从凡尔赛体系到雅尔塔体系的历史比较研究

20世纪前半叶,欧洲先后经历了两次世界大战的磨难。在战后条约的基础上,欧洲分别形成了两个不同的安全体系:"凡尔赛体系"和"雅尔塔体系"。这两大体系均为世界大战的历史产物,却在维护国际秩序方面有截然不同的表现。通过对凡尔赛体系与雅尔塔体系作一历史比较,对于建立未来"国际新秩序"来说,具有重要的意义。     

少数民族流动人口语言交流与民族关系的思考

语言是连接一个民族的纽带,是构成民族的要素之一,因而语言是民族特性的主要表现,同时语言关系也是民族关系的重要组成部分,不同民族间的语言关系会在一定程度上影响民族关系,而民族关系中的一些问题,也往往会在语言关系上反映出来.尤其对于城市少数民族流动人口来说,语言的自由沟通交流是他们真正融入当地生活的前提.也是实现真正和谐民族关系的起点.就个体而言,各民族成员只有通过族际语(汉语普通话、汉语方言或一种少数民旋语言)的学习,才能够具备顺利步入主流社会的条件,从而跨越文化障碍获得个人在主流社会的更大发展.     

论新时期城市民族关系发展态势

随着城市化进程加快,我国城市少数民族人口迅速增多.在城市,各民族之间的频繁接触和互动,一方面加深了各民族之间相互理解与相互尊重,另一方面各民族之间相互碰撞、产生纠葛的机会也增多,如果处理不好将影响城市民族关系的正常发展.本文概述了城市化进程中城市少数民族人口迅速增多过程,分析了新时期城市民族关系动态及城市民族工作的软肋,探讨了城市民族关系发展趋势及促进城市民族关系和谐发展的对策建议.     

转型以来俄罗斯联邦的民族问题

在后冷战时代的第三次全球性民族主义浪潮所引发的民族问题中,俄罗斯联邦的民族问题尤为引入注目。它主要体现在以下两个层面：第一,从俄联邦国家层面来看,主要是以俄联邦各主体为单位的命名／主体民族与俄罗斯民族的关系问题;第二,从俄联邦各主体层面来看,主要是俄联邦各主体内部的命名／主体民族与其他民族的关系问题。俄罗斯转型以来所实行的协商性的联邦制较为有效地解决了上述民族问题。     

战后东南亚民族分离主义运动评述

本简述了战后东南亚四国(印尼、菲律宾、泰国、缅甸)民族分离主义运动的发展历程,并分析了其特点及其兴起的历史、政治、经济与化因素。笔指出,上述东南亚四国主体民族与少数民族之间存在的巨大的社会、政治、经济差距是产生民族分离主义的根本原因。随着上述国家政治民主改革进程的加快与民族政策的调整、民族地区自治权力的加强及其经济的发展,主体民族与少数民族之间的社会经济差距已日益缩小,民族分离主义运动将日渐势微。     

试析印尼华族与当地民族的关系

印尼民族起源于亚洲大陆南部,华人移居印尼已有数百年历史,已形成当地少数民族——华族。苏哈托时期实行歧视华人政策,华人与当地民族的关系较紧张。印尼新政府实行多元民族、多元文化政策,华族逐步融入当地主流社会,与当地民族的关系逐步好转。     

战后东南亚经济开发引发民族冲突诸因素分析

东南亚在战后经济开发的过程中,大部分国家都出现了这样或那样的民族问题。这些民族问题,既有地方民族与中央政府的对抗,也有大民族与小民族、优势民族与劣势民族之间的争斗,民族关系在一段时间里十分紧张。虽然东南亚国家的民族问题在很大程度上是西方殖民“分而治之”政策所遗留下来的恶果,但无可讳言,战后各国在经济开发过程中的政策失误等问题也是导致民族关系恶化、民族冲突加剧的一个重要原因。认真研究经济开发与民族问题,总结其他国家处理经济开发与民族问题的经验教训,具有现实意义和借鉴作用。笔认为,在一个多民族国家里,经济开发之所以会引发民族矛盾和冲突,主要有以下几个因素。     

试论少数民族社会组织在城市民族工作中的作用 ——以锡伯族社会组织为例

随着我国城市化进程的不断加快,如何解决好城市化建设中各类民族问题、如何建立和谐的民族关系、促进各民族交往交流交融,是当今城市民族工作面临的新任务和新课题.少数民族社会组织是一支怀揣梦想、传承文化、勇于担当、不计报酬的力量,在城市民族工作中扮演着重要的、不可替代的角色.锡伯族社会组织正是这样一支队伍.     

论邓小平对新时期民族理论的贡献

新时期以来．邓小平以求实的科学精神创造性地总结民族工作的实践经验．提出了民族工作的首要任务是发展经济、民族区域自治是我国社会制度的优势、争取整个中华民族的大团结等一系列新思想、新观点．从而形成了邓小平民族理论的科学体系。这是邓小平对马克思主义民族理论的新贡献,是我们党在新时期解决民族问题的总纲领和行动指南。     

论民族地区精神文明建设思想的形成和发展

民族地区精神明建设思想作为党的民族理论的重要组成部分,是随着枉会主义革命和建设进程以及民族发展观的演进而逐步发展起来的。其内容在这一过程中不断被充实和完善,形成包含战略地位、指导方针、建设方向等内容的理论化体系。这一理论体系将随着改革开放和现代化建设的进一步深入,不断得到丰富和发展。     

Beyond Annexationism: The Central Powers’ Ostpolitik as Structural Transformation, 1917–18

This article explores the eastern policy of Germany and Austria-Hungary during the latter half of the First World War (1917–18). It attempts to go beyond the traditional annexationist–non-annexationist dichotomy prevalent in the literature and approach the issue from the perspective of structural transformation of the international system. It argues that the Central Powers endeavoured to accommodate imperial collapse in Eastern Europe and prevent its further spread by replacing the obsolete system of imperial dynasticism with a new arrangement based on autonomous and semi-autonomous states. German and Austrian leaders often disagreed on implementation and formed temporary understandings across the civilian–military divide. This policy ultimately proved counterproductive, as it failed to contain the westward spread of national and social revolution. Austro-German support for nominally independent states in Eastern Europe, national in form but Central European in cultural and political outlook, inadvertently contributed to further imperial collapse, as the increasingly restless nationalities of Austria-Hungary began to challenge the legitimacy of imperial dynasticism in Central Europe. The Central Powers’ Ostpolitik in 1917–18 became a transformative historical event due to the fact that it facilitated the structural transformation of international relations in Central and Eastern Europe from imperial dynasticism to a system of nation-states.     

Reseau urbain et diffusion de l'innovation dans la France pre-industrielle: La creation des caisses d'epargne (1818–1848)

This paper discusses the paradigms of European history and of European civilisation defined in the main histories of Europe written from the Enlightenment to Guizot.

Voltaire, Robertson, Gibbon, and Guizot consolidated a model of the history of Europe which has its origins in the fall of the western Roman Empire and the invasions of the Barbarians. The other main steps of this history were the Christianisation, the creation of a vital economic centre in western and northern Europe, the development of the cities, the rediscovery of Roman law, the creation of a complex system of states, the colonial expansion and again the birth of a society of “good manners”.

A common civilisation which did not ignore the differences which existed between one country and another – the “national characters”, discussed by David Hume in 1748. Instead the different national characters – the variety of Europe as Guizot wrote – represented an important element of the European civilisation.     

A new Gaullist moment? European bandwagoning and international polarity

The transatlantic partnership needs to be reassessed. Since the end of the Cold War, Europe has chosen to bandwagon with the United States and to outsource its security to Washington. Bandwagoning has serious consequences when the use of force is at stake: it may lead to entrapment, where weaker allies may be involuntarily dragged into a conflict. It may also lead to abandonment, where the dominant ally may choose to discard their vital security concerns. With the evolution of the international system towards a multipolar configuration, this strategy of bandwagoning is becoming increasingly costly for Europe while the dominant power, the United States, is progressively confronted by other competitors at the systemic level. These classic dilemmas attached to an asymmetric partnership are exacerbated in a multipolar configuration. In particular, the abandonment scenario may become more and more frequent precisely because there is competition—and thus potential costs—at the international level: the United States may leave Europe alone, not by choice but by necessity. The current crisis in Ukraine illustrates this shift: while some American leaders were keen to escalate the conflict by arming Ukraine, the Obama administration's commitment to the defence of Europe has been minimal and it has largely delegated the management of the crisis to the Europeans themselves. Washington had other and more important priorities. Strategic autonomy is not an option for Europe; it has become a reality, a Gaullist moment where Europeans will have to learn to think and act strategically for themselves.     

A nineteenth-century Mediterranean union: Michel Chevalier’s Système de la Méditerranée

This article examines one of the nineteenth-century’s most revolutionary schemes for establishing a union of Mediterranean states. In 1832, Michel Chevalier set out a startling scheme that would bring to an end armed conflict in Europe through a confederation of European states and a subsequent alliance between Europe and the Ottoman Empire. His plan envisaged a vast infrastructure network of railways, canals, roads and shipping lanes that would link the major ports of the Mediterranean with Europe’s capital cities and those of the Ottoman and Russian Empires. The infrastructure network at the heart of Chevalier’s Système de la Méditerranée was conceived by him as the basis for a system of economic integration that would foster political harmony throughout Europe – anticipating by over one hundred years Jean Monnet and Robert Schuman’s plans for a European Union – but also between Europe and the Ottoman world. Harboured within Chevalier’s infrastructure scheme for the Mediterranean was one of the earliest and most complex nineteenth-century theories of networks ever devised. This article examines the centrality of the Mediterranean to Chevalier’s theory of networks, and explores the multiple dimensions of this complex theory, including the intimate connection he identified between networks as expressions of human creativity and the kind of unalienated human relations that would result in the end of conflict both between and within nations.     

Strengthening the Polycentric Urban System in Europe: Conclusions from the ESDP

The first European Spatial Development Perspective (ESDP) document agreed in May 1999 calls for closer cooperation at the EU level in response to the challenges posed by globalization and the increasingly transnational impact of spatial development in Europe. The ESDP maps out a common approach to spatial development in the EU member states and supports an integrated perspective for European spatial development which goes beyond specialist viewpoints. This article focuses on the relationship between key statements on the European urban system contained in the ESDP and the 'real' structures and changes within this urban system. It also examines possible conclusions from the ESDP for urban policy in Europe in the light of the activities already launched to translate the ESDP into practice in the urban dimension of European spatial development.     

Russia’s Seat at the Table: A Place Denied or a Place Delayed?

Equivocation by Western governments about the place of Russia in Europe in the context of the enlargement of NATO and the EU leaves a critical issue unresolved. In effect, Russia has been excluded from the Euro-American ambit. Russia's present weakness has enabled its own reservations about these developments to be sidelined; but an economically rejuvenated Russia could pose a threat of dominance in eastern and central Europe every bit as substantial as the military dominance of former times. A way needs to be found to incorporate Russia into a modified European system to avoid its retreating into a potentially dangerous isolation.     

Russia's Europe, 1991–2016: inferiority to superiority

Russia defines itself as a Great Power in relation to Europe and the West. The first part of the article traces how, since 1991, a story about greatness centred on being part of contemporary European civilization has given way to a story of how Russia is great by being superior to a Europe that is now seen as rotten and decadent. The former story spelled cooperation with Europe and the West, where the latter spells confrontation. The second part argues that Russia's superiority complex is unsustainable. It is hard to see how, in the face of the formative structural pressure of the state system, Russia will be able to sustain its superiority complex. A state that does not order itself in such a way that it may either gain recognition as a Great Power by forcing its way and/or by being emulated by others, is unlikely to maintain that status. The costs of maintaining Great‐Power status without radical political and economic change seem to be increasing rapidly. If Russia wants to maintain its status, an about‐turn is needed. Such a turn may in itself be no solution, though, for if Russia does not do anything about the root causes of its perceived inferiority to Europe, then the Russian cyclical shifting from a Westernizing to a xenophobic stance will not be broken.     

Ivan the Terrible

Although the violence of Ivan IV's reign was excessive, present-day liberal views that Russia under its first tsar missed an opportunity to develop a more democratic or protocapitalist system rely on an unjustifiable assumption: that Russian society would have followed the path of Western Europe with its balance between the interests of strong government power and autonomous estates, not Eastern or Central Europe with its selfish nobility and underdeveloped towns.     

Raised bed agriculture in northwest Europe triggered by climatic change around 850 BC: a hypothesis

A sudden decline of solar activity around 850 calendar years BC caused a shift to a cool and wet climate in northwest Europe. Food production suddenly became problematic because of shorter, wetter growing seasons and increased night frost. This climate change triggered innovation and the development of a new agricultural system in continental northwestern Europe: arable farming on raised beds (Celtic field banks) laid out in a more or less checked pattern. This kind of agriculture mitigated the effects of the climate shift by providing better drainage and lessening damage by night frost and thus lengthening the growing season. Once the advantages of this kind of cultivation, soil enrichment and optimum root growth besides the hydrological effects, became obvious it will have been practised on a large scale and introduced when people thought it useful, independent of the local hydrological situation.     

‘Europe’: What Kind of Idea?

Salman Rushdie posed the question, “What kind of idea are you?” We have borrowed his provoking question and held it up to ‘Europe.’ In this article, we suggest that ‘Europe’ cannot be primarily identified or located in terms of geographies, histories, religions, cultures or values, and that attempts to do so diminish the idea of ‘Europe.’ We also contest the vision of ‘Europe’ as a series of concentric circles emanating from Brussels and suggest that this conception indefensibly marginalizes vital portions of ‘Europe.’ We propose that, while the European Union (EU) is attempting to define core concepts of ‘Europe,’ ‘Europe's’ frontiers and borders (wherever or whatever they may be, inside or outside ‘Europe’) are actively constructing, contesting and resisting ‘Europe.’ The peripheries and perimeters are no less important than the core. On the contrary, they give substance to the idea of ‘Europe.’ Finally, we argue that ‘Europe’ can best be understood as a non-teleological construct, a narrative à la Roland Barthes. Inspired by Barthes, we propose a ‘Europe’ Theory of Classification operating at the levels of functions, actions and narration.