At the heart of the liberal democratic project are two key political doctrines: firstly, the doctrine suggesting that the state should play only a limited or subsidiary role in private family life; and secondly, the idea that the state has a duty to protect the welfare of its individual citizens. A delicate balancing act is thus required to maintain social and political equilibrium. In recent times, the growing recognition of children as rights-bearing individuals has reignited debates over the rights of parents to the exclusive control and custody of their children in relation to the right of the state to intervene when parental care is judged to be inadequate. This seminar elaborates on one such form of family intervention – child adoption – and traces its development in Britain, Ireland and the United States.

Brian Kearney recently completed his PhD with the UCD School of Sociology. His research focused on the adoption of children across national borders using a case-oriented historical comparative analysis of the practice. The thrust of the research was to uncover the normative assumptions that are embedded in the formation of policies and practices within international adoption at a local, national and supra-national level.

Brian is a committee member of long standing with the International Adoption Association (Ireland) and a regular contributor to the organisation’s quarterly journal Adoption Matters. He is also a board member and sponsor of the proposed overseas adoption mediation agency (Leanbh).

A group of leading human scientists will address this and other questions about Irish culture and society in an informal workshop in which the emphasis will be on debate and discussion.

Inquiries and applications to partipate in the workshop should be made to Tom Inglis no later than Friday 7th of September 2012.

Download  the the conference poster and list of contributers.

Abstract

Using the example of conflict escalation in former Yugoslavia, an agent-based model of the mechanisms leading to conflict escalation is developed in this paper. Escalation of ethno-nationalist violence is described by the recursive feedback loop between political actors and citizens. Here the framework of the theory of securitization is used. While war crimes where undertaken (to a large degree) by paramilitary militia that where not integrated into the command structure of the Yugoslavian army, politicial entrepreneurs where able to stimulate the corresponding political athmosphere by declaring the nation as an object under threat.

The model consists of two agent classes: politicians, who enforce value orientations, and citizens, who may form paramilitary militia. To represent the cognitive complexity, the the simulation tool EMIL-S is used. First simulation results conform that the escalation dynamics is enforced by political actors. However, citizens are not passive entities. Their response seem to depend on their network structures. In future work these tentative results have to be further analysed.

 10:00 -  Mental Health

• Sarah Gibney (UCD): Childlessness in Europe: Implications for Well-being in later life
• Darach Murphy (DIT): Resolving communication deficits contributing to the 'crisis in men's health'. Is it 'get men talking' or 'get listening to men'?
• Dr Noel Richardson (CIT): Inequalities and men's health? Turning the policy spotlight on men

11:15 - Public Health

• Dr Robert Mooney (Applied Research Centre): Collective Responsibility in the Risk Society: Health Risks as a Catalyst for Social Action
• Gemma Moore (UCD): A Critical Abyss: The Absence of Policy to Regulate Stem Cell Research in Ireland
• James Fulham (UCD): Health Literacy in Ireland: Results of the European Health Literacy Survey
• Dr Ingrid Holme (Uni of Southampton): Using the devil's own tools: health behaviour in social marketing

2:00 - Life Events

• Peter J Kearney (UCC): The Barretstown Experience: A Healthy Response to Crisis
  
  

• Catherine Lynch (NCAD): Examining how the Mother Artist maps the experiences of transitions and cycles of identity
• Orla Tinsley (Cystic Fibrosis Ireland): Journalist and Campaigner

3:15 - Health Care

• Marcella McGovern (UCD): Irelands Intergrated Care Strategy for Primary Care: the implementation of primary care team

• Maria Wegrzynowska (DCU): Flintstones, Magic Hands and Polish Migrant's Women Transitional Healthcare Practices

• Professor Eamonn O'Shea (NUIG): Health Production

Ivan Light is professor of sociology at the University of California, Los Angeles. He is the author of numerous articles and of six books on immigration, entrepreneurs, and urban sociology. Ivan Light's current research concerns the effects of state minimum wage levels upon each state's influx of Mexican immigrants between 1980 and 2000.

Bryan Fanning (School of Applied Social Science) will discuss the Rules of Belonging.

Attendees should review From Developmental Ireland to Migration Nation: Immigration and Shifting Rules of Belonging in the Republic of Ireland  for the seminar.