RESUMO Este artigo desenvolve uma análise dos dados oferecidos por informações sobre status profissional e escolaridade de funcionários públicos na administração direta de 5,5 mil municípios ...brasileiros. Tomando os “estatutários com formação superior” como proxy para identificar burocracia profissional, buscou-se constatar a escala de sua participação no serviço público municipal e a medida em que maior proporção de funcionários recrutados por concurso, com estabilidade no cargo e escolaridade superior, pode ser associada à maior chance para implementação de uma agenda de políticas urbanas. Os resultados indicaram que mesmo quando controlado por variáveis demográficas ou eleitorais, a presença de burocracia profissional mostrou-se robusta para explicar as chances de introdução de legislação regulatória sobre o espaço urbano nos municípios brasileiros. Não estando submetidos aos ciclos eleitorais e de governos, burocratas de carreira disporiam de recursos técnicos e informacionais e incentivos políticos e organizacionais para equacionar vetos decorrentes de custos concentrados gerados por este tipo de legislação.
RÉSUMÉ Cet article développe une analyse des données fournies par les informations sur le statut professionnel et la scolarité des fonctionnaires publics de l’administration centrale de 5 500 communes brésiliennes. En prenant comme proxy les “titulaires issus de l’enseignement supérieur” pour identifier la bureaucratie professionnelle, on a essayé d’identifier l’échelle de leur participation dans les services publics municipaux et dans quelle mesure le fait de disposer d’un plus grand nombre de fonctionnaires recrutés par concours, à l’emploi stable et issus de l’enseignement supérieur peut être associé à la mise en œuvre effective d’un agenda de politiques urbaines. Les résultats ont indiqué que même lorsqu’elle dépend de variables démographiques ou électorales, la présence d’une bureaucratie professionnelle est une composante robuste permettant d’expliquer les chances d’introduction d’une législation visant à réguler l’espace urbain dans les communes brésiliennes. En ce qu’ils ne sont pas soumis aux cycles électoraux et aux mandats y afférents, les bureaucrates de carrière disposeraient ainsi de ressources techniques, informationnelles, politiques et organisationnelles pour contrebalancer les pressions politiques inhérentes à ce type de législation.
ABSTRACT This article develops an analysis of data on the professional status and educational background of public servants working in the core administration of 5.5 thousand Brazilian municipalities. Taking “public servants with higher education” as a proxy for identifying professional bureaucrats, we sought to determine the scale of participation in the municipal public service and the extent to which a greater proportion of servants recruited by means of an entrance exam, involving job stability and further education, may be associated with a greater chance of implementing an agenda of urban policies. The results indicate that even when controlled by demographic or electoral variables, the presence of professional bureaucracy served as a reliable link to an increased chance of introducing regulatory legislation on the urban space in Brazilian municipalities. Immune to electoral and governmental cycles, professional bureaucrats may utilize various technical and informative resources as well as political and organizational incentives for offsetting the decisions based on heavy political pressure generated by this kind of legislation.
RESUMEN Este artículo desarrolla un análisis de los datos ofrecidos por la información sobre el estatus profesional y la formación de los empleados públicos en la administración directa de 5,5 mil municipios brasileños. Tomando al “personal estatutario con formación superior” como proxy para identificar burocracia profesional, se buscó conocer su grado de participación en el servicio público municipal y en qué medida una mayor proporción de funcionarios contratados por concurso, con un cargo estable y estudios superiores, puede estar asociada a una mayor oportunidad de implementar un programa de políticas urbanas. Los resultados indicaron que, aun cuando está controlada por variables demográficas o electorales, la existencia de burocracia profesional es lo suficientemente firme para explicar las posibilidades de introducir una legislación que regule el espacio urbano en los municipios brasileños. Al no estar sometidos a los ciclos electorales y gubernamentales, los burócratas de profesión dispondrán de recursos técnicos e informativos, e incentivos políticos y organizativos para plantear vetos derivados de costes concentrados generados por este tipo de legislación.
How the legalization of assisted dying is changing our
lives. Over the past five years, medical aid-in-dying
(also known as assisted suicide) has expanded rapidly in the United
States and is now ...legally available to one in five Americans. This
growing social and political movement heralds the possibility of a
new era of choice in dying. Yet very little is publicly known about
how medical aid-in-dying laws affect ordinary citizens once they
are put into practice. Sociological studies of new health policies
have repeatedly demonstrated that the realities often fall short of
advocacy visions, raising questions about how much choice and
control aid-in-dying actually affords. Scripting Death
chronicles two years of ethnographic research documenting the
implementation of Vermont's 2013 Patient Choice and Control at End
of Life Act. Author Mara Buchbinder weaves together stories
collected from patients, caregivers, health care providers,
activists, and legislators to illustrate how they navigate
aid-in-dying as a new medical frontier in the aftermath of
legalization. Scripting Death explains how medical
aid-in-dying works, what motivates people to pursue it, and
ultimately, why upholding the "right to die" is very different from
ensuring access to this life-ending procedure. This unprecedented,
in-depth account uses the case of assisted death as an entry point
into ongoing cultural conversations about the changing landscape of
death and dying in the United States.
Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) include a subset of targets that can be advanced through standard urban management activities. In particular, routine urban vegetation management comprises a ...number of activities with potential impact on Goal #4 (quality education), #11 (sustainable cities and communities), #13 (protect the planet), #15 (life on land), and, perhaps less obviously, but equally important, on Goal #8 (good jobs and economic growth). This paper discusses how urban vegetation management can help achieve the SDGs at a local level. Drawing on a case study (Talavera de la Reina, Spain), it is shown that an intelligent approach to urban vegetation management can leverage resources towards the SDGs at little or no cost to municipalities. Minor modifications and conceptual changes in how standard practices are carried out can make a difference. Including this dimension can even result in a positive balance for the municipal budget. Our analyses and proposals are of broad and direct applicability for urban areas worldwide and can help city authorities and officials to align their cities with the SDGs simply by making minor adjustments to how they currently deal with urban vegetation.
International and national guidelines have been promoting active aging while creating the necessary means for decision-makers and other relevant actors to work together (governance mechanisms) to ...implement local and active aging policies. This is especially important in the present COVID-19 pandemic context, posing greater challenges on older people who tend to be self-isolated. How are local actors conceptualizing active aging? What are their priorities related to a healthy life for older people? Which governance mechanisms are used to implement such policies? These are some of the questions addressed in this paper, targeting Portugal, a southern European country. A mixed-methods sequential explanatory design combining a survey conducted at a national level and interviews with key actors in the NUTS III Aveiro Region was employed to identify and understand the underpinning governance mechanisms. Findings confirm the ‘passive organization type’ in which European politico-territorial studies tend to place Portugal, as there are gaps in the way policies are formulated, implemented and evaluated, as well as a lack of coordination. Results of this study have important impacts on the way local governments and other stakeholders will prepare themselves in the post-pandemic period to design and implement policies addressing active aging.
Lake wetlands play a crucial role in mitigating climate change. Human activities and climate change impact the carbon sequestration capacity of lake wetlands. However, this process is intricate. ...Clarifying the decisive factors that affect carbon sequestration is crucial for preserving, utilizing, and enhancing the carbon sequestration capacity of plateau lake wetlands. Here we analyzed the regulatory role of land use under policy guidance on the carbon sequestration capacity of the plateau lake wetland of Caohai (CHLW), SW China. The results show that: (1) The cumulative carbon sequestration varied significantly from 1990 to 2020, with the highest carbon sequestration of 15.80 × 105 t C in 1995 and the lowest of 3.18 × 105 t C in 2020, mainly originating from endogenous carbon sequestration within the plateau lake wetlands. (2) As of 2020, the carbon stock of CHLW was approximately 2.54 × 108 t C. (3) The carbon sequestration in CHLW experienced a dynamic change process of decrease-increase-decrease over 30 years, mainly influenced by land use changes under policy regulation, with human and natural factors accounting for 91% and 9%, respectively. (4) Under three simulated scenarios (Q1, Q2, and Q3), the ecological priority scenario exhibited positive regulation on the carbon sequestration of CHLW and the entire protected area in 2030 and 2060, with the highest increase in carbon sequestration. This scenario is consistent with the current conservation policy, indicating that the current protection policy for CHLW is scientifically reasonable. This research demonstrates how land use and climate changes impact carbon storage in wetlands, with consideration of policy guidance. It provides references for utilizing and conserving lake wetlands worldwide, ultimately achieving the dual goals of wetland conservation and carbon neutrality.
Research has highly valued the contribution of migrant economies to the development of mainly top‐scale metropolises. Migrant economies are considered a crucial asset when it comes to positioning ...cities internationally, revitalising neighbourhoods and generally securing the social, economic and political inclusion of migrants. Nevertheless, there is a major research gap in empirical evidence on migrant economies beyond metropolitan cities and the impact of the local context on the development of migrant economies in these localities. In order to tackle this blind spot, this paper examines how the local context fosters or hinders the development of migrant economies in two low‐scale German cities. The paper conceptualises ‘local context’ as comprising economic, political and socio‐cultural factors. In sum, it finds the local conditions less conducive to the development of migrant economies in the cities under scrutiny, for example, because these economies are not an urban policy issue there.
Based on three empirical case studies, this paper discusses options of addressing social integration as a task of local authorities. It furthermore aims to provide a conceptual scheme for a ...systematic exploration of this field of local politics. The argumentation starts from the observation that many communities in Germany have taken promising attempts to establish a genuine integration policy at the local level in the wake of recent refugee immigration. Thereby, they bolster the often-heard catchword of 'social integration occurs at particular places' and, at the same time, support both local civil society and local economy in developing their integrative potential. However, the case studies have also shown that an 'integrative urban development' (policy) must not refrain its efforts to the very field of integration policy but should link this policy to further cross-cutting paradigms – i.e., the principles of recognition, backstopping, and social cohesion. Examples from the case studies illustrate how to pursue local integration policies that allow for these principles. Yet, it will always be a matter of framework conditions, experiences and distinct local discourses, which of the proposed strategies, instruments or measures apply.
This paper presents an economic assessment of introducing solar-powered residential battery energy storage in the Madeira Island electric grid, where only micro-production for self-consumption is ...currently allowed. The evaluation was conducted against six local micro-producers using one year of energy consumption and solar photovoltaic production measurements and two distinct storage control strategies. Several inverter sizes and storage capacities were considered based on the six micro-producers’ consumption and production profiles. The results were then analyzed concerning year-long simulations and a projection for the next ten years. To this end, several indicators were assessed, including self-consumption, profit per Euro invested, number of cycles and storage degradation. The results obtained show that, despite the benefits of storage to increase the self-consumption rates, considerable drops in the storage prices are still necessary to achieve profitability during these devices’ lifetime. Furthermore, our results also highlight a very interesting trade-off between self-consumption, pre-charge and profitability, in a sense that higher levels of pre-charge increase the chances of reaching profitability even though this will imply considerable drops in the levels of self-consumption.
En France, les inégalités sociales de santé restent importantes, tant en ce qui concerne les variations d’états de santé que celles de l’accès aux soins de la population. Si leurs dimensions ...socio-économiques sont largement documentées, les processus concourant aux inégalités entre hommes et femmes ainsi que leur inscription dans les dynamiques territoriales restent peu analysés. Cet article vise à interroger le rôle de ces dynamiques dans l’accès des hommes et des femmes à la prévention. Nous nous appuyons sur l’étude des modalités locales de promotion de la santé dans la commune de Gennevilliers (Hauts-de-Seine) pour interroger ce processus de construction des inégalités. Des entretiens semi-directifs ont été menés auprès d’élus, de professionnels du champ sanitaire et social et d’acteurs associatifs. La consultation de différentes sources manuscrites et des observations de terrain complètent ce travail. La commune de Gennevilliers, par l’ancienneté de la prise en compte de la santé, le dynamisme des réseaux d’acteurs ou bien le nombre d’actions innovantes qui caractérisent sa politique sanitaire, constitue un exemple mobilisateur et pertinent pour l’analyse des freins et leviers de l’intervention en santé. Cet article démontre que les dispositifs de promotion de la santé s’inscrivent dans des dynamiques territoriales complexes, mais peuvent également contribuer au renforcement des normes de genre et des écarts entre hommes et femmes. Finalement, cette recherche illustre la nécessaire prise en compte des questions de genre et de territoire dans l’analyse comme dans l’élaboration des actions de promotion de la santé.
Building on a comparative study of the urban 'adaptations' of multiculturalism in eight European cities, this paper addresses four questions: 1) the changing relations between national and local ...immigrant policies; 2) the ways in which such policies are locally reshaped; 3) the involvement of civil society in the urban governance of immigration; 4) the advent, in some cases, of local policies of immigrant exclusion. Overall, local policies seem to have been less affected by the multiculturalist backlash than a commonsense understanding would entail; but they are in search of a new language. Diversity could be an answer to this issue.
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