scholarly journals Whole Systems Thinking and Modelling in the UK

2021 ◽  
pp. 23-47
Author(s):  
Antti Silvast ◽  
Chris Foulds
Keyword(s):  
Systems Thinking ◽  
Energy Demand ◽  
Computer Modelling ◽  
Research Programme ◽  
Academic Disciplines ◽  
Systems Perspective ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Policy And Planning ◽  
Whole Systems

AbstractUK academic researchers have been vying for a ‘whole’ systems perspective on energy issues for more than a decade. This research programme has exposed challenges in complex systems thinking and in the dialogue between academic disciplines and epistemic cultures that is needed to mediate the social, technological, and environmental impacts of energy systems. This chapter examines these efforts starting from existing studies that include detailed reports on experiences of interdisciplinary research. By extending these findings via interviews and ethnographic research, this chapter pays particular attention to the role of interdisciplinary computer modelling that was expected to represent complex energy transitions and energy infrastructures of the future. In doing so, this chapter demonstrates how interdisciplinarity has actually worked in three exemplary areas: the diversity of computer models that seek to represent everyday energy demand and how they simplify both demand and other disciplines in so doing; the need for collaborative, cross-cutting research in foresight of future energy scenarios; and how modelling scholars strongly envision their models should become ‘useful’ for imagined policy and planning stakeholders.

scholarly journals Formal and informal science advice in emergencies: COVID-19 in the UK

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (6) ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher J. M. Whitty ◽  
Luke B. Collet-Fenson
Keyword(s):  
High Speed ◽  
Research Programme ◽  
Advisory Group ◽  
Scientific Advice ◽  
Existing Structures ◽  
Improved Outcomes ◽  
The Social ◽  
Independent Expert ◽  
Regulatory Bodies ◽  
The Uk

The importance of scientific advice to government gains greater recognition in emergencies but inevitably has to be done in an environment of uncertainty, with limited data and at high speed. Adapting existing structures is more effective than creating new ones in an emergency. Between emergencies, the UK has a structured scientific advice system, including Chief Scientific Advisers, scientists in government, regulatory bodies and independent expert committees, which were adapted to COVID-19 under the umbrella of the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies. These worked alongside networks of informal scientific advice, including internationally. Multiple sciences were needed, including from the social sciences and engineering in addition to clinical science and epidemiology, and these had to be integrated. A centrally directed clinical research programme helped provide practitioners robust evidence, with observational and interventional trials providing data for policy and testing treatments and vaccines. The scale of the emergency meant unavoidable tension between detailed work and speed, and between an integrated scientific view usable in decision-making and constructive challenge. While a final judgement of the UK scientific response will take time, everyone should be grateful to the thousands of scientists involved for the research, synthesis and advice, which improved outcomes for the public.

scholarly journals Understanding stakeholders in malnutrition from system thinking perspective for better policy and planning: A review

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rahi Jain ◽  
Prashant Narnaware
Keyword(s):  
Developing Countries ◽  
Systems Thinking ◽  
System Thinking ◽  
Systems Perspective ◽  
Stakeholder Interests ◽  
Multi Stakeholder ◽  
Context Specific ◽  
Policy And Planning ◽  
Systems Thinking Approach

Malnutrition is an important issue in developing countries like India. India’s focus on malnutrition has been since its first five-year plan but the challenge persists. Several studies have identified causes behind the malnutrition, but efforts are made to address those causes, but results are inadequate. This review focuses on understanding the malnutrition from the systems perspective. The paper critically examines the literature to identify the various stakeholders that influence the malnutrition scenario of an area. The focus is on understanding the relevance of having systems thinking approach in dealing with the malnutrition issue. The paper concludes that significant understanding has been built around individual causes and stakeholders’ role in malnutrition. However, the need exists to translate this understanding into strategies that are relevant for the implementers on the ground who have to address the malnutrition issue in context-specific multi-stakeholder interests and demands.

Geographically-based approaches to the integration of health promotion into health systems: a comparative study of two Health Action zones in the UK

2005 ◽  
Vol 12 (3_suppl) ◽  
pp. 39-44 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jane Springett
Keyword(s):  
Health Promotion ◽  
Health Systems ◽  
The Political ◽  
Systems Perspective ◽  
Intersectoral Cooperation ◽  
Structural Problems ◽  
Health Action ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Whole Systems ◽  
Process Evaluations

Health Action Zones (HAZs) were introduced in the UK in the late 1990s as a whole system approach to public health and health care. Resources were targeted in historically deprived subregional units of England. Based on process evaluations undertaken in their fourth year of operation, the approaches taken by two HAZs were compared. Each had different histories of intersectoral cooperation and strategic approaches to integration. Both operated in a rapidly changing policy and organizational environment. This undermined attempts to sustain a consistent vision and eventually led to the demise of HAZs as subregional units. The approaches chosen by these two HAZs to integrate health promotion into health systems cannot be divorced from the political, historical and geographical contexts in which they were initiated. What the experiences of the two HAZs demonstrate is that while subregions and localities can potentially benefit from a whole systems perspective, there are deep-seated structural problems that constrain progress. Their experience demonstrates that context is of key importance in understanding the outcomes of any intervention aimed at promoting health.

Dowagers, Debs, Nuns and Babies: The Politics of Nostalgia and the Older Woman in the British Sunday Night Television Serial

2013 ◽  
Vol 10 (4) ◽  
pp. 769-784 ◽  
Author(s):  
Estella Tincknell
Keyword(s):  
Older Women ◽  
Social Role ◽  
Mature Female ◽  
Older Woman ◽  
Distinctive Features ◽  
The Past ◽  
Political Position ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Popular Television

The extensive commercial success of two well-made popular television drama serials screened in the UK at prime time on Sunday evenings during the winter of 2011–12, Downton Abbey (ITV, 2010–) and Call the Midwife (BBC, 2012–), has appeared to consolidate the recent resurgence of the period drama during the 1990s and 2000s, as well as reassembling something like a mass audience for woman-centred realist narratives at a time when the fracturing and disassembling of such audiences seemed axiomatic. While ostensibly different in content, style and focus, the two programmes share a number of distinctive features, including a range of mature female characters who are sufficiently well drawn and socially diverse as to offer a profoundly pleasurable experience for the female viewer seeking representations of aging femininity that go beyond the sexualised body of the ‘successful ager’. Equally importantly, these two programmes present compelling examples of the ‘conjunctural text’, which appears at a moment of intense political polarisation, marking struggles over consent to a contemporary political position by re-presenting the past. Because both programmes foreground older women as crucial figures in their respective communities, but offer very different versions of the social role and ideological positioning that this entails, the underlying politics of such nostalgia becomes apparent. A critical analysis of these two versions of Britain's past thus highlights the ideological investments involved in period drama and the extent to which this ‘cosy’ genre may legitimate or challenge contemporary political claims.

Linguistics: A Rhetor's Guide

1994 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 211-226 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dick Leith
Keyword(s):  
Discourse Analysis ◽  
Academic Disciplines ◽  
Primary Concern ◽  
Social Formation ◽  
Text Linguistics ◽  
The Social ◽  
Language Study ◽  
Recent Trends ◽  
Linguistic Inquiry ◽  
Dominant Paradigm

Abstract: To non-specialists, academic disciplines invariably seem homogeneous, even monolithic. But even a relatively young discipline such as modem linguistics is more diverse in its procedures and concerns than might appear to those working in other fields. In this paper I attempt to show how certain kinds of linguistic inquiry might be relevant to those whose primary concern is rhetoric. I argue that these practices are often opposed to what I call the dominant paradigm in modern linguistics, with its commitment to abstraction and idealization. I discuss first those strands of linguistics, such as discourse analysis, text-linguistics, and stylistics, which tend to take the social formation for granted; I end by considering recent trends in so-called critical language study. Finally, I offer some thoughts on how linguistics may proceed in order to achieve a more programmatic rapprochement with rhetoric.

A Group Awaiting Death: The Social Systems Perspective on a Naturally Occurring Group Situation

1983 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 79-89 ◽  
Author(s):  
Steven Starker ◽  
Joan E. Starker
Keyword(s):  
Intensive Care Unit ◽  
Intensive Care ◽  
Systems Theory ◽  
Social Systems ◽  
Task Structure ◽  
Systems Perspective ◽  
Naturally Occurring ◽  
The Social ◽  
Group Situation ◽  
Imminent Death

The decline and imminent death of an individual in a hospital's intensive care unit led to the creation of a transient group composed of family and friends. The dynamics of this tragic group are explored using the concepts provided by Social Systems theory. Ambiguity of the task structure and its inherent frustrations, fluidity of leadership and power, and failure of a utopian defense are all discussed as contributors to subsequent dissension and splitting. The social systems perspective provides a useful tool for understanding this naturally occurring group situation.

scholarly journals Solidarity with disabled people in times of crisis: A comparative analysis of Italy and the UK

2021 ◽  
pp. 026858092199450
Author(s):  
Nicola Maggini ◽  
Tom Montgomery ◽  
Simone Baglioni
Keyword(s):  
Social Trust ◽  
Important Determinant ◽  
Social Embeddedness ◽  
Disabled People ◽  
The Social ◽  
Religious Piety ◽  
Active Nature ◽  
The One ◽  
The Uk

Against the background of crisis and cuts, citizens can express solidarity with groups in various ways. Using novel survey data this article explores the attitudes and behaviours of citizens in their expressions of solidarity with disabled people and in doing so illuminates the differences and similarities across two European contexts: Italy and the UK. The findings reveal pools of solidarity with disabled people across both countries that have on the one hand similar foundations such as the social embeddedness and social trust of citizens, while on the other hand contain some differences, such as the more direct and active nature of solidarity in Italy compared to the UK and the role of religiosity as an important determinant, particularly in Italy. Across both countries the role of ‘deservingness’ was key to understanding solidarity, and the study’s conclusions raise questions about a solidarity embedded by a degree of paternalism and even religious piety.

scholarly journals Military Veterans and Welfare Reform: Bridging Two Policy Worlds through Qualitative Longitudinal Research

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-14
Author(s):  
Lisa Scullion ◽  
Katy Jones ◽  
Peter Dwyer ◽  
Celia Hynes ◽  
Philip Martin
Keyword(s):  
Welfare Reform ◽  
Longitudinal Research ◽  
Military Veterans ◽  
Armed Forces ◽  
Veterans Affairs ◽  
Civilian Life ◽  
Policy And Practice ◽  
Policy Makers ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Uk

There has been an increasing focus in the UK on the support provided to the Armed Forces community, with the publication of the Armed Forces Covenant (2011), the Strategy for our Veterans (2018) and the first ever Office for Veterans’ Affairs (2019). There is also an important body of research – including longitudinal research – focusing on transitions from military to civilian life, much of which is quantitative. At the same time, the UK has witnessed a period of unprecedented welfare reform. However, research focused on veterans’ interactions with the social security system has been largely absent. This article draws on the authors’ experiences of undertaking qualitative longitudinal research (QLR) to address this knowledge gap. We reflect on how QLR was essential in engaging policy makers enabling the research to bridge the two parallel policy worlds of veterans’ support and welfare reform, leading to significant policy and practice impact.

scholarly journals The Social Aspects of Sexual Health: A Twitter-Based Analysis of Valentine’s Day Perception

Sexes ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 50-59
Author(s):  
Andrea Sansone ◽  
Angelo Cignarelli ◽  
Daniele Mollaioli ◽  
Giacomo Ciocca ◽  
Erika Limoncin ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Social Networks ◽  
Sexual Behavior ◽  
Sexual Health ◽  
Ad Hoc ◽  
Healthcare Research ◽  
Social Aspects ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Us ◽  
Valentine's Day ◽  
The Uk

Sentiment analysis (SA) is a technique aimed at extracting opinions and sentiments through the analysis of text, often used in healthcare research to understand patients’ needs and interests. Data from social networks, such as Twitter, can provide useful insights on sexual behavior. We aimed to assess the perception of Valentine’s Day by performing SA on tweets we collected between 28 January and 13 February 2019. Analysis was done using ad hoc software. A total of 883,615 unique tweets containing the word “valentine” in their text were collected. Geo-localization was available for 48,918 tweets; most the tweets came from the US (36,889, 75.41%), the UK (2605, 5.33%) and Canada (1661, 3.4%). The number of tweets increased approaching February 14. “Love” was the most recurring word, appearing in 111,981 tweets, followed by “gift” (55,136), “special” (34,518) and “happy” (33,913). Overall, 7318 tweets mentioned “sex”: among these tweets, the most recurring words were “sexy” (2317 tweets), “love” (1394) and “gift” (679); words pertaining to intimacy and sexual activity, such as “lingerie”, “porn”, and “date” were less common. In conclusion, tweets about Valentine’s Day mostly focus on the emotions, or on the material aspect of the celebration, and the sexual aspect of Valentine’s Day is rarely mentioned.

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