Is there an association between Helicobacter pylori in the inlet patch and globus sensation?

AIM:To determine the association between Helicobacter pylori(H.pylori)and globus sensation(GS)in the patients with cervical inlet patch. METHODS:Sixty-eight patients with esophageal inlet patches were identified from 6760 consecutive patients undergoing upper gastrointestinal endoscopy prospectively.In these 68 patients with cervical inlet patches, symptoms of globus sensation(lump in the throat), hoarseness,sore throat,frequent clearing of the throat,cough,dysphagia,odynophagia of at least 3 mo duration wa...     

MEETING THE CHALLENGE OF MARGINALIZATION PROCESSES AT THE PERIPHERY OF EUROPE

Under the influence of the enlargement of the European Union, there is now a renewed concern for marginalization processes in rural areas. Especially in countries at the periphery of Europe, these processes often have a large‐scale and multifaceted character. As agriculture and rural areas have become dissociated, the marginalization or success of the one no longer necessarily affects the other, and not necessarily in the same way. Dealing with the phenomenon in policy terms requires tools to explicate it. In this article, we present a simple typology of marginalization processes as a first step to its disentangling. The typology is applied to Finland and Portugal, countries at the periphery of Europe. The results strengthen the idea that different processes with different characteristics are going on at the same time, requiring specific approaches.     

The alla franca dandy; modernity and the novel in the late 19th-century Ottoman Empire

ABSTRACT

In the late 19th-century Ottoman novel, an iconic character draws attention: the alla franca dandy; a man who admires the Western culture to the point of mindless imitation, and who stands aloof from his own society as he condemns the Ottoman/Islamic culture in aesthetical terms. He was born out of the Ottoman intellectuals’ ideas of and anxiety over Westernization, who sought to modernize the society without subverting the traditional foundations. As the Ottoman/Islamic and Western cultures collided, the alla franca dandy figure became the embodiment of Westernization gone astray and served the intellectuals’ objective to educate the masses by setting a bad example to be avoided. However, though the alla franca dandy figure was brought forth, in this manner, to circumscribe the proper limits of modernization, he ironically evolved, through the novels of different authors, to express individualistic attitudes, and put forth a modernist critique of the Ottoman/Islamic tradition as the intellectuals’ epistemological assumptions eroded and the society’s present is questioned and problematized as in need of intervention.     

Social Science and the Public Interest

Social Science and the Public Interest

Social Science and the Public Interest January/February 2010     

Turkish secularism and Islam under the reign of Erdoğan

ABSTRACT

This article introduces a collection of articles that explore the role of religion (Sunni Islam) in the transformation of Turkey under the reign of President Recep Tayyip Erdo?an and his Justice and Development Party (Adalet ve Kalk?nma Partisi, AKP). This special issue argues that the Turkish understanding of secularism was also one of the building blocks or/and constitutive elements of Turkey’s modernisation until the rise of the AKP. Currently, however, it seems that religion has become a new or re-born element of the new Turkey and has been transforming many areas such as: the media, the Kurdish issue, implementation of the rule of law, foreign policy and gender issues. This special issue aims to scrutinise the question: how does a religion-based transformation in Turkey influence the raison d’etat of the state?     

Agenda control in EU referendum campaigns: The power of the anti‐EU side

European Union (EU) referendums provide unique opportunities to study voters’ attitudes toward a distant level of governance. Scholars have long tried to understand whether EU referendum results reflect domestic (dis‐)satisfaction with the incumbent governments or actual attitudes toward the Union. Finding evidence supporting both domestic and European factors, the recent focus has thus turned to referendum campaigns. Recent studies emphasise the importance of the information provided to voters during these campaigns in order to analyse how domestic or European issues become salient in the minds of voters. These studies nonetheless overlook the asymmetrical political advantage in such campaigns. The broader literature on referendums and public opinion suggest that in a referendum, the ‘No’ side typically has the advantage since it can boost the public's fears by linking the proposal to unpopular issues. This article explores whether this dynamic applies to EU treaty ratification referendums. Does the anti‐EU treaty campaign have more advantage than the pro‐EU treaty campaign in these referendums? Campaign strategies in 11 EU treaty ratification referendums are analysed, providing a clear juxtaposition between pro‐treaty (‘Yes’) and anti‐treaty (‘No’) campaigns. Based on 140 interviews with campaigners in 11 referendums, a series of indicators on political setting and campaign characteristics, as well as an in‐depth case study of the 2012 Irish Fiscal Compact referendum, it is found that the anti‐treaty side indeed holds the advantage if it engages the debate. Nonetheless, the findings also show that this advantage is not unconditional. The underlying mechanism rests on the multidimensionality of the issue. The extent to which the referendum debate includes a large variety of ‘No’ campaign arguments correlates strongly with the campaigners’ perceived advantage/disadvantage, and the referendum results. When the ‘No’ side's arguments are limited (either through a single‐issue treaty or guarantees from the EU), this provides the ‘Yes’ side with a ‘cleaner’ agenda with which to work. Importantly, the detailed data demonstrate that the availability of arguments is important for the ‘Yes’ side as well. They tend to have the most advantage when they can tap into the economic costs of an anti‐EU vote. This analysis has implications for other kinds of EU referendums such as Brexit, non‐EU referendums such as independence referendums, and the future of European integration.     

Polarization and the environmental movement in Turkey

Environmental civil society organizations in Turkey have been drawn into the deep cultural and religious divide that characterizes Turkish society more broadly. Turkish environmental organizations are viewed by the Islamist leaning government as proxies for secularist opposition forces and not as independent voices truly committed to environmental protection. Interview data from fifty environmental leaders and Turkish state officials are analyzed to demonstrate how effective civil society functioning in the environmental sphere has been undermined by these deep partisan divisions. Local environmental struggles create one area of opportunity where environmental advocates can bridge the divide and work in collaboration with conservative government supporters.     

Between Breivik and PEGIDA: the absence of ideologues and leaders on the contemporary European far right

In the aftermath of the Norwegian terror attacks of 22 July 2011, the question of agency with regard to the convicted perpetrator, Anders Behring Breivik, has frequently been discussed. Did he really act on his own? Were his actions self-directed? Was he, as a typical ‘lone wolf’, inspired by the prevalent far-right concept of ‘leaderless resistance’ or, simply, a blind tool, a string puppet pushed and pulled by dark forces, as some commentators have claimed? His cut-and-paste manifesto points to inspiration from ideas circulating in the European Counter Jihad Movement (ECJM), in itself a contradictory mix of ideological positions. A number of these ideas were given new life when the so-called ‘populist right-wing movement of indignation’, the Patriotische Europäer Gegen die Islamisierung des Abendlandes (PEGIDA) took to the streets of Dresden in the autumn of 2014. The driving force behind PEGIDA, Lutz Bachmann, with a past as petty criminal and doorman, is an unlikely front man for one of the most successful political initiatives in post-unification Germany. Comparing Breivik and PEGIDA, Önnerfors argues that the ECJM is part of the ‘third generation’ of right-wing discourse that is without a consistent world view, dominant leaders and prolific ideologues. Instead, in a new atmosphere of ‘politics of passion’ and ‘post-politics’, fuzzy ECJM ideology turns into a screen upon which diffuse uneasiness with current political affairs can be projected and channelled. Outside the scope of Önnerfors's article but worth noting is the considerable impact these developments have had on electoral support for right-wing populist parties such as the Front National in France, the Alternative für Deutschland in Germany and the Sverigedemokraterna in Sweden.     

Constitutional courts as veto players: Lessons from the United States,France and Germany

The number of constitutional courts and supreme courts with constitutional review rights has strongly increased with the third wave of democratisation across the world as an important element of the new constitutionalism. These courts play an important role in day‐to‐day politics as they can nullify acts of parliament and thus prevent or reverse a change in the status quo. In macro‐concepts of comparative politics, their role is unclear. Either they are integrated as counter‐majoritarian institutional features of a political system or they are entirely ignored: some authors do not discuss their potential impact at all, while others dismiss them because they believe their preferences as veto players are entirely absorbed by other actors in the political system. However, we know little about the conditions and variables that determine them as being counter‐majoritarian or veto players. This article employs the concept of Tsebelis’ veto player theory to analyse the question. It focuses on the spatial configuration of veto players in the legislative process and then adds the court as an additional player to find out if it is absorbed in the pareto‐efficient set of the existing players or not. A court which is absorbed by other veto players should not in theory veto new legislation. It is argued in this article that courts are conditional veto players. Their veto is dependent on three variables: the ideological composition of the court; the pattern of government control; and the legislative procedures. To empirically support the analysis, data from the United States, France and Germany from 1974 to 2009 is used. This case selection increases variance with regard to system types and court types. The main finding is that courts are not always absorbed as veto players: during the period of analysis, absorption varies between 11 and 71 per cent in the three systems. Furthermore, the pattern of absorption is specific in each country due to government control, court majority and legislative procedure. Therefore, it can be concluded that they are conditional veto players. The findings have at least two implications. First, constitutional courts and supreme courts with judicial review rights should be systematically included in veto player analysis of political systems and not left aside. Any concept ignoring such courts may lead to invalid results, and any concept that counts such courts merely as an institutional feature may lead to distorted results that over‐ or under‐estimate their impact. Second, the findings also have implications for the study of judicial politics. The main bulk of literature in this area is concerned with auto‐limitation, the so‐called ‘self‐restraint’ of the government to avoid defeat at the court. This auto‐limitation, however, should only occur if a court is not absorbed. However, vetoes observed when the court is absorbed might be explained by strategic behaviour among judges engaging in selective defection.