Justifying Case-Based Research: The Role of Systematic Case Studies in Building an Evidence Base for Therapy Policy and Practice

2015 ◽  
Vol 370 (1681) ◽  
pp. 20140280 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert L. Pressey ◽  
Piero Visconti ◽  
Paul J. Ferraro

Policy and practice around protected areas are poorly aligned with the basic purpose of protection, which is to make a difference. The difference made by protected areas is their impact, defined in program evaluation as the outcomes arising from protection relative to the counterfactual of no protection or a different form of protection. Although impact evaluation of programs is well established in fields such as medicine, education and development aid, it is rare in nature conservation. We show that the present weak alignment with impact of policy targets and operational objectives for protected areas involves a great risk: targets and objectives can be achieved while making little difference to the conservation of biodiversity. We also review potential ways of increasing the difference made by protected areas, finding a poor evidence base for the use of planning and management ‘levers’ to better achieve impact. We propose a dual strategy for making protected areas more effective in their basic role of saving nature, outlining ways of developing targets and objectives focused on impact while also improving the evidence for effective planning and management.


Author(s):  
Gareth Wall

This ambitious and highly informative volume is premised on both the seismic shift in the perceived developmental role of local government across the globe, and the challenges that local governments will face as their key role in achieving the post-2015 sustainable development goals is increasingly being recognised within the global policy fora. New Century Local Government brings together an impressively wide geographic spread of country case studies from across the four regions of the Commonwealth, and pulls together work by leading scholars of local government who are all members of the Commonwealth Local Government Research Advisory Group (CLGF-RAG). It provides a plethora of detailed country case studies arranged around three themes: decentralisation in the Caribbean, Pakistan and England, local government finance and local economic development in India, South Africa and Tanzania, and new approaches to governance in Canada, Australia and New Zealand. Not only do the papers provide detailed accounts of the changes in policy and practice within their focus country cases – but many of them, notably the papers by Brown, Reid, McKinlay and Sansom include a comparative perspective with developments from Commonwealth countries in other regions, which is one of the key strengths of the volume. It is also the raison d’être of comparative work across the countries of the Commonwealth, given the shared legal and administrative histories and the dominance of English as the academic and often administrative lingua franca. It would have been great to see more of the cross-regional and cross-country lessons being drawn out from across the contributions in a final concluding chapter, but the editors leave this to the reader – possibly to ensure they read the volume in full.


2021 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. e92-e102
Author(s):  
Lyndon Reilly

BackgroundEvidence suggests that positive parenting can impact men’s mental wellbeing and child development, and male parents have a unique and critically important role as parents. Unfortunately, limited literature is available regarding the First Nations male parenting and the challenges they encounter raising children. Furthermore, the qualitative studies examining First Nations male parents do not appear effective for translating policy and practice. In effect, important knowledge from these qualitative studies is not informing or shaping First Nations male parenting programs. A systematic collation and meta-synthesis of existing qualitative studies may strengthen the evidence base and assist with the integrative knowledge into policy and practice. MethodsA meta-synthesis of qualitative studies were performed to explore the experiences, barriers and facilitators to parenting among First Nations males. A systematic search in Social Sciences Citation Index, CINAHL, ProQuest, Informit Databases, Expanded Academic, Scopus and Google scholar for e-journals was conducted to identify studies that explored First Nations male parenting, barriers and facilitators. Thematic synthesis was performed to identify the key elements influencing (challenging or facilitating) them. ResultsNine qualitative studies were identified in the review, including eight peer-reviewed articles and one dissertation. Four themes emerged: (1) the complexity of roles and relationships; (2) poverty and exclusion; (3) sharing and receiving knowledge and (4) keeping strong. Elements across studies were identified as a barrier, facilitator or both to male parenting. Conclusions There is compelling evidence demonstrating the critical role of male parents to their own and their children’s development and wellbeing. This meta-synthesis generates a much-needed empirical foundation to guide further research, policy and practice for First Nations male parents. The meta-synthesis and the resulting explanatory theory can be used by communities, practitioners and policymakers to identify the barriers and facilitators that support and promote First Nations male parenting from an indigenous understanding of history and contemporary society.


This book explores the policy and social frames through which citizens and wider communities are being engaged with culture as a tool to mitigate the effects of social exclusion and deprivation. The study is based on an inter-disciplinary four-year research project investigating those individuals and organisations whose mission is to use culture, instrumentally, to help deprived communities in a variety of different ways. The project sought to examine the different scales of activity involved within cultural intermediation, examining national policy and practice, but grounded within specific community-level case studies. Although a number of sites across England were examined, two field sites in particular were the subject for a deep ethnographic engagement, including active interventions. These were Birmingham, with a focus on the Balsall Heath neighbourhood and Greater Manchester, with detailed work being undertaken in the Ordsall ward of Salford. These case studies feature throughout much of the book as a lens through which to see the impacts of wider policy trends. Research was undertaken during a period of quite dramatic change in policy and governance within the UK’s cultural sector. These changes were driven by one of the biggest experiments in refiguring the role of the public sector within the UK since 1945, as post-credit crunch governments have responded to the challenges of a struggling global economy by employing the discourse of ‘austerity’. As this book shows, what has emerged is a cultural intermediation sector that has refined its practices, adopting new funding models and arenas of activity.


Author(s):  
Sucharita BENIWAL ◽  
Sahil MATHUR ◽  
Lesley-Ann NOEL ◽  
Cilla PEMBERTON ◽  
Suchitra BALASUBRAHMANYAN ◽  
...  

The aim of this track was to question the divide between the nature of knowledge understood as experiential in indigenous contexts and science as an objective transferable knowledge. However, these can co-exist and inform design practices within transforming social contexts. The track aimed to challenge the hegemony of dominant knowledge systems, and demonstrate co-existence. The track also hoped to make a case for other systems of knowledges and ways of knowing through examples from native communities. The track was particularly interested in, first, how innovators use indigenous and cultural systems and frameworks to manage or promote innovation and second, the role of local knowledge and culture in transforming innovation as well as the form of local practices inspired innovation. The contributions also aspired to challenge through examples, case studies, theoretical frameworks and methodologies the hegemony of dominant knowledge systems, the divides of ‘academic’ vs ‘non-academic’ and ‘traditional’ vs ‘non-traditional’.


2020 ◽  
Vol 6 ◽  
pp. 93-100
Author(s):  
Gisa Jähnichen

The Sri Lankan Ministry of National Coexistence, Dialogue, and Official Languages published the work “People of Sri Lanka” in 2017. In this comprehensive publication, 21 invited Sri Lankan scholars introduced 19 different people’s groups to public readers in English, mainly targeted at a growing number of foreign visitors in need of understanding the cultural diversity Sri Lanka has to offer. This paper will observe the presentation of these different groups of people, the role music and allied arts play in this context. Considering the non-scholarly design of the publication, a discussion of the role of music and allied arts has to be supplemented through additional analyses based on sources mentioned by the 21 participating scholars and their fragmented application of available knowledge. In result, this paper might help improve the way facts about groups of people, the way of grouping people, and the way of presenting these groupings are displayed to the world beyond South Asia. This fieldwork and literature guided investigation should also lead to suggestions for ethical principles in teaching and presenting of culturally different music practices within Sri Lanka, thus adding an example for other case studies.


2020 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Priyo Katon Prasetyo ◽  
Rosye Villanova Christine ◽  
Sudibyanung Sudibyanung

Abstract: Based on Law Number 2 of 2012 concerning Land Acquisition for Development in the Public Interest, the Openness Principle is one of the ten principles as the basis of the implementation of development. This principle is significant because its complex role can lead to conflicts and disputes. In this paper, discussions are divided into two parts: 1) how the implementation is expected to be applied according to the acquisition procedure in theory; and 2) the reality that occurs in the field. The first discussion was conducted by reviewing the applicable regulations and the methods or concepts of development of the openness principle. Meanwhile, the second discussion about the reality on the field was conducted by elaborating case studies regarding problems in land acquisition. The results of this study indicate that there are gaps in the implementation of the openness principle between theory and reality in regards of land scarcity, economic inequality, and information asymmetry among the involved parties. In conclusion, the implementation of the openness principle is significant with the role of information in land acquisition.Intisari: Berdasarkan Undang Undang Nomor 2 Tahun 2012 tentang Pengadaan Tanah Bagi Pembangunan Untuk Kepentingan Umum, Asas Keterbukaan adalah salah satu dari sepuluh asas yang menjadi dasar pelaksanaannya. Asas ini menjadi signifikan karena perannya yang kompleks dapat menimbulkan konflik dan sengketa. Artikel ini akan membagi pembahasan menjadi dua bagian: pertama, bagaimana implementasi yang seharusnya diterapkan pada prosedur pengadaan secara harapan, dan kedua, membahas mengenai realita yang terjadi di lapangan. Secara harapan pembahasan dilakukan dengan melakukan library research atau studi terhadap peraturan yang berlaku dan metode-metode atau prinsip perkembangan dari asas keterbukaan. Realitas di lapangan akan dielaborasi dari studi kasus mengenai permasalahan dalam pengadaan tanah. Hasil dari penelitian ini menunjukkan ada gap dalam implementasi asas keterbukaan antara harapan dan realitas di lapangan yang bersumber dari kelangkaan sumber daya/tanah, ketimpangan ekonomi dan asimetri informasi di antara para pihak yang terlibat. Tulisan ini menyimpulkan bahwa implementasi asas keterbukaan signifikan dengan peran informasi dalam pengadaan tanah. 


Author(s):  
Philippa Adrych ◽  
Robert Bracey ◽  
Dominic Dalglish ◽  
Stefanie Lenk ◽  
Rachel Wood

The Conclusion to this volume returns to the three main questions posed in the Introduction, examining how a shared name, alongside material culture, can affect our understanding of ancient religious practices. The first section explores the benefits of a collaborative and comparative endeavour, drawing out examples from the earlier chapters and showing how they informed our perceptions of what a name can mean. The second and third parts ask more theoretical questions about how we can use our case studies to explore broader problems of interpreting ancient religious practices, and the role of objects within them. Finally, we return to the main theme of the volume: the name Mithra, and the ideas, expectations, and traditions that have been attached to it in antiquity and in modern scholarship. We suggest a new way of approaching the phenomenon of the shared name, and what that can entail for those interested in ancient religion.


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