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The article presents a study on the amount news space alloted to foreign news and the types, pattern and flow of foreign news disseminated by Arab daily newspapers. The study uses content analysis and quantitative analysis of sample newspaper. Results reveal that over 50% of the news in all papers is political and the U.S. as well as Russia are given the greatest amount of coverage, followed by China and Great Britain. It adds that the direction of Arab coverage of foreign news can be expalined by various criteria, such as the attitude of foreign country to the Arab-Israeli problem.

Copyright of Journal of European Social Policy is the property of Sage Publications, Ltd. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Amateurs have been neglected in accounts of the rise of new specialties in science. This paper examines seven key amateurs and their relationship to the growth of astrophysics over a sixty-year period. These amateurs, five Britons and two Americans, are seen as the risk-takers of the new specialty. They pioneered in the application of photography and the use reflecting telescopes, and amassed an important body of observational material in such areas as spectroscopy. While they shared most aspects of the discipline with professionals, including access to publications, honours and awards, and the governance of scientific societies, they differed from professionals in significant ways. Because amateurs were free to take risks they sometimes came into conflict with professionals. When this happened differences between the two were magnified. By about 1900 astrophysics reached a stage where it was no longer possible for amateurs to compete. Neither wealth nor leisure could take the place of specialized training the provide access to increasingly sophisticated technologies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While many scholars researching the commercialization of science focus on biomedicine, this paper explores the changing commercial frameworks for meteorology in the UK and the US. The organization of meteorology in both countries increasingly reflects a political-economic approach that treats science as an economic entity in which market-based criteria can be used to allocate scientific resources. The differences are equally significant in terms of the production and dissemination of meteorological forecasts and other data to public and private services. Alongside this commercialization has been the emergence of weather derivatives markets -- financial products that enable trading on weather indices in a way similar to oil or gas futures -- which have re-shaped how some businesses interact with meteorologists. This paper explores how weather derivatives traders engage with, shape, and are frustrated by a commercialized approach to funding meteorological data and forecasts. It highlights how commercial imperatives raise questions about the collection and quality of meteorological data, and how forecasting and weather modelling is being adopted within the private sector to enable trading strategies in the weather derivatives market. The consequences for commercial actors are highly variable, suggesting that any account of commercialization of science, while recognizing extant policy shifts, must be sufficiently nuanced in its interpretation of such effects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For hundreds of years, the Eastern Mediterranean island of Cyprus has been subjected to the — not always welcome — attentions of external powers, finally gaining some independence from Britain in 1960. Since then, Cyprus has been the object of three international crises, almost leading to war between NATO members Greece and Turkey. Following a Turkish invasion and occupation which continues to the present, tensions have continued, while Turkey continues to occupy over one-third of Cyprus, an EU member, while trying itself to gain entry to the organisation. Papers released by British government departments in January 2008 reveal the following: an increasingly submissive yet tetchy attitude in British foreign policy formulation vis-à-vis American pressure (mainly Kissinger) on Britain not to leave Cyprus; the question of the USA financing the British bases; British government criticism of Turkey's perceived intransigence in finding a solution to the Cyprus conundrum; British government criticism of Turkey's position on its continental-shelf dispute with Greece; Britain's strong support for Turkey's European aspirations, flying in the face of the Parliamentary Select Committee on Cyprus' recommendations; past and future President Clerides' seeming contentedness with the British military presence on Cyprus; and a marked difference between French and British views. The article concludes that the British government submitted to US demands and suggests that Cyprus remains a cat's paw of big-power politics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the connections between two historical lines of research: social informatics in the United States, and sociotechnical studies in the United Kingdom. The author discusses samples of work from three long established UK research sites, at Manchester, Edinburgh and the London School of Economics, to give the reader a sense of sociotechnical work at different historical periods. Though the US and UK traditions share a common interest in the production of technology, and work with complementary concepts and methods, formal links between the two have not been strong for much of the historical period under review. However, there are signs of fusion in the work of a current generation of researchers on both sides of the Atlantic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

‘Logo’ is the name for a philosophy of education and for a continually evolving family of computer languages that aid its realization. Developed in the USA in the late 1960s, it became the material embodiment of a radical educational philosophy and a potential vehicle for the transformation of education. In the early 1980s, Logo was introduced into mainstream education in both the USA and the UK. Within an increasingly conservative social and political context with different education policy priorities, Logo was gradually stripped of its radical potential, marginalized and, where it survived, remoulded as harmless to the mainstream educational system. This paper draws on empirical research that explored the evolution of Logo between the late 1960s and the late 1990s. The paper focuses on the social processes involved in the initial development and evolution of Logo. It shows that these processes were heavily contested. Logo was the product of complex social, technical, political and economic decisions, and the product of negotiation shaped by the concerns of the social players involved. The evolution of Logo was not linear or even primarily technical. Rather, it was a seamless web in which the technical was interwoven with the social, economic and political in ways that illustrate the dialectical interaction between historical contingency and the intentions and aspirations of individuals and communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article is a critical review of the community care movement in Great Britain and the U.S. and its implications for social work practice. Parallel to the developments in Great Britain, the communities care movement in the U.S. developed quickly after the Second World War and flourished in the 1970s. The National Mental Health Act of 1946 was passed in 1947. This act created the National Institute of Mental Health to provide research and training grants to develop community-based psychiatric services as well as close down mental-health hospitals. In the 1980s, the practice of community care was under critical review by professionals and policy-makers in Great Britain. In 1986, two important papers, "Making a Reality of Community Care" and "Community Care: An Agenda for Action," were published by the government. In these two reports, the gloomy picture of community care for the mentally ill and other disabled groups was critically reviewed. Similarly, in the U.S., the practice of community care was under criticism. In 1984-5, a Delphi process study found that 42 states had no consensus on the support of chronic mental patients being treated outside institutions.

Market-based approaches to service provision are heterogeneous. The point is often lost in comparative welfare state research due to the dominance of the welfare regime approach, which emphasizes the prevailing locus of provision (state, market or family) over other dimensions of a mixed economy: finance and regulation. Comparing the cases of the British and American approaches to early childhood education and care, this paper argues that these broadly similar ‘liberal’ welfare regimes exhibit qualitatively different approaches to market-based service provision – market manager (UK) versus market moderator (US) – through the state’s role as financier and regulator. Evidence is drawn from a variety of primary and secondary sources, including prior academic studies, national policy documents, and national and international statistics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Pharmaceuticals are not permitted on to the market unless they are granted regulatory approval. The regulatory process is, therefore, crucial in whether or not a drug is widely prescribed. Regulatory agencies have developed standards of performance that pharmaceuticals are supposed to meet before entering the market. Regulation of technologies is often discussed by reference to the precautionary principle. In contrast, this paper develops the concept of the 'permissive principle' as a way of understanding the departure of regulators' practices from standards of drug efficacy to which regulatory agencies themselves subscribe. By taking a case study of antidepressant regulation in the UK and the USA, the mechanisms of permissive regulatory practices are examined. An STS methodology of both spatial (international) and temporal comparisons of regulatory practices with regulatory standards is employed to identify the nature and extent of the permissive regulation. It is found that the permissive principle was adopted by drug regulators in the UK and the USA, but more so by the former than the latter. Evidently, permissive regulation, which favours the commercial interests of the drug manufacturer, but is contrary to the interests of patients, may penetrate to the heart of regulatory science. On the other hand, permissive regulation of specific drugs should not be regarded as an inevitable result of marketing strategies and concomitant networks deployed by powerful pharmaceutical companies, because the extent of permissive regulation may vary according to the intra-institutional normative commitments of regulators to uphold their technical standards against the commercial interests of the manufacturer. Likely sociological factors that can account for such permissive regulatory practices are 'corporate bias', secrecy and excessive regulatory trust in the pharmaceutical industry in the UK, political expediency and ideological capture in the USA, combined in both countries with some regulatory deference to the clinical autonomy of the psychiatry profession. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper compares the development of genetic testing for breast cancer (BRCA testing) in the USA and the UK. It argues that national political cultures played an important role in how these genetic testing technologies were shaped, and that the shapes of these technologies had important implications for the users of these systems. In order to demonstrate the roles of national social and political elements in the development of new genetic testing technologies, I introduce the concept of a technology's architecture, which is made up of component and the specific ways in which these components are assembled to fulfill particular functions. In the USA, four very different BRCA testing systems initially emerged. However, one biotechnology company, Myriad Genetics, eventually used its legal and economic position to become the sole provider of testing. It offered BRCA testing the way many other laboratory tests were provided in the USA, available to anyone through any physician. The shape of this testing service had important implications for its participants, defining the client as a consumer who could demand access to any of Myriad's laboratory services, but could not choose among testing systems. In the UK, the government-run National Health Service provided testing through regional genetics clinics, using family history information to assess risks and triage care. Clients in the UK were defined as citizens and patients, who had the right to equal access to the testing system but could not demand any specific services. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Gene drive is an emerging biotechnology with applications in global health, conservation and agriculture. Scientists are preparing for field trials, triggering debate about when and how to release gene-drive organisms. These decisions depend on public understandings of gene drive, which are shaped by language. While some studies on gene drive communication assume the need to persuade publics of expert definitions of gene drive, we highlight the importance of meaning-making in communication and engagement. We conducted focus groups with humanities and science teachers in the United Kingdom and United States to explore how different media framings stimulated discussions of gene drive. We found diversity in the value of these framings for public debate. Interestingly, the definition favoured by gene drive scientists was the least popular among participants. Rather than carefully curating language, we need opportunities for publics to make sense and negotiate the meanings of a technology on their own terms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a case study in the production and interpretation of regulatory science, focusing on the conflicting British and American clinical risk assessments of triazolam (Halcion) — the most controversial sleeping pill in the world. The regulation of triazolam is shown to be more permissive in the USA than in the UK. Six principal socio-political factors are put forward to explain this: differential regulatory trust; regulators' socio-technical data selections; medico-scientific disciplinary influences; organizational and professional interests; conflicts of interest of expert advisers; and the growth of the neo-liberal regulatory state. The risk assessments of both the British and American regulatory agencies are shown to be complacent relative to technical standards which the agencies themselves later accepted. It is suggested that, when the interests of pharmaceutical manufacturers and patients diverge, regulatory assessments are crucially affected by whether regulators are predisposed to award the benefit of the scientific doubts to the manufacturers or patients, and by the balance of such predispositions both within and between regulatory institutions of scientific expertise. The triazolam case indicates that the amount of trust placed in the pharmaceutical industry by the British and American regulatory systems may hamper detection of flaws in manufacturers' medical data in a timely manner and, as a consequence, compromise patients' interests. Some policy implications for drug regulation are sketched. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

DNA 'fingerprinting' and other methods of genetic profiling have been used in connection with hundreds of criminal trials in the UK, USA and other nations. These molecular biological techniques are employed by the prosecution (and less often by the defense) to produce forensic evidence. By means of these techniques, selected DNA fragments extracted from a suspect's blood sample or cheek swab are compared with residues of blood, semen, skin, excreta, saliva and hair follicles collected at a crime scene. DNA-profiling evidence has been successfully challenged in a few highly publicized cases, but in the vast majority of cases such evidence has been accepted. The extensive testimony and documentation arising from cases like the 1994-95 double-murder trial of OJ Simpson in Los Angeles enable a close study of how the credibility of experts and their practices is fashioned and undermined in testimony. The arguments by the Simpson defense team delved into the practical contingencies and sources of uncertainty associated with forensic uses of DNA-profiling techniques. These arguments resemble many of the general conceptions of scientific practice within the sociology of scientific knowledge. Indeed, the resemblance is so close that the paper faces an interesting dilemma: what can be said about this case that has not already been said as part of the production and public discussion of its details? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Discusses legal issues of concern to the library and information sector. European Directive on Data Protection; US White Paper on Intellectual Property and the National Information Infrastructure.

This article contributes to the theoretical discussion of the historical legitimacy of single mothers by examining the construction of relationships between single motherhood and welfare policy. Specifically, the study analyses the changing discourse regarding single mothers, and the social policy designed for them, in the US, UK and Israel from the 1970s to the 2000s. These three countries are similar in terms of the embeddedness, extension and institutionalization of neoliberal ideology in their welfare policies and public discourse, together with welfare legislation affecting single mothers, yet they differ in terms of policy implementation and the history of policy development. The study examines institutional intersectionality along with cultural perceptions of single mothers in each country. Looking at both the development and the withdrawal of social rights over time, we deepen understanding of how the image of the single mother is created in the neoliberal welfare regime. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of International Journal of Maritime History is the property of Sage Publications, Ltd. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Explores the efforts of Great Britain foreign secretary Ernest Bevin to form a spiritual federation of the western union from 1945 to 1948. Impact of the actions of Bevin on the status of the Cold War; Transmogrification of Christianity into a politicized doctrine; Implication of the spiritual concept for the Anglo-American relations.

Using policy frameworks and author expertise to identify relevant literature, four academics and two student-activist-authors, critically review literature upon student activist responses to sexual violence on campus. We conclude, student activism is pivotal to campus cultural change. In the UK, we review how student activism challenges outdated policy; in the US, how this has elevated the issue to national policy agendas. We apply theoretical frameworks of policy windows, policy entrepreneurs, campus readiness models and embodied intersectional citizenship. This article recommends universities work collaboratively with student activists, rather than viewing collaboration as a reputational risk. Further, we recommend developing Campus Community Readiness Models to include measures of collaboration. We contend, student activism can incur costs. Connecting activists online may help manage the transience of student activism. Collaboration and connection with and between student activists may represent a cultural shift toward sustainability stages of readiness characterised by community ownership. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper addresses the proposition put forward by Solly Zuckerman that the nuclear arms race has been driven by scientists and engineers. The history of British nuclear weapons developments is described with particular attention to both their changing organizational relationships and the fluctuating interface between the UK and the USA on the exchange of nuclear weapons assistance. The relationships between the nuclear weapons communities and their governments in the UK and USA are briefly compared, and it is concluded that Zuckerman's thesis cannot be sustained. Technologists do engage in 'heterogeneous engineering' in pursuit of their goals, but they are far from all-powerful in achieving these goals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Does disciplinary practice by employers evolve over time? Not only conventional analyses of discipline but also Foucauldian theories assume that it does. Three features may be tested: the rate of discipline (which should fall); the types of behaviour punished (which should reflect the maintenance of routine); and the dynamics of the process (which should indicate a rationalised approach and the absence of disciplinary purges). Yet there are very few studies of the process. One previous study of the US textile industry found a remarkable continuity between the early nineteenth and late twentieth centuries. The present analysis confirms this finding in the very different context of British railways: though types of behaviour subject to discipline were as expected, the rates of action in the late twentieth century were similar to those of the nineteenth, and the dynamics of the process in both periods contradicted an image of rationalisation. The paper also examines links between formal rules and workplace practice. Some findings, for example the particular ways in which rules and practice were connected, are specific to railways. Others, notably the unchanging dynamics of discipline, have a more general relevance and challenge evolutionary assumptions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This qualitative study was conducted with a convenience sample of 20 South Asian women experiencing domestic violence in the United States. The results explore the patterns of abuse as well as the factors and circumstances (i.e. turning points) that motivated South Asian women to change in the context of the stage that they were in as per the Landenburger model (binding, enduring, disengaging, and recovery). The four themes that emerged from the interviews and analysis are (1) 'Timing and Frequency of abuse', (2) 'Methods of control – financial, isolation and suspicion', (3) 'Cycle of Abuse', and (4)' Turning Points – motivation to change'. Implications for practice and policy-level changes for abused South Asian women in the United States are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent technological and market changes in the television industry appear to have transformed the corporate configurations which conduce to economic success in the production industry. As a result, many leading independent television production companies in the United Kingdom and elsewhere across Europe have become prime targets for corporate activity and many have been subject to takeover, often by the US media groups. Does this matter? Does the concept of 'national' television content still have any relevance in the digital era? Drawing on a multiple-case-study-based analysis of several UK-based television production companies over recent years, this article examines how corporate takeovers in the production sector may affect creative decision-making and impact on the nature and quality of television content. Against a background of increased investment interest from multinationals in indigenous players in the United Kingdom and across Europe, the analysis presented makes a timely and policy-relevant contribution to knowledge. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article disaggregates high- and low-status care work across eight liberal welfare regimes: Australia, Canada, Iceland, Ireland, Israel, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and the United States. Using Luxembourg Income Study data, descriptive and multivariate analyses provide support for a 'migrant in the market' model of employment, notwithstanding variation across countries. The data demonstrate a wage penalty in both high- and low-status care employment in several liberal welfare regimes, with the latter (service jobs in health, education and social work) more likely to be part-time and situated in the private sector. Migrant care workers are found to work disproportionately in low-status, low-wage types of care and, in some cases, to incur additional wage penalties compared to native-born care workers with equivalent human capital. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ireland, the UK and the USA are heterogeneous examples of liberal worlds of welfare capitalism yet all three countries were deeply implicated in the 2008 global financial crisis. Examining these three countries together provides the opportunity to further develop an international comparative political economy of instability in the context of the globalised and financialised dimensions of Anglo-liberal capitalism and disciplinary governance. Our analysis is guided by the concept of disciplinary neoliberalism (Gill, 1995) through which we explore: (i) the dynamics that have shaped the impacts of and responses to the Great Recession; (ii) the ways in which state-market relations, shaped by differentiated accommodations to market imperative or market discipline, have been used as disciplinary tools and how these have interacted with existing social divisions and iii) the implications for shaping conditions for resistance. We suggest that the neoliberal pathways of each country, whilst not uniform, mark a 'step-change' and acceleration in the operation of disciplinary neoliberalism, and is particularly evident in what we identify as the coercive commodification of social policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the extent to which issues of environmental sustainability are represented in three national social work codes of ethics -- the United Kingdom, the United States and Australia. These national codes are discussed and implications for social work are analysed with a view to strengthening the profession's position regarding environmental sustainability. Findings suggest that national codes do not include concern for environmental sustainability as a core professional concern. The authors make recommendations for developing ethical practice and further argue that the international professional body of social work, the International Federation of Social Workers (IFSW), should take a fundamental leadership role in advocating for environmental sustainability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of International Social Work is the property of Sage Publications, Ltd. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This article discusses a study released by the Women's Health Initiative on the association between hormone replacement therapy (HRT) and coronary heart disease (CHD). The WHI reversed its previous findings on the risk of cardiovascular disease related to HRT. The WHI proposes that women who start HRT following menopause reduce their risk of CHD. The WHI report is a joint analysis of the combined and estrogen-alone arms of the original trial. The findings received criticism from the media in Great Britain and the U.S.

Literary translations are worldwide predominantly made from English, which is far ahead of any other language. While various studies have proposed interpretations of this supremacy few have examined translation flows in the opposite direction, studying how literary authors from the periphery can transcend the boundaries of their language and gain access to the center of the global literary world by being translated into English. From the theoretical perspective of a multi-level field approach, we propose a case study of how literary translations from Dutch are published and presented in the UK and the US. The study specifies by which mechanisms Dutch authors overcame the obstacles they encountered on the macro, meso and micro levels. The theoretical framework proposed contributes to sociological understanding of how authors from the periphery can enter an internationally dominant center, demonstrating that such an understanding is part of the same theoretical approach that accounts for the far more frequent flows from the core to the periphery. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article considers points of convergence and divergence in English-language publications in the sociology of professions. While research on professions in the US, UK, Canada and Western Europe shares many similarities, UK researchers have devoted more attention to professional regulation, while their US counterparts focus instead on organizational challenges facing professionals. Contrasting these empirical and theoretical approaches opens up new research directions, and highlights the importance of socio-historical and cultural context to professions. More international and comparative work is required to develop a better understanding of professions and professional regulation. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Studies of public support for war highlight the importance of context. Most people do not simply support or oppose the use of force but instead assess its merits depending on various aspects of the situation. One such aspect is the extent of international backing – whether from individual states or supranational organizations – for military action. This backing may be active, notably through the contribution of troops, or more a passive matter of endorsement or authorization of action. In this article, a survey experiment embedded in a major internet survey of British foreign policy attitudes (N = 2,205) is used to explore how international backing affects public support for military action. Britain’s military potential and recent history make it an obvious case study here. Both active and endorsement backing prove to have separate and significant positive effects on support. Importantly, the absolute number of troops involved matters far less than the proportion of total troop numbers to be contributed. And the perceived strength of the enemy predicts support only when the British are to contribute a large proportion of total forces. Predispositional variables are used to investigate the sources of the experimental effects but with little success: the impact of international backing proves remarkably consistent across the sample. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The article investigates how the poor and welfare recipients are depicted in British, Danish and Swedish newspapers. The study was inspired by American media studies that have documented a negative stereotypic way of portraying the poor and welfare recipients, especially when they are African Americans. The article argues that there is an institutional welfare regime logic behind the way the poor and welfare recipients are depicted in the mass media. It is not only a matter of race. This argument is substantiated by showing that the poor and welfare recipients are (1) also depicted negatively in a liberal welfare regime, the UK, where most of the poor and welfare recipients are perceived to be white, and (2) depicted positively in two social-democratic welfare regimes, Sweden and Denmark, where the poor and welfare recipients have increasingly come to be perceived as non-white, especially in Denmark. The empirical analyses are based on a sample of 1750 British, 1750 Danish and 1750 Swedish newspapers covering the period from 2004 to 2009. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article asks what sustains women union leaders’ long-term union participation given an internal environment often hostile to women and an external context antagonistic to unions. This article considers the dynamics of long-term participation by drawing on social movement interrelated concepts of commitment and collective identity in the context of a comparative study of American and British women union leaders. The study explores the experiences of 134 women union leaders, the majority of whom are long-term union participants. The findings reveal that commitment is strengthened by women’s experience of both expressive and intrinsic rewards but that such rewards are offset by costs, some of which are universal to union leadership, but others are particularly gendered. It was found that while a gendered collective identity may inform union collective identity, it is the union collective identity and associated solidarity that remains dominant in contemporary British and American women’s union leadership. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article explores the relationship between foreign policy and political possibility in two parts. First, the relationship between foreign policy and political possibility is theorized around three analytical moments: political possibility is linked to the framing of conceivable, communicable and coercive foreign policy. Second, this framework is developed and demonstrated through a brief analysis of Coalition foreign policy in the War on Terror, considering American, British and Australian foreign policy between 2001 and 2003. This analysis dissects distinct and divergent Coalition foreign policies through a linked three-part conceptualization of political possibility. It enables an understanding of how the War on Terror was rendered possible through the construction of foreign policy in thinkable, resonant and ultimately dominant terms. The article concludes by looking to the wider analytical applicability of this particular theorization of the relationship between foreign policy and political possibility. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This longitudinal study tracks US and UK participants’ shifts in their motivations and forms of engagement with technology and information as they transition between four educational stages. The quantitative and qualitative methods, including ethnographic methods that devote individual attention to the subjects, yield a very rich data set enabling multiple methods of analysis. Instead of reporting general information-seeking habits and technology use, this study explores how the subjects get their information based on the context and situation of their needs during an extended period of time, identifying if and how their behaviors change. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The return of austerity has provoked social conflict, political controversy and academic disputes. In this article we explore some of these through the metaphor of an ‘alchemy of austerity’ that forms the foundation for strategies of state retrenchment through which the consent of populations is sought. We begin, in ‘Magical thinking’, by tracing some of the discursive repertoires that circulate in analyses of austerity, showing something of its significance as a key term being mobilized in different international and national political discourses. We then go on to explore political strategies, with a particular focus on the UK in ‘Sharing the pain’. However, we suggest that such a focus offers a limited conception of politics that fails to illuminate the contradictory field of political forces put into motion by austerity strategies. This field of forces, we go on to argue, crystallizes around the problem of securing consent. In ‘Austerity and the problem of consent’ we examine this further, pointing to the proliferation of different forms of dissent and their relationship to austerity measures. We end by tracing shifting articulations of the moral and the economic by revisiting E.P. Thompson’s concept of ‘moral economy’. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Incapacitated patients must be treated in their best interests according to the Mental Capacity Act 2005. As a result of this statute, the General Medical Council has advised that the testing of incapacitated source patients for HIV following occupational needlestick injury is unlawful. In this article, the reasons for the introduction of the Act are outlined and the impact of the legislation on the profession discussed. It is argued that it is in the patient's medical best interests to know if they are HIV positive so that they can be treated appropriately whilst they are incapacitated on ICU and begin timely medical therapy. It is in their social, emotional, cultural and religious best interests to be tested so that they can alleviate the anxiety of the injured healthcare worker, change their behaviour to avoid further spread and contribute to wider society as a 'good egg'. It is concluded that the GMC has misunderstood the meaning of best interests and that their advice should be revised to allow testing to occur. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Visual performance has been studied since the 1930s to help establish a foundation for recommended illuminances. Two approaches were taken to research visual performance, one by Weston in Great Britain and the other by Luckiesh in the United States, leading to different recommended illuminances in the two countries. Because of the energy crisis of the 1970s, applied research into visual performance was undertaken to resolve the discrepancy, resulting in a model of relative visual performance. More recently, a controversy has emerged regarding the value of illuminating roadways. Recent research shows that the incremental improvements in visual performance provided by roadway lighting are correlated with the incremental reductions in night-time crashes, demonstrating that an understanding of visual performance remains important for lighting practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Psychological trauma is a favoured trope of modernity. It has become commonplace to assume that all ‘bad events’ – and particularly those which involve violence – have a pathological effect on the sufferer’s psyche, as well as that of the perpetrators. This essay explores the ways victims of rape and sexual assault were understood in psychiatric, psychological, forensic, and legal texts in Britain and America from the 19th to the late 20th century. It argues that, unlike most other ‘bad events’, which were incorporated within trauma narratives from the 1860s, the ascription of psychological trauma was only applied to rape victims a century later. Why and what were the consequences? [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

A prominent business case for employing older people in the 2000s suggests diverse employment opportunities existed for Britons over 65, despite their limited employment rights. However, it is hypothesized that employees over 65 were disproportionately segregated into less desired ‘Lopaq’ occupations: these were low paid, required few qualifications and were often part-time. The UK is contrasted with the USA, a country with long-established age discrimination legislation; the Labour Force Survey and Current Population Survey are analysed. A greater UK concentration in Lopaq occupations suggests employers, working in a context of limited employee rights, selectively retained and recruited people in their 60s to these jobs. An alternative explanation, that Lopaq employment levels reflected the characteristics of those choosing to work, is unsupported by logistic regression analysis. US evidence suggests that the 2011 default retirement age abolition will weaken UK Lopaq occupational segregation after 65 more than voluntaristic commitments to ‘age-diversity’. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The development of therapeutic cloning research sparked a scientific controversy pitting patients’ hopes for cures against religious and anti-abortion opposition. The present study investigates this controversy by examining the production and content of Anglo-American print media coverage of the branch of embryonic stem cell research known as “therapeutic cloning.” Data collection included press articles about therapeutic cloning (n = 5,185) and qualitative interviews with journalists (n = 18). Patient activists and anti-abortion groups emerged as key news sources in this coverage. Significant qualitative differences in the mediation of these subpolitical groups and their arguments for and against therapeutic cloning are identified. Results suggest that the perceived human interest news value of narratives of patient suffering may give patient advocacy groups a privileged position in journalistic coverage. Finally, Ulrich Beck’s theoretical arguments about subpolitics are critically applied to the results to elicit further insights. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article analyses the reaction of mainstream political elites to acts of terrorism and assesses whether opposition parties will rally around the flag, much like they do during military or diplomatic crises. A statistical analysis, conducted on 181 terrorist events in five countries (France, Germany, Spain, the United Kingdom and the United States) over the period 1990 to 2006, indicates that rallies around the flag are the rule. Overall, the results show that the repetition of acts of terror is a strong factor affecting political parties’ responses to terrorist acts, as repeated attacks are more likely to prompt criticism. The magnitude of the act (i.e. the number of fatalities) is also associated with a rallying effect, as larger attacks are more likely to result in a unified front across parties. Other variables, such as the identity of the perpetrators and the existence of a formal anti-terrorist pact between the parties, are significantly related to the likelihood of a rally. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article aims to contribute to the growing body of scholarly work that critically deconstructs dominant discourse on ‘trafficking’ and to the literature that documents and theorizes the gap between states’ spoken commitment to children’s rights and the lived experience of migrant children in the contemporary world. It contrasts the intense public and policy concern with the suffering of ‘trafficked’ children against the relative lack of interest in other ways that migrant children can suffer, in particular, suffering resulting from immigration policy and its enforcement. It argues that discourse on ‘child trafficking’ operates to produce and maintain exclusionary conceptions of who is normatively a child. These conceptions of the normative child then inform policy and practice that often punishes, rather than protects, children who do not conform to the imagined norm, and that simultaneously reinforces children’s existing vulnerabilities and creates new ones. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Objectives To test the hypothesis that the USA healthcare system was superior to the NHS and 17 other Western countries in reducing feasible mortality rates over the period 1979-2005. Design Economic inputs into healthcare, GDP health expenditure (GDPHE) were compared with clinical outputs, i.e. total 'adult' (15-74 years) and 'older' (55-74 years) mortality rates based upon three-year average mortality rates for 1979-81 vs. 2003-2005. A cost-effective ratio was calculated by dividing average GDPHE into reduced mortality rates over the period. Setting Nineteen Western countries' mortality rates compared between 1979-2005. Participants Mortality of people by age and gender. Main outcome measures A cost-effective ratio to measure efficiency and effectiveness of healthcare systems in reducing mortality rates. Chi-square tested any differences between the USA, UK and other Western countries. Results Input: The USA had the highest current and average GDPHE; the UK was 10th highest but joint 16th overall, still below the Western countries' average. Output: Every country's mortality rate fell substantially; but 15 countries reduced their mortality rates significantly more than the US, while UK 'adult' and 'older' mortality rates fell significantly more than 12 other countries. Cost-effectiveness: The USA GDPHE: mortality rate ratio was 1:205 for 'adults' and 1:515 for 'older' people, 16Western countries having bigger ratios than the US; the UK had second greatest ratios at 1:593 and 1:1595, respectively. The UK ratioswere >20% larger than 14 other countries. Conclusions In cost-effective terms, i.e. economic input versus clinical output, the USA healthcare system was one of the least cost-effective in reducing mortality rates whereas the UK was one of the most costeffective over the period. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Both Britain and the USA are described as market-oriented or ‘liberal’ welfare regimes. However, there are important variations within these two countries: although both have high rates of maternal employment, part-time work is much more common in the UK than in the USA, where dual-earner (full-time) couples are the norm. Part-time employment can help to ease work-family conflict for women, while simultaneously contributing to the household income. However, part-time work is limited in its economic benefits, is also career limiting, and, in the USA, it generally comes without health insurance. While most of the current research regarding maternal employment decisions focuses on women, this research involves interviews with 83 British and American fathers, to better understand the complexity of such decision-making. Men’s attitudes and experiences are examined in detail, focusing on the need for two incomes, the importance of paid health care and childcare costs and the potential role of part-time work. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Using data from several large-scale longitudinal surveys, this article investigates the relationship between the work histories and personal incomes (from both public and private sources) of older women in the UK, US and West Germany. By comparing three countries with different welfare regimes and pension systems, we seek to gain a better understanding of the interaction between the life course, pension system and women’s incomes in later life. The association between older women’s incomes and work histories is strongest in West Germany and weakest in the UK, where there is evidence of a ‘pensions poverty trap’ and where only predominantly full-time employment is associated with significantly higher incomes in later life. Work history matters less for widows (in all three countries) and more for recent birth cohorts and more educated women (UK only). The article concludes with a brief discussion of the treatment of women under different pension regimes assessed by the criteria of adequacy, proportionality, vertical equity and horizontal equity. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The study aims to provide empirical data on the alleged political bias of Dutch media. It also aims to contribute to the development of an instrument for the measurement of partiality in TV interviews. Its main question is: are TV interviewers biased in putting adversarial questions to politicians with different political backgrounds? The data collection encompasses 12 interviews taken from the late-night talk show Pauw & Witteman during the run-up to the parliamentary elections of 2006. The analysis focuses on five measures of adversarial questioning that were developed by Clayman et al. (2007): initiative, directness , assertiveness, opposition and accountability, as well as on a sixth measure that was developed in the context of this study, persistence. The results show that left-wing politicians are approached less adversarially than right-wing politicians and politicians in the political centre, even when various factors that might offer an alternative explanation are included in the analysis. The conclusion is that interviewers are partial in shaping the way in which politicians can present themselves to the public. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The concept of policy transfer (or ‘lesson-drawing’) has been used by theorists of public policy to explain how programmes developed in one context emerge in another. This article explores how far the insights of policy transfer can be used to understand better how campaign strategies move cross-nationally in cases where lender and borrower campaigns can be identified. Drawing on the policy transfer literature, it puts forward the following hypotheses: (1) transfers are from incumbent to opposition parties; (2) transfers are between parties with similar ideological positions; (3) the US is the dominant lender country; (4) party leaders, party staff and consultants are the agents of transfer; and (5) campaign strategy transfer is increasing over time. Based on a set of 32 election campaigns from the UK, USA, Israel and Germany, the article finds high levels of support for hypotheses 2–4 but more limited support for hypotheses 1 and 5. Like policy transfer, campaign strategy transfer involves a range of personnel from like-minded parties, with the United States as the predominant lender. However, campaigners appear more willing than policy-makers to learn ‘negative lessons’ (Dolowitz and Marsh, 2000: 12), and there is no evidence that campaign strategy transfer is becoming more prevalent over time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines why employer opposition is stimulated by the introduction of statutory union recognition provisions in Britain, Ireland and the US. It examines the impact of the provisions for encouraging union organizing, which in turn stimulates employer anti-unionism, which then negates the intention of the provisions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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