Heated online communication reveals global challenges in the digital age, often fuelled by collective outrage. This article investigates how Buddhist network perspectives, paralleling digital reality, can inform mental health. Avatamsaka philosophy provides practical ways to navigate web complexities, suggesting that individual actions ripple across society. Recognising our interdependence and the impermanence of social responses deepens understanding of communication’s broader impact and dynamic interconnected worldviews. These perspectives support relational balance and cognitive flexibility, essential for alleviating online distress and conflicts, including acceptance of present circumstances and fostering motivation for positive change. Valuing connectedness while respecting individuality helps cultivate resilience, enriching therapeutic practices.

This article tells the story of how high-ranking officials in New York State, during the early nineteenth century, designed and revised an institutional structure for a statewide public school system that offered, even demanded, a significant role for local residents in governing and operating their schools. This statebuilding initiative was pursued with equal vigor by members of the various political factions of the time. The educational system it produced was built by government action, rather than primarily growing out of civil-societal forces and voluntary/spontaneous efforts. Politicians in charge of the system consistently tried to encourage citizen engagement. Their goal was not just to improve the schools, but also to enhance self-government in American life more generally. The story anticipates debates in the contemporary field of theory and practice known as participatory governance, contributing to discussions about the possibilities for meaningful citizen control within large bureaucratic structures. Since participatory democracy presupposes and relies upon policy feedbacks, the article discusses feedbacks that emerged—or were hoped for but did not—and how they facilitated or obstructed participatory goals. It also contributes to scholarship on the activism of nineteenth-century government and speaks to conversations in the history of American education.

This article includes my 4 June 2023, comments on the specification of the baseline in Regulatory Impact Analyses that were submitted in response to the Office of Management and Budget’s (OMB’s) request for comments on its draft revisions to Circular A4, “Regulatory Analysis.” This article also includes supplemental remarks on the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs’ (OIRA’s) Revisions to Circular A4 in Response to Public Comments. In my supplemental remarks, I clarify two regulatory situations that I believe OIRA is trying to address in its baseline guidance. I then make three points. First, I argue that the term “dynamic baseline” is preferred to “analytic baseline” because it better conveys the key point that the baseline is a forecast of future conditions. Second, I believe OIRA’s final baseline guidance still leaves agencies with too much discretion to make their own assumptions about such basic parameters in the construction of a dynamic baseline as population and economic growth, technological innovation, and climate change. Third, I argue that the use of multiple dynamic baselines should be standard practice because it makes the baseline assumptions more transparent and thus to some extent mitigates the risk of bias that can arise from an analyst’s strategic selection of a single baseline.

Cannabis use increases the risk of psychosis, but cannabis-based medicinal products may provide additional therapeutic opportunities. Decriminalisation of cannabis has led to wider availability in certain jurisdictions, while in the UK regulated medicinal preparations are not readily accessible. A more balanced approach could reduce harms while maximising potential therapeutic benefits.

This article sketches an answer to the call for a normative foundation for the paradox perspective on corporate sustainability and also enriches an understanding of firm objectives that ought to be otherwise than profit by offering a rendering of Aristotelian virtue ethics—what I call the virtuous life of pleasure—that highlights how contemplative activity or theorein cultivates, and is essential to, virtue and eudaimonia. My claim is that the virtuous life of pleasure not only characterizes how to live the most meaningful and pleasant life, rendering it good and thus worth pursuing, but it is also, as a flourishing life, the normative foundation for safeguarding the intrinsic value of nonfinancial corporate aims, as the paradox perspective prescribes. It does so by establishing a principle of enough, which seeks to preserve integral, interdependent parts as ends in themselves and as constitutive of a larger ecosystem.

Solar geoengineering offers a speculative means to cool the planet by reflecting solar radiation into space. While some research suggests that awareness of solar geoengineering could reduce public support for decarbonization through a moral hazard mechanism, other studies indicate that it could serve as a “clarion call” that motivates further action. Using a pre-registered factorial design, we assess how sharing balanced information on solar geoengineering affects attitudes toward decarbonization policies and climate attitudes among 2,509 US residents. We do not find that solar geoengineering information affects support for decarbonization on average, though it may increase support among initially less supportive subgroups; moreover, this information tends to increase the perception that climate change is a daunting problem that cannot be resolved without decarbonization. Our results suggest that concerns about moral hazard should not discourage research on solar geoengineering – as long as the public encounters realistic messages about solar geoengineering’s role.

The troublesome weed Johnsongrass [Sorghum halepense (L.) Pers.] is predicted to expand its range under climate change. In the process, it is likely to become more competitive in corn (Zea mays L.) production areas of the northeastern United States and southern Canada. A replicated greenhouse experiment was conducted to measure interspecific and intraspecific competition between an S. halepense biotype from central New York State (northern range edge) and corn under drought and well-watered conditions. Drought stress significantly reduced the biomass and height of corn and S. halepense in both rounds of the experiment (P < 0.001). Drought stress increased the root-to-shoot ratio of S. halepense (P < 0.001) and reduced the root-to-shoot ratio of corn (P < 0.001). In one run of the experiment, corn produced 19.3% more aboveground biomass (P < 0.001) and 6.6% more height (P < 0.001) when competing with an S. halepense plant (interspecific competition) than when competing with a second corn plant (intraspecific competition). Drought conditions increased the advantage of corn plants grown under interspecific relative to intraspecific competition (P = 0.012). In that round of the experiment, biomass of S. halepense was 12.9% higher under intraspecific competition than interspecific competition in the well-watered treatment and 15.5% higher under intraspecific competition than interspecific competition in the drought treatment (main effect of competition, P = 0.002). Differences between competition treatments were smaller in the other round of the experiment (P > 0.05). Our findings suggest that the New York S. halepense biotype used in this study may not be as competitive as biotypes found in this weed’s range core in more southern regions of the United States. However, anticipated effects of climate change may increase the abundance and competitiveness of this species in the northeastern United States.

Scholars have extensively studied the diffusion of criminal laws across the American states, and this paper examines an overlooked story of penal diffusion: the mid-twentieth-century spread of habitual offender laws. These laws, which escalated sentences for repeat offenders, proliferated across the states decades before the enactment of the three-strikes laws to which they bore remarkable resemblance. But whereas prior research has traced the legislative diffusion of habitual offender laws, this article alternatively explores how state courts’ interpretations of habitual offender laws diffused across jurisdictions. Using an innovative theoretical framework blending judicial diffusion research with literatures in neo-institutional theory, this article reveals how state courts borrowed legal decisions from other states to interpret, legitimize, and alter laws within their own jurisdictions. This reveals how state courts can shape the trajectory of legislative diffusion in enduring and profound ways. This study’s unique theoretical framework uses the history of habitual offender laws as a case study to explore underappreciated features and dynamics of the diffusion process that have shaped the development of American criminal law.

This article presents an analytical framework for studying implementation failure in minimum income programs targeted against poverty and applies it to a case study focused on the recent introduction in Spain of the first national minimum income programme, the Minimum Living Income (MLI). The framework combines two criteria (the type of agent potentially triggering failure, and the type of administrative challenge) to produce four types of implementation problems in targeted minimum income schemes: identification failure, administrative incapacity, nontake-up, and overpayments. We apply this framework in the case of MLI by conducting an exhaustive review of empirical research on its implementation problems. This evidence suggests that the special political circumstances in which the MLI was approved, some features of its design, and its insertion into a complex institutional landscape of regional minimum incomes, explain part of these problems. We conclude with some final remarks and recommendations.

How can populist authoritarian incumbents justify remaining in power when the golden age they promised remains unrealized? We argue that audiovisual products such as videos are particularly suited to enlivening the histories that so many populists evoke in seeking to legitimize their rule. Political science’s traditional focus on speech-based legitimation, however, leaves audiovisual tools largely overlooked. The few studies that do engage these tools test for audience effects, but the content itself and the political strategies behind its curation and dissemination remain undertheorized. By adding an audiovisual lens to studies of authoritarian legitimation, we identify a regime durability strategy we term selective revivification. We specify the cognitive and affective characteristics of videos that quickly communicate information-dense, emotionally evocative messages, arguing that they engagingly distill specific historical elements to portray incumbent rule as not just legitimate but also necessary. In advancing our argument, we construct an original dataset of all existing narration-based YouTube videos shared by six regime institutions in Turkey from the establishment of YouTube in 2005 to 2022 (n = 134). We use quantitative analysis to identify when video usage emerges as a strategy, as well as patterns of dissemination and content elements. We then use intertextual analysis to extract common historical themes and production techniques. The audiovisual tools we specify and the selective revivification strategy they enable fill gaps in studies of authoritarian legitimation while adding to political scientists’ toolkits for wider inquiry.

Individuals with childhood experience of out-of-home care (OHC) face elevated risks of criminal behavior and poor mental health compared with the majority population. Evidence on how trajectories of offending and psychiatric disorders covary among individuals with experience of OHC is needed. This study is based on a cohort of 14,608 individuals (n = 1,319 with OHC experience) born in the Stockholm metropolitan area in 1953 (49% women) from birth to age 63 (2016). Group-based multi-trajectory modeling among those with at least one offense or psychiatric disorder (40.5% of the men, 16.6% of the women) identified four co-occurring trajectories for both sexes. Multinomial regression analyses showed that adolescent OHC placement, particularly in institutions and for behavioral reasons, was linked to higher odds of early-adulthood-limited or decreasing offending and psychiatric trajectories. Most individuals recover from offending and psychiatric disorders by retirement, but placed individuals in particular remain at high risk for offending, alongside psychiatric disorders, throughout early adulthood. Early assessment and tailored attention to needs and risk levels is important when designing long-term care services to mitigate this. Research on underlying mechanisms, and on collaboration between the welfare, justice, and psychiatric care systems, can help to design effective intervention strategies and policies.

The various meanings of ‘legitimacy’ – Constitution-making procedure as a tool to achieve the right content of a new constitutional document – The effect of the procedure on the actual social and political context – Trade-offs between the various conceptions of legitimacy – Inherent tensions between transparency and political compromise, and between inclusivity and elite support – Direct democratic involvement aggravating polarisation – When the time is not ripe for constitution-making, recommended substitute strategies – Various procedural options: popular drafting, constituent assemblies, ordinary parliaments, expert bodies, roundtables, referenda – The dangers of (Kelsenian) constitutional revolutions

Over the past decade, several multi-institutional research consortia have formed within the North American pediatric surgical community. In this article, we describe our experience with the creation and implementation of the Eastern Pediatric Surgery Network, a large and comprehensive research consortium designed to produce a wide array of high-quality clinical studies within our subspecialty. In 2020, a vision statement and rules of governance were established at thirteen academic pediatric surgery divisions in the eastern United States. The research consortium was organized based on four major pillars, namely legal ownership of aggregate data, horizontal leadership structure, mandatory participation in adopted studies, and a broad research portfolio that encompasses the full breath of the specialty. Over the past five years, the number of research projects has dramatically expanded over time and includes participation from 24 different medical centers. Despite a lack of dedicated sponsored extramural support for most projects, there have been 28 abstracts presented at national conferences and 12 manuscripts published in peer-reviewed journals. It is our hope that sharing our experience with creating this organization can help to inform others interested in establishing the academic infrastructure to engage in multi-institutional, evidence-based clinical research in other medical specialties and beyond.