bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Combination effects human chorionic gonadotropin hormon and ovaprim distribution on the time latency, percentage of fertilization, hatching and survival of silver pompano (Trachinotus blochii) larve fish
Authors: Putra W K A , Mulah A
Published: May 2019

Human Chorionic Gonadotropin (hCG) hormone has roles in inducing maturation, ovulation and fish spawning. Ovaprim is a reproductive hormone product that can stimulate the ovulation process and fish spawning. HCG hormone in marineculture is widely used for spawning fish with doses at around 1000 IU and 2 times of injections. This research was aimed to determine the effect of the combination of hCG and ovaprim hormone on spawning and figure the best treatment in inducing the spawning process of silver pompano. The method used four treatments: hCG x hCG, hCG x ovaprim, ovaprim x hCG, and ovaprim x ovaprim with three replicates of fish spawning (1 pair of parent fish). The best result in accelerating spawning latency time is ovaprim x ovaprim treatment and best performance is hCG x ovaprim treatment.
Assessing the potential of coastal ecosystems to develop marine tourism in Pramuka Island, the Kepulauan Seribu National Park, Jakarta, Indonesia
Authors: Rudianto  , Putra H M P , Gemasabil M A , Merryanti D P
Published: May 2019

Coastal zones play an important role in providing various valuable ecosystem services. However, it is also sensitive and vulnerable to environmental changes due to human overpopulation and interactions between the land and ocean. Pramuka Island, located in the Kepulauan Seribu National Park, can potentially be developed as a marine ecotourism area. Some coastal ecosystems on the island can be promoted as tourist attractions. The existing coral reefs, sea turtles, and mangrove forests are potential resources that can be used as tourism objects. However, the different objectives of marine ecotourism and ecosystem conservation might raise management conflicts in relation to land use on the island. This research aims to propose a strategy for the management of Pramuka Island by synergizing the conservation interest with the development of marine ecotourism area. It employs the ecology based Management-Driver Pressure State Ecosystem Service and Response (EBM-DPSER). The results showed that government policy is in need to reduce conflicts between conservation and economic interests.
Stock estimation, species composition and biodiversity of target reef fishes in the lesser Sunda-Banda Seascape (East Flores, Alor and South West Maluku regencies), Indonesia
Authors: Setiawan F , Muhidin  , Agustina S , Pingkan J , Estradivari  , Tarigan S A , Muttaqin E , Wijanarko T , Khaifin  , Wisesa N , Retrawimbi A Y , Akhrari H , Sadewa S
Published: May 2019

This study aimed to fill the gap of knowledge on this group of fishes by estimating the natural stock, species composition and biodiversity of target reef fishes from three regencies; Alor, East Flores (Flores Timur) and Southwest Maluku (Maluku Barat Daya/MBD) using underwater visual census method. A total of 176 species belong to 19 families of economically important target fish were recorded from 62 survey sites. The highest estimated stock is located in Southwest Maluku Regency – based on both abundance and biomass values, followed by Alor Regency and the lowest in East Flores Regency. Target fish species from the family of Caesionidae has the highest composition both based on abundance (74%) and biomass (40%). The highest species composition of target fish is from Pterocaesio tile (57.65%) which is more than 50% of the overall target fish. Community structure of target fish in the three regencies is still in a relatively good condition based on diversity index (H’), evenness (E) and no domination (C) of a single species occurs inside the target fish community, with exception in Alor Regency where the community of target fish is indicated to be under pressure. Biodiversity index by Bray-Curtis analysis in each location shows that most of the sites have the similarity of 67.51%, suggesting that there is not much difference in terms of target fish community structure between the three regencies.
Catch abundance and fishing season from vulnerable and endangered Elasmobranch species in Tanjung Luar Fishery
Authors: Simeon B M , Fahmi  , Ichsan M , Muttaqin E , Oktaviyani S , Mardhiah U , Yulianto I
Published: May 2019

The elevated extinction risk of elasmobranchs is proportional with the increase of fishing mortality due to overfishing. Indonesia is the biggest shark fishing country in the world, with Tanjung Luar as a fishing village specifically targeting sharks. More than 30 species of sharks and rays that have been landed in Tanjung Luar recently received increased conservation status under the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). This research aimed to analyze the catch abundance of vulnerable or endangered elasmobranchs in Tanjung Luar and identify the fishing seasons. Four years of landing monitoring data from 2014-2017 were analyzed the fishing seasons and fisheries pattern of vulnerable or endangered elasmobranchs species in Tanjung Luar, calculated Catch per Unit Effort (CPUE) based on fishing power index and also fishing season index. The CPUE of sharks and rays from 2014 to 2017 fluctuated but was not significantly different. We found that shark fishing season occurred in six months and ray fishing season occurred only in four months. The results suggested that management measures should focus on gear control and spatio-temporal closures which could have significant benefits for the conservation of elasmobranch species, and may help to improve the overall sustainability of the fishery.
Development of observing dolphin population method using Small Vertical Take-off and Landing (VTOL) Unmanned Aerial System (AUV)
Authors: Subhan B , Arafat D , Santoso P , Pahlevi K , Prabowo B , Taufik M , Kusumo B S , Awak K , Khaerudi D , Ohoiulun H , Nasetion F I , Madduppa H
Published: May 2019

Indonesia has a very high diversity of Cetacean, observation with good accuracy and precision must be a priority in every observation. Several methods have been developed to help calculate the marine mammal population, one of them by using Vertical Take-off and Landing (VTOL) Unmanned Aerial System (UAS). VTOL UAS is flown at a certain height to capture photos that contain the number of individuals in a pod, while also mapping the movements and recording their behaviors. The aim of this study was to determine the ideal angle to capture the photos. Several observation angles, 30°, 60°, and 90° were tested Observations were conducted in three sites in Indonesia (Sepa Island, Thousand Islands, Kepulauan Seribu National Park (TNKS); Liang Beach, Maluku Island; and Nai Island Kei Achipelago). The results showed that the angles greatly affected the number of objects in the photograph. For example, on the Island of Sepa, at the angle 30°, 60°, and 90°, the number of dolphins obtained were 3, 9 and 14, respectively. This study did not find any object rejection during observation with VTOL UAS. This study suggests that higher angle of photograph from VTOL UAS increases the accuracy of the observation of marine mammals.
Phytochemical profile of sea grass extract (Enhalus acoroides): A new marine source from Ekas Bay, East Lombok
Authors: Windyaswari A S , Purba J P , Nurrahmah S S , Ayu I P , Imran Z , Amin A A , Kurniawan F , Pratiwi N T M , Iswantari A
Published: May 2019

The coast of Southeast Indian and the tropical part of the Western Pacific is a habitat for the tropical sea grassEnhalus acoroides.In Ekas Bay, East Lombok,E. acoroidesgrows well in seashores, which is important to tropical marine ecosystem. Previous research reported the pharmacological activity ofE. acoroidessuch as antioxidant and antibacterial.E. acoroideswas tested to identify their secondary metabolites using phytochemical screening. The secondary metabolites were further characterized using thin layer chromatography with specific spray reagent. The phytochemical screening identified primary metabolites such as carbohydrates and proteins. On the other hand, the phytochemical screening also detected secondary metabolites such as alkaloid, phenolic, tannin, saponins, flavonoid, monoterpenes, and sesquiterpenes. The TLC profile with specific spray reagent confirmed the bioactive components such as phenolic, flavonoid, and terpenes in methanol extract ofE. acoroides.These results had a significant impact on profiling the marine plant as a new drug candidate. The information of secondary metabolites fromE. acoroideswill contribute to further research in determination of antioxidant, and antibacterial activity ofE. acoroides, as a promising marine drug candidate from Indonesia.
Influence of management status on the coral reef fish communities in Ujung Kulon National Park, Banten
Authors: Yudha F K , Fahlevy K , Andika W , Saraswati E , Hutami P R , Kamal M M , Samosir A M
Published: May 2019

Ujung Kulon National Park (TNUK) employs a management with the zonation system established to maintain the sustainability of resources, one of them are coral reef fish. This study aimed to identify the influence of management status on coral reef fish. Field observations were conducted on 14-22 October 2017 in Ujung Kulon using underwater visual census method, by recording the fish found in observation transects. The coral reef fish most frequently found in Core Zone was Caesionidae, while in The Marine Protection Zone is Acanthuridae. The Core Zone has higher species richness, and more abundance of coral reef fish than the Marine Protection Zone, although only species richness parameter shows a significant difference based on statistical tests. The management status that regulates the activities in each zoning has an impact on the coral reef ecosystem, including coral reef fish communities in it. Coral reef fish in the Core Zone have more diverse species than the Marine Protection Zone, because the coral reefs in the Core Zone are more preserved than the Marine Protection Zone.
Orographic effect and multiscale interactions during an extreme rainfall event
Authors: Baisya Himadri , Pattnaik Sandeep
Published: May 2019

Interaction of multiple oscillations of different time scales may result in severe weather events. The presence of orography can modulate the intensity of these events even further. Kerala witnessed one such heavy rainfall event in August, 2018, claiming 483 lives and damages worth INR 200 billion. This study focuses on the peak rainfall duration (13–17 August) when the departure from normal was 42%. Segregating moisture transport into its mean and perturbation terms show that an anomalous moisture channel over the Arabian Sea supplied continuous moisture to the Western Ghats (WG), whereas anomalous wind due to a monsoon depression advected moisture towards the southern peninsula. It is evident in the form of Moisture Flux Convergence (MFC) towers traversing along the Eastern Ghats before merging with the semi-permanent MFC feature over the WG. The presence of positive quasi bi-weekly oscillations and of Intra Seasonal Oscillations (ISO) aggravated the event as they complemented the anomalous moisture transport, with ISO constantly providing winds of the order of 2–3 ms−1. In addition, shedding of MFC towers by the depression is accredited to the synoptic scale oscillation.
A Dictionary of Business and Management in the Middle East and North Africa
Authors: Neal Mark
Published: May 2019

Over 250 entries

This innovative dictionary provides authoritative and easy-to-understand A–Z definitions of terms encountered in the area of business and management in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). Coverage includes key theoretical perspectives and concepts, events, companies, people, social customs, and sectors which have shaped and are shaping the development and structures of business and management in the region.

All nineteen countries in the World Bank definition of the MENA are covered, comprising Algeria, Bahrain, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, Oman, Palestine, Israel, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Tunisia, United Arab Emirates, and Yemen, with entries such as wasta, business–state relationship, Saudi Aramco, qarar, majlis, and the al-Saud family.

This is an invaluable resource for students, academics, and professionals engaging with international business, with a specific interest in the Middle East and North Africa.
Actor-Network Theory and Journalism
Authors: Wiard Victor
Published: May 2019

Actor-network theory (ANT) is a sociological approach to the world that treats social phenomena as network effects. This approach focuses on the evolution of interactions within networks over time and is useful for studying situations of change, unsettled groups, and evolving practices such as current developments in the world of journalism. Journalism is a messy and complex social practice involving various actors, institutions, and technologies, some of which are in a state of crisis or are undergoing rapid change due to digitization. ANT has gained momentum in journalism studies among researchers analyzing journalists’ relationships with the diverse agents they in contact with on a daily basis (e.g., technologies, institutions, audiences, other news producers) and the relationships between news production, circulation, and usage.

ANT practitioners use a set of simple concepts referred to as an infra-language, which allows them to exchange ideas and compare interpretations while letting the actors they are studying develop their own range of concepts (i.e., to speak in their own words). These concepts include actants, actor networks, obligatory passage points, and translation. ANT also proposes a set of principles for researchers to follow. These include considering all entities as participants in a phenomenon (e.g., people can make other people do things, and objects, such as computers or institutions, can as well) and following actors as they trace associations with others. Therefore, journalism scholars who use this approach conduct qualitative studies focusing on the place of a particular technology within a network or situation by following who and what is involved and how entities connect. They collect data such as the content produced, direct observations of news production, or statements from interviews during or after the case is over.

Using ANT, journalism scholars have extended their comprehension of news production by highlighting technology’s role in journalistic networks. Although journalists naturalize technologies through daily use (e.g., search engines, content management systems, cell phones, cameras, email), these tools still influence journalistic practices and outputs. ANT practitioners also consider the diversity of agents participating in news production and circulation: professional journalists, politicians, activists, and diverse commercial and noncommercial organizations. If this diversity is becoming more active and connected in this networked environment, it seems that legacy media is still an obligatory passage point for anyone willing to bring information to the general public. Recent societal changes, such as the generalization of news consumption on smartphones and the rise of platform journalism on multiple apps, indicate that ANT may be useful in the collective endeavor to provide a clear picture of what journalism is and what it will become.
The American South and LGBT Politics
Authors: Barth Jay
Published: May 2019

The cultural distinctiveness of the South led to a backlash in the region in the years following the rise of a national LGBTQ movement. In the decades that followed, political science research showed that the South remained fundamentally different than elsewhere in the nation in terms of attitudes regarding LGBTQ individuals and policies, both regarding overall views and Southerners’ imperviousness to personal contact with queer individuals in terms of reshaping attitudes. In electoral politics, explicit group-based appeals regarding LGBTQ individuals were often employed. And, policy divergence between the South and non-South was stark. While unambiguous shifts have occurred in the South in a more pro-LGBTQ rights direction, the region remains distinctively conservative when it comes to LGBTQ politics. Particularly striking are Southern attitudes toward transgender individuals and policies. That said, “two Souths” have begun to cement on LGBTQ politics as urbanized and suburbanized areas have diverged. Moreover, within the region’s Republican Party, a factional divide has begun to show itself across the South. The South remains consequential in gauging whether backpedaling on the dramatic progress made on LGBTQ rights is occurring in the United States.
Theoretical Perspectives on Subnational Public Policy and LGBT Law
Authors: Pierceson Jason
Published: May 2019

Subnational policymaking is central to LGBT politics and law, in contrast to other arenas of policymaking for marginalized groups. With barriers to national policymaking in Congress and in the federal courts, LGBT rights activists have leveraged opportunities at the state and local levels to create LGBT-supportive policies. Opponents have also used subnational politics to further their agenda, particularly direct democracy, while LGBT rights activists have used elite politics, such as state courts, effectively. Subnational LGBT politics is also marked by a significant variety in policy outcomes, with a notable urban and suburban versus rural divide in policymaking and in the presence of openly LGBT elected officials. The case of LGBT policy and law has caused scholars to rethink questions such as the role of public opinion in state policymaking, morality politics, and courts and social change.
Post-Conflict Processes and Religion: Lebanon
Authors: Ash Konstantin
Published: May 2019

Lebanon is a multisectarian society of four million people, divided among eighteen sectarian affiliations, many of which are highly salient in Lebanese society. The country experienced a complex, multifaceted civil conflict from 1975 to 1990, the aftermath of which continues to shape political interaction in the country. Sectarian identity has evolved, both before as well as after the civil conflict, shaped by clientelism, individual identities, and Islamist political movements. Despite years of conflict, identity in post-war Lebanon has remained fluid, and while sect is still a relevant identity marker, it is neither as deterministic nor as linked to religious piety as outside observers may expect. Research shows that Lebanese citizens face pressures to conform to sectarian beliefs due to the control that sectarian political parties have over goods distribution, but, at the same time, conforming to the sectarian democratic system may moderate the absolutist claims of Islamist political movements, especially Hizbollah. Despite the institutional and demographic idiosyncrasies of the Lebanese political system, each of these findings do much to inform outside literature on religion and post-conflict processes, along with tangential work on clientelism, the role of identity and politics and Islamic politics. However, there is still much to be done. Researchers should devote more attention to the growing backlash against sectarianism among popular movements within Lebanon and do more to explore the links between clientelism and sectarian identity in more precise and greater detail.
Traditional Leaders and Development in Africa
Authors: Honig Lauren
Published: May 2019

Traditional leaders have a significant role in the social, political, and economic lives of citizens in countries throughout Africa. They are defined as local elites who derive legitimacy from custom, tradition, and spirituality. While their claims to authority are local, traditional leaders, or “chiefs,” are also integrated into the modern state in a variety of ways. The position of traditional leaders between state and local communities allows them to function as development intermediaries. They do so by influencing the distribution of national public goods and the representation of citizen demands to the state. Further, traditional leaders can impact development by coordinating local collective action, adjudicating conflicts, and overseeing land rights. In the role of development intermediaries, traditional leaders shape who benefits from different types of development outcomes within the local and national community. Identifying the positive and negative developmental impacts of traditional leaders requires attention to the different implications of their roles as lobbyists, local governments, political patrons, and land authorities.
Identity, Internal State Conflict, and Religion
Authors: McCauley John F.
Published: May 2019

Social science literature does not identify a direct effect of religion on the occurrence of intrastate conflict. Yet religion as a sociopolitical identity does have several fairly unique features that render religious differences particularly useful to political entrepreneurs in the course of conflict. First, religions often have codified guidelines, typically written, that convey normative behaviors—what one should do to attain salvation, for example. The presence of such guidelines can reinforce the organizational strength of particular groups and underscore the nonnegotiable status of their beliefs, both of which can be useful in the course of conflict. Second, the religious identity includes multiple levels of division that do not exist within other identity types—including interfaith differences, differences between sects within religious traditions, and divisions between secularists and strong religionists. Such divisions create opportunities for outbidding that exacerbate tensions and conflict. Third, religious group membership confers nonmaterial benefits, such as perceived access to salvation, that can motivate behavior in very tangible, this-worldly ways, for example by encouraging fighters to choose martyrdom over negotiated settlements. Finally, religious networks link adherents transnationally in a manner that no other identity type can, creating opportunities to mobilize resources and support from abroad for a conflict within borders.

These features suggest that, whereas religion is no more likely than other types of identity divisions to cause conflict, it can be particularly powerful for political entrepreneurs to wield as a tool in conflict settings. In some cases, conflicts are viewed as religious because the religious labels of competing sides differ, even if the conflict itself has nothing to do with religion. In other cases, conflicts may be described as religious if the content over which adversary sides fight is itself religious in nature; violence over the imposition of Islamic sharia law in a religiously mixed country may be one such example. Even when intrastate conflicts are fought over religious content, however, from the perspective of political scientists the matter is still one of political choice. This underscores the critical role that political entrepreneurs play in the shaping of conflicts as religious. Understanding the power of codified behavioral guidelines, multiple layers of division, non-material payoffs, and transnational networks that religious identity provides, political entrepreneurs can use religion to exploit the (sometimes unrelated) grievances of their supporters and thus escalate conflict where doing so pays political dividends. In this way, scholars recognize that intrastate conflicts with various causal foundations frequently become fights in the name of God.
The Somatic Marker Hypothesis and Political Life
Authors: Verweij Marco , Damasio Antonio
Published: May 2019

The somatic marker hypothesis has not always been fully understood, or properly applied, in political science. The hypothesis was developed to explain the personally and socially harmful decision making of neurological patients who appeared to have largely intact cognitive skills. It posits that affect (consisting of emotions, feelings, and drives) facilitates and expands cognition, is grounded in states of bodily physiology and on the processing of those states in the entire nervous system, and is shaped by a person’s past experiences in similar situations. Thus far, it has received empirical support from lesion studies, experiments based on the Iowa Gambling Task, and brain imaging studies. The somatic marker hypothesis is not compatible with key assumptions on which various influential political and social approaches are based. It disagrees with the largely cognitive view of decision making presented in rational choice analysis. Contrary to behavioral public policy, the somatic marker hypothesis emphasizes the extent to which affect and cognition are integrated and mutually enabling. Finally, it differs from poststructuralist frameworks by highlighting the constraints that evolutionarily older bodily and neuronal networks impose on decision making. Rather, the somatic marker hypothesis implies that political decision making is socially constructed yet subject to constraints, is often sluggish but also is prone to wholesale, occasional reversals, takes place at both conscious and unconscious levels, and subserves dynamic, sociocultural homeostasis.
Associative Memory and Political Decision Making
Authors: Vonnahme Beth
Published: May 2019

Citizens are continuously inundated with political information. How do citizens process that information for use in decision-making? Political psychologists have generally thought of information processing as proceeding through a series of stages: (1) exposure and attention; (2) comprehension; (3) encoding, interpretation, and elaboration; (4) organization and storage in memory; and (5) retrieval. This processing of information relies heavily on two key structures: working memory and long-term memory. Working memory actively processes incoming information whereas long-term memory is the storage structure of the brain. The most widely accepted organizational scheme for long-term memory is the associative network model. In this model, information stored in long-term memory is organized as a series of connected nodes. Each node in the network represents a concept with links connecting the various concepts. The links between nodes represent beliefs about the connection between concepts. These links facilitate retrieval of information through a process known as spreading activation. Spreading activation moves information from long-term memory to working memory. When cued nodes are retrieved from memory, they activate linked nodes thereby weakly activating further nodes and so forth. Repeatedly activated nodes are the most likely to be retrieved from long-term memory for use in political decision-making.

The concept of an associative network model of memory has informed a variety of research avenues, but several areas of inquiry remain underdeveloped. Specifically, many researchers rely on an associative network model of memory without questioning the assumptions and implications of the model. Doing so might further inform our understanding of information processing in the political arena. Further, voters are continuously flooded with political and non-political information; thus, exploring the role that the larger information environment can play in information processing is likely to be a fruitful path for future inquiry. Finally, little attention has been devoted to the various ways a digital information environment alters the way citizens process political information. In particular, the instantaneous and social nature of digital information may short-circuit information processing.
The Political Effects of Religious Cues
Authors: Westfall Aubrey , Çelik Russell Özge
Published: May 2019

Religion is a central and comprehensive identity for billions of people all over the world. Politicians and other political actors recognize the vitality of religion and use it for political purposes, deliberately signaling religion, religiosity, or religious values and connecting them to political outcomes or behaviors in an effort to influence the political preferences of religious practitioners. The most efficient way to make the connection between religion and politics is through religious cues. Religious cues create information shortcuts linking religious identity or values with a political candidate or issue. Religious cues are used by political and religious actors in secular and religious contexts and are typically one of two general types: identity cues, which engage an individual’s religious identity and activate an in-group/out-group effect, and linkage cues, which link religious values or beliefs with an issue or candidate. Identity cues are particularly tricky to use in secular contexts because they have been shown to have strong alienating effects on nonreligious people, thereby defeating the intended purpose of the cue sender. For this reason, coded religious language called “implicit cues” is used with greater frequency in political discourse where only the religious cue receiver recognizes the religious cue for what it is. This strategy allows a political candidate to reap the benefits of the cue without risking alienation.

While scholars have made substantial progress in using experimental methods to disentangle the ways religious cues influence political behavior, there is ample opportunity for more research exploring different types of religious cues and the way they interact with other forms of cues and identities. Furthermore, most of the research on religious cues has focused on Christian cues in the United States, and a more diverse range of religions and contexts should be explored to understand the way religious cues influence political behavior. Researchers should also expand the definition of “religious practitioners” to explore how religious cues influence the growing number of people who do not affiliate with a religion or engage in practices traditionally associated with religiosity but do identify as religious. This would help to expand conceptualization of political behavior to more accurately reflect lived political experiences. Embracing these opportunities will allow the scholarly community to gain a better understanding of the varied political dynamics of religious cueing, which offers insights into how fundamental identities and attitudes are linked, thereby shedding more light on the complex dynamics of political behavior.
Preparing Pre-Service Teachers for Rural Schools
Authors: Azano Amy Price , Downey Jayne , Brenner Devon
Published: May 2019

Preparing pre-service teachers for rural schools has been a challenge in the field of education for more than a century, and issues specific to the rural teacher workforce remain a persistent and salient challenge in the United States and globally. This task is complex and multifaceted, conflated with a wide range of contextual variations in salaries, community amenities, geographic or professional distances, technology access, health disparities, and poverty rates. Additionally, institutions of higher education have wavered in their interest in and commitment to rural teacher education, though there is a growing awareness of the need to attend to the experiences of students in rural communities and the educators who teach them. The literature and research on rural teacher preparation has typically been organized around the three challenges of preparation (post-secondary education), recruitment (youth aspirations to teach, would-be career changers interested in teaching, and division-level efforts to staff schools with effective teachers), and retention (providing pre-service and new teachers with learning experiences and support that increase the likelihood of remaining in the profession in rural schools).

Literature on rural teacher preparation and evidence related to “preparation, recruitment, and retention” can be repositioned to offer new insights focused on solutions. Three focus areas—Curriculum, Context, and Conveyance—serve to answer the question: What makes a teacher preparation program rural? Curriculum serves as a core component for preparing rural teachers. A rural curriculum for a teacher education program includes introducing students to content and experiences, including field experiences, that have been designed to support their professional and personal success in rural schools and communities. Context is understanding the strengths and assets of the rural places, communities, and cultures in which pre-service teachers are preparing to live, learn, and teach. Context allows us to consider the unique environments in which rural teachers live and work. Conveyance is the means by which potential teachers have access to teacher preparation programs, that is, how programs are delivered and structured to provide access to potential teachers in rural communities (online, in person, alternative and traditional programs, etc.). A focus on Curriculum, Context, and Conveyance allows school leaders and education researchers to resist deficit ideologies and to consider how rural communities are asset-rich environments, ultimately increasing resources that prepare teachers for, and build from the strengths of, rural communities.
Teacher Education in Finland and Future Directions
Authors: Mikkilä-Erdmann Mirjamaija , Warinowski Anu , Iiskala Tuike
Published: May 2019

Finland has gained increasingly more global interest among educationalists and politicians because of its excellent results on large-scale international student assessments like the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA). An interesting question is how a small country in the Global North with only 5 million inhabitants has managed to develop a school system that has gone from undistinguished to top-performing in two decades. The reasons for Finland’s successful and egalitarian school system can be investigated from many perspectives. One view regards teacher education, with the assumption that it has special characteristics that contribute to the success of Finland’s educational system. Factors include systematic selection, a progressive curriculum design that supports teachers’ learning of content knowledge, and the creation of teachers’ didactic skills. In addition, systematic teaching practices in special schools, called training schools, are used to help students integrate theoretical understanding and the practical skills needed for the teaching profession, especially those related to individual student learning in everyday classrooms. Furthermore, the role of empirical research skills in facilitating the development of teacher expertise is essential in Finnish teacher education. Generally, the concept behind Finnish teacher education seems to work very well. However, the system will face challenges in the future, such as how to develop new research-based methods of student selection that are valid and reliable. The educational path—from academic preservice teacher education in a university context to in-service teacher education—is developing and offers the newest research-based knowledge for all teachers, but there is still a lot work to be done in order to link all teachers within official continuous learning systems with universities throughout their careers. Finland’s teaching profession offers a great deal of autonomy and freedom, and the quality of school learning is based on teachers’ evaluations, not standardized tests. Like other countries, Finland is rapidly changing. Hopefully the most important feature of the Finnish educational system, the transparent dialog between the educational research community, the government, teachers, and parents, will carry over into the future. Without dialogue, educators cannot learn about the shared values supporting current and future schools.
Afghan Trading Networks
Authors: Marsden Magnus , Hopkins Benjamin D.
Published: May 2019

Afghanistan has long been conventionally regarded as a remote space peripheral to the wider world. Yet scholarship produced in the 2nd decade of the 21st century suggests its multiple connections to a wide array of regions and settings. Such connections are especially visible when viewed through the lens of the trade networks originating from the territories of modern Afghanistan. Scholars have come to recognize that Afghan traders have long been active players in many contexts across Asia and beyond. Such traders and the networks they form play a critically important role in connecting different parts of Asia with one another, including South Asia and Eurasia, as well as East and West Asia. The connective role performed by Afghan caravanners and religious minorities in the trade between India and Central Asia are especially well documented by historians. Increasingly so too are the activities of Afghan merchants in Ottoman territories. The trading networks Afghan traders have participated in are historically dynamic. Their orientating values shift across time and space between various forms of religious, ethno-linguistic, and political identity. The capacity to adapt to changing circumstances is helpful in understanding the continuing relevance of Afghan traders to 21st-century forms of globalized capitalism, in contexts as varied as the former Soviet Union, China, and the Arabian Peninsula.
Bengali Communities in Colonial Assam
Authors: Misra Sanghamitra
Published: May 2019

The history of the Bengali community in Assam, along with many other communities such as the Marwari traders and the Nepalis, can be dated to the early decades of British rule in Assam when the East India Company found itself relying on Bengali amlahs (court officials) for its policing, legal and revenue administration of the newly acquired kingdom of Assam. The Bengali community grew partly due to the encouragement that the Company gave the Bengali language by using it in its courts, administration, and schools. While in 1873 Assamese replaced Bengali as the medium of instruction and language of the court, with some caveats and exceptions, the province of Assam, which was formed in 1874, brought together four historically distinct spaces in the region, including the two Bengali-speaking districts (Sylhet and Cachar) of the Barak-Surma Valley. The decades leading to Partition witnessed various factors, including employment opportunities and cultural and linguistic belonging, leading to contradictory pulls in Sylhet and Cachar on the question of whether it should be integrated with Bengal or Assam. Another important factor was the growth of linguistically based Assamese nationalism whose politics lay in the articulation of a unique Assamese literary and cultural identity along with the securing of employment opportunities. The latter would lead to a demand of an Assamese homeland free of competition from the Bengali middle class. A referendum in July 1947 based on limited franchise led to Sylhet being integrated to Pakistan while Cachar remained part of Assam and India. Other than the Bengali-speaking communities of Sylhet and Cachar, a history of the Bengali-speaking communities in Assam involves the story of peasant cultivators from East Bengal who continuously migrated into Assam in the early decades of the 20th century. While earlier pre-colonial patterns of migration were seasonal, the colonial state’s primary aim of acquiring high agrarian revenue led to specific policies and schemes that encouraged peasant migration into Assam from East Bengal. This further encouraged an intensification of commercial agriculture especially jute, changes in the transport network in the Brahmaputra valley, a developed credit network, and some local elements such as Marwari businessmen and Assamese moneylenders. However, with time this migration created conditions of insecurity for Assamese peasants who faced ejection from their lands as a result of the growing competition for cultivable land and higher rents. The colonial state’s attempt at regulating the migration—such as through the Line System in the 1920s—became a site of contestation among many emerging nationalist and political perspectives, whether of the Congress, the Muslim League or others. The tussle between the preservation of the rights and claims of indigenous peasants over grazing and forest reserves and those of Bengali Muslim immigrants over land defined the politics of the 1940s in Assam until Partition.
Imperial Maritime China
Authors: Schottenhammer Angela
Published: May 2019

Imperial China has a long-standing, multifaceted, and interesting imperial maritime history. Of particular importance in this context are the commercial dimensions of China’s maritime contacts with the outside world. From approximately the 7th century until Yuan 元 times (1279–1367), China even developed as a commercial maritime power, although its maritime trade was, until the late 11th century, basically dominated by foreign merchants. During the Yuan and early Ming dynasties (1368–1644), China was also a naval power—the attempts of Qubilai Khan (r. 1260–1295) to subdue Japan are well known. But their maritime interests took the Mongols as far as Southeast and South Asia. The early Ming 明 period, under the third Ming Emperor, Yongle 永樂 (r. 1403–1424), is characterized by unforeseen political, military, and commercial maritime expansion. After 1435, following the instructions of the first Ming emperor, Hongwu 洪武 (r. 1368–1398), China officially retreated from the seas and prohibited all private maritime commerce, until internal socioeconomic and financial problems and the great demand of foreigners—after 1500 also including the Europeans—for Chinese products urged the government to “reopen” its borders for trade. The rulers of the last imperial dynasty, the Qing 清 (1644–1911), first concentrated on securing their maritime borders against competing commercial and political interests, then managed a flourishing trade, increasingly also with Europeans, but were finally confronted with the colonialist and imperialistic claims of the Europeans. After the Opium Wars (1839–1842), the maritime commerce and politics of China were more and more controlled by European powers, especially the British.
Women in Namibia
Authors: Becker Heike
Published: May 2019

Women have had a significant role throughout Namibian history. Prior to colonization men were generally dominant, but certain women of high rank attained powerful positions. Namibian societies and politics became thoroughly gendered during the German and South African colonial periods. After independence the postcolonial Namibian state drew on the intensive involvement of women in the liberation struggle and adopted a legal framework and policies that emphasized gender equality. Nonetheless, little real improvement has been achieved for the majority of women in postcolonial Namibia. The country’s high level of social inequality continues to be profoundly gendered.

Namibia’s independence in 1990 followed prolonged colonial rule by South Africa, which ruled the country, named “South West Africa,” as a de facto fifth province. Post–World War II South Africa retained the full range of apartheid legislation and policy in Namibia until about 1980, when the apartheid state’s colony became a laboratory for social engineering geared toward limited change. Namibia was divided into two distinct zones in 1907 and throughout the South African colonial period. Southern and central Namibia were governed similar to South Africa and the northern regions experienced colonial rule more akin to the British doctrine of indirect rule. Both colonial projects were profoundly gendered. Thus anticolonial resistance was both varied and gendered, including its defiance of apartheid.
Health Economics of the Workplace: Workplace Accidents and Effects of Job Loss and Retirement
Authors: Ours Jan C. van
Published: May 2019

There are three main topics in research on the effects of work on health.

The first topic is workplace accidents where the main issues are reporting behavior and workplace safety policies. A worker seems to be less inclined to report a workplace accident for fear of job loss when unemployment is high or when the worker has a temporary contract that may not be renewed. Workplace safety legislation has intended to reduce the incidence and severity of workplace accidents but empirical evidence on this result is unclear.

The second topic is employment and health where the focus is on how job characteristics and job loss affect health, in particular mental health. Physically demanding jobs have negative health effects. The effects of working hours vary and the effects of job loss on physical and mental health are not uniform. Job loss seems to increase mortality.

The third topic concerns retirement and health. Retirement seems to have a negative effect on cognitive skills and short-term positive effects on overall health. Other than that, the effects are very inconsistent, that is, even with as clear a measure as mortality, it is not clear whether life expectancy goes up, goes down, or remains constant due to retirement.
New Monetarist Economics
Authors: Gu Chao , Han Han , Wright Randall
Published: May 2019

This article provides an introduction to New Monetarist Economics. This branch of macro and monetary theory emphasizes imperfect commitment, information problems, and sometimes spatial (endogenously) separation as key frictions in the economy to derive endogenously institutions like monetary exchange or financial intermediation. We present three generations of models in development of New Monetarism. The first model studies an environment in which agents meet bilaterally and lack commitment, which allows money to be valued endogenously as means of payment. In this setup both goods and money are indivisible to keep things tractable. Second-generation models relax the assumption of indivisible goods and use bargaining theory (or related mechanisms) to endogenize prices. Variations of these models are applied to financial asset markets and intermediation. Assets and goods are both divisible in third-generation models, which makes them better suited to policy analysis and empirical work. This framework can also be used to help understand financial markets and liquidity.
Contracts and Working Conditions in Medicine
Authors: Hayes Helen , Sutton Matt
Published: May 2019

Contracts and working conditions are important influences on the medical workforce that must be carefully constructed and considered by policymakers. Contracts involve an enforceable agreement of the rights and responsibilities of both employer and employee. The principal–agent relationship and presence of asymmetric information in healthcare means that contracts must be incentive compatible and create sufficient incentive for doctors to act in the payer’s best interests. Within medicine, there are special characteristics that are believed to be particularly pertinent to doctors, who act as agents to both the patient and the payer. These include intrinsic motivation, professionalism, altruism, and multitasking, and they influence the success of these contracts. The three most popular methods of payment are fee-for-service, capitation, and salaries. In most contexts a blend of each of these three payment methods is used; however, guidance on the most appropriate blend is unclear and the evidence on the special nature of doctors is insubstantial. The role of skill mix and teamwork in a healthcare setting is an important consideration as it impacts the success of incentives and payment systems and the efficiency of workers. Additionally, with increasing demand for healthcare, changing skill mix is one response to problems with recruitment and retention in health services. Health systems in many settings depend on a large proportion of foreign-born workers and so migration is a key consideration in retention and recruitment of health workers. Finally, forms of external regulation such as accreditation, inspection, and revalidation are widely used in healthcare systems; however, robust evidence of their effectiveness is lacking.