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This chapter examines economic, social, cultural, and environmental rights under international human rights law. It covers the right to property, the right to a healthy environment, the right to adequate housing, the right to health, and the right to education. The chapter discusses the legal standards and protections for these rights, the obligations of states to ensure their realization, and the role of international bodies in monitoring compliance. It also highlights the challenges in achieving these rights, particularly in the context of economic inequality, environmental degradation, and social exclusion, and the importance of adopting comprehensive and inclusive policies to address these issues.
This chapter considers Percy Shelley’s concern with ancient Greek literature through a close reading of ‘With a Guitar. To Jane’. The second half of the poem unfolds a description of the guitar modelled on the representation of the lyre in the Homeric Hymn to Hermes. In the course of this account, Shelley presents an instrument which is akin to its ancient counterpart in its bewitching power, but which derives qualities from its environment in a manner quite different from anything envisaged in the hymn. When refashioned through Shelley’s imagination, the guitar acts as a figure both for poetry’s capacity to animate as well as to reflect perception, and for the power of creative appropriations to change the terms on which we relate to ancient literature.
Soil health is essential for a resilient ecosystem. European Union proposed a Soil Monitoring Law for a legal framework of soils health. This study proposes a way to assess the mineral soil health. A database of mineral soils containing < 20% organic matter and consisting of 10 soil classes and 22 soil types was used. There were four altitudinal groups (HM-high mountains; LM-low mountains and high hills, LH-low hills, PL-low plains), covering the vegetation/climate floors, two land uses (forestland and grassland combined, and cropland), and three soil textures (coarse-CO, loamy-LO, and clayey-CL). Both SOC/Clay ratios and observed per mean SOC (O/M SOC) ratios were calculated for 19 regions. For SOC/Clay, the 1/13, 1/10 and 1/8 thresholds were used, whereas O/M SOC categories were grouped as: “low”, “intermediate”, “high”, “very high” health. SOC/Clay and O/M SOC ratios combined were used to characterize soil health. SOC sequestration depends on many factors that are specific for each pedo-climatic region and texture, and so is the soil characterization as healthy or not healthy. The recommended simultaneous application of these two indicators revealed specific SOC content values as reference levels for a good soil health, which decrease from the wetter climates towards the drier ones. SOC content considerably differed among pedo-climatic regions, and soil health should be compared within the same regions that have specific SOC sequestration conditions. Correlations between support points SOC values and the aridity index (Iar) allow separation between “healthy” and “non-healthy” soil condition for any climate, vegetation floor and land use.
In many areas of The Gambia, West Africa, population crowding in a degraded environment has forced close interactions of diurnal primate species with humans. We assessed intestinal parasitic infection prevalence and diversity in 4 diurnal non-human primate (NHP) species, Chlorocebus sabaeus, Erythrocebus patas, Papio papio and Piliocolobus badius across 13 sampling sites. The effect of human activity, determined by the human activity index, and NHP group size on parasite richness was assessed using a generalized linear mixed model (GLMM). The most common protozoa identified were Entamoeba coli (30%) and Iodamoeba buetschlii (25%). The most common helminths were Strongyloides fuelleborni (11%), Oesophagostomum spp. (9%) and Trichuris trichiura (9%). Two of six (6%) Cyclospora spp. infections detected sequenced as Cyclospora cercopitheci (both in C. sabaeus). The more arboreal P. badius trended towards a lower prevalence of intestinal parasites, although this was not statistically significant (χ2P = 0.105). Human activity or group size did not have any significant effect on parasite richness for P. badius (P = 0.161 and P = 0.603) or P. papio (P = 0.817 and P = 0.607, respectively). There were insufficient observations to fit a GLMM to E. patas or C. sabaeus. Our reports present the richness and diversity of intestinal parasites in 4 diurnal NHPs in The Gambia, West Africa. Despite desertification and habitat loss, our results indicate that the prevalence and diversity of intestinal parasites in Gambian NHPs are seemingly unaffected by human activity. Further investigation with a larger dataset is required to better elucidate these findings.
Environmental policies and enforcement pose fundamental corruption issues relating to the tensions between economic self-interest and the public good. By directing our attention to the challenges of collective action, they also highlight the importance of state-level institutional and political characteristics – notably, the political clout of industrial and environmental lobby groups. High levels of corruption and low levels of trust both weaken the stringency and enforcement of environmental policies and affect levels of emissions, although as levels of trust in a state increase, the effects of corruption weaken or vanish. Our environmental findings closely parallel those in other chapters having to do with COVID policies – not surprising, as they raise similar questions of policy and compliance – and support our argument that thinking solely in terms of specific acts of rule- or law-breaking is an incomplete understanding of corruption, its causes, and its consequences.
This article explores the formation of the University of California amidst widespread populist agitation against university leaders in the 1870s. These complaints were rooted in corruption by the Board of Regents as well as their failure to honor the requirement of the 1862 Morrill Act to offer practical training in “agriculture and the mechanic arts.” It argues that Yosemite served as a vehicle through which representatives of the University of California countered charges of elitism and fostered a reputation for trustworthy stewardship of public land. These efforts were visible to the public through literary texts, newspapers, public lectures, nature writings, and other forms of popular literature. By positioning Yosemite as a site of middlebrow intellectual exchange and an alternative to the demonstration farms established at other land grant institutions, professors such as Joseph LeConte helped quell populist critiques and strengthen affective ties to the university. The resulting shift in popular sentiment helped secure public trust in the university for the remainder of the Gilded Age and Progressive Era.
What is climate history? How can it serve as a lens through which to view other historical questions? This roundtable identifies key themes in Gilded Age and Progressive Era climate history, and demonstrates that this era was pivotal for both scientific and cultural perceptions of climate. It also shows how climate history can illuminate other subjects, including histories of science, medicine, health, and race. Further, it considers present-day implications. This roundtable began as a session sponsored by the Society for Historians of the Gilded Age and Progressive Era at the 2024 Organization of American Historians annual meeting in New Orleans. What follows is a conversation based on that panel, a selected bibliography of scholarly sources, and a collection of primary sources for teaching climate history.
How corrupt is the United States of America? While the US presents itself as an exemplar of democratic government and politics, many citizens see it as highly corrupt. In this book, Oguzhan Dincer and Michael Johnston explore corruption across a range of policy areas in all fifty states using two major forms of corruption – legal and illegal – via three proxy measures of corruption. They not only estimate the pervasiveness of such corruption in each state, but also compare and contrast their causes, consequences, and implications for contemporary issues including racial inequities, public health policy, and the environment, while also highlighting issues of citizen participation and trust in political processes. The book presents no reform toolkits or quick fixes for American corruption problems, but frames key challenges of institutional change and democratic political revival that can be used in the struggle to build a more just, and better-governed, society.
Autism spectrum disorder is defined by the presence of sustained problems in areas of social cognition and social understanding alongside repetitive and/or restricted patterns of behaviour. Behavioural presentations and developmental trajectories in autism are highly heterogeneous. For most, characteristics variably continue across the lifespan, and, for many, they overlap with numerous overrepresented comorbid combinations spanning behavioural, psychiatric and somatic domains. The current autism diagnostic systems (DSM-5, ICD-11) reflect this heterogeneity, focusing on discerning different assistance needs and symptom severity combinations. An emerging view on the pluralisation of autism – ‘the autisms’ – based on different severity levels and different developmental trajectories is gaining popularity, bolstered by the introduction of the grouping ‘profound autism’ and observations of non-persistence of autism for some. We advance the case for expanding the definition of the plural autisms based also on the numerous different aetiological routes that can lead to autism. Various genetic conditions, susceptibility to infectious agents, non-infectious environmental exposures and immune-mediated occurrences have all been observed to culminate in a diagnosis of autism. As a triad, aetiology, presentation intensity and developmental trajectory offer new ways to classify the autisms, with potentially important implications for research and practice.
This chapter outlines a historiography of the papacy and the environment and begins with several observations. First, papal approaches to the environment are shaped by the historical evolution of the papacy itself. Second, notions of environment and environmentalism are varied across secular, religious, and, by extension, papal discourse and action. Relatedly, these pluriform conceptions are influenced by locations that include geographic, epistemological, and socio-cultural. Thus informed, the chapter engages two distinct periods. The first is the sixth to the sixteenth centuries, wherein papal approaches to the environment were variously shaped by notions of wilderness, classical natural history, anthropocentrism, monastic spiritualities and activities, and expanding ecclesial infrastructure and temporal power. The second period begins with global industrialization around 1750 and continues through to today. Therein, papal environmentalism is especially expressed in modern Catholic social teaching that began with Leo XIII in 1891 and continues through Francis I, especially Laudato si’ in 2015.
The world faces a perfect storm of existential risk, with a deadly new pandemic, an escalating climate crisis, and the constant threat posed by nuclear weapons. The essential facts and dangers for all of these are long- known, but they have been downplayed or neglected until presenting an immediate threat – by which time it may be too late. We need to have a clear understanding of these risks, but also need to understand the deeper reasons why they have not been properly addressed. To a large extent these lie in the dogmas of military and political elites and in an optimistic preference for short-term results. Civil society and the world community of nations should come together to work for real change, as has already been achieved with the 2020 Treaty for the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. They should seek to safeguard the welfare of future generations, giving priority to that interest. The alternative is the growing risk of multiple disasters that could prove terminal.
The four major countries of East Asia—China, Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan—form one of the most densely populated regions on earth, and through the course of the late 20th and early 21st centuries the region experienced some of its fastest economic growth, propelled by the policies of state-led developmentalism. As a result of this density and these policies, the four countries in turn became some of the most environmentally degraded. As each achieved middle-to-high income status, however, the populace and then the regime in each country realized that they could not sustain either rapid economic growth or popular legitimacy without addressing the environmental consequences of this fast growth. The four states thus changed their fundamental economic policies from pure developmentalism to what we call eco-developmentalism, an attempt to reconcile economic prosperity with environmental sustainability. Although success so far has been mixed, this turn to eco-developmentalism has allowed these states to claim world leadership in mitigating environmental degradation.
Japan is shrinking. Current projections indicate a population decrease of around one quarter by mid-century. Depopulation is potentially good news, providing opportunities for reconfiguring living conditions and alleviating human-environmental pressures. Nevertheless, ageing and depopulation have outcomes that require adjustment. One of these is spatial inequalities, which have been accelerating since the 1990s. Japan is the Asia-Pacific’s pioneer ageing and shrinking society. In East Asia both China and South Korea are ageing and expected to begin shrinking soon. Even high immigration Anglophone countries such as New Zealand are experiencing post-growth demographic processes at subnational level. Japan’s significance is in how adaptive responses there inform prospects for others as they experience their own post-growth pathways. This article presents case studies of Sado Island in Japan and New Zealand’s South Island in a comparative qualitative analysis of rural agency under population decline. Overall, I contend there is potential for benefitting from demographic shrinkage - what I term a ‘depopulation dividend’ - and for rural regions in the Asia-Pacific to progress towards a sustainable post-growth economy and society.
Chapter 4 begins to discuss decoherence, and, thus, to address the overarching question: How does the classical world—classical states that are responsible for the objective reality of our everyday experience—emerge from within the Universe that is, as we know from compelling experimental evidence, made out of quantum stuff. The short answer to this question is that decoherence selects (from the vast number of superpositions that populate Hilbert space in the process of environment-induced superselection (also known as einselection) the few states that are—in contrast to all the other alternatives—stable in spite of their immersion in the environment. Decoherence is illustrated with a detailed discussion of two models. A spin decohered by an environment of spins as well as quantum Brownian motion have become paradigmatic models of decoherence for good reason: They are exactly solvable and yet they capture (albeit in an idealized manner) the emergence of the preferred classical states in settings that are relevant for quantum measurements and for Newtonian dynamics in effectively classical phase space.
While the concept of reasonable adjustments is well-established in academia, and it is enshrined in university policy that we must support the provision of these adjustments for our students, autistic employees may not always feel empowered to ask for necessary adjustments to thrive in an academic workplace. In this chapter participants reflect on the process of requesting and receiving adjustments, including those that have been denied and those that they wish they could ask for.
This chapter explores the bi-directional challenges of autistics in the academy. Many of the challenges experienced by autistic people in academia are similar to those experienced in other aspects of our lives – dealing with sensory challenges, different processing styles, social interaction, and communication. Other challenges that are inherent to academia include the breadth of activity, the performance and competitive aspects of the role, and complicated institutional politics.
Historically, the papacy has had – and continues to have – significant and sustained influence on society and culture. In the contemporary world, this influence is felt far afield from the traditional geographic and cultural center of papal authority in western Europe, notably in the Global South. Volume 3 frames questions around the papacy's cultural influence, focusing on the influence that successive popes and various vectors of papal authority have had on a broad range of social and cultural developments in European and global societies. The range of topics covered here reflects the vast and expanding scope of papal influence on everything from architecture to the construction and contestation of gender norms to questions of papal fashion. That influence has waxed and waned over time as successive popes have had access to greater resources and have had stronger imperatives to use their powers of patronage and regulation to intervene in society at large.
Braidotti describes the world as gasping for air as collectively we face a range of socioecological challenges. Young people are important actors in these challenges, making schools a critical space for this work. Physical education (PE) can contribute through promoting relevant embodied encounters that develop students’ physical literacies (PL). Noting the recent moves to extend the notion of a physically literate individual to include the ecological, alongside the Australian Curriculum that requires teachers to attend to their learning area, cross-curriculum priorities and general capabilities including sustainability and ethical capabilities, there are exciting possibilities for developing students’ PL to confront these challenges. Despite these opportunities, for PE to contribute meaningfully, teachers must progress from PE represented by sport techniques, linear pedagogies and driven by competition to PE that engages students to think and act differently in the world, ethically, ontologically and epistemologically. Using autoethnography, this paper presents vignettes to outline current issues and possibilities for PE. Through a posthuman lens, positioning teachers and students as learners who are always becoming, with the capacity to affect and be affected, it is possible to achieve the intended curriculum and develop young people’s capacities to make a meaningful contribution to the socioecological challenges we face.
This chapter examines the role of national and regional institutions in promoting integrated regulation and administration of biodiversity and forest management in the Middle East and North African (MENA) region. Drawing lessons from Morocco, it evaluates current legal and institutional challenges in the integrated management of forest and biodiversity. This chapter examines four fundamental themes raised by the legal and judicial protection of the forests. First, it examines the need for integrated regulation of biodiversity and forest management, given the interconnectedness of these two elements. Second, it evaluates integration gaps and challenges in laws relating to forest management and biodiversity in Morocco. Third, it evaluates institutional arrangements in forest management in Morocco, especially the role of the Water and Forestry Agency in activating integrated management of forest and biodiversity in Morocco. Fourth, it offers recommendations on how to advance integrated management of forest and biodiversity in Morocco and across the Maghreb region.
In this conversation, Professor Hiroto Koda investigates the innovation needs of Japanese society. They include embracing digital transformation, addressing the contraction of the population, in particular outside of the Tokyo metropolitan area, and finding solutions for environmental challenges. Against this background, this chapter focuses on five issues: (i) the economic effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, accelerating regional degeneration and the delay in digital transformation, (ii) the development of new business models, (iii) the solution of social issues that arise, (iv) collaboration between industry, government, academia and financial institutions and (v) the strengthening of human resources.