Applying ‘merging of knowledge’ in Tanzania: what can we learn about interrupting patterned relationships to reveal hidden dimensions of poverty?

Merging of Knowledge is a research approach that creates the conditions for people with lived experience of poverty to participate at an equal level with academics and practitioners, in the co-generation of knowledge about poverty. This paper reflects critically on the application of ‘Merging of Knowledge’ to study poverty in Tanzania, assessing its challenges, achievements, and lessons learned about revealing hidden knowledge about poverty. It also provides a brief literature review to place the Merging of Knowledge alongside other participatory approaches. This paper finds that Merging of Knowledge can effectively interrupt patterned social relationships, and empower individuals and peer groups, thereby stimulating transformation of both academics and people and poverty. It does so by addressing imbalances in social status, empowering all groups of participants at each stage of the research, and building trust, confidence, and freedom from fear in a sustainable manner. The conclusion drawn is that Merging of Knowledge holds great promise for future research on topics where strong hierarchies of knowledge exist, and where the physical inclusion of participants in data collection is not readily translated into intellectual inclusivity during analysis and the dissemination of findings

La criminalisation de la pauvreté en Grande-Bretagne: Analyse des pratiques de placement et d'adoption des enfants de familles pauvres

Tout au long de l’accompagnement et de la vie partagée avec des parents très pauvres à qui les enfants étaient enlevés souvent dans des conditions inhumaines, j’ai essayé de comprendre ce qui explique l’attitude des services sociaux.Quatre phénomènes justifient le traitement des familles pauvres par les services sociaux, la police et les tribunaux de la famille :la déshumanisation, l’objectivisation et la naturalisation des parents, la banalisation de la souffrance tout cela s’accompagnant du phénomène d’’’othering’’ (altérité).À cause de leur situation de pauvreté, les parents sont stigmatisés et les services ne leur font pas confiance, un soupçon permanent pèse sur eux, et pour chaque difficulté qui se produit, ils sont suspectés d’en être la cause.Doctorat en Sciences politiques et socialesinfo:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublishe

The Lancet Global Health Commission on financing primary health care: putting people at the centre.

The COVID-19 pandemic has brought the need for well-functioning primary health care (PHC) into sharp focus. PHC is the best platform for providing basic health interventions (including effective management of non-communicable diseases) and essential public health functions. PHC is widely recognised as a key component of all high-performing health systems and is an essential foundation of universal health coverage. PHC was famously set as a global priority in the 1978 Alma-Ata Declaration. More recently, the 2018 Astana Declaration on PHC made a similar call for universal coverage of basic health care across the life cycle, as well as essential public health functions, community engagement, and a multisectoral approach to health. Yet in most low-income and middle-income countries (LMICs), PHC is not delivering on the promises of these declarations. In many places across the globe, PHC does not meet the needs of the people—including both users and providers—who should be at its centre. Public funding for PHC is insufficient, access to PHC services remains inequitable, and patients often have to pay out of pocket to use them. A vicious cycle has undermined PHC: underfunded services are unreliable, of poor quality, and not accountable to users. Therefore, many people bypass primary health-care facilities to seek out higher-level specialist care. This action deprives PHC of funding, and the lack of resources further exacerbates the problems that have driven patients elsewhere

Key challenges for tropospheric chemistry in the Southern Hemisphere

This commentary paper from the recently formed International Global Atmospheric Chemistry (IGAC) Southern Hemisphere Working Group outlines key issues in atmospheric composition research that particularly impact the Southern Hemisphere. In this article, we present a broad overview of many of the challenges for understanding atmospheric chemistry in the Southern Hemisphere, before focusing in on the most significant factors that differentiate it from the Northern Hemisphere. We present sections on the importance of biogenic emissions and fires in the Southern Hemisphere, showing that these emissions often dominate over anthropogenic emissions in many regions. We then describe how these and other factors influence air quality in different parts of the Southern Hemisphere. Finally, we describe the key role of the Southern Ocean in influencing atmospheric chemistry and conclude with a description of the aims and scope of the newly formed IGAC Southern Hemisphere Working Group

Global COVID-19 lockdown highlights humans as both threats and custodians of the environment

The global lockdown to mitigate COVID-19 pandemic health risks has altered human interactions with nature. Here, we report immediate impacts of changes in human activities on wildlife and environmental threats during the early lockdown months of 2020, based on 877 qualitative reports and 332 quantitative assessments from 89 different studies. Hundreds of reports of unusual species observations from around the world suggest that animals quickly responded to the reductions in human presence. However, negative effects of lockdown on conservation also emerged, as confinement resulted in some park officials being unable to perform conservation, restoration and enforcement tasks, resulting in local increases in illegal activities such as hunting. Overall, there is a complex mixture of positive and negative effects of the pandemic lockdown on nature, all of which have the potential to lead to cascading responses which in turn impact wildlife and nature conservation. While the net effect of the lockdown will need to be assessed over years as data becomes available and persistent effects emerge, immediate responses were detected across the world. Thus initial qualitative and quantitative data arising from this serendipitous global quasi-experimental perturbation highlights the dual role that humans play in threatening and protecting species and ecosystems. Pathways to favorably tilt this delicate balance include reducing impacts and increasing conservation effectiveness