(Re)visioning America in the Graphic Novel: Introduction

Comics is an exciting medium which has come into its own both as serious literary and cultural expression, as well as the subject for scholarship. Much of the scholarly discourse of late has been directed at describing and analyzing the medium itself. While comics researchers versed in semiotics and narratology endeavor to construct and refine useful explanatory paradigms, it is also necessary and helpful to employ less medium-specific approaches in discussing and analyzing visual, literary, ..

Prime Minister as Moral Crusader: Stephen Harper's Punitive Turn in Social Policy-making

Stephen Harper has been Canada’s Prime Minister since 2006, heading three Conservative administrations; two minority governments (2006-08, and 2008-11) and one majority government (2011- to the present). Harper’s time in power has spanned periods of economic growth and surplus federal budgets, through a deep economic recession and budget deficits, to a tentative recovery of the Canadian economy and federal program of general fiscal restraint. Throughout this period of shifting economic and political circumstances, Harper, an intensely partisan and disciplined politician, has dominated his cabinet and parliamentary party as well as defined federal social policy and intergovernmental relations in particular ways. Like other Prime Ministers and governments, the Harper era exhibits a mixed pattern of social policy-making. Thus, although there are certain similarities in policies with previous federal administrations led by Liberal Prime Ministers, Harper’s social policy is distinctive as well. This article advances the argument that Harper’s characteristic approach can be understood in terms of an institutional-punitive conception of social policy. This stern approach to federal social policy-making involves the identification of dangerous persons and threatening behaviours, the elaboration of laws and creation of new offences, and the intensification of legal penalties and punishments. What emerges is the role of Prime Minister as moral crusader in a politics of fear, judgement and regulation. Stephen Harper est le premier ministre du Canada depuis 2006, et il a dirigé trois administrations conservatrices: deux gouvernements minoritaires de 2006-2008, et de 2008-2011, et un gouvernement majoritaire de 2011 à aujourd’hui. Ces administrations ont connues des périodes de croissance économique et de budgets fédéraux excédentaires, ainsi qu’une profonde récession économique, pour arriver enfin à une relance incertaine de l’économie canadienne et à un programme général fédéral de contraintes budgétaires. Harper est un politicien éminemment partisan et très discipliné, et il a dominé son cabinet ainsi que son parti parlementaire au cours de cette période de conditions économiques et politiques changeantes. Il a également redéfini la politique sociale fédérale et les relations intergouvernementales de manière spécifique. Comme d’autres premiers ministres et gouvernements auparavant, l’ère de Harper fait montre d’un mélange de motifs de politiques et de gestion sociales. Donc, bien qu’il existe de similarités en politiques sociales avec les administrations fédérales libérales qui l’ont précédée, la politique social de Harper est très distincte et cet article propose donc que l’approche caractéristique à Harper peut être définie comme une politique sociale institutionnelle-punitive. Cette approche sévère a propos des politiques sociales fédérales, incorpore un processus d’identification de personnes dangereuses et de omportements menaçants, la création de nouvelle lois et de nouveaux délits pour les contrôler, et, l’augmentation des sanctions et peines légales. Le rôle du premier ministre émerge donc comme celui d’un champion de la moralité, aidée par une politique de peur, de jugement et de règlementation. Mots-clefs: politique sociale fédérales; conservatisme moral; sciences politiques

Numerical analysis of pulse pedestal and dynamic chirp formation on picosecond modelocked laser pulses after propagation through a semiconductor optical amplifier

A numerical analysis, based on a modified Schrodinger equation, of the formation of pulse pedestals and dynamic chirp formation on picosecond pulses after propagation through a semiconductor optical amplifier is presented. The numerical predictions are confirmed by an experiment that utilises the frequency resolved optical gating technique for the amplified pulse characterisation

Triple-wavelength fiber ring laser based on a hybrid gain medium actively mode-locked at 10 GHz

A fiber ring laser based on a hybrid gain medium that produces three simultaneously mode-locked wavelength channels is presented. The lithium niobate based modulator used to actively mode-lock the laser cavity at 10 GHz is birefringence compensated to reduce its polarization sensitivity. A Lyot filter defines the lasers multiwavelength spectrum which has a wavelength spacing of 1 nm. The polarization sensitive nature of the laser cavity and its affect on the performance of the laser is discussed

Weary Warriors

As seen in military documents, medical journals, novels, films, television shows, and memoirs, soldiers’ invisible wounds are not innate cracks in individual psyches that break under the stress of war. Instead, the generation of weary warriors is caught up in wider social and political networks and institutions—families, activist groups, government bureaucracies, welfare state programs—mediated through a military hierarchy, psychiatry rooted in mind-body sciences, and various cultural constructs of masculinity. This book offers a history of military psychiatry from the American Civil War to the latest Afghanistan conflict. The authors trace the effects of power and knowledge in relation to the emotional and psychological trauma that shapes soldiers’ bodies, minds, and souls, developing an extensive account of the emergence, diagnosis, and treatment of soldiers’ invisible wounds

Understanding Universality within a Liberal Welfare Regime: The Case of Universal Social Programs in Canada

Although Canada is known as a liberal welfare regime, universality is a key issue in that country, as several major social programs are universal in both their core principles and coverage rules. The objective of this article is to discuss the meaning of universality and related concepts before exploring the development of individual universal social programs in Canada, with a particular focus on health care and old-age pensions. More generally, the article shows how universality can exist and become resilient within a predominantly liberal welfare regime due to the complex and fragmented nature of modern social policy systems, in which policy types vary from policy area to policy area, and even from program to program within the same policy area. The broader analysis of health care and old-age pensions as policy areas illustrates this general claim. This analysis looks at the historical development and the politics of provincial universal health coverage since the late 1950s and at the evolution of the federal Old Age Security program since its creation in the early 1950s. The main argument of this article is that universality as a set of principles remains stronger in health care than in pensions yet key challenges remain in each of these policy areas. Another contention is that there are multiple and contested universalisms in social policy

Banishing Bureaucracy or Hatching a Hybrid? The Canadian Food Inspection Agency and the Politics of Reinventing Government

The Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) is the lead governmental organization in Canada devoted to the regulation of animal, food, and plant health as well as consumer safety in regards to the labeling and packaging of food products. A recent organizational innovation in public administration, the CFIA came into being April 1997, and represents a rich case study for better understanding issues such as how and why regulatory agencies are created in an age of deregulation, as well as the nature of alternative service delivery and accountability arrangements. This innovation is of wider interest because it is the first alternative delivery service agency created at the national level in Canada and thus offers insights into the politics of transforming the public sector in a science-based regulatory field and within a parliamentary system. A second aim of this article is to explore the application of the Reinventing Government (RG) paradigm on government reform by describing the legal and policy mandate of the CFIA and its organizational design, and comparing it to principles of the RG model. The concept of RG is now a mainstream phrase if not common practice in public sectors across numerous jurisdictions. The phrase itself and th

Risk factors for polyoma virus nephropathy

Background. Polyoma virus-associated nephropathy (PVN) is a common cause of renal transplant failure. The risk factors for the development of PVN have not yet been studied in large cohorts of patients for periods of 20 years. Methods. We collected clinical, renal biopsy and urinary cytology data from all patients with renal transplantations performed at the University Hospital of Basel from 1985 to 2005. All patients with a renal biopsy and urine cytology were included (n = 880). Renal transplants were divided into three groups, according to evidence of polyoma virus (PV) infection (decoy cells in the urine) and biopsy-proven PVN: Renal transplants without evidence of a PV infection (n = 751). Renal transplants with PV reactivation, e.g. decoy cell (DC) found by urinary cytology, but without PVN (n = 90). Renal transplants with PVN (n = 39). Results. The prevalence of biopsy-proven PVN in this cohort of patients was 3.3%. Immunosuppression with mycophenolate and/or tacrolimus, ATGAM, male gender of the recipient and a higher number of transplant rejection episodes were factors significantly associated with PVN development. Conclusions. The most important risk factors for the development of PVN are acute rejection and ATGAM used as induction therapy as well as tacrolimus and mycophenolate as maintenance therapy. Therefore, we conclude that patients with tacrolimus and mycophenolate maintenance therapy should be carefully monitored for the development of PV

Two dimensional dynamical systems which admit Lie and Noether symmetries

We prove two theorems which relate the Lie point symmetries and the Noether symmetries of a dynamical system moving in a Riemannian space with the special projective group and the homothetic group of the space respectively. The theorems are applied to classify the two dimensional Newtonian dynamical systems, which admit a Lie point/Noether symmetry. Two cases are considered, the non-conservative and the conservative forces. The use of the results is demonstrated for the Kepler - Ermakov system, which in general is non-conservative and for potentials similar to the H\`enon Heiles potential. Finally it is shown that in a FRW background with no matter present, the only scalar cosmological model which is integrable is the one for which 3-space is flat and the potential function of the scalar field is exponential. It is important to note that in all applications the generators of the symmetry vectors are found by reading the appropriate entry in the relevant tables.Comment: 25 pages, 17 table