Integrating Agonism with Deliberation - Realising the Benefits

In “Agonism as Deliberation” (Knops 2007) I suggest a reconciliation between Mouffe’s agonist version of democracy, adjusted to preserve consistency, and deliberation. Here I reply to two subsequent criticisms of this project: Gürsözlü (2009) and Fives (2009). Although both hold agonism and deliberation incompatible impossible, they do so from opposing perspectives. Gürsözlü defends Mouffe’s agonism as distinct and coherent on the basis of what he considers a correct understanding of her concept of hegemony. Fives argues Mouffe’s approach is separate but incoherent, and should be rejected. Against these two conflicting positions, I seek to demonstrate not only that integration between agonism and democracy is possible, but that it has distinct benefits for both agonism and deliberative theory. Divested of its contradictory assertion that universal rational consensus is impossible in principle, agonism can be interpreted as theory of the moment of difference within a broader deliberative dialectic that seeks to move from more to less partial consensus. Conceived in this way, we can better appreciate how these two approaches can complement one another, in pursuing shared goals, rather than the static and unnecessary opposition offered by the two critics I address here

Public participation and collaborative governance

This paper draws on the findings of a study within the ESRC's Democracy and Participation Programme. It explores the processes of participation within deliberative forums – such as user panels, youth forums, area based committees – developed as a means of encouraging a more active, participating mode of citizenship and of improving welfare services by making them more responsive to users. Our findings open up a number of issues about constraints on the development of ‘collaborative governance’. To understand these constraints, we suggest, there is need to locate participation initiatives in the context of government policy, to explore ways in which such policy is interpreted and enacted by strategic actors in local organisations and to examine the perceptions of members of deliberative forums themselves. Our findings highlight the constraints on the ‘political opportunity structures’ created by the enhanced policy focus on public participation, and the consequent limits to ‘collaborative governance’. We discuss how governance theory and social movement theory can each contribute to the analysis, but also suggest productive points of engagement through which each of these bodies of theory might enrich the other

Power, Participation and Political Renewal: Issues from a Study of Public Participation in Two English Cities

Contemporary interest in citizen engagement in public policy stems from a concern with the governance and quality of public service delivery, with improving the legitimacy of decision making and witharticulating the claims of those previously marginalised (Barnes and Bowl 2001; Newman 2001; Sullivan and Skelcher 2002). This article discusses recent research into the diversity of sites and practices of public participation in two contrasting English cities, Birmingham and Liverpool.1 It explores the perspectives of citizens and officials on participation and examines the construction of “the public”, the negotiation of legitimacy and how questions of difference and diversity are managed in spaces for participation. Our analysis reflects on issues of interaction and institutional design within forums for public involvement, the interaction between representative and participative democracy in the public policy field and how the tensions between representative and participative democracy are reconciled, or not

Nutrient addition increases grassland sensitivity to droughts

Grasslands worldwide are expected to experience an increase in extreme events such asdrought, along with simultaneous increases in mineral nutrient inputs as a result of human industrialactivities. These changes are likely to interact because elevated nutrient inputs may alter plantdiversity and increase the sensitivity to droughts. Dividing a system?s sensitivity to drought intoresistance to change during the drought and rate of recovery after the drought generates insights intodifferent dimensions of the system?s resilience in the face of drought. Here, we examine the effects ofexperimental nutrient fertilization and the resulting diversity loss on the resistance to and recoveryfrom severe regional droughts. We do this at 13 North American sites spanning gradients of aridity, 5annual grasslands in California and 8 perennial grasslands in the Great Plains. We measured rate ofresistance as the change in annual aboveground biomass (ANPP) per unit change in growing seasonprecipitation as conditions declined from normal to drought. We measured recovery as the change inANPP during the post drought period and the return to normal precipitation. Resistance and recoverydid not vary across the 400 mm range of mean growing season precipitation spanned by our sites inthe Great Plains. However, chronic nutrient fertilization in the Great Plains reduced drought resistanceand increased drought recovery. In the California annual grasslands, arid sites had a greater recoverypost-drought than mesic sites, and nutrient addition had no consistent effects on resistance orrecovery. Across all study sites, we found that pre-drought species richness in natural grasslands wasnot consistently associated with rates of resistance to or recovery from the drought, in contrast toearlier findings from experimentally assembled grassland communities. Taken together, these resultssuggest that human-induced eutrophication may destabilize grassland primary production, but theeffects of this may vary across regions and flora, especially between perennial and annual-dominatedgrasslands.Fil: Bharath, Siddharth. University of Minnesota; Estados UnidosFil: Borer, Elizabeth. University of Minnesota; Estados UnidosFil: Biederman, Lori A.. owa State University; Estados UnidosFil: Blumenthal, Dana M.. State University of Colorado - Fort Collins; Estados UnidosFil: Fay, Philip A.. United States Department of Agriculture; Estados UnidosFil: Gherardi, Laureano. Arizona State University; Estados UnidosFil: Knops, Johannes M. H.. United States Department of Agriculture; Estados UnidosFil: Leakey, Andrew D. B.. State University of Colorado - Fort Collins; Estados UnidosFil: Yahdjian, María Laura. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Parque Centenario. Instituto de Investigaciones Fisiológicas y Ecológicas Vinculadas a la Agricultura. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Agronomía. Instituto de Investigaciones Fisiológicas y Ecológicas Vinculadas a la Agricultura; ArgentinaFil: Seabloom, Eric. University of Minnesota; Estados Unido

Carbon Sequestration in Dryland and Irrigated Agroecosystems: Quantification at Different Scales for Improved Prediction

The overall objective of this research is to improve our basic understanding of the biophysical processes that govern C sequestration in major rainfed and irrigated agroecosystems in the north-central USA

Cancer-Associated Fibroblast Density, Prognostic Characteristics, and Recurrence in Head and Neck Squamous Cell Carcinoma: A Meta-Analysis.

Introduction: The progression and clinical course of head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSCC) relies on complex interactions between cancer and stromal cells in the tumor microenvironment (TME). Among the most abundant of these stromal cells are cancer-associated fibroblasts (CAFs). While their contribution to tumor progression is widely acknowledged, and various CAF-targeted treatments are under development, the relationship between CAF density and the clinicopathologic course of HNSCC has not been clearly defined. Here we examine the published evidence investigating the relationship of cancer-associated fibroblasts to local recurrence and indicators of prognostic significance in HNSCC. Methods: We conducted a meta-analysis of existing publications that compare the relationship between CAF density, local recurrence, and clinically significant pathologic criteria of disease development (T stage, nodal positivity, clinical stage, vascular invasion, perineural invasion, Ki67 expression, and differentiation). Thirteen studies met the selection criteria, providing a total study population of 926 patients. Forest plots and risk ratios were generated to illustrate overall relationships. Results: Higher CAF density within the tumor microenvironment is associated with advanced T stage, nodal infiltration, clinical stage, vascular invasion, perineural invasion, Ki67 expression, and differentiation (p Conclusions: Across multiple studies, increased CAF density is correlated with histopathological criteria of poor prognosis in HNSCC. These findings highlight that CAFs may play a pivotal role in HNSCC development and progression. Staining for CAFs may represent a valuable addition to current pathologic analysis and help to guide prognosis and treatment. Understanding the mechanisms by which CAFs reciprocally interact with cancer cells will be crucial for optimization of TME-focused treatment of HNSCC