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13341. Ideas Toolkit: The Role of Culture in the Transboundary Air Pollution Issue in Northeast Asia

Author:
Kenneth E. Wilkening
Publication Date:
02-1999
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
International Studies Association
Abstract:
This paper outlines a general approach for analyzing the role of culture in international environmental policymaking. It draws on work in anthropology and foreign policy analysis. As a first step in investigating the role of culture in international environmental policy, culture needs to be viewed as a “toolkit of environmental ideas.” The second step is to delimit broad definitions of culture to a more workable forms. Three forms are offered (following Hudson 1997a): culture as organization of environmental meaning, environmental shared-value preferences, and templates for environmental action. The third step is to answer three basic questions relative to the specific definition of culture employed: who draws what environmentally-related ideas from the ideas toolkit, how are these ideas employed in the political arena, and how do these ideas, originally drawn upon for political purposes, change and ultimately end up changing the set of environmentally-related ideas in the toolkit. In the political arena the ideas are assumed to be embodied in a “discourse.” The terminology of discourse and the body of theory built up around it is then used as a vehicle for examining the role of culture and cultural change in international environmental policymaking. A rough and preliminary attempt is made to provide a concrete example of the above approach in relation to the role of culture in the transboundary air pollution issue in Northeast Asia.
Topic:
International Relations, Environment, and Politics
Political Geography:
Israel and Northeast Asia

13342. Observations on The Township People's Congress Elections in Chongqing January 5-15, 1999 and Cooperative Activities with the Ministry of Civil Affairs August 1, 1998-January 15, 1999

Publication Date:
03-1999
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Carter Center
Abstract:
This report describes in detail The Carter Center's activities in China from July 1998 to January 1999 with a focus on the observation of China's village and township elections and recommendations to improve the quality of those elections. The report is divided into two parts. Part I is a report on the Center's observation of township elections in Chongqing. Part II covers the Center's activities with respect to village elections in cooperation with the Ministry of Civil Affairs (MCA ).
Topic:
Civil Society, Democratization, and International Organization
Political Geography:
China

13343. Ethnic Conflict in South Asia

Author:
P. Sahadevan
Publication Date:
06-1999
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies, University of Notre Dame
Abstract:
A tumultuous region with a common cultural background and shared political experience, South Asia occupies a prominent place in the global map of ethnic conflict. Many groups have fiercely fought with each other, laid siege on the state, frustrated its nation-building efforts, and burnt bridges to capture the larger consciousness of the international community. In comparison, the region is unique in many ways from the standpoint of ethnicity, use of violence and approach to peace. First, it is one of the world's most complex regions with multi-ethnic societies, characterized by striking internal divisions along linguistic, regional, communal and sectarian lines, but externally linked to one another across national boundaries. Yet, multiculturalism or pluralism as a guiding principle of governance is hardly adopted into the popular political culture of the region. A probable exception is India where different ethnic groups, at least in principle, enjoy 'equally' a modicum of political space for cultural and political autonomy. But there, multicultural arrangements are hindered by the Center's intrusion into the affairs of political institutions, leading to political decay and rupture in center-periphery relations. The manner and the extent of state intervention in promoting the politico-economic interests of groups, therefore, determine the dynamics of conflict.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution, Security, Defense Policy, Ethnic Conflict, and Peace Studies
Political Geography:
South Asia and India

13344. Processes and Mechanisms of Democratization

Author:
Charles Tilly
Publication Date:
02-1999
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Institute for Social and Economic Research and Policy at Columbia University
Abstract:
Aristotle described democratization as a perversion. In a constitutional government, when the majority substituted its particular interest for the community's general interest, self-serving rule of the many — democracy — resulted. In his analysis of political forms, Aristotle went on to specify processes promoting a majority's pursuit of its narrow interest, for example the rise of demagogues and the increase of a polity's size beyond the limits of mutual acquaintance. He also allowed that revolution could convert a tyranny or an oligarchy (his names for degenerate forms of monarchy and aristocracy) directly into a democracy. Aristotle's Politics does not offer a causal theory sufficient to specify the process by which today's Uganda or Uzbekistan could become democratic. It does, however, provide an exemplary model of theoretically coherent explanation. It goes far beyond mapping the initial conditions and sequences of events that constitute paths to democracy. It actually features causes and effects.
Topic:
Democratization
Political Geography:
Uganda and Uzbekistan

13345. "Contentious Europeans: Is There a European Repertoire of Collective Action?";

Author:
Doug Imig and Sydney Tarrow
Publication Date:
06-1999
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Institute for Social and Economic Research and Policy at Columbia University
Abstract:
The research reported here was inspired by a talk that the second author was induced to give for a seminar in West European Politics at Nuffield College, Oxford, in February 1994 by Vincent Wright, to whom we express our gratitude and to whom all complaints and cavils should be directed.
Topic:
Government and Politics
Political Geography:
Europe and Western Europe

13346. The Myth of Meritocracy? An Inquiry into the Social Origins of Britain's Business Leaders Since 1850

Author:
Tom Nicholas
Publication Date:
01-1999
Content Type:
Working Paper
Abstract:
Recent sociological analysis of the extent to which modern British society has become more meritocratic raises important conceptual issues for the recurrent economic history debate concerning the social mobility of Britain's business leaders. The majority view in this debate is that high social status backgrounds have predominated in the profiles of businessmen throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. François Crouzet's The First Industrialists reveals that Britain's industrial pioneers were drawn largely from the middle-and upper-classes, and that the image of the self-made man as the mainstay of the Industrial Revolution is a myth. Stanworth and Giddens identify a prevalence of 'elite self-recruitment' among deceased company chairmen active in large corporations and banks between 1900 and 1970. Scott's work on the upper classes distinguishes a 'core' business stratum characterised by kinship and privilege. Bringing together a range of research on the social origins of businessmen in the twentieth century, Jeremy asserts that 'it was rare for sons of the semi-skilled and unskilled to rise to national leadership in Britain'. The typical twentieth century business leader is upper-or upper middle-class by social origin, rising through the public schools and Oxbridge into the higher echelons of the business community.
Topic:
Economics, Industrial Policy, and Regional Cooperation
Political Geography:
Britain and United Kingdom

13347. Income Distribution and Convergence: the European Experience, 1870-1992

Author:
Philip Epstein
Publication Date:
01-1999
Content Type:
Working Paper
Abstract:
Economic convergence has emerged as one of the key debates in the theoretical and historical literature over the last decade. Galor identified three forms of long run per capita income convergence: absolute convergence, whereby convergence occurs independently of the initial conditions facing each economy; conditional convergence, whereby convergence occurs among economies which have identical structural characteristics, independently of their initial conditions; and club convergence, whereby convergence occurs only if the structural characteristics are identical and initial conditions are also similar. Of these, the absolute convergence hypothesis has been discredited whereas there is empirical support for both the conditional convergence and club convergence hypotheses. The club convergence hypothesis, in particular, has much to offer to economic historians. It stresses the importance of both the initial conditions facing each economy and the structural and institutional features of the economy (e.g. preferences, technologies, rates of population growth, government policies, etc.).
Topic:
Economics, Industrial Policy, and Regional Cooperation
Political Geography:
Middle East

13348. Industrial Growth Revisited: Manufacturing Output in Greece during the Interwar Period

Author:
Christodoulakim Olga
Publication Date:
01-1999
Content Type:
Working Paper
Abstract:
Although industrial production and growth in Greece during the interwar period has attracted considerable attention, there has not been any serious challenge either in qualitative or quantitative terms to the orthodoxy established in the period itself. The literature usually sees the 1920s as a landmark in the industrialisation of the country and a time when Greek manufacturing achieved an "unprecedented prominence". The momentum given to industrial expansion in the 1920s was encouraged by institutional changes brought about by government policy aimed at reducing social tensions stemming from unemployed refugees gathered in urban areas, by the depreciation of the drachma and heavy tariffs. The swift demographic changes that happened in the country following the Asia Minor debacle, however, have played a pivotal role in the literature in explaining industrial growth in the 1920s. According to conventional belief, the arrival of the refugees created the preconditions for an industrial expansion in the 1920s. The sudden increase in the population of the country has been linked to industrial growth in three ways: firstly, the abundance of cheap labour gathered in urban centres exerted downward pressures on wages; secondly, the refugees it is argued, brought with them entrepreneurial skills, their skilled labour, in short contributing to an improvement of the human capital in Greece, and took initiatives that promoted industrial development; finally, the sudden expansion of the domestic market because of the increase in the population boosted demand which consequently stimulated industrial production. The carpet industry, an industry that emerge in the 1920s and was mainly run by refugees, is usually mentioned as a representative example of the impact that refugees had in promoting new industries and entrepreneurial skills in the country.
Topic:
Economics and Industrial Policy
Political Geography:
Middle East, Greece, and Asia

13349. Nutrition and Economic Destitution in Northern Ghana, 1930-1957. A Historical Perspective on Nutritional Economics

Author:
Jérùme Destombes
Publication Date:
01-1999
Content Type:
Working Paper
Abstract:
This research takes Iliffe's suggestion seriously. For the student of Sub- Saharan Africa who has decided to explore a plausible route of causation between nutrition and poverty, the most urgent task is to disregard the initial discouragement triggered by the scarcity of references. The lack of relevant data is commonly pointed out and the contrast with the powerful insights made throughout the last decade by development economists is striking: poverty issues have been comprehensively investigated with behavioural models that strive to capture household strategies to cope with nutritional inadequacy and scarcity of resources. Although these strategies potentially have immense effects on welfare, development and the effectiveness of public policies, there have been few attempts to examine nutrition in less-developed countries through an economic history lens.
Topic:
Economics and Industrial Policy
Political Geography:
United Kingdom and Ghana

13350. The Mined Road to Peace in Guatemala

Author:
Susanne Jonas
Publication Date:
09-1999
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The North-South Center, University of Miami
Abstract:
This paper presents a political history and interpretation of the Guatemalan peace process, its turning points, and its crises. Beyond the significance of the process for Guatemala itself, the story of the peace negotiations holds fascinating and surprising lessons for a conflict-ridden world. Highlighted are the dynamics of the negotiation in its different stages, the role of the UN as a central player, its interactions with the key Guatemalan players, and some suggested hypotheses about the effects of the UN involvement.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution, Peace Studies, and United Nations
Political Geography:
United States