Organisational Capacity for Engaging with Indigenous Australians

Community capacity building is a common goal for programmes and policies involving Indigenous peoples, but it relies heavily on organisational capacity to work effectively in intercultural settings. This paper reviews the organisational capacity of the senior leaders of Australian Red Cross and institutional efforts to build a culturally appropriate and respectful organisation. It reports results from a survey of the organisation's leadership team and follow‐up interviews undertaken in 2010, reviews the challenges facing the organisation in working with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians, and considers institutional progress in building internal capacity to lead change in working with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians. The paper concludes with discussion of wider implications of this research.     

Nationality and sexuality: homophobic discourse and the ‘national threat’ in contemporary Latvia

ABSTRACT. This article seeks to understand why attitudes towards homosexuality in Latvia appear to be more intolerant than in all other EU member states. It argues that, while the impact of religion, the legacy of communism and post‐communist transition have all played a role in shaping attitudes towards homosexuality in Central and Eastern Europe, these factors do not explain sufficiently the divergence among post‐communist states and, in particular, do not account for Latvia's extreme position. While acknowledging that intolerance towards non‐heteronormative sexuality cannot be explained by a single factor but is the cumulative effect of a range of social influences, this study argues that homosexuality is particularly reviled in Latvia because it has been constructed discursively as a threat to the continued existence of the nation in its desired ethnic form and to the core values defining Latvian national identity.     

Brexit or Bremain: what future for the UK's European diplomatic strategy?

A major public debate on the costs and benefits of the United Kingdom's membership of the European Union is presently under way. The outcome of the referendum on 23 June 2016 will be a pivotal moment in determining whether the EU has a future as a component of the UK's European diplomatic strategy or whether there is a major recalibration of how the UK relates to Europe and more widely of its role within international relations. Since accession to the European Economic Community the UK has evolved an uncodified, multipronged European diplomatic strategy. This has involved the UK seeking to reinforce its approach of shaping the security of the continent, preserving a leading diplomatic role for the UK in managing the international relations of Europe, and to maximize British trade and investment opportunities through a broadening and deepening of Europe as an economically liberal part of the global political economy. Since accession the UK's European diplomatic strategy has also been to use membership of the EU to facilitate the enhancement of its international influence, primarily as a vehicle for leveraging and amplifying broader national foreign and security policy objectives. The strategy has been consistent irrespective of which party has formed the government in the UK. Increasing domestic political difficulties with the process of European integration have now directly impacted on this European strategy with a referendum commitment. Whether a vote for a Brexit or a Bremain, the UK will be confronted with challenges for its future European strategy.     

SEISMIC FRAGILITY OF LRC FRAMES WITH AND WITHOUT MASONRY INFILL WALLS

This paper summarises the first phase of the fragility analyses of generic (representative) buildings in the area of Memphis, Tennessee, USA. The study was conducted at Cornell University as a part of the project Loss Assessment of Memphis Buildings (LAMB) for the National Center for Earthquake Engineering Research (NCEER). In this study, the fragility analyses focus on low-rise Lightly Reinforced Concrete (LRC) frame buildings with and without infill walls. The obtained fragility curves are compared with those of ATC-13 for different facility classes. Based on the obtained fragility curves, it is concluded that adding masonry infill wails to low-rise LRC frame buildings significantly reduces the likelihood of seismic damage.     

The political support system for American primacy

The United States persists in aggressively exploiting primacy because the policy has been popular across the domestic political spectrum and is tolerated abroad despite unhappiness with it. Objections prove to be much more about style than substance. Although Democrats in the US criticize Bush for unilateralism, they seldom make the alternative of multilateralism a precondition for American action. When Washington genuflects to principles of multilateral consultation, allied governments allow themselves to be pulled along on US initiatives. Differences between the Bush and Kerry views of the American role in the world have been less than meets the eye. Only a significant disaster-such as the total unravelling of the project in Iraq-is likely to turn either party away from the urge to control the development of world order.     

Conceptual and practical issues in the detection of local disease clusters: a study of mortality in Hamilton, Ontario

Recent advances in local spatial statistics and operational computing capacity have led to growing interest in the detection of disease clusters for public health surveillance and for improving understanding of disease pathogenesis. Although conceptual reviews and applied examples have appeared in the literature, few studies have addressed the connection between conceptual and practical issues that confront researchers interested in using local statistics to detect disease clusters. Here we review recent literature on the use of local statistics for cluster assessment and focus on the practical issue of assigning correct geographic coordinates. The process of assigning geographic coordinates to an address or postal code, known as ‘geocoding’, is a necessary step in conducting smallarea health analyses. With a study of mortality data from Hamilton, Ontario, we illustrate inaccuracies that may be encountered when using Statistics Canada postal code conversion files. Using the Moran's I and Getis‐Ord Gi and Gi* local spatial statistics to identify significant mortality clusters or ‘hot spots’, we demonstrate that small geocoding errors, even those that affect less than one percent of a total dataset, can have a discernible impact on analytic results. To assist other researchers, we supply guidelines to minimize error introduced by geocoding. These results emphasize the importance of accurate geocoding in local health analyses. Les avancées récentes en statistiques spatiales localisées et en capacité informatique opérationnelle ont conduit à un intérêt croissant dans la détection de foyers de maladies pour fins de surveillance de santé publique, et dans l'approfondissement de la compréhension de leur pathogénèse. Bien que des revues conceptuelles et des exemples concrets aient été publiés dans la littérature, peu d'études ont adressé le lien entre les problèmes conceptuels et pratiques auxquels sont confrontés les chercheurs intéressés à utiliser les statistiques locales pour détecter les foyers de maladies. Nous revoyons ici la littérature récente sur l'utilisation de statistiques locales dans l'évaluation de foyers et focalisons sur le problème pratique d'assigner des coordonnées géographiques correctes. Le procédé d'assigner des coordonnées géographiques à une adresse ou à un code postal, nommé‘géocodage’, est une étape nécessaire dans la conduite d'analyses de santéà petite échelle. À l'aide d'une étude sur des données de mortalitéà Hamilton, en Ontario, nous illustrons que des inexactitudes peuvent être rencontrées lorsque les fichiers de codes postaux et de conversion de Statistique Canada sont utilisés. En utilisant les statistiques spatiales localisées I de Moran, Gi and Gi* de Getis et Ord pour identifier des foyers de mortalité significatifs ou des ‘points chauds’, nous démontrons que de petites erreurs de géocodage, même celles n'affectant moins qu'un pour cent de la base de données, peuvent avoir un impact discernable sur les résultats analytiques. Afin d'aider d'autres chercheurs, nous fournissons des recommandations pour minimiser les erreurs introduites par le géocodage. Ces résultats soulignent l'importance d'un géocodage exact dans les analyses de santé locale.