Neurohypofyzární peptidy v lékařství z pražských a švédských laboratoří. Část I: Historie výzkumu a počátky produkce lékových forem

From the fifties to the seventies of the last century, the neurohypophyseal peptides oxytocin and vasopressin constituted one of the main research areas at the Institute of Organic Chemistry and Biochemistry in Prague (IOCB). A significant contribution to this area is associated with the names of František Šorm, director of the said institute, and Josef Rudinger, head of the institute's peptide laboratory. At that time, newly developed research tools enabled to synthesize structural analogues of these hormones in numerous laboratories worldwide and hence to investigate the structure-activity relationships within this peptide group. Contributions of single peptide-chain positions to the respective biological activities were identified which opened a possibility to rationalize a design of peptides with a combination of changes in several positions. Several clinically interesting peptides were synthesized in the late 1960s at the IOCB and employed as therapeutics: [(Gly)3-Cys1,Lys8]-vasopressin (Glypressin Ferring®, Terli­pressin INN), 1-deamino-8-ᴅ-arginine vasopressin (Desmopressin INN, dDAVP), and later the uterotonics carbetocin (INN), widely used in obstetrics to prevent postpartum haemorrhage. Since the industrial production of peptide therapeutics was scarcely possible under the conditions of socialist economy in Czechoslovakia as well as in other countries under the Soviet influence, F. Šorm agreed to use the already established scientific contacts of IOCB with the Swedish pharmaceutical company Ferring AB and to transfer the production licences to Sweden. The license agreements were signed in 1969 and led to a quick spread of dDAVP in the substitution therapy of the central form of diabetes insipidus and, moreover, contributed to a fast upsurge of the Ferring company. Somewhat later, Glypressin was produced as a therapeutic with a prolonged action in cases of cardiovascular collapse. Contacts between Prague peptide chemists and the Ferring company lasted on a rather informal base until the end of the 1980s. After the fall of the totalitarian regime in Czechoslovakia in 1990, Ferring started a joint-venture collaboration with the newly organized Czech company Léčiva st.p. Praha in a newly established group Prague Polypeptide Institute spol. s. r.o. (later Ferring-Léčiva A.S.). A substantial part of the peptide-production capacities was then transferred to new buildings in Prague.

The Fight against Corruption in Sport: International and National Experience

Corruption is a particularly dangerous scourge, which encompasses the whole of society, all spheres of human activity, and by virtue of this, it also encompasses education, whether we want to recognize it or not. Corruption flourishes in times of great social unrest, in times of crisis that societies are going through, especially in the period of transition from a totalitarian regime to a democratic society. The factor generating corruption is the socio-economic crisis, having as causes: weakening of state authority, degradation of living standards, altered moral judgment, lack of effective control levers, diminished public confidence in institutions and social values, non-adaptation of legislation to economic and social conditions and so on Sport is one of the largest businesses in the world, being influenced and influencing in turn both financial and political interests. Every year, millions of dollars and Euros circulate in this area, most of the transactions and agreements taking place behind closed doors, in order to keep any possible advantage over the competition. This fierce competitiveness, together with the lack of transparency, makes the sports field extremely vulnerable to corruption acts. Summarizing the results of our study, we can conclude: the fight against corruption is an opportunity for beneficiary institutions, which can strengthen and improve their systems for preventing and combating corruption and money laundering and asset recovery, by reference to worldwide first-class practices and standards. Following intense consultations with all beneficiaries in the Republic of Moldova: Minister of Education, Culture and Research, National Olympic and Sports Committee, Paralympics’ Committee, Sports Federations and other structures in the country, in order to ensure effective support in the field of physical culture and sports. The direct relations with the interested actors contribute to the creation of a positive framework, which will favour the general success of the future activities that will take place in obtaining the expected results.

Europejski Trybunał Praw Człowieka wobec totalitarnej destrukcji porządku własnościowego w Polsce. Część 1

The aim of this article is to analyze the role of the European Court of Human Rights in overcoming totalitarian regime in the area of proprietary rights in Poland, the only state not adopting special legislation to meet these claims. It is the destruction of this part of the traditional legal system after World War II that can be considered as a key element of totalitarianism itself. However, this paper is not focused on historical developments, but rather on their current consequences, trying to evaluate links between them and modern legal order — particularly important in terms of limited temporal court jurisdiction over the area. In terms of the rule of law principle, it is essential how can a state cope with making good damages suffered by the victims. Careful research has proved practical application of the domestic law as well as functioning of public institutions to be based on serious systemic deficiencies making effective legal protection very difficult and sometimes impossible. They were rulings of the court playing a crucial role in supporting national authorities and setting standards of better protection — also achieved through judicial dialogue with the national judiciary. This very case-law also has a more general meaning, as it pictures a mode of ECHR’s jurisdictional activity and quite functional approach to the interpretation of the convention. This article is divided into two parts. The first one presents the general meaning of the area, the genesis of the protection, and major trends in the case-law development. The second part will offer a legal analysis of art. 1 and careful a systematization of leading rulings.

J. ZALEWSKI’S ACTIVITY AS DIRECTOR OF THE CENTRAL POLISH STATE LIBRARY IN KIEV IN1925–1931

The purpose of the article is an attempt to discover and analyze the activity of J. А. Zalewski (1894–?) аs director of the Central Polish State Library in Kiev in 1925–1931, on the background of the development of the main components of its functioning, to characterize the main achievements of his personal contribution as a director of the library in connection with the formation of the book collection as one of the leading library institutions in the city. In his scientific work the author has widely used historical-comparative, historical-genetic, statistical, chronological, biographical methods of research, the method of diachronic analysis, etc. The article analyzes the main socio-cultural factors of the development of the Central Polish State Library in Kiev, the dynamics of the main library components of its work and the main directions and achievements of book collections under the direction of J. А. Zalevsky during the specified period. Against the background of the characteristics of J. А. Zalevsky’s activity as a library director, the growth of book collections, composition and range of library readers, their reading interests, as well as the dynamics of the main library activity indicators of book collections under the direction of J. А. Zalevsky were investigated. The main directions of the work of J. А. Zalevsky as director of book collections and the sphere of the most important tasks of the library during the studied period are identified and characterized. The importance of activity of J. А. Zalevsky as a director of the library through the prism of the main tendencies of its development is analyzed. It was found that the sustainable development and successful activity of the Central Polish State Library in Kiev under of the direction J. А. Zalewski in 1925–1931 were limited by the shortcomings of the material and technical base, lack of funds, lack of systematic acquisition of books in Polish language, insufficient the number of publications published in Polish on the territory of the country, as well as political and socio-cultural factors of the country’s social life in the conditions of strengthening of the state totalitarian regime of the party bureaucracy and the curtailment of gender roots of rooting, ”which began at the turn of the 1920s‑1930s. However, thanks to J. Zalewski’s leadership, despite all the obstacles and objective difficulties, the work of the Central Polish State Library in Kyiv during the second half of the 1920s evolved steadily. Slowly, the bookstore was transformed into a cultural, educational, scientific and organizational-methodical center, which provided not only ordinary readers but also many experts who studied the history and culture of the Polish and Ukrainian peoples with the necessary information sources and bibliographic materials. Under the guidance of J. Zalewski of the Central Polish State Library in Kiev actively carried out cultural-educational,cultural-mass, educational and scientific-bibliographic work, in particular in book collections organized classes with graduate students, held certain measures to improve the skills of library staff of Polish libraries, organized exhibitions, lectures, creative evenings, exchange of library experience and more. Under the pretext of J. Zalewski, employees of the Central Polish State Library in Kiev carried out extensive organizational and methodological work; created Polish mobile libraries serving the Polish population in remote regions of the country; helped to organize new Polish departments at district book collections in many cities of Ukraine. It was at the turn of the 1920s‑1930s, when the institution was headed by J. Zalewski, that the greatest growth rate of development of the Central Polish State Library in Kiev was observed, when a certain network of Polish libraries, reading rooms and clubs was almost formed in the Ukrainian SSR.

Corps de femmes et maisons d’enfants dans Enfants du diable de Liliana Lazăr

Women Bodies and Children’s Homes in Liliana Lazar’s Enfants du diable [The Devil’s Children]. Many contemporary Romanian writers who chose French as a literary language seem to share a common interest in revisiting through fiction Romania’s relatively recent communist past, thus exposing the dysfunctionalities of the ‘multilaterally developed socialist society’ during the last years of Nicolae Ceaușescu’s dictatorship. In her novel, Enfants du diable (2016), Liliana Lazar’s merit is to emphasize the abusive nature of the Romanian totalitarian regime by exploring a topic which is normally less taken into account by post-communist Romanian fiction, namely the private body of women transformed into a public, even political body after the implementation of the Anti-abortion Decree 770/1966. Our aim is to examine the way in which Lazar’s book deals with this topic and its social and personal consequences, as well as its denunciation of a less evident form of the communist carceral system, namely the institutionalization of orphaned children. Keywords: communism, totalitarian regime, women’s body, orphanage, carceral system, Liliana Lazar, Nicolae Ceaușescu

The Stalin Cult as Political Religion

Political religion is a concept that gained prominence around the middle of the twentieth century, being associated for many with the idea of a totalitarian regime. Political religion was seen as a secular ideology whose followers took it up with the enthusiasm and commitment normally associated with adherence to religion. Comprising liturgy, ritual and the sacralization of politics, it created a community of believers, and usually had a transcendental leadership and a millennial vision of a promised future. This paper will explore the utility of this concept for understanding leader cults in authoritarian regimes. Such cults have been prominent features of authoritarian regimes but there is little agreement at the conceptual level about how they should be understood. One of the most powerful of such cults was that of Joseph Stalin in the Soviet Union from 1929 to 1953. This paper analyses this cult in terms of liturgy and ritual and concludes that despite some aspects that are common between the cult and religion, most ritualistic aspects of religion find no direct counterpart in the cult.

Primary Education in Ukraine. History and European Priorities

The article briefly discusses the main models of providing primary education in the leading countries of Europe, in particular, the organization of the educational process. Against their background and as a result of historical consideration (the long experience of the totalitarian regime), it is shown how post-Soviet Ukraine reached its transitional system of primary education. The international value of the article lies in the demonstration of the historical totalitarian influence on primary education in comparison with the countries of ancient democracies. The article may be of interest to educational historians, specialists in comparative pedagogy, etc. Goals as a determining component in the system of primary education were formed under the influence of state educational policy, the needs of society, school practice, research in the field of primary education. The invariant goals of primary education in the chosen chronological framework remained the all-round development of children of primary school age; upbringing of high moral qualities in them, the development of their mental and physical abilities, in accordance with the prevailing social and political system, acquired a communist or national connotation. It is proved that Ukrainian primary education is still at the initial stage of borrowing pan-European value and methodological systems.

Romanian musical creation of Bizantine source in the period 1918–2018

Written in the year of Romania’s centennial anniversary as a national state, this paper intends to offer a panorama of the monodic music of Byzantine tradition of the period, composed by the Romanian chanters. Although the entire twentieth century was characterized by the harmonization of the already established church chants, the musical works written in neumatic notation specific to the Orthodox Church continue to exist, albeit discontinuously. Based on the political changes that occurred in the Romanian society, three distinct periods of psaltic music creation can be distinguished: a. 1918–1947; b. 1948–1989; c. 1990–2018. The first period coincides with the last stage of the process of “Romanianization” of church chants. The second one corresponds to the communist period and is marked by the Communist Party’s decisions regarding the Church, namely the attempt to standardise the church chants. After 1990, psaltic music regains its position and the compositions of the last two decades enrich its repertoire with new collections of chants. Thus, we can see that in the course of a century marked by political turmoil and changes, psaltic composition went on a hiatus in the first decades of the totalitarian regime, to gradually resurge after 1980, enriched with numerous works bearing a distinct Romanian stamp.

The Georgian period of the filmmaker Otar Ioseliani

The creation of the film director Otar Ioseliani has a significant role in the evolution of Georgian cinematographic art. Since the 1950s, Ioseliani had been active in RSS Georgia, and since the 1980s, thanks to ideological circumstances, he continued his work as a filmmaker in France. Ioseliani imposed himself through a special style in the detection and cinematic expression of the negative parts of everyday life. That is why most of his films were not accepted by Soviet film critics, acclaiming them as negative works that did not fit the Soviet reality and lifestyle. Those works corresponded more to the conditions of critical realism than to socialist realism - the dogma of the totalitarian regime. As arguments for these ideas will serve the analysis (thematic, ideational background, cinematic expression, etc.) of Otar Ioseliani’s films from the Georgian period, starting with the bachelor’s thesis Watercolor (1958) and continuing with the films that became known to the general public: November, The Last Leaf, Pastoral, Once Upon a Time there was a Blackbird.