Public opinion and foreign policy in João Goulart's Brazil (1961-1964): Coherence between national and foreign policy perceptions?

Abstract This paper analyses public opinion during the João Goulart government in Brazil (1961-1964), focusing on public perceptions on domestic and foreign policies. We employ a recently declassified public opinion survey conducted on behalf of United States Information Agency (USIA) in urban areas. We found that the Brazilian public opinion was somewhat coherent, supporting redistributive reforms domestically and a neutralist approach in foreign affairs.

Public health and the knowledge industry

Knowledge plays an important role in health care. The production and diffusion of health-related knowledge are increasingly under the control of private commercial interests, which are characterized by conflicts of interests that result in abuses of power. Considerable research has been done on the medical-industrial complex and its role in the production of power imbalances and the consequent abuses, but little attention has been dedicated to the role played by the publishing industry, which can be subject to the same problems. The widely diffused idea that "frequent and major changes" occur in medicine, albeit unsupported by clearcut evidence, is an effective marketing tool for both the pharmaceutical and publishing industries, who feed and thrive on physicians' insecurities. The production and distribution of knowledge should be addressed as a strategic component of public health.

Persisting problems related to race and ethnicity in public health and epidemiology research

A recent and comprehensive review of the use of race and ethnicity in research that address health disparities in epidemiology and public health is provided. First it is described the theoretical basis upon which race and ethnicity differ drawing from previous work in anthropology, social science and public health. Second, it is presented a review of 280 articles published in high impacts factor journals in regards to public health and epidemiology from 2009-2011. An analytical grid enabled the examination of conceptual, theoretical and methodological questions related to the use of both concepts. The majority of articles reviewed were grounded in a theoretical framework and provided interpretations from various models. However, key problems identified include a) a failure from researchers to differentiate between the concepts of race and ethnicity; b) an inappropriate use of racial categories to ascribe ethnicity; c) a lack of transparency in the methods used to assess both concepts; and d) failure to address limits associated with the construction of racial or ethnic taxonomies and their use. In conclusion, future studies examining health disparities should clearly establish the distinction between race and ethnicity, develop theoretically driven research and address specific questions about the relationships between race, ethnicity and health. One argue that one way to think about ethnicity, race and health is to dichotomize research into two sets of questions about the relationship between human diversity and health.

Welfare regimes, work-life balance public policies and gender equality - parental leaves in Portugal and Sweden

Comunicação apresentada na "European Sociological Association Conference" em Lisboa de 2 a 5 de Setembro de 2009.

Chronic disease prevention and health promotion. Public policies and social network analysis of the hospitals services and oyhers health and social organizations to support joint action for children with diabetes

Comunicação apresentada na 18th Conference International of Health Promotion Hospitals & Health Services "Tackling causes and consequences of inequalities in health: contributions of health services and the HPH network", em Manchester de 14-16 de april de 2010

Portuguese public managers and administrative reform in the global context of competitiveness

Comunicação apresentada no 27th International Congress of Administrative Sciences "Global Competitiveness and Public Administration: implications for education and training" em Abu Dhai, United Arb Emirates de 9 a 14 de Julho de 2007.

Contamination of public parks and squares from Guarulhos (São Paulo State, Brazil ) by Toxocara spp. and Ancylostoma spp.

The contaminated soil with mammal feces is an important factor of risk to infection with zoonotic diseases. Amongst these zoonoses are visceral larva migrans and cutaneous larva migrans caused by Toxocara spp. and Ancylostoma spp., respectively. The aim of this study was to assess the environmental contamination by Toxocara spp. eggs and hookworms (Ancylostoma spp.) in public parks and squares in the city of Guarulhos, a metropolitan area of São Paulo, São Paulo State, Brazil. Soil samples were collected, between September and December 2010, and examined using the centrifugal flotation technique with sodium dichromate and zinc sulphate as well as the modified Baermann method. Notably, 35 (74.5%) of the 47 districts surveyed in Guarulhos possessed samples contaminated with Toxocara spp. and/or eggs or larvae of Ancylostoma spp. The frequency of Toxocara spp. and Ancylostoma spp. in the samples from public areas was 68.1% and 46.8%, respectively. Overall, the eastern side of Guarulhos is the region with the highest occurrence of causative agents of larva migrans. In all collection sites, the presence of feces from dogs and cats accompanied by their owners and stray animals were observed. Notably, it is important to adopt measures to control dog and cat breeding, to treat infected animals, and provide health education to the population.

Evolution in public procurement and the impact of e-procurement platforms: A case study

A Work Project, presented as part of the requirements for the Award of a Masters Degree in Management from the NOVA – School of Business and Economics

Humor and the framing of the public sphere and public opinion in Portugal (1797-1834)

In his Answer to the Question: What is Enlightenment (1784), Kant puts forward his belief that the vocation to think freely, which humankind is endowed with, is bound to make sure that “the public use of reason” will at last act “even on the fundamental principles of government and the state [will] find it agreeable to treat man – who is now more than a machine – in accord with his dignity”. The critical reference to La Mettrie (1747), by opposing the machine to human dignity, will echo, in the dawn of the 20th century, in Bergson’s attempt to explain humor. Besides being exclusive to humans, humor is also a social phenomenon. Freud (1905) assures that pleasure originated by humor is collective, it results from a “social process”: jokes need an audience, a “third party”, in order to work and have fun. Assuming humor as a social and cultural phenomenon, this paper intends to sustain that it played a role in the framing of the public sphere and of public opinion in Portugal during the transition from Absolute Monarchy to Liberalism. The search for the conditions which made possible the critical exercise of sociability is at the root of the creation of the public sphere in the sense developed by Habermas (1962), whose perspective, however, has been questioned by those who point 2 out the alleged idealism of the concept – as opposed, for example, to Bakhtin (1970), whose work stresses diversity and pluralism. This notwithstanding, the concept of public sphere is crucial to the building of public opinion, which is, in turn, indissoluble from the principle of publicity, as demonstrated by Bobbio (1985). This paper discusses the historical evolution of the concept of public opinion from Ancient Greece doxa, through Machiavelli’s “humors” (1532), the origin of the expression in Montaigne (1580) and the contributions of Hobbes (1651), Locke (1690), Swift (1729), Rousseau (1762) or Hume (1777), up to the reflection of Lippman (1922) and Bourdieu’s critique (1984). It maintains that humor, as it appears in Portuguese printed periodicals from 1797 (when Almocreve de Petas was published for the first time) to the end of the civil war (1834) – especially in those edited by José Daniel Rodrigues da Costa but also in O Piolho Viajante, by António Manuel Policarpo da Silva, or in the ones written by José Agostinho de Macedo, as well as in a political “elite minded” periodical such as Correio Braziliense –, contributed to the framing of the public sphere and of public opinion in Portugal.

Operation modes for the electric vehicle in smart grids and smart homes : present and proposed modes

This paper presents the main operation modes for an electric vehicle (EV) battery charger framed in smart grids and smart homes, i.e., are discussed the present-day and are proposed new operation modes that can represent an asset towards EV adoption. Besides the well-known grid to vehicle (G2V) and vehicle to grid (V2G), this paper proposes two new operation modes: Home-to-vehicle (H2V), where the EV battery charger current is controlled according to the current consumption of the electrical appliances of the home (this operation mode is combined with the G2V and V2G); Vehicle-for-grid (V4G), where the EV battery charger is used for compensating current harmonics or reactive power, simultaneously with the G2V and V2G operation modes. The vehicle-to-home (V2H) operation mode, where the EV can operate as a power source in isolated systems or as an off-line uninterruptible power supply to feed priority appliances of the home during power outages of the electrical grid is presented in this paper framed with the other operation modes. These five operation modes were validated through experimental results using a developed 3.6 kW bidirectional EV battery charger prototype, which was specially designed for these operation modes. The paper describes the developed EV battery charger prototype, detailing the power theory and the voltage and current control strategies used in the control system. The paper presents experimental results for the various operation modes, both in steady-state and during transients.

Tourism education in Ireland : an analysis of the provision of third level tourism education in Ireland focusing on the needs of the public, private and voluntary sectors

Tourism education in Ireland has witnessed a transformation within the last four decades since CERT introduced the first fundamentals of training in the 1960’s. An analysis of the provision of tourism education in Ireland, focusing on the needs of the public, private and voluntary sectors was the main focus of this study and concentrates mainly on third level provision of tourism education within the island of Ireland. The study examines the role of tourism education in Ireland, establishing any current or emerging trends in third level tourism provision. It identifies and analyses the main stakeholders in the public, private and voluntary sectors and investigates if any requirements exist in the provision of third level education. The multi-faceted nature of the tourism industry has resulted in the provision of a diverse range of educational courses. As a result of this diversity, a question hangs over the status of tourism as a professional discipline within itself. Other issues identified through this study are the over provision of tourism courses and the current and future disparity within tourism education. The qualitative nature of the research involved questioning of major stakeholders and educators who influence tourism education provision and developing an overview of the current status of tourism education provision in Ireland identifying the present needs of each sector. Finally several strategies are suggested which may enhance third level tourism education in the future.

The red ocher culture of the upper Great Lakes and adjacent areas / Robert E. Ritzenthaler, Curator of Anthropology, Milwaukee Public Museum, and George I. Quimby, Curator of North American Archaeology and Ethnology, Chicago Natural History Museum.

v.36:no.11(1962)