bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Diminishing Class Voting and the Increasing Influence of the Economy on Executive Approval in Denmark, 1974–2016
Authors: Seeberg Henrik Bech
Published: September 2023

How stable is the impact of the economy on executive approval among voters over a long period of time and how has it changed? This is a major question in the literature on how voters use the economy to evaluate the executive’s performance. This chapter contributes to answering this question by analysing a freshly collected data set on the influence of consumer confidence on executive approval in Denmark, 1974–2016. The analysis shows that the impact of the economy on executive approval has increased over time. In the early period, characterized by high party loyalty among voters and class voting, consumer confidence does not systematically influence executive approval since class and ideology decide executive approval. Yet, as loyalty and class-adherence weaken and issue voting based on party performance becomes more central later in the period, executive approval clearly declines during economic distress.
Concurrent Proceedings
Authors: Hamer Kenneth
Published: September 2023

This chapter highlights issues relating to concurrent proceedings. In R v. Executive Council Joint Disciplinary Scheme, ex parte Hipps and ors [1996], Dyson J states the principles to be applied by the courts in determining whether to grant a stay of disciplinary proceedings pending the trial of concurrent civil or criminal proceedings. However, only limited assistance can be derived when comparing the facts of a particular case with those of other cases in which a stay was or was not granted. In the healthcare professions, the practice of regulators is generally to await the outcome of any criminal proceedings against the registrant and, in the meantime, to apply to the interim orders tribunal for the practitioner’s registration to be suspended or made subject to conditions, on the grounds that an interim order is necessary for the protection of members of the public, or is otherwise in the public interest, or is in the interests of the practitioner. Employment cases also may require a different approach: an employer does not normally need to await the outcome of criminal or regulatory proceedings before commencing or continuing disciplinary proceedings against an employee.
Consensual Disposal
Authors: Hamer Kenneth
Published: September 2023

This chapter discusses the issues relating to consensual disposal of proceedings in healthcare cases. The General Medical Council (GMC) rules provide that the test for consensual disposal before a fitness to practise tribunal is that the panel must be satisfied that any undertakings are sufficient to protect patients and protect the public interest. The SDT’s Practice Direction Number 1: Agreed Outcomes (November 2019) states that if the tribunal is not satisfied that the agreed outcome is appropriate having heard from the parties and, if so requested by the parties, it will consider whether or not it wishes to indicate the sanction it regards as appropriate on the basis of the agreed facts. In Solicitors Regulation Authority v. Panayides and Clifford Chance LLP, Case No 11716-2017, in approving the agreed outcome and determining the appropriate level of fine, the tribunal took into account comparative cases in which fines had been imposed. However, consensual disposal of proceedings may mean that there is less scope for the tribunal to assess the practitioner’s insight and the risk of repetition.
Conviction and Caution Cases (Sanction)
Authors: Hamer Kenneth
Published: September 2023

This chapter details issues relating to sanction in conviction and caution cases. Any sentence imposed by a criminal court may be of little weight when the fitness to practise committee or tribunal comes to determine what, if any, sanction to impose in disciplinary proceedings. The functions of the court and the committee are quite different. The criminal court is concerned with punishment and the wider issues of public protection, whereas the focus for the committee is to judge the effect of the conduct on public confidence in the profession and to identify a sanction proportionate to its judgment. In Bawa-Garba v. General Medical Council [2018], the Court of Appeal observed that there are undoubtedly some cases in which the facts are such that the most severe sanction, erasure, is the only proper and reasonable sanction. However, a factor weighing in favour of the practitioner may be that they are a competent and useful doctor who presents no material danger to the public and who can provide considerable useful future service to society. As a general rule, it is not appropriate for a practitioner to resume unrestricted practice while serving a sentence imposed by the criminal court.
Costs
Authors: Hamer Kenneth
Published: September 2023

This chapter focuses on issues relating to orders for costs, looking at three distinct and quite separate matters: (a) orders for costs by a disciplinary tribunal against the practitioner; (b) orders for costs by the tribunal in favour of the practitioner and against the regulator; and (c) costs on appeal. In healthcare proceedings, orders for costs are not normally made by the tribunal against or in favour of the practitioner, although the General Optical Council retains the power to make costs orders against either party. In relation to other bodies, the practice of making costs orders is usually governed by the rules of the regulator. Meanwhile, costs on appeal are governed by the relevant rules governing the appeal process. If the regulator choses to appeal, the court, in wishing to do justice between the parties, may award the successful appellant only a limited contribution towards costs. A key example is General Medical Council v. Khetyar [2018].
Delay
Authors: Hamer Kenneth
Published: September 2023

This chapter addresses delay in criminal and disciplinary proceedings. It is well established that Article 6 ECHR applies to professional disciplinary proceedings and a violation of the reasonable time requirement may be established without proof of prejudice to the practitioner. However, delay alone is unlikely to be sufficient to justify a stay of disciplinary proceedings. In R (Gibson) v. General Medical Council [2004], Elias J (as he then was) held that disciplinary hearings do not constitute a special case and do not give any unique protection to a registrant. In the case of the ‘five year rule’, the key question is whether it is in the public interest for the five-year restriction to be applied to the particular allegation. In crime, whether a direction on delay is to be given to the jury and the way in which it is formulated will depend on the facts of the case.
Disclosure, Confidentiality, Data Protection, and Freedom of Information
Authors: Hamer Kenneth
Published: September 2023

This chapter explores issues relating to disclosure, confidentiality, data protection, and freedom of information. It is plain that a respondent should receive all evidence that weakens the case against them, but there is no free-standing obligation imposed on a regulator to gather evidence similar to the responsibility of the police in criminal proceedings to investigate possible lines of inquiry that might assist the defence. However, a regulator is not without statutory powers to obtain documents from a third party, and in Holton v. General Medical Council [2006], it was considered that appropriate steps should be taken to obtain relevant medical notes and hospital records. Patient confidentiality in other instances may also have to give way to the public interest in the proper and effective pursuit of professional disciplinary proceedings or promoting the welfare of a child. The chapter looks at the UK General Data Protection Regulation, the Data Protection Act 2018, and the Freedom of Information Act 2000.
Estoppel
Authors: Hamer Kenneth
Published: September 2023

This chapter talks about estoppel or res judicata, which is a portmanteau term that is used to describe different legal principles with different juridical origins. In disciplinary proceedings, estoppel is particularly important where a regulator seeks to bring a second set of proceedings based on the same or similar facts as earlier disciplinary proceedings. It explains the court’s likeliness to adopt the doctrine of merger, which treats a cause of action as extinguished once judgment has been given. The chapter cites the Christou v. Haringey London Borough Council case, wherein the first set of proceedings were held not to give rise to a judicial or quasi-judicial determination. It also details how estoppel can work both ways, such as in the case of Salem v. GMC, wherein the practitioner was estopped from reopening earlier findings in the proceedings.
Fines
Authors: Hamer Kenneth
Published: September 2023

This chapter discusses the Decision Procedure and Penalties Manual (DEPP) of the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), which sets out policies to firms, approved persons, and other persons. DEPP includes the FCA’s statement of policy with respect to the imposition and amount of penalties. It also reviews the provisions of DEPP that are concerned with, amongst other matters, penalties for market abuse, penalties in non-market abuse cases, and determining the appropriate level of financial penalty. The chapter explores financial hardship and the FCA’s approach to determining penalties that is intended to ensure financial penalties are proportionate to the breach. It mentions the discount for early settlement and the FCA’s approach to negotiate with the person concerned to agree in principle the amount of a financial penalty in connection with the FCA’s statement of policy.
Judicial Immunity
Authors: Hamer Kenneth
Published: September 2023

This chapter recounts the case of Addis v. Crocker, which established that professional disciplinary proceedings attract absolute privilege and immunity, and that no action for defamation may be brought in respect of them. It addresses the question why the functions of a professional disciplinary body are judicial and not administrative. There is nothing to prevent proceedings being brought by a practitioner against their employer under the Equality Act 2010 on the grounds of discrimination. The chapter demonstrates how the findings and order of the committee are an intrinsic part of the hearing. If the hearing itself is protected by absolute privilege, the same applies to the findings and order.
Negligence
Authors: Hamer Kenneth
Published: September 2023

This chapter explains how an act or omission of gross negligence can amount to professional misconduct. Disciplinary committees or fitness to practise tribunals may be asked to consider through the Bolam test whether a practitioner’s conduct has fallen below the standards accepted as proper by a responsible body of practitioners skilled in that profession. The distinction between falling below and falling significantly below depends on whether the practitioner’s act or omission was reasonably likely to have put the patient at risk of harm. The chapter explores the principle in Montgomery wherein a doctor’s duty involves taking reasonable care to ensure that the patient understands the material risks in any proposed treatment that has been applied to other professional situations. It looks into cases of the negligent conduct of the registrant and claims against the regulator.
Striking Off
Authors: Hamer Kenneth
Published: September 2023

This chapter explains striking off as the erasure or removal of a practitioner from the register reserved for the most serious misconduct or behaviour. It mentions that the sanctions guidance of most regulators, such as the General Medical Council, General Dental Council, and the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors, indicates the justification for striking off from the register. Additionally, disbarment is considered to be the most serious sanction that can be imposed and reserved for cases in which there is a need to protect the public or maintain confidence. The chapter tackles various healthcare misconduct cases that feature the allowed and denied appeals of erasure. It highlights how the tribunal or committee should give clear grounds for the registrant’s conduct being fundamentally incompatible with continued registration.
Suspension
Authors: Hamer Kenneth
Published: September 2023

This chapter focuses on the provisions for suspension which is used by regulatory bodies to maintain the reputation of the profession and confidence in its regulatory processes. Most regulators’ provisions indicate whether the practitioner’s fitness to practise is impaired, then the tribunal or committee may give a direction that the entry in the register of the practitioner concerned is suspended. Suspensions often contain a deterrent effect, which then signals the practitioner, the profession, and the public about behaviour unbefitting a member of the profession. Thus, tribunals must provide reasons for the period of suspension chosen. The chapter also covers specific cases involving healthcare professionals, legal professionals, and other professionals.
Voluntary Erasure
Authors: Hamer Kenneth
Published: September 2023

This chapter looks into disciplinary cases that showcase how legislation permitted an application for voluntary erasure from the register. When a registrant is subject to ongoing fitness to practise proceedings, most regulators, like the General Medical Council, guide the factors that will be taken into account by the registrar when considering an application for voluntary removal from the register. The authorities recognize a balance is required to be struck between the public interest and the practitioner’s interests. Moreover, healthcare regulators have an overarching objective to promote and maintain public confidence in the profession and to promote and maintain proper professional standards and conduct by members of that profession. The chapter cites how decision-makers should assess the seriousness of the allegations and whether it would undermine public confidence in the profession if they were not fully investigated.
Fieldwork
Authors: Santos Juan Manuel
Published: September 2023

Within the Colombian government’s strategy to reduce extreme poverty, Red Unidos (United Network) stands out. As part of this network, thousands of caseworkers travel across the country to survey families in vulnerable situations, evaluate their situation based on 45 social indicators, and provide advice and support so that they may take advantage of available State social services. Red Unidos is a true “social army” that brings social policy to the ground and ensures that State assistance reaches those who need it. During special sessions called “Caseworker for a Day,” chief executive officers (CEOs) from large companies in the country, national and local State officials, and diplomats and representatives of multilateral organizations joined this social army, which increased social awareness among the private sector and international cooperations. The chapter includes the story of Valeriano Domínguez and his family, who won a home in the free housing program. This is an example of how Red Unidos caseworkers’ work can help improve a household’s living conditions. The chapter emphasizes the importance of considering the fight against poverty as an issue that involves society as a whole, not just the government and public entities. The fight against poverty requires leadership both from the public sector and the private sector, coordinated efforts, and personal and direct contact with the poor and their living conditions.
Epilogue
Authors: Santos Juan Manuel
Published: September 2023

After making important progress on reducing poverty and inequality, Juan Manuel Santos’s second term of office concluded in August 2018, but his administration ensured the continuity of its main social and reconciliation programs. Programs such as the comprehensive early childhood care program, the conditional assistance program to encourage children’s school attendance and nutritional check-ups, and programs that help large swaths of the population across the country’s territory access social benefits now that the peace agreement is signed with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), are now national laws and State policies. In this way, they are not at risk of being discontinued due to political whims. The Colombian Multidimensional Poverty Index continues to be an instrument of reference for new national development plans and the measurement of progress on the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Much remains to be done, and the outlook is still challenging—the Iván Duque administration between 2018 and 2022 did not prioritize social policy nor the consolidation of peace, and the COVID-19 pandemic led to major setbacks—but Colombia continues to advance surefootedly toward the goal of eradicating extreme poverty by 2030. The election of a new administration, led by Gustavo Petro, who promises to fully implement the peace agreement, combat poverty, and work for the environment, opens up space for hope.
Individuality in an Age of Reproduction
Authors: Zwicker Jonathan
Published: September 2023

When European collectors began purchasing Japanese woodblock prints in the mid-nineteenth century, ukiyo-e prints came to be understood within the logic of European artistic conventions that prized originality. For collectors and connoisseurs, the prints of the nineteenth century, in particular, posed a problem: actor images from this period were premised on a method that foregrounded the recognition of the actor across various printed media and regardless of the print designer, leading to a style that was often criticized as manneristic. Using the writings on composition of the print designer Utagawa Toyokuni as a starting point, “Individuality in an Age of Reproduction” re-examines the history of nineteenth-century actor images in woodblock prints and printed books to explore how ideas of individuality and distinctiveness changed across the nineteenth century and how the emergence of photographic images of actors fit within a longer history of actor prints.
Citizenship Resounding
Authors: Stokes Martin
Published: September 2023

This chapter offers a new theorization of music and citizenship through three extended case studies. Musicology has been making efforts for decades to think beyond the sovereign subject of liberalism, beyond Whiteness, and beyond able-bodiedness. But the complex of thinking around heroism, “greatness,” and Whiteness in music in relation to citizenship has proved notoriously hard to unravel beyond the professional academic core. The soundworlds of collectivity—of crowds and social movements—continue to be hard to describe, at least, with reference to our habitual ways of describing and analyzing music. The case studies focus on iconic figures, scenes, and soundworlds in Egypt, the United Kingdom, and Turkey—“The citizen on his bike,” “the citizen in the crowd,” and “the citizen in the square,” respectively—with these critical ends in mind. The key to these extremely complex scenes of citizenship-making, the chapter argues, lies in music, which helps us understand something important about the mobilization of citizenly iconography, its transmission, its mediation, and its affective and temporal dynamics.
From Coppola to Cage
Authors: Schonfeld Zach
Published: September 2023

This chapter offers untold details of Nicolas Cage’s high school years at Beverly Hills High, where he starred in school productions of The Crucible and Oklahoma!, as well as his little-seen screen debut in a failed television pilot called The Best of Times (1981). The chapter examines Cage’s film debut in the 1982 teen classic Fast Times at Ridgemont High, in which he had a small, non-speaking role and was teased by fellow cast members for being Francis Ford Coppola’s nephew. The chapter reveals how Cage’s treatment on the set of Fast Times led to his decision to relinquish the Coppola name, and explores the veiled meaning of Cage’s chosen name, with its dual references to superhero Luke Cage and composer John Cage—representing opposing poles of Cage’s filmography.
Uncle Francis
Authors: Schonfeld Zach
Published: September 2023

This chapter examines Nicolas Cage’s conflicted relationship with his uncle Francis Ford Coppola. In the 1980s, Cage resented living in the shadow of his uncle’s fame and fortune, yet benefited from roles in his uncle’s movies. This chapter delves into the tumultuous making of three Coppola films featuring early Cage performances: Rumble Fish (1983), The Cotton Club (1984), and Peggy Sue Got Married (1986). In Rumble Fish, Cage gave an early performance in one of his uncle’s most polarizing films. In the infamously troubled The Cotton Club, Cage portrayed the role of a vicious gangster and was so determined to remain in character that he behaved erratically on set, trashing his trailer and damaging period cars. And in Peggy Sue Got Married, Cage alarmed his co-stars by delivering his dialogue in a nasal voice modeled after a Claymation horse from Gumby. This chapter explores how Cage’s bizarre performance in Peggy Sue Got Married signaled his evolution from realism toward a more surrealistic and impressionistic style of acting.
Cage and the Curious Case of the Big Rubber Nose
Authors: Schonfeld Zach
Published: September 2023

This chapter focuses on Nicolas Cage’s odd appearances in two largely forgotten low-budget films: the teen sex comedy Never on Tuesday (1989) and the critically panned neo-noir Deadfall (1993). In Never on Tuesday, Cage appeared in a brief cameo as a strange man with a rubber nose, creating a character so bizarre that it became a topic of viral internet fascination thirty years later. In Deadfall—directed by his brother, Christopher Coppola—Cage gave a chaotic, unwieldy performance seemingly inspired by Andy Kaufman’s belligerent alter-ego, Tony Clifton. Cage essentially went rogue in Deadfall, to his brother’s great frustration and bewilderment. This chapter chronicles the stories behind each film and argues that both films are a revealing glimpse into how Cage thinks about the push-and-pull between creativity and commerce. When appearing in low-stakes, low-pay projects, he feels emboldened to pursue his wildest ideas. Never on Tuesday and Deadfall are both relatively straightforward genre exercises—one a teen comedy, the other a neo-noir—blown off their axes by eccentric, scenery-chewing Cage performances.
Culture Wars
Authors: Anil Pratinav
Published: September 2023

This chapter looks at how the nationalist Muslims fared in the Constituent Assembly, showing how depoliticization became the order of the day. Everywhere, nationalist Muslims beat a retreat. In the assembly they led the effort to rescind separate electorates and reservations for Muslims and retain simple plurality voting, whose distorting effects, to the detriment of minorities, were well known to lawmakers. But the political realm was one thing, the legal realm quite another. At a time when Islamic laws were being torn up, or radically rewritten at the very least, across the Muslim world—in Pakistan, Tunisia, and the United Arab Republic especially—in India, Muslim personal law remained untouched. This reflected the preference of the nationalist Muslims, for whom there existed a neat separation between the political and cultural. The former needed to be relinquished, the latter defended.
Pressure Politics
Authors: Anil Pratinav
Published: September 2023

This chapter charts the rise and fall of the Majlis-e-Mushāwarat, the most important Muslim outfit of the sixties and seventies. If disunity had been the Achilles’ heel of Muslim politics throughout the Nehruvian period, at its close Congressmen and Leaguers, clerics and lay politicians, nationalists and Islamists, all concluded that the chasms between them, in fact, counted for very little. More united than divided them. The nationalist Muslims were beginning to grow impatient with the Hindu leadership; Leaguers were never particularly hot-headed to begin with. The maulanas and career politicians were agreed on the need to protect the sharia. India’s Islamists were in fact rather conventional nationalists; nationalist Muslims were not above exceptionalist pretentions. They all broadly shared in what could be called an Indian Muslim ideology. Here, then, lay the justification for the birth of the Mushāwarat. But impulses to unity came on sufferance. A concatenation of crises accelerated this belated appreciation, the most important of which was Nehru’s death in May 1964. Hindu prejudice played a part, too, as did trouble brewing in the borderlands; the underrepresentation of Muslims in the services; the short shrift given to the Urdu language; and the sharp increase in violence against Muslims.
‘Every Day I Witness Nightmares’
Authors: Gupta Diya
Published: September 2023

Chapter Two considers emotions associated with hunger arising from the Bengal Famine of 1943 and 1944. It assesses Bengali photojournalist Sunil Janah’s images alongside soldiers’ letters and Bibhutibhushan Bandyopadhyay’s Bengali novel Ashani Sanket (Intimations of Thunder, 1944–1946), and analyzes famine-related Bengali modernist poetry by Sukanta Bhattacharya and Samar Sen. The chapter focuses on how starvation is imagined, witnessed, and represented, and argues that letter-writing and literary texts read alongside each other yield new meaning to the emotions of hunger in the homeland. These include highlighting the role played by the body in famine writing, and how this enables us to inhabit the subjective experiences of a soldier on an international battlefront hearing about famine, a Bengali village character experiencing famine in a novel, and a civilian poet and emergency relief provider on the streets of Calcutta witnessing famine. Middle Eastern and North African battlefronts, Bengal’s rural spaces and the streets of Calcutta, then, form new connections in this reading. The chapter looks at how hunger is registered in the novel, and how Bengali poetry is remade by new imagery. It concludes by discussing how, in the midst of catastrophic death, communities of knowledge and empathy are formed.
Changing Drinking Habits in the Nineteenth Century
Authors: Matthee Rudi
Published: September 2023

Chapter Seven documents the changes in consumption of alcoholic drinks for Iran in the Qajar period, as the country was being incorporated into the global market by way of trade, taste, and table manners. While unbridled drinking persisted among many provincial power holders, “modern” “freethinkers” increasingly spurned religious strictures and flaunted their modernity by flouting the Islamic law. The royal court, meanwhile, lacking religious legitimacy, sobered up or at least took its consumption indoors.
Alcohol in the Modern Age New Drinks and Drinking Customs
Authors: Matthee Rudi
Published: September 2023

Chapter Eight discusses modern drinking in the Arab world with a focus on North Africa, Egypt, Iraq, and Yemen. With the arrival of (colonial) modernity came a widening gap between class and status groups reflected in a growing segregation in terms of drinks and venues. Islamists and nationalists alike came to identify alcohol with Western debauchery and decadence. The transition from religious rejection to health concern continued, Western-inspired temperance movements were founded, and the challenge of how to balance the formal proscription of alcohol and its irresistible lure as part of a global culture based on youth, fun, and freedom became more acute than ever.
Conclusion
Authors: Matthee Rudi
Published: September 2023

The conclusion sums up the various themes discussed in the book, arguing that, whereas the traditional Islamic Middle East was indeed capacious, willing to accommodate drinking so long as it did not disturb the social order, modern Muslim societies, whose members still engage in motivated reasoning to justify drinking, continue to struggle with the paradox of how far to go in censoring a commodity that is at once illicit and irrepressible. The “live and let live” mindset, the capacity for ambiguity that had marked premodern Muslim life got lost and became overwhelmed by full-fledged denial-cum hypocrisy, part willful amnesia, part oblivion.
Introduction
Authors: Jamal Ahmad Shuja , Maley William
Published: September 2023

This chapter introduces the body of the book and opens with a discussion of the evolution of Afghanistan as a territorial unit and a political system, making the point that Afghanistan’s complex society cannot easily be captured in simplistic tropes. The chapter goes on to discuss how a Communist coup in April 1978 destabilized the country, setting the scene for decades of instability culminating in the overthrow of the Taliban regime in 2001. It gives a brief account of the rise of the Afghan Republic in 2001, and its fall to the Taliban in 2021 following the US decision to exit Afghanistan. It concludes by outlining the structure of the book, and makes the point that it does not offer a single theory to explain decline and fall, but rather identifies contributing factors.
Mussolini’s Power as Leader
Authors: Williamson Peter J.
Published: September 2023

This chapter examines the power Mussolini enjoyed as Prime Minister and the constraints that he faced as a personal dictator. It sets out how, formally, Mussolini had considerable power and enjoyed deference from colleagues but that an excessive desire for personal control and a highly bureaucratic approach to governing meant he was not able to effectively use the powers he had while the government became dysfunctional and lacked dynamism. His need to play the omnicompetent leader resulted in his isolation as a leader and insulation from advice on policy matters to the detriment of decision-making. Mussolini also never created the machinery to deliver his intentions from the center of government. The state bureaucracy retained considerable autonomy free of serious political encroachment, while attempts to extend the reach of central government by numerous public entities created bodies that were more managerialist than Fascist in their operational logic while local administrative bodies were able to retain considerable discretion to respond to local needs and political interests.
Russia’s Anti-Western Tilt in Africa
Authors: Ramani Samuel
Published: September 2023

This chapter examines the impact of the systemic confrontation in U.S.–Russia relations, which escalated after the 2014 annexation of Crimea, on the Kremlin’s Africa policy. Aside from US efforts to thwart the construction of a Russian naval base in Djibouti, the Russia–West relationship in Africa was largely characterized by “hostility without confrontation.” Russia’s burgeoning partnership with China did not readily translate into Sino–Russian cooperation in Africa. The continued lack of Western scrutiny allowed Russia to burnish its role as a crisis-proof partner for authoritarian regimes, such as Omar al-Bashir’s Sudan, Robert Mugabe’s Zimbabwe, and Yoweri Museveni’s Uganda. It also provided openings for cooperation with South Africa, as President Jacob Zuma resisted domestic pressure to isolate Russia over the Crimea annexation and pursued an ill-fated nuclear energy project with Rosatom. Russia’s 2015 military intervention on Bashar al-Assad’s behalf in Syria bolstered its prestige as a counter-insurgency partner in Africa. This served as a gateway for military-technical agreements, arms sales to and police training in Nigeria, and displacing France as the Central African Republic’s primary security guarantor in 2017.
Meat for Some, Wildlife for Others
Authors: Trefon Theodore
Published: September 2023

The introduction describes and analyzes the reliance on bushmeat in Central Africa, cultural attachment to and economic reliance on bushmeat, why there is a rapidly growing bushmeat crisis, local perceptions of wildlife management and international responses to it, and discusses wildlife sustainability and major threats.
A Shrinking Forest Habitat
Authors: Trefon Theodore
Published: September 2023

Chapter 2 explains deforestation drivers such as slash-and-burn agriculture, and trends such as demographic growth and urbanization. Wildlife habitat is shrinking and being degraded, threatening wildlife populations. As the forest area shrinks, wild animals find it increasingly difficult to reproduce, survive, and thrive. Healthy forests can sustain healthy wildlife populations: degraded forests threaten wildlife survival.
Eating Out in Kinshasa
Authors: Trefon Theodore
Published: September 2023

Chapter 7 is the book’s most ethnographic chapter and recounts the personal trajectory of Mama Régine who runs a bustling bushmeat restaurant in one of Kinshasa’s most populous districts. Her personal narrative humanizes the bushmeat economy by highlighting how bushmeat and identity define these women. There are thousands of such bushmeat restaurant women throughout Central Africa. Before delving into her narrative, the chapter presents some of the problems of food insecurity that the urban poor must grapple with.
Game Over?
Authors: Trefon Theodore
Published: September 2023

The conclusion ties together the three main messages of the book: bushmeat is economically and culturally important throughout Central Africa; wildlife is under threat; and sustainable wildlife management policies are inefficient. It summarizes the book’s main focus: bushmeat is food for the heart, mind, and soul just as much as it is money and food for the stomach.
Stable Isotopes as a Tool for Ecologists
Authors: Cotrufo M. Francesca , Pressler Yamina
Published: September 2023

“Stable Isotopes as a Tool for Ecologists” presents an argument for why stable isotopes are a powerful tool of study in any subdiscipline in ecology. Ecologists need tools that integrate across many disciplines and environmental systems to answer research questions and advance theory. Stable isotopes are an ideal tool to advance ecological science because they integrate ecological processes over space and time, indicate the presence and magnitude of ecological processes, record environmental changes, and trace movement of key elements through ecological systems. This chapter introduces stable isotopes as a tool for ecologists by providing examples for their use in the study of ecological processes, to record changes over time and space, and to trace nutrients and water as they cycle through the environment.
Assurance and Trust
Authors: Simpson Thomas W.
Published: September 2023

There is a natural distinction between believing what a person says, and believing a person, with the latter seeming to entail the former, but not the reverse. Second-personal views of testimony and trust have sought to make sense of this distinction, arguing that someone’s giving their assurance—their word—gives a distinctive reason to believe them, and thereby what they say. They thus pose a challenge to the evidentialist view of trust I have been developing as, if I am following my total evidence as to how likely a person is to be trustworthy, what I am not doing is accepting their assurance. This chapter assesses what these accounts get right and what they get wrong. It prepares the ground for the positive account, in the following chapter, of how a speaker’s word may give a hearer reason to believe what the speaker says.
Simple Event Nominals, Referring Nominals, and allosemy
Authors: Wood Jim
Published: September 2023

This chapter discusses readings beyond the Complex Event Nominal (CEN) reading. The claim is that these divide into two groups. In the first group, v is semantically expletive, and n is semantically contentful, so n combines semantically with the root. In this case, the alloseme inserted in n can interact directly with the meaning of the root in an unpredictable, idiosyncratic way that may need to be listed. In the second group, v is semantically contentful, like it is in CENs, but unlike in CENs, n is semantically contentful too. In this case, the alloseme inserted in n cannot interact directly with the root, so the result is a compositional, non-idiosyncratic meaning. This distinction is illustrated and supported with case studies of verbal prefixes and a class of verbs argued to have the structure of compounds. This chapter also discusses the distinction between allosemy and ’semantic readjustment’ of a root.
A Methodology for Modality
Authors: Leech Jessica
Published: September 2023

This chapter begins by motivating the book’s interest in modality, i.e. possibility and necessity. It also motivates why the book takes a Kantian approach to philosophical questions about modality. The chapter introduces and defends a methodology for modal metaphysics according to which we should take seriously questions about the function of modal judgments, i.e., judgments of possibility and necessity, as an important constraint on our metaphysical theory of modality. In light of this methodology, the chapter introduces and highlights key questions concerning the function of modal judgment, and the function of judgments of logical necessity and metaphysical necessity in particular. The chapter concludes by presenting a plan of the rest of the book.
Introduction
Authors: de Boer David
Published: September 2023

Between 1650 and 1750, persecuted Protestants and their advocates often employed the printing presses in the Dutch Republic, the period’s dominant international news hub, to raise transnational awareness of their plight. This book explores which stakeholders produced such printed accounts, what role they hoped to play in domestic and international politics, and which political norms they invoked to cry out against religious maltreatments, executions, and massacres. The introduction argues that such accounts cannot be reduced to expressions of confessional tribalism. To reach diverse audiences and transcend Europe’s confessional divides, opinion makers often opted for universalizing arguments against religious persecution, appealing to positive and natural law, reason, and a sentiment of common humanity. As such, the seventeenth- and eighteenth-century Dutch press became a crucial site of experiment in which many of the techniques and languages of humanitarianism were developed.
Single universe or multiple universes
Authors: Zubairy M. Suhail
Published: September 2023

There is a consensus among physicists about the outcome of any experiment. However, there continues to be discussion about the interpretation of these results. At the heart of this discussion is the so-called measurement problem. The interaction of the particles with the measurement apparatus forms the measurement problem that has haunted physicists since the very early days of quantum mechanics. The problem is that quantum mechanics only describes the evolution of the wavefunction with time, but does not answer about the interaction with the measurement apparatus. These issues, related to the measurement problem, have led physicists to come up with different interpretations. Many possibilities are discussed. One of the most amazing resolutions of the measurement problem is via the possibility of the existence of multiple universes. This many-worlds approach is a desperate attempt to solve the measurement problem.
Appreciating the links between heart failure and depression
Authors: Critchley H D , Yarovova E , Howell S , Rosen S D
Published: September 2023

Depression and heart failure frequently occur together, symptoms overlap and the prognosis is worsened. Both conditions share biopsychosocial risk factors and are accompanied by behavioural/lifestyle, neurohormonal, inflammatory and autonomic changes that are implicated aetiologically. Depression has been conceptualized as a decompensated response to allostatic overload, wherein adaptive psychological, behavioural and physiological responses to chronic and/or severe stress, become unsustainable. Heart failure can similarly be viewed as a decompensated response to circulatory overload, wherein adaptive functional (neurohormonal effects on circulation, inotropic effects on heart) and structural (myocardial remodelling) changes, become unsustainable. It has been argued that the disengaged state of depression can initially be protective, limiting an individual’s exposure to external challenges, such that full recovery is often possible. In contrast, heart failure, once past a tipping-point, can progress relentlessly. Here, we consider the bidirectional interactions between depression and heart failure. Targeted treatment of depression in the context of heart failure may improve quality of life, yet overall benefits on mortality remain elusive. However, effective treatment of heart failure typically enhances function and improves key psychological and behavioural determinants of low mood. Prospectively, research that examines the mechanistic associations between depression and heart failure offers fresh opportunity to optimize personalized management in the advent of newer interventions for both conditions.
The risk of cardiovascular comorbidity in children with Behçet’s disease
Authors: Demir Selcan , Duzova Ali , Karagoz Tevfik , Oguz Berna , Aykan Hayrettin Hakan , Satirer Ozlem , Sag Erdal , Ozen Seza , Bilginer Yelda
Published: October 2023

Objective

Patients with Behçet’s disease (BD) may experience long-term morbidity caused by various forms of cardiovascular disease. This study aimed to assess the risk for cardiovascular comorbidity in paediatric BD patients with and without vascular involvement, independent of the contribution of traditional risk factors.

Methods

Paediatric patients classified as having BD according to the 2015 Peadiatric BD (PEDBD) criteria were included in the study. Twenty-four-hour ambulatory blood pressure monitoring (ABPM), transthoracic echocardiography, and carotid intima-media thickness (cIMT) measurements were performed. Patients with an active disease or those who have other known risk factors for cardiovascular disease were not included in the study.

Results

Thirty-one children and adolescents with paediatric BD (16 female, 51.6%; F/M: 1.06) were enrolled in the study. Among the BD patients, 10 patients (34.4%) had abnormal ABPM. Carotid IMT values, mean arterial pressure, systolic and diastolic blood pressure by ABPM and the prevalence of abnormal ABPM, non-dipping, and ambulatory hypertension were similar between patients with and without vascular involvement. The echocardiography measurements showed that BD patients with vascular involvement had a significantly higher velocity and velocity time integral of the left ventricle outflow tract, which may indicate increased stiffness of the aorta.

Conclusion

Paediatric BD patients with vascular involvement may tend to have more cardiovascular risk factors. However, cardiovascular assessment should be considered in all BD patients, regardless of the involved systems. We suggest that ABPM may accurately define hypertension and cardiovascular risk in BD.
Effects of oral contraceptives and menopausal hormone therapy on the risk of rheumatoid arthritis: a prospective cohort study
Authors: Hadizadeh Fatemeh , Johansson Therese , Johansson Åsa , Karlsson Torgny , Ek Weronica E
Published: September 2023

Objectives

Oral contraceptives (OC) and menopausal hormone therapy (MHT) contain exogenous sex hormones and are used by millions of women around the world. However, their effect on the development of rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is still debated and the current literature suggests that they may exert opposite effects on the risk of RA. The present study aimed to estimate the effects of exogenous hormones on the development of RA, both during the reproductive lifespan and later in life.

Methods

The association between OC and RA, as well as between MHT and late-onset RA (LORA), was investigated using time-dependent Cox regression modelling in white British women from the UK Biobank (n = 236 602 and n = 102 466, respectively) and replicated in women from all ethnic groups.

Results

OC use was associated with a decreased risk of RA in ever-users [hazard ratio (HR) = 0.89; 95% CI = 0.82–0.96], as well as in current (HR = 0.81; 0.73–0.91) and former users (HR = 0.92; 0.84 –1.00), compared with never-users. In contrast, MHT use was associated with an increased risk of LORA in ever-users (HR = 1.16; 1.06–1.26) as well as in former users (HR = 1.13; 1.03–1.24) compared with never-users.

Conclusion

OC use appears to protect against RA, while MHT may increase the risk of LORA. This study provides new insights into the possible inverse effect of exposure to different exogenous sex hormones on the risk of RA.
The Meaning of Merit: Talent versus Hard Work Legitimacy
Authors: Friedman Sam , Ellersgaard Christoph , Reeves Aaron , Larsen Anton Grau
Published: October 2023

Elites often use merit to explain, justify, and make sense of their advantaged positions. But what exactly do they mean by this? In this paper, we draw on 71 interviews with elites in Denmark and the UK to compare self-justifications of meritocratic legitimacy. Our results indicate that while elites in both countries are united by a common concern to frame their merits as spontaneously recognized by others (rather than strategically promoted by themselves), the package of attributes they foreground vary significantly. In the UK, elites tend to be “talent meritocrats” who foreground their unique capacity for ideational creativity or risk taking, innately good judgment, and “natural” aptitude, intelligence, or academic ability. In contrast, in Denmark, elites are more likely to be “hard work meritocrats” who emphasize their unusual work ethic, extensive experience (as a signal of accumulated hard work), and contributions outside of work, particularly in civil society. We tentatively argue that one explanation for this cross-national variation is the role that different channels of elite recruitment play in amplifying legitimate notions of merit. In the UK, for example, elite private schools act to nurture ideas of exceptionalism and natural talent, whereas in Denmark elite employers socialize the connection between hard work and success. These findings suggest that nationally specific understandings of merit can have quite different implications for the legitimation of inequality.
Low-Skilled Migrant Labor Schemes in Japan’s Agriculture: Voices From the Field
Authors: ROBERTS Glenda S , FUJITA Noriko
Published: September 2023

Despite rapid demographic decline, until recently, low-skilled migrant workers have been welcomed only through ‘side-doors’ such as technical interns (TITP). Yet pressure for change comes from two sides: the moral critique of the ‘side-door’ scheme, and the growing economic pressures of a dwindling labor force. In 2018 Japan put in place a short-term bona-fide labor scheme (Specified Skilled Worker; hereafter, SSW) in fields previously largely inaccessible to foreign labor. In combination with the TITP schemes, these workers are allowed to stay longer. But what do these changes mean, how do the farmer-employers see them, and will the SSW lead to a sustainable farm labor supply going forward? We explore stakeholders’ views of the current schemes and their opinions on how low-skilled labor migration should proceed in agriculture. Businesses are desperate for labor, but not at any cost. Under SSW, employers are being asked to change the ways they envision and treat migrant labor. The tensions between their expectations and the realities on the ground reflect the contradictions that Japan’s migration policies inherit, based in the bureaucratic fiction that only ‘skilled’ labor is necessary. Data for this paper come from qualitative interviews conducted from 2018 to 2022 in Kyoto, Aichi, and Tokyo.