Global Policy Initiatives Research Articles

Domestic violence and child participation: contemporary challenges for the 1980 hague child abduction convention

ABSTRACT This article addresses two contemporary challenges for the 1980 Hague Child Abduction Convention: (i) domestic violence and (ii) child participation. It also outlines three components of a global socio-legal policy and research initiative undertaken to address these issues and, where relevant, their intersection. The published literature on these topics, including the children’s objections exception, is explored, as are the ways in which these challenges are addressed within some of the 101 Contracting States to the Convention and through the Guide to Good Practice on Article 13(1)(b) of the Convention. Regard is paid to the data provided by the statistical analysis of applications made under the Convention in 2015 by Lowe and Stephens, and the changes which will occur once the Recast of The European Brussels 11a Regulation comes into operation. The likely impact for 1980 Hague Convention abduction proceedings of the UK having left the European Union at 23.00 GMT on 31 January 2020 is contemplated. Other current international initiatives are discussed, including the development of a child-friendly version of the Convention through The International Association of Child Law Researchers. Training is a key to changing attitudes and upskilling family justice professionals to ensure the Convention operates in a fully child-centric way. This will maintain and strengthen the Convention by keeping it ‘fit for purpose’.

Global campaigns for girls’ and women’s education, 2000–2017: insights from transnational social movement theory

ABSTRACTRecent decades have witnessed a growing number of global campaigns on girls’ and women’s education, including major global policy initiatives such as the MDGs and the SDGs. While scholars have critically analysed the conceptualisations of gender, equality and development in such campaigns, and their significance for national level policy and practice, less has been written about why and how girls’ education came to be such a high profile feature of international policy frameworks. This paper draws on perspectives from transnational social movement theory, which has been used by gender scholars to explore the activities and significance of non-governmental organisations for agenda-setting at the global level. In this paper these perspectives are applied to the field of global education policy, through an analysis of evidence from international conferences, data on aid flows and interviews with key policy actors, to explore the factors behind rise of the global agenda on gender equality in education. In doing so, it suggests that the current dominant framing around girls’ education, access and quality, may be explained by the relatively weak involvement of non-governmental women’s groups in proportion to the strong involvement of multilaterals, bilateral agencies, national governments and more recently, private sector organisations.

Spiritual enrichment or ecological protection?: A multi-scale analysis of cultural ecosystem services at the Mai Pokhari, a Ramsar site of Nepal

Ecosystem services, a globalizing discourse referring to benefits humans gain from ecosystems, has been rapidly mainstreamed into scientific and political thinking of environmental management. However, non-material benefits, also known as cultural services, have been rather subsumed within the dominant ecosystem services discourse. This paper explores local cultural services in the Mai Pokhari, a Ramsar site of Nepal, and adopts a multi-scalar analysis to explore the implications of global policy making at the local scale.The research, informed by political ecology, applies mixed methods. At the local scale, spirituality, sense of place and traditional practices were identified as important local cultural values within ecosystem management. But such local values were found to be marginalized in conservation policy making at national and global levels. The Ramsar listing at the case study site resulted in restrictions on community activities and opened the possibility of resettlement, creating disenchantment among the local community whose access to cultural services was curtailed. The study emphasizes the need to recognise and value local cultural services in policy-making at all levels. This is important not only for refining and improving global conservation policy initiatives based on ecosystem services, but also for securing just and sustainable conservation and development goals.

Patient Is the New Black

In this essay, I challenge the ways in which global drug policy initiatives call for more humane drug policy and decriminalization. Although these initiatives promote human dignity and agency, they also encourage a particular approach to drug use and addiction. Embracing patientism in their liberating narratives of ‘treatment, not punishment,’ these voices take for granted the advantages of their proposed approach. Drawing on my experiences with Norwegian OST, I illustrate patients’ engagement and resistance towards the politically hyped social categories and ask how we can understand this socio-political desire for a narrative transformation.

Digital Manipulation of Images of Models' Appearance in Advertising: Strategies for Action Through Law and Corporate Social Responsibility Incentives to Protect Public Health.

Widespread digital retouching of advertising imagery in the fashion, beauty, and other consumer industries promotes unrealistic beauty standards that have harmful effects on public health. In particular, exposure to misleading beauty imagery is linked with greater body dissatisfaction, worse mood, poorer self-esteem, and increased risk for disordered eating behaviors. Moreover, given the social, psychological, medical, and economic burden of eating disorders, there is an urgent need to address environmental risk factors and to scale up prevention efforts by increasing the regulation of digitally altered advertising imagery. This manuscript summarizes the health research literature linking digital retouching of advertising to increased risk of eating disorders, disordered weight and appearance control behaviors, and body dissatisfaction in consumers, followed by a review of global policy initiatives designed to regulate digital retouching to reduce health harms to consumers. Next, we turn to the US legal context, reporting on findings generated through legal research via Westlaw and LexisNexis, congressional records, federal agency websites, law review articles, and Supreme Court opinions, in addition to consulting legal experts on both tax law and the First Amendment, to evaluate the viability of various policy initiatives proposed to strengthen regulation on digital retouching in the United States. Influencing advertising practices via tax incentives combined with corporate social responsibility initiatives may be the most constitutionally feasible options for the US legal context to reduce the use of digitally alternated images of models' bodies in advertising. Policy and corporate initiatives to curtail use of digitally altered images found to be harmful to mental and behavioral health of consumers could reduce the burden of eating disorders, disordered weight and appearance control behaviors, and body dissatisfaction and thereby improve population health in the United States.

Global reform initiatives: From compulsory to higher education

The purpose of this paper is the analysis of the two most influential global policy initiatives in education reform - the OECD?s comparative study of students? educational achievements after compulsory education - PISA, and the Bologna process or the creation of a single European Higher Education Area. Although they relate to different levels of the education system, they have been initiated with the same aim of making education more effective in the context of the so-called knowledge societies. Apart from having appeared in about the same timeframe (the first cycle of the PISA survey was conducted in 2000 and the Bologna Declaration was adopted in 1999), both policy initiatives consider education in the context of the imperatives of economic rationality, competitiveness, and freedom to choose individual participants according to personal preferences. Undoubtedly, the OECD and the Bologna Process have altered the purpose and structure of education systems around the world in a relatively short time in accordance with the dominant neoliberal values and the perception of a man as homo economicus. The results of the initiated reforms are linked to the ?economization? of education policy and the ?pedagogisation? of economic policy, given the increased importance of the role of skills and the human capital agenda. Their key pedagogical implications can be described as reducing education to developing human capital and instrumentalizing education for non-pedagogical purposes.

The Global Burden of Musculoskeletal Pain-Where to From Here?

To summarize the current understanding of the global burden of musculoskeletal pain-related conditions, consider the process of evidence generation and the steps to generate global pain estimates, identify key gaps in our understanding, and propose an agenda to address these gaps, we performed a narrative review. In the 2010 Global Burden of Disease Study (GBD), which broadened the scope of musculoskeletal conditions that were included over previous rounds, low back pain imposed the highest disability burden of all specific conditions assessed, and subsequent GBD reports further reinforce the size of this burden. Over the past decade, the GBD has produced compelling evidence of the leading contribution of musculoskeletal pain conditions to the global burden of disability, but this has not translated into global health policy initiatives. However, system- and service-level responses to the disease burden persist across high-, middle-, and low-income settings. There is a mismatch between the burden of musculoskeletal pain conditions and appropriate health policy response and planning internationally that can be addressed with an integrated research and policy agenda.

All-cause mortality risk associated with long-term exposure to ambient PM2·5 in China: a cohort study

Evidence from cohort studies in North America and Europe indicates that long-term exposure to fine particulate matter (PM2·5) is associated with an increased mortality risk. However, this association has rarely been quantified at higher ambient concentrations. We estimated the hazard ratio (HR) for all-cause mortality from long-term exposure to PM2·5 in a well established Chinese cohort of older adults. The Chinese Longitudinal Healthy Longevity Survey (CLHLS) is a prospective cohort study of men and women aged 65 years and older enrolled in 2008 and followed up through 2014 for mortality events. We studied individuals for whom residential locations were available in 2008 for linkage to 1 km grids of PM2·5 concentrations, derived from satellite remote sensing. Cox proportional hazards models were used to estimate the effect of long-term exposure to PM2·5 on all-cause mortality, controlling for age, sex, smoking status, drinking status, physical activity, body-mass index, household income, marital status, and education. We then used our results to estimate premature mortality related to PM2·5 exposure in the population aged 65 years and older in China in 2010. 13 344 individuals in the CLHLS cohort had data for all timepoints, yielding follow-up data for 49 440 person-years. In a 3-year window, these individuals were exposed to a median PM2·5 concentration of 50·7 μg/m3 (range 6·7-113·3). The overall HR for a 10 μg/m3 increase in this value was 1·08 (95% CI 1·06-1·09). In stratified analyses, HRs were higher in rural than in urban locations, in southern versus northern regions, and with exposure to lower versus higher PM2·5 concentrations. Based on the overall HR, we estimated that 1 765 820 people aged 65 years and older in China in 2010 had premature mortality related to PM2·5 exposure. Long-term exposure to PM2·5 is associated with an increased risk of all-cause mortality among adults aged 65 years and older in China, but the magnitude of the risk declines as the concentration of PM2·5 increases. National Natural Science Foundation of China, National High-Level Talents Special Support Plan of China for Young Talents, US National Aeronautics and Space Administration, and the Columbia University Global Policy Initiative.

Assessing the policy and practice impact of an international policy initiative: the State of the World\u2019s Midwifery 2014

BackgroundUnderstanding how policies lead to changes in health systems and in practice helps policymakers and researchers to intervene more successfully. Yet identifying all the possible changes that occur as a result of a new policy is challenging not only methodologically and logistically, as limited resources are available to conduct indefinite evaluations, but also theoretically, as a complete mapping and attribution of post-hoc changes requires a full understanding of the mechanisms underpinning all change. One option is to identify possible changes across a number of policy impact domains.MethodsUsing a Policy Impact Framework, we brought together data from media, documents and interviews to identify changes to midwifery policy, practice and provision, following the launch of a new global policy initiative, the State of the World’s Midwifery (SoWMy 2014) report published in 2014. We used these identified impacts to develop a map of the mechanisms underpinning these changes.ResultsSoWMy 2014 contributed to a number of changes at national levels, including increased status of midwifery within national governments, improved curricula and training opportunities for midwives, and improved provision of and access to midwifery-led care. These contributions were attributed to SoWMy 2014 via mechanisms such as stakeholder interaction and acquisition of government support, holding national and international dissemination and training events, and a perceived global momentum around supporting midwifery provision. Policy initiatives of this kind can lead to changes in national and international policy dialogue and practice. We identify factors and mechanisms that are likely to increase the scope and scale of these changes, at contextual, national and global levels.ConclusionsIdentifying changes following a policy using a policy impact framework can help researchers and policymakers understand why policies have the effect they do. This is important information for those wishing to increase the effectiveness of future policies and interventions.

Why strengthening primary health care is essential to achieving universal health coverage.

[See related article at [www.cmaj.ca/lookup/doi/10.1503/cmaj.180186][2]][2] KEY POINTS Strengthening primary health care[1][2] and the attainment of universal health coverage[2][3],[3][4] are both important current global health policy initiatives. Primary health care is essential and affordable

Conservation Leadership: A Developmental Model

Dealing with environmental issues requires citizens who adopt conservation behaviors, influence those around them to follow suit, and lead local and global policy initiatives. The purpose of this study is to advance our understanding of the developmental processes that undergird young people’s emergence as conservation leaders with the capacity to take on these roles. A qualitative, grounded theory analysis of transcripts from focus groups and interviews with 76 adolescent and young adult participants of a national conservation leadership program provided the empirical foundation for a developmental model of conservation leadership. The model has four phases: seed, sprout, bloom, and propagate. Within each phase, there are three qualitatively distinct and integrated domains: action, motivation, and understanding. Data in this study indicate that conservation leadership development is ongoing and cumulative, with subsequent developmental experiences promoting new capacities and propensities that expand young people’s conservation repertoires within each domain. The emergent developmental model of conservation leadership proposed in this article puts forth a comprehensive theory about how conservation leadership unfolds in adolescence and young adulthood. This model serves both to instigate further research and provide insights on how youth programs might intentionally promote the development of conservation-oriented action, motivation, and understanding.

Children's Geographies: Tracing The Evolution and Involution of a Concept

This essay traces the evolution of children's geographies as a concept through three phases. First, in the early 1970s as a beginning impression influenced heavily by developmental and environmental psychology. Second, beginning around 1990, children's geographies cohered politically as geographers focused on young people's identity through feminism and Marxism, and global policy initiatives on children's rights. The third phase, covering the last couple of decades, coming from issues of political identity, challenges what we think we know about young people and their geographies, and also advocates a set of loose theories about the ways young people create and re‐create spaces and themselves. Cognate disciplines coming to geography for insights about children and their worlds characterize this current phase. To offset this seeming linear progression the essay also notes an involution of the concept that defies clear categories and sequences, but suggests the fluidity of tensions and accommodations that comprises children's geographies.

Arctic Indigenous Societal Security at COP21: The Divergence of Security Discourse and Instruments in Climate Negotiations

In UN climate change conferences, there exists a disconnect between the space for and use of Arctic cultural heritage as a catalyst for action and parallel international legal and financial support for climate adaptation and mitigation in the North. This article aims to unpack this divergence of creating a space for societal security discourse and producing tangible climate commitments to Arctic Indigenous peoples in UN climate negotiations. The article surveys and explores visual and textual narratives pertaining to Arctic heritage at COP21 focusing on regional Indigenous political organizations and representatives. It contends both that societal security is to maintain Arctic indigenous culture in its traditional state from changes in the climate and that societal security is to protect indigenous culture from harm or destruction while allowing it to live, change and develop in its own accord to assist with climate mitigation and adaptation actions. The article then turns to the resulting Paris Agreement and Paris Road Map to survey specific legal, financial, and policy support mechanisms for Arctic Indigenous peoples. The article argues that the space for and use of Arctic Indigenous societal security discourses at COP21 are uneven with the resulting global policy initiatives, and do not adequately support the security of current cultural practices and heritage in the Arctic.

Climatic vulnerability of the world’s freshwater and marine fishes

To understand how species will cope with warming, knowledge of the thermal limits is needed. This study estimates 2,960 ray-fin fish species’ thermal sensitivity. Comparison with projected warming highlights vulnerable freshwater and marine regions. Climate change is a mounting threat to biological diversity1, compromising ecosystem structure and function, and undermining the delivery of essential services worldwide2. As the magnitude and speed of climate change accelerates3, greater understanding of the taxonomy and geography of climatic vulnerability is critical to guide effective conservation action. However, many uncertainties remain regarding the degree and variability of climatic risk within entire clades and across vast ecosystem boundaries4. Here we integrate physiological estimates of thermal sensitivity for 2,960 ray-finned fishes with future climatic exposure, and demonstrate that global patterns of vulnerability differ substantially between freshwater and marine realms. Our results suggest that climatic vulnerability for freshwater faunas will be predominantly determined by elevated levels of climatic exposure predicted for the Northern Hemisphere, whereas marine faunas in the tropics will be the most at risk, reflecting their higher intrinsic sensitivity. Spatial overlap between areas of high physiological risk and high human impacts, together with evidence of low past rates of evolution in upper thermal tolerance, highlights the urgency of global conservation actions and policy initiatives if harmful climate effects on the world’s fishes are to be mitigated in the future.

Introduction

Introduction Arien Mack this is the fourth issue of social research since 2009 that is concerned with changes occurring in universities both in the United States and elsewhere. It may seem a disproportionate number given the many other subjects we might have considered, but we do not think so, given our history. Social Research, the journal of the New School for Social Research, was first published in 1934, established by the University in Exile scholars who were the founding faculty members of the Graduate Faculty of Political and Social Sciences at The New School, now known as the New School for Social Research (NSSR), a division of The New School. Since its founding, Social Research and the NSSR have been deeply concerned with maintaining freedom of inquiry, which we take to be a core value of all institutions of higher learning. That core value is now facing challenges from many directions. As is now well known, the University in Exile (UIE) was the home at The New School for primarily German Jewish scholars who had been rescued by The New School's first president from almost certain imminent extinction by the Nazi regime, which was then rising to power. The Nazi regime, while it was at work doing many evil things, was launching a frontal attack on the principle of free inquiry at German universities. The UIE was meant not only to protect these endangered scholars but also to protect the prized principle of free inquiry, and it has continued to do so through its several name changes. It is for this reason, if not for others, that it seems completely right for Social Research to put together a series of special issues on universities, which are subject to many different kinds of pressures today, some of which have the potential to encroach on or erode freedom of inquiry, whether directly or indirectly. [End Page xix] Our first two issues explicitly concerned with universities both appeared in 2009 and were titled "Free Inquiry at Risk: Universities in Dangerous Times." One focused primarily on the United States, the next on universities in other countries. A third issue appeared in 2012 and was titled "The Future of Higher Education." The current issue addresses an aspect only touched on in earlier issues: the effect on universities of the growing pressure for accountability, which appears to stem from their increasing corporatization and other kinds of societal pressures. The questions that are front and center here are: • This accountability is to whom and for what? • Who sets the standards and what ends do they serve? • Why should the state pay for higher education unless its own purposes are served? • What are these purposes and how do they affect what gets taught and what research gets supported? These are the questions that the authors in this issue were asked to grapple with. While their answers are not uniform, all are interesting and some are provocative. There seems to be little doubt that what is at stake here in the arguments surrounding accountability is the future of universities and of scholarly knowledge more generally. The papers in this special issue were first presented at the conference entitled "The Future of Scholarly Knowledge: Principles, Pressures, and Prospects," which was held October 13–14, 2016, at the New School for Social Research. I am grateful to Sage Publications for its generous support of the Future of Scholarly Knowledge Project, directed by Kenneth Prewitt at Columbia University's Global Policy Initiative. I am also deeply grateful to Ken himself for conceiving the conference and working with me to put it together, and for guest co-editing this special issue with me. [End Page xx] Copyright © 2017 The New School

A Global Synthesis of Managing Groundwater Dependent Ecosystems Under Sustainable Groundwater Policy.

Groundwater is a vital water supply worldwide for people and nature. However, species and ecosystems that depend on groundwater for some or all of their water needs, known as groundwater dependent ecosystems (GDEs), are increasingly becoming threatened worldwide due to growing human water demands. Over the past two decades, the protection and management of GDEs have been incorporated into several water management policy initiatives worldwide including jurisdictions within Australia, the European Union, South Africa, and the United States. Among these, Australia has implemented the most comprehensive framework to manage and protect GDEs through its water policy initiatives. Using a science-based approach, Australia has made good progress at reducing uncertainty when selecting management thresholds for GDEs in their water management plans. This has been achieved by incorporating appropriate metrics for GDEs into water monitoring programs so that information gathered over time can inform management decisions. This adaptive management approach is also accompanied by the application of the "Precautionary Principle" in cases where insufficient information on GDEs exist. Additionally, the integration of risk assessment into Australia's approach has enabled water managers to prioritize the most valuable and vulnerable ecologic assets necessary to manage GDEs under Australia's national sustainable water management legislation. The purpose of this paper is to: (1) compare existing global policy initiatives for the protection and management of GDEs; (2) synthesize Australia's adaptive management approach of GDEs in their state water plans; and (3) highlight opportunities and challenges of applying Australia's approach for managing GDEs under other water management policies worldwide.

How the nursing profession can contribute to sustainable development goals.

As of 1 January 2016, the UN sustainable development goals (SDGs) became the focus of global efforts on a wide range of development agenda. The SDGs have subsumed the work of the UN millennium development goals (MDGs), so it is timely to reflect on the contribution made by nurses and midwives, so that we can optimise the profession's contribution to the 17 SDGs. This article reports the results of a scientometrics analysis of the published literature related to the MDGs and SDGs indexed in CINAHL, which identified the underlying themes addressed by nurses and midwives. It shows how analysis demonstrates that although nursing was slow to engage with the MDG agenda, it has made some progress in contributing to SDG scholarship. So far this contribution has been narrowly focused, but the profession could contribute to all 17 of the SDG goals. Routine updates of the analysis described here could help monitor progress, identify gaps in nursing's contributions to the goals, and provide further impetus to its engagement in this major global policy initiative.

Exploring Conceptualisations of Disability: A Talanoa approach to Understanding Cultural Frameworks of Disability in Samoa

Purpose: The concepts of disability are explored from a Samoan cultural frame. The impact of disability conceptualisations on identity development and cultural inclusion was assessed through the Samoan language. The study also evaluated the extent of endorsement of global policy initiatives at a local level. Methods: Through facilitating a Talanoa approach, which is a rich cultural tradition of sharing knowledge, space emerged for dialogue around the lived experiences of members of the disability community in Samoa. Results: Incongruous conceptualisations of disability were identified as a contributing factor in the persistence of stigmatising attitudes and beliefs. Borrowing concepts and terms from moral, medical, and social disability models, this disparity of conceptualisation is reflected in Samoan disability terminology. It was also found that while global policy initiatives are generally politically embraced, they engage more effectively with the community when they are underpinned by Samoan cultural ontologies. Conclusion: The findings suggest that multiple ideologies regarding rights, capabilities and experiences, challenge the development of identity, self-worth, and inclusion. There is significant value in merging cultural concepts with a social disability model framework. It is important to future development that people with disability can express a sense of cultural identity without risking the right to inclusion and equality.

Accessible tourism futures: the world we dream to live in and the opportunities we hope to have

PurposeAccessible tourism is evolving as a field of academic research and industry practice, set within a dynamic social context. The field is interdisciplinary, multidisciplinary and transdisciplinary. The purpose of this paper is to examine key concepts and global initiatives that will shape accessible tourism futures.Design/methodology/approachThree of the authors have extensive academic experience in the area and the fourth author is the Managing Director of the pre-eminent European Network for Accessible Tourism. In taking a limited Delphi approach to canvassing key areas likely to shape accessible tourism futures, the following concepts and policy initiatives were examined: motivations, dreams and aspirations of people with disability; demography; UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities; destination competitiveness; universal design (UD); and the UN Sustainable Development Goals for 2030.FindingsA discussion of each of the above areas was placed in context to accessible tourism futures and to contextualise the papers that were selected for the special issue. The latter part of the paper outlines the contribution of each empirical paper to the issue discussing the approach, findings and implications. Stakeholder collaboration was identified as the key common theme of the papers and the factor for developing accessible tourism solutions, recognising the value of the market and capitalising on it. A collaborative approach is required to recognise the complementary nature of the different paradigms; to re-shape and transform the future of the accessible tourism industry. To assist in the development of accessible tourism futures, UD principles should provide a foundation to enhance the future competitiveness of tourism destinations and organisations.Originality/valueThe paper’s examination of the concepts and global policy considerations provides a strong academic and practitioner foundation for considering accessible tourism futures. In doing so, accessible tourism futures are shown to be affected by key concepts related to core tourism considerations and major policy initiatives on accessibility and sustainability. Yet, accessible tourism futures also have the potential to create their own momentum and contribute unique learnings on the diversity of tourism markets that will shape tourism concepts and global policy initiatives in their own right.

The critical condition of rhetorical choices

HIV/AIDS is an epidemic that is still pervasive globally. Through effective health communication campaigns, the disease may be contained. This paper is a rhetorical visual analysis of the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) and its online presence. Global policy initiatives such as PEPFAR have wide reaching ramifications. Thus, the rhetoric of the George W. Bush administration as reflected in the PEPFAR initiative bears scrutiny. Both visual and discursive tropes reflected in the PEPFAR initiative offer an interesting contradiction. While the Bush administration's rhetoric purported to offer succor to those stricken with HIV/AIDS, the actual content and substance of PEPFAR belied its surface appearances by undercutting support for those in danger of being infected and those already ill with HIV/AIDS.