Teaching Chinese history : the issue of approach

In China, the study of history has never been a detached academic pursuit, as it has always been indistinguishable from political directions. Chinese political leaders have been unable to adopt a disinterested approach towards history, be it distant or contemporary. On the other hand, Western historians interpret Chinese history from their own point of view, and they often view Chinese history as an extension of Western history. Often, they have been preoccupied with the concern to explain or justify their own record or involvement rather than to produce an objective account, especially in regard to the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries’ history of China. This study questions the conventional approach to China’s past, be that of a Confucian, a Communist or a Western ethnocentric historiographer. It explores the possibility of establishing a “Chinese experience-based” approach while maintaining “impartiality and neutrality”, looking to historical studies outside of China to achieve this.

Barriers among Danish women and general practitioners to raising the issue of intimate partner violence in general practice: a qualitative study

Thirty-five percent of Danish women experience sexual or physical violence in their lifetime. However, health care professionals are not in the practice of asking about intimate partner violence (IPV) in Denmark. It is currently unknown what hinders general practitioners from asking about partner violence and how Danish women would perceive such an inquiry. This aspect has not previously been explored in Denmark. An exploratory study was conducted to examine what hinders general practitioners (GPs) from asking and what Danish women's views and attitudes are regarding being asked about IPV.

Evaluating Australian social media policies in relation to the issue of information disclosure

Information disclosure is a key concern for many organisations especially in the era of social media. Social media allows for information disclosure to occur easily due to the ubiquitous usage of technology such as mobile devices. Acceptable social media policies can be used by organisations and their employees to improve their decision making behaviours as well as being used as a controlling mechanism to mitigate the issue of information disclosure. Through a review of related research literature along with a content analysis of publicly available Australian social media policies, this paper identifies a perceived gap pertaining to the issue of information disclosure in current Australian social media use policies. To fill this gap, we have highlighted the key components when developing an organisational social media policy. An evaluation criteria is also proposed by the paper that organisations can use to assist in mitigating the information disclosure.

‘Moral luck’ and the question of autonomy, choice, and control in end-of-life decision making

It is commonly assumed that, in the realm of ethical decision making at the end-of-life, ‘luck’ and ‘risk’ do not intrude. Nonetheless ‘moral luck’ (where happenstance makes a moral difference) does intrude and can have an unanticipated impact on the ultimate moral outcomes of end-of-life care. In the interests of upholding the ethical standards of end-of-life care, healthcare providers have increasingly relied on ethical principlism as a rational decision-guiding frame in the sincere belief that such an approach will enable patient selfdetermination and control over treatment decisions when needing end-of-life care. Due to contextual variables and associated uncertainties in end-of-life care, however, the intended moral outcomes of appeals to commonly accepted ethical principles (in particular the principle of autonomy) are not always realized. What is not always appreciated is that whether ‘good’ or ‘bad’ moral outcomes are achieved can be as much a matter of chance as of choice. This essay explores the relevance and possible implications of moral luck in end-of-life decision making and care. A key conclusion of the paper is that the notion of moral luck needs to be taken seriously in end-of-life care contexts since it can have an unanticipated impact on the outcomes of the decisions that are made and thereby on the moral interests of patients facing the end of their lives.

Investigating the issue of pollution in the micro-scale design of mega-cities : a case study of Enghelab Street, Tehran

Today there is a growing concern about urbanization and its impact on environmental pollution, which threatens human health and quality of life especially in mega cities. The mega city of Tehran, the capital of Iran, deals with various types of pollution. Although a large body of research has highlighted the significance of study on urban pollution in mega cities, only a few studies have addressed the issue at the micro scale. However, most of the research is restricted to air and noise pollution, whereas visual pollution as an important type of pollution that can be interpreted more deeply on a micro-scale, has been neglected. This study aims to evaluate some of the major issues of environmental pollution in Tehran by focusing on the micro-scale of the street. Therefore, as the central part of Tehran is one of the most affected divisions in the city, Enghelab Street has been selected as the case study for this research. This paper argues that identification and implementation of pollution mitigating strategies in Tehran’s master plan is not responsive enough to the whole city. This study of Enghelab Street reveals that policy making strategies for decreasing pollution should be initiated from micro-scale with further emphasis on psychological health. In the future, the lessons learned from the case study of Enghelab will help other major cities in developing countries to combat pollution through initiating from most affected districts in small scale.

The ethics of surrogate decision making in medicine : autonomy, paternalism, or a different approach?

Knowing who to involve in treatment decisions when a patient is incapacitated has been the subject of discussion in bioethical, health law and clinical research. The major issues tend to revolve around the tension between exercising a degree of medical paternalism and respecting patient autonomy. Patients are encouraged to exert their autonomy even when they may not be capable of doing so, by means of surrogate consent or advanced directives. While liberal concepts of autonomy are exemplified in western bioethics and legal systems, clinically these decisions remain difficult, and input from medical professionals is sought, raising the issue of paternalism. A framework of bioethics, which places the patient in a relational context rather than a strictly autonomous one, may be a more helpful way of deliberating these difficult decisions

Analysis of cultural conflict in the development of web-enabled information systems

The advent of the World Wide Web (WWW) and the emergence of Internet commerce have given rise to the web as a medium of information exchange. In recent years, the phenomenon has affected the realm of transaction processing systems, as organizations are moving from designing web pages for marketing purposes, to web-based applications that support business-to-business (WEB) and business-to-consumer (B2C) interactions, integrated with databases and other back-end systems (Isakowitz, Bieber et al., 1998). Furthermore, web-enabled applications are increasingly being used to facilitate transactions even between various business units within a single enterprise. Examples of some of the more popular web-enabled applications in use today include airline reservation systems, internet banking, student enrollment systems in universities, and Human Resource (HR) and payroll systems. The prime motive behind the adoption of web-enabled applications are productivity gains due to reduced processing time, decrease in the usage of paper-based documentation and conventional modes of communication (such as letters, fax, or telephone), and improved quality of services to clients. Indeed, web-based solutions are commonly referred to as customer-centric (Li, 2000), which means that they provide user interfaces that do not necessitate high level of computer proficiency. Thus, organizations implement such systems to streamline routine transactions and gain strategic benefits in the process (Nambisan & Wang, 1999), though the latter are to be expected in the long-term. Notwithstanding the benefits of web technology adoption, the web has ample share of challenges for initiators and developers. Many of these challenges are associated with the unique nature of web-enabled applications. Research in the area of web-enabled information systems has revealed several differences with traditional applications. These differences exist with regards to system development methodology, stakeholder involvement, tasks, and technology (Nazareth, 1998). According to Fraternali (1999), web applications are commonly developed using an evolutionary prototyping approach, whereby the simplified version of the application is deployed as a pilot first, in order to gather user feedback. Thus, web-enabled applications typically undergo continuous refinement and evolution (Ginige, 1998; Nazareth, 1998; Siau, 1998; Standing, 2001). Prototype-based development also leads web-enabled information systems to have much shorter development life cycles, but which, unlike traditional applications, are regrettably developed in a rather adhoc fashion (Carstensen & Vogelsang, 2001). However, the principal difference between the two kinds of applications lies in the broad and diverse group of stakeholders associated with web-based information systems (Gordijn, Akkermans, et al., 2000; Russo, 2000; Earl & Khan, 2001; Carter, 2002; Hasselbring, 2002; Standing, 2002; Stevens & Timbrell, 2002). Stakeholders, or organizational members participating in a common business process (Freeman, 1984), vary in their computer competency, business knowledge, language and culture. This diversity is capable of causing conflict between different stakeholder groups with regards to the establishment of system requirements (Pouloudi & Whitley, 1997; Stevens & Timbrell, 2002). Since, web-based systems transcend organizational, departmental, and even national boundaries, the issue of culture poses a significant challenge to the web systems’ initiators and developers (Miles & Snow, 1992; Kumar & van Dissel, 1996; Pouloudi & Whitley, 1996; Li & Williams, 1999).

A data envelopment analysis of the efficiency of Victorian TAFE Institutes

In recent years the provision of vocational education and training has been recognised as having a vital role to play in improving Australia's economic performance and in alleviating the hardship of the long term unemployed. The importance of education and training gives rise to the issue of operating educational institutions with a high level of efficiency. In this article, Data Envelopment Analysis is used to derive estimates of the technical and scale efficiency of Victorian Technical and Further Education Institutes in 1995. The results reveal substantial dispersion in technical and scale efficiencies. Regression analysis is used to identify variables which are associated with technical inefficiency.

The use of correspondence analysis to develop a scale to measure workplace morale from multi-level data

This paper focuses on the issue of comparing social groups or collectivities using measures derived from individual-level multivariate data. In this case, groups need to be differentiated such that: (a) between-group differences are maximized; (b) within-group differences are minimised; and (c) `differences' are calibrated to a scale that reflects a set indicators or observed variables.This paper demonstrates empirically how correspondence analysis can achieve this. It presents a scale of `workplace morale' derived from the responses of employees in a large sample of workplaces to questions concerning satisfaction with various facets of their job and their workplace. The scale derived through correspondence analysis is shown to achieve the three criteria described above.

"Sexually transmitted debts":the scope of defences to directors' liability for insolvent trading

The recent demise of prominent Australian corporations, such as GIO Australia Holdings Ltd, One.Tel Ltd, HIH Insurance Ltd and Ansett Australia Ltd, have highlighted the relevance of, inter alia, the Australian insolvent trading provisions embodied in the Corporations Act 2001 (Cth) (formerly Corporations Law). What may not be appreciated, however, is that insolvent trading is not only concerned with large public companies. Many of the insolvent trading cases that come before the courts involve small proprietary companies. Moreover, in many cases these are small “family” companies where there may only be one active director. This gives rise to a difficult issue as to the appropriateness of imposing liability for insolvent trading on a spouse who is, factually, merely a dormant director. This article explores the issue of spousal liability for insolvent trading, particularly focusing on the scope of the current defences to insolvent
trading under s 588H.

Family law in Australia: re Patrick and the matter of Child A

In Re Patrick, Guest J of the Family Court of Australia dealt with the issue of whether a gay sperm donor, known to the lesbian mother of the child, had a right under Australian law to regular contact with the child. Justice Guest held that the sperm donor was allowed contact with the child to the extent that this was in the child's best interests. His Honour did, however, find that due to the way in which particular provisions of Australia's Family Law Act 1975 (Cth) are drafted, a sperm donor cannot be regarded as the 'parent' of the child, and accordingly called for legislative reform to recognise the rights of known sperm donors wanting involvement with the child. In this article, we discuss the matter of Re Patrick, comparing it with the strikingly similar matter of Pursuer Against Defender in the Case of Child A, decided recently by Sheriff Laura Duncan in the Glasgow Sheriff Court. We will then outline a proposal to amend the Family Law Act 1975 so that sperm donors can apply for an order to be a 'parent' for the purposes of the law, and therefore have the same rights and responsibilities as any other parent. In response to the tragic ending to the matter of Re Patrick, we conclude by stressing the need for an educational programme to be established, so that lesbian women who are considering parenthood may do so in the knowledge that the sperm donor does have the status of 'father', and in some jurisdictions 'parent', rather than merely being a 'donor'.

Fateful moments and the discourses of grief

This paper is concerned with the ways in which language functions in our making sense of death and loss, not only with the use of euphemisms for death, but also the wider discourses which frame meanings and understandings. Many bystanders and commentators on September 11, 2001, for example, likened the impact of the planes on the towers, and their subsequent collapse as “just like a movie ... I couldn’t believe it was happening”. From a culture whose primary experience of death and violence is mediated by film and television, the issue of how these experiences are communicated and understood – by the families of those who died, by the rescue workers and police, by the politicians and the military, and also importantly, by the media and their audiences – is crucial in understanding the ways in which what seem like natural responses are socially and culturally constructed.

A comparative study of construction industry size and structure between the UK and Australia and the significance of industry fragmentation

While comparing both the size and structure between the UK and Australian construction industries, this study reveals that the UK construction industry is about two and a half times larger than the Australian construction industry, and both industries are dominated by the proportion of small firms. The issue of fragmentation is characteristic of the construction industries in these two countries, and beyond. This study then develops a self recruiting-subletting cost indifference point model to explain why fragmentation occurs. Although the high proportion of small firms in the construction industry has been criticised as it prevents the exploitation of economies of scale, the self recruiting-subletting cost indifference point model theoretically proposes that subletting is usually profitable for construction firms. Thus the size distribution of the construction industry has a propensity to skew towards small firms.

A comparative analysis of opinions of Americans, Australians and Malaysians on the use of biometric devices in workplaces for security and monitoring of worker productivity

Since the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks in New York, the use of biometric devices such as fingerprint scans, retina and iris scans and facial recognition in everyday situations for national security and border control, have become commonplace. This has resulted in the biometric industry moving from being a niche technology to one that is ubiquitous. As a result. more and more employers are using biometrics to secure staff access to their facilities as well as for tracking staff work hours, maintaining 'discipline' and carry out surveillance against thefts. detecting work hour abuses and fraud. However, the data thus collected and the technologies themselves are feared of having the potential for and actually being misused - both in terms of the violating staff privacy and discrimination and oppression of targeted workers. This paper examines the issue of using biometric devices in organisational settings their advantages, disadvantages and actual and potential abuses from the point of view of critical theory. From the perspectives of Panoptic surveillance and hegemonic organisational control, the paper examines the issues related to privacy and identification, biometrics and privacy, biometrics and the 'body', and surveillance and modernity. The paper also examines the findings ofa survey carried out in Australia. Malaysia and the USA on respondents' opinions on the use of biometric devices in everyday life including at workplaces. The paper concludes that along with their applications in border control and national security, the use of biometric devices should be covered by relevant laws and regulations. guidelines and codes of practice. in order to balance the rights to privacy and civil liberties of workers with employers' need for improved productivity, reduced costs, safeguards related to occupational health and safety, equal opportunity, and workplace harassment of staff and other matters, that employers are legally responsible for.