[Pathways-to-Care for First-Episode psychotic patients--an overview of international studies]

A longer duration of untreated psychosis (DUP) as well as of untreated illness (DUI) was found to be associated with a negative course of psychosis. Thus, increasing efforts are made to reduce the DUP and provide adequate treatment as early as possible. But, in order to overcome obstacles to early help-seeking, these have to be identified first. Thus, an overview on initial help-seeking behaviour and predictors of DUP is given. Across 25 identified studies, the DUP, at about one year on average, is still unfavourably long and includes on average of three help-seeking contacts prior to the initiation of adequate treatment. Since negative factors in pathways-to-care involve features on all relevant levels (patient, social environment and health-care system), an optimisation of pathways-to-care will require the integration of services and continuous awareness programmes targeting the general population and mental health-care professionals.

The Social Desintegration of an Ethnical German Group from Romanian Village Community Comparative with a Romanian Group and Hungarian Group from some Village Their Integration into the German Society

Zarna is witness to the disappearance of the Swabian community in Santana, a process which seems to date back to before the major changes in Central and Eastern Europe. His project showed how a strong German ethnic community, formed more than 250 years ago, has virtually disappeared from the village of Santana (Romania). Zarna presents the causes leading to the loss of their ethnic identity, of their culture, traditions and of the collective reproduction of their ethnicity, although the last Swabians remaining in the village have preserved their individual identity and not let themselves be assimilated. The policy of the former communist regime is not sufficient to explain the decline of the German ethnic group, nor is the present international context with its varying effects on the form and reproduction of their ethnic identity. Zarna has analysed the origins of the Swabian community, its development, historical changes (both desired and imposed) and the disappearance of elements that determined their German culture and their pride in being German. The Germans have demobilised more rapidly than other ethnic groups in Romania, partly because of Germany's pro-emigration policy over the last two decades. Many of the emigrants were however, poorly prepared for emigration and have not been able to recreate the prosperous financial situation which they left. The prevalent feeling among those interviewed was disappointment and this increases with age and education.

On the Integration of Smalltalk and Java

After decades of development in programming languages and programming environments, Smalltalk is still one of few environments that provide advanced features and is still widely used in the industry. However, as Java became prevalent, the ability to call Java code from Smalltalk and vice versa becomes important. Traditional approaches to integrate the Java and Smalltalk languages are through low-level communication between separate Java and Smalltalk virtual machines. We are not aware of any attempt to execute and integrate the Java language directly in the Smalltalk environment. A direct integration allows for very tight and almost seamless integration of the languages and their objects within a single environment. Yet integration and language interoperability impose challenging issues related to method naming conventions, method overloading, exception handling and thread-locking mechanisms. In this paper we describe ways to overcome these challenges and to integrate Java into the Smalltalk environment. Using techniques described in this paper, the programmer can call Java code from Smalltalk using standard Smalltalk idioms while the semantics of each language remains preserved. We present STX:LIBJAVA - an implementation of Java virtual machine within Smalltalk/X - as a validation of our approach

Ethnosciences - A step towards the integration of scientific and non-scientific forms of knowledge in the management of natural resources for the future

Integration of indigenous knowledge and ethnoscientific approaches into contemporary frameworks for conservation and sustainable management of natural resources will become increasingly important in policies on an international and national level. We set the scene on how this can be done by exploring the key conditions and dimensions of a dialogue between ‘ontologies’ and the roles, which ethnosciences could play in this process. First, the roles which ethnosciences in the context of sustainable development were analysed, placing emphasis on the implications arising when western sciences aspire to relate to indigenous forms of knowledge. Secondly, the contributions of ethnosciences to such an ‘inter-ontological dialogue’ were explored, based on an ethnoecological study of the encounter of sciences and indigenous knowledge in the Andes of Bolivia, and reviewed experiences from mangrove systems in Kenya, India and Sri Lanka, and from case-studies in other ecosystems world-wide.

Evaluating Integration. Research contributions for a gender sensitive migration policy: Research contributions for a gender sensitive migration policy

The integration of academic and non-academic knowledge is a key concern for researchers who aim at bridging the gap between research and policy. Researchers involved in the sustainability-oriented NCCR North-South programme have made the experience that linking different types of knowledge requires time and effort, and that methodologies are still lacking. One programme component was created at the inception of this transdisciplinary research programme to support exchange between researchers, development practitioners and policymakers. After 8 years of research, the programme is assessing whether research has indeed enabled a continuous communication across and beyond academic boundaries and has effected changes in the public policies of poor countries. In a first review of the data, we selected two case studies explicitly addressing the lives of women. In both cases – one in Pakistan, the other in Nepal – the dialogue between researchers and development practitioners contributed to important policy changes for female migration. In both countries, outmigration has become an increasingly important livelihood strategy. National migration policies are gendered, limiting the international migration of women. In Nepal, women were not allowed to migrate to specific countries such as the Gulf States or Malaysia. This was done in the name of positive discrimination, to protect women from potential exploitation and harassment in domestic work. However, women continued to migrate in many other and often illegal and more risky ways, increasing their vulnerability. In Pakistan, female labour migration was not allowed at all and male migration increased the vulnerability of the families remaining back home. Researchers and development practitioners in Nepal and Pakistan brought women’s shared experience of and exposure to the mechanisms of male domination into the public debate, and addressed the discriminating laws. Now, for the first time in Pakistan, the new draft policy currently under discussion would enable broadly-based female labour migration. What can we learn from the two case studies with regard to ways of relating experience- and research-based knowledge? The paper offers insights into the sequence of interactions between researchers, local people, development practitioners, and policy-makers, which eventually contributed to the formulation of a rights-based migration policy. The reflection aims at exploring the gendered dimension of ways to co-produce and share knowledge for development across boundaries. Above all, it should help researchers to better tighten the links between the spheres of research and policy in future.