Food, The Environment, and Democracy: A Case Study of the Marine Conservation Movement\u27s Shift from State-centered to Market-based Approaches

This paper examines the shift by the marine conservation movement from state-centered to market-based strategies and its implications for the democratization of food and agriculture. Using two theoretical frameworks form social movement theory – the opportunities approach and resource mobilization theory – three factors are identified as driving the shift by marine conservation organizations to market-based strategies. First, limited success using state-centered strategies created the impetus for marine conservation organizations to seek out alternative strategies. Second, changes in food and agriculture created opportunities for market based strategies. Specifically, the emergence of retailers as leader actors, the development of an economy of qualities in food, and the increasing use of governance each created opportunities for market-based approaches. Lastly, foundations used their funding to channel marine conservation organizations toward market-based approaches. The outcome is a market-based model of environmental change in which movement organizations work with and/or pressure industry to make changes. In concluding, the potential implications of the shift toward market-based strategies for democratic politics are examined. Whereas market-based strategies open new opportunities for movements, the use of such strategies may also constrain democratization in that they: (1) promote consumption, (2) depend on the market, and (3) use private governance. Each of these potential constraints is briefly examined

Norfolk Resource Mothers Program Evaluation

This study uses the post-test only design to assess the preliminary effects of a community-based policy initiative, the Norfolk State University Resource Mothers Program (RMP), on the gestational ages, birth weights, and survival rates of infants born to participating adolescent mothers. The RMP uses experienced mothers or paraprofessionals similar in race and socio-economic status to the participating teenagers. These persons are trained to assist pregnant adolescents and teen parents with nonmedical dimensions of pregnancy and child care. They recruit teens into the RMP, encouraging them to get early prenatal care. Resource Mothers provide teen mothers and their families with practical help as needed, and help increase community awareness of the infant mortality and adolescent pregnancy issues. This analysis compares selected pregnancy outcomes of participants in the RMP with pregnancy outcomes of participants in an alternate program, young mothers who receive traditional prenatal care without structured psycho-social support, and with teens who receive no prenatal care. The pregnancy outcomes of the total study population and subgroups also are compared with national, state, regional and local low birth weight rates, and high infant mortality rates. Study findings show that premature deliveries and low birth weight babies are lower among adolescent mothers, at increased risk for delivering low weight infants, by using a specialized support program involving lay home-visitors who share socio-economic characteristics of the adolescents\u27 families or a multi-disciplinary program with home visiting

The Way You Make Me Feel: Semantic Response Behavior Following a Status Prime in the Context of Romantic Relationships

Intimate Partner Violence is a potential result of an imbalance within a romantic relationship that comes with grave consequences. Often, abusers find that their higher status position assists them in their ability to harm someone with a lower status position, which thereby leading to higher likelihood of aggression. It is currently unknown whether or not people who verbalize this status imbalance through semantic choice will have a higher likelihood of aggressing. The power of suggestion is a strong phenomenon. Not only can semantics be used in priming to affect various types of behavior such as emotional responses (Hansen & Shantz, 1995), but they can also predict likelihood of behaving in a certain manner (Amrhein, Miller, Yahne, Palmer, & Fulcher, 2003). I hypothesize that when primed with an imbalance in status within a social relationship via the imposition of a social hierarchy, subjects will choose higher ratings of their emotional responses to vignettes and identifying with the words that result from those ratings, which represent their emotional expression. I additionally hypothesize that the variations between social relationships, such as whether the relationship is of a romantic or non-romantic nature, will ultimately influence this decision-making process as well. This is not necessarily stating that the participants will have a higher likelihood of aggression, but rather is attempting to bridge the gap between the semantic tendency to verbalize one\u27s position within the hierarchy of a relationship and verbally aggressive behavior, which is represented by high ratings for negatively-valenced emotions followed by confirmation of identification. By bridging this gap between semantics and aggression, I am hoping to provide a potential way to identify aggressors before they aggress. The results of this experiment revealed no significance in terms of emotional ratings or for the emotional identification, but there was directionality within the emotional ratings which suggests that this line of inquiry deserves further inspection

An Interview with Dr. Lawrence Busch of the Michigan State University School of Agrifood Governance and Technoscience

An Interview with Dr. Lawrence Busch of the Michigan State University School of Agrifood Governance and Technoscienc

AC railway electrification systems - An EMC perspective

Railways are electrified in many different ways. In this article, the main options for electrifying a high speed AC railway are reviewed from an electromagnetic compatibility (EMC) perspective. Firstly, the trend of increasing the usage of electrified trains to replace conventional diesel locomotives is pointed out. On this basis, the significance of considering EMC in the railway environment is explained, with a view to preventing the malfunction of the railway system. Secondly, different electrification options are introduced, namely the rail-return, booster-transformer and auto-transformer systems. The benefits and drawbacks of each electrification option are considered based on the interference level to the trackside railway signaling and telecommunication systems. The discussion of each electrification system is verified using electromagnetic simulations. By comparing the different electrification schemes, it is shown that the auto-transformer system has better EMC performance and delivers higher power to the train

"May All Rise Up": Highland Mobilization in Post-1954 Guatemala

This dissertation examines a difficult subject in a difficult period: activism by indígenas before, during, and after la violencia (1978-1983), the most brutal years of Guatemala's 36-year civil war. It was a time of increasing oppositional politics, and in that context, indígenas from different regions began discussions and organizing focused on ethnic and class identities, indigenous culture, justice, and state violence. This study analyzes connections among activists from across the highlands and the complex and evolving ways in which they expressed demands in the name of the pueblo indígena. Organizing was diverse: indígenas struggled for economic and cultural rights, challenged the state, even fought for revolution, in markedly different ways, some articulated around ideas of race and ethnic identity, others in terms of class struggle. In the context of armed insurgency in the 1960s, '70s, and '80s, these class- and race-based tendencies among indígenas have been interpreted as diametrically opposed, even revolutionary and counter-revolutionary. I focus instead on links that existed among different forms of organizing. The dissertation documents how indigenous students and intellectuals, catechists, campesino organizers, and revolutionaries shaped, challenged, and reinforced each other's struggles. State violence had profound and contradictory effects on indigenous organizing: initially state repression had a mobilizing and radicalizing effect on young indígenas and was a catalyst in the formation of broadening pan-Indian identity. As extreme terror reached the level of genocide, however, it had its intended effect, the demobilization of political opposition. The experiences of extreme state terror directed specifically against the indigenous population significantly altered relationships among indigenous activists, and an "indigenous" struggle became divorced from broader opposition movements. La violencia continues to shape how indígenas and Guatemalan society as a whole remember the past and how they mobilize, or not, in the present. Despite a distancing on the part of many Mayas from a history of activism, this study shows that Mayas were not bystanders in the transformations that preceded and accompanied the civil war. Activism by indígenas helped shape that war; that war shaped indigenous activism

The relationship between hiv duration, insulin resistance and diabetes risk

The risk of developing Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus in people living with HIV (PLWH) can be four times greater and can occur at an earlier age and even without the presence of obesity compared to those without HIV. Therefore, the purpose of this analytical cross-sectional study was to determine the relationship between HIV duration and glucose metabolism among PLWH. Eighty-two PLWH were categorized into shorter (≤15 years) or longer HIV duration (≥16 years) and then compared for differences in demographics, physical and clinical characteristics, biomarkers, and dietary intake. Compared to those with shorter HIV duration (n = 34), those with longer HIV duration (n = 48) were on average older (p = 0.02), reported lower consumption of alcohol (p = 0.05), had higher levels of homeostasis model assessment of insulin resistance (HOMA-IR, p = 0.02), were also more likely to be a woman (p = 0.06), and have higher levels of fasting insulin (p = 0.06). When adjusted for age and body weight, the levels of HOMA-IR and fasting insulin were higher (p = 0.02 and p = 0.04) with longer compared to shorter HIV duration, respectively. Longer exposure to HIV infection is associated with impaired insulin sensitivity. Continuing research aimed at the long-term effects of HIV infection and (antiretroviral therapy) is required