This article extends the concept of symmetry to ethics. Using the case of canola in Canada, the authors argue that grades and standards simultaneously subject humans and nonhumans to rites of passage that test their "goodness. " Then, they further develop a tentative typology of standards. The authors argue that these standards allow something resembling the neoclassical market to be established, create the conditions for economic analysis, and allocate power among human actors.

This paper challenges contemporary portrayals in the nursing literature of the spaces within which care of patients in hospital settings is conducted. Within the wider discourse of fiscal restraint on health care spending, professional nursing has cast its disciplined eyes on details of the nurse‐patient relationship for the ostensible purpose of repairing that which is treated as individual failings of nurses to practise in ways prescribed by nursing theories. Set aside in this approach to the so‐called ‘problems’ of nursing practice (...) has been an examination of the conditions within which nurses come in contact with patients, and a critical recognition that such contacts represent skilled accomplishments of social action. In this paper, these conditions are treated as resources available to both nurses and patients to generate accounts for the nurse's presence as well as the nurse's absence. Examples from an ethnographic study of nursing practice are used to illustrate how the spaces operating between nurses and patients are not empty voids but aresocialspaces through which particular meanings about nursing care can be conveyed. (shrink)

There is ongoing ethical and legal debate about withdrawing life sup- port for patients with disorders of consciousness (DOCs). Frequently fu- eling the debate are implicit assumptions about the value of life in a state of impaired consciousness, and persistent uncertainty about the quality of life (QoL) of these persons. Yet there are no validated methods for assessing QoL in this population, and a significant obstacle to doing so is their inability to communicate. Recent neuroscientific discoveries might circumvent that (...) problem and help shed light on QoL in DOCs. There is an ethical imperative to prioritize QoL research in this patient population, to provide evidence to inform treatment, research, and end of life decisions. A minimalist and pragmatic model of QoL is proposed, targeting positive and negative affect as domains for which there is po- tential to reach across the communication gap, and restore to these voiceless persons some measure of control. (shrink)

'Quality' is a widely invoked concept in healthcare, and 'quality improvement' is now a central part of healthcare service delivery. However, these concepts and their associated practices represent relatively uncharted territory for applied philosophy and bioethics. In this paper, we explore some of the conceptual complexity of quality in healthcare and argue that quality is best understood to be conceptually plural. Quality is widely agreed to be multidimensional and as such constitutively plural. However, we argue (...) that quality is plural in two further senses. First, quality is competitively plural : that is, different high-level conceptions of quality can be appropriately invoked in different contexts and serve... (shrink)

In this paper we report findings from a commissioned report to the COVID-19 Clinical Research Coalition on approaches to streamline multinational REC review/approval during public health emergencies. As currently envisioned in the literature, a system of REC mutual recognition is theoretically possible based on shared procedural REC standards, but raises numerous concerns about perceived inequities and mistrust.

The paper deals with credible and relevantinformation flow in dialogs: How useful is it for areceiver to get some information, how useful is it fora sender to give this information, and how much credibleinformation can we expect to flow between sender andreceiver? What is the relation between semantics andpragmatics? These Gricean questions will be addressedfrom a decision and game-theoretical point of view.

Hospital ethics committees have become widespread over the last 25 years, stimulated by the Quinlan decision of the New Jersey Supreme Court, the report of a President's Commission, and most recently by the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Health Care Organizations , which now man dates that each hospital seeking accreditation have a functioning process for the consideration of ethical issues in patient care. Laws and regulations in several states require that hospitals establish ethics committees, and some states stipulate that (...) certain types of cases and disputes be taken to such committees. At least one state grants legal immunity to those who implement recommendations of an ethics committee. (shrink)

Constructing energy scenarios is traditionally an endeavour driven by experts. I suggest that an outcome of relying solely on expertise is incompleteness. Moreover, expertise, while being a necessary condition, is not a sufficient condition for epistemic quality and normative legitimacy of energy scenarios given the scope of transitions that energy scenarios entail, which includes substantial societal repercussions. Four reasons will be provided for wide participation when constructing energy scenarios. First, there are several forecasting shortcomings of top-down approaches. Second, to (...) rely solely on expertise provides incomplete conceptualizations of energy and central concepts such as ‘smartness’, in addition to neglecting normative views. Third, increased epistemic quality is an outcome of wide participation. A fourth reason is derived from the argument of inductive risks, stating that thresholds of evidence should reflect the potential outcomes if erroneously corroborating or rejecting a hypothesis. As energy scenarios provide input to decision-making having potentially large societal impact, they ought to be both normatively legitimate as well as of sufficient epistemic quality, components provided by wide participation. -/- . (shrink)

Food quality is an important issue on the global agenda, particularly in high- and middle-income economies, but of little concern in designing Mexico’s food policy. Food policy has focused on quantity and in the case of maize, on satisfying domestic demand by supporting large commercial agriculture and importing from abroad. However, and as argued in this paper, obtaining a food staple of quality is also an important issue for rural households and contributes to motivating continued smallholder production. Based (...) on case studies in the rural district of Atlacomulco, in the state of Mexico, as well as in two regions of the state of Chiapas, this paper analyzes the production and consumption strategies of rural households. We focus on goals of food security and quality and note differential trends among households of varying characteristics and local contexts. We find that the motivation of small-scale producers to grow maize should be supported by Mexico’s food policy. (shrink)

Purpose: It has been argued in literature that culture has significant influence on the education implementation. While it is undeniable that education quality is the most important in the education implementation, many attempt to ensure quality assurance at all levels of education. Hence this Study investigates the culture approach in Quality assurance in Elementary School. Design: A Qualitative approach was applied in this study. Using explorative research with a naturalistic phenomenon exposure in Elementary school in Bangkalan city, (...) Madura Island, East Java Province, Indonesia. Data collection using in depth interview while data analysis using descriptive with deductive methods. Findings: Teachers showed a strategic approach with an integrated culture in quality assurance as the students’ good grade is the focus of the teaching. Support system in developing a more cultural, independent, self-reliant approach in teaching to achieve good quality in education is needed. Teachers perceive themselves doing well in their job, however teachers need close guidance and support when undertaking quality assurance assessment. (shrink)

Motivation plays an immense role and is one of the key factors for successful and qualitative performance in all spheres of personal and professional engagement of individuals. Therefore, educational institutions, including academia, pay special attention to finding tools for motivating students, but also for motivation of their academic staff. Increased motivation has shown to lead to better performance and better performance inevitably contributes to quality enhancement at both individual and institutional level. The aim of this paper is to present (...) an institutional Ranking and Remuneration Policy based on Key Performance Indicators in four areas identified as the most crucial for successful operation of a higher education institution: teaching and learning, research, staff digital profile, service to society and project-based activities. Southeast European University in North Macedonia has developed KPIs in these four areas through an inclusive and transparent process based on its unique Total Quality Management approach. The policy has been created after many consultations, trials and simulations and its main objective is to enhance institutional academic productivity and effectiveness through a human resource vibration that starts from individual evaluation, motivation and performance differentiation and leads to stimulation for achieving excellence. It is at an initial stage and if tested well in practice, it can serve as a model for other higher education institutions in the country and wider. (shrink)

Increasingly, both mothers and fathers are expected to play an equal role in child rearing. Nonetheless, we know little about how child care arrangements affect couples’ sexual intimacy and relationship quality. Research has focused on the effect of the division of paid labor and housework on couples’ relationships, finding that egalitarianism is problematic for sexual intimacy, relationship quality, and relationship stability. These findings, however, come almost universally from studies utilizing decades-old data that fail to examine the division of (...) child care. In this study, we update this work by utilizing data from the 2006 Marital and Relationship Study to examine how the division of child care affects the relationship quality and sexual intimacy of heterosexual couples in the United States. Results indicate that men’s performance of child care is generally associated with more satisfaction with the division of child care, more satisfying sexual relationships, and higher quality relationships. Importantly, we find that egalitarian child care arrangements have positive consequences for both men and women. These findings contribute to a growing body of research that challenges the costs of egalitarianism and indicates instead that egalitarianism is associated with higher quality, more intimate relationships than gender traditional arrangements. (shrink)

Evolving practice requires peer review of clinical ethics (CE) consultation for quality assessment and improvement. Many institutions have identified the chart note as the basis for this process, but to our knowledge, electronic health record (EHR) systems are not necessarily designed to easily include CE consultation notes. This article provides a framework for the inclusion of CE consultation notes into the formal EHR, describing a developed system in the Epic EHR that allows for the elaborated electronic notation of the (...) CE chart note. The implementation of the “meaningful use” criteria for EHR, mandated by the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act of 2009, requires that health professionals meet certain standards for quality, efficiency, and safety, all of which overlap with the goals of standardization, peer review, and quality improvement within CE consultation. (shrink)

The argument that I shall pursue here will take the following form. Organisms are wholes that are centres of agency. To live is to act intentionally, to discriminate and to experience. To accommodate within science an understanding of the life with which we as organisms are familiar, it is necessary to acknowledge the reality of qualitative experience. This leads to an expanded conception of science that preserves all that is of value in our tradition of exploring reality but avoids the (...) unfortunate conclusion that some of our deepest experiences are in some sense unreal. (shrink)