Building Social Cohesion Through Intergroup Contact: Evaluation of a Large-Scale Intervention to Improve Intergroup Relations Among Adolescents

Journal of Youth and Adolescence - Past research has found intergroup contact to be a promising intervention to reduce prejudice and has identified adolescence as the developmental period during...     

South Korea’s hydrogen economy program as a case of weak ecological modernization

In January 2019, the South Korean president Moon Jae In announced his plans for the transformation of the South Korean economy into a “hydrogen economy.” This involves the replacement of fossil fuels for the production of energy on a large scale. The government’s plan supports the use of hydrogen fuel cells (HFCs) for industrial and residential energy production and promotes the replacement of vehicles with internal combustion engines that burn fossil fuel by cars that are powered by HFCs. This study is primarily interested in the plans of the South Korean government to facilitate the production of hydrogen for mobile purposes and to promote fuel cell vehicles (FCVs); and it investigates whether this South Korean policy can be considered a case of ecological modernization. Ecological modernization is a concept that has been developed in a European context and was adopted by the European Union as its main principle in environmental policy making. The new South Korean policy is outlined in the government’s Hydrogen Economy Roadmap which specifies the measures that have to be taken to initiate the transformation of the South Korean transport system based on hydrogen and announces several ambitious goals which the government wants to achieve with this program until 2022, 2030, and 2040, respectively. At its center is an effort to build a nationwide network of hydrogen gas stations, to reduce the price of hydrogen by more than half, and to facilitate the purchase of FCVs. It was found that the overall environmental benefits of this program would be meager in the medium-term, but in the long term it could contribute to a considerable reduction of greenhouse gas emissions and of fine dust, depending on the technology that is used to produce hydrogen.

     

Barcelona 2002: law, ethics, and human rights. HIV testing for peacekeeping forces: legal and human rights issues

In 2001, the United Nations Security Council established an Expert Panel to study the issue of whether the UN should institute HIV testing of peacekeeping personnel. This article, based on a 9 July 2002 presentation to the XIV International AIDS Conference (abstract TuOrG1173), reports on the findings of a paper prepared for the Expert Panel by the Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network. The paper examined whether it is permissible for the UN to implement mandatory HIV testing of its peacekeeping personnel, and whether HIV-positive UN peacekeeping personnel should be excluded or restricted from service on the basis of their HIV status or HIV disease progression. The article describes some of the court cases in which these issues have been considered; discusses the importance of analyzing such issues in the context of a human rights-based approach to the pandemic; and formulates a series of key principles for guiding UN decision-making. The article concludes that a policy of mandatory HIV testing for all UN peacekeeping personnel cannot be justified on the basis that it is required in order to assess their physical and mental capacity for service; that HIV-positive peacekeeping personnel cannot be excluded from service based on their HIV status alone, but only on their ability to perform their duties; and that the UN cannot resort to mandatory HIV testing for all UN peacekeeping personnel to protect the health and safety of HIV-negative personnel unless it can demonstrate that alternatives to such a policy would not reduce the risk sufficiently. In the end, the Expert Panel unanimously rejected mandatory testing and instead endorsed voluntary HIV counselling and testing for UN peacekeeping personnel.     

Reviews and commentary

Conspiring for democracy

Peter Coleman: The Liberal Conspiracy: The Congress For Cultural Freedom And The Struggle For The Mind Of Postwar Europe The Free Press, New York, 1989, 333 p., $22.95.

The importance of doing homework!

H. H. A. Cooper and Lawrence J. Redlinger: Catching Spies: Principles and Practice of Counterespionage Paladin Press, Boulder, Colo., 1988, 403 p., $19.95.

_____: Making Spies: A Talent Spotter's Handbook Paladin Press, Boulder, Colo., 1986, 272 p., $16.95.

The CIA and intelligence policy

Loch K. Johnson: America's Secret Power: The CIA in a Democratic Society Oxford University Press, New York, 1989, 344 p., $24.95.

RAF Secret missions in southeast Asia during World War II

Terence O'Brien: The Moonlight War: The Story of Clandestine Operations in Southeast Asia, 1944–45 Collins, London, 1987, 363 p., £12.95.

Outside the inside story

Ernest Volkman and Blaine Baggett: Secret Intelligence: The Inside Story of America's Espionage Empire Doubleday, New York, 1989, 229 p., $19.95.

Prescribing caution on glasnost

Edward Jay Epstein: Deception: The Invisible War Between the KGB and the CIA Simon and Schuster, New York, 1989, 335 p., $19.95.

U.S. intelligence: a long view

Nathan Miller: Spying for America: The Hidden History of U.S. Intelligence Paragon House, New York, 1989, 482 p., $24.95.