Politics, Policy, and Participation: Contemporary Issues in Canadian Gender Equality

Introduction to the Symposiu

Will e-Governance and e-Democracy Lead to e-Empowerment? Gendering the Cyber State

The onslaught of information and communications technologies (ICTs), the burgeoning popularity of the Internet, and the ideology behind the new information economy has coalesced into a force that is fundamentally reshaping the contours of the Canadian political landscape. This reorganization of the state will profoundly impact women’s opportunities to participate in and alter conventional notions of citizenship. The establishment of electronic or e-government and the implications behind the development of the cyberstate promise to revolutionize Canadian governance and our traditional understandings of democracy. While there is the political possibility of shaping the emerging cyberstate as a vehicle of empowerment for women and marginalized others, there is also the prospect that Internet-facilitated government will exacerbate inequalities and impair women’s citizenship status. (author's abstract

Deep Deification: Soteriology for a World in Ecological Crisis

What might an adequate soteriology look like for a world in ecological crisis? This dissertation constructively addresses this problem at the intersection of contemporary ecofeminist theology and Patristic soteriologies of theosis or deification. I examine ecofeminist soteriologies, drawing on the work of Rosemary Radford Ruether, Sallie McFague, and Elizabeth Johnson in particular, and deification soteriologies, especially that of Maximus the Confessor, arguing that each of these trajectories offers both fruitful possibilities for a reconstruction of soteriology but that each also raises some problems. In bringing these two trajectories into conversation, I suggest directions for a constructive theology of salvation that speaks to the ecological problems of our time. Theologians, ethicists, and church leaders, including Pope Francis, have called for a more expansive and less anthropocentric notion than traditional atonement theologies of how God relates to, and saves, the world. Two responses to this have been ecofeminist theology and a retrieval in the West of the Greek patristic theme of deification. Ecotheologians call for an expansion of God’s continuing care for creation to include animals and the earth (or even universe) itself. Deification, meanwhile, expands the meaning of salvation beyond the more typically modern, Western notions of salvation only from sin. Salvation as deification encompasses the whole story of God’s relationship with human beings, and indeed with the cosmos, from creation through eschatology, to the time in which God will be “all in all.” A deeper conversation that addresses the tensions between these two trajectories will lead to an enrichment of ecotheology. Indeed, as ecotheologians, following Niels Gregersen, speak of “deep incarnation,” there are rich resources for thinking of a corresponding “deep deification,” in which the goal of all creation is divinization: the broken and crucified body of God restored to new life and invited into the life of the Trinity

Climate Change Subsystem Structure and Change: Network Mapping, Density and Centrality

Policy capacity in web-based settings is largely the product of nodality, which provides centralized actors with enhanced opportunities to detect information and affect behavior. This paper examines four Canadian virtual policy networks (VPN) currently facing policy challenges associated with climate change adaptation including finance, infrastructure, transportation, and forestry. The four sectors each face specific types of challenges that will presumably influence government’s policy capacity to respond to climate change adaptation, which in turn will affect the state’s nodal positioning in the VPNs. At the macro level governing capacity will vary considerably among these sectors with some more able to affect social behavior and evidence-informed learning, while others will struggle to lead policy discourse and development. It is hypothesized that the Canadian federal government’s nodality, which is shaped by both reputational capital and information credibility, will also be influenced by the nature of actors involved and the degree to which the VPN is internationalized

Third Sector and Social Media

While social media has become a mainstay of communication in the twenty-first century, many organizations still struggle to include it in their operations. This is no less the case for organizations in the third sector. However, evidence-based practices tying social media activity to social media success are still elusive in the field. Examining the Facebook and Twitter presence of 45 Canadian organizations concerned with education, disaster relief, and environmental advocacy, the authors evaluate social media practices used by third sector organizations. Borrowing from Mark Granovetter’s (1973) work on the strength of social ties, the authors found that disaster relief organizations tended toward activities to build emotionally intense, or “strong,” relationships, while educational organizations offered more informational means to build “weak” relationships based on common interests. Environmental organizations used both strategies, but were less likely to broaden their activities beyond Facebook and Twitter. The authors propose identifying organizations’ weak-tie/strong-tie strategies as a tool for evaluating social media activity in the not-for-profit sector. They argue that co-ordinating both types of strategies is necessary for successful social media campaigns. RÉSUMÉ Bien que les médias sociaux soient devenus omniprésents dans la communication au 21ème siècle, plusieurs organisations tardent à les inclure dans leurs opérations. Ceci n’est pas moins le cas des organismes du troisième secteur. En même temps, la recherche établissant un rapport entre le recours aux médias sociaux et le succès d’une organisation demeure peu concluante. Dans cet article, les auteurs évaluent l’utilisation de médias sociaux par des organisations du troisième secteur en examinant la présence sur Facebook et Twitter de quarante-cinq organismes canadiens se spécialisant en éducation, en secours aux sinistrés et en activisme écologique. En recourant à l’œuvre de Mark Granovetter sur la puissance des liens sociaux, les auteurs ont trouvé que les organismes de secours aux sinistrés tendaient à effectuer des activités axées sur des relations intenses d’un point de vue émotionnel, donc « fortes », tandis que les organismes éducationnels avaient une approche plus informationnelle afin de construire des relations « faibles » fondées sur des intérêts communs. Les organisations environnementales quant à elles employaient les deux stratégies, mais elles étaient moins enclines à élargir leurs activités au-delà de Facebook et Twitter. Les auteurs proposent d’identifier les stratégies d’attaches faibles et fortes comme outils pour évaluer le recours aux médias sociaux dans le secteur sans but lucratif. Ils soutiennent que la coordination des deux types de stratégie est nécessaire pour réussir les campagnes de médias sociaux

Neuromuscular recovery from botulism involves multiple forms of compensatory plasticity

IntroductionBotulinum neurotoxin (BoNT) causes neuroparalytic disease and death by blocking neuromuscular transmission. There are no specific therapies for clinical botulism and the only treatment option is supportive care until neuromuscular function spontaneously recovers, which can take weeks or months after exposure. The highly specialized neuromuscular junction (NMJ) between phrenic motor neurons and diaphragm muscle fibers is the main clinical target of BoNT. Due to the difficulty in eliciting respiratory paralysis without a high mortality rate, few studies have characterized the neurophysiological mechanisms involved in diaphragm recovery from intoxication. Here, we develop a mouse model of botulism that involves partial paralysis of respiratory muscles with low mortality rates, allowing for longitudinal analysis of recovery.Methods and resultsMice challenged by systemic administration of 0.7 LD50 BoNT/A developed physiological signs of botulism, such as respiratory depression and reduced voluntary running activity, that persisted for an average of 8–12 d. Studies in isolated hemidiaphragm preparations from intoxicated mice revealed profound reductions in nerve-elicited, tetanic and twitch muscle contraction strengths that recovered to baseline 21 d after intoxication. Despite apparent functional recovery, neurophysiological parameters remained depressed for 28 d, including end plate potential (EPP) amplitude, EPP success rate, quantal content (QC), and miniature EPP (mEPP) frequency. However, QC recovered more quickly than mEPP frequency, which could explain the discrepancy between muscle function studies and neurophysiological recordings. Hypothesizing that differential modulation of voltage-gated calcium channels (VGCC) contributed to the uncoupling of QC from mEPP frequency, pharmacological inhibition studies were used to study the contributions of different VGCCs to neurophysiological function. We found that N-type VGCC and P/Q-type VGCC partially restored QC but not mEPP frequency during recovery from paralysis, potentially explaining the accelerated recovery of evoked release versus spontaneous release. We identified additional changes that presumably compensate for reduced acetylcholine release during recovery, including increased depolarization of muscle fiber resting membrane potential and increased quantal size.DiscussionIn addition to identifying multiple forms of compensatory plasticity that occur in response to reduced NMJ function, it is expected that insights into the molecular mechanisms involved in recovery from neuromuscular paralysis will support new host-targeted treatments for multiple neuromuscular diseases

Evidence of Natural Bluetongue Virus Infection among African Carnivores

Bluetongue is an International Office of Epizootics List A disease described as the century\u27s most economically devastating affliction of sheep. Bluetongue (BLU) viruses were thought to infect only ruminants, shrews, and some rodents, but recently, inadvertent administration of BLU virus-contaminated vaccine resulted in mortality and abortion among domestic dogs. We present evidence of natural BLU virus infection among African carnivores that dramatically widens the spectrum of susceptible hosts. We hypothesize that such infection occurred after ingestion of meat and organs from BLU virus infected prey species. The effect of BLU virus on endangered carnivores such as the cheetah and African wild dog requires urgent investigation. Also, the role of carnivores in the epizootiology of this disease needs elucidation

Disseminating Research News in HCI: Perceived Hazards, How-To's, and Opportunities for Innovation

Mass media afford researchers critical opportunities to disseminate research findings and trends to the general public. Yet researchers also perceive that their work can be miscommunicated in mass media, thus generating unintended understandings of HCI research by the general public. We conduct a Grounded Theory analysis of interviews with 12 HCI researchers and find that miscommunication can occur at four origins along the socio-technical infrastructure known as the Media Production Pipeline (MPP) for science news. Results yield researchers' perceived hazards of disseminating their work through mass media, as well as strategies for fostering effective communication of research. We conclude with implications for augmenting or innovating new MPP technologies.Comment: 10 pages, 2 figures, accepted paper to CHI 2020 conferenc