Understanding the Vancouver Hydrogen and Fuel Cells Cluster: A Case Study of Public Laboratories and Private Research‡

Conventional analyses of conventional industrial clusters look at the local, regional,1 In this paper “regional” refers to a sub-national entity, such as a state, province, state or collectivity of a few provinces or states. View all notes national and global factors affecting their ability to compete and grow. However, it is beginning to become apparent that in at least a few cutting-edge, high-technology areas, firms compete directly on a global basis for talent and markets. A case study of the fuel cell cluster in Vancouver, Canada appears to confirm this proposition. Policy makers have realized that this cluster must compete on the world market if it is to succeed. The cluster is endowed with several favourable factors including a high quality of life for its human capital and strong support for demonstration projects.     

Enrolling the Private Sector in Community Development: Magic Bullet or Sleight of Hand?

The role of the private sector in international development is growing, supported by new and evolving official programmes, financing, partnerships and narratives. This article examines the place of the private sector in ‘community development’ in the global South. It situates corporate community development (CCD) conceptually in long‐standing debates within critical development studies to consider the distinct roles that corporations are playing and how they are responding to the challenges and contradictions entailed within ‘community development’. Drawing on field‐based research across three different contexts and sectors for CCD in Fiji, Papua New Guinea and South Africa, the article suggests that caution is required in assuming that corporations can succeed where governments, non‐governmental organizations (NGOs) and international development organizations have so often met with complex challenges and intractable difficulties. We argue that four specific problems confront CCD: (a) the problematic ways in which ‘communities’ are defined, delineated and constructed; (b) the disconnected nature of many CCD initiatives, and lack of alignment and integration with local and national development planning policies and processes; (c) top‐down governance, and the absence or erosion of participatory processes and empowerment objectives; (d) the tendency towards highly conservative development visions.     

Public support for ANZUS: Evidence of a generational shift?

Recent polling has shown that younger Australians are less likely to support the alliance with the USA than older Australians. This may reflect the passing of the wartime generation from the Australian population and the rise of a new, better educated, more multicultural Australia less sympathetic to the USA. Some have concluded that Australia may be undergoing a generational shift away from alignment with the USA. In this article, I pool all Australian Election Studies from 1993 to 2013 to assess this possibility. I find that ageing, not formative political experiences, pushes Australians in a more pro-American direction. Additionally, degree holders and Australians from non-Anglo-Australian backgrounds are slightly less likely to support Australia, New Zealand, United States Security Treaty (ANZUS), but the alliance still commands comfortable majority support even here. ANZUS is therefore likely to remain a popular component of Australian foreign policy for the foreseeable future.

最近的民调显示,相对于老辈,年轻的澳大利亚人不大会支持美澳联盟。这也许是因为战争一代逝去,受过良好教育、多文化的新一代对美国较少好感。一些人认为澳大利亚正在经历一个代际转移,不再站美国一边。笔者网罗了1993至2013年澳大利亚的全部选举研究,以评估这种可能性。笔者发现,年龄的增长而不是形成阶段的政治经历造成澳大利亚人更为亲美。再有,有学历的和非盎克鲁撒克逊背景的澳大利亚人对澳新美安保条约的支持度要稍低一些。但即便是这部分人口,支持美澳联盟的也占大多数。在可预见的未来,澳新美联盟依然会是澳大利亚对外政策得民意的一部分。     

Post-Communist Corruption: In a League of its Own?

Conventional wisdom has it that the post-communist countries are in a league of their own with regard to corruption. At first sight, the levels of corruption are, indeed, particularly high in both presently communist and formerly communist countries. However, this generalization dissolves as a mirage when the proper control variables are included into the explanatory model. Countries with a communist past or a communist presence are as corrupt as one would expect based on other structural characteristics such as the level of economic development, a Protestant cultural tradition and the dependency on natural resources. Ceteris paribus, then, the communist legacy has no direct effect on contemporary levels of corruption. At most, it is possible to argue that it has an indirect effect working through the variable of economic development.     

The EU as a conflict manager? The case of Georgia and its implications

This article offers an analysis of the EU's engagement in Georgia as a standpoint from which to assess the EU's role as a conflict manager. The article begins with a brief narrative account of the development of EU—Georgia relations in the context of the country's two unresolved conflicts over Abkhazia and South Ossetia. It then proceeds to the analysis of two sets of factors—those within, and those external to, the EU—that are crucial for understanding the nature and impact of EU efforts to manage the two Georgian conflicts. On the basis of this case-study analysis, the authors offer a wider analysis of the EU's potential for assuming a wider role as an international security actor. This is undertaken by considering both the limitations of the EU's existing capabilities for conflict resolution and the new developments contained within the Lisbon Treaty. The final part of the article asserts that the EU has suffered from two key weaknesses that have prevented it from living up to its aspirations of becoming a globally significant and effective conflict manager. The first is structural—the lack of, to date, a permanent External Action Service; the second is conceptual—the lack of a coherent and comprehensive conflict management strategy. The article concludes with five substantive principles that should guide the EU's approach to conflict management.     

‘How to do things with books’: Quentin Skinner and the dissemination of ideas

This is one of a number of talks given on 23 May 2008 in the Faculty of History, University of Cambridge, on the occasion of Quentin Skinner's retirement from the Regius Professorship of Modern History. No attempt has been made to disguise the origins of this piece, or its festal tone, and any statistics quoted reflect the position as of 1 May 2008.     

How Do Pre-existing R&D Activities in a Region Influence the Performance of Cluster Initiatives? The Case of French Competitiveness Clusters

This article explores the diversity of 66 French competitiveness clusters, which were all accredited in 2005 according to the same specifications, by characterizing the initial context in which they emerged and taking a close look at the link between this initial context and their current performance. Since French competitiveness cluster policy is based on state co-funding of R&D projects, we establish a typology based on a multiple component analysis and a hierarchical ascending classification of the R&D potential of the cluster's territory, the respective R&D efforts of companies and academic laboratories, the kinds of actors setting up the cluster and their pre-existing relationships. We then measure the differences among the five classes relating to their clusters' capacity to obtain state funding for their projects. Our results show that initial context can partially explain competitiveness clusters' performance. Competitiveness clusters in territories possessing significant R&D resources, and involving large companies capable of organizing projects, are the most efficient in obtaining state funding. In contrast, competitiveness clusters without prior cooperation experience perform poorly.     

Standing on the Shoulders of Giants: How Do We Combine the Insights of Multiple Theories in Public Policy Studies?

The combination of multiple theories in policy studies has a great potential value—new combinations of theories or concepts may produce new perspectives and new research agendas. However, it also raises important ontological, epistemological, methodological, and practical issues that need to be addressed to ensure disciplinary advance. This article identifies three main approaches: synthesis, in which we produce one theory based on the insights of multiple theories; complementary, in which we use different theories to produce a range of insights or explanations; and contradictory, in which we compare the insights of theories before choosing one over the other. It examines the issues that arise when we adopt each approach. First, it considers our ability to “synthesize” theories when they arise from different intellectual traditions and attach different meanings to key terms. Second, it considers the practical limits to using multiple theories and pursuing different research agendas when academic resources are limited. Third, it considers the idea of a “shoot‐out” in which one theory is chosen over another because it appears to produce the best results or most scientific approach. It examines the problems we face when producing scientific criteria and highlights the extent to which our choice of theory is influenced by our empirical narrative. The article argues that the insistence on a rigid universal scientific standard may harm rather than help scientific collaboration and progress.     

China and the United States: a succession of hegemonies?

This article critically reviews the suggestion that we are experiencing a ‘succession of hegemonies’ from the United States to China. It develops Martin Wight's writings on hegemony, and introduces a fundamental distinction (not made by Wight) between a power transition and a hegemonic succession. Wight held complex views about the nature of power and at times seemed to subscribe to a purely materialist account. Elsewhere he was more nuanced and appealed to the purpose of dominant states as part of his argument that influence does not correlate exactly with mass and weight. This suggestion is developed in the author's view of hegemony—as distinct from primacy—as denoting a legitimate practice within international society. These ideas are then superimposed upon current debates about a power transition, or a succession of hegemonies, as between the United States and China. The existing debate conflates those two issues. Accordingly, while it can readily be acknowledged that there are important indicators of a shift in the material distribution of power, this in no way amounts, as yet, to any kind of hegemonic succession. For the latter to occur, there would need to be clear evidence of an effective socialization of the aspirant hegemon's purpose and support for its preferred order. On the contrary, to date China has been largely content to operate within existing frameworks, rather than instigate a revision of them, and does not yet present a model for emulation elsewhere. It is possible that a power transition, without any hegemonic succession, could be corrosive of global governance.     

教学设计:人教版八年级英语上册 Unit 8 How do you make a banana milk shake?

一、教学目的:1教材分析:英语课程改革的重点就是从学生的学习兴趣、生活经验和认知水平出发,倡导体验、实践、参与、合作与交流的学习方式和任务型的教学途径,发展学生的综合语言运用能力,使语言学习的过程成为学生形成积极的情感态度、主动思维和大胆实践、提高跨文化意识和形成自主学习能力的过程。     

Between banality and effervescence?: a study of Japanese youth nationalism

The study of taken‐for‐granted nationalism has been bourgeoning in the last two decades. With Michael Billig's seminal thesis of banal nationalism, it is now more common to see those studies that focus on day‐to‐day unconscious flagging of national symbols in established (as opposed to new) nations. There are also studies that re‐emphasize Durkheimian moments of collective effervescence through ecstatic events (such as the Olympics and the Soccer World Cup) that concretize national identities. By critically engaging with these concepts, this exploratory study delves into the nature of Japanese youth nationalism. What are the sources of their national pride? How proud are they? Or, not? How do the Japanese youth perceive the national symbols such as the national flag and how is it related to the sense of nation?     

Phenomenology and the Megaliths of Wales: a Dreaming Too Far?

It is argued that the field data do not support the claims made by Tilley in his A Phenomenology of Landscape (1994) for intentional relationships between the placing of Welsh megalithic tombs and natural features of the landscape. The critique relates to sample quality, observational rigour and failure to examine alternative hypotheses concerning the siting factors involved in the placing of the tombs.     

Redistricting and partisan fluidity: do we really know a gerrymander when we see one?

Redistricting analysis and the concept of gerrymandering are based on the assumption that the electorate is comprised of durable racial, ethnic or partisan blocs of voters. Accordingly, vote dilution analysis is employed to determine whether the constituencies comprised of these durable blocs have had their aggregate voting power diminished by a particular redistricting scheme. In this article, I demonstrate that this assumption does not hold for partisan redistricting analysis because partisan blocs of voters are not durable. Instead, their partisan profile changes in response to incumbency, electoral competition and redistricting. These findings not only contradict prevailing analyses of redistricting, but also undermine the logic of remedial redistricting.     

A Stake in Place? The Geography of Employee Ownership and its Implications for a Stakeholding Society

In recent years employee ownership has become a means by which some workers facing privatization, closure or takeover have attempted to defend their jobs and communities. Proponents of a 'stakeholding' society have advocated the widening of share ownership as a means of democratizing the economy, building partnerships and achieving consensus at work. But is employee ownership able to sustain local investment and industrial partnership? Through a detailed case study of a management and employee buyout in the railway industry, I suggest that the ability of employee ownership to fix investment in place may be enhanced by relations of 'stakeholding', increasing employee commitment to the firm and its future. In the case studied here, however, lack of employee power and finance effectively excluded most workers from the processes and philosophy of the buyout. The new ownership structure did little to reshape local relations between workers and those in control. While ownership cannot eradicate economic threats to community, it might, if used as a mechanism to promote new styles of management and employee commitment, foster long-term success. It is argued that government and trade unions can do more to promote wider employee ownership and participation at work in the future.