Reforming women in the United States and Aotearoa/New Zealand: A comparative ethnography of welfare reform in global context

Historically, the United States and Aotearoa/New Zealand symbolize opposite poles of an individualist-collectivist welfare state continuum. Until recently, Aotearoa/New Zealand was known as a "cradle-to-grave" welfare state, with "universal" employment and coverage in health and education. U.S. history, in contrast, is marked by an unabashed individualism and a residualist approach to welfare. Recent neoliberal reforms, however, have engendered a convergence between the two countries in the conceptualization and organization of assistance for poor single mothers. Most notable are the "workfare" provisions of legislative changes made in 1996 in the two countries, which work to reconstitute poor mothers as potential able-bodied workers. In this article we analyze welfare reform in the United States and Aotearoa/New Zealand, with particular reference to how poor single mothers respond to, comply and cope with, or resist neoliberal strategies. Analysis is based on participant-observation, interviews, and focus groups conducted between 1989 and 1999

The Critical Challenges from International High-Tech and Computer-Related Crime at the Millennium

The automotive industry stands in front of a great challenge, to decrease its impact on the environment. One important part in succeeding with this is to decrease the structural weight of the body structure and by that the fuel consumption or the required battery power. Carbon fibre composites are by many seen as the only real option when traditional engineering materials are running out of potential for further weight reduction. However, the automotive industry lacks experience working with structural composites and the methods for high volume composite manufacturing are immature. The development of a composite automotive body structure, therefore, needs methods to support and guide the conceptual work to improve the financial and technical results. In this thesis a framework is presented which will provide guidelines for the conceptual phase of the development of an automotive body structure. The framework follows two main paths, one to strive for the ideal material diversity, which also defines an initial partition of the body structure based on the process and material selection. Secondly, a further analysis of the structures are made to evaluate if a more cost and weight efficient solution can be found by a more differential design and by that define the ideal part size. In the case and parameter studies performed, different carbon fibre composite material systems and processes are compared and evaluated. The results show that high performance material system with continuous fibres becomes both more cost and performance effective compared to industrialised discontinuous fibre composites. But also that cycle times, sometimes, are less important than a competitive feedstock cost for a manufacturing process. When further analysing the manufacturing design of the structures it is seen that further partition(s) can become cost effective if the size and complexity is large enough.      QC 20140527</p

Multilateralism as Terror: International Law, Haiti and Imperialism

Much of the liberal criticism of the Bush administration's prosecution of the war in Iraq has taken a legalistic form, decrying that law as 'illegal'. This criticism has often implied that US unilateralism has been definitional to the neoconservative project and the geopolitical moment, and that a contrasting and supposedly non-existent 'multilateralism' would be neither illegal nor objectionable. The overthrow of Haiti's President Jean-Bertrande Aristide in 2004 and the subsequent installing of UN MINUSTAH peace-keepers in the country was a model multilateral action, the fact of which should have problematised this model: its almost wholesale ignoring in the scholarly international law literature is therefore investigated. The intervention is understood as a successful imperialist action, and the argument made that multilateralism as much as unilateralism can easily be part of an imperialist strategy

Marketplace of Ideas: Combating Global Warming through Congestion Pricing with London Deputy Mayor Nicky Gavron

This is a transcript from DMI's 'Marketplace of Ideas' series, which highlights policymakers who successfully put progressive values into practice. This event features London Deputy Mayor Nicky Gavron. On the morning of Friday, May 18 over 200 people turned out to hear London Deputy Mayor Nicky Gavron and distinguished panelists and guests discuss the most hotly debated part of Mayor Bloomberg's recently revealed plan for a greener New York - an $8 congestion fee for driving into Manhattan's Central Business district during peak hours

Mindfulness Program for Student Athletes

Student athletes face challenging situations during their time at college which can cause their experience to be a negative one if they are not fully supported. This can be due to several factors; most athletes face an immense amount of pressure to succeed in the classroom as well as in their sport. Also, many athletes are moving away from home for the first time and this can be a daunting feeling. They are expected to manage all of these challenges, and if mishandled, it can lead to an overwhelming amount of negative stress resulting in an unsuccessful time as a student athlete. Furthermore, the intensity and pressure of their sport can be detrimental to other areas of their life. Many of these young athletes do not possess the leadership skills necessary to manage these tasks and remain in a healthy state of mind. My recommendation is not to take away these challenges, but rather offer support systems which empower student athletes to be able to manage the struggles they encounter in university settings. This mindfulness program enables people to be present and aware of themselves, acknowledge what their body is saying to them, and take action in a calm focused way to move into a healthy state of mind. My program offers communication at the individual and group level, techniques to be present, manage stress, and motivate positive thoughts which create pathways for successful experiences. Mindfulness practices are new to sports and are not currently applied to college athletics; however, the stress and challenges associated with being a student athlete are ever present. Therefore, I argue that college programs/coaches need to provide support systems which help their students be successful. This would then become a platform whereby they could succeed athletically, academically, personally, and prepare them for life outside of college

The Carrot Approach to Accounting Standard Setting

In December 2006, Conrad Hewitt, the chief accountant at the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), promised that the issue of complexity in accounting would be addressed early in 2007 and would be a leading focus of work by his office in 2007. The goal in financial reporting is to disseminate transparent, understandable, financial information that fairly presents the financial condition of the reporting company. Oftentimes, however the information public companies disseminate is overly complex, quagmired in legalistic form at the expense of true economic substance, and is devoid of conveying true, meaningful and understandable information regarding the company. In this regard, the SEC, in conjunction with the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB), is making an attempt to remedy this problem by exploring ways to simplify the fragmented and complex accounting regime currently in existence. The goal of this Article is to highlight one aspect of this reform effort that must be addressed to insure success of the SEC\u27s stated objective of a more simplified accounting and financial reporting system. The aspect in question is management and its role in the accounting and financial reporting process

UNDERSTANDING THE RELATION BETWEEN MINDFULNESS-BASED INTERVENTIONS, READING AND ATTENTION

According to the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), roughly one third of American 4th and 8th grade students perform at or above the proficient level, suggesting that further interventions are needed to support student reading skills. Mindfulness interventions have generally been implemented to impact attentional, social-emotional needs, and internalizing symptoms such as stress and anxiety. However, mindfulness interventions have only recently been deployed to increase academic skills such as reading. This current research evaluated the effects of a brief year-long mindfulness intervention on reading and attention skills across an ethnically diverse at-risk sample of 7th grade students. Five 7th grade English-Language Arts (ELA) classrooms were randomized to either a mindfulness (n = 3) or an active control condition (n = 2). The students in the mindfulness classrooms (n = 36) began each ELA class with a five-minute guided mindfulness practice audio track. The students in the control classrooms (n = 20) began each ELA class with a brief five-minute assignment related to class content. Participants completed measures at three time points (i.e., pre-intervention, midway through the school year, & post-intervention) to assess self-reported levels of mindfulness, executive attention, and reading comprehension. Results indicate that students assigned to the mindfulness intervention classroom condition had significantly higher reading comprehension scores than their control counterparts at the end of the school year. Results also suggest that the brief mindfulness intervention did not significantly increase student self-reported levels of mindfulness, or executive attention measured via a computerized behavioral Flanker task. In conclusion, the current research indicates that brief a daily mindfulness intervention may be associated with increased student reading comprehension performance