11 research outputs found
Agriculture in Taiwan and South Korea: the minimalist state?
SUMMARY The state has intervened heavily in the agricultural economies of Taiwan and South Korea, both by direct administrative means and by establishing price relativities very different from those set by market forces. Although state action has not always been effective or efficient, it has played a major role in making agriculture serve the objective of rapid industrial growth. The forms and consequences of state intervention have changed over time in response to the political and economic pressures arising from structural economic change. The state has been obliged to be interventionist in order to try to maintain the political order on which continual reinvestment and thus continued growth depend. RESUMEN Agricultura en Taiwán y Corea del Sur: estado minimalista? El estado ha intervenido fuertemente en la economĂa agrĂcola en ambos paĂses, tanto por medios directamente administrativos, como por el establecimento de precios relativos muy diferentes de aquellos derivados de la acciĂłn de las fuerzas del mercado. Aunque no siempre la acciĂłn estatal ha sido efectiva o eficiente, ha jugado un rol principal para que la agricultura sirva los objetivos de un rápido crecimiento industrial. Las formas y consecuencias de la intervenciĂłn estatal han cambiado a travĂ©s del tiempo, como respuesta a las presiones econĂłmicas derivadas del cambio en la estructura econĂłmica. El estado se ha visto obligado a ser intervencionista para tratar de mantener el orden politico del cual depende la continua reĂnversĂĂłn y, en consecuencia, el crecimiento persistente. RESUMES L'agriculture Ă Taiwan et en CorĂ©e du Sud: l'Ă©tat minimaliste? L'Ă©tat a intervenu de façon très importante dans les Ă©conomies agricoles de Taiwan et de la CorĂ©e du Sud, par des moyens administratifs directs et en Ă©tablissant une relativitĂ© des prix très diffĂ©rente de celle Ă©tablie par les forces de marchĂ©. Quoique l'action de l'Ă©tat n'ait pas toujours Ă©tĂ© effective ou efficace, elle a jouĂ© un rĂ´le de grande importance en se servant de l'agriculture pour aider une croissance industrielle rapide. Les formes et les consĂ©quences de l'intervention de l'Ă©tat ont changĂ© au cours des temps en fonction des pressions politiques et Ă©conomiques provenant du changement de la structure Ă©conomique. L'Ă©tat a Ă©tĂ© obligĂ© d'ĂŞtre interventionniste de façon Ă essayer de maintenir l'ordre politique duquel dĂ©pendent le rèinvestissement continu et donc la croissance continue
Pathways to Injury in Chronic Pancreatitis: Decoding the Role of the High-Risk SPINK1 N34S Haplotype Using Meta-Analysis
Background: The complex interactions between recurrent trypsin-mediated pancreatic injury, alcohol-associated pancreatic injury and SPINK1 polymorphisms in chronic pancreatitis (CP) are undefined. We hypothesize that CP occurs as a result of multiple pathological mechanisms (pathways) that are initiated by different metabolic or environmental factors (etiologies) and may be influenced differentially by downstream genetic risk factors. We tested this hypothesis by evaluating the differences in effect size of the high risk SPINK1 N34S haplotype on CP from multiple etiologies after combining clinical reports of SPINK1 N34S frequency using meta-analysis. Methods and Findings: The Pubmed and the Embase databases were reviewed. We studied 24 reports of SPINK1 N34S in CP (2,421 cases, 4,857 controls) using reported etiological factors as surrogates for pathways and multiple meta-analyses to determine the differential effects of SPINK1 N34S between alcoholic and non-alcoholic etiologies. Using estimates of between-study heterogeneity, we sub-classified our 24 studies into four specific clusters. We found that SPINK1 N34S is strongly associated with CP overall (OR 11.00; 95% CI: 7.59-15.93), but the effect of SPINK1 N34S in alcoholic CP (OR 4.98, 95% CI: 3.16-7.85) was significantly smaller than in idiopathic CP (OR 14.97, 95% C.I. = 9.09-24.67) or tropical CP (OR 19.15, 95% C.I. = 8.83-41.56). Studies analyzing familial CP showed very high heterogeneity suggestive of a complex etiology with an I2 = 80.95%. Conclusion: The small effect of SPINK1 N34S in alcoholic subjects suggests that CP is driven through a different pathway that is largely trypsin-independent. The results also suggest that large effect sizes of SPINK1 N34S in small candidate gene studies in CP may be related to a mixture of multiple etiologic pathways leading to the same clinical endpoint. © 2008 Aoun MD et al