States are measured and ranked on an ever-expanding array of country performance indicators (CPIs). Such indicators are seductive because they provide actionable, accessible, and ostensibly objective information on complex phenomena to time-pressed officials and enable citizens to hold governments to account. At the same time, a sizeable body of research has explored how CPIs entail ‘black boxing’ and depoliticisation of political phenomena. This article advances our understanding of the consequences of governance by indicators by examining how CPIs generate specific forms of politicization that can undermine a given CPI’s authority over time. We contend that CPIs rely upon two different claims to authority that operate in tension with one another: i) the claim to provide expert, objective knowledge and ii) the claim to render the world more transparent and to secure democratic accountability. Analysing CPIs in the field of education, economic governance, and health and development, we theorize and empirically document how this tension leads to three distinct forms of politicisation: scrutiny from experts that politicises the value judgements embodied in a CPI; competition whereby rival CPIs contest the objectivity of knowledge of leading CPIs; and corruption, where gaming of CPIs challenges its claim to securing transparent access to social reality. While the analysis identifies multiple paths to the politicization and undermining of specific CPIs’ authority, the article elaborates why these processes tend to leave intact and even reproduce the legitimacy of CPIs as a governance technology.

This paper presents a highly isolated diplexer-antenna and a dual-band filtenna with high-frequency selectivity. The precise design procedure for the diplexer based on substrate-integrated waveguide technology is presented and effectively integrated with magnetoelectric dipole antenna/microstrip patch antennas to achieve a diplexer-antenna and dual-band filtenna. The proposed configuration enables the design and control of the filtering response of the channels individually. To verify the proposed method, a diplexer-antenna and a dual-band filtenna with operating frequencies of 26.5–27.5 and 28.5–29.5 GHz, a fourth-degree Chebyshev response, and two symmetric radiation nulls for each band are designed and simulated. Finally, the proposed dual-band filtenna is fabricated and measured. The measured peak realized gains for the lower and higher bands are 4 and 4.5 dBi, respectively. Besides, a high out-of-band suppression with a deep roll-off of better than 20 dBi is obtained.

This paper addresses the gap between theoretical modeling of cyber risk propagation and empirical analysis of loss characteristics by introducing a novel approach that integrates both approaches. We model the development of cyber loss counts over time using a discrete-time susceptible-infected-recovered process, linking these counts to covariates, and modeling loss severity with regression models. By incorporating temporal and covariate-dependent transition rates, we eliminate the scaling effect of population size on infection counts, revealing the true underlying dynamics. Simulations show that this susceptible-infected-recovered framework significantly improves aggregate loss prediction accuracy, providing a more effective and practical tool for actuarial assessments and risk management in the cyber risk context.

This study investigates the feasibility of reconstructing the last closed flux surface in the DIII-D tokamak using neural network models trained on reduced input feature sets, addressing an ill-posed task. Two models are compared: one trained solely on coil currents and another incorporating coil currents, plasma current and loop voltage. The model trained exclusively on coil currents achieved a mean point displacement of $0.04$ m on a held-out test set, while the inclusion of plasma current and loop voltage reduced the error to $0.03$ m. This comparison highlights the trade-offs between input feature complexity and reconstruction accuracy, demonstrating the potential of machine learning algorithms to perform effectively in data-limited environments, such as those expected in fusion power plants due to diagnostic constraints imposed by the presence of blankets and shielding.

As ecological scholars situated within a dominant educational system that privileges human-centred, competency-based education, we problematise its tendency to promote singular, monologic narratives of environmental education rooted in scientific and technological knowledge. In response, we offer interpretations of relationships with the more-than-human world (e.g., trees, insects, rivers, mountains, animals, rocks) through dialogic inquiry informed by Asian worldviews, specifically the Indian principle of Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam meaning that the whole world is one family and the Japanese Shinto-Buddhist belief that all entities, living or non-living, embody spirits or deities. Beginning with a narrative grounded in one author’s lived experience as a forester – compelled to view forest as commodity, we explore its deeper significance for environmental education. Writing to one another in ways that attend to Asian relational and ecological perspectives, our work emphasises reciprocity, intercorporeality, and embodied immersion in forest, offering transformative possibilities for reimagining environmental education within planetary interdependence.

The article examines the boom of the “Mitsu Desu” game in 2020, which was created in the context of social distancing policies. In the game, players act as Tokyo governor Yuriko Koike, dispersing crowds to earn points. This case underscores that entertainment can help people cope with crises and can serve as an informal tool for policy implementation. The article identifies what design elements attracted people and analyzes how players interpreted in-game actions in relation to real-world situations. It also addresses the question of how conventional and new media triggered the game’s boom.

This paper involves the unlikely partnering of a designer/design educator and an environmental philosopher of education as they consider together pedagogical responses to the metacrisis. It will begin with an exploration of some recent research that positions education at the heart of the project of eco-social – cultural change. Then, using six prompts proposed as a starting place for this type of education we will follow a full semester of a third-year undergraduate design class as students are immersed in a curriculum created with a vision towards both eco-social – cultural change and, by implication, ‘doing design differently’. Through this reflective study, the research hopes to explore some of the successes, failures, learnings, and potential challenges that exist for students, educators, and theories of educational change in the work of educating in, through, and beyond these times of crisis. The paper will end with a rendering of our findings and an extended discussion of the pedagogical possibilities, prompts, and peculiarities of teaching during this metacrisis and some considerations around the potentialities and limitations of these six prompts for eco-social – cultural change and environmental education.

The global expansion of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) is an understudied area of research, particularly in the Middle East. The issue is often framed through a linear, state-centric lens that oversimplifies its complexities and subordinates the role of microprocesses and individual actors. This article contributes to global and refugee history through a microhistorical study of the establishment of UNHCR’s branch office for the Middle East in Beirut in 1962. It challenges the assumption that UNHCR’s globalization process unfolded in a systematic and well-reasoned manner and presents three interconnected arguments: first, the selection of Beirut was neither purely systematic nor entirely haphazard; second, UNHCR representatives enjoyed significant freedom in shaping the structure and functions of branch offices; and third, pragmatic diplomacy, rather than strict formalization through an agreement, ensured smooth relations between UNHCR and the Lebanese government.

Money and Edinburgh go back a long way. The Bank of Scotland was founded in 1695, just a year after the Bank of England. Three centuries later, the first edition of the Global Financial Centres Index (in 2007) confirmed what everyone had always assumed: second only to London in the UK, sixth in Europe. But how? This small city, its population only topping 500,000 in the twenty-first century, was far from the centers of power and finance, with only a modest trading and manufacturing base of its own. This paper marries fresh oral history from the city’s mid-twentieth century financial elite—that is, an Edinburgh before the Global Financial Crash—with Pierre Bourdieu’s theory of habitus in the relatively new paradigm of Historical Organisation Studies, treating the industry as a single unit across banking, life assurance, and investment management. This reveals their personal characteristics and demonstrates the “symbolic violence” which socialized them into absorbing and embracing both the values and practices of the organizations where they worked and the external structures, including professional bodies and, not least, the Church of Scotland, which helped maintain some of those values.

This article examines an overlooked aspect of Xenophon’s philosophy: the crucial role of lower body training in his conception of physical fitness as an essential component of education for both humans and animals. Three key questions guide this investigation. Why does Xenophon appear to prioritize physical over intellectual education? Why does he emphasize lower body training for humans, hounds and horses? What unifying concepts connect Xenophon’s ideas about physical fitness and education? The article argues that the parallels between the physical education of Spartan children, Socrates’ shoelessness and the training of hounds and horses suggest shared physical characteristics across certain species, leading to similar methods for developing bodily vigour. Moreover, it contends that ideal education (paideia) must not only begin with but also maintain continuous emphasis on strengthening the body’s support structure—feet and legs—hence the focus on exercises like walking and running. The analysis reveals recurring foundational concepts: toil (πόνος), endurance (καρτερία)—two core principles of Socratic ethics—good health (ὑγίεια), exercise (ἄσκησις/μελέτη), gymnastics (γύμνασις) and good physical disposition (τοῦ σώματος εὐεξία). This pattern, present in both Socratic and non-Socratic works, offers new insights into Xenophon’s coherent vision of the relationship between physical fitness and education.

We developed a dynamic COVID-19 Vaccination Barrier Index (CVBI) at the census-tract level in Clark County, Nevada and assessed its geographic disparities and relationship with COVID-19 vaccination rates over time. Using monthly census-tract data from December 2020 to June 2022, the CVBI integrated demographic, socioeconomic, environmental, housing, and transportation variables, alongside surrogates for vaccination accessibility and vaccine hesitancy. Lagged weighted quantile sum regression was applied to construct monthly indices, while a Besag-York-Mollié model assessed associations with vaccination rates. The results revealed consistent vaccination barriers such as living in group quarters, housing inadequacy, and population density across all vaccination statuses (partial, full, booster). Rural and northern Clark County, especially northeastern Las Vegas, exhibited higher CVBI scores that correlated negatively with vaccination rates. Booster vaccination patterns differed, displaying fewer significantly vulnerable tracts. The dynamic nature of barriers is evident, highlighting temporal shifts in the significance of variables like driving distance to vaccine sites. This study emphasizes the importance of dynamic, localized assessments in identifying vaccination barriers, guiding public health interventions, and informing resource allocation to enhance vaccine accessibility during pandemics.

Achieving a Better Life Experience (ABLE) accounts can help build financial capacity for people with disabilities as tax-advantaged savings vehicles designed for disability-related expenses. ABLE accounts might be particularly beneficial for low-income individuals with severe disabilities who receive Supplemental Security Income (SSI) from the Social Security Administration (SSA), because funds deposited in ABLE accounts do not count toward the asset limits required to maintain monthly SSI benefits and access to healthcare. This paper investigates the potential savings and financial capacity of eligible individuals with disabilities who may benefit from the expansion of ABLE accounts. Utilizing the 2014–2017 Survey of Income and Program Participation merged with the 2014 Social Security Supplement, this study examines different levels of access to savings and financial assets – factors that may influence ABLE participation – among people with disabilities, particularly SSI recipients. Financial capacity is analyzed across three disability onset age groups: before age 26, ages 26 through 45, and age 46 and older, with particular attention to individuals in the second group, who will become eligible for ABLE in January 2026 when the onset-age threshold increases from age 26 to age 46. Findings from logistic and OLS regression analyses indicate that financial capacity is particularly weak among SSI recipients who are newly eligible for ABLE accounts, suggesting limited financial resources to open or contribute to ABLE accounts. Directions for further research on ABLE participation are discussed.