Managed Competition: Lessons from Britain

As phrases like “managed care backlash” become part of the lexicon in American health care policy circles, it is instructive to examine a managed competition experiment in a vastly different context. Britain’s Conservative government instituted reforms in 1991 to transform the National Health Service (NHS) from a centrally administered service to managed competition between purchasers and providers. Five years later, it replaced those reforms to promote cooperation rather than competition. This Issue Brief summarizes what the NHS can learn from decades of American experience with purchasing care, and what the American health system can learn from the British experiment with an internal market in the 1990s

Identifying Potential Carbon Flux Responses to Shifting Hydroecological and Climactic Regimes in the Peace-Athabasca Delta

The CO2 flux response of organic carbon stored in lake sediments and littoral peat contained in sensitive, northern wetlands may contribute to accelerating atmospheric CO2 concentrations. Temperature and moisture conditions are important variables that affect the rate and quantity of CO2 released to the atmosphere from organic matter stored in lake sediments and peat. Antecedent hydroecological conditions also influence the direction and magnitude of CO2 fluxes to the atmosphere in a changing environment. To better understand and characterize the role of antecedent conditions on CO2 fluxes, this study combines paleolimnological reconstructions with laboratory incubations of littoral peat and lake sediment from two ponds in the Peace - Athabasca Delta (PAD) in Alberta to (1) investigate the role that past and present hydrological conditions plays on the amount and lability of stored organic carbon to oxidation and respiration potentials and (2) evaluate potential production of CO2 in light of anticipated future hydroecological conditions. Lake sediment geochemical records from a currently closed-drainage site (PAD 1) provide evidence for a three-phase hydrological history spanning the last -600 years, consistent with other independently identified climatic intervals in the PAD. Bulk organic carbon and nitrogen elemental and isotopic analyses of lake sediment organic matter and reconstruction of lake water 8 O from cellulose oxygen isotope analyses reveal periods of hydrological connectivity to Lake Athabasca during the Little Ice Age (LIA) high-stand. Low 513Corg, high C/N and variable but elevated 5180|W values from the beginning of the record to -1600 CE, align with the Medieval Period (MP), when lower water levels characterized the central interior of the PAD and this site would have been a closed-drainage basin. A shift to higher 513Corg, lower and constant C/N and lower 5 0]w values occur during the LIA, suggesting that elevated Lake Athabasca water levels would have been capable of inundating this basin during this time. This is further supported by minimum 8 Oiw values at -1700, when maximum discharge occurred from the Rocky Mountain glacial headwaters. A shift to lower 513Corg, declining C/N and variable but increasing 5 0|w values define the 20f century, reflecting a decline in water levels and the development of closed-drainage conditions at PAD 1. Lake sediment organic matter profiles of three sediment cores from PAD 31 in the southern, Athabasca-sector of the delta provide evidence for increases in the frequency of overland flood events due to the natural upstream bifurcation of the Embarras River (Embarras Breakthrough, 1982). High 813Corg values indicate periodic hydrological connection with Lake Athabasca water at the peak of the LIA, while lower 8 Corg values and increasing bulk organic content indicate the development of closed-drainage conditions following water level declines into the 20th century. An inflection of organic content to lower values and higher bulk densities indicate the increasing flood frequency following the 1982 Embarras Breakthrough event. Laboratory incubations measuring CO2 production potentials from selected lake sediment and peat depth intervals reveal site, substrate and stratigraphic differences in potential CO2 production. Mean, depth-integrated CO2 production rates are greatest during warm, moist treatments. Production of CO2 from PAD 31 peat substrates is greater than from PAD 1 peat, while PAD 1 sediments produce more CO2 during both moist and saturated treatments. Stratigraphic-dependent CO2 production reveals that sediment and peat deposited during the LIA at PAD 1 potentially produce less CO2 than MP or 201 century intervals. Intervals characterized by increased flooding at PAD 31 (following the 1982 Embarras Breakthrough) deposit peat and sediment that produces greater amounts of CO2 compared to earlier, less flood-dominated stratigraphic intervals. PAD 31 peat and sediment substrates are more sensitive to changes in temperature and moisture than those obtained from PAD 1. Near-surface substrates also exhibit the least temperature sensitivity of CO2 production at each site. These results suggest that more flood-prone, frequently flooded sites (PAD 31) produce and store organic matter in peat and lake sediment that may contribute greater amounts of CO2 to the atmosphere than closed-drainage sites (PAD 1). Stratigraphic differences in CO2 production also emphasize the importance of considering antecedent hydrological conditions when evaluating potential CO2 fluxes from northern wetland environments

A Phone Learning Model for Enhancing Productivity of Visually Impaired Civil Servants

Phone-based learning in civil service is the use of voice technologies to deliver learning and capacity building training services to government employees. The Internet revolution and advancement in Information and Communications Technology (ICT) have given rise to online and remote staff training for the purpose of enhancing workers productivity. The need for civil servants in Nigeria to develop capacity that will enhance knowledge is a key requirement to having competitive advantage in the work place. Existing online learning platforms (such as web-based learning, mobile learning, etc) did not consider the plight of the visually impaired. These platforms provide graphical interfaces that require sight to access. The visually impaired civil servants require auditory access to functionalities that exist in learning management system on the Internet. Thus a gap exist between the able-bodied and visually impaired civil servants on accessibility to e-learning platform. The objective of this paper is to provide a personalized telephone learning model and a prototype application that will enhance the productivity of the visually impaired workers in Government establishments in Nigeria. The model was designed using Unified Modeling Language (UML) diagram. The prototype application was implemented and evaluated. With the proposed model and application, the visually and mobility impaired worker are able to participate in routine staff training and consequently enhances their productivity just like their able-bodied counterparts. The prototype application also serves as an alternative training platform for the able-bodied workers. Future research direction for this study will include biometric authentication of learners accessing the applicatio

Learning masculinities in a Japanese high school rugby club

This paper draws on research conducted on a Tokyo high school rugby club to explore diversity in the masculinities formed through membership in the club. Based on the premise that particular forms of masculinity are expressed and learnt through ways of playing (game style) and the attendant regimes of training, it examines the expression and learning of masculinities at three analytic levels. It identifies a hegemonic, culture-specific form of masculinity operating in Japanese high school rugby, a class-influenced variation of it at the institutional level of the school and, by further tightening its analytic focus, further variation at an individual level. In doing so this paper highlights the ways in which diversity in the masculinities constructed through contact sports can be obfuscated by a reductionist view of there being only one, universal hegemonic patterns of masculinity

Parallels in Public and Private Environmental Governance

Private actors, including business firms and non-governmental organizations, play an essential role in addressing today’s most serious environmental challenges. Yet scholars have not fully recognized the parallels between public environmental law and the standard-setting and enforcement functions of private environmental governance. “Instrument choice” in environmental law scholarship is generally understood to refer to government actors choosing among options from the public law “toolkit,” which includes prescriptive rules, the creation of property rights, the leveraging of markets, and informational regulation. Each of these major public law tools, however, has a parallel in private environmental governance. This Article first provides a descriptive account of these parallels, which highlights two underappreciated tools used by both public and private actors: procurement and insurance for environmental risks. It then considers the normative criteria that should inform choices among instruments by using the example of climate change. The resulting portrait of a multi-tiered, global regime of environmental governance with both public and private options promises greater flexibility and institutional power to address otherwise intractable environmental problems than the traditional paradigm of relying only on public regulation

CubeSat Measures World's First Ice Cloud Map to Support Climate Research

Virginia Diodes, Inc. received NASA SBIR Awards to fund research and development for a lesser developed region of the electromagnetic spectrumterahertz waves. Their work led to funding from NASA ESTO, and the resulting CubeSat (named IceCube) captured the worlds first ice cloud map, which will contribute to our understanding of Earths climat