Negotiation Of Agreements Research Articles

The current state of methods for establishing reliability in qualitative chemistry education research articles

The tradition of qualitative research drives much of chemistry education research activity. When performing qualitative studies, researchers must demonstrate the trustworthiness of their analysis so researchers and practitioners consuming their work can understand if and how the presented research claims and conclusions might be transferable to their unique educational settings. There are a number of steps researchers can take to demonstrate the trustworthiness of their work, one of which is demonstrating and reporting evidence of reliability. The purpose of this methodological review is to investigate the methods researchers use to establish and report reliability for chemistry education research articles including a qualitative research component. Drawing from the literature on qualitative research methodology and content analysis, we describe the approaches for establishing the reliability of qualitative data analysis using various measures of inter-rater reliability and processes including negotiated agreement. We used this background literature to guide our review of research articles containing a qualitative component and published in Chemistry Education Research and Practice and the Journal of Chemical Education from the years 2010 through 2019 for whether they report evidence of reliability. We followed this by a more in-depth analysis of how articles from the years 2017 through 2019 discuss reliability. Our analysis indicates that, overall, researchers are presenting evidence of reliability in chemistry education research (CER) articles by reporting reliability measures, describing a process of negotiated agreement, or mentioning reliability and the steps taken to demonstrate it. However, there is a reliance on reporting only percent agreement, which is not considered an acceptable measure of reliability when used on its own. In addition, the descriptions of how reliability was established were not always clear, which may make it difficult for readers to evaluate the veracity of research findings. Our findings indicate that, as a field, CER researchers should be more cognizant of the appropriateness of how we establish reliability for qualitative analysis and should more clearly present the processes by which reliability was established in CER manuscripts.

The Call for Bilateral/Regional Trade Agreements and the Salient Features of the Anti-Dumping & Countervailing Duties Act, No. 2 of 2018 of Sri Lanka

The Call for Bilateral/Regional Trade Agreements and the Salient Features of the Anti-Dumping & Countervailing Duties Act, No. 2 of 2018 of Sri Lanka

Outside‐in Politicization of EU–Western Africa Relations: What Role for Civil Society Organizations?

AbstractThis article explores the empirical relevance of researching outside‐in politicization processes in European studies. To this end, it examines to what extent and how civil society organizations (CSOs) have contributed to the politicization of EU policies towards Western Africa in two cases: the negotiation of Economic Partnership Agreements and the EU's engagement with the G5 Sahel. CSOs were strongly engaged in the trade negotiations, while they were largely excluded from the G5 Sahel process. In both cases this was due to CSOs' own initiatives, or the absence thereof, with these strongly linked to being either invited or discouraged by official actors. The article argues that authority transfer and the domestic context – including state fragility and state–society relations – are relevant to explaining the (non‐)involvement of CSOs in outside‐in politicization.

The Treaty Imaginary and Tribal Sovereignty in South Dakota

This article examines the history of the South Dakota "Mitigation Act" (as it is commonly know by Lakota people) in the 1990s and early 2000s. The Mitigation Act, enacted in 1998 and implemented over a period of nine years, was meant to create a negotiated agreement between tribal governments and the state for jurisdiction over the regulation of hunting and fishing on the Missouri River that would avoid a long history of bitter litigation over jurisdictional contests. The act was also meant to return lands held by the US Army Corps of Engineers, originally acquired for the purpose of constructing three main-stem dams on the Missouri, to the tribes that had originally held the land, and to the State of South Dakota. Both the goal of negotiating state and tribal jurisdiction, and returning lands to the state and the tribes, led to heightened intensity of the very tribal-state conflicts that the act was meant avoid. Based primarily on the senatorial records of Senator Thomas Daschle (D-SD) and the gubernatorial papers of William Janklow (R), the article examines the logic of the "treaty imaginary" among Lakota tribal governments and their constituencies, and the liberal democratic principle of negotiation by "all interested parties" at the center of development of the Mitigation Act. The article ties the conflict over the act to its fundamental misrecognition of the continuing validity of treaties for Lakota people, and the family resemblance the act had to the illegal taking of the Black Hills for many Lakota and other Great Sioux Nation tribes.

War termination and women's political rights

Does the manner in which a civil war is terminated affect women's political rights developments? In this article, we develop an analytical framework showing how the context of war termination type affects both the opportunity and willingness of warring parties and their openness towards the influence of international actors, thereby making it possible to translate social ruptures and pressures from women's groups into post-war improvements in women's political rights. Studying 205 civil war terminations in 69 countries since 1989, we find support for our claim that a conflict terminated through the negotiation and implementation of a comprehensive peace agreement significantly improved women's political rights in the post-war period when compared to other types of conflict termination. This finding holds after controlling for the women's rights provisions negotiated in the agreement. Our results carry substantial policy relevance by underlining the significance of women's inclusion in peace processes.

Policy Change Through Negotiated Agreements: The Case of Greening Swiss Agricultural Policy

Negotiated agreements are a promising pathway for policy change. This paper revisits and extends characteristics of negotiated agreements using the Advocacy Coalition Framework. We focus on two characteristics of negotiated agreements that previous literature has not explicitly addressed. First, we scrutinize the role of policy core and secondary policy beliefs in actor constellations. Secondly, we address partial success, that is, the notion that actors concede on some points, but in return succeed in others. We investigate these two characteristics in the 2014 reform of Swiss agricultural policy. Based on cluster and social network analysis, we exemplify how negotiated agreements embedded in a participatory policy process lead to a surprising level of policy change by promoting agricultural production practices with an intended positive effect on the environment. We show that rather than coalitions based on policy core beliefs, the formation of groups of actors based on secondary beliefs who span across the coalitions formed the basis for a negotiated agreement. Green and conservative groups were both able to achieve partial success. We conclude that insights from this exemplary case study should revive the concept and initialize a research agenda on negotiated agreements as a pathway for change in domestic policymaking.

Metadiscursive Nouns in Conclusion Subsections of Novice Writers’ PhD Dissertation and Expert Writers’ Research Articles

Academic discourse is the product of agreement negotiation among members in academic communities. The primary rhetorical function of academic discourse is to persuade the readers into agreeing upon the writers’ claims. This rhetorical function can be embodied through textual linking and stance expressing realized by linguistic devices. Metadiscursive nouns, as an extension and supplementation of metadiscourse, combine these two functions and contribute to the cohesion of textual organization and the conveying of writers’ stance. This study explores the difference in the employment of this linguistic device in PhD dissertation written by Chinses advanced English learners as novice writers and research articles published in international journals written by expert writers in the field of foreign linguistics and applied linguistics. The purpose of this study is to reveal the different ways of knowledge construction by means of metadiscursive nouns in the two genres and the interactional conventions embedded in the academic communities. Explicit instruction strategies are provided to enhance the pedagogical practice in academic writing.

The impact of the General Data Protection Regulation on internet interconnection

The Internet comprises thousands of independently operated networks, interconnected using bi-laterally negotiated data exchange agreements. The European Union (EU)'s General Data Pro-tection Regulation (GDPR) imposes strict restrictions on handling of personal data of European Economic Area (EEA) residents. A close examination of the text of the law suggests signifi-cant cost to application firms. Available empirical evidence confirms reduction in data usage in the EEA relative to other markets. We investigate whether this decline in derived demand for data exchange impacts EEA networks' decisions to interconnect relative to those of non-EEA OECD networks. Our data consists of a large sample of interconnection agreements between networks globally in 2015–2019. All evidence estimates zero effects: the number of observed agreements, the inferred agreement types, and the number of observed IP-address-level inter-connection points per agreement. We also find economically small effects of the GDPR on the entry and the observed number of customers of networks. We conclude there is no visible short run effects of the GDPR on these measures at the internet layer.

Far right alternative news media as ‘indignation mobilization mechanisms’: how the far right opposed the Global Compact for Migration

ABSTRACT The paper analyses the role of alternative far-right media in promoting and organizing mobilization against the Global Compact for Migration – the first intergovernmentally negotiated agreement, prepared under the auspices of the United Nations, covering all dimensions of international migration in a holistic and comprehensive manner. Exploring four European alternative far-right media: PI-News in Germany, Il Primato Nazionale in Italy, the UK localization of Breitbart, and the transnational Voice of Europe, we show that these media have gone beyond (dis)informing and have actively mobilized and channeled indignation through petitioning and protest organization. While most research on far-right media practices so far has focused either on social media interactions or exclusively on ‘disinformation’ and ‘fake news’, we analyse web based alternative news media as part of а far-right social movement that has successfully used progressive left-wing protests repertoires and tactics. We argue that alternative far-right news media act as ‘indignation mobilization mechanisms’ that not only fuel the indignation of the public by channeling the messages of far-right politicians but also channel bottom-up indignation through online campaigns, petitions, and offline street protests. This unabashedly biased and mobilization-oriented approach is what distinguishes far-right media from mainstream media and guarantees them a loyal and dedicated supporter base.

Talks before the talks: Effects of pre-negotiation on reaching peace agreements in intrastate armed conflicts, 2005–15

Pre-negotiation is widely accepted as a means to convince intrastate conflict parties to negotiate formally; however, research has not yet established a causal link between early efforts to bring warring parties together and the outcome of any negotiated settlement. This gap begs the question: To what extent do activities during the pre-negotiation phase contribute to the signing of a peace agreement? Theory on interstate conflict suggests that pre-negotiation reduces risk, thereby convincing conflict parties that they have more to gain from negotiating than from fighting. However, in conflicts between governments and non-state armed actors, this article argues that reciprocity paves the way for reaching peace agreements. This article introduces a new dataset on pre-negotiation including nearly all intrastate armed conflicts between 2005 and 2015. Confirming previous findings, mediation is significantly and positively correlated with reaching a type of peace agreement; conflicts over government are more likely to end in a negotiated agreement than conflicts over territory or both government and territory. In contrast to existing qualitative research, this study finds little evidence that pre-negotiation increases the likelihood that conflict dyads sign peace agreements. Future quantitative research on this topic requires more nuanced measures of the conditions under which conflict parties shift from unilateral to joint decisionmaking.

Mediation and Appropriate Dispute Resolution

2019 was a significant year for mediation. On 7 August 2019, 46 states – an unprecedented number – came together in Singapore to sign the United Nations Convention on International Mediated Settlement Agreements Resulting from Mediation (“Singapore Convention”). The Convention, which comes into force on 12 September 2020, provides a legal framework for the recognition and enforcement of mediated settlement agreements across borders and thereby addresses one of the major criticisms of international mediation, namely, the lack of an internationally recognised expedited enforcement mechanism. The Singapore Convention aims to be for mediation what the Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbitral Awards is for arbitration. The Singapore Convention casts an even brighter spotlight on Singapore as a mediation and dispute resolution hub; with this attention comes increased interest in Singapore’s jurisprudence on mediation and other forms of appropriate dispute resolution (“ADR”). It is therefore timely to introduce a chapter on mediation and ADR to the Ann Rev. In terms of scope, this chapter will not deal with arbitration unless it forms part of a mixed mode dispute resolution process, which has mediation as an element. Further, the authors note that the body of jurisprudence on mediation and ADR-related subject matter is evolving. Thus, the categories of cases in this chapter will develop accordingly. In this inaugural chapter, the authors offer a review of cases in three categories. First, cases on the recognition and enforcement of negotiated and/or mediated settlement agreements are examined. Next, cases which address issues in mediation and ADR practice and ethics are reviewed. Finally, the authors consider cases dealing with civil procedure aspects of mediation, including disclosure of mediation evidence and the apportionment of costs.

Informal instruments to impose human rights obligations on foreign investors: An emerging practice of legality?

AbstractIn parallel to the negotiation of international investment agreements to protect foreign investment, intergovernmental organizations have deployed considerable efforts to adopt and implement standards of conduct for business enterprises operating abroad. Despite their informal character under international law, these instruments are increasingly mentioned in international investment agreements and investment arbitration. How can references to informal instruments elaborated by intergovernmental organizations contribute to the imposition of human rights obligations on foreign investors in international investment law? Drawing upon the interactional theory developed by Jutta Brunnée and Stephen J. Toope, this article considers these references as a practice that has the potential to strengthen the normative pull towards compliance with human rights norms. In addition to emphasizing the role of international investment law as a relevant forum to develop a practice surrounding these informal instruments, it assesses whether the use of these instruments by members of a community of practice is intended to establish a genuine sense of obligation and to impose human rights obligations on foreign investors. Even if some instances evidence a practice that strengthens such a sense of obligation, most of the references included in international investment agreements and investment arbitration do not render a practice of legality.

PNS16 Real Purchasing Price Negotiated with the Italian Medicine Agency in 2016-2018

In last years the Italian Medicines Agency (AIFA) has increasingly adopted negotiating agreement to manage the raise of pharmaceutical expenditure, as AIFA discount, especially for high-cost drugs distributed through hospital channel. This analysis aimed to quantify the amount of price reductions negotiated with AIFA, identifying the deviation between ex-factory price and Real Purchasing Price (RPP). 102 drugs belonging to different therapeutic areas and approved by EMA in 2016-2018 period was investigated. Of 102 drugs approved, the 55 drugs reimbursed by AIFA for the first indication were analyzed. For each drug, EMA website and Italian Official Gazette were investigated to evaluate regulatory (i.e. orphan and innovative designations) and pricing features (i.e. ex-factory prices). The RPP by hospital pharmacies came from an IQVIA statistic elaboration based on a proprietary dataset, which gathers drug consumption and price from a panel of Italian hospital pharmacies. Finally, the difference between ex-factory net price and RPP represented the total discount negotiated with AIFA, including commercial discounts. In 2016, AIFA reimbursed 19 drugs, presenting an average total discount of 30%, increased to 38% in 2017 (22 drugs) and 39% for 14 drugs in 2018. Focusing on innovative drugs, the discount increased from 36% in 2016, to 47% in 2018. Investigation of therapeutic areas highlighted that AIFA applied higher discounts to cancer drugs, from 38% in 2016, to 45% in 2018. Contrary, orphan drugs showed a 35% discount in 2017 and 2018. Last years showed an overall increase of discount applied, maybe linked to several high-cost drugs introduction. Contrary to innovative drugs, orphan drugs benefit for their status, showing discounts below the average. The analysis highlighted the crucial step of the price negotiation for launches in the Italian market: further investigation is needed to evaluate the whole impact of negotiation agreements, which can additionally influence molecules’ effective price.

The Impact of the General Data Protection Regulation on Internet Interconnection

The Internet comprises thousands of independently operated networks, interconnected using bilaterally negotiated data exchange agreements. The European Union (EU)’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) imposes strict restrictions on handling of personal data of European Economic Area (EEA) residents. A close examination of the text of the law suggests significant cost to application firms. Available empirical evidence confirms reduction in data usage in the EEA relative to other markets. We investigate whether this decline in derived demand for data exchange impacts investment in interconnection by networks in the EEA relative to networks in non-EEA OECD countries. Our data consists of a large sample of interconnection agreements between networks globally in 2015–2019. All evidence estimates precisely zero effects: the number of observed agreements, the inferred agreement types, and the number of observed IP-address-level interconnection points per agreement. We also find economically small effects of the GDPR on the entry and the observed number of customers of networks. We conclude there is no visible short run consequence of the GDPR at the internet layer. Institutional subscribers to the NBER working paper series, and residents of developing countries may download this paper without additional charge at www.nber.org.

The impact of open access publishing agreements at the University of Vienna in light of the Plan S requirements: a review of current status, challenges and perspectives

The University of Vienna, in partnership with other organisations across Austria, has been at the forefront of the open access (OA) movement in Europe and has been actively broadening the OA publishing opportunities for its researchers for well over half a decade. Although the launch of Plan S in September 2018 by a group of funding bodies that includes the Austrian Science Fund (FWF) brought its unique challenges, it has also provided the international research community with a much-needed impetus, jolting publishers into action and raising awareness among university administrators and faculty in general. The announcement also prompted the Vienna University Library to perform a mapping exercise, with a view to assessing how well the current publishing agreements match the needs of the University’s researchers in light of the Plan S requirements. This article presents the results of this analysis and shares some of the challenges encountered through the negotiation and implementation of OA publishing agreements and how these, together with the revised Plan S implementation guidelines, have been informing the University’s strategy.

Industry submissions on alcohol in the context of Australia's trade and investment agreements: A content and thematic analysis of publicly available documents.

Alcohol use is a leading risk factor for death and disability, responsible for 3 million deaths in 2016. The alcohol industry is a powerful player in shaping trade and investment rules in ways that can constrain the ability of governments to regulate alcoholic beverages to reduce harm. This paper analyses publicly available submissions about alcohol in the context of Australia's free trade agreements to determine the key themes put forward by industry. We searched for submissions made to the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade by alcohol industry trade associations, alcohol manufacturers, distributors and retailers, general industry association, and government agencies with responsibilities for alcohol trade, about specific free trade agreements involving Australia. Thirty-one submissions in relation to eight trade agreements were included for analysis. The analysis involved both descriptive content analysis and thematic analysis. Findings suggest that industry is actively seeking to shape trade negotiations around alcohol. Priority issues for the industry include improving market access, harmonising regulation, improving clarity and transparency, reducing the burden of regulation and preventing monopolies on product names. The alcohol industry and associated business and government organisations are actively working to influence trade agreement negotiations for industry economic gain, arguing for rules which may undermine public health goals. The analysis suggests that public health experts should pay attention to trade and investment agreements and develop counter frames to ensure agreements do not create barriers for coherent health policies.

Promoting sustainable development through trade? EU trade agreements and global value chains

AbstractSustainable development provisions have become an integral part of the European Union's (EU's) ‘new generation’ trade agreements. Yet, a growing number of empirical works show that their design varies significantly, even in the trade agreements signed with countries at similar (low) levels of development. We contend that this variation can be accounted for by discussing how the growing integration of the EU economy with specific developing countries across global value chains (GVCs) affects the domestic politics of regulatory export in the EU. European firms that operate within GVCs rely on imports of inputs produced in low-labor cost countries. These firms tend to oppose the export of those regulatory burdens that generate an increase in their imports' variable costs. The political mobilization of these actors weakens domestic coalitions supporting regulatory export strategies, which explains why the EU adopts a more lenient approach over the inclusion of sustainable development provisions in Preferential Trade Agreement negotiations with some developing countries.

Effects of Implementing the Timed and Targeted Counselling Model on Pregnancy Outcomes and Newborn Survival in Rural Uganda: Protocol for a Quasi-Experimental Study.

Background: Although mortality rates have declined in Uganda over the last decade, maternal mortality is still high at 336 deaths per 100,000 live births, as is infant mortality at 43 deaths per 1000 live births. One in every 19 babies born in Uganda does not live to celebrate their first birthday. Many of these deaths occur within the first 28 days of life, forming the single largest category of death. Promising effects for preventing death are expected from timed and targeted counselling (ttC), an intervention package of key messages and actions that address integrated health and nutrition needs of the mothers and children, barriers and negotiation agreement, to cause sustainable behavioural change at specific timelines in the first 1000 days. Methods: The study has a quasi-experimental design in order to evaluate the implementation and effectiveness of the ttC intervention. Participants are pregnant women who have been registered by village health team (VHT) members and who live in Hoima (intervention region) or Masindi (control region) districts, who will be monitored throughout their pregnancy up to at least six weeks after delivery. A multi-stage sampling technique will be employed to select participants, the study sites being purposively chosen. Sample size is determined using the pregnancy rate from the population estimates, resulting in a total required sample of 1218 (609 each in the intervention and control group). Study instruments that will be used include the Ugandan VHT household register (in which all mothers to be studied will be registered), the ttC register (an additional tool for the study area), and a study questionnaire, to collect data at outcome level. Univariate, bivariate and multivariate analyses will be performed using SPSS to evaluate intervention effects on outcomes (e.g., relationship between pregnancy outcomes and antenatal attendance). In addition, quantitative findings will be triangulated with qualitative data, and collected through interviews and focus group discussions with participants and implementers. Discussion: The proposed study will examine the effectiveness of implementing ttC to improve maternal and child outcomes in Uganda. If ttC is effective, broader implementation of appropriate antenatal services can be advised as essential newborn care improvements. Trial registration: PACTR, PACTR202002812123868. Registered on 25 February 2020.

Procedural unconstitutionality and illegality of Prespa Agreement

The Prespa Agreement signed on June 17, 2018, which changed the constitutional name of the Republic of Macedonia, is a precedent on international law. In the procedure of his conclusion, ratification, and execution were committed serious violations of procedural rules. Although the violations that this agreement produces are numerous, and with different nature, the focus of this paper is on procedural violations. The Prespa Agreement also has a lot of substantial mistakes which is in confrontation with the Constitutional, and the international law because the Prespa Agreements provisions derogate some essentially fundamental rights as a right of self-determination. But this paper is focused only on fundamental violations of legal norms that prescribes the procedure for promulgation of the Prespa Agreement - the process of negotiation, conclusion, ratification, and publishing. The process of negotiating, signing and ratifying the Prespa Agreement is followed by flagrant violations of the constitutional norms, statute norms, and the norms of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties in the part that regulates the issue of persons who was competence for adopting an authenticating the text of a treaty. Besides the introductory part and historical introduction to the genesis of the problem, the focus of this paper is the procedure of negotiating, concluding, and ratifying the Prespa Agreement. The procedural aspects of the referendum on the Prespa Agreement will be elaborate in the part called “negotiation and conclusion of international agreement” because, by the time being, this referendum was issue notice after the conclusion phase and before ratification.

Geographical Indications: A Major Challenge for MERCOSUR

Abstract This article focuses on the intellectual property chapter of the EU-MERCOSUR Free Trade Agreement. It is not intended to provide an exhaustive analysis of all the intellectual property rights involved but to go deeply into a specific matter, geographical indications, which is undoubtedly a controversial concession in the chapter. The entire free trade agreement negotiations took more than 20 years and ended in June 2019 with an ‘Agreement in principle’. From the very beginning it involved a red line for the MERCOSUR countries, namely the intellectual property chapter. This article will show the complexity of including the private rights of prior users (generic names, plant varieties and trademarks) as a trade-off for agricultural market access in negotiations mainly focused on tariff reduction and trade rules. In addition, the imbalance between the parties was deepened by the lack of regionally harmonized intellectual property standards within MERCOSUR. In this regard, the main objective of this article is to identify the legal challenges derived from the overlap of national, regional and bi-regional rules that the Mercosur countries will face when implementing the geographical indication commitments, given the bloc’s legal and institutional structure. Unlike tariff reduction, the commitments derived from the negotiation of private rights are a crucial issue. Against this background, some proposals are outlined to address how to determine a medium- and long-term strategy based on the needs of local producers to add value to their productions.