Dept. of Social Sciences

he maintenance of high participation rates is a crucial issue for panel surveys. Because losses of participants do not tend to be random, high initial and continuing participation rates are the best solution to ensure accurate representation of the target population from year to year. Proper representation of a sample is important not only to facilitate the examination of various phenomena, but also to allow for the analysis of changes in people's trajectories and circumstances, and to identify the reasons for such changes. The various strategies employed by the Swiss Household Panel to counteract attrition may be categorized according to the stage in the survey process during which they were applied: (i) the first contact, (ii) the request for participation, (iii) the interview itself, or (iv) between interview waves. This paper provides an overview of the chosen strategies used at each of these stages, the theory or arguments underlying the choices of certain strategies, and evaluations of the effects of these strategies on response rates. The focus is on communication and transmission of information as a directed means to convince potential respondents about the utility and importance of their participation. 1

The production of social research publications presents an important moment in the professional lifespan of INSTAT. The Population and Housing Census of 2001, as well as the Living Standard Measurement Survey (LSMS) of 2002, were used as the main data sources of analysis during the last decade. The information collected in these two surveys pertained to such issues as internal and external migration, the state of the labor market, the impact that these issues have on the lives of women and men in Albania, their living conditions, and how the inequalities are distributed in the basic sectors of everyday life. This data was also used in the population projections for 2001-2002. These research publications represent a significant instrument for policy makers and other stakeholders. The information collected can be used in mainstreaming poverty reduction, minimizing inequalities, guiding investment funds towards services and infrastructure, and helping local authorities in designing specific strategies in favor of vulnerable groups. These publications will contribute to completing information concerning the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) in Albania, and bringing in new elements to enable the continuous monitoring of the indicators.

The paper explores power relations in Russia and the corresponding structures of personalized trust on the base of an analysis of three different types of distinctions and relations: state (capacity) vs. society, institutionalized power vs. personalized power networks and institutional structures of trust vs. personalized networks of trust. The analysis of the importance of personal networks of power can be, as the case of Russia shows, presented as a compensation for the absence of strong institutions or institutionalized structures of trust. Moreover in "low trust societies" like Russia highly personalized power systems are not necessarily expressing only illegal or semi-legal structures of trust, they can, in an environment without institutionalized social capital forms, be also the engine for reforms.)

Desde Seoveinte hemos organizado un concurso de Seo y a lo largo de estos días os desgranaremos todo lo necesario para participar. Pero, como ya os hemos comentado en otras ocasiones, en este tipo de concursos como en el SEO en general una buena estrategia de Link Building resulta clave sin lugar a dudas, por ello cuantos más enlaces se redirijan mucho mejor.

The World Heritage cultural property “Hidden Christian Sites in the Nagasaki Region” is Japan’s 22nd World Heritage (WH) property as of June 2018. The nomination of a national property for inscription on the World Heritage List is a diachronic process of transformation in terms of imagined resources as well as a synchronic one, involving multi-level actors such as international, state and non-state institutions, individuals, places or objects. By taking a longue durée perspective, we first question the imaginations and articulations of places, objects and practices along the nomination process, since the informal preparation stage until the pre-inscription phase. Secondly, we reveal the reflection of the WH selections of objects at the local state and non-state institutional level hosting the cultural property. Based on ethnographic fieldwork in Tokyo, Nagasaki and places from the Nagasaki Prefecture, we reveal the complementarities and contrasts between the World Heritage and local level in terms of privileged objects, places or practices. The theoretical framework given by Latour’s (2013) “modes of existence” will provide an understanding of “heritage” as a temporary network involving human and non-human agents.