Continuity or Discontinuity in the Recent History of the Australian Labor Party?

Recent characterisations of the Australian Labor Party as a ‘cartel party’ suggest that there was, after the 1970s, a fundamental discontinuity in Labor's history. We assess this contention not only in terms of the ALP's policies but also the mechanisms which link it with different classes and social groups: Labor's electoral support, membership and local branches, the backgrounds of the Party's parliamentarians and leaders, the role of trade unions inside the ALP, and its sources of funding. While there have been some quantitative changes in these characteristics, we conclude that Labor remains, on balance, a ‘capitalist workers party.’     

Alchemy or Science? Compromising Archaeology in the Deep Sea

In the torrid debate between archaeology and treasure hunting, compromise is often suggested as the pragmatic solution, especially for archaeology carried out either in deep water or beyond the constraints that commonly regulate such activities in territorial seas. Both the wisdom and the need for such compromise have even been advocated by some archaeologists, particularly in forums such as the internet and conferences. This paper argues that such a compromise is impossible, not in order to fuel confrontation but simply because of the nature of any academic discipline. We can define what archaeology is in terms of its aims, theories, methods and ethics, so combining it with an activity founded on opposing principles must transform it into something else. The way forward for archaeology in the deep sea does not lie in a contradictory realignment of archaeology’s goals but in collaborative research designed to mesh with emerging national and regional research and management plans.     

The Affluent Worker or the Divided Party? Explaining the Transformation of the ALP in the 1950s

This article argues that the Australian Labor Party was transformed in the 1950s, shedding its rhetorical commitment to socialism as well as many of its democratic ties to the organised working class. It also attempts to explain this transformation. The argument that this transformation was the product of rising working-class incomes and declining class consciousness is considered, before being rejected on both empirical and theoretical grounds. An alternative political explanation, which focuses on the interactions between the Party, its working-class constituency, and its leadership, is then offered. The article thereby aims not only to reconceptualise a specific moment in the history of Labor, but to reorient our theoretical approach to the Party, and our understanding of political change in the early postwar decades.     

A regionalisation or long-distance trade? Transformations and shifts in the role of Tana in the Black Sea trade in the first half of the fifteenth century

Abstract

The Italian trading stations in Tana were important in the long-distance trade system of the Italian maritime republics Venice and Genoa. The deeds of two Venetian notaries who worked there during the 1430s, Nicolo de Varsis and Benedetto de Smeritis, are an important source for tracing the transformation of the issues and directions of Italian trade in the Black Sea region, a trade which was recovering from the crisis of the fourteenth century. Notwithstanding the Venetian-Genoese struggle and previous crisis events, this recovery made the economic conditions favourable. Although some scholars see a regionalisation of trade in fifteenth century, the source evidence challenges this interpretation. Westerners began to import Italian, Flemish and English textiles to the Eastern markets, and the local goods (fish, caviar) were widely exported to Europe – even to the markets of Flanders. Finally, the slave trade was intensive. My main argument here is that though there were considerable transformations in the Italian trade, there was no real regionalisation of trade, which retained its long-distance character.     

Australia and the European Union in the World Trade Organisation: partners or adversaries?

Shared interests between Australia and the European Union (EU) in multilateral trade negotiations are increasing. However, the relationship in the WTO continues to be defined by conflicts over agriculture. This article examines the case for closer Australia-EU co-operation on shared interests in WTO negotiations while continuing to press for more rapid reform of EU agriculture policies. It traces the major changes in the interface between Australia and the EU in the WTO, including the re-structuring of the Australian economy over the past two decades and the more recent efforts by the EU to modify the trade impact of the Common Agriculture Policy (CAP) on world agriculture trade. The article concludes that closer co-operation between Australia and the EU in the WTO on shared interests would enhance Australia's influence in the multilateral trade system.     

Panchayati Raj in West Bengal: Popular Participation for the People or the Party?

Since 1978 the Left Front government in West Bengal, led by the Communist Party of India (Marxist) — CPI(M) — has pursued a strategy of decentralized planning through locally elected panchayats (councils) in the countryside. The stated ideological commitment of the CP1(M) is to support and eventually empower the poor and oppressed and this has resulted in Panchayati Raj assuming the status of not just a state sponsored decentralization strategy, but the institutional forum for the mobilization of the poor and the expansion of the party's base. However the CPI(M)'s strategy is to some extent ambiguous in that it combines a need to maintain an electoral status as a party leading a state government within the Indian Union and a political status as a party promoting the conditions for, and the transition to, a people's democracy and thereby socialism.     

Culturally clustered or in the cloud? How amenities drive firm location decision in Berlin

Creative firms are neither capital‐ nor land‐intensive in production. They predominantly rely on creative and specialized labor and, assuming a strong competition for workers, are therefore increasingly dependent on the location of their (potential) employees. If these creative and highly qualified employees are attracted by consumption amenities such as bars, clubs, and restaurants, then it follows that these same amenities may determine the location of creative service firms. I investigate this hypothesis by examining whether Berlin Internet start‐up firms locate in urban amenity‐rich places. Identification builds on the fall of the Berlin Wall. A 1 percent increase in amenity density raises the probability of a start‐up location by almost 2 percent. A comparison with other service industries suggests that amenities are significant to the location choice of creative sectors, whereas no effect can be observed for nonreative firms.     

To Devolve or Not To Devolve? Welfare Reform in the States

This article analyzes variation in the degree to which states have responded to the devolution of welfare at the federal level by devolving authority over welfare policy to local government. I find that to the extent that states have devolved authority to lower levels of government, they tend to be states that already had a high degree of involvement of local government in welfare provision. In states without this record of local government involvement, the devolution that has occurred has not generated greater involvement of local government, but rather responsibility has been devolved to regional entities with ties to workforce development and with a substantial degree of business involvement. As states gain increasing authority over a redistributive policy, they may begin to treat it as a subset of a larger developmental policy—workforce development.     

Yangjiao or the ��Other��? Christianity and Chinese society in the second half of the nineteenth century

This article explores the relationship between Christianity and Chinese society in the second half of the nineteenth century by re-examining the primary sources of anti-Christian movements. The first part shows how Christian churches broke the dominance of the Qing government over local society. Conflicts between Christianity and Chinese religion were often transformed into political confrontations between churches and the Qing bureaucracy. The second part analyzes how Confucianism, Buddhism, and Daoism interpreted Christianity, with an emphasis on how to understand the perception of Christianity in Chinese society. Exploring broader societal perceptions of Christianity—and not just those expressed in the writings of the Confucian literati—allows for a more nuanced understanding of Chinese interpretations of Christianity. The third part studies the relationship between churches and Chinese religious sects. On the one hand, in the language of anti-Christian movements such as those of the Zaili and Cai sects, Christianity was the hateful “Other.” On the other hand, in the process of preaching Christianity, churches themselves experienced a period of transmutation: they recruited into the church not only non-religious civilians but also the followers of popular religions. For a long period, Christianity was called yangjiao, the “foreign religion,” making it the “Other.” Missionaries started to feel an urgency to reject their identity as the “Other” after the harrowing experience of the Boxer Movement.     

Wild or domestic? Biometric variation in the cat Felis silvestris Schreber

Investigation of modern biometric data indicates that it may be possible to distinguish wildcats from house cats in many instances. Applying the log‐ratio (log‐difference) technique to archaeological samples from medieval northern Europe, and to mixed samples of wildcats and house cats, shows that the differentiation may not always be clear, and the possibility that some samples include hybrids is discussed. The technique is applied to samples from the Orkney Islands to demonstrate that single wildcat specimens can be identified in small samples. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The Creative Economy: Vision or Illusion in the Structural Change?

This contribution discusses the hopes associated with the rise of the creative industries and gives explanations for the debates in politics, science and the media. In doing so, our underlying thesis is that the culture and creative economy is a virtual sector and that a uniform promotion—also by means of staged events that attract a lot of media attention—needs to be challenged. In a further step, the scientific implications will also be outlined on the basis of the term's “career” in the public debate. A brief analysis of the empiricism of the creative economy will provide further insight into its real significance and demonstrate possible definitional weaknesses of the term. The creative industries are an essential element of modern economic infrastructure. They will play an important role in the future, especially for cluster strategies. However, the scientific research so far is not able to reach more accurate conclusions regarding the effects of governance on the culture and creative industry. Therefore, this contribution shows future research fields. We will conclude by venturing an outlook on the further development of the sector and demonstrate its social and economic effects using the example of the Ruhr Area in North Rhine-Westphalia.     

Introduction: Italy in the EU—pigmy or giant?1

This introductory article discusses the circumstances under which Italy manages to forge ‘national preferences’ and push them through the European policy‐making process. Drawing from the analysis of several policy areas, it concludes that Italy plays a major policy‐making role, particularly when it acts as mediator between large countries and small‐ and medium‐sized ones, and when it argues its case according to policy‐ and EU‐appropriate logics. While Italy may not have it ‘its way’ all the time (as no member‐state does), it still manages to influence the EU policy‐making process more frequently and more significantly than the literature has so far conceded.     

Big society or broken society?: Food banks in the UK

This article discusses the recent increase in food poverty in the UK, the reasons for this and some of the ways in which it is being addressed by the voluntary or third sector, with a particular focus on food banks. Through use of a number of anthropological concepts such as reciprocity and gifting, shame and stigma, some of the complexities and contradictions which arise in this situation are revealed. Through the prism of food poverty and food aid, the piece poses a series of questions about rights and entitlement, as well as the political economy of inequality and austerity and the policies implicated in them and seeks to demonstrate that anthropology has a contribution to make in this area.     

A meal on the hoof or wealth in the kraal? Stable isotopes at Kgaswe and Taukome in eastern Botswana

Iron Age sites associated with the Toutswe tradition in Eastern Botswana date between CE 700–1300 and share a variety of settlement patterns, economic features and material culture. The presence of domestic fauna, settlement structures and concentrations of vitrified dung provide archaeological evidence for herding economies. However, due to factors of preservation and past retrieval techniques, evidence for plant remains is still somewhat limited for the Toutswe sites in Botswana. Additionally, archaeological remains such as flora, fauna and material culture often provide only indirect evidence for their contributions to diet. This study provides new evidence for the diet of individuals from the Toutswe tradition. Given the large numbers of animal remains and residues at Toutswe sites, the expectation is that animal domesticates were also an integral part of the diet. Stable isotopic analysis of human remains indicates that even though domestic cattle and sheep occur in great abundance at Toutswe sites, their contribution to the diet may be minimal. The main source of protein for individuals at Kgaswe and Taukome comes from C4 plants such as sorghum and millet and to a lesser extent, animal products. The practice of maintaining large domestic herds for economic and social reasons rather than for primary subsistence in southern Africa today may have its roots in the Iron Age populations of the region. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Thomas Piketty's Capital in the Twenty-First Century: Economic Analysis or Tract for the Times?

I argue that the French economist Thomas Piketty's 2014 (American) bestseller Capital in the Twenty-First Century is not the treatise of economic analysis that its author purports it to be, but is rather a work of political partisanship making claims about the supposedly inevitable increase in the share of national income deriving from capital as opposed to labor—to the point where Chinese bankers or Middle Eastern oil sheiks might own “everything,” even people's bicycles, barring either world catastrophe or broad government intervention—that lack any empirical support or logical plausibility. As a professed heir to (what he understands to be) the spirit of the French Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen, as distinguished from the American Declaration of Independence, Piketty displays none of the respect for the rights of the individual—including the right not to have lawfully acquired property arbitrarily confiscated by government—that the original American political tradition entails. Nor, indeed, despite his profession of staking everything on “democracy,” does Piketty display any regard for the principle of self-government. Rather, his ultimate, admittedly “utopian” goal, outlined in Part IV of his book, is of a European “budgetary parliament,” selected in vague fashion by the existing parliaments of Eurozone members (not by the people themselves), that would hold sweeping powers to confiscate any privately owned wealth that its members regarded as “excessive” and redistribute it to others they deem more needy or deserving. This body would exacerbate all the difficulties resulting from the European Union's widely publicized “democracy deficit.” Yet Piketty implies it should ultimately be a model for world governance. Ultimately, his cause is the opposite of democracy: the unfettered continental or even worldwide rule of unaccountable bureaucrats, advised by “intellectuals” like Piketty himself, convinced that they know far better than their fellows how the latter should live their lives, and claiming the authority to regulate it accordingly.     

Cherubs or Putti? Gravemarkers Demonstrating Conspicuous Consumption and the Rococo Fashion in the Eighteenth Century

Since the 1960s, James Deetz and other archaeologists have attributed the appearance of the cherub icon on colonial-period gravemarkers to religious movements such as the Great Awakening or diminished Puritan influence during the eighteenth century. The cherub has been interpreted by many scholars as a symbol of a heavenly being that reflects freer perceptions on life and the afterlife. This article challenges the long-held religious connotations of the cherub icon. Instead, this article demonstrates that the icon relates to the wider Rococo artistic trend that was the prime influence on the forms and decorations of contemporary material culture. In this artistic fashion, the cherub is a putto, a Classical allegorical element that remained common in architectural and mortuary sculpture. The use of the putto comes with a number of additional contemporary elements and shows that consumer choice connected to the latest fashion instead of changing religious attitudes being the driver behind iconographic and decoration change on colonial gravemarkers.