Use of expert panels in highway safety: A critique

Expert panels have been used extensively in the development of the "Highway Safety Manual" to extract research information from highway safety experts. While the panels have been used to recommend agendas for new and continuing research, their primary role has been to develop accident modification factors—quantitative relationships between highway safety and various highway safety treatments. Because the expert panels derive quantitative information in a “qualitative” environment and because their findings can have significant impacts on highway safety investment decisions, the expert panel process should be described and critiqued. This paper is the first known written description and critique of the expert panel process and is intended to serve professionals wishing to conduct such panels.

The coming of post-reflexive society : a critique of the political economy of digital capitalism

Language is a unique aspect of human communication because it can be used to discuss itself in its own terms. For this reason, human societies potentially have superior capacities of co-ordination, reflexive self-correction, and innovation than other animal, physical or cybernetic systems. However, this analysis also reveals that language is interconnected with the economically and technologically mediated social sphere and hence is vulnerable to abstraction, objectification, reification, and therefore ideology – all of which are antithetical to its reflexive function, whilst paradoxically being a fundamental part of it. In particular, in capitalism, language is increasingly commodified within the social domains created and affected by ubiquitous communication technologies. The advent of the so-called ‘knowledge economy’ implicates exchangeable forms of thought (language) as the fundamental commodities of this emerging system. The historical point at which a ‘knowledge economy’ emerges, then, is the critical point at which thought itself becomes a commodified ‘thing’, and language becomes its “objective” means of exchange. However, the processes by which such commodification and objectification occurs obscures the unique social relations within which these language commodities are produced. The latest economic phase of capitalism – the knowledge economy – and the obfuscating trajectory which accompanies it, we argue, is destroying the reflexive capacity of language particularly through the process of commodification. This can be seen in that the language practices that have emerged in conjunction with digital technologies are increasingly non-reflexive and therefore less capable of self-critical, conscious change.

Butterpaper, sweat & tears : the affective dimension of engaging students during the architectural critique

Considering how dominant a feature of architectural education the critique has been, and continues to be, little has been written about the affective dimension of engaging students during this key final stage of the design or documentation process. For most students, the critique is unlike any previous educational or life experience that they have ever confronted, and the abrupt change in the instructor’s role, from tutor to judge, can be disconcerting at a time when the student is feeling their most vulnerable. The fact that the period immediately leading up to the critique habitually entails not only a focused and sustained effort, but also sleepless nights of intensive work, further exacerbates this. The purpose of this paper is to recognise the affective phenomena influencing student engagement, during the critique. The participants of this research were second to fourth year architecture students at a major Australian university. Following the implementation of trials in alternative modes of critique in architectural design and technology studios, qualitative data was obtained from students, through questionnaires and interviews. Six indicators of engagement were investigated through this research: motivation and agency, transactional engagement with staff, transactional engagement with students, institutional support, active citizenship, and non-institutional support. This research confirms that affective phenomena play a significant role in the events of the critique; the relationship between instructor and student influences student engagement, as does the choreography and spatial planning of the critique environment; and these factors ultimately have an impact on the depth of student learning.

The legal framework for Australia's carbon pricing mechanism : a critique

As part of the Australian Government’s Clean Energy Plan, the Government has attempted to harness the legal innovation of the tradeable emissions unit, within a capped carbon trading system, to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Such an approach promises to send a price signal to the market which will influence emitting behaviours and reduce our emissions in a cost-effective manner. However, if the carbon trading scheme is to successfully achieve cost-effective emissions reductions then the carbon market must be supported by an appropriate legal framework. This paper will consider the key features of the Australian Carbon Pricing Mechanism, including the Carbon Farming Initiative, and critique whether it has all the hallmarks of an effective legal framework to reduce Australia’s net greenhouse gas emissions. The likely future of the trading scheme, following the 2013 elections, will also be addressed.

From critique to cultural recovery: critical futures studies and casual layered analysis

Critical futures studies is not about the careers of a few scholars, rather it is about projects that transcend the narrow boundaries of the self. This biographical monograph examines the life and work of Richard Slaughter and Sohail Inayatullah.

Victoria's “Day in Prison Program” : an evaluation and critique

The use of “Day in Prison” programs to deter young adult offenders is a concept which originated in the United States and was replicated in Australia during the late 1970s. After almost a decade of uncertainty this model of ‘crime prevention’ re-emerged in Victoria with the introduction of a pilot “Day in Prison” program. This article traces the development and operation of the Victorian experience and provides evaluation research findings which conclude that coercive, intimidatory and degrading aversion techniques should not be utilised by the criminal justice system for the purposes of individual deterrence.

Beyond the accolades : a postcolonial critique of the foundations of the Ottawa Charter

Introduction: The Ottawa Charter is undeniably of pivotal importance in the history of ideas associated with the establishment of health promotion. There is much to applaud in a charter which responds to the need to take action on the social and economic determinants of health and which seeks to empower communities to be at the centre of this. Such accolades tend to position the Ottawa Charter as ‘beyond critique’; a taken-for-granted ‘given’ in the history of health promotion. In contrast, we argue it is imperative to critically reflect on its ‘manufacture’ and assess the possibility that certain voices have been privileged, and others marginalized. Methods: This paper re-examines the 1986 Ottawa Conference including its background papers from a postcolonial standpoint. We use critical discourse analysis as a tool to identify the enactment of power within the production of the Ottawa health promotion discourse. This exercise draws attention to both the power to ensure the dominant presence of privileged voices at the conference as well as the discursive strategies deployed to ‘naturalize’ the social order of inequality. Results: Our analysis shows that the discourse informing the development of the Ottawa Charter strongly reflected Western/colonizer centric worldviews, and actively silenced the possibility of countervailing Indigenous and developing country voices. Conclusion: The Ottawa Charter espouses principles of participation, empowerment and social justice. We question then whether the genesis of the Ottawa Charter lives up to its own principles of practice. We conclude that reflexive practice is crucial to health promotion, which ought to include a preparedness for health promotion to more critically acknowledge its own history.