Between clinical medicine and the laboratory: medical research funding in France from 1945 to the present

By focusing on funding methods, this paper considers the way in which medical research eventually led to the science-based medicine that is prevalent in France today. This process seems to have taken place in three stages during the second half of the twentieth century. In the 1940s and 1950s, two major events occurred. The first was the creation of a national health insurance fund in France, which opened up new reasons for, and ways of, funding medical research. The second was the development of antibiotics, which triggered a revival of clinical medicine. In the 1960s and 1970s, a proactive government science policy allowed the life sciences and medical research to come together in the wake of a burgeoning new science: molecular biology. Thus, in 1964, the creation of the National Health and Medical Research Institute (Institut national de la santé et de la recherche médicale or INSERM), destined to "molecularize" medical research, was seen as the fulfillment of the government's ambitious research policy. Today, with medicine irreversibly embedded in scientific and technical rationality, health has become a major issue in modern societies. This paper therefore touches on some of the key features of biomedical research, including the revival of funding systems for clinical research and the development of a system of research grants that was made possible by patient organizations and the creation of new funding agencies.     

Harvest Rites in Ireland

LES FONCTIONS MENTALES DANS LES SOCIÉTÉS INFÉRIEURES. Par L. LÉVY-BRUHL. Paris: Félix Alcan, 1910. 8vo, pp. 461. Reviewed by E. A. Hooton.

THE FOLK-LORE OF HEREFORDSHIRE. Collected from Oral and Printed Sources. By ELLA MARY LEATHER. Intro, by EDWIN SIDNEY HARTLAND. Sidgwick &; Jackson, 1912. Large 8vo, pp. xxviii + 288. Ill. Reviewed by Charlotte S. Burne.

JOURNAL OF THE FOLK-SONG SOCIETY. NO. 16 (Vol. IV., Part iii., December 1911). A Collection of one hundred and five Songs of Occupation from the Western Isles of Scotland. Compiled by Miss FRANCES TOLMIE. 19 Berners Street, W., 1911. 4to, xiv, 143–278 + ix. Reviewed by K. W. Grant.

LA RELIGIONE PRIMITIVA IN SARDEGNA. By RAFFAELE PETTAZZONI. Piacenza: Societá Editrice Pontremolese, 1912. 8vo, pp. xxiii + 253. Reviewed by R. R. Marett.

LA CHANSON POPULAIRE DE L'ILE DE CORSE. Par AUSTIN DE CROZE. Avec conclusion de M. PAUL FONTANA. Paris: Librairie Honoré Champion, 1911. 16mo, pp. xv + 188. Reviewed by A. M. Spoer.

LE LÉGENDAIRE DU MONT SAINT-MICHEL. Par ÉTIENNE DUPONT. Paris: Robert Duval, 1911. Sm. 8vo, pp. xlvii + 173.

THEMIS. A Study of the Social Origins of Greek Religion. By JANE ELLEN HARRISON. With an Excursus on the Ritual Forms preserved in Greek Tragedy by Prof. GILBERT MURRAY, and a Chapter on the Origin of the Olympic Games by Mr. F. M. CORNFORD. Cambridge: Univ. Press, 1912. 8vo, pp. xxxii + 559. Ill. Reviewed by W. Crooke.

LA SOCIÉTÉ MUSULMANE DU MAGHRIB. MAGIE ET RELIGION DANS L'AFRIQUE DU NORD. Par EDMOND DOUTTÉ. Alger: Typographie Adolphe Jourdan, 1909. 8vo, pp. vi + 617. Reviewed by E. Sidney Hartland.

THE SUK : THEIR LANGUAGE AND FOLKLORE. By MERVYN W. H. BEECH. With Intro, by Sir Charles Eliot. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1911. 8vo, pp. xxiv + 152. Maps and ill. Reviewed by A. R. Wright.

THE LAND OF UZ. By ABDULLAH MANSÛR (G. Wyman Bury). Macmillan, 1911. 8vo, pp. xxvii + 354. Ill. Reviewed by Hans H. Spoer.

MATERINSKAYA FILIACIYA v VOSTOCHNOY 1 CENTRALNOY AZII. [Mother-right in Eastern and Central Asia]. V?p. 1. Materinskaya Filiaciya u Kitaycev, Koreycev i Yaponcev [Mother-right in China, Korea, and Japan]. V?p. 2. Materinskaya Filiaciya u Tibetcev, Mongolov, Myaocz?, Lolo i Tai [Mother-right among the Tibetans, Mongols, Miaotzu, Lolos, and Tai]. By NICHOLAS MATSOKIN. Vladivostock, 1910–11. 8vo, pp. 40, iv + 147. Reviewed by M. Trophimoff.     

On What's Right and Keeping Left: Or Why Geography Still Needs Marxian Political Economy

Recently the value of Marxian approaches to human geography has again been called into question in the pages of Antipode. In this paper I review the reasons as to why geographers re‐discovered Marx and then, from the late 1960s, began to engage with Marxian approaches. I then consider some of the reasons why Marxian approaches in their turn became the subject of critique in geography and some of the alternatives explored in the wake of this. The conclusion is that a pluri‐theoretical human geography is necessary but that Marxian approaches remain of central significance to radical and critically minded geographers.     

The second demographic transition, new household forms and the urban population of France during the 1990s

European household structures and their geography have been transformed in recent decades as a response to the interplay of demographic events and changing lifestyles. The formation of new households generally outstrips the rate of population increase, as more numerous and smaller households result from changing patterns of marriage, child-bearing, divorce and longevity. This paper tests some of the underlying hypotheses of the 'second demographic transition' using data from the most recent (1999) French population census. It provides an analysis of changing national household structures over the last quarter of the twentieth century and highlights the importance of smaller households, with particular emphasis on the rise of living alone. Trends identified in earlier work have intensified during the 1990s. In discussing the geography of new household forms, the paper focuses particularly on the evolution of major central cities and argues for more explicit links between their distinctive population and household structures and wider socio-economic change.     

Poverty and Neo‐Liberal Bias in the Middle East and North Africa

This article examines the definition of poverty and the evidential base for the claims that the region of the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) has historically low levels of poverty and relatively good levels of income distribution. It argues that the dominant trend in the literature on poverty in the global south in general, and in MENA in particular, has a neo‐classical bias. Amongst other things, that bias fails to understand that poverty does not emerge because of exclusion but because of poor people's ‘differential incorporation’ into economic and political processes. It also raises the question: if the MENA has indeed had relatively low levels of poverty and good income distribution, does this complicate the issue of autocracy and the western drive to remove political ‘backwardness’ in the region? In particular, the characterization of autocracy and the west's attempt to promote political liberalization is likely to impact adversely on the social contract that autocratic rulers have enforced regarding the delivery of basic services.     

Policymaking in the Parallelogram of Forces: Common Agency and Human Service Provision

The "congressional dominance" literature in political science provides valuable insights into the legislative control of administrative agencies. However, this literature tends to be conceptualized with respect to regulatory agencies, and it is not especially helpful in understanding the dynamics of policymaking in the provision of human services. After distinguishing the tasks of regulation and human services provision, we present an alternative: a common agency model of human service policy as the outcome of interest group bargaining. We illustrate its implications with an analytic narrative of service provision for the seriously mentally ill.     

Can South–South Cooperation Compete? The Development Bank of Latin America and the Islamic Development Bank

Southern‐led multilateral development banks (MDBs) play a key role in harnessing global capital to finance the sectors most important to borrowers, especially infrastructure. Two prominent Southern MDBs, the Development Bank of Latin America (CAF) and the Islamic Development Bank (IsDB), have become crucial drivers of regional infrastructure growth. This article explores whether their performance has lived up to their goals of establishing borrower control over bank governance without sacrificing financial dynamism. Using power‐weighted voting indices for member representation on bank boards, the authors determine that these banks offer borrowers much more representation on their boards than do their Northern‐based counterparts, the Inter‐American Development Bank (IDB) and the World Bank International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD). The article also analyses bank operations to determine whether their governance structure impacts their internal performance, as reflected on balance sheets, and external performance — gaining relevance in development finance and particularly in infrastructure lending, including the burgeoning sector of sustainable (climate‐resilient) infrastructure. The authors find that the CAF and IsDB have become major players in development finance, including in sustainable infrastructure. However, important issues remain in relation to their continued internal capacity development, especially with regard to the environmental and social safeguards necessary to oversee lending.