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Geopolitical game-changer: China’s expanding role in Latin America’s defense, aerospace, and telecommunications
No full textThis chapter delves into the expanding influence of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC), with an emphasis on defense, aerospace, and telecommunications. It explores Beijing's pursuit of natural resources in the region and its bid to extend its economic sway there, and how this is reshaping regional power dynamics, notably in relation to the United States. It highlights the PRC's recent strides in the global arms trade, in space exploration initiatives, and in advances in telecommunications technology. It is revealed that Beijing's engagement in these sectors is redefining international partnerships, often placing China in the dominant role. This development is acutely observable in South America: Venezuela emerges as a key collaborator with the PRC in military cooperation and arms procurement, while Brazil's involvement in space and telecommunications reveals a combination of overambition and naivety. Moving beyond merely documenting the PRC's growing presence, the chapter also offers policy recommendations for Latin America and the U.S., recognizing the significant shifts in regional relationships. These insights are vital for grasping the evolving dynamics of U.S.-Latin American relations; they signal major changes in the geopolitical landscape of the Western Hemisphere
Investment law’s alibis: colonialism, imperialism, debt and development, written by David Schneiderman
No full textDavid Schneiderman, Investment Law’s Alibis: Colonialism, Imperialism, Debt and Development. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2022, 224 pp., isbn 9781009153492, £ 85.00
POS1552-HPR A synthesis of guidance available for assessing methodological quality and grading of evidence from qualitative research to inform clinical recommendations: a systematic review
No full textBackground Qualitative research is crucial to understand key stakeholders experiences and perspectives of care and health services. However, there is a lack of explicit frameworks and guidelines about how best to use qualitative evidence to formulate clinical recommendations. Part of the problem includes uncertainties about the contributions of qualitative research to the evidence, and the empirical and theoretical basis for appraising and synthesizing qualitative evidence in a standardized manner. In addition, most existing grading systems of qualitative research originates from quantitative research, and there is no clear guidance about how to incorporate qualitative research into the evidence hierarchy. Objectives To conduct a systematic literature review (SLR) to answer two research questions (RQ): RQ1) What guidance (e.g., tools, checklists, frameworks) exists to assess the methodological quality of qualitative research employed to inform clinical recommendations?; RQ2) What methods exist specifically to grade levels of evidence for qualitative research? Methods The protocol for this review was registered on www.researchregistry.com (reviewregistry1240). Electronic databases (PubMed/Medline, EMBASE, Web of Science, COCHRANE, Emcare, PsycINFO, ERIC, Academic Search Premier, Sociological Abstracts, ProQuest Dissertations and Thesis Global) were searched for published and unpublished studies. Searches were completed from inception to 23rd October 2020. No restrictions were applied to clinical population. Eligible studies for both questions included primary articles and guideline documents available in English, describing the: i) development; ii) application of validated tools (e.g., checklists); iii) guidance on how to assess methodological quality of qualitive research and iv) guidance on how to grade levels of qualitative evidence. Opinion pieces and conference abstracts were excluded. Manual searches of the reference lists of full text articles were conducted. Two reviewers independently screened the titles, abstracts, and full text. A narrative synthesis was conducted to identify key aspects between the included studies. Results 9071 records were retrieved (Figure 1). After de-duplication and title/abstract screening, 51 full-articles articles were assessed for eligibility yielding 15 included articles. For RQ1, six articles were included that described six tools (1) The society for Critical Care Medicine Family – Cantered Care Guidelines; 2) Nursing Management of the Second Stage of Labour evidence based clinical practice guidelines; 3) Jonna Briggs Institute Critical Appraisal of Qualitative Studies; 4) Critical Skill's Appraisal Programme (CASP) and 6) the Modified CASP checklist). All tools ranged from 10 to 30 items, and evaluated research design, recruitment, ethical rigour, data collection and data analysis. Seven articles described one approach (GRADE CER-Qual) to assess methodological quality of qualitative research. This approach advised on the importance for assessing methodological limitations. For RQ2, two articles were included, one described a qualitative hierarchy of evidence, and another described a research pyramid that included a section on qualitative research. Figure 1 PRISMA diagram of included papers Conclusion This review highlights lack of consensus and limited availability of tools, checklists, and approaches to 1) appraise the methodological quality of qualitative research used to inform clinical recommendations and 2) grade levels of evidence for qualitative research. Current research agendas will need to determine the most relevant and appropriate method for the quality appraisal of qualitative research. This way, qualitative research could be more consistently and appropriately applied to the development of clinical recommendations. References N/A Disclosure of Interests Mandeep Sekhon: None declared, Annette de Thurah: None declared, George E. Fragoulis: None declared, Tanja Stamm: None declared, T.P.M. Vliet Vlieland: None declared, Bente Appel Esbensen: None declared, Heidi Lempp: None declared, Lindsay Bearne: None declared, Marios Kouloumas: None declared, Polina Pchelnikova: None declared, Thijs W. Swinnen: None declared, Chris Blunt: None declared, Ricardo J. O. Ferreira: None declared, Loreto Carmona: None declared, Elena Nikiphorou Speakers bureau: Celltrion, Pfizer, Sanofi, Gilead, Galapgos, AbbVie, Eli Lilly, Grant/research support from: Pfizer, Eli Lill
Living with a sense of a right to hope
No full textThis is an essay about the idea of a right to hope. It asks: what might it mean, to construct hope as a right in this way, to live with hope in this way? I come to these questions through law, and in particular through the notion of the ‘right to hope’ articulated by the European Court of Human Rights in recent years. Discussions of this have tended to stay within the legal literature, but in this essay I suggest that an analysis of the construction of the right to hope in European human rights law opens up a distinction that takes us beyond law: a distinction between living with an idea of a right to hope and living with a sense of a right to hope. How might we think about this distinction? How might we think with this distinction? And what might it mean, to live with a sense of a right to hope? The essay examines these questions and reflects on the way of thinking and relating that the very notion of living with a sense of a right to hope implies
Migrant returnees as (anti-)migration messengers? a case of street-level representative bureaucracy in Senegal
No full textInternational organizations and foreign-funded NGOs run campaigns in Senegal to raise awareness of the perils of irregular migration. To increase their effectiveness, these organizations often enlist local migrant returnees to share their personal migration experiences and transmit an anti-irregular migration message to their compatriots. This article examines whether policymakers' assumptions regarding the representativeness of migrant returnees operating as (anti-)migration messengers in terms of shared identities corresponds to reality at the street level. It draws from theories of street-level bureaucracy and representative bureaucracy and is based on 31 qualitative interviews with migrant returnees and experts. The study shows that migrant returnees engaged in migration information campaigns are not as representative of the local population as envisaged by policymakers, potentially impacting policy outcomes. They stand out from their compatriots in terms of skillsets and social status – partly because of the selection mechanism employed by organizations and partly because of the training and capacity-building efforts directed at migrant returnees
Population-wide depression incidence forecasting comparing autoregressive integrated moving average and vector autoregressive integrated moving average to temporal fusion transformers: longitudinal observational study
No full textBackground: Accurate prediction of population-wide depression incidence is vital for effective public mental health management. However, this incidence is often influenced by socioeconomic factors, such as abrupt events or changes, including pandemics, economic crises, and social unrest, creating complex structural break scenarios in the time-series data. These structural breaks can affect the performance of forecasting methods in various ways. Therefore, understanding and comparing different models across these scenarios is essential. Objective: This study aimed to develop depression incidence forecasting models and compare the performance of autoregressive integrated moving average (ARIMA) and vector-ARIMA (VARIMA) and temporal fusion transformers (TFT) under different structural break scenarios. Methods: We developed population-wide depression incidence forecasting models and compared the performance of ARIMA and VARIMA-based methods to TFT-based methods. Using monthly depression incidence from 2002 to 2022 in Hong Kong, we applied sliding windows to segment the whole time series into 72 ten-year subsamples. The forecasting models were trained, validated, and tested on each subsample. Within each 10-year subset, the first 7 years were used for training, with the eighth year for setting hold-out validation, and the ninth and tenth years for testing. The accuracy of the testing set within each 10-year subsample was measured by symmetric mean absolute percentage error (SMAPE). Results: We found that in subsamples without significant slope or trend change (structural break), multivariate TFT significantly outperformed univariate TFT, vector-ARIMA (VARIMA), and ARIMA, with an average SMAPE of 11.6% compared to 13.2% (P = .01) for univariate TFT, 16.4% (P = .002) for VARIMA, and 14.8% (P = .003) for ARIMA. Adjusting for the unemployment rate improved TFT performance more effectively than VARIMA. When fluctuating outbreaks happened, TFT was more robust to sharp interruptions, whereas VARIMA and ARIMA performed better when incidence surged and remained high. Conclusions: This study provides a comparative evaluation of TFT and ARIMA and VARIMA models for forecasting depression incidence under various structural break scenarios, offering insights into predicting disease burden during both stable and unstable periods. The findings support a decision-making framework for model selection based on the nature of disruptions and data characteristics. For public health policymaking, the results suggest that TFT may be a more suitable tool for disease burden forecasting during periods of stable burden level or when sudden temporary interruption, such as pandemics or socioeconomic variation, impacts disease occurrence
AI threatens women’s job market participation
No full textThe possibility of an AI-managed world is increasingly tangible. Not well represented in STEM areas, women could get left behind in an AI-driven economy. Anne Theunissen and Lorea Olivieri Novoa write that governments, businesses and educational institutions must pool their resources to invest in STEM education for girls, bridging the digital divide and ensuring that AI is developed with a gender lens
Peer learning and technology adoption in a digital farmer-to-farmer network
No full textInformation constraints rank high among barriers to agricultural technology adoption among small-scale farmers, particularly for complex bundles of complementary practices. Information communication technologies are emerging to extend the reach of agricultural training, with potential to deliver information through mobile and smartphones at little or no cost to farmers. In this study, we develop a low-cost digital extension platform that facilitates peer-to-peer learning through SMS-based chat groups on basic feature phones. Using a randomized controlled trial, we evaluate its effectiveness in promoting the adoption of beneficial agricultural practices compared to a one-way SMS extension program. We measure strong positive effects of treatment on adoption of practices discussed in the chat groups, increasing intercropping and organic fertilizer production by 11-18 and 15 percentage points, respectively, suggesting that a simple group discussion forum can be a powerful addition to digital extension initiatives. However, chat group participation declined over the course of the study, underscoring the challenges of designing technological interventions that sustain user engagement