Maatschappelijk organisaties, de weg kwijt?

__Abstract__ Dit paper over Nederlandse maatschappelijke organisaties beperkt zich tot de gesubsidieerde particuliere organisaties binnen de internationale samenwerking voor ontwikkeling (OS). De rol van het ministerie van Buitenlandse Zaken (Buza) is van grote invloed geweest op de professionalisering en de beleidskeuzes van de particuliere OS-sector. Nu subsidiering steeds meer onder vuur ligt, zoeken ontwikkelingsorganisaties hun heil op de charimarkt dan wel op de zakelijke markt. Dit lijkt ons de weg van de minste weerstand; het leidt bovendien af van de kern en de meerwaarde van hun mandaat. Ontwikkelingsorganisaties doen er beter aan anticyclisch te denken en hun oorspronkelijke politieke opdracht te hervinden: weerwerk bieden, misstanden aan de kaak stellen en oplossingen zoeken in de verbinding tussen mondiale problemen en de Nederlandse samenleving. Dat kun je niet aan de markt overlaten. Wij zijn dan ook van mening dat de overheid dit ruimhartig moet subsidieren, en dat ontwikkelingsorganisaties daarvoor moeten gaan vechten

Report on the evaluation of the IMD programme in Guatemala 2002 - 2003

An external evaluation was carried out in July-August 2003 to assess the results and the implementation process of the first 15 months of IMD’s programme in Guatemala. The central objective of this programme is to strengthen political parties and the party system in a sustainable way. Several unfavourable conditions limit the realisation of this ambition: (i) the political party system in Guatemala has been unstable, fragmented, polarised and discredited, (ii) political parties were often not more than electoral machines, lacking a programmatic and ideological base, and generally figured among the weakest actors in society, (iii) political participation by citizens has been very low, especially among the indigenous majority of the population. Against this background, since March 2002 IMD developed in a joint venture with UNDP an ambitious project for a multiparty dialogue process, trying to generate consensus on a shared National Agenda that reflects the basic principles of the Peace Agreements. The basic idea was that collaboration and dialogue among the parties is a prerequisite for future democratic stability, as none of the individual parties is able to sustain such a national project. Moreover, the national Congress does not function as a forum for dialogue given the polarized political climate in the country...

Surreptitious symbiosis: engagement between activists and NGOs

Based on research conducted in Athens, Cairo, London and Yerevan the article analyses the relationship between activists engaged in street protests or direct action since 2011 and NGOs. It examines how activists relate to NGOs and whether it is possible to do sustained activism to bring about social change without becoming part of a ‘civil society industry’. The article argues that while at first glance NGOs seem disconnected from recent street activism, and activists distance themselves from NGOs, the situation is more complicated than meets the eye. It contends that the boundaries between the formal NGOs and informal groups of activists is blurred and there is much cross-over and collaboration. The article demonstrates and seeks to explain this phenomenon, which we call surreptitious symbiosis, from the micro- perspective of individual activists and NGO staff. Finally, we discuss whether this surreptitious symbiosis can be sustained and sketch three scenarios for the future

e-Transmission of ECGs for expert consultation results in improved triage and treatment of patients with acute ischaemic chest pain by ambulance paramedics

Aims: In pre-hospital settings handled by paramedics, identification of patients with myocardial infarction (MI) remains challenging when automated electrocardiogram (ECG) interpretation is inconclusive. We aimed to identify those patients and to get them on the right track to primary percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI). Methods and results: In the Rotterdam-Rijnmond region, automated ECG devices on all ambulances were supplemented with a modem, enabling transmission of ECGs for online expert interpretation. The diagnostic protocol for acute chest pain was modified and monitored for 1 year. Patients with an ECG that met the criteria for ST-elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI) were immediately transported to a PCI hospital. ECGs that did not meet the STEMI criteria, but showed total ST deviation ≥800 µv were transmitted for online interpretation by the ECG expert. Online supervision was offered as a service if ECGs showed conduction disorders, or had an otherwise ‘suspicious’ pattern according to the ambulance paramedics. We enrolled 1,076 patients with acute ischaemic chest pain who did not meet the automated STEMI criteria. Their mean age was 63 years; 64% were men. After online consultation, 735 (68%) patients were directly transported to a PCI hospital for further treatment. PCI within 90 min was performed in 115 patients. Conclusion: During a 1-year evaluation of the modified pre-hospital triage protocol for patients with acute ischaemic chest pain, over 100 acute MI patients with an initially inconclusive ECG received primary PCI within 90 min. Because of these results, we decided to continue the operation of the modified protocol

Struggles over access to the Muslim public sphere: Multiple publics and discourses on agency, belonging and citizenship (Introduction to the Themed Section)

Abstract This introductory essay provides the context for the articles in this Themed Section. Despite the diversity in locations, historical backgrounds and contemporary processes of change, all contributors to this Themed Section focus on the struggle of Muslim groups over access to an emergent Muslim public sphere. They highlight the contestations of and shifts in the notions of agency, belonging, and citizenship in nation-states with Muslim communities within its borders. The introduction consists of two parts. The first part reviews the notion of the public sphere as conceptualized by Habermas and critiqued by scholars of a diversity of backgrounds. In relation to the concept of the Muslim public sphere, three aspects of critique are given closer c