Regulations are necessary for the governance of health products in order to protect public health and safely introduce new technologies. This article examines the history of regulations in the USA and EU for food, medicines and medical devices, to uncover the original motivations and objectives for legislative initiatives. The foundation of the US FDA in the early twentieth century resulted from concerns about adulteration of foods. Drug regulation in the 1930s was precipitated by the sulfanilamide scandal. The development of regulations for medical devices during the 1970s was accelerated by concerns about deaths attributed to devices, and complications with the Dalkon shield intrauterine device. In the EU, pharmaceutical regulation in 1965 followed the thalidomide scandal while the first directives for medical devices after 1990 followed petition from manufacturers and earlier concerns about pacemakers and heart valves. In Europe and the USA, pharmaceutical and device regulations have been initiated reactively in response to crises, as well as perceived deficiencies in regulatory frameworks. The European Commission is now conducting a review of the medical device regulations to consider possible legislative changes. This review of the history of regulations provides an opportunity to reconsider what is needed, proactively and on scientific and clinical grounds.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has, over almost 35 years, developed into a model for effecting science-led governance for global environmental change. However, on the back of the sixth Assessment Report, and with preparations underway for the seventh, the IPCC arguably faces an identity crisis. With many inside and outside the IPCC perceiving a persistent disconnect between this immense scientific enterprise and meaningful political action, some argue the IPCC is failing to fulfil its social contract. At this important juncture, which could have implications for other spheres of global governance, a pilot study was conducted, interviewing IPCC authors about how they perceive the IPCC’s social contract has evolved according to the interplay of key elements that IPCC members draw on to define the organization’s identity and authority. Building on a long history of critical social science about the IPCC, this study found that authors discussed a weave of identity elements, which were categorized under three headings: (i) task identification and interpretation; (ii) mode of operation; and (iii) shifting key concerns. As scoping exercises ramp up for the seventh Assessment Report, IPCC leadership will need to be mindful of how groups inside and outside the IPCC are re-crafting the identity and authority of the organization.

Agricultural exports influence ecological outcomes by promoting sustainable farming and eco-friendly technologies, aligning with international standards, and contributing to decarbonization and environmental sustainability. Türkiye has seen considerable growth in agricultural exports, but this rapid expansion raises concerns about its environmental consequences, especially regarding carbon emissions and overall ecological sustainability. This article investigates the impact of agricultural exports on environmental sustainability within the context of trade liberalization policies during Türkiye’s export-oriented agricultural expansion from 1990 to 2015, utilizing the autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) bounds testing approach. The findings demonstrate that agricultural exports significantly reduce environmental degradation over the long term. This is further validated by the Conditional Error Correction (CEC) model, which confirms that agricultural exports enhance ecological quality by lowering carbon emissions. Additionally, renewable energy consumption supports environmental sustainability by reducing carbon emissions. This research contributes to the existing body of knowledge by presenting empirical evidence on the interplay between agricultural exports and environmental sustainability in Türkiye. This article suggests that policymakers focus on an export-oriented agricultural extension strategy to address environmental challenges. Such a strategy should be aligned with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and integrate agricultural exports as a key component of Türkiye’s long-term environmental sustainability plan.

The purpose of this study is to thoroughly examine the concept and significance of corruption in the European Union from an ethical standpoint and analyse statistical data on the level of corruption and attitudes towards it, using the example of Italy, Greece and Latvia. For effective research on the subject, it is important to use the hermeneutical method and quantitative analysis. The study considers corruption and ethics, identifies the essence, their concept and content, and demonstrates the connection between them. The analysis of an international regulatory act related to the fight against corruption is conducted and, based on this analysis, the forms of corruption are determined. The influence of corruption on society and various spheres of state government, both in general, in the international arena (and directly within the European Union), and on the example of individual states (Italy, Greece and Latvia) is established. The level of corruption is analysed in accordance with the Corruption Perceptions Index Transparency International, and the best and worst indicators among the member states of the European Union are highlighted. As a result of the study, the most thorough definitions of the concepts of ethics and corruption are provided, the relationship between these concepts is demonstrated, and statistical data on the level of corruption in the world’s countries (in particular, in relation to the selected states) are established. Changes in the perception of the level of corruption in 27 European Union states from 2012 to 2023 are also analysed. This study emphasizes the importance of compliance with ethical behaviour by representatives of the civil service and enterprises. The specific problem of employees exceeding their powers, which leads to public disbelief in the effectiveness of the government of their state, is also noted. In addition, the study showed that focusing on ethical issues can substantially contribute to preventing and combating corruption.

The early development of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in the latter half of the twentieth century was marked by limited, hand-crafted systems and fluctuating perceptions of the field’s potential. Early research explored a range of paradigms – including symbolic, neural and probabilistic approaches – constrained by severe hardware and data limitations. Key technological advances, such as the invention of microchips, GPUs and later TPUs, significantly enhanced computational capacity, enabling more complex AI experimentation. Concurrently, the proliferation of digital data through the internet addressed longstanding bottlenecks in data availability. The most transformative shift, however, came from architectural innovations in neural networks, culminating in the deep learning revolution. This unfolded in two phases: the emergence of Recurrent and Convolutional Neural Networks, followed by the development of transformer-based models, which underpin today’s Large Language Models (LLMs).

In much of its history from the nineteenth century to the last decade of the twentieth, comparative literature remained largely Eurocentric, and surveys or histories of the world’s literatures were mostly written by Western scholars from a West-centred perspective. Literature: A World History (LAWH) took the first step in writing a history of literature of the world from a non-Eurocentric point of view by having the voices of the world’s different traditions heard and by distributing the proper space to macro-regions more equally than ever before. That is the most significant contribution this long and arduous project made for a better understanding of the world’s literatures.

Attention has customarily centred on the academic profession’s ability to carry out its work in light of external threats to academic freedom. This article draws attention to internal threats − what the academic profession does to impair itself. Self-regulation is a central attribute of professions. In the absence of professional control, quality of practice is thrown into question. Like academic freedom, self-regulation is a principle and not always a practice. Focused on the academic profession’s teaching role, this article examines two types of problems in professional control that impair academic freedom: slippage and overreach. Both are instances of organizational deviance and abrogation of professional ethics. It is argued that the patterns threaten the structural integrity and public confidence of faculty, fields and higher-education institutions and thereby compromise the profession’s capacity to persuasively defend itself.

I argue that the respective understanding of value discriminates between two forms of ‘strong university leadership’: one that is incompatible with academic freedom, one that is compatible with, if not necessary for it. The structural evolution of modern science implies that present-day sciences understand their path of knowledge creation in terms of the enhancement of measurable functional control over effects with regard to problems of life. Consequently, measures, parameters, quanta – in short: values – are a condition of ‘scientific progress’. If we understand academic freedom as the openness to a fundamental transformation of knowledge, in the domain of value-driven science, the scope of freedom is therefore structurally narrow. However, a particularly pernicious threat to academic freedom arises when scientific practice is controlled by a-scientific values. Once a-scientific metrics gain the upper hand over scientific values, academic freedom is out of play. University leaders who cannot discriminate between scientific ‘thinking in values’ and a-scientific ‘evaluating’, will likely adhere to the latter. ‘Strong university leadership’ will then merely consist of the authority to exercise an indiscriminate, arbitrary prerogative in deciding the ‘what’ and ‘who’ of scientific research and education. The effects on academic freedom of such ‘strong leadership’ can only be detrimental.

This article explores the evolving concept of patriotism in the context of contemporary liberal democracies. As politicians increasingly employ patriotism in response to globalization and neoliberalism, diverse conceptions such as civic, constitutional, ethical, and cosmopolitan patriotism have emerged. Three evaluative criteria are thus introduced: inclusiveness, identity, and critical loyalty. Civic patriotism emphasizes democratic governance but may lack national rootedness. Constitutional patriotism risks overlooking cultural particularities, while ethical patriotism seeks to reconcile diverse identities but risks universalizing differences. Cosmopolitan patriotism aims to bridge global and national loyalties but may overlook critical loyalty complexities. Therefore, patriotism can be compatible with liberal democracy and citizenship if it is adequately inclusive, respects personal identities, and is critically loyal to universal constitutional ideals and specific cultural contexts.

Max Weber and Émile Durkheim are two of the most important classical authors in the social sciences. The influence of their respective theories and methodological approaches is still seen in the work of many contemporary authors. This article presents some contributions of the authors to qualitative and quantitative research. For this, we discuss Weber’s qualitative research in the work Protestant Ethics and Spirit of Capitalism and Durkheim’s quantitative research in Suicide: A Sociological Study. We are interested in showing how the authors use methodological and epistemological constructs to produce a sociological analysis with interpretative and causal scopes on social phenomena.

This article explores the ‘moral turn’ in contemporary sociological theory, positioning it as a response to the global crisis of democracy and the erosion of civil society. I argue that beyond institutional (or ‘hard’) democracy, the sustainability of democratic life depends on the moral fabric – or ‘moral space’ – that underpins civil society, constituted by values such as trust, reciprocity, solidarity and justice. As populism and authoritarianism gain traction globally, these moral underpinnings are increasingly threatened. Against this backdrop, contemporary sociological theorists are returning to foundational moral questions, not by imposing normative codes, but by uncovering value systems embedded in social practices and human interactions. This article examines this shift through three major theorists, who respectively advocate for a cosmopolitan morality grounded in empathy and tolerance toward diversity, promote a gift paradigm emphasizing reciprocity as a basis for convivial social life, and identify moral injury and misrecognition as key drivers of social struggle and transformation. Ultimately, the moral turn reflects the renewed ethical responsibility of social scientists to act as public intellectuals, restoring the normative vision of a just and democratic society from within sociological inquiry itself.

The concept of literature is central to histories of literature, but ‘literature’ is less of a unitary notion than one might think: what is literature according to one established usage may not be literature according to another conventional way of considering the term. It is, in reality, a problem for the writing of literary history with large historical scope that the concept of literature is traditionally used in a much broader fashion about works from – very approximately – before 1800 than about more modern works. I argue that this problem is in fact inescapable – it cannot be overcome without breaking with the genre expectations on a history of literature – but that writers of literary history should at least not hide it but be fully attentive to this state of affairs and adopt an explicit attitude to it.

This study analyses the evolution of body mass index (BMI) as income increases across the population, controlling for age, sex, educational level, marital status and some lifestyle habits. To this end, a quantile regression, an econometric technique that readjusts the weights of the variables in each quantile to minimize deviations, has been carried out, where the variable that orders the sample is income. We use 316,777 observations from the European Health Interview Survey (EHIS) for these regressions. This approach allows us to separate the regression analyses for low-, middle-, and high-income groups, evidence that as individual income increases, BMI tends to rise. Consequently, individuals with higher incomes exhibit higher BMI levels. Additionally, the estimated parameters for explanatory variables increase with income, signifying that wealthier individuals not only have a greater likelihood of increased BMI but also that socio-economic factors influencing BMI – whether positively or negatively – evince a stronger impact as income levels rise.

Everywhere in the world, higher education is in crisis, and institutional autonomy and academic freedom are under threat. In this article, I propose a continuum of university autonomy in relation to academic freedom, with ‘little or no autonomy’ on one end, followed by ‘low autonomy’, ‘somewhat-balanced autonomy’, and with ‘balanced autonomy’ on the other end. Then I analyse the role of the government in influencing institutional autonomy and academic freedom. My conclusion is that the government plays a key role in determining what kind of autonomy a university enjoys, and balanced autonomy can be achieved if higher education is operated as a federation where different actors, including the government, the board of trustees, the president, faculty and students, work together, one way or the other, as partners. Only then can the university as a public good rightfully fulfil its aims and purposes for the benefit of all humanity.

This chapter is based on the assumption that conflicts between separate ethnolinguistic identities and imperial cultures have existed throughout history, and often played important roles. The four-volume work, Literature: A World History, serves as a starting-point for a discussion of the effects of such conflicts on various literatures. Examples are taken from, in particular, literatures written in Iranian and Slavonic languages, but the Chinese, Arabic and Turkic/Turkish impact on various literatures is also mentioned. Finally, it is questioned what this four-volume work has done to address the problem of literature and such conflicts, and what can be done to avoid spreading narratives that are – perhaps unconsciously – imperialistic. After all, this work is written in English, the most broadly used imperial language ever, and it is questioned what it means that it is being presented in this language.

The decision to apply for EU membership has prompted significant legislative changes in Central and Eastern European countries, including Serbia. The focus on the single European market emphasizes the importance of product safety and quality. Establishing a National Quality Infrastructure (NQI) is crucial for good governance and fostering a favourable trade environment. This article aims to analyse how Serbian policymakers view quality infrastructure by examining parliamentary debates on four NQI laws, contributing to a better understanding of policy development in Serbia and similar countries in the region. Out of 266 parliamentary speeches at the joint hearings of NQI laws, 35 speeches of law proponents, ministers, and deputies were analysed in detail. The European solutions adopted in Serbia lacked sufficient critical evaluation of their applicability, leading to unjustified economic and social costs. The quality infrastructure laws were viewed merely as EU requirements, rather than essential measures with intrinsic value and relevance to Serbia.

In an international comparison, Sweden’s state higher education institutions are characterized by their form of association, as they are formally administrative authorities. An administrative authority under the government is subordinate to the government and is normally tasked with carrying out the tasks decided by the Riksdag and the government, which are communicated via regulations, instructions to authorities, letters of appropriation and specific assignments. It is easy to see that the stated relationship of obedience to the government does not sit well with the idea of universities being free from politics and the market. In this article the weak constitutional support of academic freedom in Sweden will be displayed and problematized, and a historic account of how Swedish universities have ended up with the same legal status as the state will be given. It is exposed how academic freedom is undermined not because of illiberal ambitions, which are often at the centre of this type of analysis, but rather due to a lack of understanding for the specificity of the university by the political and administrative sphere.

This article examines the narrative strategies employed in the representation of world literature history, departing from the chronological and geographical divisions used in the recently published four-volume work, Literature: A World History. The separation of the narrative paths by continents may appear overly mechanical, but the work demonstrates remarkable flexibility in this regard. The example of classical literature is particularly illustrative. Despite the chapters belonging to the ‘Europe’ category, the work discusses literature produced in all three continents around the Mediterranean together and without any mechanical separation. Although divisions in a narrative of such a vast scope are unavoidable, it is essential to apply them in a flexible manner.