Defining ‘Success’ of Local Citizens’ Initiatives in Maintaining Public Services in Rural Areas:A Professional's Perspective

In the shift towards the Big Society, it is widely proclaimed that citizen participation and citizens’ initiatives are indispensable to maintaining services that used to be run by local or regional governments. Despite the increased interest in citizens’ initiatives, research has scarcely debated what actually defines the success of such initiatives. Using focus group discussions, this study examined the meanings and norms collectively constructed by government officials and professionals regarding the success and failure of citizens’ initiatives in rural areas. Remarkably, we found that the professional perspective of successful citizens’ initiatives was not dominated by the achievement of actual policy targets or project goals, such as maintaining public services. Rather, an initiative was perceived as successful as long as citizens are continuously active and in charge. Arguably, this somewhat paternalistic professional view of successful citizens’ initiatives could be challenged by the volunteers in those initiatives

Brain death, states of impaired consciousness, and physician-assisted death for end-of-life organ donation and transplantation

In 1968, the Harvard criteria equated irreversible coma and apnea (i.e., brain death) with human death and later, the Uniform Determination of Death Act was enacted permitting organ procurement from heart-beating donors. Since then, clinical studies have defined a spectrum of states of impaired consciousness in human beings: coma, akinetic mutism (locked-in syndrome), minimally conscious state, vegetative state and brain death. In this article, we argue against the validity of the Harvard criteria for equating brain death with human death. (1) Brain death does not disrupt somatic integrative unity and coordinated biological functioning of a living organism. (2) Neurological criteria of human death fail to determine the precise moment of an organism’s death when death is established by circulatory criterion in other states of impaired consciousness for organ procurement with non-heart-beating donation protocols. The criterion of circulatory arrest 75 s to 5 min is too short for irreversible cessation of whole brain functions and respiration controlled by the brain stem. (3) Brain-based criteria for determining death with a beating heart exclude relevant anthropologic, psychosocial, cultural, and religious aspects of death and dying in society. (4) Clinical guidelines for determining brain death are not consistently validated by the presence of irreversible brain stem ischemic injury or necrosis on autopsy; therefore, they do not completely exclude reversible loss of integrated neurological functions in donors. The questionable reliability and varying compliance with these guidelines among institutions amplify the risk of determining reversible states of impaired consciousness as irreversible brain death. (5) The scientific uncertainty of defining and determining states of impaired consciousness including brain death have been neither disclosed to the general public nor broadly debated by the medical community or by legal and religious scholars. Heart-beating or non-heart-beating organ procurement from patients with impaired consciousness is de facto a concealed practice of physician-assisted death, and therefore, violates both criminal law and the central tenet of medicine not to do harm to patients. Society must decide if physician-assisted death is permissible and desirable to resolve the conflict about procuring organs from patients with impaired consciousness within the context of the perceived need to enhance the supply of transplantable organs

Cross-Sector Review of Drivers and Available 3Rs Approaches for Acute Systemic Toxicity Testing

Acute systemic toxicity studies are carried out in many sectors in which synthetic chemicals are manufactured or used and are among the most criticized of all toxicology tests on both scientific and ethical grounds. A review of the drivers for acute toxicity testing within the pharmaceutical industry led to a paradigm shift whereby in vivo acute toxicity data are no longer routinely required in advance of human clinical trials. Based on this experience, the following review was undertaken to identify (1) regulatory and scientific drivers for acute toxicity testing in other industrial sectors, (2) activities aimed at replacing, reducing, or refining the use of animals, and (3) recommendations for future work in this area

Examining 'postmulticultural' and civic turns in the Netherlands, Britain, Germany, and Denmark

There is a widely shared view that the appeal of multiculturalism as a public policy has suffered considerable political damage. In many European states the turn to “civic” measures and discourses has been deemed more suitable for the objectives of minority integration and the promotion of preferred modes of social and political unity. It is therefore said that the first decade of the new century has been characterized by a reorientation in immigrant integration policies—from liberal culturalist to the “return of assimilation” (Brubaker, 2001), on route to a broader “retreat from multiculturalism” (Joppke, 2004). In this article, we argue that such portrayals mask a tendency that is more complicated in some cases and much less evident in others. To elaborate this, we offer a detailed account of the inception and then alleged movement away from positions in favor of multiculturalism in two countries that have adopted different versions of it, namely the United Kingdom and the Netherlands, and two countries that have historically rejected multiculturalism, namely Denmark and Germany. We argue that while there is undoubtedly a rhetorical separation between multiculturalism and civic integration, the latter is in some cases building on the former, and broadly needs to be understood as more than a retreat of multiculturalism. Taking seriously Banting and Kymlicka’s argument that understanding the evolution of integration requires the “the mind-set of an archaeologist,” we offer a policy genealogy that allows us to set the backlash against multiculturalism in context, in manner that explicates its provenance, permutations, and implications

Dynamism in Islamic activism: references points for democratization and human rights/ WRR Scientific Council For Government Policy

238 hal. ; 23 cm

Labour market flexibility and unemployment regulation and flexibility of markets Taking the Netherlands and the Federal Republic of Germany as an example

'Wenn die Hypothese der beschaeftigungsschaedlichen Wirkung sozialstaatlicher Institutionen richtig ist, sollten die Niederlande in wesentlichen Aspekten 'deregulierter' sein als die Bundesrepublik, es sollten die Transferzahlungen geringer und die Anreize zur Arbeitsaufnahme hoeher sein. Es zeigt sich aber, dass der niederlaendische Sozialstaat grosszuegiger, der Kuendigungsschutz strenger ist und die Lohnverhandlungen institutionell denen der Bundesrepublik angeglichen worden sind. In der Bundesrepublik viel kritisierte Regelungen, wie die Vermutung abhaengiger Beschaeftigung bei einem Teil der Werkvertraege, ein Recht auf Teilzeitarbeit etc., sind in den Niederlanden schon lange Praxis. Der Autor greift drei Bereiche institutioneller Regelungen auf, die fuer den Bundesrepublik/ Niederlande-Vergleich besonders interessant sind, und die haeufig fuer die Arbeitsmarktprobleme verantwortlich gemacht werden: 1. Kuendigungsschutz, wo die Niederlande strengere Regelungen praktizieren als die Bundesrepublik; 2. Lohnverhandlungssysteme, wo die Niederlande sich den Regelungen der Bundesrepublik angenaehert haben; 3. durch Transfer, Steuer und Abgaben bedingte Anreize zur Arbeitsaufnahme.' (Autorenreferat)German title: Arbeitsmarktflexibilitaet, die Regulierung der Arbeitslosigkeit und die Flexibilitaet der Maerkte: Beispiel Niederlande und Bundesrepublik DeutschlandAvailable from IAB-90-0DE0-309000 BO 271 / FIZ - Fachinformationszzentrum Karlsruhe / TIB - Technische InformationsbibliothekSIGLEDEGerman

Development of employment and labour market institutions The employment-policy success of the Netherlands

'Anfang der Achtzigerjahre befanden sich die Niederlande in einer wirtschaftlichen Krise. Die Arbeitslosigkeit schoss bis auf 11 Prozent empor. Regierung und Tarifpartner entschlossen sich, ein Buendnis fuer Arbeit zu schliessen, dessen wesentlicher Bestandteil die Lohnzurueckhaltung bildete (Abkommen von Wassenaar von 1983). Im Gegenzug versprachen die Arbeitgeber mehr Arbeitsplaetze, insbesondere auf Teilzeitbasis, zu schaffen. Weiterhin wurde das Staatsdefizit eingedaemmt. Nicht mehr Subventionen fuer bedrohte Branchen, sondern die Staerkung der technologischen Erneuerung sowie von Forschung und Lehre wurden zur Richtschnur der Strukturpolitik. Seitdem verzeichneten die Niederlande beachtliche Wachstumserfolge, die sich auch auf den Arbeitsmarkt auswirkten. Das Wirtschaftswachstum allein erklaert aber noch nicht den Beschaeftigungsaufschwung. Der Aufsatz befasst sich deshalb auch mit der Bedeutung des institutionellen Rahmens und dessen Einfluss auf die Arbeitsmarktentwicklung: Dezentrale Lohnfindung, Aktivierung von Erwerbslosen, Lohnsubventionen fuer Geringverdiener, individuelle und flexible Formen der Arbeitszeitverkuerzung, 'Flexicurity', d.h. Staerkung des rechtlichen Position atypisch Beschaeftigter bei weniger Beschaeftigungsschutzrechten fuer sog. 'Normalarbeitnehmer', mehr Vertragsfreiheit bei befristeter Beschaeftigung und beim Einsatz von Zeitarbeitnehmern.' (Autorenreferat)German title: Beschaeftigungsentwicklung und Arbeitsmarktinstitutionen: der Erfolg der niederlaendischen ArbeitsmarktpolitikAvailable from IAB-90-0DE0-309000 BO 271 / FIZ - Fachinformationszzentrum Karlsruhe / TIB - Technische InformationsbibliothekSIGLEDEGerman

Media Policy for the Digital Age

Voor een gezonde democratie is een gevarieerd en toegankelijk media-aanbod van groot belang. Radio, televisie, kranten en tijdschriften spelen een belangrijke rol in de maatschappelijke informatievoorziening, het publieke debat, de cultuur, de vrijetijdsbesteding en de ontspanning. Het mediabeleid van de regering is erop gericht een veelzijdig, kwalitatief hoogwaardig en onafhankelijk mediaaanbod te garanderen, dat toegankelijk is voor alle bevolkingsgroepen waar ook in het land. Door de opkomst van het internet en veranderend consumentengedrag is het medialandschap echter sterk aan het veranderen. In deze Engelse vertaling van het WRR-Rapport Focus op functies brengt de WRR advies uit aan de regering om daarmee de doelstellingen van het mediabeleid op een toekomstbestendige wijze op een lijn te brengen met de (verwachte) veranderingen in het medialandschap. Klik hier voor meer informatie over de "http://www.aup.nl/do.php?a=show_visitor_book&isbn=9789053567333">Nederlandse editie Focus op Functie