bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Dietary methionine restriction reduces hepatic steatosis and oxidative stress in high-fat-fed mice by promoting H2S production
Authors: Yang Yuhui , Wang Yanan , Sun Jin , Zhang Jiahong , Guo Haitao , Shi Yonghui , Cheng Xiangrong , Tang Xue , Le Guowei
Published: November 2018

Dietary methionine restriction reduces hepatic steatosis and oxidative stress in high-fat-fed mice by promoting H2S production.
The effective treatment of multi-drug resistant tumors with self-assembling alginate copolymers
Authors: Kumar Jatin N. , Wu Yun-Long , Loh Xian Jun , Ho Nicholas Y. , Aik Shalen X. , Pang Victoria Y.
Published: November 2018

Alginates of two different chain lengths were alkyne functionalized on the hydroxyl group, leaving all carboxylic groups intact.
Self-assembly of a metallo-peptide into a drug delivery system using a “switch on” displacement strategy
Authors: Das Priyadip , Pan Ieshita , Cohen Ehud , Reches Meital
Published: November 2018

Two newly designed tripeptides and their corresponding Cu2+ conjugates self-assemble into nanometric structures of different morphologies. These self-assembled metallo-peptide networks can serve as a drug delivery platform using a fluorescent-based "Turn-On" displacement strategy.
Self-delivery nanoparticles of an amphiphilic irinotecan–enediyne conjugate for cancer combination chemotherapy
Authors: Li Jing , Li Baojun , Sun Lili , Duan Bing , Huang Shuai , Yuan Yuan , Ding Yun , Hu Aiguo
Published: November 2018

An amphiphilic small molecular drug self-delivery system was designed by linking a hydrophilic topoisomerase I inhibitor irinotecan (Ir) with a lipophilic cytotoxic enediyne (EDY) antibiotic through an ester bond.
J-PLUS: Identification of low-metallicity stars with artificial neural networks using SPHINX
Authors: Whitten D. D. , Placco V. M. , Beers T. C. , Chies-Santos A. L. , Bonatto C. , Varela J. , Cristóbal-Hornillos D. , Ederoclite A. , Masseron T. , Lee Y. S. , Akras S. , Borges Fernandes M. , Caballero J. A. , Cenarro A. J. , Coelho P. , Costa-Duarte M. V. , Daflon S. , Dupke R. A. , Lopes de Oliveira R. , López-Sanjuan C. , Marín-Franch A. , Mendes de Oliveira C. , Moles M. , Orsi A. A. , Rossi S. , Sodré L. , Vázquez Ramió H.
Published: November 2018

Context.We present a new methodology for the estimation of stellar atmospheric parameters from narrow- and intermediate-band photometry of the Javalambre Photometric Local Universe Survey (J-PLUS), and propose a method for target pre-selection of low-metallicity stars for follow-up spectroscopic studies. Photometric metallicity estimates for stars in the globular cluster M15 are determined using this method.

Aims.By development of a neural-network-based photometry pipeline, we aim to produce estimates of effective temperature,Teff, and metallicity, [Fe/H], for a large subset of stars in the J-PLUS footprint.

Methods.The Stellar Photometric Index Network Explorer, SPHINX, was developed to produce estimates ofTeffand [Fe/H], after training on a combination of J-PLUS photometric inputs and synthetic magnitudes computed for medium-resolution (R~ 2000) spectra of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey. This methodology was applied to J-PLUS photometry of the globular cluster M15.

Results.Effective temperature estimates made with J-PLUS Early Data Release photometry exhibit low scatter, σ(Teff) = 91 K, over the temperature range 4500 <Teff(K) < 8500. For stars from the J-PLUS First Data Release with 4500 <Teff(K) < 6200, 85 ± 3% of stars known to have [Fe/H] < −2.0 are recovered by SPHINX. A mean metallicity of [Fe/H] = − 2.32 ± 0.01, with a residual spread of 0.3 dex, is determined for M15 using J-PLUS photometry of 664 likely cluster members.

Conclusions.We confirm the performance of SPHINX within the ranges specified, and verify its utility as a stand-alone tool for photometric estimation of effective temperature and metallicity, and for pre-selection of metal-poor spectroscopic targets.
Executive Severance Agreements: Making Sense of an Emerging, Yet Fragmented, Research Field
Authors: Klein Felice B. , McSweeney Kevin , Devers Cynthia E. , McNamara Gerry , Blosser Spenser
Published: November 2018

Scholars have devoted significant attention to understanding the determinants and consequences of executive compensation. Yet, one form of compensation, executive severance agreements, has flown under the radar. Severance agreements specify the expected payments and benefits promised executives, upon voluntary or involuntary termination. Although these agreements are popular among executives, critics continually question their worth. Yet severance agreements potentially offer three important (but less readily recognized) strategic benefits. First, severance agreements are viewed as a means of mitigating the potential risks associated with job changes; thus, they can serve as a recruitment tool to attract top executive talent. Second, because severance agreements guarantee executives previously specified compensation in the event of termination, they can help limit the downside risk naturally risk-averse executives face, facilitating executive-shareholder interest alignment. Third, severance agreements can aid in firm exit, as executives and directors are likely to be more open to termination, in the presence of adequate protection against the downside.

Severance agreements can contain provisions for ten possible termination events. Three events refer to change in control (CIC), which occurs under a change in ownership. These are (1) CIC without termination, (2) CIC with termination without cause, and (3) CIC with termination for cause. Cause is generally defined by events such as felony, fraud, embezzlement, neglect of duties, or violation of noncompete provisions. Additional events include (4) voluntary retirement, (5) resignation without good reason, (6) voluntary termination for good reason, (7) involuntary termination without cause, (8) involuntary termination with cause, (9) death, and (10) disability. Voluntary retirement and resignation without good reason occurs when CEOs either retire or leave under their own volition, and voluntary termination with good reason occurs in response to changes in employment terms (e.g., relocation of headquarters). Involuntary termination refers to termination due to any reason not listed above and is often triggered by unsatisfactory performance.

Although some prior work has addressed the antecedents, consequences, and moderators of severance, the findings from this literature remain unclear, as many of the results are mixed. Future severance scholars have the opportunity to further clarify these relationships by addressing how severance agreements can help firms attract, align the interests of, and facilitate the exit of executives.
Collective Protest, Rioting, and Aggression
Authors: Reicher Stephen
Published: November 2018

In understanding crowd psychology and its explanation of conflict and violence, there are different theoretical approaches that turn on different understandings of communication processes. There are three models of communication in the crowd worth reviewing: classic, normative, and dynamic. Classic models suggest that crowd members are influenced by an idea of emotion presented to them. Normative models suggest that influence is constrained by what is seen as consonant with group norms. And, finally, dynamic models examine how that which becomes normative in the group depends upon intergroup relations. The last of these approaches can explain the patterned, socially meaningful and yet changing nature of crowd action. Crowd action, itself, is a form of communication because it serves to shape the social understandings of participants as well as the social understandings of those beyond the crowd. It is argued that the nature and centrality of crowds contribute to the understanding and creating of social relations in society.
Disability and Intergroup Communication
Authors: Jones Karyn Ogata , Crandall Lee
Published: November 2018

Intergroup communication adds to the general knowledge about disability by summarizing key areas in research and commentary. Intergroup communication is discussed in terms of how stigma affects identification, perception, and communication. Scholarship examining efforts to measure attitudes these groups have about each other, and the effects of inter-group communication on attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors, is reviewed. Scholarly commentary plays a role in the complicated relationship between identity and disability, and how this relationship impacts intergroup interactions, as well as present a summary of studies examining intergroup communication and disability in interpersonal, group, mediated, and professional settings. Illustrations from social media are provided to show how mediated inter-group communication can impact perceptions and knowledge. Studies are presented from an international perspective, allowing for culturally based comparisons.
Feminist Perspectives on Criminal Justice in Popular Culture
Authors: Olson Greta
Published: November 2018

A discussion of feminist perspectives on crime and criminal justice in popular culture has to begin by pointing out that pop culture itself has traditionally been gendered as feminine. As epitomized by abstract visual art, nonnarrative poetry, and auteur cinema, high culture is still regarded in some critical circles as the opposite of popular culture, which is associated with the seductive and immersive qualities of mass media. Resulting from a masculinist aesthetic that privileged difficulty and abstraction as in Modernist poetics, so-called feminine forms have traditionally been considered to be less valuable than ones associated with masculinity. Media vehicles associated most readily and negatively with popular culture are those directed primarily at women audiences, such as daytime television, romance novels, and women’s magazines. Associated with the domestic space, leisure time, and unemployment, television itself was until recently viewed as a less-valuable, feminine medium.

For these reasons, and because of television’s preoccupation with crime, this article concentrates on television as a formally feminized medium that has for technological and social reasons now become more highly valued. Critiquing the conjoining of masculinity and cultural value is a feminist task. As viewers watch their favorite series in public spaces on handheld devices, and certain series are considered novelistic and complex enough to supersede other cultural forums, television has gained new cultural credence and is a premier space in which to relate popular images about women and criminal justice.
Correctional Programming and Gender
Authors: Fedock Gina , Covington Stephanie S.
Published: November 2018

As the number of women under correctional supervision continues to increase in the United States, attention to gender within correctional programming is crucial as women offenders present with different concerns than their male counterparts. Gender differences exist in a range of criminal justice factors, including pathways to involvement in the criminal justice system, frequencies in types of offenses, treatment needs, and facilitating factors for treatment engagement and positive outcomes. Thus, this chapter highlights the importance of gender in terms of correctional program design and delivery. Gender-responsive programming for women involved in the criminal justice system is guided mainly by the feminist pathways theory of women’s criminality, as well as additional theories. This framework considers the interconnected roles of trauma and victimization histories, substance abuse, economic and social marginalization, and the gendered effects of criminal justice policies and practices. For gender-responsive programming, elements that should be considered in women’s treatment and services in correctional settings include: program environment or culture or both, staff competence, theoretical foundations, treatment modalities, reentry issues, and collaboration. In addition, principles of trauma-informed care are crucial elements needed in systems and services for women involved in the criminal justice system. These two frameworks of gender-responsive programming and trauma-informed care offer specific principles that can be applied across correctional settings for women to shape policies, programming design, program delivery, and daily practices. Likewise, these frameworks encourage community-based responses to women’s involvement in criminal behaviors. Gender is a crucial element for correctional programming in multiple ways.
Postnatal Neurogenesis in the Olfactory Bulb
Authors: Polosukhina Aleksandra , Lledo Pierre-Marie
Published: November 2018

This is an advance summary of a forthcoming article in the Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Neuroscience. Please check back later for the full article.

In adult mammals, the olfactory bulb and the hippocampus are the regions in the brain that undergo continuous neurogenesis (production and recruitment of newborn neurons). While the other regions of the brain still retain a certain degree of plasticity after birth, they no longer can integrate new neurons. In rodents, thousands of adult-born neurons integrate into the bulb each day, and this process has been found to contribute not only to sensory function, but also to olfactory memory. This was a surprising finding, since historically the adult-brain has been viewed as a static organ. Understanding the process of regeneration of mature neurons in the brain has great potential for therapeutic applications. Consequently, this process of adult-neurogenesis has received widespread attention from clinicians and scientists.

Neuroblasts bound for the olfactory bulb are produced in the subventricular zone of the lateral ventricle. Once they reach the olfactory bulb, they mostly develop into inhibitory interneurons called granule cells. Just after one month, about half of the adult-born neurons are eliminated, and the other half fully integrate and function in the olfactory bulb. These cells not only process information from the sensory neurons in the bulb, but also receive massive innervation from various regions of the brain, including the olfactory cortex, locus coeruleus, the horizontal limb of diagonal band of Broca, and the dorsal raphe nucleus. The sensory (bottom-up) and cortical (top-down) activity has been found to play a vital role in the adult-born granule cell survival. Though the exact purpose of these newborn neurons has not been identified, some emerging functions include maintenance of olfactory bulb circuitry, modulating sensory information, modulating olfactory learning, and memory.
Critical Perspectives on the Political Economy of Higher Education in India and Globally
Authors: Patnaik Prabhat
Published: November 2018

There are two alternative perspectives on higher education, one of which sees it as a means of augmenting the recipient’s employment prospects and earning capacity through the imparting of skills, while the other sees it as fulfilling a social role beyond merely supplying skilled personnel. While the conversion of higher education into a commodity that is sold for profit in commercially run private institutions is in sync with the first perspective, the second demands that education should be primarily the responsibility of the government and should be mainly publicly funded. The second perspective informed the anti-colonial struggle in the developing world and the policies of the dirigiste regimes that came up post-decolonization. But under the subsequent neoliberal regime, the first perspective has come to the fore, and there has been a significant commoditization of higher education. This has the effect of excluding large numbers of students from deprived backgrounds from the ambit of higher education, of constricting free and creative thinking, and consequently of destroying rational discourse and giving free rein to fascist, semi-fascist, and fundamentalist forces that can do great damage to the fragile structures of developing societies. An awareness of these dangers is necessary if appropriate interventions to prevent such a denouement are to be undertaken in the sphere of higher education.
Traditions, Research, and Practice Supporting Academically Productive Classroom Discourse
Authors: Park Jie , Michaels Sarah , Affolter Renee , O'Connor Catherine
Published: November 2018

This article focuses on both research and practice relating to academically productive classroom discourse. We seek to “expand the conversation” to include newcomers to the field of classroom talk, as well as practitioners and youth researchers who want to contribute to knowledge building in this area. We first explore a variety of traditions, questions, and methods that have been prominent in work on classroom talk. We also summarize some key findings that have emerged over the past several decades:

• Finding 1: Certain kinds of talk promote robust learning for ALL students.

• Finding 2: The field lacks shared conceptualizations of what productive talk is and how best to characterize it.

• Finding 3: Dialogic discourse is exceedingly rare in classrooms, at all grade levels and across all domains.

• Finding 4: A helpful way forward: conceptualizing talk moves as tools.

Following the presentation of each research finding we provide a set of commentaries—explicating and in some cases problematizing the findings. Finally, we provide some promising approaches that presume cultural and linguistic assets among both students and teachers, including curricular programs, teacher education, professional development programs, teacher research, and intergenerational communities of inquiry. In all of this, we try to make our own assumptions, traditions, and governing gazes explicit, as a multi-generational and multi-role group of authors, to encourage greater transparency among all who work in this important and potentially transformative field of study.
Food Production in the Forest Zone of West Africa: Archaeological and Historical Perspectives
Authors: Chia Richard T. , D'Andrea A. Catherine
Published: November 2018

Recent narratives on the origin of food production in the West African forest zone have replaced earlier diffusion-based models with viewpoints that emphasize the diversity of sources for plants and animals exploited and domesticated in the region. Management of indigenous tree species, including oil palm and incense tree, managed first by indigenous foragers, have the longest history in the area, dating back to over 8,400 before present (bp). After the 4th millennium bp, domesticates such as pearl millet, cowpea, and domestic caprines were introduced from adjacent Sahel and the savanna regions, and populations began to favor oil palm over incense tree. The mechanisms of these introductions are less clear but likely involved both diffusion and/or movements of peoples who became sedentary to varying degrees. Palaeoenvironment is an important factor to consider in tracking the development of food production in the forest zone; however, some combination of natural and human-mediated changes took place, the nature of which was not uniformly distributed.
Assessment of Active Learning
Authors: Gibson Kay , Shaw Carolyn M.
Published: November 2018

With the shift in learning objectives that were more focused on the development of skills and processes, new assessment techniques were required to be developed to determine the effectiveness of new active-learning techniques for teaching these skills. In order for assessment to be done well, instructors must consider what learning objective they are assessing, clarify why they are assessing and what benefits will derive from the process, consider whether they will conduct assessments during or after the learning process, and specifically address how they will design solid assessments of active learning best suited to their needs. The various types of assessment for active-learning strategies include written and oral debriefing, observations, peer- and self-assessment, and presentations and demonstrations. In addition, there are several different measurement tools for recording the assessment data, including checklists and student surveys. A final aspect to consider when examining assessment techniques and measurement tools is the construction of an effective rubric. Ultimately, further research is warranted in the learning that occurs through the use of active-learning techniques in contrast with traditional teaching methods, the “portability” of active-learning exercises across cultures, and the use of newer media—such as internet and video content—as it is increasingly incorporated into the classroom.
Conceptual Debates in Ethnicity, Nationalism, and Migration
Authors: Larin Stephen J.
Published: November 2018

Since the mid-nineteenth century, the term “ethnic” has come to mean “member of a group of people with a set of shared characteristics,” including a belief in common descent. As such, “ethnic groups” refer to human groups that entertain a subjective belief in their common descent because of similarities of physical or customs type or both, or because of memories of colonization and migration. Ethnic phenomena are primarily explained through the “primordialist” and “instrumentalist” explanations. Primordialism holds that ethnicity is a constitutive and permanent feature of human nature. Instrumentalists argue that ethnicity is a social construct with the purpose of achieving political or material gain. However, the real debate is among constructivists over whether ethnicity should be studied from the participant or the observer perspective. Meanwhile, it is difficult to determine exactly when and where “the nation” first became identified with “the people” as it is today, but the process is closely tied to the rise of popular sovereignty and representative democracy. When nations and nationalism became the subject of academic inquiry, three positions emerged: “modernism,” which holds that both nations and nationalism are modern phenomena; “perennialism,” which argues that nationalist ideology is modern, but nations date back to at least the Middle Ages; and “ethno-symbolism,” a combination of the previous two. Most contemporary classifications of nations and nationalism are typological, the most prominent of which identify two dichotomous types, such as the distinction between “civic” and “ethnic” nationalism. Other classifications are better described as taxonomies.
Conflict Analysis and Resolution as a Field
Authors: Kriesberg Louis
Published: November 2018

Conflict analysis and resolution (CAR) is defined by a set of ideas about avoiding, minimizing, and stopping violence that often is mutually destructive. CAR relates to all domains of conflicts, whether within or between families, organizations, communities, or countries. The CAR field emerged between 1946 and 1969, as numerous wars and crises erupted, associated with the Cold War and the national liberation struggles of the decolonization process. Many doctrines, theories, and research appeared to explain and influence those conflicts. New governmental and nongovernmental actions were also undertaken to prevent future wars by building transnational institutions and fostering reconciliation between former enemies. The rapid expansion and institutionalization of CAR began in the early 1970s, when many American pioneers in the field became discouraged by their failure to accomplish more during the 1950s and 1960s. The end of the Cold War in 1989 and collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 profoundly changed the world environment. Several developments contributed to limiting destructive international and domestic conflicts. These include the increasing economic integration of the world and the intensification of global communications; the growing adherence to norms protecting human rights; increasing number of democratic countries; and growing engagement of women in governance. Core CAR concepts include conflict analysis, conflict fluidity and subjectivity, and multiplicity of actors.
Critical Geopolitics
Authors: Kuus Merje
Published: November 2018

Critical geopolitics is concerned with the geographical assumptions and designations that underlie the making of world politics. The goal of critical geopolitics is to elucidate and explain how political actors spatialize international politics and represent it as a “world” characterized by particular types of places. Eschewing the traditional question of how geography does or can influence politics, critical geopolitics foregrounds “the politics of the geographical specification of politics.” By questioning the assumptions that underpin geopolitical claims, critical geopolitics has evolved from its roots in the poststructuralist, feminist, and postcolonial critique of traditional geopolitics into a major subfield of mainstream human geography. This essay shows that much of critical geopolitics problematizes the statist conceptions of power in social sciences, a conceptualization that John Agnew has called the “territorial trap.” Along with political geography more generally, critical geopolitics argues that spatiality is not confined to territoriality. The discursive construction of social reality is shaped by specific political agents, including intellectuals of statecraft. In addition to the scholarship that draws empirically on the rhetorical strategies of intellectuals of statecraft, there is also a rich body of work on popular geopolitics, and more specifically on resistance geopolitics or anti-geopolitics. Another emerging field of inquiry within critical geopolitics is feminist geopolitics, which shifts the focus from the operations of elite agents to the constructions of political subjects in everyday political practice. Clearly, the heterogeneity of critical geopolitics is central to its vibrancy and success.
Cultural Political Economy
Authors: Biebuyck William , Meltzer Judith
Published: November 2018

Cultural political economy (CPE) is an approach to political economy that focuses on how economic systems, and their component parts, are products of specific human, technical, and natural relations. Notwithstanding longer historical roots, CPE emerged as part of the “cultural turn” within the social sciences. Although it is often seen as countering material determinism and the neglect of culture in conventional approaches in political economy, the cultural turn was less about “adding culture” than about challenging positivist epistemologies in social research. For some, cultural political economy continues to be defined by an orientation toward cultural or “lifeworld” variables such as identity, gender, discourse, and so on, in contrast to conventional political economy’s focus on the material or “systems” dimensions. However, this revalorization of the nonmaterial dimensions of political economic life reinforces a sharp distinction between the cultural and the material, an issue which can be traced to the concept of “(dis)embedding” the economy and subordinating society. A more noticeable development, however, is the increasing orientation of critical (CPE) analyses of global development toward the “economization” of the cultural in the context of mutating forms of neoliberalism. Concomitant to the economization of the cultural in narratives of global development is the “culturalization” of the economic. Here attention is paid not just to the growth of cultural industries but to the multiple ways in which culture has been normalized in discourses of global and corporate development.
Deontological International Ethics
Authors: Doyle Thomas E.
Published: November 2018

Deontological international ethics describes, analyzes, and assesses the principles governing the interactions of actors at and across various levels of society; focuses on the relations between states and other international actors; and is concerned with identifying and specifying the moral duties that each kind of international actor bears toward all others. The core theoretical elements of deontological international ethics include accounts of individual and collective agency, moral reason, the moral nature of action, and respect for the moral law as a necessary feature of ethical action. There are three historical phases of deontological international ethics: divine command and natural law ethics prior to Kant, late-modern thinker Immanuel Kant’s international ethics, and contemporary neo-Kantian approaches to nuclear ethics and transnational economic relations. The divine command ethical theories posit divine authority as the absolute and incontrovertible source of moral obligation. Meanwhile, natural law focuses on the intrinsically moral nature of military action and the centrality of moral agency and intention in the rightful use of force. On the other hand, Kant’s systemic deontological ethical theory posits individuals and states as autonomous and rational moral agents, identifies the categorical imperative as the supreme rational principle or morality and the concept of public right as its political corollary, describes a formal method for actors to determine their moral duty in ideal and non-ideal contexts, and applies this theory to the problems of interstate conflict and commerce.
Development: Institutional Perspectives
Authors: Fairbrother Malcolm
Published: November 2018

There are three key literatures on the political economy of development that all emphasize the importance of institutions, but in different and somewhat contradictory ways. These literatures focus on developmental states, good governance, and political economic pathways. The developmental states literature is based largely on case studies of East Asian countries that have, since about 1950, largely “caught up” to the already developed nations in Europe, North America, and the Antipodes. The central conclusion of this literature has been that successful late development requires a competent, committed state bureaucracy, independent enough to be capable of imposing its will on domestic businesspeople, but also sufficiently connected to them so as to make good decisions about what will to impose. The literature focusing on good governance, based largely in economics, also sees state actions and characteristics as keys to positive development outcomes. But while the developmental states literature argues that states need to play an interventionist role in “governing” markets (including not infrequently restricting them), the good governance literature usually looks more favorably on free markets. Finally, research in the political economic pathways literature tends to examine much longer periods of time than the other two literatures, and typically emphasizes economic and political developmental outcomes as joint products of differences in the historical trajectories followed by different countries. The key explanatory variables for this literature are a country’s circumstances in the colonial period, and levels and types of social inequality.
Devolution, Regional and Peripheral Nationalism
Authors: Lecours André
Published: November 2018

Social science scholars have repeatedly predicted the demise of regional (or peripheral) nationalism, from the late nineteenth century to the post-World War II period and in the 1990s. However, all suggestions about the death of regional nationalism have been proven wrong. On the contrary, nationalist movements in the West have not only survived advanced capitalist development in liberal democratic contexts but have thrived as well. In the developing world, decolonization gave rise to a variety of regional nationalist movements that frequently spiraled into violent conflict and secessionist attempts. To deal with regional nationalism, states often turned to devolution, resulting in the implementation of various schemes of autonomy, most of which came under the guise of federalism. Three trends characterize the literature on regional nationalism and its management through devolution: a change in the way regional nationalism is viewed; a transformation in the type of political, institutional, and constitutional response scholars have suggested toward regional nationalism; and a willingness to accept, or even favor, secession as a possible solution to conflict in multinational and/or multiethnic countries. At the same time, there are at least two challenges in the study of regional nationalism and its management: objectivity and the need to develop a greater comparative perspective.
Diplomacy and International Law
Authors: Clinton David
Published: November 2018

Within the international society, law and diplomacy have always been complementary and interdependent. However, lawyers and diplomats deal with international issues differently, making them rivals to be the primary mode of international interaction. Diplomacy is the art and practice of conducting negotiations between representatives of states; it usually refers to international diplomacy, the conduct of international relations through the mediation of professional diplomats with regard to a full range of topical issues. Nations sometimes resort to international arbitration when faced with a specific question or point of contention in need of resolution. For most of history, there were no official or formal procedures for such proceedings. They were generally accepted to abide by general principles and protocols related to international law and justice. International law is the set of rules generally regarded and accepted as binding in relations between states and between nations. It serves as a framework for the practice of stable and organized international relations. Much of international law is consent-based governance. This means that a state member is not obliged to abide by this type of law, unless it has expressly consented to a particular course of conduct, or entered a diplomatic convention. Interdisciplinary courses, like diplomacy and international law, are designed to help one think critically about diplomatic and international legal issues in real-life contexts, while applying theory to practice and addressing some of the key questions facing the world today.
East Asia and Foreign Policy
Authors: Zhang Enyu , Zhang Qingmin
Published: November 2018

The study of East Asian foreign policies has progressed in sync with mainstream international relations (IR) theories: (1) from perhaps an inadvertent or unconscious coincidence with realism during the Cold War to consciously using different theoretical tools to study the various aspects of East Asian foreign policies; and (2) from the dominance of realism to a diversity of theories in studying East Asian foreign policies. Nonetheless, the old issues from the Cold War have not been resolved; the Korean Peninsula and the Taiwan Strait remain two flashpoints in the region, with new twists that can derail regional stability and prosperity. New issues also have emerged and made East Asia most volatile. One issue is concerned with restructuring the balance of power in East Asia, particularly the dynamics among the major players, i.e. Japan, China, and the United States. Regionalism is another new topic in the study of East Asian foreign policies. A review of the current state of the field suggests that two complementary issues be given priority in the future. First, the foreign policy interests and strategies of individual small states vis-à-vis great powers in the region, particularly those in Southeast Asia and the Korean peninsula. Second, what could really elevate the study of East Asian foreign policies in the general field of IR and foreign policy analysis is to continue exploring innovative analytical frameworks that can expand the boundaries of existing metatheories and paradigms.
Ecofeminism and Global Environmental Politics
Authors: Allison Juliann Emmons
Published: November 2018

Ecofeminism can be described as both an ecological philosophy and a social movement that draws on environmental studies, critiques of modernity and science, and feminist critical analyses and activism to explicate connections between women and nature, and the implications of these relationships for environmental politics. Feminist writer Françoise d’Eaubonne is widely credited to be the founder of ecofeminism in the early 1970s. Ecofeminists embrace a wide range of views concerning the causal role of Western dualistic thinking, patriarchal structures of power, and capitalism in ecological degradation, and the oppression of women and other subjugated peoples. Collectively, they find value in extending feminist analyses to the simultaneous interrogation of the domination of both nature and women. The history of ecofeminism may be divided into four decade-long periods. Ecofeminism emerged in the early 1970s, coincident with a significant upturn in the contemporary women’s and environmental movements. In the 1980s, ecofeminism entered the academy as ecofeminist activists and scholars focused their attention on the exploitation of natural resources and women, particularly in the developing world. They criticized government and cultural institutions that constrained women’s reproductive and productive roles in society, and argued that environmental protection ultimately depends on increasing women’s socioeconomic and political power. In the current postfeminist and postenvironmentalist world, ecofeminists are less concerned with theoretical labels than with effective women’s activism to achieve ecological sustainability.
Environmental Justice
Authors: Bryner Gary
Published: November 2018

Environmental justice brings together two of the most powerful social movements of the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries, environmentalism and civil rights. Despite the success in reducing pollution and improving environmental quality in many areas, the reduction of race- and income-based disparities in environmental conditions, such as the levels of pollution to which individuals are exposed, has seen limited progress. Minority and low income communities continue to bear the brunt of environmental burdens. The idea of environmental justice also helps clarify the ethical issues underlying climate change and compels action to reduce the threat even in the face of uncertainties and to help poor nations with the costs of adapting to disruptive climate change. A major challenge in environmental justice is deciding how to define the problem. Five options for framing the issue of environmental justice capture most of the approaches taken by advocates and scholars. These are the civil rights framework; theories of distributive justice, fairness, and rights; the public participation framework, social justice framework, and ecological sustainability framework. These frameworks are not mutually exclusive. They overlap considerably and proponents of one primary framework may rely on elements of others as they frame the issues. Advocates of environmental justice will find that elements of each can contribute to their goal. No one framework is sufficient, but in recognizing where those with other views are coming from, we can develop opportunities for creative solutions that bring together alternative approaches.
Environmental Security and Climate Change
Authors: Dalby Simon
Published: November 2018

Environmental security focuses on the ecological conditions necessary for sustainable development. It encompasses discussions of the relationships between environmental change and conflict as well as the larger global policy issues linking resources and international relations to the necessity for doing both development and security differently. Climate change has become an increasingly important part of the discussion as its consequences have become increasingly clear. What is not at all clear is in what circumstances climate change may turn out to be threat multiplier leading to conflict. Earth system science findings and the recognition of the scale of human transformations of nature in what is understood in the 21st century to be a new geological epoch, the Anthropocene, now require environmental security to be thought of in terms of preventing the worst dangers of fragile states being unable to cope with the stresses caused by rapid environmental change or perhaps the economic disruptions caused by necessary transitions to a post fossil fueled economic system. But so far, at least, this focus on avoiding the worst consequences of future climate change has not displaced traditional policies of energy security that primarily ensure supplies of fossil fuels to power economic growth. Failure to make this transition will lead to further rapid disruptions of climate and add impetus to proposals to artificially intervene in the earth system using geoengineering techniques, which might in turn generate further conflicts from states with different interests in how the earth system is shaped in future. While the Paris Agreement on Climate Change recognized the urgency of tackling climate change, the topic has not become security policy priority for most states, nor yet for the United Nations, despite numerous policy efforts to securitize climate change and instigate emergency responses to deal with the issue. More optimistic interpretations of the future suggest possibilities of using environmental actions to facilitate peace building and a more constructive approach to shaping earth’s future.
Environmental Sustainability and Sustainable Development
Authors: Manno Jack , Fix Adam
Published: November 2018

Environmental sustainability as a topic in international studies is most often considered in the context of sustainable development, a goal-oriented, normative concept that suggests the need to reconcile the often conflicting goals of economic development, environmental protection, and social progress. The concept of sustainable development begs the question of how to promote human welfare and prosperity (development) without undermining the ecological life-support systems on which all prosperity ultimately must depend (sustainability). More colloquially: How can we live well while living lightly on the Earth? Unfortunately, economic and social “development” to date has too often meant a steady increase of activities that have led to air and water pollution, cleared forests, drained wetlands, obstructed rivers, and other ecosystem disruptions. These material transformations alter the structure and function of ecosystems, often destroying the services that ecosystems provide and routinely renew: clean fresh water, healthy air, fertile soils, and the other basics of habitability. When pollution crosses borders, when natural resource depletion and environmental degradation cause people to migrate for survival, when global climate and the world’s oceans are threatened, then sustainability becomes an international concern and necessarily a focus of international studies. Ultimately, the challenge for international studies scholars studying sustainability is to understand how to create an international system imbued with consideration of ecological interdependence and coevolution, a sense of responsibility to future generations, and a capacity to make informed decisions based on ecological rationality. In order to find our way out of the sustainability conundrum, policies must be designed to improve welfare without increasing energy and material throughput. This means investing human resources into alternatives to consumption, such as innovations in simple living, collective action, nonmaterial personal satisfaction, and needs prevention.
Ethnicity, Nationalism, and Migration in the Middle East
Authors: Sahin Zeynep
Published: November 2018

Since the second half of the 1940s, the Middle East has experienced intense migrations. In 2005 alone, the region received a total of approximately 6 million refugees. Migration flows to and from the Middle East have been linked to nationalist movements and ethnic conflicts. However, these relations have received little attention from scholars. Scholarly work on migration in the Middle East that has accumulated between the early 1950s and the late 1980s falls into two broad categories in terms of subject matter: Jewish migration to Israel and the Palestinian refugees, and migrations to labor-short countries of the Gulf and Europe. New trends in the literature on migration in the Middle East can also be identified, including those relating to the gender aspects of migration, population displacement and resettlement, return migration, and the relationship between migration and security. Although the field has made significant progress—the scope of the literature with respect to subject matter has broadened from the 1980s onward, and the methods used by scholars have become more sophisticated over the years—there are some shortcomings that need to be addressed. A number of important issues, such as citizenship or economic dynamics, remain unexplored. Since labor migrations to and from the Middle East are central to economic development, a focus on the evolution of migration may shed light on numerous relevant themes.
Foreign Intervention in Ethnic Conflicts
Authors: Paquin Jonathan , Saideman Stephen M.
Published: November 2018

Foreign intervention in ethnic conflicts has received significant attention in the last 20 years. Scholars have initially considered the sources for these interventions through instrumental and affective factors, though a better classification involves grouping these motives between domestic and international factors. The former category assumes that a third state’s internal politics best explain motives of intervention, and that domestic groups within the state have the greatest impact on foreign policy decision making. Theories based on domestic explanations assume that domestic politics greatly matter in the formulation of states’ decisions to intervene or not in ethnic conflicts elsewhere. As for the external explanations, scholars share a common assertion that the international environment is the central determinant explaining third state intervention. These explanations focus on the impact of institutions and international norms on the international relations of ethnic conflicts. In addition to these approaches, this area of research still contains many issues left unaddressed, such as how interference from outside might affect an ethnic conflict, and what forms of analysis might be used to study foreign interventions. Scholars have applied both quantitative and qualitative techniques, and the diaspora literature stands out for relying almost exclusively on case studies and on very notable cases. Otherwise, the rest of the work in this field follows the current standards by using a mixture of case studies and quantitative analyses depending on the questions in play.
Foreign Policy Decision Making: Evolution, Models, and Methods
Authors: Brulé David , Mintz Alex
Published: November 2018

Choices made by individuals, small groups, or coalitions representing nation-states result in policies or strategies with international outcomes. Foreign policy decision-making, an approach to international relations, is aimed at studying such decisions. The rational choice model is widely considered to be the paradigmatic approach to the study of international relations and foreign policy. The evolution of the decision-making approach to foreign policy analysis has been punctuated by challenges to rational choice from cognitive psychology and organizational theory. In the late 1950s and early 1960s, scholars began to ponder the deterrence puzzle as they sought to find solutions to the problem of credibility. During this period, cross-disciplinary research on organizational behavior began to specify a model of decision making that contrasted with the rational model. Among these models were the bounded rationality/cybernetic model, organizational politics model, bureaucratic politics model, prospect theory, and poliheuristic theory. Despite these and other advances, the gulf between the rational choice approaches and cognitive psychological approaches appears to have stymied progress in the field of foreign policy decision-making. Scholars working within the cognitivist school should develop theories of decision making that incorporate many of the cognitive conceptual inputs in a logical and coherent framework. They should also pursue a multi-method approach to theory testing using experimental, statistical, and case study methods.