Digital Commons Network^™

The Inaccessibility Of Nonprofit Organizations Data In Sub-Saharan Africa, Barnabas Suva, Robert Bhero

Journal of Nonprofit Innovation

This article presents initial findings from a research study on nonprofit data across countries, focusing on the accessibility of nonprofit organizations in 49 countries in Sub-Saharan Africa, following thorough research of accessibility data from nonprofit organizations, regulatory bodies, and nonprofit websites. Only 12% of countries maintain a functional public nonprofit organization database, and even fewer provide detailed, searchable registries. While 94% of countries legally grant nonprofit organizations tax exemption, mandatory reporting obligations are often not paired with public access, thereby weakening accountability. These findings situate data inaccessibility as an agency problem where principals (donors, policymakers, communities) lack sufficient information to …

Special Edition: Full Issue - Research For Practice, September 2025, Angie Holzer, Erica Bassett

Journal of Nonprofit Innovation

No abstract provided.

Bridging Theory And Practice: The Vision And Action Plan Of The Istr Research For Practice Affinity Group, Angie Holzer, Christopher Dayson, Dana Doan, Patricia Quinn, Tayyeb Hadi, Michele Fugiel Gartner, Carissa Van Den Berk-Clark, Ana María Sánchez, Farouq Aliyu Muhammad, Romina Farías, Christopher Einolf

Journal of Nonprofit Innovation

This article presents the strategic vision and comprehensive action plan of the International Society for Third Sector Research (ISTR) Research for Practice (R4P) Affinity Group, established to address the persistent gap between academic research and nonprofit practice in the third sector. Recognizing that practitioners are primarily focused on action and problem-solving while academics concentrate on knowledge accumulation and theory building, the R4P initiative creates a systematic framework for enhanced collaboration to maximize societal impact and advance evidence-informed practice. The R4P model employs a multi-dimensional approach through seven specialized sub-committees—Advocacy, Education & Training, Practitioner Engagement & Matchmaking, Research Accessibility and Sharing, …

Protecting Children's Rights In The National Climate Policies In Greece, Elpis Rerra

COP30

This paper aims to address the question, “How can we ensure that children’s rights are protected in national climate policies?” Ιn the broader field of climate justice, ecocide, and security, the theme of this study is children’s rights in the context of climate change and how the government can truly include them in the climate policies. This paper begins by highlighting the importance of addressing the issue of protecting children's rights from the impact of climate change. Moreover, it underlines the critical and urgent nature of children’s vulnerability to climate change. The paper also examines Greek climate policies and whether …

Indigenous Leadership In The Fight Against Environmental Racism And Ecocide: Advancing Climate Justice And Human Rights, Carlos Matheus Matos Santos Dos Santos

COP30

Climate change intensifies social, economic, racial, and gender inequalities, disproportionately affecting historically marginalized communities, such as indigenous peoples, black populations, and riverine communities. In Brazil, practices of environmental racism and actions that constitute ecocide (such as the installation of large enterprises, illegal mining, and predatory exploitation of natural resources) compromise ecosystems and traditional ways of life. Cases such as the Belo Monte Power Plant and the expansion of mining on indigenous lands illustrate the inadequacy of socio-environmental protection mechanisms and the implementation of necropolitical policies that remove or expose communities to environmental degradation. The analysis highlights the need to integrate …

Tackling Gaps In Action For Climate Empowerment Through Subnational Ace Hubs, Kim Jessica Wahnke

COP30

Key notes

Context: Climate scepticism and misinformation have become more rampant than ever, political will and popular support is eroding

Problem: National efforts on ACE remain under-resourced, disorganised and fragmented

Precedent: The NRW ACE Hub pilot builds on the strength of subnational governments but has work to do with regards to accessibility and past activity integration

Solution: Subnational ACE Hubs are regional platforms for the coordination of local actors and the co-design and integration of past ACE activities

Impact: Reduce divisions between stakeholders, close education gaps, advance community-driven climate ACE action

Call to Action: Implementation of ACE hubs through coordinated …

The Climate League: A Competitive Governance Model To Enhance Ndc 3.0 Ambition And Delivery, Mohamed Noby

COP30

The first Global Stocktake (GST) has confirmed that the world is off-track; where current Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) are far from sufficient to meet the Paris Agreement’s 1.5°C target. Despite decades of climate negotiations, an ambition gap, implementation deficit, and climate finance shortfall continue to hinder meaningful progress; driven largely by a focus on securing commitments rather than ensuring their implementation and real-world impact. This policy paper identifies the governance gap at the heart of these failures and proposes a new framework: The Climate League. which aims to transform climate action into a dynamic competitive process by ranking countries based …

From Awareness To Action: The Educational Pillar Of Capacity Building And Ace, Eman Akrout

COP30

Education has always been identified as the most potent medium for sustaining long-term climate action by helping students, teachers, and communities understand climate risks and participate in solution building. This literature review will therefore focus on how education helps build capacity and contributes to Action for Climate Empowerment (ACE). As recent reports indicated by IPCC and UNESCO have also highlighted, climate education heightens the level of awareness supportive of green jobs while improving the resilience of a community. However, there is a lack of climate material in most schools with untrained teachers posing a huge gap in the international efforts …

Climate-Ready Health Systems: A Regional Strategy For Building Climate-Health Capacity In North Africa, Donia Khaled

COP30

North African nations are highly exposed to the climate-health crisis, facing combined risks that greatly impact vulnerable groups. These include repeated climate-related disease outbreaks, plus more heat waves and droughts. Existing health education and infrastructure aren't ready to handle these issues. A dual-track strategy to build regional climate-health capacity is proposed in this policy paper: A) integrate climate-health education into medical and public health curricula at all universities across North Africa; and B) launch a multilingual Continuous Professional Development (CPD) platform will develop health workers and students, adaptation through knowledge sharing, building local leadership, and ensuring fair access to resources. …

Driving Climate Mitigation And Health Equity In Rapid Test Diagnostics (Rdts): A Sustainable Biodegradable Patch Solution, Sarah Abozeid

COP30

Total energy-related CO2 emissions increased by 0.8% in 2024, hitting an all-time high of 37.8 Gt CO2, driven primarily by energy, transport, and industrial sectors. The healthcare sector, often overlooked in mitigation discussions, contributes 4.4% of total global GHG emissions, a footprint exceeding that of many countries. Disposal of petroleum-based plastics—especially through incineration—emits approximately 2.7 tonnes of CO2 equivalent (CO2e) per tonne of plastic burnt. Production itself accounts for around 2.5 tonnes CO2 per tonne of

plastic, making the combined lifecycle emissions significant when including end- of-life incineration or decomposition. Around 16,000 tonnes of plastics are

produced globally for rapid …

Strengthening A Just Energy Transition In Egypt By 2035: Policy Options And A Practical Road Map, Basmala Zahran

COP30

Egypt’s dilemma is twofold: reduce emissions of greenhouse gasses in line with international commitments while safeguarding the livelihoods of workers and communities dependent on fossil-fuel industries. Egypt’s continued subsidies on fossil fuels, natural gas powered electricity generation, and regional skill and energy access gaps could lead to an inequitable and politically unstable transition. This paper analyzes the evidence, reviews lessons from Spain and Indonesia, and proposes a hybrid, actionable policy package: (1) a National Green Jobs Training & Reskilling Program, (2) a phased, socially-protected removal and reallocation of fossil-fuel subsidies, and (3) a rooftop-solar mandate for public buildings. Implementation strategies, …

Transferring Green Hydrogen Solution For Decarbonization: A Comparative Review Of Germany And Brazil’S Mitigation Pathways To Net Zero, Fagr Mohamed

COP30

According to the Paris agreement, there is a global narrative to limit global warming to 1.5 c, which requires urgent decarbonization of energy incentive sectors, particularly industry and heavy transport which amount to 50% of global CO2 emissions. Among emerging technologies green hydrogen which is hydrogen produced via electrolysis process by renewable energy such as solar and wind and hydro offers a high potential zero emission energy vector for sectors where direct electrification remains challenging.

This paper assesses Germany’s green hydrogen strategy as a successful model of mitigation policy, and examines its potential transferability to Brazil, a developing country with …

Learning Platforms: A Future In Environmental Education Or A Motionless Present?, Nazareno Calvo

COP30

In a global context marked by the climate crisis, environmental education and training have taken a different path, adapting to current technologies. It is in these circumstances that learning platforms (from now on LP’s) emerge, changing the way we learn and perform around climate change. This type of web app can provide remote knowledge, and has taken on a growing role the last few years. However, despite their potential, challenges remain, such as inequality in digital access, poor variety of languages and cultural adaptation, a lack of media outreach, and the absence of assessments of their real impact on communities …

Police Killings In The Mountain West, 2013-2023, Isabelle G. Graham, Olivia K. Cheche, Caitlin J. Saladino, William E. Brown Jr.

Criminal Justice

This fact sheet presents data on police killings between 2013 and 2023 for the five Mountain West states of Arizona, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, and Utah. The Brookings Institution report, “The state of police reform: measuring progress in each state,” tracks the total number of killings by police and the number of killings by police per one million residents in all 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia. This fact sheet reports data on the total number of people killed by police and the rate of police killings per capita for each Mountain West state.

Holidays, Religiosity, And Democratic Attitudes, Hannah Ridge

Political Science Faculty Articles and Research

Decades of research have linked religion and religiosity to support for democracy and authoritarianism. This study uses a temporal religious prime during national surveys – the European Social Survey and the National Election Survey – to identify the effect of religion on regime-type preferences. Jewish Israelis who took surveys on Friday or Saturday, the Jewish Sabbath, expressed more openness to non-democratic governance. They also interpreted the word democracy in a more populist way. Furthermore, non-religious Jews were less democratic on the Sabbath and more interested in strongman rule than they were on days without the religious connotation. Similarly, more religious …

Chinese Prostitution Policies From 1949 To 2024 : An Analysis From The Perspectives Of Marxism, Political Economy, Cultural Citizenship, And Feminism, Ning He

Lingnan Theses (MPhil & PhD)

Existing scholarship on Chinese prostitution control largely focuses on limited historical periods, legal regulations, or single theoretical perspectives, leaving a gap in understanding how Chinese prostitution policies have evolved from a historical perspective across the entire post-1949 era. This study aims to fill this gap by addressing four research questions: (a) What were the main changes in Chinese prostitution policies from 1949 to 2024? (b) How far can the four approaches (Marxism, political economy, cultural citizenship, feminism) effectively explain the nature of Chinese prostitution policies in different periods? (c) What are the main factors shaping Chinese prostitution policies in different …

Call For Papers For The Journal Of Social Encounters’ Special Issue

The Journal of Social Encounters

No abstract provided.

Review Of: Practical Radicals: Seven Strategies To Change The World, Bill Droel

The Journal of Social Encounters

No abstract provided.

Review Of: Spreading Hate: The Global Rise Of White Supremacist Terrorism, Sachal Jacob

The Journal of Social Encounters

No abstract provided.

Review Of: Election 2024 South Africa: Countdown To Coalition, Gary Prevost

The Journal of Social Encounters

No abstract provided.

Escalation Pathways To The April War And The Dynamics Of Sudan's Political Economy, Salih Mustafa, Osama Hassan, Nagi Alassam

The Journal of Social Encounters

This paper analyzes the escalation processes that led to the outbreak of the April 2023 war in Sudan, based on Wolfram Lacher's theoretical framework of "escalation processes". The paper focuses on tracing the escalatory trajectories that preceded the war, analyzing the complex interplay between structural, political, and economic factors, as well as the impact of the political economy on the dynamics of the conflict and its escalation to full-scale war.

Introduction: Continuing The Exploration Of The Darfur And Sudan Crisis, Mawa Mohamed, Ron Pagnucco

The Journal of Social Encounters

No abstract provided.

The Late Father Rev. John Anthony Kaiser: “A Case For Justice”, Mbuthi Gathenji

The Journal of Social Encounters

No abstract provided.

Enhancing Peacebuilding For Integral Human Development: Caritas Good Practices And Lessons Learnt, - Caritas Internationalis

The Journal of Social Encounters

Today’s geopolitical context, with big powers choosing bilateralism over multilateralism, is fostering a proliferation of conflicts and violence throughout the globe. The Caritas Confederation has been working actively for peacebuilding for decades, especially since the Rwanda genocide in 1994. Indeed, there is a growing consensus within the Confederation supporting the urgent need to enhance peacebuilding efforts globally. This document explores best practices and lessons learnt, with a strategic focus on the importance of involving women in peacebuilding. Each best practice is illustrated by one or two projects implemented by Caritas Member Organisations.

Hezbollah's Military Setback: From Strategic Strength To Political Dilemma—A Comprehensive Analysis, Habib Albadawi

The Journal of Social Encounters

This study examines the unprecedented military transformation of Hezbollah from 2024 to 2025, analyzing how technological superiority and strategic constraints have fundamentally altered the effectiveness of irregular warfare organizations. Through extensive analysis of organizational adaptation, technological disruption, and external dependencies, this research investigates the paradox of how advanced military capabilities, when constrained by external dependencies, can become operational liabilities rather than strategic assets. The study employs multiple theoretical frameworks to understand this transformation and its implications for future irregular warfare.

Democracy, Rights, Historical Memory, And Interfaith Relations In The Works Of Fatima Mernissi And Asma Uddin, Jon Armajani

The Journal of Social Encounters

The works of Moroccan-born Muslim scholar Fatima Mernissi (1940-2015) and United States-born Muslim scholar Asma T. Uddin (b. 1980) are distinctive contributions in modern conversations about the intersections of Islam, law, human and civil rights as well as historical memory and interfaith relations (AncestryLibrary, n.d.; Fox, 2015; Florida Bar, n.d.; Justia Lawyers, n.d.; Rodoski, 2011; Sadiqi, 2018).[i] Mernissi, who was a professor of sociology at Mohammed V University in Rabat, Morocco, and Uddin, who is an attorney and scholar based in the United States, are influential and delve into the intricate relationships between Islamic ideas and modern legal frameworks, …

An Interfaith Paradise Lost? Religion And The Memory Of The Lebanese Civil War In Postwar Novels, Wilbert Van Saane

The Journal of Social Encounters

This essay analyzes three Lebanese postwar novels: Nathalie Abi-Ezzi’s A Girl Made of Dust, Jad El Hage’s The Myrtle Tree, and Hoda Barakat’s The Tiller of Waters. I argue that these novels narrate the memory of war with reference to religious imagery and theological structures, especially the idea of a paradise lost as described in John Milton’s epic poem Paradise Lost. The paradise these novels present consists of a harmonious relation between people of different faiths. The root of violence is situated in a distortion and misrepresentation of the narratives of others. The novels also include the theme of a …

Political Violence In America: Turning Point Or Flashpoint?, Alan Saquella

Publications

The murder of right-wing activist Charlie Kirk reignited an old debate in the United States: Are we approaching a turning point in political violence, or is this simply another flashpoint in a long, uneven history of partisan conflict?

Political scientists and commentators appear divided. Some warn of a spiraling wave of tit-for-tat violence, fueled by incendiary rhetoric and amplified by online echo chambers. Others emphasize that such acts are rare, often the work of lone actors rather than coordinated movements, and that the broader public overwhelmingly rejects violence as a political tool.

For security professionals, the challenge is not to …

Russian Arctic Land Forces And Defense Trends Redefined By Nato And Ukraine, Troy J. Bouffard, Lester W. Grau, Charles K. Bartles, Mathieu Boulègue

The US Army War College Quarterly: Parameters

This article argues that Russia’s Arctic land forces have been weakened by the Russia-Ukraine War and NATO’s northern expansion, creating a strategic window for Western militaries to bolster their Arctic capabilities. Unlike existing studies that focus on maritime operations and the Northern Sea Route, it integrates technical assessments of ground-based Arctic platforms with analysis of military-district reforms. Using a mixed methodology that incorporates equipment specifications, Russian government documents, media reports, and NATO strategic-response evaluations, this article constructs a comprehensive baseline understanding of Russia’s Arctic land-force potential and readiness. Policy and military practitioners will benefit from actionable insights into Arctic force-design …

Parameters Autumn 2025, Usawc Press

The US Army War College Quarterly: Parameters

No abstract provided.