This article examines the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) framework as a political project in tension with its universal and multilateral aspirations to serve as a counterbalance to narrow populist visions increasingly dominating global politics. Building upon Laclau and Mouffe’s theory of populism and their notion of ‘radical democracy’, we conceptualise the SDGs as a struggle for hegemony and in competition with other styles of politics, over what counts as ‘development’. This hegemonial struggle plays out in the attempts to form political constituencies behind developmental slogans, and it is here that religious actors come to the fore, given their already established role in organising communities, expressing values and aspirations, and articulating visions of the future. Examining how the SDG process has engaged with faith actors in India and Ethiopia, as well as how the Indian and Ethiopian states have engaged with religion in defining development, we argue that a ‘radical democracy’ of sustainable development requires a more intentional effort at integrating religious actors in the implementation of the SDGs.

Previous systematic reviews and meta-analyses of cross-sectional data assessing the effect of cannabis on cognitive functioning and intelligence show inconsistent results. We hypothesized that frequent and dependent cannabis use in youth would be associated with Intelligence Quotient (IQ) decline. This study is a systematic review and meta-analysis. We searched Embase, PubMed and PsychInfo from inception to 24 January 2020. We included studies with non-treatment seeking samples and pre- and post-exposure measures of IQ. We requested data from authors if summary data was not available from published work. We preregistered our review with PROSPERO (ID no. CRD42019125624). We found seven cohort studies including 808 cases and 5308 controls. We found a significant effect for the association between frequent or dependent cannabis use in youth and IQ change, Cohen's d = −0.132 (95% CI −0.198 to −0.066) p < 0.001. Statistical heterogeneity between studies was also low at I2 = 0.2%. Study quality was moderate to high. This translates to an average decline of approximately 2 IQ points following exposure to cannabis in youth. Future studies should have longer periods of follow up to assess the magnitude of developmental impact.

Recent discussions of accountability in contexts of expert knowledge raise questions about the limits of transparency. Against this background, we discuss the nexus between expert knowledge and meaningful accountability – that is, context-sensitive accountability based on a genuine understanding of a situation. We argue that the concentration of expertise in certain institutions makes it difficult to hold those institutions accountable. In particular, three components challenge meaningful accountability: specialization, inaccessibility and potential biases or conflict of interest. We emphasize the role of ‘epistemic communities’ and their impact on the tension between expert knowledge and independence. Drawing on the deliberative systems literature, we discuss how expert knowledge might be communicated to outsiders to enable meaningful accountability. To illustrate our argument, we draw on the European Central Bank, a case study in which states have chosen a delegation design characterized by a high degree of independence and trust in expert knowledge, to the detriment of accountability. We sketch possible avenues for creating the conditions for meaningful accountability even in the case of institutions with highly concentrated expertise.

Adverse childhood experiences are significant risk factors in the development of adolescent borderline personality disorder symptoms (BPDs). Theorists have posited that two personality vulnerabilities factors, self-criticism and dependency, may inform our understanding of this relationship. However, no research has examined the associations between early negative experiences, personality vulnerabilities, and adolescent BPDs. The current study aimed to identify profiles of dependency and self-criticism to examine the associations of these profiles with cumulative forms of childhood maltreatment (CM) and BPDs as well as to explore the mediating and moderating role of vulnerable personality profiles in the relationship between cumulative CM and BPDs. Two hundred and forty-one nonclinical and clinical adolescents participated in the study (Mage = 16.37, SD = 1.84). The findings indicated three different profiles: average dependent profile, dependent and self-critical profile, and self-critical profile. Individuals in the average dependent profile presented lower levels of CM and BPDs. Mediation analyses showed that relative to the average dependent profile, a higher cumulative CM history predicted a higher probability of belonging in the dependent and self-critical profile or the self-critical profile and, in turn, this was associated with higher levels of BPDs. No moderating effects of profiles of dependency and self-criticism were found.

We can all agree that institutions matter, though as to which institutions matter most, and how much any of them matter, the matter is, paraphrasing Douglass North's words at the Nobel podium, unresolved after seven decades of immense effort. We suggest that the obstacle to progress is the paradigm of the New Institutional Economics itself. In this paper, we propose a new theory that is: grounded in institutions as coevolving sources of economic growth rather than as rules constraining growth; and deployed in dynamical systems theory rather than game theory. We show that with our approach some long-standing problems are resolved, in particular, the paradoxical and perplexingly pervasive influence of informal constraints on the long-run character of economies.