The Soul of the Potala Palace

ItisaholystatueoftheGoddessofMercy.Measuring93cmhighand10cmwide,thesmallstatueinthePotalaPalaceinLhasaenjoysfameasgreatasthestatueofSakyamuni,thefOunderofBuddhismintheJokhangMonasterywhichwasbroughttoTibetbyTangDynasty(618-907)PrincessWenchengwhenshewasma…     

The person for the period?

Sir Robert Menzies, The Measure of the Years, Cassell Australia Ltd., 1970, pp. 300, $6.95. Kylie Tennant, Evatt: Politics and Justice, Angus and Robertson Ltd., Sydney, 1970, pp. 418, $8.95.     

The Grandest Canyon in the World

Ｔｈｅ　Ｇｒａｎｄｅｓｔ　Ｃａｎｙｏｎ　ｉｎ　ｔｈｅ　ＷｏｒｌｄＴｈｅＧｒａｎｄｅｓｔＣａｎｙｏｎｉｎｔｈｅＷｏｒｌｄ￥ｂｙＹａｎｇＹｉｃｈｏｕＦｏｌｌｏｗｉｎｇｎｕｍｅｒｏｕｓｉｎｖｅｓｔｉｇａｔｉｏｎｓａｎｄｅｘｐｅｄｉｔｉｏｎｓ，ｅｘｐｅｒｔｓ...     

The end of the territorially-sovereign state? The case of crime control in the United States

Numerous commentators argue that the nation-state is an endangered species. External forces of globalization and internal forces of social differentiation, many suggest, are significantly weakening the state's capacity to regulate its subject population within its jurisdictionally-defined space. Such an argument is often made in the specific case of crime control. The spread of international communications networks and the growth of international policing suggest that single-state crime control efforts will increasingly be insufficient, the growth of private security and community-oriented crime reduction efforts suggest that the state is surrendering crime control to other domestic agencies. This paper examines the specific case of crime control in the United States to argue that the putative weakening of the state is not in fact occurring. When examined more closely, suggested evidence of decreased state power vis-a-vis crime turns out, if anything, to demonstrate the opposite. The analysis demonstrates that, in the American case especially, the state remains startlingly relevant when it comes to efforts to combat crime and maintain order. Because police agencies are bureaucratic institutions that must demonstrate their relevance to ensure their continued health, and because the state's broader legitimacy is linked to the provision of security, the public crime control apparatus promises to remain robust for the indefinite future.     

The Book of Job – The Cyclical Progression of the Aporia

ABSTRACT

This article explores the relation between aesthetics and theology in the Book of Job. The overall aim of the article is to explain the relationship between centre and periphery (poetry and prose) and its significance for the theology of the book. The article claims that Job's problem is not the attainment of wisdom but how to reconcile wisdom with suffering—how to relate to suffering. And this theological theme is propagated through aesthetics—including stylistic, narrative, compositional and structural features.

It is impossible to point out a preferential reading in the Book of Job because of the fundamental and structural dissonance of the text. This destabilized, ambiguous, paradoxical, ironical and dissonance-producing text is the hermeneutical starting point. Qua dissonance-producing text this feature is used as foundation for the interpretative task. And to get a comprehensive grip on the book two instruments are used: the literary and compositional means are analyzed, and the structural elements are evaluated in their relation between frame and centre. Following this line of interpretation reveals that the stylistic differences of the work manifest crucial theological distinctions. In the book of Job, shape and aesthetics are meaning and theology.     

The Muddle in the Middle Pleistocene: The Lower–Middle Paleolithic Transition from the Levantine Perspective

The terms Lower Palaeolithic and Middle Palaeolithic represent research constructs within which cultural evolution and prehistoric hominin behaviours can be studied, with the transition usually understood as marking a watershed in our evolution: an adaptation with a million-year record of success that gives way to something new. The interpretation of the Lower Palaeolithic Acheulian technocomplex is usually understood as a period of cultural stasis that extends over much of Africa and Eurasia, principally associated with Homo erectus. Those innovations that can be observed occur widely separated from one another in space and time. Yet a closer and more detailed examination of the Middle Pleistocene records from East Africa, southern Africa, Europe and the Levant reveals significant variation in cultural repertoires. A kind of paradox emerges, in which an Old World Lower Palaeolithic, apparently lacking an overall dynamic of distinctive and directed change in terms of cumulative variation over time, nevertheless culminates in a transition which sees the universal appearance of the Middle Palaeolithic. The two main hypotheses that have been advanced to explain the global transition, which happens essentially synchronously, appear mutually exclusive and contradictory. One view is that altered climatic-environmental constraints enabled and encouraged an ‘Out-of-Africa’ dispersal (or dispersals) of a new type of genus Homo. This cultural replacement model has been challenged more recently by the alternative hypothesis of accumulating but unrelated and temporally non-linked regional, and in fact potentially autochthonous, processes. The Levant, by virtue of its position bridging Africa and Eurasia (thus being the region into which any out-of-Africa groups would have had first to disperse into), must be seen as a critical region for assessing the relative merits of these competing hypotheses. This paper deals with the Lower–Middle Paleolithic boundary in the Levant within a long temporal perspective. The Middle Pleistocene record in the Levant enables us to examine the amplitude of variation within each techno-complex, as well as to question whether there are diachronic changes in the amplitude of techno-typological variations as well as changes in the manner by which they appear in the record. The results carry significant implications for understandings of demographic and societal processes during the Lower–Middle Paleolithic transition in the Levant.     

The Conservation Institute of the Dunhuang Academy

1IntroductionTheConservationGroupofdleDunhuangInstituteofCtilturalPropertywasestablishedin1952andtheGroupwasexpandedintoaConservationDepartmentin1980.In1984theConservationDepartmentwasundedastheConselvationInstitUtewhichhasbeentheeariestinstitutiondesignatedforscientificstudiesongrottositesandlelicsconservation.For40yeare,theInstitutehasbendevelopedtobeoneofthemestimportantmultidisciplinaporganizationinconselvationfieldinChina.TheInstituteconsistsofenvironment,analysis,restoraion,docume…     

The Longest Painting Scroll in the World

Zongza Lhagyicannot forgetDecember 3,1999,When hereceived the entry certifi-cate from me London-based Guinness Book ofWorld Records while hewas in Shanghai.It reads:China Tibetan Cultural ArtColor Painting, the longest.measures 618 meters longand 2.3 meters wide.     

The end of the NPT regime?

In the context of rising regional instability and conflict, along with increased incidents of global terrorism, in a dynamic, uncertain security environment, emerging nuclear and other weapons of mass destruction threats—both state proliferation and terrorism—are seen as growing dangers giving rise to increasing global insecurity. The international nuclear nonproliferation regime, the centerpiece of which is the Nuclear Non‐proliferation Treaty (NPT), is essential to current and future non‐proliferation efforts and needs to be maintained and strengthened, not replaced. The normative and legal weight of the regime is important for counterterrorism as well as non‐proliferation, but it will not likely directly affect the behaviour of so‐called ‘rogue states’ and terrorists. Preventing them from achieving their objectives if they attempt to wield nuclear and radiological weapons may deter and dissuade them, as may a credible prospect of punishment. The interaction of non‐proliferation and deterrence, so clear during the Cold War history of the NPT, remain crucial parts of an increasingly complex picture.     

The President the US Needs Next?

Abstract

A New Bottom Line in American society should be the primary focus of America's next president. Institutions (including corporations and governments), social practices, and even personal actions should be judged rational, efficient and productive not only to the extent that they maximize money and power, but also to the extent that they maximize love and caring, ethical and ecological sensitivity and behavior, kindness and generosity, non-violence and peace, and to the extent that they enhance our capacities to respond to other human beings as embodiments of the sacred, and enhance our capacities to respond to the earth and the universe with awe, wonder and radical amazement at the grandeur of creation. Applying this focus to every aspect of American domestic and foreign policy would stimulate a spiritual revolution in American and global consciousness and open the possibility of global solidarity replacing chauvinist nationalism.     

The Greening of the Queensland electorate?

The Greens at the 2004 Queensland State election almost trebled their primary vote from 2001, an increase suggesting the party has already filled the vacuum left by the declining Australian Democrats as the State's principal Left-of-Centre minor party. This article argues, first, that much of this growth in support can be attributed to the substantial interstate migration to the State's southeast, a pattern that has contributed to a partial transformation of Queensland's traditional political culture to one more disposed to Green support. Second, given that this growth is set to continue, it is argued that the Queensland Greens are yet to maximise their vote. This article analyses the 2004 Queensland State election results to determine the impact of Green preferences under the State's Optional Preferential Voting (OPV) system, and to locate where geographically, and among whom demographically, Green support was strongest. A rudimentary profile of the ‘typical’ Queensland Greens voter is also offered.     

‘The Bashful and the Boastful’

The creation and maintenance of influential leaders and authorities is one of the key themes of archaeological and historical enquiry. However, the social dynamics of authorities and leaders in the Mesolithic remains a largely unexplored area of study. The role and influence of authorities can vary remarkably in different situations, yet they exist in all societies and in almost all social contexts from playgrounds to parliaments. Here we explore the literature on the dynamics of authority creation, maintenance and contestation in egalitarian societies, and discuss the implications for our interpretation and understanding of the formation of authorities and leaders and changing social relationships in the Mesolithic.     

The End of the Cold War on the Cold War?

Melvyn P. Leffler. A Preponderance of Power: National Security, the Truman Administration, and the Cold War .     

The First ‘Urnfields’ in the Plains of the Danube and the Po

Journal of World Prehistory - Archaeological research is currently redefining how large-scale changes occurred in prehistoric times. In addition to the long-standing theoretical dichotomy between...     

＂The Excellences of the Republic＂ Produced on the Roof of the World

Since its peaceful liberation, Tibet, at the roof of the world, has been keeping abreast with the motherland to constantly renew its progress.     

The Americanisation of Europe after 1945? The Case of the German Universities

Academic discourse about America's influence on Europe constitutes an important contribution to the understanding of intercultural transfer-processes. In this context particularly the twentieth century has to be considered, because it was during this period when the decline of more than 400 years of the Europeanisation of the world ran parallel to the beginning of its Americanisation. The thesis presented here pursues an aspect of Amercanisation which has hardly been analysed: namely, the direct and indirect American influences on the German universities and academic system after the Second World War. In this case, the term Americanisation does not mean a one-sided transfer of the American higher education system, but rather a gradual merging of American influences with the German university tradition.