Bolsa Familia Program and school enrolment: An analysis of the 2010 Brazilian demographic census

The Bolsa Família Program goal is to promote social development and poverty reduction, through the direct transfer of conditional cash, in association with other social programs. This study aims to analyze whether Bolsa Família had an association with children’s school attendance, which is one of the educational conditions of the program. Our main hypothesis is that children living in households receiving Bolsa Família had greater chances of attending school. Data from the Ministry of Social Development and Combating Famine indicated that children living in households with Bolsa Família had greater school enrolment levels. By using data from the 2010 Demographic Census, collected by the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE), some descriptive analyzes and binary logistic regression models were performed for different thresholds of household per capita income. These estimates were made by comparing children who lived in households receiving Bolsa Família to those children not receiving the program. We took into consideration characteristics about the household, mothers, and children. The results were clustered by the municipality of residence of the child. In all income thresholds, children benefi ting from Bolsa Família were more likely to be enrolled in school, compared to children not receiving the benefi t.

The difficulty of measuring culture and diversity. Comparison of three international models of cultural measurement: FCS-2009, ESSnet-2012 and CAB-2015

The growing interest in quantifying the cultural and creative industries, visualize the economic contribution of activities related to culture demands first of all the construction of internationally comparable analysis frameworks. Currently there are three major bodies which address this issue and whose comparative study is the focus of this article: the UNESCO Framework for Cultural Statistics (FCS-2009), the European Framework for Cultural Statistics (ESSnet-Culture 2012) and the methodological resource of the “Convenio Andrés Bello” group for working with the Satellite Accounts on Culture in Ibero-America (CAB-2015). Cultural sector measurements provide the information necessary for correct planning of cultural policies which in turn leads to sustaining industries and promoting cultural diversity. The text identifies the existing differences in the three models and three levels of analysis, the sectors, the cultural activities and the criteria that each one uses in order to determine the distribution of the activities by sector. The end result leaves the impossibility of comparing cultural statistics of countries that implement different frameworks.

Contemporary Transformations of the Relations between Politics, Culture and Religion in Western Europe. Some Notes on the Spanish Case

According to Tilly, two laws shaped the process of transformation undergone by Western European societies since the Peace of Westphalia until the end of the 20th century: their increasing inner homogenisation and their growing heterogeneity between them. Cultural inner homogenisation affected, fi rst, those ethnic groups living within the territories of the said states. The second phase of homogenisation impinged on those groups that immigrated after World War II. This process followed different models according to the country considered, but the 1973 oil crisis revealed their general lack of success. During the last quarter of the 20th century and onwards, these European societies have been altered by two progressive and contradictory global logics: a process of cultural homogenisation at the world level (rather than society level) and a process of cultural re-creation led by those groups with an immigrant background, who have reacted against their integration shortcomings by searching for new sources of social and personal esteem in their respective cultural and religious traditions. This paper seeks to clarify these processes from a social differentiation and political representation theory perspective. The latter becomes indispensable, as the said processes have happened in a context in which the structure of relations (i.e. communication) between civil society and the democratic political sphere have experienced a radical crisis. In this way, the complex relations that exist between civil society, culture, religion and politics in these Western European societies are depicted.

The intersectorial approach in providing guidance and school support. The perspective of counsellors, tutors and principals

The provision of guidance and educational support requires joint work and the collaboration of different professionals and institutions, especially when we face complex problems that require a high level of specialization and the combination of knowledge from different areas. The research has aimed to examine the proximity of the institutional system of guidance and support to school in nine Autonomous Communities, to the intersectorial approach of counselling. We present the results of a descriptive study using the survey method, which allows knowing the opinions of counsellors, tutors and principals of Primary and Secondary Compulsory Education about the collaboration with the local public services (social, health, education, and employment) in the specialized support to students and schools. The final sample consisted of 9732 subjects who were selected from a random sampling proportional to the size of the subpopulations of each Autonomous Community. Results indicate how, in general terms, there is collaboration among the school and the local public services, although not as frequently as it would be desirable. In the same way, the professionals that were interviewed believe that the collaboration with social and educational services is quite adequate, but the assessment is not as positive when health and employment services are analysed. Finally, taking into account the different professionals considered, tutors from both educational stages are the ones that show a higher degree of satisfaction with the collaboration between the school and the local public services, except in the case of social services.

Questioning the merits and demerits of electronic communication in Social Work

This paper examines the social dynamics of electronic exchanges in the human services, particularly in social work. It focuses on the observable effects that email and texting have on the linguistic, relational and clinical rather than managerial aspects of the profession. It highlights how electronic communication is affecting professionals in their practice and learners as they become acculturated to social work. What are the gains and losses of the broad use of electronic devices in daily lay and professional, verbal and non-verbal communication? Will our current situation be seriously detrimental to the demeanor of future practitioners, their use of language, and their ability to establish close personal relationships? The paper analyzes social work linguistic and behavioral changes in light of the growth of electronic communication and offers a summary of merits and demerits viewed through a prism emerging from Baron’s (2000) analysis of human communication.