The public's considerations about implementing non-pharmaceutical interventions to manage a novel COVID-19 epidemic.

In the future, new variants of the SARS-CoV-2 virus might emerge and cause outbreaks. If this occurs, the implementation of non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPIs) can be reconsidered. Consideration of the potential benefits and harms of implementing NPIs, and ultimately deciding about implementing NPIs, is currently mainly executed by experts and governments. However, general literature on public engagement suggests that integrating public perspectives into decision-making can enhance the quality of decisions and foster greater public understanding of them. In this study, a deliberative mini-public was conducted to integrate this public perspective. The aim was to elicit public considerations regarding non-pharmaceutical interventions by asking a diverse group of citizens to participate as decision-makers and convene, learn and deliberate about implementing non-pharmaceutical interventions during a hypothetical outbreak of a new SARS-CoV-2 variant. Participants emphasized the importance of early implementation during the outbreak, to prevent exceeding healthcare capacity, long-term mental health issues, educational deficits, and bankruptcies. Additionally, participants stressed taking public support into account, and shared ideas on maintaining support. Furthermore, participants wanted to give citizens personal responsibility and freedom in making their own assessment regarding adherence to interventions and how much risk of infection they would be willing to accept. Participants also expressed the need for the government to adopt a learning attitude towards improvements in pandemic response, and to generate more focus on long-term strategies. The deliberative mini-public, revealed public considerations that reflected public values and needs. These considerations might be helpful in better aligning epidemic management policies with public perspectives. Regarding the deliberative mini-public, uncertainties remain about the design and impact on a bigger scale.

Politicians' high-status signals make less-educated citizens more supportive of aggression against government: A video-vignette survey experiment.

Various branches of the literature suggest that exposure to the high-status appearances and lifestyles of politicians in contemporary "diploma democracies" affects the attitudes and behavior of less-educated citizens because it confronts them with their lower status in the political domain. Informed by this, we theorize that such exposure inspires docility (a lower subjective social status, weaker feelings of political entitlement) and revolt (anger, more support for aggression against government). To investigate this, we conducted an original, pre-registered, video-vignette survey experiment among a representative sample of the Dutch population. While our findings likely generalize to other liberal democracies, the Dutch context is suitable to test our theorizing because low-status and high-status appearances and lifestyles are found across the political arena, irrespective of politicians' substantive positions or use of populist rhetoric. Each less-educated respondent (n = 1390) was presented with a professionally produced video of an actor playing the part of a fictitious politician. This politician signaled either a low or a high status via his appearance and lifestyle. The potentially confounding factors of his substantive positions and populist rhetoric were randomized and controlled for. We find that exposure to the high-status politician increased less-educated citizens' support for aggression against the government. Through exploratory analyses, we assess how the responses of docility and revolt are interrelated, and how they are shaped by less-educated citizens' economic status.

Meddling in the 2016 Elections and Satisfaction With Democracy in the US.

In this article, we investigate how external election interventions influence satisfaction with democracy. We expect that mere knowledge about a foreign intervention will not affect system support. Instead, only those who believe that the external influence campaign had a decisive impact on the election outcome should see a reduction in democratic satisfaction. Furthermore, since electoral winners are likely to think that their preferred party provides superior policy outputs, supporters of winning parties should be less affected by their beliefs in the decisiveness of an influence campaign. Finally, we expect that those who place a high value on in-group loyalty will be more likely to engage in motivated reasoning. Thus, in-group loyalty should cause electoral winners to discount the substantive impact of a given electoral intervention, whereas it should have the opposite effect for losers. Our analysis relies on US survey data, and it uncovers broad support for our theoretical expectations.

Intersections in the digital society: cancel culture, fake news, and contemporary public discourse.

This article critically examines the intricate relationship between cancel culture and fake news, shedding light on their collective impact on current societies. The changing social landscape, marked by the transition from the "network society" to the "platform society," has given rise to unprecedented phenomena such as cancel culture. Rooted in social media complaints, cancel culture intersects with the dissemination of intentionally created false information, forming a complex web of dynamics. The study explores the multifaceted nature of cancel culture, its unintended consequences and the nuanced definitions surrounding it. The synthesis of erasure culture and fake news prompts critical reflections on the democratization of information, the protection of fundamental rights, and the potential risks to democracies of an unbridled online narrative. As digital networks continue to play a central role in everyday life, understanding and addressing these challenges is essential to maintaining a balanced discourse that upholds democratic values.

Preferences on Governance Models for Mental Health Data: Qualitative Study With Young People.

BACKGROUND: Improving access to mental health data to accelerate research and improve mental health outcomes is a potentially achievable goal given the substantial data that can now be collected from mobile devices. Smartphones can provide a useful mechanism for collecting mental health data from young people, especially as their use is relatively ubiquitous in high-resource settings such as the United Kingdom and they have a high capacity to collect active and passive data. This raises the interesting opportunity to establish a large bank of mental health data from young people that could be accessed by researchers worldwide, but it is important to clarify how to ensure that this is done in an appropriate manner aligned with the values of young people. OBJECTIVE: In this study, we discussed the preferences of young people in the United Kingdom regarding the governance, sharing, and use of their mental health data with the establishment of a global data bank in mind. We aimed to determine whether young people want and feel safe to share their mental health data; if so, with whom; and their preferences in doing so. METHODS: Young people (N=46) were provided with 2 modules of educational material about data governance models and background in scientific research. We then conducted 2-hour web-based group sessions using a deliberative democracy methodology to reach a consensus where possible. Findings were analyzed using the framework method. RESULTS: Young people were generally enthusiastic about contributing data to mental health research. They believed that broader availability of mental health data could be used to discover what improves or worsens mental health and develop new services to support young people. However, this enthusiasm came with many concerns and caveats, including distributed control of access to ensure appropriate use, distributed power, and data management that included diverse representation and sufficient ethical training for applicants and data managers. CONCLUSIONS: Although it is feasible to use smartphones to collect mental health data from young people in the United Kingdom, it is essential to carefully consider the parameters of such a data bank. Addressing and embedding young people's preferences, including the need for robust procedures regarding how their data are managed, stored, and accessed, will set a solid foundation for establishing any global data bank.

When liars are considered honest.

This article introduces a theoretical model of truth and honesty from a psychological perspective. We examine its application in political discourse and discuss empirical findings distinguishing between conceptions of honesty and their influence on public perception, misinformation dissemination, and the integrity of democracy.

Democratic quality and excess mortality during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The aim of this study is to analyse the relationship between democratic quality and excess mortality produced in the year 2020 before COVID-19 vaccinations were generalised. Using cross-sectional data from 80 countries on five continents, multiple linear regression models between excess mortality, the general democracy index and its disaggregation into five categories: electoral process and pluralism, government functioning, political participation, political culture and civil liberties were estimated. The analysis also considered, public health spending per capita, overweight inhabitants, the average temperature of the country, population over 65 years of age, The KOF Globalisation Index, and the Gross National Income per capita as control variables. It was possible to establish a strong inverse association between excess mortality per million inhabitants and the general democracy index and four of its five categories. There was a particularly strong relationship between excess mortality and the political culture dimension (-326.50, p < 0.001). The results suggest that the higher the democratic quality of the political institutions of a State and particularly of their political culture the more improved the response and management of the pandemic was in preventing deaths and protecting their citizens more effectively. Conversely, countries with lower democracy index values have higher excess mortality. Quality democratic political institutions provide more effective public health policies in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Is society caught up in a Death Spiral? Modeling societal demise and its reversal.

Just like an army of ants caught in an ant mill, individuals, groups and even whole societies are sometimes caught up in a Death Spiral, a vicious cycle of self-reinforcing dysfunctional behavior characterized by continuous flawed decision making, myopic single-minded focus on one (set of) solution(s), denial, distrust, micromanagement, dogmatic thinking and learned helplessness. We propose the term Death Spiral Effect to describe this difficult-to-break downward spiral of societal decline. Specifically, in the current theory-building review we aim to: (a) more clearly define and describe the Death Spiral Effect; (b) model the downward spiral of societal decline as well as an upward spiral; (c) describe how and why individuals, groups and even society at large might be caught up in a Death Spiral; and (d) offer a positive way forward in terms of evidence-based solutions to escape the Death Spiral Effect. Management theory hints on the occurrence of this phenomenon and offers turn-around leadership as solution. On a societal level strengthening of democracy may be important. Prior research indicates that historically, two key factors trigger this type of societal decline: rising inequalities creating an upper layer of elites and a lower layer of masses; and dwindling (access to) resources. Historical key markers of societal decline are a steep increase in inequalities, government overreach, over-integration (interdependencies in networks) and a rapidly decreasing trust in institutions and resulting collapse of legitimacy. Important issues that we aim to shed light on are the behavioral underpinnings of decline, as well as the question if and how societal decline can be reversed. We explore the extension of these theories from the company/organization level to the society level, and make use of insights from both micro-, meso-, and macro-level theories (e.g., Complex Adaptive Systems and collapsology, the study of the risks of collapse of industrial civilization) to explain this process of societal demise. Our review furthermore draws on theories such as Social Safety Theory, Conservation of Resources Theory, and management theories that describe the decline and fall of groups, companies and societies, as well as offer ways to reverse this trend.

Correlation of geopolitics, education, democracy with COVID-19 vaccination rate.

INTRODUCTION: Vaccine hesitancy is an ongoing problem and determining the factors that increase the vaccination rate in various countries of the world might be useful for further implementation of efficient public health policies and negating anti-vaccination campaigns. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Human Development Index (HDI), Education Index (EI), Democracy Index (DI), COVID-19 vaccination rates, COVID-19 data were collected from public sources such as UNDP - Human Development Reports, UNESCO - Education Index, Economist Intelligence, WHO- COVID-19 Dashboard, Our World In Data, The Financial Times COVID-19 Dashboard. Statistical analysis such as Pearson correlation, and linear regression analyses were done to determine a relation between the above-mentioned indices and COVID-19 vaccination rates (1-dose, 2-dose, booster, and combined). RESULTS: HDI had the strongest positive correlation with the vaccination rates (1-dose- r (181) = 0.632, p < 0.001, 2-dose- r (181) = 0.671, p < 0.001, booster- r (181) = 0.718, p < 0.001, combined- 0.703, p < 0.001). EI (1-dose- r (177) = 0.560, p < 0.001, 2-dose- r (177) = 0.599, p < 0.001, booster- r (177) = 0.642, p < 0.001, combined- 0.626, p < 0.001), DI (1-dose- r (163) = 0.445, p < 0.001, 2-dose- r (163) = 0.479, p < 0.001, booster- r (163) = 0.534, p < 0.001, combined- 0.508, p < 0.001), as well as Geographic location (1-dose- η (Eta) = 0.610 p < 0.001, 2-dose- η (Eta) = 0.633 p < 0.001, booster- η (Eta) = 0.657, p < 0.001, combined- η (Eta) = 0.645, p < 0.001) had positive correlation with vaccination rates. CONCLUSION: There is a strong positive correlation of COVID-19 vaccination rates with HDI and EI.

Consolidating political leadership in healthcare: a mediating institution for priority-setting as a political strategy in a local health system.

The allocation of resources is a crucial part of political decision-making in healthcare, but explicit priorities are rarely set when resources are distributed. Two areas that have received some attention in research about legitimacy and priority-setting decisions in healthcare are the role of technical expert agencies as mediating institutions and the role of elected politicians. This paper investigates a political priority-setting advisory committee within a regional authority in Sweden. The aim is to explore how a political body can serve as a mediating institution for priority-setting in healthcare by disentangling the arrangements of its work in terms of what role it performs in the organisation and what it should do. The findings illustrate that promoting the notion of explicit priority-setting and the political aspects inherent in priority-setting in political healthcare management can contribute to consolidating political governance and leadership. There is, however, a complex tension between stability and conflicting values which has implications for the role of politicians as citizens' democratic representatives. This paper enhances our understanding of the role of mediating institutions and political properties of healthcare priority-setting, as well as our understanding of political and democratic healthcare governance in local self-government.

Shushing the press shortens lives: cross-national evidence of the impact of press freedom on life expectancy.

AIMS: Press freedom around the globe has deteriorated over the past decade, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic. This paper explores the effect of press freedom, as a cornerstone of democracy, on life expectancy. METHODS: Exploring cross-country data, we use the ordinary least square method to estimate the association between press freedom and life expectancy. In addition, we adopt three novel instrumental variables to explore the causal relationship. RESULTS: Our estimations indicate that a freer press leads to higher life expectancy, and the effect exists independently of the level of democracy. In addition, the effect of continuous exposure to press freedom is stronger than sporadic free press status. The results are robust to measurement errors, influential outliers, and country-specific heterogeneity. CONCLUSIONS: This study reveals the fundamental role of press freedom in promoting public health that was previously underexplored. Therefore, enhancing freedom of expression can be an effective tool to address three of the United Nations Millennium Development Goals, that is, reduce under-five mortality, improve maternal health, and combat HIV/AIDS.JEL:I1 H7 D02.

Bioética y democracia en la sociedad digital / Bioètica i democràcia a la societat digital / Bioethics and democracy in digital society

La sociedad contemporánea vive la revolución digital y la necesidad de reflexionar sobre la interacción entre los seres humanos y las tecnologías digitales. El auge de las tecnologías de inteligencia artificial y la algoritmización social ha planteado interrogantes sobre la indispensabilidad de la supervisión y el análisis ético de la información y los datos en Internet. Así como la necesidad de verificar la influencia de las plataformas digitales en el ejercicio de la ciudadanía. La bioética posibilita la investigación sobre los principios que se deben respetar en una sociedad democrática y digital. Resaltamos los principios de responsabilidad social y no discriminación con la intención de que los beneficios del uso tecnológico promuevan el bienestar y la calidad de vida de los menos favorecidos. Su objetivo es garantizar la supervivencia de la especie humana y la mejora de la protección de la vida de todos los seres vivos, animales y plantas. La reflexión bioética sobre el uso de la inteligencia artificial podría establecer la brújula moral que oriente el análisis de los conflictos éticos y la defensa de que a todos los seres humanos se les debe garantizar la igualdad de oportunidades y las condiciones para realizar plenamente su proyecto de vida.(AU)

La societat contemporània viu la revolució digital i la necessitat de reflexionar sobre la interacció entre els éssers humans i les tecnologies digitals. L'auge de les tecnologies d'intel·ligència artificial i la algoritmització social ha plantejat interrogants sobre la indispensabilitat de la supervisió i l'anàlisi ètic de la informació i les dades a Internet. Així com la necessitat de verificar la influència de les plataformes digitals en l'exercici de la ciutadania. La bioètica possibilita la recerca sobre els principis que es deuen respectar en una societat democràtica i digital. Destaquem els principis de responsabilitat social i no discriminació amb la intenció que els beneficis de l'ús tecnològic promoguin el benestar i la qualitat de vida dels menys afavorits. El seu objectiu és garantir la supervivència de l'espècie humana i la millora de la protecció de la vida de tots els éssers vius, animals i plantes. La reflexió bioètica sobre l'ús de la intel·ligència artificial podria establir la brúixola moral que orienti l'anàlisi dels conflictes ètics i la defensa que a tots els éssers humans se'ls ha de garantir la igualtat d'oportunitats i les condicionsper realitzar plenament el seu projecte de vida.(AU)

Contemporary society is going through the digital revolution and the need to reflect on the interaction between human beings and digital technologies. The rise of artificial intelligence technologies and social algorithmization has raised questions about the need for ethical monitoring and analysis of information and data on the Internet. As well as the need to verify the influence of digital platforms in the exercise of citizenship. Bioethics enables research on the principles that must be respected in a democratic and digital society. We highlight the principles of social responsibility and non-discrimination with the intention that the benefits of technological use promote the well-being and quality of life of the less favored. Its objective is to guarantee the survival of the human species and the improvement of the protection of the life of all living beings, animals, and plants. Bioethical reflection on the use of artificial intelligence could establish the moral compass that guides the analysis of ethical conflicts and the defense that all human beings must be guaranteed equal opportunities and the conditions to fully carry out their project of life.(AU)

Drug use and the constitution of homo politicus in Swedish politics 1966-1979.

BACKGROUND: The emergence of the drug user as a political problem in Sweden during the 1960s presented politicians with the problem of how to fit this new character into the existing democratic order. The aim of this article is to examine how Swedish politics sought to regulate democratic participation by establishing norms that conditioned who is recognized as a political subject as well as what counts as political speech and action. METHODS: The analysis is based on a close reading of parliamentary debates, political motions, and public reports and covers the period 1966-1979. RESULTS: During the examined period, Swedish politics constituted the ideal subject of democratic politics, homo politicus, as a subject embedded in a community of active and politically conscious citizens endowed with the capacity to cooperate and engage in the collective formulation of the common good. Drug use therefore posed a threat to the democratic order due to its passivizing effects that inhibited the cooperation needed to uphold the democratic polity. CONCLUSION: The perceived individualism, passivity, and inability of the drug user to engage in cooperation within a politically conscious community of citizens positioned the drug user as a threat to the democratic order. The drug user thereby became a useful figure in the political regulation of the democratic sphere and the constitution of homo politicus, the ideal subject of democratic politics.

A dataset exploring turnout patterns in Spanish party primaries (1991-2023).

The paper presents exhaustive information on a dataset of primary processes held by Spanish political parties with representation at both the national and regional level. Using evidences collected from various sources, the dataset covers more than 360 processes carried out by more than 30 Spanish political parties between 1991 and 2023, at both the national and regional level and for both candidate and leadership selection processes. The dataset provides information on the results of the ballots (Turnout, Share of the winner), some basic party features (Ideology, etc.) and the specific features of each process (Competitiveness, Voting procedures, etc.). Hence, it offers the possibility to analyze how different variables providing information on each political party and each internal process are related to the results of each ballot.

Imagining the model citizen: A comparison between public understanding of science, public engagement in science, and citizen science.

This article examines the visions of citizens' ideal practices regarding technoscientific affairs in a democratic society, namely "imaginaries of model citizens," that underlie three science and public initiatives: public understanding of science, public engagement in science, and citizen science. While imaginaries of citizens are performative and necessary to these initiatives, they are often relegated to the background. I argue that such imaginaries are the result of a complex of perceptions on the nature of science, the role of democracy in scientific activities, and the form of "democratizing" science. The imaginary of model citizens in public understanding of science is of literate citizens who should know science sufficiently, use it in daily life, and support science; in public engagement in science, the model citizen is a responsible one who should engage in the governance of technoscientific issues; and in citizen science, a contributive one who should partake in and enjoy creating scientific knowledge.

Neuroscience and Society: Supporting and Unsettling Public Engagement.

Advancing neuroscience is one of many topics that pose a challenge often called "the alignment problem"-the challenge, that is, of assuring that science policy is responsive to and in some sense squares with the public's values. This issue of the Hastings Center Report launches a series of scholarly essays and articles on the ethical and social issues raised by this vast body of medical research and bench science. The series, which will run under the banner "Neuroscience and Society," is supported by the Dana Foundation and seeks to promote deliberative public engagement, broadly understood, about neuroscience. As a social goal, deliberative public engagement is both ubiquitous and elusive-called for everywhere yet difficult to undertake at a national level on a complex scientific topic. To be meaningful, deliberative public engagement must occur in many locations in a society and be carried forward by many actors. Scholarly writing might contribute in several ways.

Building Back Better: Going Big with Emancipatory Sciences.

This commentary argues that precarity and inequity across the life course and aging has accelerated via the COVID-19 pandemic. President Biden's vaccination efforts, $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan Act, and Build Back Better framework reflect a paradigm shift to restore faith and trust in government that boldly confronts entrenched austerity ideologues. We offer emancipatory sciences as a conceptual framework to analyze and promote social structural change and epic theory development. Emancipatory sciences aim to advance knowledge and the realization of dignity, access, equity, respect, healing, social justice, and social change through individual and collective agency and social institutions. Epic theory development moves beyond isolated incidents as single events and, instead, grasps and advances theory through attempts to change the world itself by demanding attention to inequality, power, and action. Gerontology with an emancipatory science lens offers a framework and vocabulary to understand the individual and collective consequences of the institutional and policy forces that shape aging and generations within and across the life course. It locates an ethical and moral philosophy engaged in the Biden Administration's approach, which proposes redistributing - from bottom-up - material and symbolic resources via family, public, community, and environmental benefits.

More Process, Less Principles: The Ethics of Deploying AI and Robotics in Medicine.

Current national and international guidelines for the ethical design and development of artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics emphasize ethical theory. Various governing and advisory bodies have generated sets of broad ethical principles, which institutional decisionmakers are encouraged to apply to particular practical decisions. Although much of this literature examines the ethics of designing and developing AI and robotics, medical institutions typically must make purchase and deployment decisions about technologies that have already been designed and developed. The primary problem facing medical institutions is not one of ethical design but of ethical deployment. The purpose of this paper is to develop a practical model by which medical institutions may make ethical deployment decisions about ready-made advanced technologies. Our slogan is "more process, less principles." Ethically sound decisionmaking requires that the process by which medical institutions make such decisions include participatory, deliberative, and conservative elements. We argue that our model preserves the strengths of existing frameworks, avoids their shortcomings, and delivers its own moral, practical, and epistemic advantages.

The Conflict over Bialowieza Forest in the Light of Philip Kitcher's Ideal Deliberation.

Environmental conflicts involve many participants in the social life: citizens, foresters, the media, activists, politicians, officials and scientists. In this paper we pay special attention to scientists who provide the others with expert knowledge and proposals for solutions to ecological problems. Using the example of the ecological conflict around the strategy of protection of Bialowieza Forest against the invasion of the spruce bark beetle (Ips typographus), we will present how these scientific functions were performed as well as what communication mistakes were made, and formulate a postulate to enrich forest management with a participatory model of social debate involving scientists representing all possible approaches to the problem. Our proposal applies Kitcher's framework giving a ground for different stakeholders to come together to address complex environmental issues. Fitting into the trend of deliberative democracy, the paper provides an insight from philosophy that can be applied to controversial issues of policy and management, and how to influence an environmental change.