Degree Of Obligation Research Articles

The early emergence of ombuds systems in Japanese science universities

Abstract Ombuds systems in higher education institutes have become increasingly commonplace in North America and Europe, yet there remains a dearth of studies that examine dispute resolution systems in Asia. This article examines the case of Japan, a veritable technology powerhouse that adopted its first organizational ombuds offices in 2019 and 2021 at two leading science universities: Okinawa Institute of Technology and Kyushu Institute of Technology. We assess why these were established, how the change came about, and with what remit the offices are entrusted. We find that policy transfer from abroad occurred in both cases, yet with considerably different degrees of obligation and volitional lesson-drawing, and to considerably different ends. Additionally, policy entrepreneurs played key roles in agenda setting and institutionalization. Nearly all interviewees in this study raised the issue of gender harassment as an enduring challenge for which new conflict resolution mechanisms are needed. The two newly introduced ombuds offices therefore represent one possible model for leveling inequalities in the science landscape.

Developing and enforcing internal information systems standards: InduMaker’s Standards Management Process

It is widely agreed that standards provide numerous benefits when available and enforced. Company-internal Information Systems (IS) management procedures and solutions, in the following coined IS ‘standards’, allow for harmonizing operations between company units, locations and even different service providers. However, many companies lack an organized process for defining and managing internal IS standards, which causes uncertainties and delays in decision making, planning, and design processes. In this case study of the globally operating InduMaker (anonymized company name), an established manufacturing supplier, we look into the company-internal management of IS standards. Theoretically grounded in the organizational and IS-focused literature on business process modelling and business process commoditization, we describe and investigate InduMaker’s newly developed Standard Management Process (SMP) for defining and managing company-internal business and IS standards, with which the multinational pursues offering clear answers to business and IT departments about existing IS standards, their degree of obligation, applicability, and scope at any time.

Marrying in a single moment: Zimbabwean Baptist ethics and the management of kin relations

AbstractScholarship about Southern Africa registers a persistent tension between the prospect of relations created in a processual manner over time and the role of discrete ritual or lifecycle events. Marriage is one of the sites where this tension becomes particularly evident, not only in bridewealth transactions but also in an increasing prominence given to European-style ‘white weddings’. For Baptist Christians living in urban Zimbabwe, the tension raises a host of ethical considerations. This group of Christians seeks to establish and maintain social relations that they value for cultural and for religious reasons, while also facing the ethical task of moderating the degree of obligation that these relations can exert over them. They do so in order to maintain the moral autonomy necessary to live ethical Baptist lives, and attempt to achieve this goal by creating marriages according to a model of immediate transformation, rather than one of gradual unfolding. I suggest that drawing from recent discussions in the anthropological study of ethics offers a way to discuss choice and evaluation in marriage practice in ways not reducible to class interest or social and material expediency alone.

The EU’s Recovery and Resilience Facility: A Next Phase in EU Socioeconomic Governance?

The European Semester (Semester) was implemented a decade ago. Ample research has addressed the Semester’s development, including some major changes in processes and content (Verdun & Zeitlin, 2018). The Covid-19 crisis seems to mark the next stage in the evolution of the Semester. It connects the Semester with the wider Recovery and Resilience Facility (RRF) and links its country-specific recommendations to conditional financial support. Thus, the next stage of the Semester suggests a stronger and more deliberate interlinkage of different EU tools that jointly guide national socioeconomic policies. It should support both national public investment and reforms while focusing on meeting the EU priority of moving towards a climate-neutral, digitalized, and resilient Europe (De la Porte & Dagnis Jensen, 2021). This article addresses the question of what room the new-style Semester gives to the involvement of national-level actors, such as national parliaments. Therefore, it expands existing analytical frameworks in order to assess the RRF in connection to the Semester, focusing on the degree of obligation, enforcement, and centralisation. Jointly, this outlines the room the RRF gives to the participation of national actors in the Semester. The article concludes that although the national parliaments are not mentioned in the Regulation establishing the RRF, they could claim a role both in developing national plans for accessing financial support as well as in amending and approving reforms.

SKEMA PENTASYARUFAN ZAKAT UNTUK PENANGGULANGAN COVID 19

Zakat is one of the obligatory worship with detailed explanation in the Qur’an and Hadits, both about the subject, object, degree of obligation and to whom is given. A few months ago, a Fatwa from the Indonesian Ulema Council (MUI) appeared on the introduction of zakat for the handling of covid-19 victims and their handlers. From this fatwa then negative assumptions are formed, as if the zakat property is not assigned to the existing zakat according to the guidance of the Qur’an and the Hadits. In this paper the author tries to scheming the contents of the fatwa using the methodology of liberry risert, it is hoped that what is stated in the fatwa of the preaching of zakat and shadaqah can be understood by the public well

Measures to manage, reduce and prevent medicines shortages in European countries in 2020

Abstract Background Several countries have seen an increase in medicines shortages that constitute a major public health threat as they can negatively impact the health outcomes of patients. The study aims to survey measures that European countries apply or consider introducing to address medicines shortages. Methods A questionnaire was sent to the public authorities, as involved in the Pharmaceutical Pricing and Reimbursement Information (PPRI) network, in 47 countries, thereof 44 countries of the WHO European region. Respondents were asked to report measures in place or being discussed as of the first quarter of 2020. Results Preliminary data from 8 countries (Albania, Austria, Finland, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Romania, Sweden; further responses are expected) show that national registers to which manufacturers notify, usually on a mandatory basis, upcoming and existing shortages (including end dates and causes in some countries) are common (all countries but Albania). Medicine reserve supplies that have to be kept for defined medicines exist in Albania and Finland; they are being established the Netherlands and are under discussion in Germany and Sweden. Finland and Italy allow issuing export bans for targeted medicines; this possibility is before implementation in Austria, was planned and then withdrawn in Romania and is under discussion in the other countries (except Albania). Further measures include simplified import permits (with patient information leaflets in foreign language), working groups with relevant stakeholders and financial sanctions for manufacturers in case of non-supply. Conclusions Governments have been reacting to shortages by implementing appropriate measures and adapting existing ones. Actions taken differ with regard to stakeholders addressed, the degree of obligation and the focus (optimising the management of existing shortages vs. prevention of future supply limitations). Key messages A mix of measures to address medicine shortages is applied in European countries. Recently, the number of measures increased, and actions requested from stakeholders tend to have become mandatory.

Hardening and softening of country-specific recommendations in the European Semester

This article conceptualises and illustrates hardening and softening trends in country-specific recommendations (CSRs) that are part of the European Semester. It proposes an analytical framework that meets the specific characteristics of CSRs: its adaptable and non-uniform norms, which are co-determined by actors operating across governance levels. It proposes three elements to analyse hardening and softening of CSRs, adding the degree of ‘centralisation’ to the often used elements of ‘obligation’ and ‘enforcement’. Then it illustrates the framework with trends in CSRs given to Belgium and the Netherlands on pensions and wages. Both countries and topics show hardening as well as softening trends regarding the degree of obligation, enforcement and centralisation. The article suggests that a complete analysis of hardening and softening of CSRs requires assessing the degree of centralisation as well. Looking at obligation and enforcement alone could misinterpret the hardness or softness of CSRs.

LEGAL INFLUENCE, LEGAL REGULATION AND ITS MECHANISM IN THE PROCESS OF ORGANIZATION OF LEGAL SECURITY OF THE BORDER SECURITY OF UKRAINE

The paper summarizes the scientific views of scientists to clarify the concept and essence of the categories “legal influence”, “legal regulation” and “mechanism of legal regulation”. It is substantiated that the most significant contribution to the theoretical solution to the problems of legal regulation was made by S.S. Alekseev, who, for the first time, summarizing the scientific achievements of his predecessors, first offered a complete theoretical concept of legal regulation and its mechanism. It is emphasized that researchers of different generations have significantly enriched the number of scientific approaches to the interpretation of the categories under study. At the same time, modern Ukrainian and foreign scientists define legal regulation from more or less the same scientific positions. It is noted that the legal impact on the consciousness and behavior of military personnel and employees of the State Border GuardService of Ukraine, military formations and other law enforcement agencies of the border security of our country is important for improving the quality of legal regulation in the research area, which is especially important in the context of hybrid, which is the ATO/OOS. Attention is drawn to the specific differences of legal influence from legal regulation in the field of border security of Ukraine. The author proposes four criteria for the following differences: by subject of action, by mechanism, by effect, by degree of obligation. The place, role and importance of the mechanism of legal regulation of legal relations in the field of border security of Ukraine, which is the main component of national security of our state, is determined. Therefore, the importance of the studied category is actualized not only by military confrontation with the Russian Federation, but also by the intensification of Ukraine’s integration and globalization processes, which leads to the exit of any direction of legal regulation beyond state borders and the urgent need to form bilateral mechanisms for such regulation of legal relations in common with the border neighboring countries, as well as the formation of a single international mechanism for the unified regulation of relations in the European and world border area as a whole.

Six shades of grey: Identifying drinking culture and potentially risky drinking behaviour in the grey zone between work and leisure. The WIRUS culture study.

Objectives: The aim of this study was to explore drinking culture and drinking situations that employers and employees encounter in the grey zone between work and leisure, and identify what might affect employees’ risky drinking behaviour.Methods: We used eight focus groups to interview 61 core company informants from eight Norwegian companies (private and public sector) participating in the WIRUS – Workplace-based interventions preventing risky alcohol use and sick leave – project. The informants represented employers and employees with a diversity of roles at multiple organisational levels. The transcribed interviews were analysed by applying a phenomenological hermeneutical approach.Results: The analysis revealed six dimensions of drinking culture representing potentially risky drinking behaviour in situations that fall in the grey zone between work and leisure: (1) “Who invited me?” (Degree of obligation towards inviter), (2) “Do I have to participate?” (Degree of participation volunteerism), (3) “To drink or not to drink?” (Degree of drinking volunteerism), (4) “Work talk or small talk?” (Degree of work-related conversation), (5) “Are there any drinking rules to follow?” (Degree of regulation), and (6) “The influence of being away from home” (degree of distance to home).Conclusions: The findings reveal that employers and employees’ experience of drinking culture can be categorised as six different “shades of grey”. The grey zone is shaded from light to dark grey, indicating how risky the informants perceive the grey zone to be. The findings may be useful when designing workplace health promotion programmes and alcohol regulations in the workplace.Significance for public healthIdentifying potentially risky drinking situations in the grey zone between work and leisure is of relevance for public health as use of alcohol is considered a threat to public health. Alcohol is causing ill health and premature death, as well as physical and social problems. Work related use of alcohol is one arena influencing the alcohol consumption, and therefore a significant arena for a public health perspective on employees’ alcohol habits. In Norwegian working life, the use of alcohol takes place in the grey zone between work and leisure time, to a small degree at work, and identifying risky drinking situations in the grey zone, is of value in order to develop efficient and effective alcohol prevention strategies. The model developed in this article for identifying potentially risky drinking situations can help improve interventions for health outcomes for working population, significant for public health.

Ansatz und Ausweis widerruflicher Kreditzusagen in der nationalen und internationalen Rechnungslegung

Loan commitments are a vital part of banking practice. They exist in various forms and depending on the degree of obligation can be divided in irrevocable and revocable loan commitments. The paper discusses loan commitments focusing on their legal classification and their national and international accounting treatment. In doing so, the paper puts an emphasis on the distinction between irrevocable and revocable commitments.

Capturing distinctions while mining text data: Toward low-tech formalization for text analysis

In this article we consider some low-tech approaches to text mining. Our goal is to articulate a RiCH (Reader in Control of Hermeneutics) style of text analysis that takes advantage of the digital affordances of modern reading practices and easily deployable computational tools while also preserving the primacy of the interpretive lens of the human reader. In the article we offer three analytical interventions that are suitable to the low-tech formalizations we propose: the first and most developed intervention tracks the (normally computationally ignored) “stop” words; the second identifies the use of strategic anxiety terms in the texts; and the third (less developed in this article) introduces the grammatical features of modality (including modalization statements of probability and usuality, and modulation statements regarding degrees of obligation and inclination). All three analytical interventions provide a productive tracking of various modes and degrees of strategic decisiveness, contradiction, uncertainty and indeterminacy in a corpus of recent U.S. National Security Strategy reports.

EU Competition Law Analysis of FRAND Disputes

This paper describes the degree of obligation created by a FRAND commitment on the holders of a Standard Essential Patent (“SEP”) from an EU competition law perspective. It shows that the EU courts case-law does not seem supportive of the reading of FRAND as a distributional, pricing commitment. Instead, it views FRAND as a soft commitment device, designed to promote cooperation and exchange amongst independent firms. This is apparent in the Huawei v ZTE judgment, which conveys an invitation on both SEP holders and unlicensed implementers to follow basic procedural requirements in licensing talks. In addition, the paper contributes to the debate on the legal applicability of Article 102 TFEU to SEP holders other than practicing entities. Last, the paper discusses if Standard Setting Organizations (“SSOs”) ex ante specifications of FRAND terms can constrain the conduct of SEP holders under EU competition law.

Attitudes Toward Making Babies … With a Deceased Partner's Cryopreserved Gametes

A multiple segment factorial vignette was used with a probability sample of 857 U.S. households to assess the effects of contextual variables on attitudes toward posthumous reproduction using the cryopreserved gametes of a deceased partner. Attitudes were affected in predictable directions by marital status, gender of the deceased individual, disposition of the deceased's parents, and the deceased's wishes. In addition, respondents who identified more closely with their chosen religion tended to perceive posthumous conception as less appropriate and those who had never had children attributed a greater degree of obligation to assist on the part of medical professionals.

Das Individuum und die Peers – eine strukturelle Perspektive

Peer relationships are diverse in the sense that their degree of obligation, their intensity, their stability and even their number of participants vary. At the same time they have effects on the intraindividual and interindividual development of children and adolescents who tend to value them highly. Sociometric peer nominations provide one way of describing the complexity of peer relationships and of analyzing their various determinants. Peers are sources of information in the context of a defined system like a classroom in school. The consistency of this information (how many children like A and how many children like B), its reciprocity, and its stability are structural parameters that--in concert with other psychological constructs--may provide valuable cues and predictions about the optimal conditions for a positive peer socialization. The present article attempts to use these structural elements as the point of departure by navigating through the complexity, in order to delineate existing knowledge before the background of open questions and important question marks.

Versorgungsstrukturen und Qualitätssicherung für Prävention und Gesundheitsförderung in Deutschland

In order to identify requirements of quality assurance in this field, a general description of prevention, health promotion and education is outlined, based upon healthcare supply analyses and 158 interviews with experts. Prominent features are, among others, a distinctive heterogeneity and complexity of settings, suppliers, and interventions; supply of coverage is below public health criteria (needs); weak outcome evaluation; competition among suppliers, providers, and political agencies and decision makers; need for intra- and intersectoral coordination; the lack of evidence-based healthcare planning; and hurdles for quality assurance. A structural taxonomy of quality assurance systems is then developed, consisting of three dimensions: validity (quality of information), regularity, and degree of commitment and obligation. In terms of these dimensions, important systems of quality assurance in prevention, health promotion and education in Germany are analyzed. A number of different systems and approaches can be found. However, most of them share questionable validity, regularity, and degree of obligation. Increased commitment on behalf of providers, suppliers, and political institutions and decision makers for the quality of preventive interventions is inevitable in order to raise the performance of prevention and health promotion in Germany to their potential effectiveness.

Reactive power service cost allocation using Aumann-Shapley method

There is a general consensus that there should be a separate reactive power market to manage the provision of reactive power in a deregulated power system. Owing to the importance of such a reactive power service for system reliability and its complexity, a significant degree of obligation and centralised control are needed in this market. A centrally-managed reactive power market model is adopted in which the system operator, taking into account the technical feasibility and economic efficiency, procures the required reactive service from the competitive reactive power suppliers and the incurred cost is fully allocated to all users. A reactive power optimum power flow is used as a tool for the procurement and dispatching of reactive power services. As the reactive power can be consumed directly or consumed indirectly, accompanied by the transportation of real power, difficulties arise in the cost allocation process, especially in a pool-bilateral coexisting real power energy market. A reactive power cost allocation scheme using the Aumann-Shapley method is proposed to tackle this challenge. A modified IEEE 14-bus system is used to demonstrate the validity of the proposed methodology.

Alternatives to “Legalization”: Richer Views of Law and Politics

The authors of “Legalization and World Politics” (International Organization, 54, 3, summer 2000) define “legalization” as the degree of obligation, precision, and delegation that international institutions possess. We argue that this definition is unnecessarily narrow. Law is a broad social phenomenon that is deeply embedded in the practices, beliefs, and traditions of societies. Understanding its role in politics requires attention to the legitimacy of law, to custom and law's congruence with social practice, to the role of legal rationality, and to adherence to legal processes, including participation in law's construction. We examine three applications of “legalization” offered in the volume and show how a fuller consideration of law's role in politics can produce concepts that are more robust intellectually and more helpful to empirical research.

International Human Rights Law and Practice in Latin America

Human rights practices have improved significantly throughout Latin America during the 1990s, but different degrees of legalization are not the main explanation for these changes. We examine state compliance with three primary norms of international human rights law: the prohibition against torture, the prohibition against disappearance, and the right to democratic governance. Although these norms vary in their degree of obligation, precision, and delegation, states have improved their practices in all three issue-areas. The least amount of change has occurred in the most highly legalized issue-area—the prohibition against torture. We argue that a broad regional norm shift—a “norms cascade”—has led to increased regional and international consensus with respect to an interconnected bundle of human rights norms, including the three discussed in this article. These norms are reinforced by diverse legal and political enforcement mechanisms that help to implement and ensure compliance with them.

Speech a La Mode

Forty sentences, each containing one of five modal auxiliaries (must, should, can, would, and might), were recorded by four speakers (two males, two females), using three patterns of emphatic stress (stress on modal, stress on main verb, and no stress). For each sentence, respondents (N = 55) were asked to judge the degree of certainty and the degree of obligation being communicated. Judgments were found to differ according to modal used; stress pattern used, with stress on the main verb resulting in higher certainty and obligation ratings for most modals; and sex of the respondent, with females expressing stronger judgments than males. Respondents listened to the recordings in four blocks. Each block comprised 10 sentences uttered by one speaker. After listening to each speaker, respondents rated that speaker on an impression scale. Male respondents rated male speakers higher than female speakers on assertiveness. There was some indication that, when speakers employed a medium pitch range across the utterance, certainty and obligation ratings were higher and impression ratings were more favourable, than when a wide pitch range was used. Results were seen to support the interpersonal functional component of language.

Hard and soft deontologism

There are many types of deontological moral philosophy, all having in common the assumption that duty, obligation, tightness-wrongness, and related concepts, are primary in ethics. The empirical value of consequences, the "good life," and so on, are ancillary. It will prove fruitful however to draw a distinction between two types of deontological theory. The one type I shall call (following James on determinism) hard deontologism, and the other soft deontologism. The best known hard deontologists are the strict Judaic-Christian moral philosophers and Immanuel Kant. I would consider W.D. Ross to be a classical soft deontologist. His notion of prima facie duties, presented in hierarchical order, surely suggests a markedly softer approach to the choice of one's obligations, even though a prima facie duty has intrinsic value. An obvious example of a hard deontological decision would be Abraham's unquestioning obedience to God's demand that Issac, Abraham's only son, be sacrificed at the altar. God's word, as the source of all obligation, takes precedence over anything else, even though requiting a hideous action having heartrending consequences. And consider Kant's well-known reply to the French philosopher who asked him whether he would not lie if confronted at his front door by a madman with a firearm looking for one of his, Kant's, close friends, who happens to be dining in the next room. Kant answered that there is still the alternative of remaining silent. This is genuine hard deontologism! The soft deontologist, on the other hand, like the soft determinist, wants, I think, to have his cake and eat it too. What else can be the import of Ross's prima facie duties? We have some kind of insight into what is absolutely binding upon our moral conduct. And yet we must hedge this insight by taking into account first appearances and evaluations of degrees of obligation. In general any deontologist maintains that the obligation to obey certain moral rules does not rest on the consequences of an act. Rather one is