This study presents a transcultural mapping of department stores in modern East Asia from a socio-political perspective centered on colonialism and nationalism. Department stores in the region exhibited a coeval culture, as suggested by the common use of the term “hyakka/baihuo/baekhwa.” While focusing on the common impact of Japanese colonialism, this study examines mainly Mitsukoshi in Tokyo; Wing On and Sincere in Shanghai; and Mitsukoshi, Minakai, and Hwashin in Seoul. It consists of four parts. The first part traces the translingual-scape of “hyakka” and shows how the modern universalism celebrated in the term, in reality, contributed to shaping an exclusive social group. The second part expands the etymological survey of “hyakka” into the physical dimension and analyzes items for sale at department stores, select lifestyles, and social group formations. The third part illuminates the patriarchal, militaristic managerial styles that developed under the influence of Japanese imperialism. The last part delves into Japanese department stores' colonial expansion within East Asia. This study employs a transcultural methodology to highlight multidimensional connections and coeval localities as well as differences, though it is often differences that are highlighted by research that involves straightforward country comparisons.

Existing approaches to the representation of argument structure in grammar tend to focus either on semantics or on syntax. Our goal in this paper is to strike the right balance between the two levels by proposing an analysis that maintains the independence of the syntactic and semantic aspects of argument structure, and, at the same time, captures the interplay between the two levels. Our proposal is set in the context of the development of a large-scale grammar of Modern Hebrew within the framework of Head-driven Phrase Structure Grammar (HPSG). Consequently, an additional challenge it faces is to reconcile two conflicting desiderata: to be both linguistically coherent and realistic in terms of the grammar engineering effort. We present a novel representation of argument structure that is fully implemented in HPSG, and demonstrate its many benefits to the coherence of our Hebrew grammar. We also highlight the additional dimensions of linguistic generalization that our proposal provides, which we believe are also applicable to grammars of other languages.

What is the relationship between Nazism and natural law—the notion of universal standards, which arise from either God, revelation, nature, rationality, or morality, and which human-made statutes cannot break? In 1946, in the wake of World War II, Gustav Radbruch, one of Germany's most respected Social Democrats and legal philosophers, published his influential article, “Statutory Injustice and Suprastatutory Law,” which grappled with a pressing issue of postwar justice. Should courts deem judges criminally responsible for having earlier convicted defendants, and often sentenced them to death, based on denunciations by family, neighbors, or rivals, denunciations that the Nazi regime had encouraged but that a fair-minded government must condemn? As a matter of jurisprudence, Radbruch set forth his famous formula, which declared that judges must adhere to positive or statutory law, except in rare circumstances in which such law violated fundamental principles of justice. In his words, “[P]ositive law, secured through legislation and power, prevails, even if it is substantively unjust and inexpedient, unless the tension between positive law and justice reaches such an intolerable level that the law as ‘false law’ must yield to justice.” As a matter of history, Radbruch excused Nazi-era judges who had missed his jurisprudential point, because they had succumbed to the legal theory of positivism that had long permeated German legal thinking. “Positivism,” Radbruch wrote, “with its belief that ‘law is law’ rendered the German judiciary defenseless against arbitrary and criminal laws.”

I here settle a recent dispute between two rival theories in distributive ethics: Restricted Prioritarianism and the Competing Claims View. Both views mandate that the distribution of benefits and burdens between individuals should be justifiable to each affected party in a way that depends on the strength of each individual's separately assessed claim to receive a benefit. However, they disagree about what elements constitute the strength of those individuals’ claims. According to restricted prioritarianism, the strength of a claim is determined in ‘prioritarian’ fashion by both what she stands to gain and her absolute level of well-being, while, according to the competing claims view, the strength of a claim is also partly determined by her level of well-being relative to others with conflicting interests. I argue that, suitably modified, the competing claims view is more plausible than restricted prioritarianism.

Upstream engagement is commonly regarded as necessary for the smooth implementation of new technologies, particularly when there is an impact on health. Is the healthcare context in Australia geared toward such public engagement? There are established engagement practices for issues of healthcare resourcing, for example; however, the situation becomes more complex with the introduction of a new technology such as nanomedicine.

Mr. Hope is a 40-year-old man who has resided at a long-term care facility for the past 10 years. The resident was originally admitted to the nursing home for his inability to care for himself secondary to advanced AIDS and complications from progressive multifocal leukoencephalopathy (PML). When he initially arrived at the nursing home, Mr. Hope was able to smile and appeared to respond to some of the staff’s requests. Now, he responds by wincing when told that procedures are being performed and especially when he is told that he has to go back to the hospital. He is extremely contracted, with his arms wedded to his chest in a crossed fashion, as though he is protecting himself from blows. Mr. Hope’s family consists of a partner, his parents, and one sibling. Numerous conversations have been had with the family, and according to the facility staff, “they persist in continuing aggressive measures with the hope that the patient will wake up and walk out of the facility.” What had been frequent visits to the local hospital ER have increased substantially in the last few months, for what appear to be new infections and pneumonia. During most visits he ultimately spends a few days in the hospital to resolve his acute issues. On his most recent return to the long-term care facility, the medical staff approached the family about Mr. Hope’s code status. The family continues to insist on a full code status and that he be provided every opportunity to “live.” The staff is very concerned about Mr. Hope and his welfare. Many of the nursing staff have grown attached to him over the years, and watching him deteriorate has been distressing. They see part of their role as being his advocate and supporting him in ways that his own family has not. They express very strong reservations about performing CPR on Mr. Hope because they think it will be ineffective and they will have to break his upper extremities in order to gain access to his chest for resuscitation. The staff has contacted the ethics consultation service with the request that Mr. Hope needs protection and that his own family is not making the best decisions for him.

The Criminal Code of Canada prohibits persons from aiding or abetting suicide and consenting to have death inflicted on them. Together, these provisions have prohibited physicians from assisting patients to die. On February 6, 2015, the Supreme Court of Canada declared void these provisions insofar as they “prohibit physician-assisted death for a competent adult person who (1) clearly consents to the termination of life and (2) has a grievous and irremediable medical condition (including an illness, disease or disability) that causes enduring suffering that is intolerable to the individual in the circumstances of his or her condition.” This declaration of invalidity was scheduled to take effect one year (later extended by six months) after the ruling, to give the government time to put legislation in place. We trace the history of this decision, discuss how it has forever changed the debate on physician-assisted dying, and identify the issues that must be resolved to write the legislation. Of special importance here are the topics of access, safeguards, and conscientious objection.

Mr. Hope’s family’s expectations and his staff’s concerns raise important issues about surrogate decisionmaking, communication regarding prognosis, and staff angst. Unfortunately, Mr. Hope himself is unable to reliably understand and communicate his preferences, especially for complex medical decisions, so the ethics consultant is left to negotiate the disagreement between his family and his healthcare providers, who presumably both believe they are acting in his best interest.

An ethics consult was scheduled for the following day. Prior to the consult, Mr. Hope subsequently decompensated and was transferred to the local hospital. The ethics consultation service continued with the ethics consult to discuss the ethical concerns of the medical staff but in particular to create an open forum for the staff to process their moral distress over the care of this patient and to come to an agreed-on plan on how they would proceed should the resident code. The patient never returned to the long-term care setting. While in the emergency room, the patient took a turn for the worse and appeared to require intubation. The emergency room attending physician contacted the patient’s family and discussed the imminent likelihood of the patient’s demise and the potential harm caused to the patient by resuscitation and intubation, and the family agreed to switch to comfort measures, allowing the patient to pass peacefully. The family stated to the ER physician that they needed to feel as though they had done everything they could to keep their loved one alive and did not want any responsibility for his death. The staff at the long-term care setting still remember Mr. Hope in their daily work and talk about him often.

In 2014, the Japanese government amended the laws concerning regenerative medicine. This reform aimed to contribute to the appropriate promotion of regenerative medicine and new drug discovery for intractable diseases using stem cells. It also helped restrict stem cell tourism, that is, provision of stem cell therapy of unclear efficacy and safety to tourists from abroad, and its relaxed regulations may even lead to the resolution of the drug lag problem. Stem cell medicine is positioned as a part of a national growth strategy that requires cooperation among the industry, government, healthcare field, and academia. It can be characterized as a “mesoscopic strategy,” in that it aims to achieve high-level technological developments that would allow results from human-induced pluripotent stem cell and traditional stem cell research to contribute to regenerative medicine and drug development for intractable diseases, while attempting to strike a balance with commercialization and improved access of citizens to cutting-edge medical care.