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The volume explores and assesses the origins and current state of the private security sector in four Southeast European countries (Bulgaria, Serbia, Albania and Kosovo), with specific reference to principles of good governance and the protection of human rights. In particular, the authors examine when and how the first private security companies developed and whether and how PSCs, their clients, and other factors such as relevant legislation determined the services private security offer today, and which companies were established/have survived in the market. The studies look into the economic importance of private security especially as a source of employment. They also explore if PSCs are able to provide quality security services by looking at the background and qualifications of managers and employees. A number of important questions are addressed: who are the people who work for PSCs, what is their level of expertise and professionalism and what are their working conditions? How important are (political) relationships for the success of a PSC and do domestic political considerations have an impact on which PSC receives contracts and how well they work? How is quality defined and enforced by both PSCs and their clients, especially public sector clients? Finally, do PSCs and state security providers coordinate, cooperate or compete with each other?
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Negatív életesemények hatása a kamaszok és fiatalok egészségkárosító magatartására
The paper studies how negative life events affect risk behaviour of children and young people. Calculations on the database of the ‘Hungarian youth 2012’ research suggest that negative life events are strong predictors of different types of risk behaviour like alcohol, drug abuse and suicide. According to the data people who have experienced several and more serious negative lifevents, more likely refuse and turn away from the norms of the adult society than those whose life proves to be less stressful. To place these results into child protection context, the study calls attention to the fact that the Hungarian child protection system does not treat each group in the fragmented society equally, although, on the basis of the incidence of threat it should. Another important message of this paper is to highlight that in addition to scientific values large-scale sociological research studies have professional and practical values as well. To support it, from the questions of the well-known Holmes-Rahe scale the authors re-developed an exploration scale (Reduced Life Events Scale). The application of the Reduced Life Event Scale (or the original Holmes-Rahe scale) allows experts to focus more on the studied issues in the process of planning services, prevention and case work. The tool might propose solutions to use the insufficient resources in a more targeted way.
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Egy intervenció tapasztalatai
Intergroup contact is the most effective method of prejudice reduction according to a vast number of studies conducted in various intergroup situations. However, it is not contact, but its optimal conditions which are difficult to attain in societies lacking a general acceptance of egalitarian social norms, facing strong segregation, large status differences, and endorsing strong prejudicial attitudes. Therefore, the optimal conditions for intergroup contact are rarely available when attempting to reduce prejudice against Roma people in Hungary. We present two studies in which we tested the influence of an intervention based on intergroup friendship – a highly positive example of intergroup contact – to reduce anti-Roma prejudice among university students. The research builds upon the so-called “fast friends” method which refers to a short closeness generating procedure based on mutual self-disclosure which creates an experience resembling real friendships. First year psychology students participated in our first study (N = 132) within an experimental, an extended contact, and a “control” group. We found some overall improvement in attitudes based on the comparison between the pre- and the post-test questionnaire results. In a second study (N = 61) we tested whether the findings of Study 1 were the direct result of the intervention, or its indirect influence through promoting non-prejudicial institutional norms. This time we worked with an experimental and a naïve control group, and found significant differences in attitude change between the groups along some attitudinal variables and in the perception of institutional norms. We discuss the scope and limits of anti-Roma prejudice reductions methods.
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PhD theses of Anikó Gregor on attitudes concerning gender roles in Hungary in the 2000s
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Pojam abortusa ili pobačaja (lat. abruptio graviditatis) definira se kao spontani ili izazvani prekid trudnoće izbacivanjem ploda prije navršenog 28. tjedna trudnoće. Tema izazvanog abortusa je tema koja se kroz povijest doživljavala kao sasvim uobičajena stavka svakodnevnog života ili pak najgora kontroverza koja direktno pogađa ljudski život. Kao takav, abortus može biti legalan ili ilegalan te se proučava kroz razne aspekte (povijesni, sociološki, kulturološki, pravni, psihološki, moralno-etički, itd.). Iako se povijest abortusa prati još od antičkog doba može se reći kako je pitanje abortusa rodno određeno, te više pogađa žene. Riječ je o djevojkama i ženama koje uglavnom same stoje pod upitnikom abortusa.
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In this study, the relationship between crime and the socialization process in Gypsy subculture is examined. This is is a qualitative study analysing the relationship between crime and the socialization process among Gypsies in different parts of Karaman between the years 2014-2015, especially the “Yeni” neighborhood known as Abdali district. In-depth interviews helped us to group Gypsy families into four different family types. It can be said that during unique socialization process of Gypsy subculture, Gypsy individuals’ attitudes to crime is shaped in the context of its unique dynamics through their families, relatives and friends. Unlike other social groups, the Gypsy subculture allows forming a habitus conducive to be involved in crime. Although they have common social characteristics with Gypsies living in different parts of Turkey, Gypsies in Karaman have a distinctive lifestyle and habitus due to their unique socialization process.
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During the research, 241 interviews were made between 2007 and 2011. The interviewees were members of different social, gender, and age groups, with different world-views, social status and political attitudes. Their common denominator was the representation of any alternative life strategies compared to the profit- and success-oriented mainstraim. The hypothesis of the authors was that these ˮalternative” people have further common attributes, which play an important role in the social integration process, too. The article summarizes the typical (integrative) values of these alternative life strategies.
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This paper presents two main versions of altruism: the filantrophy and the humanism, their most developed historical forms and ways of legitimation. It is shown why private property, market and profite maximization are not inconsinent with the philantrophy and why it is not in accordance with the humanism. One should consider the role of philantrophy in the apology of capitalism.The paper compares two clasical writings: Marx-Engels’ „Manifest of the Communist Party” and Andrew Carnegies essay „The Gospel of Wealth”. In addition, it explores historical development, main features and the limitations of solidarity both in humanism and in philantropy in religious and in secular life as well as the types of philantrops and humanists and the contemporary philantrocapitalism in USA and Germany. There are two kinds of the philantropy criticism: (1) Non systemic one, which warns on the different abuses of philantrops, but which doesn’t deny the system’s foundations, and (2) Systemic one, which does’nt separate the criticism of philantropy from the criticism of capitalism itself. Special attention is dedicated to the usage of symbolic capital in the philantropy and to different doubts about the sincerity of benefaction.There is difference between apstract humanism which only comdemn the inhumanity, on the one side, and the theory of real humanism, as the lever by means of which one should put down exploatation and oppression of human beings. One is able to differentiate between ideological explanations of charity, philantropic and humanistic attempts in the epochal consciousnesses of the different historical ages from the antiquity to neoliberalism. Humanism prevailed during the Cold War in socialism, whereas philantropy has become hegemonic since the collapse of European socialism. Humanism was rooted in critism of the private property, while philantropy serves to promote and the bouergoies values. The conclusion is that the philantrophy relieves misery on the level of distribution, while humanism tries to annihilate the misery on the level of production.
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At the end of 20th century, parts of Europe get caught again by xenophobia’s which were hidden under the rug of the Cold War. Balkans was again at the heart of eruptions of nationalistic ideas and hegemonist aspirations. In resolving the last unsettled Kosovo case in the Balkans, west democra-cies corrected the mistake made at the beginning of the same century. In this direction gave input the Jewish community of USA. “We need to come out in defense of the defenseless victims ... can-not let people like Milosevic to continue killing men, women and children. We had to do this earlier, but not later or now”, said Elie Wiesel, the most prominent Jewish Nobel Prize winner, in a meeting with Holocaust survivors and veterans. This was not the only voice of the Jewish members in defense of Kosovo Albanians. A significant number of elite American-Jewish prominent politicians and diplomats, senior U.S. administration, from public life, have been cautious in pursuit of developments in Kosovo before the war. Altruism within Jewish elite influenced or advised U.S. policy makers on the necessity of intervention in Ko-sovo, to prevent scenarios prepared by the Serbian regime to de-albanize Kosovo. They decided and implemented the diplomacy of dynamic actions in stopping the repetition of the similarities of holocaust within the same century. What prompted this perfectly organized community in the U.S., with distinctive culture and other religious affiliations to people of Kosovo to support them during exterminating circumstances? Which were the driving factors on influencing the policy of most pow-erful state in the world in support of Albanians? This paper aims to illuminate some of the answers on the raised question as well as analyze the activities of most prominent American-Jewish personal-ities, some of their philanthropic actions that are associated with emotions, their principles and be-liefs to prevent human suffering and exodus of Kosovo Albanians, similar to their holocaust but with different actors.
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Sarajevski otvoreni centar i neformalna grupa Trans*BiH su od februara do maja 2015. godine radili na istraživanju problema u svakodnevnom životu sa kojima se susreću trans* osobe u BiH. Inicijalni cilj ovog istraživanja bio je mapirati stvarne probleme i procijeniti konkretne potrebe trans* osoba u BiH kako bi se moglo, argumentirajući preciznim podacima, dalje raditi na rješavanju tih problema kroz konkretni rad sa raznim institucijama, te kroz zagovaranje izmjena zakona, sastanke sa odgovornima, edukacije i slično, sa onima za koje se pokaže da diskriminiraju trans* osobe, da ne obavljaju svoj posao u skladu sa etikom ili da na bilo koji drugi način ugrožavaju ljudska prava trans* osoba. Do procjene realnih problema i potreba došlo se kroz statističku obradu upitnika, koje su popunjavale trans* osobe koje žive u BiH.
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Anti-Corruption Policies Revisited: WP9 Organised crime and impact on vulnerable groups
This integrated report investigates the link between political corruption and organised crime, by examining the modalities, resources and strategies used by criminal groups to govern and/or capture the market of political corruption. On the one hand, the report looks at the infiltration of organised crime in three main policy sectors where public spending and regulations play a pivotal role: public procurement, the privatization of public services, and management of EU funds. Alongside this, the report also analyses the criminal penetration of electoral politics, by evaluating the influence that criminal organisations can achieve in electoral arenas. As a result, the report provides a general assessment of policy regulations, legal countermeasures and practices adopted to prevent and combat organised crime, especially in interaction with political corruption. The report is drawn from data collected in five European countries (Bulgaria, Croatia, Hungary, Italy, Kosovo) across the above themes, and includes two more countries for the assessment of anti-organised crime legislation and initiatives (Albania and Georgia). The methodology involves both extensive and intensive strategies of investigation. A quantitative assessment of the crime and politics nexus is based on the Organised Crime & Corruption (OCC) events database, in which events data about the link between criminal groups and political corruption have been gathered and assembled1. A qualitative assessment involves in-depth understanding of the mechanisms of corrupt exchanges, presented as single case studies conducted in the countries covered by this study, inclusive of primary and secondary sources (interviews, legal proceedings, academic and policy-oriented reports). Data collection and analyses were conducted by five institutions across Europe (EUI, CSD, BCE, IKS, PSD).
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Corruption in Southeast Europe has been in the news, in the focus of public debate, and on the policy agenda of national and international institutions so often and for so long that its scrutiny hardly needs to be justified. It is precisely because it has proven to be such an intractable issue that innovative approaches to its understanding – and hence its reduction – are warranted. The EU accession prospects for the countries in the region – though distant – provide an enabling framework for action but it is local stakeholders, and in particular civil society who can bring about sustained progress in anti-corruption. The Southeast Europe Leadership for Development and Integrity (SELDI) has made the in-depth diagnosing and understanding of corruption and governance gaps in the region one of its main priorities, as a requisite condition for its advocacy of knowledge-driven anticorruption policies. This SELDI report fits in the development and implementation framework of the emerging regional anticorruption policy and infrastructure as exemplified by the SEE2020 Strategy’s Governance Pillar run by the Regional Anti-Corruption Initiative. Despite some important achievements – mostly with respect to the stabilisation of democratic institutions, the adoption of laws in key anticorruption areas, a reduction in petty bribery and growing public intolerance of corruption – anticorruption and good governance reforms are not consolidated, corruption among elected politicians and judges seems to be increasing and the enforcement of anticorruption legislation is haphazard. Anticorruption policies and institutions in the region will benefit immensely from the adoption of regular and accurate victimisation-survey based tool for measuring corruption and the rate of progress in good governance, similar to the special Eurobarometer on anticorruption, UNODC’s SEE monitoring of corruption and organised crime, and the Corruption Monitoring System employed by this report.
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This research is aimed at constructing a theoretical framework for the study of citizen participation in public policy making, based on genre theory. Drawing on various approaches to genre (rhetorical analysis, literary analysis, sociolinguistics, media studies, organisational communication, user interface design, and computer mediated communication), this paper suggests a series of theoretical perspectives on participatory genres, a notion freely borrowed from Erickson (1997) and applied to the methods, activities or applications of citizen participation in public policy making (e.g. consultations, petitions, citizens panels, opinion polls). The proposed theoretical framework takes into account the contexts of participation (conceived as both situations and communities) as well as the interrelationships between participatory genres, and focuses on the repertoires of elements (Lacey, 2000) that characterize participatory genres in terms of ‘why’, ‘how’, ‘what’, ‘who/m’, when’ and ‘where’ (Orlikowski & Yates, 1998). It is argued that approaching citizen participation in public policy making through the lens of participatory genres is valuable to both researchers and practitioners.
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This case study aims to demonstrate that an approach based on cooperation and collaboration can improve the rapport and trust between food businesses and enforcement officers leading to improvement in levels of compliance and reduce costs. The study integrates a desk research literature review with a qualitative case study approach supported by quantitative data. Case interviews with food industry professionals were performed to identify opinions and barriers to successful legal compliance plus in depth interviews with the Preston City Council whose approach is the focus of this case study. The barriers and challenges facing all parties involved implementing risk based food safety management systems and achieving an acceptable level of compliance with the various public regulations and industry regulations have been the subject of much research. These include factors of motivation, commerce, training, hazard control, analysis and management. This case study shows that the cooperative approach, and techniques used by Preston City Council demonstrates a trend towards improvement in the levels of food hygiene compliance among food businesses as well as economic benefits in the use of resources.
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Kosovo's constitution obliges the authorities to consider an initiative against giving ethnic Serb population greater autonomy.
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Azimjan Askarov was among the ethnic Uzbeks sent to prison for allegedly fomenting fierce ethnic clashes in 2010.
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Communists labelled King Zog a traitor and erased the royal family from the history books; monarchists see Prince Leka II’s upcoming marriage as an important symbol.
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Police reportedly seize grenades, ammunition, and suspicious pamphlets in Baku and Ganja.
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