Search

Background: Global curricular homogenization is purported to have a multitude of benefits. However, homogenization, as typically practiced has been found to promote largely Western ideals. The purpose of this study was to explore the issue of representation in the development of global oncology curricula. Methods: This systematic review of global oncology curricula involved a comprehensive search strategy of eight databases from inception to December 2018. Where available, both controlled vocabulary terms and text words were used. Two investigators independently reviewed the publications for eligibility. Full global/core oncology curricular documents were included. Data analysis included exploration of representation across a number of axes of power including sex and geographic sector, consistent with a neocolonial approach. Results: 32,835 documents were identified in the search and 17 remained following application of the inclusion/exclusion criteria. Eleven of 17 papers were published from 2010 to 2018 and 13 curricula originated from Europe. The 17 curricula had 300 authors; 207 were male and most were from Europe (n = 190; 64%) or North America (n = 73; 24%). The most common curricular purposes were promoting quality patient care (n = 11), harmonization of training standards (n = 10), and facilitating physician mobility (n = 3). The methods for creation of these curricula were most commonly a committee or task force (n = 10). Over time there was an increase in the proportion of female authors and the number of countries represented in the authorship. Conclusion: Existing global oncology curricula are heavily influenced by Western male authors and as a result may not incorporate relevant socio-cultural perspectives impacting care in diverse geographic settings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of TEME: Casopis za Društvene Nauke is the property of TEME: Casopis za Drustvene Nauke 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.)

While a vast theoretical literature argues that we live in populist times, the success of populism beyond its electoral dimension is rarely investigated empirically. This paper analyses the development of populism in five Western European countries (Austria, Germany, Netherlands, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom) from the 1970s to the 2010s. First, it measures whether political parties articulate populist discourses more and more often in their election manifestos. Second, the paper tests whether the presence of populism has increased over time in newspaper articles. The results show that populism is not a new phenomenon and that there is no linear increase over the decades. Moreover, while election manifestos are significantly more populist in the 2010s than in previous decades, populism in newspaper articles remains rather stable at a low level, suggesting that the media curb rather than foster populist discourses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Bohemistyka is the property of Instytut Filologii Slowianskiej Uniwersytetu im. Adama Mickiewicza w Poznaniu 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.)

In the European public discourse on Islamophobia, comparisons of anti- Semitism and Islamophobia have provoked heated debates. The academic discourse has also touched on this issue, an example being the works of Edward Said, where he alludes to connections between anti-Semitism and Islamophobia. Following the 2003 publication of the Islamophobia report produced by the EU Fundamental Rights Agency (FRA), which discusses the similarities between Islamophobia and anti-Semitism, scholars in various fields began a debate that compares and contrasts anti-Semitism and Islamophobia. Participants in this debate include Matti Bunzl, Brian Klug, Sabine Schiffer, Nasar Meer, Wolfgang Benz, and many others. To some degree, the academias of the German- and English-speaking worlds have conducted this discourse separately. This paper surveys, to a degree, the state of the field of the comparative approach to studying Islamophobia and anti-Semitism as a pair, and also presents some central topoi and associated questions. It aims to highlight primary insights that have been gained from such a comparison, including how this comparison has been discussed and criticized, and what similarities and differences have been identified on which levels. It questions which epistemological assumptions were made in taking such a comparative approach, and which political discourses--especially regarding the Holocaust and the conflict in Israel/Palestine (which are not part of this discussion)--have shaped this debate in many forums, including academia. Furthermore, this paper discusses which possible aspects of comparative research on anti-Semitism and Islamophobia have not yet been explored, and where there could perhaps lay more possibilities for further investigation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The recent electoral successes of right-wing and far-right actors in different parts of the world have prompted discussion on various topics: the causes of their rise, their characteristics and strategies, the motivations of electorates and the depth of the right-wing shifts in a range of societies. This paper proposes key themes for systematising this debate and some clues to understanding the rise of the right in such diverse and heterogeneous national realities. It also suggests recovering a constructivist conceptualisation of "authoritarian traditions" in order to analyse the mobilisation strategies, behaviour and coordination of right-wing groups from a perspective that highlights their dynamic and innovative nature. This approach allows us to (re)think authoritarianism as the result of symbolic practices and discourses that are assembled, (re)invented and updated to serve various purposes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates how specific notions of gender and ethnicity are integrated into diversity discourses presented on 241 top European company websites. Large European companies increasingly disclose equality and diversity policies in statements on websites. Such statements may be used to promote an ethical image of the company in terms of how well it manages diversity and guards against discrimination. In this paper, we argue that diversity statement discourses are important as they play a key part in socially constructing how diversity should be regarded in the company by minority and majority groups, as well as indicating corporate values to external stakeholders (investors, government, community, press etc.). Sometimes, the notions of gender or ethnic diversity are positioned as a liability in need of protection, whilst in others, as a source of competitive advantage. We find evidence of use of discursive tools such as problematisation, rationalisation, fixation, reframing and naturalisation of the notions of gender and ethnic diversity, reinforced by use of symbols, such as statistics, photographs, membership badges and awards. Few statements directly associate gender and ethnic diversity with enhanced corporate performance. We found that diversity statements sometimes appear to reinforce existing business stereotypes of women and people from ethnic minorities, and in a few discourses, create new ones, particularly evident in photographs illustrating the diversity web pages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The refugees' crisis has set the public agenda on European topics throughout 2015. Considered by many as (another) existential test for the European project, this new type of crisis has triggered frustrations and extreme disappointment, leading to a further aggravation of the already existing intra-EU cleavages, such as those between the West and the East, the "net debtors" (now labeled as the net supporters of the refugees) and the "net creditors" (now intensely recognized as adversaries of migration). Noteworthy, Angela Merkel declared that the refugees' crisis is "testing Europe's mettle" (2015), whereas Jean-Claude Juncker posed that a "blame-game" is shattering the EU, with Member States accusing "each other of not doing enough or of doing the wrong thing" (2015). This paper argues that the European leaders have tacitly fueled - through their emotional and solidarity-centered discourse - the intra-EU cleavages between the Member-States, as well as public attachment to far-right xenophobic ideologies. By means of a combined narratives' and frames' analysis, this paper focuses on the discursive means employed by the European leaders in order to tackle the sensitive topic of the migration crisis. Firstly, some background information about the causes and developments of the migration crisis is presented. Secondly, frames and narratives are approached as two different yet complementary instances of discourse analysis. Lastly, two key discourses given by Angela Merkel and Jean- Claude Juncker are investigated with the purpose of identifying how frames and narratives combine to tell the story of European integration under the pressure of the refugees' flows. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Public affairs and lobbying is a high status and strategically vital public relations specialism. It is a field of PR practice that generates high levels of both scholarly and public concern in regard to its perceived role in supporting corporate power and the associated impact on the functional legitimacy of democratic institutions. For this paper a content analysis was conducted of academic journals (between 2000 and 2013) to provide insights into how public affairs and lobbying have been theorised and researched within public relations scholarship and to ascertain to what degree wider public concerns have been addressed. Findings include an empirical confirmation of the low level of research activity on public affairs; that stakeholder and rhetorical theories have been the most widely used theories, but are far from constituting dominant paradigms; that scholarship has privileged functional objectives over civic concerns; and that published work originates almost entirely from institutions in Europe and the US with the Global South invisible. The paper also discusses future directions for research in public affairs and advocates the placing of discourse into definitions of public affairs, and that academic public relations should assert responsibility for this field, but in a manner that more equitably balances organisational and societal concerns. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The 'transformative power of Europe' is a promising standpoint to shed light on national attitudes and beliefs formed in the course of centuries, as well as on paths taken by legal systems more recently. The paper seeks to unravel some -- more or less cryptic -- legal changes driven by the EU integration process in both the German and the French judicial discourse. In doing so, it argues that the souveraniste stance taken by the Bundesverfassungsgericht, as well as the 'constitutional identity' turn of the Conseil constitutionnel, contain the seeds of a new representation of what German and French constitutional judges consider to be their role in the relationships between EU law and domestic law. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Problem solving (PbS) talk has been associated with disagreement and conflict as interactants oppose each other''s views and express diverse opinions. Although disagreement and conflict have been regarded in earlier work as potentially negative acts more recent work points to the importance of context and local practices instead of a priori categorizations of what the interactants perceive as un/acceptable linguistic behaviour. The paper draws on data from two projects on workplace discourse, one focusing on multinational companies situated in Europe and one on small/medium firms (SMEs). The dataset consists of recordings of meetings, ethnographic observations and interviews. The analysis of the data shows that ‘deviating opinions’ are not only ‘acceptable’ but also unmarked and they form an inherent part of the PbS process. At the same time linguistic behaviour perceived as face threatening or intentionally impolite is typically rare. The paper closes by drawing a theoretical distinction between marked and unmarked disagreement. The latter is perceived as task bound and does not pose a threat to the management of the meeting participants’ complex identities and relationships. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

In 1996, a Canadian company started geological explorations in the Rosia Montana area in the Romanian Carpathians. Two years later it formed a joint-venture with a Romanian state company to exploit what is believed to be Europe's largest gold reserves. However, as of June 2011 extraction has not started yet and it may never start due to the opposition of numerous NGO's that have pointed out the environmental, social and economic unsustainability of this mining project. This situation is highly unusual for a country that is hungry for foreign investment especially since up until very recently the state had supported any project promising to revitalize its mining sector. This paper will investigate the changes in the discourses surrounding this mining project taking into consideration the effects of globalization and the effects of Romania's EU membership after 2007. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of ÖZP - Österreichische Zeitschrift für Politikwissenschaft is the property of Oesterreichische Zeitschrift fur Politikwissenschaft 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.)

Summary: This paper explores the proposition that public discourse about the European Union in Croatia is not European, but national. The 'nationalness' of this discourse about Europe leads to divergent constructions of Croatian and European identity, and this, in turn, makes inclusion in the EU's distributive mechanisms more difficult. The first part of the paper highlights the two discourses that exist in Europe - European and national. The second part describes how Croatian and European public discourse about the European Union diverge, and what the consequences of this divergence are. In the third part, reasons contributing to this divergence are offered, and the dangers of such a development for Croatia's European future are indicated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study analyzes the discourses surrounding the interrelation between digitalization and sustainability in Europe on Twitter between 2010 and 2021. We identify 34,802 tweets related to the interrelation between digitalization and sustainability among 634,017 tweets discussing sustainability issues with explicit mentions of Europe. Based on a qualitative analysis of tweets, we identify the main domains discussed (and not discussed). We then sketch the development of the identified domains, as well as their relationship to each other over time, based on a quantitative analysis of their (co-)occurrences. We find that smart city and mobility were two of the most dominant and interrelated domains, particularly in the middle of the decade. In parallel, the domain of climate change has gained ever more attention since 2017 and has emerged as a discursive hub. We further develop hypotheses for how external factors and events (especially EU-level programs) likely led to increases in attention to some domains. Finally, we find that the Twitter discourse across domains mirrors common blind spots regarding sustainable digitalization discourses in its uncritical stance toward economic growth and its overreliance on efficiency in comparison to sufficiency concerns. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Stefan Eich's The Currency of Politics reconstructs and contextualises the monetary understanding of some of the most renowned political thinkers in history. By contextualising each author's conceptualisation (subjective perception) against their respective contemporary monetary frameworks (objective institutional dimension), Eich elaborates a narrative composed of cumulative layers leading to a double conclusion: that money is political at its core, and that current policies are actively de-politicizing money. These relevant findings are the point of departure of a reflection on the role that law, and constitutional theory in particular, must play in the configuration of Europe's common currency to overcome some of the most acute difficulties the process of integration is currently experiencing. If the triad law, money and public discourse is supposed to articulate social life in the polity, European monetary integration has neutralised them by neglecting the relevance of one of their key features: civic reciprocity. Reactivating the three mechanisms of social integration requires an exercise of constitutional imagination able to integrate interdisciplinary knowledge about money within an institutional framework able to prevent the concentration of unlimited power in unaccountable institutions and to promote and fully exploit the democratic potential of money. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper addresses the puzzle of why Portugal has consistently supported the EU's fifth enlargement. We argue that standard explanations, based on welfare maximisation, geopolitics, or rhetorical action, cannot persuasively account for this policy choice. Instead, we advance an alternative explanation - subsequently referred to as 'identity endorsement - that is based on a logic of appropriateness where behaviour is shaped by aspects of similarity and congruence, and where the development of Portuguese identity has constituted what has been perceived as appropriate in the context of Eastern enlargement. We argue that EC/EU membership has provided Portuguese political elites with a renewed collective identity, in which a choice for membership has been equated with a choice for democracy, stability and openness. Portuguese support for Eastern enlargement has consistently been based on these concepts that originated from Portugal's own period of accession negotiations. By fully supporting Eastern enlargement, Portugal could act together with the 'European core', and Portugal itself would become more 'core', i.e. more European. For Portuguese political elites, supporting Eastern enlargement thus constituted an act of 'identity endorsement', i.e. the confirmation, (re-)production and reinforcement of existing identity constructions. We tentatively suggest that the notion of identity endorsement may also shed light on other empirical puzzles related to European integration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Revija za Sociologiju is the property of Revija za Sociologiju 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.)

Copyright of Sociologija: Mintis ir Veiksmas is the property of Vilnius University 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.)

Copyright of Moderna Sprak is the property of Institutionen for Moderna Sprak 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 study examines conceptions of outsiders to the polity, focusing on the lexical items migrant(s), refugee(s), and exile(s) in both internet- and print-based sources. Drawing primarily on a subsection of the Genealogies Internet Corpus consisting of left-wing sources, I argue that left-wing politics is currently caught up in the rhetoric of the right and of mainstream institutions in society, largely reproducing the same discursive patterns even as it sets out to challenge them. Dominant patterns in left-wing Internet sources reveal, for example, that the economic migrant vs. political refugee distinction enforced by mainstream institutions remains largely intact, that the assumption of a "refugee crisis" unfolding in Europe is accepted at face value, and that the left is entangled in the same politics of labeling imposed by the right, reproducing designations such as "undocumented migrants" uncritically. Refugees and migrants, moreover, are represented as victims with no agency, are discussed in legal terms that serve to dehumanize them, and are repeatedly "quantified" as a homogenous and potentially problematic category. Acknowledging the contagious nature of dominant discourses and the difficulty of finding an alternative language with which to argue against established institutional rhetoric, the study further explores historical models that appear more consistent with the values espoused by left-wing politics today. It examines a subcorpus of modern English translations of ancient Greek texts such as Thucydides' The Peloponnesian War and Herodotus's Histories to demonstrate the viability of adopting a different conceptualization of refugees and other outsiders to the polity that may be drawn from classical antiquity—and/or from nineteenth- and early twentieth-century receptions of texts originating in classical antiquity—and the possibility of developing an alternative discourse with which to speak about migrants in the present. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The magrant crisis that Europe has been facing for many years has triggered an avalanche of xenophobia and the dispersion of anti-migrant sentiments that have become the reference matrix for populist discourse. Anti-migrant discourse emerges in parallel as a form of language use and a form of social and political interaction. The antagonistic stereotypical narrative of migrants begins with the thesis that they constitute a retrograde social group that poses an economic and security threat to the natives and which is not capable of culturally assimilating in the countries of transit and destination (dichotomy Us vs. Them). Spreading anti-migrant discourse becomes a strategy for winning the electorate and an important tool for mobilizing political support. The political engineering of European political parties shows that anti-migrant discourse is not the exclusivity of right-wing parties of the political spectrum (although they are the most closely related), but is becoming an increasingly important topic on the political agenda of left-wing populism. Anti-migrant discourse is reflected through a nationalist and hostile approach to immigration, the glorification of national and sovereign narratives, and hostility to neoliberalism. Anti-migrant narratives have found their footing in the political activities of many European parties that are largely sovereignly profiled. Such a political vault ofreasoning transforms migrant into a foreigner and attest on the triumph of communitarianism in regards to cosmopolitanism, which makes the EU’s slogan „in varietate concordia” (united in diversity) questionable and subject to deconstruction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In light of recent outbreaks of diseases such as measles in Europe, policymakers and public health practitioners are seeking strategies to address anti-vaccination attitudes and to increase immunization rates. Identifying effective strategies that will not further alienate vaccination sceptics raises challenges that go to the heart of relations between the state and society. Drawing on accounts of state–society relations, this article discusses how the problem of vaccination hesitancy might be explained from a political science perspective. Discourse-analytical approaches emphasize the importance of storylines, politics and social context in explaining a range of phenomena. Given the number and strength of prevailing discourses in groups with anti-vaccination sentiments, the literature on discourse coalitions can offer perspectives on the challenges that arise in designing strategies to address vaccine hesitancy. Paying closer attention to individual reasons why parents are vaccine hesitant might allow for designing strategies that are more suited to address concerns. However, given the pervasiveness of the discourses of anti-vaccination movements, challenges in reaching citizens who are sceptical of vaccines will remain. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This contribution analyzes the public discourse on foreigners and Muslims in Switzerland between 2000 and 2009. In Switzerland, as elsewhere in Europe, the Muslim minority has emerged as the main concern for integration in public discourse. What makes Muslims special in the debate on immigration and integration? How does the public discourse on Muslims differ from the portrayal of foreigners in general? A quantitative content analysis of four Swiss newspapers was conducted covering three direct democratic campaigns. While the demographic composition of the Muslim minority has not changed substantially, the way Muslims are perceived in public discourse did. Certain ethnic groups, which are still categorized as foreigners in 2000, are mainly assigned to the Muslim minority in 2009. The latter is seen as a relatively homogeneous group raising other issues than foreigners. These results should lead to question the current academic and political debate on integration in Switzerland. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article measures populist discourse among prime ministers in new Central and Eastern European democracies using holistic grading as a specific type of textual analysis. The article first offers a definition of populism and then measures political discourse by grading political speeches of contemporary prime ministers in Central and Eastern Europe. Next, it presents descriptive data about prime ministers' political discourse and discusses positive cases of populism in reference to democratic structures. Despite suggestions that we live in a populist zeitgeist, populism is a rare and occasional phenomenon in Central and Eastern European executive politics. It has often been associated with violations of democratic structure by individual leaders. However, these violations are more likely to be related to undemocratic political culture in general than to populism in particular. Where populism does coincide with an already undemocratic political mindset, this represents a more serious threat to democratic standards. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How far can there be such a thing as a 'European archaeology'? Is this a matter of geography and recent history or does it rather reflect different discourses that take place in different parts of Europe? The contrast between a western ('Anglo-American') and central or eastern ('mitteleuropaisch') European archaeology is considered, along with recent discussions of similarities and differences across the continent. The role of the European Association of Archaeologists (EAA) in bringing scholars and practitioners together is seen as a positive force, which a common language (English) is helping to promote. Recent developments include the 'Discovering the Archaeologists of Europe' project, and changes in the licensing and registering system in different countries; here the example of Romania shows a progressive official attitude to preventive archaeology, coupled with a very traditional approach to the study and teaching of archaeology. The opportunities presented by the creation of the European Research Council should be exploited by the profession with a view to creating large-scale projects that can serve to address questions on a pan-European scale. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Deliberative democracy is increasingly discussed in relation to the transnational sphere in terms of promoting democratic mechanisms of representation and participation. The establishment of the European Integration Forum (EIF) represents an effort to apply deliberation to the field of integration policies at the EU level. The EIF combines an original structure consisting of civil society actors and EU institutions, on the one hand, and national and European organisations, on the other. In this article, the institutional and discursive dimensions of the EIF are discussed. The institutional dimension refers to the benefits of the deliberative model for inclusive policy making and it is argued that it is particularly useful for incorporating immigrant voices in consultative processes. The discursive dimension relates to the articulation of a common European discourse on integration within the already existing EU framework. Discourses of contestation emanating from civil society are constrained especially in relation to the identification of a sole target group of integration policies, namely third-country nationals. The deliberative approach of the EIF is efficient in its institutionalisation through the inclusion of multiple civil society actors, but its discursive potential in terms of reflecting a heterogeneity of viewpoints and the capacity for generating contestation are reduced. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article examines the potential impact of the changes in European Union (EU) policy-making processes and the application of the Open Method of Coordination (OMC) on the normative and cognitive foundations of childcare policy. It explores the European Employment Strategy (EES) mechanisms that aim to influence the foundations of reconciliation of work and family life policies in EU member states. Moreover, it defines policy learning.