Elite politics under the spotlight: Whither Thailand (again)?

Less than a week ago on 13th January, we met to take stock of politics in Thailand ahead of the general election in an event co-sponsored by LSE IDEAS and the Pacific-Asia Specialist Group of the UK Political Studies Association. Controversy – of which Thailand has seen much in recent years – attracts and the event was well attended by a mixed academic and policy audience. Leading Thai specialists, Professor Duncan McCargo, who is Professor of Southeast Asian politics at the University of Leeds, and Professor Peter Leyland, Professor of Public Law at London Metropolitan University, spoke, offering a fascinating insight into possible elections scenarios and some of the likely challenges going forward in terms of unresolved political differences, the role of Constitutional Court, and upholding free speech

Women in Prison: International Problems and Human Rights Based Approaches to Reform

The growth in prison populations is a world-wide phenomenon, and within the overall growth rate, many countries are seeing a disproportionate rate of increase among women. Despite differences in culture and resources, women everywhere face similar problems in prison systems, which have been designed primarily by and for men. These include sexual abuse, lack of appropriate medical care, loss of children and breakdown of families. The United States leads the world in both the overall size of its prison population and its rate of incarceration. Advocates for reform are increasingly turning to international human rights laws, standards and norms to provide the framework for addressing many of the problems facing women prisoners

The Myth of a Centralised Socialist State in Vietnam: What Kind of a Myth?

Through a case study of Vietnam, the article explores the view that there is a tendency to overstate the degree to which there is a coherent central body, namely the state, directing the country. Exploring this myth, it argues that there is a tendency to reify the state, even in writing which is attentive to localism and the diversity of societal actors at play in Vietnamese political life. The article argues that the myth of the central state endures because there are domestic and foreign political interests that depend on it. However, more fundamentally, the myth endures because of the power of the state to colonise our minds such that even when the empirical data does not fit with the idea of the state, we make it fit. The article’s findings have implications for the study of politics far beyond the Vietnamese case

The Myth of a Centralised Socialist State in Vietnam:What Kind of a Myth?

Through a case study of Vietnam, the article explores the view that there is a tendency to overstate the degree to which there is a coherent central body, namely the state, directing the country. Exploring this myth, it argues that there is a tendency to reify the state, even in writing which is attentive to localism and the diversity of societal actors at play in Vietnamese political life. The article argues that the myth of the central state endures because there are domestic and foreign political interests that depend on it. However, more fundamentally, the myth endures because of the power of the state to colonise our minds such that even when the empirical data does not fit with the idea of the state, we make it fit. The article’s findings have implications for the study of politics far beyond the Vietnamese case

Malesky vs Fforde:How Best to Analyze Vietnamese Politics?

The article explores different ways of thinking about Vietnamese politics through an examination of the writing of Adam Fforde and Edmund Malesky. It argues that in order to adjudicate between different approaches to analysing Vietnamese politics, we need to come to a view about what we think politics actually is (i.e., ontology forms the basis on which we can answer questions about epistemology). This is very different from more positivist approaches to political analysis which argue that deciding between competing arguments is about weighing the data. I argue, by contrast, that adjudicating between rival positions has more to do with a series of a priori positions or beliefs that influence what we consider reliable data in the first place.</jats:p

Priest in the Inner City:Subjecting the Ecclesiology of John Milbank and Rowan Williams to Empirical Scrutiny

The article considers the strengths and weaknesses of John Milbank’s ecclesiology by examining encounters the author has had as a Church of England priest working in the inner city. The analysis is further sharped by setting Milbank’s ecclesiology alongside Rowan Williams’s ideas about the Church and priestly ministry. The article argues that, while there is more to Milbank’s ecclesiology than some critics have allowed, his account can be usefully supplemented by close attention to the lived experience of the Church day by day. For a more rounded characterization of the Church as a distinctive human community, we need to look at the Church taken to its limits, sticking with situations of ‘dis-ease and conflict’, and not looking for ‘quick and false solutions’. These points can all be found in Williams’s ecclesiology.</jats:p

Patterns of coping behaviour in depression

Previous literature relating the occurrence of stressful life events to the onset of depression is reviewed together with that which discusses the range of behaviour which people habitually deploy against such depression. The study explored the proposition that certain personality characteristics would influence the pattern of behaviour shown by individuals responding to stressful situations and would therefore determine their susceptibility to reactive depression. 24 subjects, from each of three experimental groups (normals, psychiatric controls and depressives) were asked to describe their responses to a series of 6 imagined stressful events and to the condition of feeling depressed itself. It was hypothesised that internal subjects (as defined by the Rotter Internal-External Locus of Control scale) would deploy more active problem-solving behaviour than externals who were predicted to show more defensive or passive behaviour. It was also hypothesised that the trait of internality would be stable and predictive of susceptibility to depression. Although the predicted relationship was observed between locus of control beliefs and both patterns of responding and the amount of depressed mood, it was concluded that the external beliefs could be regarded as being co-determined with the depressive affect, rather than preceding and causing it. Some evidence was found for interactions between the nature of the stressful event and the nature of the individual, as determinants of the patterns of responding elicited. The nature of such interactions was discussed in the light of current theories of depression

Bile duct injury in an anatomical variant of the posterior right hepatic duct draining in the cystic duct: case report

During laparoscopic cholecystectomy, several factors increase the likelihood of bile duct injury (BDI). The most common cause of BDI during laparoscopic cholecystectomy is an inappropriate identification of the critical view of safety associated with acute and chronic inflammation, obesity, haemorrhage, and anatomical variants. Of all anatomic variants of the biliary tree, Blumgart type F has been reported as the least common, but allegedly it carries the biggest risk of BDI. We present the case of a 45-year-old woman with acute cholecystitis subjected to laparoscopic cholecystectomy with Strasberg type C injury in association with a Blumgart F variation confirmed by magnetic resonance cholangiopancreatography. The anatomical variant was identified during the surgical procedure but the BDI was diagnosed postoperatively. Intraoperative identification and treatment of the injury confers a better prognosis to the patient. Management of a BDI on a Blumgart F variant can be challenging and must be targeted to the individual case. Safety measures to prevent such injuries must be promoted by institutions

Bringing the countryside to the city: practices and imaginations of the rural in Ho Chi Minh city, Vietnam

10.1177/0042098014563031Urban Studies532324-33