Are shifting party-union relationships impacting the vote intentions of union members in Canada? By analyzing voting intentions within the Canadian labour movement, the findings illuminate the complexity of union members’ electoral behaviour and the strategic opportunities for parties vying for their votes. The authors find that while union members continue to be more likely than the average voter to support the NDP, this support is nuanced by factors such as union type, gender, education, age, and income. Notably, the study finds that the Conservatives have made significant inroads among construction union members and those with college education, challenging traditional assumptions about Canadian labour politics.

This article is concerned with the history of eugenic sterilisation in Britain through the 1920s and 1930s. In this period, the Eugenics Society mounted an active but ultimately unsuccessful campaign to legalise the voluntary surgical sterilisation of various categories of people, including those deemed ‘mentally deficient’ or ‘defective’. We take as our explicit focus the propaganda produced and disseminated by the Eugenics Society as part of this campaign, and especially the various kinds of data mobilised therein. The parliamentary defeat of the Society’s Sterilisation Bill in July 1931 marks, we argue, a significant shift in the tactics of the campaign. Before this, the Eugenics Society framed sterilisation as a promising method for eradicating, or at least significantly reducing the incidence of, inherited ‘mental defect’. Subsequently, they came to emphasise the inequality of access to sterilisation between rich and poor, (re)positioning theirs as an egalitarian campaign aimed at extending a form of reproductive agency to the disadvantaged. These distinct phases of the campaign were each supported by different kinds of propaganda material, which in turn centred on very different types of data. As the campaign evolved, the numbers and quantitative rhetoric which typified earlier propaganda materials gave way to a more qualitative approach, which notably included the selective incorporation of the voices of people living with hereditary ‘defects’. In addition to exposing a rupture in the Eugenics Society’s propagandistic data practices, this episode underscores the need to further incorporate disabled dialogues and perspectives into our histories of eugenics.

Surgical sterilisation practices significantly increased in contraceptive capacity as the twentieth century unfolded. Despite this prolific uptake, sterilisation is markedly absent from histories of birth control and family planning and instead has remained addressed within histories of eugenics and coercion. The purpose of this article is twofold: firstly, to demonstrate a voluntary, contraceptive history of sterilisation that is distinct from, though connected to, involuntary and eugenic sterilisation; and secondly, to explain the integral role that individual doctors and their private practice played in the rise of contraceptive sterilisation in twentieth-century Australia. Through a combination of archival material and oral history interviews with twentieth-century practitioners of tubal ligation and vasectomy, this article reframes the history of surgical sterilisation, situating it firmly within the history of birth control.

In their analyses of specific cases involving armed conflict, the European Court of Human Rights and the Inter-American Court of Human Rights have acted as monitoring bodies for international humanitarian law (IHL) by factoring that body of law into their interpretation of human rights and State obligations set out in the European and American Conventions on Human Rights. In this article, the author argues that, in such cases, the two courts also acted as monitoring bodies for the rules of IHL designed to protect the dead and missing in both international and non-international armed conflicts. This monitoring function is apparent in the two courts’ judgments, which uphold the obligations of States to search for and identify the dead and missing in armed conflicts, to bury the remains of the dead and to investigate unlawful deaths and cases of forcible disappearance. The author concludes that not only has IHL bolstered the interpretation of the European and American Conventions on Human Rights, but that those two instruments and their interpretation have expanded the content and scope of the rules of IHL that protect the dead and missing in armed conflict.

High-energy, short-pulse laser-driven proton–boron (p–11B) fusion has attracted growing interest due to its aneutronic character and potential for clean energy generation. In this study, we report on two experimental campaigns carried out at the LFEX laser facility using petawatt-class laser systems (energy $\sim$1.2–1.4 kJ, pulse duration 2.7 ps, peak intensity $\sim$(2–3) × 1019 W/cm2). The experiments explored the influence of complex target geometries – including spherical, cylindrical and wedge-shaped configurations – on α-particle yield. Our results demonstrate that spherical targets can enhance α-particle production by up to two orders of magnitude compared to planar targets of identical composition and also lead to a noticeable shift of the α-particle energy spectrum toward higher values. Furthermore, we implemented a novel diagnostic technique for unambiguous α-particle detection using a CR-39 detector integrated into a Thomson parabola spectrometer. Particle-in-cell simulations performed with the Smilei code provide additional insight into the role of self-generated magnetic fields in modulating particle dynamics. These simulations highlight the critical interplay among target geometry, confinement effects and fusion efficiency. Overall, our findings underscore the potential of optimized target designs to significantly enhance fusion yield and α-particle output in p–11B fusion, with promising implications for the development of laser-driven α-particle sources and advanced clean energy concepts.

This paper studies the dynamic extraction problem of an exhaustible common-pool resource. We build on classical closed-economy growth models with intertemporally maximizing, infinitely lived dynasties exhibiting a constant population growth rate. Utility is obtained from periodic consumption based on the fixed-rate capital and the extraction of the resource, and from the amenity values derived from the standing resource stock. The resource contributes to both consumptive and amenity utilities, while different generations are interconnected by intergenerational altruism. Dynamic allocation of the natural resource is determined by a benevolent social planner. This allows us to examine intra-generational inequity issues in combination with the intergenerational concerns. We demonstrate how the optimal allocation of the resource depends on the population growth, wealth level, inequality, ecological vulnerability of the resource and rivalry on the amenity value. Our results highlight the trade-offs between reducing the degree of inequality and preserving the ecological values of the resource.

Identifying use-related residues from stone artefacts has become increasingly important in determining starchy plant exploitation over time and in different locales. Standard methods for processing residues samples are widely available but there is no clear consensus on suitable methods for attributing unknown starch grains to known plant taxa. We revisit the case study of a flaked stone artefact (K/76/S29B) recovered from Phase 1 (c. 10,000 ka) at Kuk Swamp in Papua New Guinea (PNG). Starch grains from taro (Colocasia esculenta) were identified in the residue extraction, but there were other grains that could not be attributed a plant origin at that time. The new analysis applied robust statistical methods, categorial attributes and expert input. In addition to C. esculenta, kudzu bean (Pueraria montana var. lobata) was identified, representing the earliest use of kudzu bean in the PNG highlands. Importantly, we also determined that starch grains from C. esculenta and Dioscorea esculenta are morphologically indistinguishable. We turned to other attributes of potential contributing plant taxa in determining distinguishing features: habit/growing requirements; the sedimentary context of the archaeological find; and environmental settings. Cultural use of both plants, artefacts and artefact technologies can be critical elements in confident identification outcomes, as exemplified here.

Let ${\mathscr {G}} $ be a special parahoric group scheme of twisted type over the ring of formal power series over $\mathbb {C}$, excluding the absolutely special case of $A^{(2)}_{2\ell }$. Using the methods and results of Zhu, we prove a duality theorem for general ${\mathscr {G}} $: there is a duality between the level one twisted affine Demazure modules and the function rings of certain torus fixed point subschemes in affine Schubert varieties for ${\mathscr {G}} $. Along the way, we also establish the duality theorem for $E_6$. As a consequence, we determine the smooth locus of any affine Schubert variety in the affine Grassmannian of ${\mathscr {G}} $. In particular, this confirms a conjecture of Haines and Richarz.

Refreezing is a critical component of the mass balance of glaciers in Svalbard, yet the processes and changes under a warming climate are not fully understood. Here, we investigate changes in firn properties of the Austfonna ice cap, Svalbard, using a combination of observations and model simulations. We analyze firn stratigraphy and density from five newly retrieved and 11 previously retrieved firn cores, collected at elevations ranging from 506 m a.s.l. to 791 m a.s.l. between 1958 and 2022. All cores exhibit frequent ice layers that indicate persistent refreezing of meltwater; however, no ice slabs (layers exceeding 1 m) were observed. A 13-year-long firn temperature time series from a site near the summit (773 m a.s.l.) shows that annual water percolation reaches depths of 7 m to over 13 m. A notable transition in the firn thermal regime occurred in 2013, transitioning from cold to temperate conditions above the firn-ice interface despite the seasonal cooling occurring in the upper firn layers. Simulations using the CryoGrid community model from 2009 to 2022 corroborate this thermal shift and suggest the development of a firn aquifer multiple times since 2013, with increasing duration and thickness over time.

Recruitment of participants for research is often difficult in primary care, especially children and adolescents. Poor recruitment often leads to extension or discontinuation of randomized controlled trials involving patients. This study describes the impact of media recruitment compared to recruitment via general practitioners (GPs) on characteristics of 152 children aged 7–17 years with functional abdominal pain (FAP) and irritable bowel syndrome. Demographics, clinical and psychosocial characteristics were compared. No clinically relevant differences were found, except for longer pain symptom duration and more diagnoses of FAP in children recruited via media compared to children recruited by their GP. Our results suggest that recruitment via media is effective to recruit children in primary care without inducing relevant baseline characteristic differences and this might decrease research recruitment load for GPs. Subgroup analyses on recruitment method are recommended because recruitment strategy might induce differences in unknown baseline characteristics between groups.

Bayesian estimates from experimental data can be influenced by highly diffuse or “uninformative” priors. This paper gives examples of how diffuse priors can affect estimates, and discusses how practitioners can use their expertise to critique and select a prior.1

The Cold War is often depicted in binary terms: communists against anti-communists, the left against the right, or the free world versus the communist world. However, during the latter part of the Cold War, particularly following the 1979 war between China and Vietnam, earlier Cold War binaries no longer applied, and new alliances were established. These alliances often brought people with the same enemies together, despite having little in common ideologically. This article examines the historical circumstances and Cold War geographies of ethnic Khmu anti-Lao PDR and anti-Vietnamese insurgents, including their alliances with right-wing governments in Thailand and the communist People’s Republic of China (PRC). As neutralists, these Khmu occupied a political space rarely discussed in relation to the Cold War. Although the PRC provided training, weapons, and supplies to the neutralist Khmu between 1979 and 1983, later their political leader, General Kong Le, had a falling out with the Chinese, and the PRC stopped supporting his largely ethnic minority soldiers. However, up until 1989, the Thai government continued to allow the Khmu to maintain bases in Thailand for launching military operations inside Laos, until the Thai government adopted the “Battlefield to Marketplace” policy. Some Khmu continued resisting inside northwestern Laos during the early 1990s, but with declining numbers of soldiers and decreased outside support, armed resistance ended in 2003. It is critical that the geographies and alliances of the later Cold War be differentiated from those of the earlier years of the Cold War. This transnational insurgency deserves attention.

Children are known to derive more implicatures when the required alternative is made salient through contrast or when it is made contextually relevant through a story or a Question Under Discussion. We investigated the exclusivity implicature of three disjunctions (sau “or”, sau… sau, and fie…fie “either…or”) in child Romanian, an understudied language in the previous literature. Three experiments reveal that the mere presence of the stronger alternative, that is, simply hearing unrelated conjunctive statements in the course of the experiment, is not enough to boost implicatures. Rather, implicatures increase as a result of both access to alternatives and contextual relevance (expressed through conjunctive questions such as Did the hen push the train and the boat?). Interestingly, the boost in implicatures was observed only for sau-based disjunctions, not for fie…fie, which we conjecture may be due to children treating the latter as ambiguous between disjunction and conjunction.