk factors were malleable (potential factors to target), the mechanism of change, and how to deliver this. The findings informed the development of the causal pathway, the intervention theory of change and the Phase Three co-development of the intervention core components and small-scale evaluation. Five co-development workshops (four with local residents and one with local stakeholders) iteratively informed identification of priority risk factors, the delivery format and setting, and finalization of intervention core components. The pilot intervention was then tested with volunteer participants (N=34) to assess feasibility, acceptability and potential effectiveness in Phase four. Results: The scoping review identified the most common risk factors for hypertension in SSA. Residents FGDs and key stakeholder interviews, informed by the scoping review findings, identified a number of potentially malleable hypertension risk factors at individual and interpersonal levels, including high salt intake and other dietary factors, low physical activity, excess body weight, central obesity, high alcohol intake and smoking. From these, the workshops prioritised intervening on salt intake, other dietary factors, and physical inactivity. Using these suggestions, an 8-week group-based intervention (CHiPI) was codeveloped. Stakeholders proposed evaluation of the CHiPI on a small scale and delivery through churches: “nearly all residents belong to a church”. Stakeholders also identified community health workers and church leaders as delivery facilitators. The intervention core components were agreed and refined in close consultation with residents. These included linguistic and cultural adaptations of SMART goal setting and self-monitoring tools, which were iteratively tested and refined to reflect the local socio-cultural context. The small-scale evaluation of the intervention showed high acceptability, feasibility and potential effectiveness in improving health literacy, adoption of healthier diets (less salt added during cooking [p=0.014], reduction in added salt to the plate at mealtimes [p=0.001], increased fruit intake [p=0.001], reduced fried meals [p = 0.001]), increased physical activity [p=0.01] and reduced sedentary lifestyle [p = 0.001]. Reductions in body weight [p = 0.002], BMI [p = 0.001], WC [p = 0.001], SBP [-3mmHg, p=0.003] and DBP [-4mmHg, p = 0.001] were also observed. Conclusions and implications: Participatory methods succeeded in engaging local residents and stakeholders in the development of a potentially effective culturally sensitized, 8-week, group-based hypertension prevention lifestyle intervention for delivery through churches in Zambia. Having demonstrated high feasibility, acceptability and potential effectiveness, taking this intervention to a larger evaluation to obtain evidence of effectiveness can inform hypertension prevention intervention development in Zambia and other SSA countries
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