Social Prescribing (SP) is an approach which aims of improving health and well-being and connecting patients to community services. Examples of these services include physical activity and cultural activities. Despite its benefits, SP has still not been fully implemented in Portugal. This case study is part of a larger study on Social Prescribing Local System (SPLS) implementation, which comprised a quantitative approach, a pilot study and a qualitative approach, and aims at exploring patients’ and healthcare workers’ perspectives on SP. The study was carried out to understand the motivations of different stakeholders for participating in the pilot project, the anticipated benefits for patients, healthcare professionals, and the health unit, as well as their perceptions and experiences within the scope of the SP project. Data collection was carried out in December 2020 through semi-structured individual interviews and a focus group. A total of seven participants were included, of which one patient, one museum representative and five healthcare professionals. Different common dimensions related to SP emerge, including health and well-being, social interaction and community engagement, accessibility and inclusivity, motivation and adherence, collaboration and coordination, and education and awareness. The patient considered the adequacy of the activity to the patient’s state of health and capabilities, adoption of a phased approach, with a focus on progress, in order to promote long-term adherence as facilitators. For the museum, disseminating its activities to healthcare professionals and patients through different channels such as posters at the health center, social media pages, and training sessions can significantly enhance visibility and engagement, while direct phone contact and digital publications can further promote adherence, ensuring a comprehensive and coordinated approach to patient participation and institutional benefit. Healthcare professionals identified several benefits, including reduction of social isolation and sedentarism, as well as a means of strengthening the therapeutic relationship with patients. The design and implementation of SP programs should be participative and involve all stakeholders participating in the process. Barriers to adherence included time for activity and the associated costs or prerequisites, availability of activities and lack of perceived interest in health.

This paper presents an overview of the policies and efforts of the Provincial Government of Bali, Indonesia, to tackle the development of HIV/AIDS. This study considers the socio-cultural context and analyzes the factors that are most likely to influence its spread, the response of the community, and the local government’s efforts to form Provincial AIDS commission whose movement is supported by the village government and the community to suppress the spread of HIV/AIDS. The authors observe the micro factors that most determine this program, such as attitudes, behaviors, and desires of policy-making actors, stakeholders, implementing organizations, adequacy of human resources, financial funds, information, education, communication, advocacy, regional languages, the role of students, and field workers, and local culture in preventing the spread of HIV/AIDS. Therefore, this research does not focus on just one dimension in efforts to deal with this outbreak. Following the application of the public policy theory, all potential contributing elements must be addressed simultaneously. This requires a truly interdisciplinary and multisectoral approach that requires to be comprehended by policymakers in other provinces where the prevalence of HIV/AIDS is quite high. This effort also requires commitment and strong political will from levels of government.

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) can be viewed as the aftermath of the Millennial Development Goals (MDGs). This is due to the fact that the seventeen (17) SDGs are designed to continue the work expected to have been done by the MDGs. In other words, the failure of the MDGs to eradicate poverty birthed the SDGs. However, the SDGs seem not to be achieving the desired result. This has led to the projection for the need for a decade of action. In the African context, the questions of why the MDGs failed and the SDGs tend to be failing are yet to be asked. By projection, if the questions are not asked and answers are not provided, the projection of the decade of action may also fail. Hence, the reason for this conceptual paper which was targeted at exploring the possibility of considering the Africanization of the SDGs as remedy to ensuring sustainable development in the African continent. Different relevant sources were identified, reviewed and analysed. The findings from the reviewed and analysed sources showed among others that for Africanization of the SDGs to be a reality and practicable, glocalization must be embraced. Meanwhile, there will be need to question the use of Eurocentric curricula in African institutions of learning.

This study aims to investigate the difficulties local governments face as a result of the province directly managing county system reform. It reveals the various challenges faced by local governments under the provincial directly managed county reform through a thorough analysis of the history, rationale, and implementation of the reform along with pertinent literature reviews and case studies. It is discovered that the county reform, which is directly governed by the province, has not only significantly altered the functions and organizational structure of local governments, but it has also made their resource allocation, financial strain, and brain drain problems worse. To help local governments deal with the difficulties in the province-directly governed county reform, related remedies, and solutions are finally proposed to handle these issues.

In a territorial development model such as that of Valencia (Spain), in which limitations, resistance and difficulties are observed as a result of the dualization that it has undergone in these almost 40 years of operation, we ask whether these obstacles have had an effect on the evolution of employment. This is understood as the basic indicator, the primary aim of any action undertaken for development of the territory. To this end, we set out from the methodological articulation of various techniques (survey by means of a pre-coded questionnaire, application of the READI® methodology) based on the primary information collected from the AEDL (Employment and Local Development Agents) technical staff of Valencia province, which showed us their perception of the dualization to which the model is subjected and the difficulties that this generates when carrying out their professional activity. Statistical and documentary sources were also analyzed. With all this, the evolution of employment in these territories over the last five years was studied in order to validate, or not, the initial hypothesis: Whether this reality of the model (duality) responds to short-term or structural parameters.