In this introduction we have outlined the vital importance of the role of culture (i.e.: the cultural factor) in the field of international relations, foreign policy, and diplomacy and the professional need for cultural competence among its practitioners.

Today professionals have to deal with more uncertainties in their field than before. We live in complex and rapidly changing environments. The British philosopher Ronald Barnett adds the term ‘supercomplexity’ to highlight the fact that ‘we can no longer be sure how even to describe the world that faces …

Background: Determining what constitutes an excellent allied health care professional (AHCP) is important, since this is what will guide the development of curricula for training future physical therapists, oral hygienists, speech therapists, diagnostic radiographers, and dietitians. This also determines …

In January 2013, a group of 6 professionals associated with the HvA Research and development Centre for society and Law made a study trip to the USA. Under the name "Krachtwerk on tour" they traveled three weeks through the USA, covering about 7000 km from Boston to San Francisco and Berkeley, through …

Introduction: Primary care has a central role in integrating care within a health system. However, conceptual ambiguity regarding integrated care hampers a systematic understanding. This paper proposes a conceptual framework that combines the concepts of primary care and integrated care, in order to …

The 'Media Battle' is a concept for a competitive one-week pressure-cooker contest, in which students develop a creative product for companies or other organisations. It brings together education, research and professional practice, with benefits for all parties involved. We guide participating organisations …

The Internet offers many opportunities to provide parenting support. An overview of empirical studies in this domain is lacking, and little is known about the design of web based parenting resources and their evaluations, raising questions about its position in the context of parenting intervention programs. …

The Salvation Army has been battling social problems in the Netherlands for more than 125 years. Over the course of this period, the Dutch Salvation Army has developed into a well-known faith-based organization as well as an important professional social service provider. These two characteristics: religious …

Over the past decade, the reliability of the overall quality of mbo (vocational) students has declined in the Netherlands. People from the professional field question the value of an mbo diploma severely when they consider hiring recent graduates. This is due to the fact that all the various studie tracks …

Because understanding sustainability does not automatically lead to sustainable acting, we feel that additional awareness building should be necessary. Therefore a project is started in which a very old method, namely the Socratic dialogue, is borrowed from the founders and customized for the use in …