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Alcopops are malt-based or spirit-based sugary beverages whose consumption has led to numerous policies in different Western countries. This article examines the representational and socio-political dynamics surrounding the sale of alcopops that led to restrictive policies in Canada (2017–2020). Using qualitative methods during this period, including interviews with key players in the field of alcohol policy, analysis of press articles and review of legislative documents, we trace the evolution of public and political discourse on alcopops. We shed light on the role of social actors—mainly public-health organizations and the alcohol industry—defending their own interests to influence policy-making. A multi-theoretical framework is used to analyze how alcopops emerged as a public problem. This framework integrates Herbert Blumer's theoretical perspective on social problems, Serge Moscovici's social representation theory and Stevens and Zampini's political constellation model. Through an analysis of the socio-political context in Quebec, we reveal the complex interplay between public health imperatives and the interests of the alcohol industry. This should serve as a model to study public problems that lead to public policies implementation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This conceptual article explores the relationship between stakeholder theory and electoral processes, focusing on the contemporary challenges and ethical implications of applying this theory, rooted in accountability, to the political realm. Drawing on an extensive literature review to develop the theory within the political field and elections, the analysis uncovers the factors and multifaceted issues that shape stakeholder engagement in electoral contexts, and the pervasive influence of political money on the sway of tribal affiliations and identity politics—which can result in misaligned representation and unfair policy outcomes that may harm the long‐term interests of stakeholders themselves. This underscores the need for regulatory reforms to enhance transparency and accountability in elections, advocating for ethical governance to balance broader public interests against narrow stakeholder interests. Ultimately, the research provides insights into improving global electoral processes and governance, calling for policies supporting equitable, accountable, and sustainable governance practices. Related Articles: Adegboye, Alex, Kofo Adegboye, Uwalomwa Uwuigbe, Stephen, Ojeka, and Eyitemi Fasanu. 2023. "Taxation, Democracy, and Inequality in Sub‐Saharan Africa: Relevant Linkages for Sustainable Development Goals." Politics & Policy 51(4): 696–722. https://doi.org/10.1111/polp.12547. Akwei, Cynthia. 2018. "Mitigating Election Violence and Intimidation: A Political Stakeholder Engagement Approach." Politics & Policy 46(3): 472–504. https://doi.org/10.1111/polp.12256. Sohn, Hyodong. 2023. "Policy Agenda Trade‐offs for Sustainability: The Compositional Change of Attention about Energy in Legislative Hearings." Politics & Policy 51(6): 973–1007. https://doi.org/10.1111/polp.12563. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In light of the increased frequency of multi-hazards, the dynamics of vulnerability across time, space, and different hazards emerges as an intriguing but challenging research topic. Within multi-hazard contexts, both the impacts of hazards and mitigation strategies can augment vulnerabilities, adding layers to the complexity of multi-risk assessments. Delving into these interactions, this study aims to analyse new connections in rising vulnerability that result from impacts and adaptation options, as well as their implications, putting co-occurrent powerful river flood events and the COVID-19 pandemic in Romania under the magnifying glass, taking 2020 and 2021 as references. The proposed framework relies on an impact chain that was enhanced to include new elements (i.e. augmented vulnerabilities and derived impacts) and links (i.e. connections that describe the augmentation of vulnerability), which were also used to rank the vulnerabilities based on their augmentation. The impact chain draws on various data and information sources, including the scientific literature, the feedback of first responders, reports, legislative documents, official press releases, and news reports. This research work makes a significant contribution to the field of disaster risk reduction (DRR) by broadening the purpose of the impact chain, transforming it into a first-hand, semi-qualitative tool for analysing vulnerability dynamics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, we provide a comparative case study analysis of the differentiated climate change engagement of the Bank of England (BoE), European Central Bank (ECB) and Federal Reserve (Fed). Drawing on semi-structured interviews and a newly composed database of central banker speeches and legislative documents, we argue that climate (in)actions of these central banks are shaped by concerns over their reputation. A broad socio-political consensus on the need for climate change mitigation enabled the BoE and ECB to begin integrating CRFRs into their supervisory frameworks without affecting their socio-political reputation while the carbon bias in their own asset purchase programs compelled both central banks to also start greening their monetary policy to preserve their performative reputation. The Fed's more cautious moves have been driven by a fear of loss of technical reputation in the face of a growing transnational consensus on the financial stability risks of climate change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of the conducted research was to determine the role of legal mechanisms for monitoring the observance of public order in the context of the interaction of police officers with local self-government bodies. To determine the legal framework for collaboration between the police and regional selfgovernment, formal legal and comparative methods, analysis of legal acts, and abstract and logical methods were used. The forms of interaction between the police and local self-government in controlling the observance of public order are identified in the article, and recommendations for improving such cooperation are formulated. It was determined that in order to improve the proper mechanisms of interaction between police officers and local self-government bodies, it is recommended to adopt a normative document on the legislative consolidation of the mechanism of interaction in the field of public safety and order in ordinary and emergency situations. It is recommended that the responsible entities and mechanisms for monitoring the state of this interaction be identified. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of the study is to analyse the EU's existing and potential capabilities in criminal law policy to prevent transnational environmental crimes. The study uses statistical analysis, formal legal, comparative legal and descriptive methods. As a result of the work carried out, it was found that today, Ukraine requires special attention in terms of the scale of transnational environmental crimes. About 2,500 environmental crimes committed by Russian companies were recorded in the country. In this regard, the author's in-depth analysis of the current legislative documents related to transnational environmental crimes provides valuable insights. It is determined that changes in the criminal law policy of the European Union may improve the situation with transnational environmental crime. At the same time, the author considers the prospects for further improvement of criminal law policy, including introducing the concept of "ecocide" into the Rome Statute. The author notes the European Union countries' best practices in preventing environmental crimes using criminal law instruments and the SIENA platform's effectiveness in exchanging information on environmental crimes between countries. The findings of this work can be applied in developing mechanisms for the prevention of transnational environmental crimes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Prominent judges and scholars have long challenged the use of legislative history in statutory interpretation. Critics point to the privileged role that supposedly unrepresentative committee chairs play in the production of legislative history and a perceived inability to aggregate individual lawmakers’ intentions. These features, the argument goes, cast doubt on the reliability of committee reports, floor speeches, and the like as windows into congressional intent. This critique even comes with a pithy framing: using legislative history to interpret statutes is misguided because “Congress is a ‘they,’ not an ‘it.’” This widely adopted expression, although appropriate in previous congressional epochs, no longer reflects reality. Drawing on analysis of nine decades of congressional data, a detailed accounting of organizational changes on Capitol Hill, and case studies of bills passed in different eras, this Article synthesizes a set of developments that, taken together, greatly improve the signal quality of legislative documents. In brief, producers of legislative history in the contemporary Congress operate as agents of cohesive coalitions; the majority party selects them for these roles based on their orthodoxy, then decides to engage them to draft some bills and sideline them for others. In light of these developments, it is time for courts to inter the widespread view that legislative history cannot shed light on an enacting coalition’s collective will. In its place, this Article presents a new paradigm: when determining whether to consult legislative history, judges must consider Congress’s structure and procedures at the time of the relevant statute’s enactment. For laws enacted in recent decades, the conditions are such that legislative history evinces legislative intent. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

BACKGROUND: To reduce radiation dose and subsequent risks, several legislative documents in different countries describe the need for Diagnostic Reference Levels (DRLs). Spinal radiography is a common and high-dose examination. Therefore, the aim of this work was to establish the DRL for Computed Tomography (CT) examinations of the spine in healthcare institutions across Jordan. METHODS: Data was retrieved from the picture archiving and communications system (PACS), which included the CT Dose Index (CTDI (vol) ) and Dose Length Product (DLP). The median radiation dose values of the dosimetric indices were calculated for each site. DRL values were defined as the 75th percentile distribution of the median CTDI (vol) and DLP values. RESULTS: Data was collected from 659 CT examinations (316 cervical spine and 343 lumbar-sacral spine). Of the participants, 68% were males, and the patients' mean weight was 69.7 kg (minimum = 60; maximum = 80, SD = 8.9). The 75th percentile for the DLP of cervical and LS-spine CT scans in Jordan were 565.2 and 967.7 mGy.cm, respectively. CONCLUSIONS: This research demonstrates a wide range of variability in CTDI (vol) and DLP values for spinal CT examinations; these variations were associated with the acquisition protocol and highlight the need to optimize radiation dose in spinal CT examinations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Ukrainian system of medical and social expertise needs to revise its conceptual and methodological foundations in accordance with the realities of the current development of social sciences in the world and demand of the state regarding the modern understanding of disability. The purpose of the study was to analyze international experience and legislation on policy towards persons with disabilities and systematic approaches to the criteria of violation of functioning and the possibilities of determining the status of "person with disabilities" using the basic principles of the International Classification of Functioning (ICF), Impairment and Health to create optimal approaches to determining the criteria for disability in Ukraine. The study was based on the analysis of available scientific literature and legislative documents of developed countries on the understanding of the concept of "person with a disability". The scientometric databases used were Scopus, Web of Science, Google Scholar, and MedLine. Data from the official websites of the Political Department of the European Parliament, WHO, the United Nations, UNICEF, the World Bank. According to the results of the study, it is determined that a single state body is responsible for determining the status of a person with a disability in sustainable development countries using a multidisciplinary approach. The author identifies 3 main components that most developed countries assess when determining disability: economic, medical and social. At the same time, the main criterion is decreased performance. It has been established that since 2022, Spain has completely switched to the criteria of the International Classification of Functioning in determining the signs of disability, basing the severity of a person's condition as a degree of disability on a percentage decrease in the person's functioning. Some European countries use selective categories of the ICF. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Moroccan courthouses are increasingly using videoconferencing technology to connect an accused remotely to a judicial hearing. While videoconferencing is more than just a technological tool, it continues to raise several legal concerns due to the seriousness of the legal rights and principles at stake. This article examines how videoconferencing technology is faithful in enshrining a natural and effective defence for the accused appearing at a distance. It analyses the transformations generated by this technology both in the ritual framework of the trial and in the perceptions of the various participants in the hearing, which may have an impact on the fairness of the trial and, more generally, on the image of justice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Governance theory emphasises that networks are pivotal to societal governance and related steering mechanisms. One important means of steering is legislation, the evidence base of which is built on the interaction between social actors and the expert hearings related to the legislative process. This research uses network analysis to examine the construction of a legislative knowledge base and the information resilience displayed in the related networks. The data are derived from experts (n=440) appearing in committee hearings on five proposed acts of parliament. The results show that the expert consultations behind the legislation are official-oriented and illuminate the limited information produced by the private sector and a narrow view of scientific expertise. The network reveals epistemic authorities - mainly representing the security cluster - acting as gatekeepers. A more systemic approach is needed to build an evidence base encompassing the views on societal phenomena derived from different disciplines. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A parallel corpus comprising Croatian EU legislative documents automatically translated into English spans 28 years and is enriched with metadata, including creation year and hierarchical classifier tags denoting descriptors, document types, and fields. However, nearly two-thirds of the approximately 1.5 thousand texts lack complete metadata, necessitating labor- intensive manual efforts that pose challenges for human administration. This incompleteness issue can be observed in the case of official legal sites functioning as regular service provisioning databases. In response, this paper introduces an artificial cognitive and multilabel classification approach to expedite the tagging process with only a fraction of the manual effort. Leveraging the Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) algorithm, our method assigns field values or tags to incompletely labeled documents. We implement a Flexible LDA variant, incorporating the influence of topics close to the most probable topic, regulated by a relative probability threshold (RPT). We evaluate the LDA prediction's dependence on document prefiltering and RPT values. Furthermore, we investigate the dependence of quantitative linguistic properties on the type and speciality of pre-processing tasks. Our algorithm, built on error-correcting optimizing codes, successfully predicts a mixture of topic probabilities for these legal texts. This prediction is achieved by calculating the Hamming distance of binary feature vectors created using the legal fields of the EUROVOC multilingual thesaurus. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Inclusive education is an important foundation of many societies, including the post-Soviet countries. It has been more than ten years since the official implementation of inclusion in Russia. However, the inclusive education system has not developed enough to be equally supported everywhere throughout the country, and is marked by controversial views on legal regulation and inclusive strategies. The purpose of this article is to examine inclusion and inclusive education, mainly for students with special educational needs, as understood in the educational policy. The data consist of legislative and strategic documents on the state level between 2012 to 2014. The data analysis was based on a qualitative content analysis. The analysis indicated two main themes: the subtle expression and lack of a definition for inclusion, and an inconsistent expression and definition of inclusive education. The results point to the necessity of encouraging discussions as well as reflections with respect to articulating and defining what inclusion is and how Russia can create an effective strategy for the further development of inclusive education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study aims to analyze the evolution of the Musical Curriculum for the second cycle of Early Childhood Education in Spain from a historical perspective. Methodologically, a review and analysis of the legislative documents on Early Childhood Education from the end of the 19th century to the present has been carried out. To this end, a comprehensive review of the main legislative contributions in this context is carried out. The results reveal that since the 1980s to the present, there has been a trend toward a greater number of curricular elements in relation to the area of Music and, in addition, with respect to the different musical fields, it is seen that they too have undergone a progressive increase over time. The inclusion of the musical language within the area of Artistic Education is a premise that has remained present in all documents. The level of concretion of the normative text is discussed, which has been decreasing over time, contributing to greater freedom for the teacher when considering teaching practice in the classroom. The study of past references is considered necessary to adequately shape the new regulations, especially in a context such as Spain, characterized by constant change in the educational field. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Current and emerging photovoltaic modules may include small amounts of toxics. • Global toxicity characterization policies for photovoltaic devices are compared. • Sampling approach, particle size, and methods cause leachate result variability. • Limitations of current assessment procedures and regulations are disclosed. Environmental management of solar photovoltaic (PV) modules is attracting attention as a growing number of field-operated PV modules approach end of life (EoL). PV modules may contain small amounts of toxic metals, and the procedures for assessing and regulating the toxic metal content and release of such materials at EoL differ widely across nations. This paper provides an overview of the metal composition of PV modules and common procedures for toxicity assessment through extensive research and review of technical literature and legislative documents. This review focuses on three primary aspects: first, it explores the distribution of toxic elements within current and emerging PV module designs, with a specific focus on obtaining representative samples for proportional toxicity testing within different module laminate areas. Second, it examines a sampling standard and the diverse toxicity testing methods and regulations employed in various regions, encompassing standards like the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Test Method 1311 (Toxicity Characteristic Leaching Procedure, TCLP) in the U.S., Restriction of Hazardous Substances (RoHS) in Europe, and the Waste Extraction Test (WET) in California. Third, the review examines the sources of variability in toxicity testing outcomes, including techniques for securing homogeneous samples from non-uniform PV modules, selecting particle sizes representative of landfill conditions in extracted samples, determining appropriate leachate characteristics such as leaching agents and pH levels, and considering factors like test duration and temperatures. In summary, this review summarizes relevant regulations and offers a comprehensive overview of the strengths and limitations associated with several toxicity assessment procedures currently in practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The field of Natural Language Processing (NLP) has experienced significant growth in recent years, largely due to advancements in Deep Learning technology and especially Large Language Models. These improvements have allowed for the development of new models and architectures that have been successfully applied in various real-world applications. Despite this progress, the field of Legal Informatics has been slow to adopt these techniques. In this study, we conducted an extensive literature review of NLP research focused on legislative documents. We present the current state-of-the-art NLP tasks related to Law Consolidation, highlighting the challenges that arise in low-resource languages. Our goal is to outline the difficulties faced by this field and the methods that have been developed to overcome them. Finally, we provide examples of NLP implementations in the legal domain and discuss potential future directions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, machine translation has made significant advancements; however, its effectiveness can vary widely depending on the language pair. Languages with limited resources, such as Kazakh, Uzbek, Kalmyk, Tatar, and others, often encounter challenges in achieving high-quality machine translations. Kazakh is an agglutinative language with complex morphology, making it a low-resource language. This article addresses the task of post-editing machine translation for the Kazakh language. The research begins by discussing the history and evolution of machine translation and how it has developed to meet the unique needs of languages with limited resources. The research resulted in the development of a machine translation post-editing system. The system utilizes modern machine learning methods, starting with neural machine translation using the BRNN model in the initial post-editing stage. Subsequently, the transformer model is applied to further edit the text. Complex structural and grammatical forms are processed, and abbreviations are replaced. Practical experiments were conducted on various texts: news publications, legislative documents, IT sphere, etc. This article serves as a valuable resource for researchers and practitioners in the field of machine translation, shedding light on effective post-editing strategies to enhance translation quality, particularly in scenarios involving languages with limited resources such as Kazakh and Uzbek. The obtained results were tested and evaluated using specialized metrics—BLEU, TER, and WER. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

When advocating for policy change, coalitions rely on various elements and strategies of policy narratives, including emotions. However, past research on the Narrative Policy Framework, and more broadly on the policy process, has largely ignored the role of emotions. This paper argues that emotions, such as anger and fear, are central to how coalitions advocate for policy change. It explores the role of anger and fear in policy narratives by examining the oral testimony (n = 474) given over four legislative committee hearings in March 2019 concerning Colorado Senate Bill 19‐181. This bill changed the mission of the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission to prioritize protecting the environment and public health over oil and gas development. This research finds the coalition that successfully supported the bill used anger towards the oil and gas industry, while those that opposed the bill relied more on fear of the uncertain consequences of the bill. It also finds the coalition that opposed the bill relied on self‐characterization as heroes and victims, which was a failed strategy. The implications for this research on the Narrative Policy Framework and, more broadly, for the policy process and advocacy are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Summary: This article delves into a crucial yet understudied aspect of Italian penitentiary history during the 1930s: the intricate interplay between international influences and the development of fascist prison policies with regard to issues of sexuality. Drawing from a rich archive of legislative documents, contemporary publications, and historical accounts, this study examines the emergence of a multifaceted discourse surrounding sexuality within the context of Italian prisons. Within this framework, the article illuminates the tensions between Mussolini's authoritarian policies and the pioneering penitentiary practices that were undergoing experimentation in foreign legal systems 1. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article explores the implications of the widespread adoption of virtual technology in courtrooms, particularly in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. It discusses the shift towards online hearings, examining the challenges and opportunities presented by virtual technology for the administration of justice. It distinguishes between different technological settings, such as video-enabled hearings, virtual hearings, and immersive virtual hearings.

The Great Mosque of Tlemcen is a unique case, as it is one of the few mosques dating back to the Almoravid period that is almost intact. It has evolved in a constantly changing space and now has a conjoined public square, following an occidental configuration, which is quite rare. The size of this square suggests that it could be put to use as an additional vector for the valorisation of the mosque, but the current situation is different. This added space, introduced by occidental culture, creates a dual architectural language with several other buildings that mark all the layers of evolution in the urban fabric. Apart from its religious function, this mosque used to play the role of a covered public square, a role that has eroded over time. The aim of this research is to analyse the relationship between the building and its surroundings, as well as the population's perception of this relationship. Additionally, the research is intended to highlight changes in the perception of the Great Mosque of Tlemcen's public square over time, depending on historical, political, and social contexts. This research relies on an approach that combines different methods, including a thorough analysis of historical, cartographic, and legislative documents. Through this approach, we were able to conduct a comparative analysis with other similar cases. Finally, field research allowed us to understand the relationship between space and society. Despite the legal recognition of the surroundings as a historical monument, this status is not widely perceived and integrated into the population's sense of heritage space. This is reflected in private and even public actions, despite the instrumentalisation of this heritage status, with appropriations of protected space that occur outside of regulations and become part of the landscape expression of the building in its environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The evaluation of relative changes in policy agenda composition using dynamic compositional models can offer a useful way to lead future studies of policy agenda trade‐offs for sustainability. As a specific empirical case, this study examines changes in the annual composition of legislative attention in the United States congressional hearings on energy as a substantive issue domain. Using the description texts of hearings, this article assesses the compositional energy topic changes of conventional agendas, other general agendas, and unconventional agendas, including environmental and social agendas. By focusing on how economic contextual shocks, along with political factors, shape the energy agenda attention mix, this study discovers that conventional agendas related to energy topics in U.S. congressional hearings are relatively less likely to be discussed when economic conditions are adverse under Democratic legislature controls. It illustrates example conditions under which policy agenda subtopics for sustainability are more likely to be pursued at the expense of which subtopics. Related Articles: Heidbreder, Brianne. 2012. "Agenda Setting in the States: How Politics and Policy Needs Shape Gubernatorial Agendas." Politics & Policy 40(2): 296–319. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1747‐1346.2012.00345.x. Morini, Marco, and Marco Cilento. 2020. "New Parties, Fractionalization, and the Increasing Duration of Government Formation Processes in the EU Member States." Politics & Policy 48(6): 1202–32. https://doi.org/10.1111/polp.12381. Steger, Wayne P. 2008. "The President's Legislative Program: An Issue of Sincere versus Strategic Behavior." Politics & Policy 33(2): 312–29. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1747‐1346.2005.tb00645.x. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Revista Internacional de Educación para la Justicia Social is the property of Universidad Autonoma de Madrid 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 this paper, a detailed analysis was carried out of the methods that have been developed by various countries and organizations to calculate the losses of oil and petroleum products from tanks caused by natural factors. In the course of the study, legislative and regulatory documents regulating emissions into the atmosphere in various countries of the world were considered. Both positive and negative sides of the methods under consideration were identified, and based on the results obtained, a new and more improved method of automatic accounting of hydrocarbon vapors from tanks was proposed, the effectiveness and operability of the proposed method was proved. The study also formulated recommendations for future research in this direction, which may be useful for further improvement of methods for automatic calculation of losses of oil and petroleum products in various conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Revista Foco (Interdisciplinary Studies Journal) is the property of Revista Foco 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 Policy Discourse Analysis (PDA) explores 19 state legislative documents focused on the teaching of disability history in K-12 schools. Framed through critical perspectives on constructions of disability and race, alongside discourse theory, we iteratively analyzed these legislative documents to understand (a) how disability and disability history are constructed (particularly in relation to whiteness); and (b) the stated purpose of the legislation and who is meant to benefit materially as a result of the laws. We find the legislation upholds dominant notions of whiteness and ability as part of school curriculum, while simultaneously constructing disability history as in the past and disability justice as already achieved, centering the learning and awareness of white, nondisabled students. We offer discussion and implications for research and practice surrounding policy implementation of teaching disability history. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The complexity and the impact of international migration on developing economies have grown to be a global phenomenon that cannot be ignored. Natural disasters, human-made disasters such as conflicts as well as political and economic instabilities in countries are at the centre of international migration. The receiving countries can have positive contributions from migration and face the glaring realities of providing social services to their citizenry and the migrants. South Africa is not an exception to this impasse. Among other challenges experienced by developing countries linked to international migration are overpopulation growth, rising unemployment and poverty levels, poor infrastructure and low lifestyle quality. Therefore, the purpose of this conceptual paper was to analyse the impact of international migration on developing economies with specific reference to South Africa. The study used secondary data comprising existing literature and legislative and policy documents related to international migration for both domestic and international migration. The information collected from the secondary data was analysed and used as the basis to give the view and the study in its conclusion. The study aimed at contributing to the body of knowledge and the shaping of policy perspectives for both policy makers and development actors in South Africa, and to broaden the understanding of how governments from both receiving and the sending countries deal with international migration. The study provided an important foundation upon which further large-scale research could be developed on international migration, especially on its impact on developing economies like South Africa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Demand for fish continued to grow worldwide while production from capture fisheries has decreased. In the Eastern African Region (EAR), the open-access nature of capture fisheries has resulted in illegal fishing. Within communities engaged in fishing, small-scale fisheries support food security strategies and sustain livelihoods. Despite the role of fisheries in EAR, inland fisheries are vulnerable to loss, and management solutions authorized for inland fisheries are inadequate. This review investigates production potential, challenges, opportunities, and management of inland fisheries in the EAR. It is therefore expected that in aquaculture promising areas, the EAR will turn to depend more on aquaculture to meet the extended needs and supply gaps created as a result of capture fisheries shortfalls. However, aquaculture is still in its infant stage in the region, and there exists no adequate aquaculture policy framework and funds in some EAR (e.g., Ethiopia, Somalia). Stakeholders at all levels should entertain the importance of fishery-based activities for food security in EAR. As a result, easily implemented and community-oriented fisheries legislative documents need to be prepared for advancing sustainable fisheries management. Legislative documents might consider techniques of continual catch statistics (consider small water bodies as much as possible) of inland fisheries and enforcing existing laws to manage illegal fishing activities to accustom sustainable development of inland capture fisheries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Through this book, university professor Cristina Otovescu presents scientific evidence (administrative, legislative documents and reports issued by institutions, studies and opinion polls), but in a language accessible to the public, how the authorities in Romania managed, to what extent it affected and how the population of the country reacted to the COVID-19 pandemic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]