Integrating Sustainable Development: A Foresight Analysis of Interactions Among Competing Development Challenges

This report documents an exercise undertaken by development scholars based at the Institute of Development Studies (IDS) and the University of Sussex (both in Brighton, UK) to explore the interactions among three key goals of international development policy and practice, namely reducing inequalities, accelerating sustainability and building secure and inclusive societies. Experts from a selection of relevant fields of study convened in three deliberative foresight workshops to explore these three themes individually and their interactions, using an adapted scenario-building methodology. The report describes the adapted scenario methodology used during the workshops, presents the future scenarios generated during each event, and analyses the insights emerging from the scenarios as well as the workshop discussions leading up to them. The analysis draws attention to potential tensions and conflicts, as well as complementary and mutually reinforcing dynamics, which may be expected to emerge between the three themes in the future

Crimes Against Probate

Policymakers have increasingly turned their attention to wrongdoing that affects wills, such as the forgery of wills, the procurement of wills through coercion or deceit, and the destruction or suppression of wills. In particular, they have attempted to deter this misconduct by punishing wrongdoers through new forms of criminal and civil liability. Because the United States is on the precipice of the largest intergenerational wealth transfer in history, a significant portion of which will take place through wills, these attempts of deterrence are well-intentioned. However, their implementation has been flawed. These implementation difficulties stem from the fact that a will has no legal effect until the testator’s death. Because the consequences of misconduct affecting wills are delayed until after the victim’s demise, policymakers have stretched traditional conceptions of criminal law and tort law to fit situations to which they do not easily apply. Specifically, they have created crimes akin to theft that punish conduct that does not deprive the testator of property rights during life and torts that remedy property harms inflicted upon a deceased victim who arguably can suffer no more harms. Current conceptions of criminal and civil liability for wrongdoing affecting wills are therefore riddled with theoretical and doctrinal shortcomings. To remedy these shortcomings, this Article reconceptualizes wrongdoing affecting wills as evidentiary misconduct. A will is documentary evidence of a testator’s intent that probate courts use to determine how to distribute a testator’s property upon death, and misconduct that affects a will diminishes its evidentiary value. When wrongdoing affecting wills is framed as evidentiary misconduct that impedes the functioning of probate courts, rather than as property offenses, sounder theoretical footing for punishing this misconduct emerges. The victim is no longer the deceased testator but is instead the probate system itself. Reframing the wrongdoing as an interference with evidence also alleviates some of the doctrinal shortcomings of the current scheme. Misconduct involving evidence that impedes judicial proceedings is already criminalized in a variety of contexts. However, the idiosyncrasies of the probate system counsel in favor of an evidentiary crime that is specifically tailored to wills. This Article therefore proposes a new evidentiary crime, entitled Intentional or Willful Interference with Probate, that better deters misconduct and is more easily implemented than the law’s current deterrent mechanisms

Zika virus infection: a review of available techniques towards early detection

Zika virus belongs to the family Flaviviridae as do other viruses like Dengue, West Nile and Yellow Fever. They are arboviruses transmitted by the Aedes species of mosquito. Zika virus was first isolated in rhesus monkeys in Uganda in 1947. Human infections of the virus were found between the 1960s and 1980s in Africa, the Americas, Asia and the Pacific. The similarity in clinical presentation in Zika-infected patients compared with Dengue caused infections to be previously misdiagnosed as Dengue infection. The Zika virus pandemic in 2015 created a lot of concern globally because of little information about available techniques, samples as well as no available antiviral and vaccines for treatment and vaccination against infection. In addition, the vectors identified for transmission, Aedes aegypti and Aedes albopictus, were of great concern due to their ability to survive both temperate and tropical climatic conditions, hence indicating the possible global spread of Zika virus infection. Almost two years after the report of infection in pregnant women in Brazil resulting in microcephalic babies, Zika virus was identified as a public health problem. Thus, a lot of research into early detection and prevention has been conducted to control the spread of the virus. This review paper highlights available information on techniques currently available for diagnosis of infection caused by Zika virus.  

An Experience Sampling Study of Expressing Affect, Daily Affective Well-Being, Relationship Quality and Perceived Performance

Few studies have directly examined the processes through which workers use job resources, such as job control and social support, to regulate affect. We focused on affective expression, which is a specific form of affect regulation. We investigated the extent to which workers used both job control and social support to express affect. Thirty-nine call centre workers provided data up to four times a day over five consecutive working days (number of observations = 272). Executing job control to allow workers to express affect was related to using social support to express affect. Workers' understanding of their personal goals mediated relationships between using social support to express affect and four outcomes (negative affect, positive affect, perceived performance, and quality of workplace relationships). Perceived empathy mediated relationships between using social support to express affect and three outcomes (negative affect, positive affect, and quality of workplace relationships). The findings indicated that (1) one job resource can be used to facilitate using another job resource for affect regulation and (2) different job resources may play different roles in conferring benefits from affective expression

A Foresight Scenario Method for Thinking About Complex Sustainable Development Interactions

In this article, we describe an innovative foresight approach, which we used to examine the interactions among three themes that are likely to be significant for international development policy and strategy in the coming decades. We adapted existing foresight scenario methods (drivers of change analysis, scenarios, wind-tunnelling) to investigate possible trade-offs, tensions and synergies that may exist among competing international development goals of reducing inequalities, accelerating sustainability and building more inclusive and secure societies. Our method combined foresight methods with programme theory analysis, an approach commonly used in impact evaluation. We describe our approach in detail and discuss its strengths and weaknesses

A common garden design reveals population-specific variability in potential impacts of hybridisation between populations of farmed and wild Atlantic salmon, Salmo salar L

Released individuals can have negative impacts on native populations through various mechanisms; including competition, disease transfer and introduction of maladapted gene-complexes. Previous studies indicate that the level of farmed Atlantic salmon introgression in native populations is population-specific. However few studies have explored the potential role of population diversity or river characteristics, such as temperature, on the consequences of hybridisation. We compared freshwater growth of multiple families derived from two farmed, five wild, and two F1 hybrid salmon populations at three contrasting temperatures (7°C, 12°C, and 16°C) in a common garden experiment. As expected, farmed salmon outgrew wild salmon at all temperatures, with hybrids displaying intermediate growth. However, differences in growth were population-specific and some wild populations performed better than others relative to the hybrid and farmed populations at certain temperatures. Therefore, the competitive balance between farmed and wild salmon may depend both on the thermal profile of the river and the genetic characteristics of the respective farmed and wild strains. While limited to F1 hybridisation, the present study shows the merits in adopting a more complex spatially resolved approach to risk management of local populations

The Genitive Ratio and its Applications

The genitive ratio (GR) is a novel method of classifying nouns as animate, concrete or abstract. English has two genitive (possessive) constructions: possessive-s (the boy's head) and possessive-of (the head of the boy). There is compelling evidence that preference for possessive-s is strongly influenced by the possessor's animacy. A corpus analysis that counts each genitive construction in three conditions (definite, indefinite and no article) confirms that occurrences of possessive-s decline as the animacy hierarchy progresses from animate through concrete to abstract. A computer program (Animyser) is developed to obtain results-counts from phrase-searches of Wikipedia that provide multiple genitive ratios for any target noun. Key ratios are identified and algorithms developed, with specific applications achieving classification accuracies of over 80%. The algorithms, based on logistic regression, produce a score of relative animacy that can be applied to individual nouns or to texts. The genitive ratio is a tool with potential applications in any research domain where the relative animacy of language might be significant. Three such applications exemplify that. Combining GR analysis with other factors might enhance established co-reference (anaphora) resolution algorithms. In sentences formed from pairings of animate with concrete or abstract nouns, the animate noun is usually salient, more likely to be the grammatical subject or thematic agent, and to co-refer with a succeeding pronoun or noun-phrase. Two experiments, online sentence production and corpus-based, demonstrate that the GR algorithm reliably predicts the salient noun. Replication of the online experiment in Italian suggests that the GR might be applied to other languages by using English as a 'bridge'. In a mental health context, studies have indicated that Alzheimer's patients' language becomes progressively more concrete; depressed patients' language more abstract. Analysis of sample texts suggests that the GR might monitor the prognosis of both illnesses, facilitating timely clinical interventions

Using capital theory to explore problem solving and innovation in small firms

Purpose: This study investigated how small firms work at a micro-level, applying Bourdieu’s Capital Theory to give insight into the way individuals use the social and cultural capital at their disposal, to innovate and solve problems. Design/Methodology/Approach: We applied qualitative methods to explore problem solving and innovation activities at the micro-level in small firms, using interviews and thematic analysis. Findings: Our findings reveal that, compared to firms with lower levels of social and cultural capital, firms which possess higher levels of social and cultural capital have a higher success rate in problem solving and are more likely to engage in innovative activity. Social and cultural capitals complement and reinforce one another in small firms, for example an enhanced ability to utilise networks (social capital) allows small firms to access a greater diversity of knowledge (cultural capital). Originality/Value: Little is known about how different forms of capital are utilised in the day-to-day operations and problem solving of small firms: the application of Bourdieu’s Capital Theory offered an original frame in which to explore these activities