The politics of academic knowledge and time in the worlds of higher education

Peer reviewe

New Horizons in the Europe of Knowledge

open access journalThis editorial introduces the notion of the Europe of Knowledge and places it in the European integration research agenda. We first describe what the concept means before suggesting how to approach the Europe of Knowledge as a new case for investigating European integration dynamics. This discussion revolves around the evolution of policy developments in research and higher education to show how knowledge policies are compound and manifest distinct dimensions of differentiated integration and experimentation, both fruitful theoretical research agendas. We then summarise the articles to show the respective Europe of Knowledge themes they highlight. We conclude by considering how the Europe of Knowledge in the making encourages testing established empirical and analytical assumptions about European integration and experimenting with emerging ideas about regional cooperation from around the world

Image and Substance Failures in Regional Organisations: Causes, Consequences, Learning and Change?

States often pool their sovereignty, capacity and resources to provide regionally specific public goods, such as security or trade rules, and regional organisations play important roles in international relations as institutions that attempt to secure peace and contribute to achieving other similar global policy goals. We observe failures occurring in these arrangements and activities in two areas: substance and image. To analytically account for this, we distinguish four modes of substance and image change and link these to specific types of failure and (lack of) learning. To empirically ground and test our assumptions, we examine instances of image failure in ASEAN (political/security policy) and substantive policy failure in EU labour migration policy. In so doing, this article contributes to several different fields of study and concepts that have hitherto rarely engaged with one another: analyses of policy failure from public policy, and regional integration concerns from area studies and international relations. We conclude with suggestions for ways forward to further analyse and understand failures at the international and supranational levels

Higher education governance and policy : an introduction to multi-issue, multi-level, and multi-actor dynamics

This thematic issue introduces the multifaceted nature of contemporary public policy—its multi-level, multi-actor, and multi-issue features—by using the case of higher education poli-cies from around the world. To do so, this introduction first describes how higher education as a policy sector should be garnering far more attention from scholars interested in political, economic, and social transformation. A framework for identifying and accounting for how the ‘multi-s’ characteristics configure and re-configure public policy is then introduced. Next, this thematic issue’s contributions are summarised with highlights of how they bring to life the different ‘multi-s’ features. This introduction concludes with a discussion of what the proposed framework of the ‘multi-s’ offers to studies of higher education policy coordina-tion. In so doing, the objectives of this thematic issue are to highlight what the case of higher education policy coordination offers to studies of public policy, and to initiate a dialogue between all social scientists and practitioners interested in the increased complexity of gov-erning, producing, and using knowledge today

Working Within the Aspiring Center: Professional Status and Mobilities Among Migrant Faculty in Singapore

This paper investigates the migration of Asia-born academics from traditional centers in the West to Singapore, a rapidly developing education hub in Southeast Asia. We argue that such movement can be seen as a form of quasi-return, where migrant faculty look for places where they can be “close enough” to aging parents and family, while working in an institution that is “good enough” to continue research work. This position leads to conflicting notions of social mobility, when defined in terms of professional prestige and status. While interviewees perceived their move to Singapore as a form of upward mobility when compared to colleagues within their home countries, they simultaneously worried about their downward mobility compared to peers who had remained in the West. Such perceptions shape their decision to leave Singapore in the future, reinforcing current university hierarchies, where institutions in the USA and Europe continue to dominate notions of academic prestige

Policy Coherence for Development in the EU Council: Strategies for the Way Forward. CEPS Paperbacks. July 2006

In recognition of the fact that EU policies in non-development areas, such as trade, energy and migration, can also profoundly affect the poor in developing countries, the EU has affirmed ‘Policy Coherence for Development’ as an important principle for achieving more effective development cooperation. This new CEPS study analyses whether policy-making processes in the EU Council provide sufficient scope for development inputs to be made in 12 key policy areas: trade, environment, climate change, security, agriculture, fisheries, social dimension of globalisation, employment and decent work, migration, research and innovation, information society, transport and energy. The study also includes coverage of the policy-making processes in the European Commission as it initiates and defends most of the policies being discussed in the EU Council. Its findings point to the highly segregated character of EU policy-making and provide interesting insights into the internal challenges the EU will need to address in order to fulfil its goal of achieving greater coherency in its (external) policy-making. To strengthen the potential for PCD the study suggests six proposals for structural reform as well as a set of specific recommendations

Is clopidogrel better than aspirin following breakthrough strokes while on aspirin? A retrospective cohort study.

ObjectiveThere is insufficient evidence on which to base a recommendation for optimal antiplatelet therapy following a stroke while on aspirin. The objective was to compare clopidogrel initiation vs aspirin reinitiation for vascular risk reduction among patients with ischaemic stroke on aspirin at the time of their index stroke.DesignRetrospective.SettingWe conducted a nationwide cohort study by retrieving all hospitalised patients (≥18 years) with a primary diagnosis of ischaemic stroke between 2003 and 2009 from Taiwan National Health Insurance Research Database.ParticipantsAmong 3862 patients receiving aspirin before the index ischaemic stroke and receiving either aspirin or clopidogrel after index stroke during follow-up period, 1623 were excluded due to a medication possession ratio <80%. Also, 355 were excluded due to history of atrial fibrillation, valvular heart disease or coagulopathy. Therefore, 1884 patients were included in our final analysis.InterventionsPatients were categorised into two groups based on whether clopidogrel or aspirin was prescribed during the follow-up period. Follow-up was from time of the index stroke to admission for recurrent stroke or myocardial infarction, death or the end of 2010.Primary and secondary outcome measuresThe primary end point was hospitalisation due to a new-onset major adverse cardiovascular event (MACE: composite of any stroke or myocardial infarction). The leading secondary end point was any recurrent stroke.ResultsCompared to aspirin, clopidogrel was associated with a lower occurrence of future MACE (HR=0.54, 95% CI 0.43 to 0.68, p<0.001, number needed to treat: 8) and recurrent stroke (HR=0.54, 95% CI 0.42 to 0.69, p<0.001, number needed to treat: 9) after adjustment of relevant covariates.ConclusionsAmong patients with an ischaemic stroke while taking aspirin, clopidogrel initiation was associated with fewer recurrent vascular events than aspirin reinitiation

Subtyping intractable functional constipation in children using clinical and laboratory data in a classification model

BackgroundChildren with intractable functional constipation (IFC) who are refractory to traditional pharmacological intervention develop severe symptoms that can persist even in adulthood, resulting in a substantial deterioration in their quality of life. In order to better manage IFC patients, efficient subtyping of IFC into its three subtypes, normal transit constipation (NTC), outlet obstruction constipation (OOC), and slow transit constipation (STC), at early stages is crucial. With advancements in technology, machine learning can classify IFC early through the use of validated questionnaires and the different serum concentrations of gastrointestinal motility-related hormones.MethodA hundred and one children with IFC and 50 controls were enrolled in this study. Three supervised machine-learning methods, support vector machine, random forest, and light gradient boosting machine (LGBM), were used to classify children with IFC into the three subtypes based on their symptom severity, self-efficacy, and quality of life which were quantified using certified questionnaires and their serum concentrations of the gastrointestinal hormones evaluated with enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. The accuracy of machine learning subtyping was evaluated with respect to radiopaque markers.ResultsOf 101 IFC patients, 37 had NTC, 49 had OOC, and 15 had STC. The variables significant for IFC subtype classification, according to SelectKBest, were stool frequency, the satisfaction domain of the Patient Assessment of Constipation Quality of Life questionnaire (PAC-QOL), the emotional self-efficacy for Functional Constipation questionnaire (SEFCQ), motilin serum concentration, and vasoactive intestinal peptide serum concentration. Among the three models, the LGBM model demonstrated an accuracy of 83.8%, a precision of 84.5%, a recall of 83.6%, a f1-score of 83.4%, and an area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUROC) of 0.89 in discriminating IFC subtypes.ConclusionUsing clinical characteristics measured by certified questionnaires and serum concentrations of the gastrointestinal hormones, machine learning can efficiently classify pediatric IFC into its three subtypes. Of the three models tested, the LGBM model is the most accurate model for the classification of IFC, with an accuracy of 83.8%, demonstrating that machine learning is an efficient tool for the management of IFC in children