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Network perspectives in organizational research have focused primarily on how the embeddedness of actors shapes individual, or nodal, outcomes. Against this backdrop, a growing number of researchers have begun to adopt a wider lens on organizational networks, shifting the focus to collective, or whole network, performance. Yet, efforts to understand the relationship between whole network structure and whole network performance have produced conflicting findings, which suggests that a different approach may be needed. Drawing on macrostructural sociology, we propose a "whole network morphology" framework, which argues the whole network structure-performance relationship is contingent on other fundamental—relational and cultural—whole network dimensions. Subsequently, we undertake an application of our framework, through which we demonstrate how a morphological view helps address conflicting findings on the structure-performance relationship. Leveraging data on 350 million physician relationships, we study 250 whole networks known as Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs). Consistent with previous work, we do not find a clear association between structural connectedness and performance. However, we find that a more disconnected network structure is associated with negative ACO performance when the relational strength of network ties is high. We also find evidence of better ACO performance in the presence of a physician cultural orientation when the whole network is more connected.

A very respectable theory (K.R. Popper) argues that civilization tends to limit the use of violence and opposes a state of chaos, madness, barbarism and war. It is a philosophical theory that in its empirical validity can find a minimum (not exclusive) support from a triad of arguments. In fact, by limiting the concept of civilization to that field that we can call "law and legal justice", we can have, in this case, three arguments, to argue that law actually tends to limit the use of violence, without being based exclusively on the force (and violence) of the sanction: (i) A philosophical-juridical argument, the theory of “international regimes; (ii) A sociological one, the theory of companies such as "Small World Networks" and (iii) A mathematical one, the theory of deterministic chaos applied to the phenomenon of sanction (also definable as coercive force, deterrence or even "just war").

We examined the 500 largest community water systems in the US to explore whether ownership is related to annual water bills, and the percent of income that low-income households spend on water. Regression results show that, among the largest water systems, private ownership is related to higher water prices and less affordability for low-income families. In states with regulations favorable to private providers, water utilities charge even higher prices. Affordability issues are more severe in communities with higher poverty and older infrastructure. Water policy needs to address ownership and regulation and explore new mechanisms to ensure water affordability for low-income residents.

Objective We examined undergraduates' concerns about returning to campus and online learning from home. Participants Undergraduates majoring in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) at US universities/colleges. Methods Participants completed an online survey in July 2020. We content-analyzed responses to open-ended questions about concerns about fall 2020. Results Students (N = 64) were 52% women, 47% low socioeconomic status (SES), and 27% non-Hispanic white. Concerns about returning to campus included student noncompliance with university COVID-19 prevention guidelines (28%), infection risk (28%), poor instructional quality (26%), inadequate university plans for preventing/handling outbreaks (25%), negative impacts on social interactions (11%), and transportation/commuting (11%). Concerns about learning from home included difficulty focusing on schoolwork (58%), lack of hands-on/experiential learning (24%), negative impacts on social interactions (19%), family/home environment (15%), concerns that online learning wastes time/money (10%), and inadequate technology/Internet access (5%). Conclusions Universities should address student concerns and provide resources to overcome barriers to effective learning.

This article develops the concept of racialized burdens as a means of examining the role of race in administrative practice. Racialized burdens are the experience of learning, compliance and psychological costs that serve as inequality reproducing mechanisms. To develop this concept, we examine administrative burdens in the US state from the theoretical perspective of racialized organizations. Using examples from attempts to access citizenship rights—via immigration, voting and the social safety net—we illustrate some key points. First, racialized burdens combine control of access to resources and ideas about racial groups in ways that typically disadvantage racially marginalized groups. Second, while still promising fair and equal treatment, racially disproportionate burdens can be laundered through facially neutral rules and via claims that burdens are necessary for unrelated reasons. Third, racialized burdens emerge when more explicit forms of racial bias in policies or administrative practices become illegal, politically untenable or culturally unacceptable. Racialized burdens neatly carry out the “how” in the production of racial inequality while concealing, or providing an alibi for, the “why.”

The expert group on scenarios and models of the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services initiated the development of the Nature Futures Framework for developing scenarios of positive futures for nature, to help inform assessments of policy options. This new scenarios and modelling Framework seeks to open up diversity and plurality of perspectives by differentiating three main value perspectives on nature – Nature for Nature (intrinsic values of nature), Nature for Society (instrumental values) and Nature as Culture (relational values). This paper describes how the Nature Futures Framework can be applied in modelling to support policy processes by identifying key interventions for change in realizing a diversity of desirable futures. First, the paper introduces and elaborates on key building blocks of the framework for developing qualitative scenarios and translating them into quantitative scenarios: i) multiple value perspectives on nature and the Nature Futures frontier representing diverse preferences, ii) incorporating mutual and key feedbacks of social-ecological systems in Nature Futures scenarios, and iii) indicators describing the evolution of social-ecological systems with complementary knowledge and data. This paper then presents three possible application approaches to modelling Nature Futures scenarios to support the i) review, ii) implementation and iii) design phases of policy processes. The main objective of this paper is to facilitate the integration of the relational values of nature in models, through improved indicators and other forms of evidence, and to strengthen modelled linkages across biodiversity, ecosystems, nature’s contributions to people, and quality of life to identify science- and knowledge-based interventions and to enhance ecological understanding for achieving sustainable futures. The paper aims at stimulating the development of new scenarios and models based on this new framework by a wide community of modelers, and the testing and possible further development of the framework, particularly in the context of future IPBES assessments.

Research on the impacts of city–county consolidation often focuses on issues relating to efficiency, effectiveness, and economic development; yet, relatively few studies have addressed the issue of racial and ethnic minority representation. Although existing research is limited, findings indicate that consolidating city and county governments dilutes minority voting strength and has a disparate impact on minority representation. However, it is not clear if this is a nationwide trend, particularly in preclearance states previously covered by the Voting Rights Act. Thus, the question becomes, does consolidation negatively affect minority representation, and to what extent? This study employs a quasi-experimental interrupted time-series analysis to ascertain the overall impact of consolidation on the descriptive representation of African Americans since 1965. Results indicate that while descriptive representation has generally increased in recent decades, there are discernible declines following consolidation and noticeable representational disparities in counties previously covered by the Voting Rights Act.

The latest National Family Health Survey (NFHS 5) indicates that child stunting in India was severe and has been deteriorating since 2015. This trend could have worsened since the pandemic and the stringent lockdowns meant to contain it. There has been an acute increase in impoverishment as governmental food policies have further exacerbated rather than mitigated inequalities. Families eligible under the National Food Security Act (NFSA), 2013, have been provided with double food grain rations during two waves of the pandemic. However, nearly 42% of India’s population without these ration cards have been largely excluded from additional food relief from the central government. Simultaneously, India’s food grain stocks in government granaries have accumulated to their all-time peak with 2 years of bumper harvests. Therefore, in light of the acute distress faced by marginalised communities due to the pandemic, this article analyses the availability of adequate food grain stocks and contends that the time is opportune for the universal expansion of the public distribution system.

Investigating seasonal variation in health and mortality helps understand disease dynamics and environmental health exposures. Using four available rounds of India's Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS), this paper examines seasonality in infant mortality in India. I use information on the birth month-year, survival status within the first year of life, and age (in months) at death (if the infant died) of more than 330,000 children born between 1989 and 2014 to estimate period mortality rates between ages 0 and 1 for each calendar month. Relative to the spring months, infant mortality is higher in the summer, monsoon, and winter months. If the mortality conditions in the spring months were prevalent throughout the year, would have been less by 10.8 deaths per 1,000 infant alive per year in early 1990s and 4.1 deaths per 1,000 per year in the mid-2010s. Seasonal variation in infant mortality is higher among children born in less wealthy households, among children of less educated mothers, in rural areas, and in poorer regions. Although seasonality in infant mortality has attenuated over-time, seasonal variation in the early-childhood disease environment remains a concern, particularly in rural areas. These results highlight the multiple environmental health threats that infants in India face, and the limited period within a year when these threats are less salient.

Abstract This article interprets emerging scholarship on rental housing platforms—particularly the most well-known and used short- and long-term rental housing platforms—and considers how the technological processes connecting both short-term and long-term rentals to the platform economy are transforming cities. It discusses potential policy approaches to more equitably distribute benefits and mitigate harms. We argue that information technology is not value-neutral. While rental housing platforms may empower data analysts and certain market participants, the same cannot be said for all users or society at large. First, user-generated online data frequently reproduce the systematic biases found in traditional sources of housing information. Evidence is growing that the information broadcasting potential of rental housing platforms may increase rather than mitigate sociospatial inequality. Second, technology platforms curate and shape information according to their creators’ own financial and political interests. The question of which data—and people—are hidden or marginalized on these platforms is just as important as the question of which data are available. Finally, important differences in benefits and drawbacks exist between short-term and long-term rental housing platforms, but are underexplored in the literature: this article unpacks these differences and proposes policy recommendations. Policy and practice recommendations As rental housing technologies upend traditional market processes in favor of platform oligopolies, policymakers must reorient these processes toward the public good. Long-term and short-term rental platforms offer different market benefits and drawbacks, but the latter in particular requires proactive regulation to mitigate harm. At a minimum, policymakers must require that short-term rental platforms provide the information necessary for cities to enforce current, let alone new, housing regulations. Practitioners should be cautious inferring market conditions from rental housing platform data, due to difficult-to-measure sampling biases.

This study investigated whether homicides increased after protested police-involved deaths, focusing on the period after Michael Brown’s death in Ferguson in August 2014. It also tests for effects of legal cynicism by comparing effects in homicide and aggravated assault on the assumption that reporting of the latter is discretionary and police abuses may make communities reluctant to notify police. Using FBI data from 44 U.S. cities, homicide and assault rates from 2011 to 2019 were analyzed using an interrupted time series design and combined in a meta-analysis to calculate pooled effects. A meta-regression tested effect moderators including external investigations and city/county sociodemographic characteristics. With a conservative threshold of p ≤ .01, 21 of the 44 cities experienced a significant increase and one had a significant decrease. The pooled effect was a 26.1% increase in the homicide (99% CI: 15.3% to 36.8%). Aggravated assaults increased above baseline, though the effect was 15.2 percentage points smaller (99% CI: –26.7 to –3.6) than the effect in homicides. When outcomes were measured as percent change, there were no significant effect moderators, but when measured as absolute change, homicides increased to a greater extent when the death was subject to external investigation and in cities with higher Black populations, poverty rates, and baseline homicide rates. The findings suggest that protested police-involved deaths led to an increase in homicides and other violence due to the distrust fomented within the very communities whom police are meant to protect.

Global commitments to protected area expansion should prioritize opportunities to protect climate refugia and ecosystems which store high levels of irrecoverable carbon, as key components of an effective response to biodiversity loss and climate change. The United States and Canada are responsible for one‐sixth of global greenhouse gas emissions but hold extensive natural ecosystems that store globally significant above‐ and below‐ground carbon. Canada has initiated a process of protected area network expansion in concert with efforts at reconciliation with Indigenous Peoples, and acknowledged nature‐based solutions as a key aspect of climate change mitigation. The US, although not a party to global biodiversity conventions, has recently committed to protecting 30% of its extent by 2030 and achieving the UNFCCC Paris Agreement's mitigation targets. The opportunities afforded by these dual biodiversity conservation and climate commitments require coordinated national and regional policies to ensure that new protected areas maximize biodiversity‐focused adaptation and nature‐based mitigation opportunities. We address how global commitments can best inform national policy initiatives which build on existing agency mandates for regional planning and species conservation. Previous analyses of global conservation priorities under climate change have been tenuously linked to policy contexts of individual nations and have lacked information on refugia due to limitations of globally available datasets. Comparison and synthesis of predictions from a range of recently developed refugia metrics allow such data to inform planning despite substantial uncertainty arising from contrasting model assumptions and inputs. A case study for endangered species planning for old‐forest‐associated species in the US Pacific Northwest demonstrates how regional planning can be nested hierarchically within national biodiversity‐focused adaptation and nature‐based mitigation strategies which integrate refugia, connectivity, and ecosystem carbon metrics to holistically evaluate the role of different land designations and where carbon mitigation and protection of biodiversity's resilience to climate change can be aligned., Global and national commitments to protected area expansion should prioritize protection of climate refugia and ecosystems which store high levels of irrecoverable carbon, as key components of effective response to biodiversity loss and climate change. The US and Canada have committed to protecting 30% of their respective lands and waters by 2030 and achieving ambitious carbon mitigation targets. We describe how these countries' regional conservation efforts can be coordinated within national strategies which use recently‐developed metrics to identify where carbon mitigation and protection of biodiversity's resilience to climate change can be aligned.

This paper critically engages with dynamics of the Chinese food safety governance infrastructure following the melamine crisis. It presents a qualitative analysis of sixteen in-depth stakeholder interviews in Hunan, Hubei and Henan. We reveal tensions between a segmented model of governance and a centralised model, between a centralised top-down model and stakeholder participation, and between a public model and a private, decentral market where corporate reputation must result in transparency and trust. Stakeholders also see gaps between ideals of inclusive, transparent and participatory governance, and effective problem-solving. Governance of food safety in China, even when targeting inclusion and public accountability, remains heavily dependent on the central state as a pivotal actor.

Title in Portuguese: Avaliação de impacto do bônus sociorracial da UFMG no desempenho acadêmico dos estudantesAbstract: The objective of this article is to assess whether academic performance at the Federal University of Minas Gerais (Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais - UFMG) varies depending on whether students received socioracial bonuses on the institution’s entrance exam. The study analyzes the impact of different categories of this social inclusion policy. The database contains socioeconomic and academic performance information for students in their 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th semesters at UFMG in 2009 and 2010. A series of models were estimated to analyze differences in Semiannual Global Performance (Rendimento Semestral Global - RSG). The results suggest that RSG results for students who received and did not receive the bonus are similar, controlling for social, demographic and economic variables. This study suggests that UFMG’s socioracial bonus policy had the desired effect of including less-favored groups at the university without diminishing educational quality.Resumo: O objetivo deste artigo é avaliar se o desempenho acadêmico na Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais (UFMG) é diferenciado entre estudantes que receberam e que não receberam o bônus sociorracial no vestibular da instituição. O estudo analisa o impacto de diferentes categorias desta política de inclusão social. O banco de dados possui informações socioeconômicas e de desempenho acadêmico sobre alunos que estavam cursando os 1ºs, 2ºs, 3ºs e 4ºs semestres na UFMG nos anos de 2009 e 2010. Uma série de modelos foram estimados para analisar diferenças no Rendimento Semestral Global (RSG). Os resultados sugerem que o RSG é similar entre bonistas e não bonistas, controlando por variáveis sociais, demográficas e econômicas. Este estudo sugere que a política de bônus sociorracial da UFMG ocasionou o efeito desejado de inclusão de grupos menos favorecidos na universidade, sem diminuir a qualidade de ensino.

Investigación realizada en el marco del curso Estadística Multivariada, dictado por Juan Carlos Castillo en el Departamento de Sociología de la Universidad de Chile. Para más información contactar a les investigadores: Carolina Carrillo Devia carolina.carrillo@ug.uchile.cl Frente al problema público de la influencia de la participación social en la aplicación de políticas sanitarias, y la importancia de la cooperación ciudadana particularmente en la pandemia de COVID-19 (OMS, 2020), se busca explicar el grado de acuerdo de los sujetos con las medidas sanitarias adoptadas por el Gobierno a través de la aplicación de modelos de regresión múltiple. En este sentido, se propone determinar el efecto de la constancia en la información sobre el avance del COVID-19, la percepción de desigualdad frente a la pandemia y la percepción de peligro ante el COVID-19, en el grado de legitimidad que los sujetos le adjudican a las medidas sanitarias adoptadas por el Gobierno. Para ello se utilizan los datos de la encuesta transversal a hogares MOVID-Impact, realizada por el Centro UC de Encuestas y Estudios Longitudinales por encargo del proyecto académico CoV-IMPACT-C, liderado por la Universidad de Chile. La base de datos cuenta con 1216 casos tras el tratamiento de casos perdidos.

Title in Portuguese: Desempenho acadêmico dos estudantes da UFMG: Uma análise da política de bônus sociorracialAbstract: This paper analyzes the academic performance of students of the Federal University of Minas Gerais (UFMG), Brazil, in order to observe differences in academic performance between students who received and who did not receive the socio-racial bonus at the entrance exam of the institution. The database with students’ socioeconomic information comes from the admission exam’s permanent review committee (“Comissão Permanente do Vestibular” – COPEVE) at UFMG. The database with information about academic performance of students was provided by the department of registry and academic control (Departamento de Registro e Controle Acadêmico – DRCA). These data were aggregated for this study. The results suggest that the academic performance is similar between students who received and who did not receive the socio-racial bonus in most comparisons. That is, this affirmative action policy seems to ban an effective one in order to promote social inclusion with academic excellence. This is an important analysis to be developed at this moment of implementation of the 2012 quota law by the Federal Government (Law #12,711).Resumo: Este trabalho faz uma análise do desempenho acadêmico de estudantes da Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais (UFMG) com o objetivo principal de verificar se há diferenças de desempenho significativas entre estudantes que receberam e não receberam o bônus sociorracial no vestibular da instituição em 2009 e 2010. O banco de dados com informações socioeconômicas dos estudantes é proveniente da Comissão Permanente do Vestibular (COPEVE) da UFMG. O banco de dados com informações sobre desempenho acadêmico dos estudantes foi disponibilizado pelo Departamento de Registro e Controle Acadêmico (DRCA) da universidade. Estes dados foram agregados para a realização deste estudo. Os resultados sugerem que o desempenho escolar entre bonistas e não bonistas é similar na grande maioria das comparações. Ou seja, a política de bônus sociorracial, implementada durante alguns anos na UFMG, não promoveu a entrada de estudantes com baixo potencial acadêmico, sendo, portanto, uma política eficaz de inclusão social sem danos para a excelência acadêmica da universidade. Esta análise é importante de ser realizada neste momento de implementação da lei de cotas de 2012 do Governo Federal (Lei nº 12.711).

Title in Portuguese: A política de segurança pública no Brasil: uma análise dos gastos estaduais (1999-2010)Abstract: This article analyzes the public spending on public safety policy in Brazil in the period of 1999-2010, noting particularly its relations with the ideological perspectives of the parties elected to the Executive (state governments). It was tested especially the hypothesis that spending on public safety policy would be greater in states ruled by right-wing parties, as part of the national literature points to the existence of most concern this political-ideological spectrum with the function social control. We used multivariate regression models and the main findings were: a) increased spending in left-wing and center-wing parties, compared to the right-wing parties; and b) approximation of the percentages of the collection invested in safety policy in the states, regardless of the incumbent parties.Resumo: Este artigo analisa os gastos estaduais em segurança pública no período de 1999 a 2010, observando principalmente suas relações com as perspectivas ideológicas dos partidos eleitos para o Poder Executivo (governador). Testou-se, sobretudo, a hipótese de que o gasto com a política de segurança pública seria maior em estados governados por partidos de direita, uma vez que parte da literatura nacional aponta para a existência de maior preocupação desse espectro político-ideológico com a função de controle social. Foram utilizados modelos de regressão multivariada que indicaram os seguintes achados: a) variação positiva dos gastos quando os partidos são de esquerda e centro, comparados aos partidos de direita; e b) relativa aproximação dos percentuais de arrecadação investidos em segurança nos estados, independentemente dos partidos nos governos.

This paper analyzes the impact of the educational conditions of Brazil’s Bolsa Família Program on the school enrollment, age-grade discrepancy, and labor of children benefiting from the program. The main hypotheses of this paper is that a child who lives in a household that receives the benefit has higher chances of being in school, lower chances to have age-grade discrepancy, and lower chances of working. Data used are from the 2010 Brazilian Demographic Census. Logistical models were estimated for each dependent variable (school enrollment, age-grade discrepancy, and child labor) and for three household income thresholds. Independent variables account for characteristics related to the household, mother, child, and whether the household was receiving Bolsa Família. The income thresholds are a maximum household per capita income of 70 Brazilian Reais, 140 Brazilian Reais (the official maximum value for eligibility into the Bolsa Família in 2010), and 280 Brazilian Reais. Models were also estimated separated by the rural and urban areas in the official income threshold. Results follow initial hypotheses of higher chances of school enrollment and lower chances of age-grade discrepancy among children who receive Bolsa Família. However, models also suggest higher chances of child labor among beneficiaries of the program.

Title in Spanish: Programa Bolsa Familia y frecuencia escolar: Un análisis con el censo demográfico de Brasil de 2010Abstract: The Bolsa Família Program goal is to promote social development and poverty reduction, through the direct transfer of conditional cash, in association with other social programs. This study aims to analyze whether Bolsa Família had an association with children’s school attendance, which is one of the educational conditions of the program. Our main hypothesis is that children living in households receiving Bolsa Família had greater chances of attending school. Data from the Ministry of Social Development and Combating Famine indicated that children living in households with Bolsa Família had greater school enrolment levels. By using data from the 2010 Demographic Census, collected by the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE), some descriptive analyzes and binary logistic regression models were performed for different thresholds of household per capita income. These estimates were made by comparing children who lived in households receiving Bolsa Família to those children not receiving the program. We took into consideration characteristics about the household, mothers, and children. The results were clustered by the municipality of residence of the child. In all income thresholds, children benefiting from Bolsa Família were more likely to be enrolled in school, compared to children not receiving the benefit.Resumen: El Programa Bolsa Familia tiene el objetivo de promover el desarrollo social y el alivio de la pobreza a través de la transferencia directa de ingresos, en combinación con otros programas sociales. Este estudio tiene como objetivo analizar si el programa Bolsa Familia ha tenido una correlación con la escolarización de los niños de las familias perceptoras de las ayudas, que es una de las condiciones del programa. La hipótesis principal es que el niño residente en hogares beneficiados por el programa Bolsa Familia tiene más posibilidades de asistir a la escuela. Los datos del Ministerio de Desarrollo Social y de Lucha contra el Hambre corroboran esta hipótesis. Utilizando los microdatos del Censo de 2010 recogidos por el Instituto Brasileño de Geografía y Estadística (IBGE), en esta investigación se han realizado análisis descriptivos y modelos de regresión logística binaria para diferentes límites de ingreso per cápita del hogar. Estas estimaciones se han llevado a cabo mediante la comparación de los niños que formaban parte de los hogares beneficiarios y los que no eran beneficiarios del programa Bolsa Familia. Se han tenido en cuenta las características del hogar, de la madre y del niño. Los resultados han sido ponderados de acuerdo con el municipio de residencia del niño. En todos los límites de ingresos, los niños beneficiarios del programa eran más propensos a estar escolarizados, en comparación con los niños no beneficiarios del programa Bolsa Familia.

Objectives: ‘Undetectable’, a term describing HIV viral load at the level of non-transmissibility, appears to be used as a stigma-reducing term on dating apps and is predictive of condomless sex. Anecdotal evidence about the meaning of the term suggests that a mix of both accurate data and misinformation can abound. We sought to uncover what range of meanings the term ‘undetectable’ holds for a cohort of HIV testers at a free HIV testing facility along mid-Market St, San Francisco.Design: A four question survey with additional demographic questions was administered to 130 individuals at the testing site. The resulting answers were then coded as ‘informed’, ‘uninformed’, or ‘misinformed’ and correlated with demographic measures, including residential zip code of the respondent.Results: Residents in the Castro district were most likely to associate ‘undetectable’ status with medication adherence. The most misinformed zip code with respect to the meaning and implications of the term ‘undetectable’ was the Tenderloin, which corresponds to the San Francisco zip code with the lowest rates of HIV suppression. Compared to MSMs, heterosexuals were the most uninformed; while racially, Asians were the most misinformed and Blacks the least misinformed. Older men seem most cautious about using ‘undetectable’ as a risk-reduction strategy.Significance: The study highlights the degree to which certain neighbourhoods and demographics have assimilated the concept of ‘undetectable’ and how viral suppression is maintained, while pinpointing neighbourhoods for additional outreach to correct identified misinformation.

A dogma accepted in many ethical and legal frameworks is that the reasons that lie behind conscientious objection (CO) in healthcare cannot be evaluated or judged by anyone other than the objector herself, because conscience is individual, autonomous, and inaccessible to any outside evaluation. In this paper I argue that this view is mistaken: physicians have an obligation to reveal and explain their reasons for CO and that these reasons may be evaluated either ex ante or ex post. In arguing for my claims I refer mostly to the Polish context and I defend some novel claims that have not been analyzed extensively in the debates on CO. First, I introduce a moral threshold requirement: CO is justified only if the reasons behind a refusal are of moral nature and meet a certain threshold of importance. Second, I highlight the similarities between CO in healthcare and the regulations concerning military refusals, including an emerging practice of granting the right to selective CO status to professional soldiers, that places the burden of proof on a petitioner for CO status. My argument highlights the special status of refusing to kill human organism (military conflicts, abortion, assisted-suicide), and shows that certain other common forms of CO do not warrant accommodation (e.g. emergency contraception).

As cities become more involved in data-driven processes of growth and governance, critical scholarship has highlighted the formidable issues around ownership, uses and the ethics of collecting, storing, and circulating such data. However, there has been less focus on the physical infrastructure as the ‘last mile’ problem for Internet access, between a revanchist perspective on the ‘broken Internet’ delivered by digital capitalism and the liberal rhetoric of the Internet as a human right. Through two case studies, the paper plots a pragmatic trajectory in the adoption of the Internet for people and ‘things’, in which city and users take different roles and responsibilities. It highlights benefits and challenges around the long-term sustainability and maintenance of the Internet as an infrastructure of the commons. An attention to ‘commoning’, instead, reveals the exclusionary or enabling practices the smart city might foster. Thus, the paper advocates for the direct involvement of the city and its citizens in maintaining and reproducing connectivity networks in the smart city.

Title in Portuguese: Avaliação de Impacto das condicionalidades de educação do Programa Bolsa Família (2005 e 2009)Abstract: This paper analyzes the impact of the educational conditions of Brazil's Bolsa Família Program on the dropout rates of children benefiting from the program. The main hypothesis is that children living in a household that receives the benefit have a lower chance of dropping out of school. Data are from the 2005 and 2009 Impact Evaluation of the Bolsa Família Program (AIBF), collected by the Ministry of Social Development and Combating Famine (MDS), Brazil. Logistic models estimated the chance that children would drop out of school in 2005 and 2009, for three different household income thresholds, taking into account characteristics related to the household, mother, and child. Children who lived in households benefiting from Bolsa Família had a significantly lower chance of dropping out in 2005. Data for 2009 were not statistically significant, although results pointed to a decrease in dropout rates, due to the impact of Bolsa Família.Resumo: Este artigo analisa o impacto das condicionalidades de educação do Programa Bolsa Família na evasão escolar de crianças beneficiárias deste programa. A principal hipótese é de que a criança residente em domicílio que recebe o benefício possui menores chances de abandonar a escola. São utilizados dados da Avaliação de Impacto do Programa Bolsa Família (AIBF) de 2005 e 2009 do Ministério do Desenvolvimento Social e Combate à Fome (MDS). Modelos logísticos estimaram as chances de crianças evadirem da escola em 2005 e 2009, em três limites de renda domiciliar per capita, levando em consideração características do domicílio, da mãe e da criança. Crianças que residiam em domicílios beneficiários do Programa Bolsa Família apresentaram redução significativa nas chances de evasão escolar em 2005. Os dados de 2009 não foram estatisticamente significativos, apesar de terem apontado para diminuição da evasão escolar, em decorrência do recebimento do Bolsa Família.

The literature on state-sponsored violence has grown significantly over the last decades. Although scholars have suggested a number of potential correlates of mass killings, it remains unclear whether the estimates are robust to different model specifications, or which variables accurately predict the onset of large-scale violence. We employ extreme bounds analysis and distributed random forests to test the sensitivity of 40 variables on a sample of 177 countries from 1945 to 2013. The results show that GDP per capita, the post-Cold War period, and stable political regimes are negatively associated with mass killings. In contrast, ethnic diversity, civil wars, and previous political turmoils increase the risk of state-led violence. Years since the last episode of mass violence, GDP per capita, urban population, ethnic polarisation, the number of military personnel, and democracy make the greatest contribution to the models' out-of-sample predictive power.

Societal Impact Statement: Reading and writing DNA is now possible with an unprecedented speed and ease. To catch up with digitization of genetic resources, scientists need to join with all relevant stakeholders and design new global governance mechanisms for digital sequence information. We propose the establishment of a Multi-stakeholder Committee on the Governance of Digital Sequence Information (DSI). This multi-disciplinary body will be dedicated to mitigate governance issues associated with the digitization of genetic resources. Solving the DSI conundrum is sorely needed given the forthcoming multilateral meetings of the Access and Benefit Sharing (ABS) framework (the next CBD COP is scheduled in 2021) that are central to tackle the global loss of biodiversity, global warming, pandemic risk and food insecurity. Summary: Contemporary research is increasingly data-centric and the rise of genomics revolutionized our approach and use of genetic resources. However, genomics developed relatively independently from the international instruments on the conservation of biological diversity, in particular the Access and Benefit Sharing (ABS) framework. The legal and political status of Digital Sequence Information (DSI) derived from genetic resources emerged recently as a contentious point in the various ABS instruments dealing with genetic resources. In view of the multiple parallel and uncoordinated debates that occurred in various forums dealing with plants, animals, terrestrial, microbial, marine and agricultural biodiversity, we propose here to take a step back in the discussion. We argue that DSI should be considered as an overarching issue to be addressed through a coordinated and inclusive Multi-stakeholder Committee that would assess its position and role within the existing ABS regime complex. This Multi-stakeholder Committee on the Governance of Digital Sequence Information, that may run under the auspices of the United Nations, will be dedicated to mitigate global governance issues associated with the digitization of genetic resources. In this paper, we sketch this body as a transversal and inclusive tool to facilitate long-term coherence in all ABS policy forums.

First published online: 14 August 2020 Platform companies like Uber not only disrupt existing markets but also contest existing regulatory regimes. This raises the question of how, when, and why such companies are regulated. This article develops, tests, and defends a theoretical framework that explains the politics of regulatory response to the rise of platform capitalism. Using discourse network analysis and a case study on the regulation of Uber in New York, it shows that the success or failure of regulations depends on the ability of actors to mobilize broad coalition; that narratives affect the composition of these coalitions; and that platform companies have both unique political strengths and vulnerabilities. This article makes substantive contributions to our understanding of the politics of platform capitalism, and it makes theoretical contributions to the literature studies on coalitional politics, ideational institutionalism, and business power.

Purpose This paper aims to provide a snapshot of key learnings about paid online peer-to-peer accommodation trading, as it relates to tourism and hospitality, and to identify future research questions. Design/methodology/approach The paper paints a picture and discusses research conducted in the past, which relates to paid online peer-to-peer accommodation, in brief. It also lists a number of specific research questions which should be investigated in future. Findings Some of the key topics, such as the business model of facilitators of peer-to-peer trading and the necessary regularly responses, have been extensively studied. The focus should now turn on how peer-to-peer trading of travel-related services can best be leveraged to the benefit of economies, communities and people. Originality/value The main value of this perspective paper lies in offering a succinct overview of research into paid online peer-to-peer accommodation and pointing to key questions for future research.

Neglected diseases have been characterised as a misalignment in the research system because so little research is directed towards such a large burden of disease. By focusing on one of the most extreme cases of misalignment, we highlight opportunities and potential pitfalls of targeting research towards specific social outcomes more generally. We trace how the category of neglected diseases came to prominence, largely framed as a problem to be addressed by scientific research. This mobilised R&D investment but there have been unintended consequences, particularly for broader health system strengthening and research capacity building efforts. These developments may contribute to a 'tragedy of the evaluation commons', where the effectiveness of broad remit research programs remain poorly characterised. This exacerbates a lack of evidence, relative to targeting specific diseases where the evaluation challenge is narrower. Research targeting then, is intimately tied to evaluation practice. A new research and policy agenda oriented towards broader research evaluation may support further investments not just for biomedical R&D in high-income countries, but also for researchers in other countries, for interdisciplinary, applied and social sciences, and ultimately, for poor patients.

Charitable activity is a core tenet of most faith traditions, and many charitable organizations have a religious identity. However, little is known about the prevalence and scale of faith-based foundations, and how they differ from secular foundations. This study identifies the field of public foundations, differentiates between faith-based and secular foundations, and compares their characteristics by analyzing Form 990 data. Our analysis estimates that 24% of all public charities operate as foundations and that 17% of public foundations are faith-based. We use these findings to generate first-ever estimates for the entire field of public foundations. Based on our analysis and calculations using nonprofit sector data, there are approximately 300,000 public foundations in the U.S., and we estimate that 52,000 of them are faith-based. Collectively, these faith-based public foundations have at least $90 billion in assets, and in 2015, they contributed at least $8 billion to charitable causes. Additional analyses comparing faith-based and secular foundations indicate that faith-based foundations tend to be older, have greater revenue and more assets, receive less money from the government, and distribute more money in grants, especially to international causes. This study provides an important lens through which to examine the field of public foundations and better understand similarities and differences among faith-based and secular foundations. It can help scholars analyze relationships between religion and philanthropy, help grantmakers assess foundations through a faith-based-secular grid, and help grantees identify funders who share a similar orientation toward religion. Overall, this study reveals the meaningful presence of faith-based foundations, indicates the scale of their impact, and underscores religion’s enduring and significant influence in the philanthropic sector.

Can greater inclusion in democracy for historically disadvantaged groups reduce rebel violence? Democracy-building is a common tool in counterinsurgencies and post-conflict states, yet existing scholarship has faced obstacles in measuring the independent effect of democratic reforms. We evaluate whether quotas for Scheduled Tribes in local councils reduced rebel violence in Chhattisgarh, an Indian state featuring high-intensity Maoist insurgent activity. These quotas did not originate as a counterinsurgency technique, but instead as an effort to address the longstanding political marginalization of India’s Scheduled Tribes. We employ a geographic regression discontinuity design to study the wartime effects of quotas implemented in Chhattisgarh, finding that reservations reduced Maoist violence in the state. Exploratory analyses of mechanisms suggest that reservations reduced violence by bringing local elected officials closer to state security forces, providing a windfall of valuable information to counterinsurgents. Our study shows that institutional engineering, like reforms to create more inclusive representative democracy, can shape the trajectory of insurgent violence. Institutional engineering creating more inclusive representative democracy during an ongoing conflict can affect the political economy of information sharing in civil war and, ultimately, affect the trajectory of insurgent violence.

Low public concern about anthropogenic climate change (ACC) – due in part to distrust toward the global scientific community – may decrease demand for policies aimed at mitigating and adapting to the deleterious effects of climate change. Encouragingly, though, recent public opinion research suggests that experiences with the COVID-19 pandemic has elevated trust in scientific expertise worldwide. Consequently, amid the suffering associated with global pandemic, one “silver lining” might be that trust in the scientific community attributable to COVID-19 pandemic response is spilling over to increase public acceptance of other contentious aspects of scientific consensus: such as the reality of ACC. We explore this possibility by turning to globally-representative survey data from 111 countries (N = 119,088) conducted during the COVID-19 pandemic. We show that trust medical experts’ handling of the COVID-19 pandemic is associated with increased acceptance of ACC, worldwide. These findings hold even when accounting for individuals’ broader trust in the scientific community, and therefore do not appear to be confounded by more-general orientations toward science. Problematically, though, we also show that effect of trust in medical professionals is strongest in countries experiencing the most positive change in attitudes toward the scientific community, which we demonstrate (via multivariate country-level analyses) tend to be disproportionately wealthy, and perhaps less likely to bear the deleterious and unequal effects of ACC. We conclude by discussing how this work helps elucidate the role of pandemic psychology on “post-pandemic life,” and discuss the potentially-far-reaching benefits of improving trust in medical institutions in the developing world.

This paper studies sister city relations between the EU and Turkey. Town twinning agreements have been used as a means to promote EU values. Over the past decades, town twinning agreements have seen an enormous widening. Mindful of the deterioration of EU-Turkey relations, the paper suggests three future scenarios for the development of EU-Turkey town twinning relations.

En los últimos treinta años, el campo de la administración pública en América Latina ha girado en torno a cómo introducir reformas en el sector público inspiradas por la Nueva Gestión Pública. En efecto, la mayoría de las administraciones públicas se han enfocado casi exclusivamente en introducir este tipo de reformas, ignorando una serie de alternativas que han emergido en el debate académico. Una de esas alternativas es el enfoque de la motivación de servicio público, el cual analiza cómo ciertos factores intrínsecos, directamente asociados con la noción de servicio público, motivan el comportamiento de los empleados públicos. Este artículo tiene como objetivo fomentar un debate latinoamericano sobre cómo diseñar e implementar políticas de recursos humanos basadas en la teoría de la motivación de servicio público. A partir de una muestra no probabilística con 172 respuestas, el artículo identifica un número de factores de motivación de servicio público entre funcionarios públicos chilenos. Los hallazgos muestran que la atracción por las políticas públicas, el compromiso con el interés general y la compasión son factores tan poderosos como el amor por el dinero. Al mismo tiempo, los resultados muestran que el autosacrificio no motiva a los funcionarios públicos chilenos. A partir de estos hallazgos, se presenta una discusión sobre cómo la motivación de servicio público puede ser un enfoque útil para rediseñar políticas de recursos humanos.

The role of external suppliers across statutory health insurance procurement processes varies widely and is a source of political contention throughout the modern world. We comprehensively examine the role of non-profit organisations in public health procurement within publicly funded healthcare which runs parallel to private provision in a 'two-tier' system. We build a unique 'Big Data' based pipeline which scrapes tens of thousands of heterogeneous accounting datasets from across a commissioning hierarchy. These datasets provide granular information on every element of procurement at the micro-level (where the value of a transaction is greater than twenty-five thousand pounds), mandated by transparency requirements introduced by David Cameron in 2010. We develop tools to scrape, parse, and reconcile suppliers with institutional registers. The processed dataset contains over four hundred and forty-five billion pounds worth of commissioning across over 1.9 million rows of clean data. Approximately 1% at each level of procurement comes from institutions listed on the Charity Commission for England and Wales: a number relatively consistent across time, despite contractual patterns. We show a slight regional variation and analyse the 'North-South' divide. Linking to the International Classification of Non-profit Organizations, we show involvement of multiple different types of charity, with more payments going to the 'Social Services' aggregate, but the highest cumulative values going to the 'Health' aggregate. We analyse the distribution across various sizes and ages, from grassroots to 'Super Major' non-profits, and analyse variation over time. We conclude with a re-evaluation of the effects of the controversial Health and Social Care Act of 2012 and the integration of the free market and volunteerism, otherwise known as the 'Big Society'.

Die öffentliche Verwaltung in Deutschland ist mit der Herausforderung konfrontiert, in einem stark umkämpften Arbeitsmarkt eine zunehmende Zahl von Fachkräften rekrutieren zu müssen. Die Veröffentlichung von Stellenanzeigen stellt ein zentrales Element bei den Bemühungen des öffentlichen Sektors dar, diesem “War for Talent” zu begegnen. Diese Studie hat sich daher zum Ziel gesetzt, den Rekrutierungserfolg der öffentlichen Verwaltung zu untersuchen und Faktoren zu identifizieren, die Stellenanzeigen und Rekrutierungsbemühungen erfolgreicher machen. Die Erkenntnisse beruhen auf der Analyse von fast 1.900 Stellenanzeigen, die mit einer wissenschaftlichen Befragung der in den Anzeigen genannten Kontaktpersonen verknüpft wurde. Die Datenbasis stellt die Umfangreichste zum Rekrutierungserfolg des öffentlichen Sektors in Deutschland dar.

In school systems around the world, countless reform strategies have focused on school and teacher accountability—the process of evaluating schools’ performance on the basis of student measures. Policy and education research has been dominated by debates on its effectiveness, where advocates highlight the positive effects on achievement while critics emphasize the negative consequences on pressure, morale, and autonomy. Yet the question is not so much whether to have accountability, but what form it should take. To answer this, sociologists should study the organizational and ecological dynamics—key facets that are sidelined when researchers only focus on quantitative program evaluation. An organizational perspective highlights the meaning-making school actors and the general public have of the policy, viewing it through technical-rationalist and institutional-performative lenses. An ecological perspective highlights how the form of accountability is a negotiated outcome of larger macrosocial forces, and how accountability is itself contributive to larger social changes. This review suggests a broader perspective of policies being multivalent and multiscalar as well as their being dynamically negotiated and metabolically changed.

The WHO recommends ‘testing, tracking and isolation’ of COVID-19 cases as the ‘backbone’ of pandemic response; these seemingly simple recommendations can be daunting for many countries in the Global South. In this commentary based on data from India, we dissect and exemplify some of the underlying vulnerabilities of the countries in the Global South that may impede effective implementation of WHO guidelines from the standpoint of vulnerability assessment and risk management. In the midst of urgent decision-making underlying vulnerabilities can be overlooked, as technical and logistical aspects take precedence. However, differentials in vulnerability can not only modulate the outbreak impact, but also the capacity and effectiveness of the response. Countries need to design their response with due consideration of existing capacity gaps and vulnerabilities to ensure a sustainable response that can avert knee-jerk reactions and minimize likely cascading effects.

Over the past decade, practitioners and scholars have intensified the discussions around people’s expectations from their jobs and how public and private organizations can succeed in the war for talent. In this context, it has become obvious that people not only seek high salaries and career opportunities but also meaningfulness in their daily tasks. Although many public service jobs offer opportunities to help others (prosocial impact) or contribute to society (societal impact), employees tend to become accustomed to these positive aspects or forget about them. This article tests whether a microintervention that emphasizes employees’ prosocial or societal impact can positively affect their well-being, intention to stay in the job, and willingness to recommend their respective jobs to others. The combined results of three preregistered experiments reveal that microinterventions can indeed have these effects, particularly if they focus on creating awareness about the jobs’ societal impact.

Advances in nuclear weapon technologies from – and the corresponding evolution in the threat landscape posed by – non-allied nations over the past four years underscores the exigency of the United States (U.S) in updating its stated national security policies. Here we review and suggest options for the 2022 Nuclear Posture Review (NPR) regarding the low-yield submarine-launched cruise missile (SLCM-N) and submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) programs. The 2018 NPR called for programmatic changes to counteract the evolving threat environment and allow for greater deterrence flexibility. These programs include modernization of existing technologies and creation of novel weapons systems. Of these changes, two new programs were started to develop low-yield, sea-based, non-strategic weapons. These options are designed to counter any perceived gaps in U.S. regional deterrence capabilities. We enumerate several policy options likely to be considered by the Biden White House. Our proposed solution calls for maintenance of the W76-2 program and the continuance of the low-yield SLCM-N program; we present our argument along the axes of technical and cost considerations, service system preferences, tailored response capabilities, ensured support and defense of our allies, and prevention of escalation to war.

Peer review of scientific manuscripts before publication is essential in scholarly publishing, and most active researchers hold relationships with a number of journals as both an author and a reviewer. There have been several studies focusing on gender balance in academic research and authorship, but fewer studies on our role as reviewers. Publons is a commercial website run by Clarivate Analytics that allows researchers to track and verify their peer review activities and be recognized for it. The platform features over 2 million researchers and 6.9 million reviews for more than 5,000 partnered journals, listing the most active reviewers as “top reviewers”. Our study focuses on gender representation in this ‘top reviewer’ group while also looking at the countries, regions and research fields they represent, as well as the relationship between their roles as authors and reviewers. The results show that male reviewers dominate in almost all countries, regions, and research fields. Male reviewers generally contribute to review work more frequently than females; however, female reviewers write longer reviews. The correlations between reviewing activity and research activity are generally weak overall and within specific research fields. This may reflect that active reviewers are not necessarily the most productive researchers in their fields. What clearly emerges from our results is the need for more concern over gender representation in the quality assurance and gatekeeping functions of scholarly publishing.

This brief note introduces the use of a range of responses rather than a single response for an opinion survey question. The methodological advantage of collecting this additional information is that it can help discern between ambiguity and ambivalence in situations where it is valuable to further investigate the nature of a respondent’s indecision.

The COVID-19 pandemic has been the single deadliest acute public health crisis in American history, and these deaths are a salient threat to the functioning of family and social networks. We assess counts and rates of parental and other in-home caregiver loss using death data published by the CDC and household composition data available through the American Community Survey's Public Use Microdata Sample. We find that, through mid-November 2021, more than 167,000 children under the age of 18 lost a parent or other in-home caregiver to COVID-19. Most of these children are under the age of 13 and, though this experience is universal across racial and ethnic groups, ages, and states, racial and ethnic disparities in caregiver loss exceed already high disparities in COVID-19 deaths. We summarize literature on the impacts of parental loss and, after reviewing potential interventions for these children, offer recommendations to policymakers and practitioners.

The paper is focused on practical advice for the use of bibliometrics in research assessment in the social sciences. Guidelines are presented from three official sources of advice with a particular focus on individual-level assessments of applications for positions, promotions, and external funding. General problems with applying bibliometrics in evaluations of the social sciences are also discussed, as well as the specific problems with using the Journal Impact Factor and the H-Index. The conclusion is not that bibliometrics should be avoided in research assessment of social scientists. Used with care and competence, bibliometrics can be a valuable extra source of information, but not replace judgement in research evaluation.

Notwithstanding the rationale and the demand for public participation in climate policies, aggregated perspectives of maxi-publics are often belittled as uninformed, self-interested and short-term focused. The upcoming vogue of climate assemblies, citizen parliaments and other forms of mini-publics is to give citizens a central role in climate policy-making and in some cases to break political impasse. Yet climate mini-publics face challenges in political environments too, such as co-option, favoring expert-opinions and losing touch with the broader public. To remedy such pitfalls, recent papers have argued to combine synchronous deliberations of small groups of citizens with online participation procedures for the larger public. In this article, we report the results of a three-step combination model, where first a mini-public in the region of Súdwest-Fryslân (NL) were given a ‘carte blanche’ to draft the content and the parameters of several related policy alternatives. Second, their proposals were fed into a digital participation tool, the Participatory Value Evaluation (PVE) to consult the wider public. A total of 1,376 (approx. 2% of the inhabitants) expressed their preferences and explained why they favour a dominant role for the municipality and the residents but are reticent about giving the market too big a role. Third, a citizen forum translated the outcomes of the maxi-public into policy recommendations, which were unanimously approved by the municipal council. In this paper, we report our findings of combining mini-and maxi-publics and how actors involved evaluated the strengths and weaknesses of the combination of these two participatory approaches.

The paper describes the full range of publishing and its purposes in the social sciences – from scholarly publishing via professional communication to societal interaction in public media – and how it is represented in five different contexts for research evaluation and funding. The five contexts are: applications for external project funding, applications for positions or promotions, indicator-based institutional funding systems, summative organizational evaluation systems, and formative organizational evaluation systems. The chapter provides a critical discussion of how publications from the social sciences may be filtered out or placed in predetermined hierarchies in these evaluation and funding contexts, and also of how the evaluation and funding procedures can be improved to appropriately represent social science research and publishing.

PurposeThis study aims to examine the impact of job-related knowledge sharing on information availability and job satisfaction for information-receiving employees in the public sector. Following self-determination theory, the study suggests that job satisfaction is only partly affected by knowledge sharing itself, but particularly through the availability of job-related information enabling the information receiver to work effectively.Design/methodology/approachThe hypotheses are tested with data from the US Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey from 2018. Additionally, results are replicated with earlier waves of the survey.FindingsResults show the positive impact of job-related knowledge sharing on job satisfaction, whereby the availability of job-relevant information mediates this relationship partially.Practical implicationsThis study confirms that managers should provide room for social interactions when introducing knowledge management practices.Originality/valueThe results emphasize that knowledge sharing is a highly social process in which support and relatedness play a significant role in success in addition to the diffusion of information itself.

One year after the European work–life balance directive, which recognises the need for work–family policy support, measures to slow the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic began shaping parents’ work–life balance in significant ways. Academically, we are challenged to explore whether existing theoretical frameworks hold in this new environment with combined old and new policy frameworks. We are also challenged to understand the nuanced ways in which the first lockdown affects the combination of paid work and care. We address both of these issues, providing a cross-sectional comparative analysis of highly educated mothers’ perceptions of work–life balance during the COVID-19 pandemic in Finland and the Netherlands. Our findings show that highly educated Finnish mothers have more difficulty combining work and care during the first lockdown than Dutch mothers. The absence of state-provided care during the lockdown creates greater difficulty for full-time working Finnish mothers in a dual-earner/state-carer system than an absence of such care in the Dutch one-and-a-half earner system, where most mothers work part time. Further analyses suggest variation in part-time and (nearly) full-time hours mitigates the work–life balance experiences of highly educated Dutch mothers. Additional factors explaining cross-country variation or similarities include the presence of young children and the presence of a partner. We discuss these findings in light of current theoretical frameworks and highlight avenues for future research. acceptedVersion

International audience; Agriculture is considered to be a vital aspect of Algeria's national economy and rural development. Achieving sustainable agricultural production, generating employment, reducing imports and minimising post-harvest crops losses are the major objectives of the Algerian government. However, based on the evaluation of existing policies, this study found that poor governance is hampering the agriculture sector, particularly in terms of management of financial resources, where most financial investments are made only for short-term gains. The lack of awareness about the importance of post-harvest practices and lack of using modern technology threaten the growth of this sector. Adopting sound post-harvest methods can reduce food losses and wastage in every stage of the food supply chain, and integration of modern techniques, skilled labour, and education training systems are very important if agriculture in Algeria is to progress.

International audience; Public sectors around the world, especially in the developing counties, are not functioning well due to widespread fraud, governance, corruption, and inefficacy. For this reason, the world's public sectors need to improve their efficacy by using a sound risk management system. This study attempts to comprehend the phenomenon of current risk management practices among the public sector employees in different service schemes in Malaysia. A questionnaire survey was utilized to collect primary data from 194 department heads in Malaysia's federal ministries. The collected data was analysed using descriptive statistics and factor analysis. Findings revealed that 94.7% of respondents agreed to implementing risk management in their respective departments, but the level of priority for these risk management factors differs based on the service schemes. This study will assist policymakers to identify what is needed to enhance risk management practices in the public sector.

Despite established recommended standard definitions, measures, and methods by the UN Washington Group on Disability Statistics and the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health (ICF) to assess dimensions of disability, national censuses vary widely in the questions used to identify people with disabilities. Although many seek to conform ex-ante to ICF definitions, they also deviate from this basic framework in different ways. This complicates ex-post harmonization and standardization for cross-national comparisons of disabilityprevalence and outcomes influenced by disability status, such as labor market participation. Addressing these issues, this study uses IPUMS International Census microdata since 2,000 to examine disability mea- surement across 65 countries. We find that definitions, terminology, measurement, and instructions to both respondents and enumerators mat- ter for understanding disability prevalence cross-nationally. For instance, questions that included potentially stigmatizing language were associ- ated with lower rates of disability reporting, but questions that listed spe- cific limitations were associated with higher rates. Beyond disability, our findings also speak more broadly to ongoing challenges in survey har- monization for cross-national comparison.