Participatory Action Research with and within community activist groups: capturing the collective experience of Ireland's Community and Voluntary Pillar

The inclusion of community activists in policy planning is increasingly recognized at the highest international level. This article shows how the use of Participatory Action Research (PAR) can present a deeper and more holistic picture of the experiences of Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) in shaping national-level social policy. By utilizing action-based research, the Community and Voluntary Pillar (CVP) of Ireland’s system of social partnership is shown to be an important agent in deliberating national bargaining outcomes (known as the Towards 2016 national agreement). The key contribution of this research is the reflective methodological considerations in terms of PAR design, execution and participant integration in the research process as a way to enrich and develop a deeper and more informed community of practice.

An Analysis of Soft Law Applicable to Humanitarian Assistance: Relative Normativity in Action?

There is limited binding international law specifically covering the provision of humanitarian assistance in response to natural and human-made disasters. Yet a variety of authoritative soft law texts have been developed in the past 20 years, including the UN Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement, the Red Cross Red Crescent Code of Conduct and the Sphere Project’s Humanitarian Charter and Minimum Standards in Disaster Response. While such ‘non-binding normative standards’ do not carry the weight of international law, they play an essential role in the provision of humanitarian assistance albeit subject to their limited enforceability vis-à-vis intended beneficiaries and to their voluntary application by humanitarian actors. Notwithstanding a lack of legal compulsion, certain non-binding normative standards may directly influence the actions of States and non-State actors, and so obtain a strongly persuasive character. Analysis of texts that influence the practice of humanitarian assistance advances our understanding of humanitarian principles and performance standards for disaster response. As the International Law Commission debates draft articles on the Protection of Persons in the Event of Disasters, such non-binding normative standards are crucial to the development of an internationally accepted legal framework to protect victims of disasters.

Getting Close to the Action: The Micro-Politics of Rural Development

This article identifies and positions micro-politics within rural development practice. It is concerned with the hidden and subtle processes that bind groups together, including trust, power and personal perceptions and motivations. The first section of the article provides a theoretical context for micro-political processes which reveals subtle distinctions from social capital. The section following describes the ethnographic approach that sets the methodological framework for the research. The findings reveal how micro-political processes manifest in a rural development group affect norms and relations both positively and negatively. Finally the causes of and factors affecting micro-politics are considered before concluding with a discussion on how micro-politics may be managed in rural regeneration.

Novel dipeptidyl peptidase IV resistant analogues of glucagon-like peptide-1(7-36)amide have preserved biological activities in vitro conferring improved glucose-lowering action in vivo

Although the incretin hormone glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) is a potent stimulator of insulin release, its rapid degradation in vivo by the enzyme dipeptidyl peptidase IV (DPP IV) greatly limits its potential for treatment of type 2 diabetes. Here, we report two novel Ala(8)-substituted analogues of GLP-1, (Abu(8))GLP-1 and (Val(8) GLP-1 which were completely resistant to inactivation by DPP IV or human plasma. (Abu(8))GLP-1 and (Val(8))GLP-1 exhibited moderate affinities (IC50: 4.76 and 81.1 nM, respectively) for the human GLP-1 receptor compared with native GLP-1 (IC50: 0.37 nM). (Abu(8))GLP-1 and (Val(8))GLP-1 dose-dependently stimulated cAMP in insulin-secreting BRIN BD11 cells with reduced potency compared with native GLP-1 (1.5- and 3.5-fold, respectively). Consistent with other mechanisms of action, the analogues showed similar, or in the case of (Val(8))GLP-1 slightly impaired insulin releasing activity in BRIN BD11 cells. Using adult obese (ob/ob) mice, (Abu(8))GLP-1 had similar glucose-lowering potency to native GLP-1 whereas the action of (Val(8))GLP-1 was enhanced by 37%. The in vivo insulin-releasing activities were similar. These data indicate that substitution of Ala(8) in GLP-1 with Abu or Val confers resistance to DPP IV inactivation and that (Val(8))GLP-1 is a particularly potent N-terminally modified GLP-1 analogue of possible use in type 2 diabetes.