No cause for celebration: the rise of celebrity news values in the British quality press

In their study of news values in in the British press Harcup and O’Neill (2001) noted that celebrity was one of the redefinitions of the ‘taxonomy of news values for the twenty-first century’. At the time, Harcup and O’Neill made no judgement about the changes in news values in their redefinition, nor did their research focus on the relative importance and potency of certain news values in the hierarchy of news. Using celebrity case studies from recent decades in the British ‘quality’ press, this article seeks to do just that, demonstrating that the pervasiveness and volume of coverage of celebrity has risen exponentially over 30-plus years. Celebrity/entertainment news values would appear to have risen much higher up the hierarchy of news, guaranteeing extensive coverage if combined with other news values such as surprise and bad news. The findings give rise to a wider debate and concerns about the colonisation of celebrity news and dumbing down in so many areas of British journalism, and the implications for the public and educators

Why the Imago Dei is in the Intellect Alone: A Criticism of a Phenomenology of Sensible Experience for Attaining an Image of God

This paper, as a response to Mark K. Spencer’s, “Perceiving the Image of God in the Whole Human Person” in the present volume, argues in defence of Aquinas’s position that the Imago Dei is limited in the human being to the rational, intellective soul alone. While the author agrees with Spencer that the hierarchical relation between body and soul in the human composite must be maintained while avoiding the various permeations of dualism, nevertheless, the Imago Dei cannot be located in the human body or the principle of the body considered within the body/soul composite without betraying a number of fundamental Thomistic metaphysical principles. Essential to these includes Aquinas’s position that an image of God should image not only the Divine Nature, but also the Trinitarian relations between the Divine Persons. Further, the paper also argues that a phenomenology of sense experience could not, on principle, attain to an image of God in the whole human person within a Thomistic framework generally

Agriculture, the EC and the WTO:a legal critical analysis of the concepts of sustainability and multifunctionality

The agricultural policies of the member states of the EC has for many years now been controlled from Brussels under the Common Agricultural Policy. In recent years the CAP has, together with other policies of the EC, been refocused from crop production support to a European Rural policy, with the term "sustainability" being written into many policy documents. This term has achieved international recognition, and the definition used by the Brundt Land commission has been widely accepted, as evidenced by its use in OECD documentation. While the term "sustainability" has been written into WTO texts, the robustness of the term is questionable. The question then arises as to the legal interaction of WTO texts and Multi-lateral Environmental Agreements, which do have "sustainability" as their core philosophy. A new term has entered the regional and global debate in the policy area of agriculture, that of "multifunctionality". The EC is increasingly defining agriculture as being multifunctional. This term has yet to be clearly defined at and EC level, however the OECD has done some work in this area. How the Millenium round of WTO negotiations reacts to the term "multifunctionality" will have an important impact on the EC's Common Agricultural Policy

Overview of Business-Facing Arts Audience Research

This report is a review of public-domain research conducted specifically in order to inform arts organisations about their audiences. The research covered is driven by the demands of the arts industry to understand its audiences and to develop and broaden audiences for the arts. The report includes links to key publications and research organisations, and an overview of the key offerings

The Brussels Convention:a still born child?

Whether status of Brussels Convention as international treaty rather than EU treaty limits its potential and effectiveness

International business encounters organized crime:the case of trafficking in human beings

With increasing globalization, transnational crime in general, and human trafficking in particular, a design of new legal framework is required in order to effectively operationalize interstate law enforcement operations and prosecutions. The development of a transnational criminal legal framework—or frameworks—can build on pre-existing transnational economic frameworks. There is also the need to extend the application of domestic law beyond national borders to influence transnational corporate behavior. Regulations based on reflexive law are one possible approach. Teubner’s idea of reflexive law has been informing developments in this area. This approach uses traditional national law to inform corporate governance strategies in order to achieve effects on the market. A few jurisdictions have already adopted measures modeled on this approach to tackle human trafficking and slavery-like conditions in global supply chains. Weaknesses in the approaches adopted by the UK and the State of California have already been identified. If strengthened, this approach could be adopted in more jurisdictions—including the EU—and also to combat more areas of transnational crime—such as money laundering. This paper will examine the resulting challenges using human trafficking as a case study

A lick: the performances of Angela Bartram

This short essay discusses the performances of artist Angela Bartram whose practice involves interactions with animals which often evoke revulsion in audiences