Biology & Political Science. Foundational Issues of Political Biology

In their classic formulations, valid to this day, the issue of self-preservation is foundational for both political science and economics. In order to fixate this concept, the Modern theorists relied upon various assumptions about human nature. Due to the advances of biology and evolutionary theory, we are today in the position of explicating these assumptions in the form of stable scientific certainties. A foundational concept in biological theory is that of "fitness". The paper indicates the relationship between the less determined concept of self-preservation and the more rigorous one of fitness. By that, it accomplishes two things: it gives more solidity to the foundation of political theory and political economy, by anchoring them in biology; it opens the path towards a unification between two social sciences and their immediate juxtaposed science, biology. The emphasis of the paper is on political science, aiming to define, on the basis of the above argument, its proper object of study. The notion of fitness extraction is thus defined. A lateral exposition differentiates between political action, thus understood, and economic action, defined more generally as fitness transfer. The distinction is to be eventually furthered in a separate study.Biology; Evolution; Fitness; Foundational Theory; Foundations of Economics; Political Science

Education across borders : Towards e-Didactics of International Module in Socio-cultural Aspects of ICT

Articles presented in this issue address topics related the initiative Moodle for International Learning. Within this initiative Nesna University College launched international e-learning course ‘ICT in Society and Work Life’ (ITL 103). The course was provided within the structure of ‘ICT and Learning’ studies and was based on the previous Norwegian version ‘IKT i samfunn og arbeidsliv’. The issue contains texts written by the authors from Norway and Poland who contributed to the realization of the idea of joining students of various nationalities within a learning experience supported by Moodle Learning Management System. The opening paper is the contribution from senior lecturer Hallstein Hegerholm who originated the idea of ‘ICT and Learning’ studies and elaborated on the principles on which digital portfolio operates in Nesna University College. These principles lay foundations for the mode of work within all the six e-learning modules realized under the common name ‘ICT and Learning’. The paper presents the establishment of ‘ICT and Learning’ studies and the description of the digital portfolio. The following contribution is made by Per Arne Godejord, the dean of the Faculty of Scientific Subjects within the structure of which ‘ICT and Learning’ studies were provided. The paper addresses the topic of distance education and presents brief history of establishing e-learning in Nesna University College. It also contains references to the process of internationalization initiated by NUC within the courses provided with the support of Moodle Learning Management System. These references are framed by recommendations elaborated on by Norwegian national policy on internationalization within educational sector. Subsequent two papers are contributed by Polish researches from University of Szczecin: prof Maria Czerepaniak-Walczak and dr Elzbieta Perzycka. Prof. Czerepaniak Walczak coveres thoroughly the issues related to the connections between the concept of internationalization and higher education settings. Dr Perzycka explores the question of competencies enabling the provision of ‘useful’ education in online environment. She refers to the issues of both teachers and students competencies through the prism of information culture and information literacy. The final contributions are made by the researchers who actively participated in the realization of the module ‘ICT in Society and Work Life’: dr Beata Godejord (Nesna University, Poland) and dr Wioletta Kwiatkowska (Nicolaus Copernicus University, Poland). Dr B. Godejord was the lecturer in the course and originator of the idea of utilizing blogs as tools for e-learning. Her paper addresses the issue of educational qualities of blogging. Blogging is showed through the perspective of the concept of New Learning, effective learning environment, connective learning and e-learning practices and skills. Dr Wioletta Kwiatkowska monitored and supported the participation of students from Poland. Her paper presents the analysis of students’ comments on their co-students’ blogs. In her analysis she utilizes the classification of interaction categories „Interaction Process Analysis” by Robert F. Bales, pointing to interesting conclusions. The works on the development of international e-learning module ‘ICT in Society and Work Life’ are continued. In this academic year (2011/2012) one on the Polish private colleges – Academy of Business in Dabrowa Gornicza – decided to include the module in their study plans and make it obligatory for two groups of sociology students. We are looking forward to this experience and hope for developing international online studies on a broader scale

Bureaucrationality Behind the Scenes Field Study of Bureaucrats’ Balance Between Objectivity and Compassion

Considering the depersonalization that the bureaucratic role entails, it is interesting to analyze the bureaucratic role-play that occurs between public and private sphere from a dramaturgical perspective. In order to investigate the personal shift of bureaucrats’ attitude, I conducted participant observations and interviews at an office of a Swedish Agency. Based on critical theory and feminist critique, the main research question regarded how a bureaucrat is balancing between objectivity and compassion in their daily work. The findings show that fragmentation of bureaucratic system entails a distribution of accountability for each element of the process, however, absence of responsibility for the final outcome. Bureaucrats deciding upon cases are physically distanced from their customers, whereas street-level bureaucrats are mostly information providers. The system constitutes a precondition for emotional detachment and imbalance between objectivity and compassion. Expressing compassion is considered as belonging to the private sphere, among intimate relationships. Expressing objectivity, which represents reason, is considered as belonging to the public sphere

Pupils’ Conception of Organic Foods and Healthy Eating in School. Qualitative insights from focus group interviews with 5th and 7th grade pupils in a Copenhagen elementary school

Adult habits, including unhealthy eating patterns, are largely established during a person´s childhood and early youth. In this connection, public schools are important health promoting platforms due to their potential for encouraging interest, knowledge and learning about health related issues. The main aim of the study was to shed light on primary and lower secondary school pupils´ everyday experience with food, nutrition, ecology and health in connection to public organic school food, using the municipality of Copenhagen as a case. We have examined how a procurement and provision strategy that primarily originates from “backstage agents” such as engaged politicians and civil servants and governed by administrative priorities, is perceived among agents at the front stage arena - the school. Furthermore we have investigated to which degree the pupils experience a connection between the “organicness” of the food program and the underlying organic supply chain principles, and to which degree the pupils experience a connection between the “organicness” of the food program and classroom initiatives in subjects related to ecology and health. In February 2008, we approached a public school which proved willing to participate in our study. Subsequently, over a period of four weeks, we designed an interview guide used to conduct focus group interviews with pupils from grades 5 and 7, which were then transcribed. In general, pupils were very interested in ecology as a subject. However it seems that they do not see a very strong connection between the healthy, organic meals offered at school and class room activities related to health and ecology. The pupils did not feel that they had been involved in the decision to establish organic and healthy food procurement. As a result they held that they did not feel very committed or engaged in the school provision initiative, and the organic and healthy food procurement was not highly sought after on the part of the pupils. This appears to justify a distinction between the perspective that front stage actors have, including pupils, and the perspective of politicians and planners that operate back stage. The distance between these two stages, which tends to increase in large scale municipal school food systems, is an important challenge to address when planning school food interventions. There seems to be a potential for linking organic school food service more closely with curricular activities, and for linking issues of healthier eating and organic food supply. There is also a need for greater involvement of the pupils and other front stage actors when the food service system and food related curricular activities are planned

When Anger Arises in the Interaction with Children in Kindergartens – The Staff’s Reactions to Children’s Resistance

publishedVersio

‘Will I get cancer again?’ An ethnography of worries, healing landscapes and sensation-to-symptom processes among people living in the aftermath of cancer in rural Norway

Today, 71% of those who are diagnosed with cancer live five years or longer after treatment. Although the level of mortality varies considerably between different cancer diagnoses, the total number of people who recover after cancer is increasing. There is a need to gain knowledge on how people who live in the aftermath of cancer treatment experience health and illness, bodily sensations, everyday life and relations to the health care system. Several remote municipalities in Northern Norway face challenges regarding the accessibility of specialized health care, which influences the experience of the aftermath of cancer treatment. This dissertation is part of the overall research project ‘SenCancer - Sensing illness in everyday life: Care-seeking and perception of symptoms among chronic cancer patients’. The main goal of the project was to investigate how people who live in the aftermath of cancer treatment experience bodily sensations, make sense of and act towards cancer illness and health. This involved an exploration of the social processes and relational dimensions of sensations and care-seeking processes. The study builds upon 11 months of ethnographic fieldwork in 2014 in a rural context, located far off from specialist health care services, more specifically in a coastal village of fewer than 3000 inhabitants in the northernmost county of Norway. Ten people from the village, with different cancer diagnoses and having undergone cancer treatment from three months to ten years earlier, were the core participants in the study. During fieldwork, I took part in the everyday life of participants and in the village in general. The core participants gave monthly semi-structured interviews on experiences of illness and health, treatment, bodily sensations, activities, and relations to family, friends, co-villagers and health care professionals. The findings of the study are presented in three scientific articles, all published internationally. The articles focus on ways of living, sensing and coping in a small remote village after cancer diagnosis and treatment. They contribute to the understanding of living in the aftermath of cancer treatment in a rural context far away from specialist health care services. The analysis builds upon different analytical approaches to understand social processes of the participants’ bodily sensations, and a) their coping in everyday life in relation to familiar landscapes, b) how they cope with worries of relapse in relations with others, and c) the social and moral embeddedness of bodily sensations. The study contributes to the theoretical field of ‘medical anthropology of the sensations’, to an anthropological understanding of emotions and to understanding embodied relations to local landscapes when living in the aftermath of cancer diagnosis and treatment. Article 1: The significance of cultural norms and clinical logics for the perception of possible relapse in rural Northern Norway – sensing symptoms of cancer; Published in ‘Qualitative Research in Medicine & Healthcare’, Vol. 1 (3), 2017. In this article, we explore how the process from experiencing indeterminate bodily sensations to perceiving them as possible symptoms of cancer relapse is related to clinical logics, and to local values and clinical practice in rural Northern Norway. We show how the high turnover among primary health care staff relates to how and when core participants present indeterminate bodily sensations to shifting GPs. In addition, core participants had certain understandings of what could be presented in a consultation and what is appropriate to ask for from previous experiences with the health care system, and embodied and included clinical routines in their perception and assessment of bodily sensations. The core participants feel that they have to present clear symptoms, so they hesitate to see the doctor for such bodily sensations. Moreover, the personal evaluation of bodily sensations is embedded in local values in the village. Core values are to contribute to the common good, not to be a burden, be positive and avoid focusing on ‘difficult things’. Participants’ inner dialogues with co-villagers and health personnel lead to decisions not to share concerns about bodily sensations which might be symptoms of relapse. We suggest a rethinking and relocation of Hay’s analysis of ‘social legitimation’ in sensationto-symptom processes in order to grasp the experiences of cancer in rural Northern Norway. Article 2: Approaching Health in Landscapes - An Ethnographic Study with Chronic Cancer Patients from a Coastal Village in Northern Norway; Published in ‘Anthropology in Action’, Vol. 24 (1), 2017. In this article, we analyze how core participants engage with their familiar surroundings in efforts to counter bad mood, anxiety and symptoms of relapse and to strengthen their health. By drawing on Tim Ingold’s understanding of taskscape, it is suggested that the participants after cancer treatment dwell in and engage with the surroundings of the village in similar ways as before the illness, but after cancer treatment, their core task has changed to coping after illness and staying healthy. The participants are part of and embody the landscape through the temporality of taskscape, related to their ways of dealing with pain, worries and bodily sensations in everyday life. Article 3: The cancer may come back: experiencing and managing worries of relapse in a North Norwegian village after treatment; Published online in ‘Anthropology & Medicine’, 2018. Little is known about how people living in the aftermath of cancer experience and manage worries about possible signs of cancer relapse, not only as an individual enterprise but also as a socially embedded challenge. We contemplate human emotions as arising in contexts of interactions, capable of creating social realities. We highlight how people who recover from cancer construct and experience worries about possible relapse in relation to close family members, friends and co-villagers in the socially closely-knit and relatively isolated village. These emotional experiences emerge through relationships with others, have communicative characteristics and take place in interaction with the social environment of their village. While the participants attempt to protect family members by avoiding sharing worries with them, they express the need to share their worries within friendships. They experience both comfort and challenges in managing their worries in relation to acquaintances in the village. The article enhances understanding of the social embeddedness of emotions in everyday life

The politics of emotion in a parenting support programmes for refugees in Norway

acceptedVersio