A comparative survey of the economic decline of Empires

Abstract

On 15 December 1965 Tanzania broke off diplomatic relations with the United Kingdom (UK) because of Harold Wilson's policy towards Rhodesia's Unilateral Declaration of Independence (UDI). Although Tanzanian president Julius Nyerere took this course of action to comply with a resolution of the Council of Ministers of the Organisation of African Unity, he made the support for Rhodesian independence a central pillar of Tanzania's nation-building project. Since 1967 human dignity, African liberation and opposition to racialism and colonialism became central tenets of both Tanzania's foreign policy as well as the Ujamaa socialist policy implemented internally by its government. The loss of a British £ 7.5 million loan notwithstanding, Tanzania's unyielding criticism of British policy towards UDI strengthened Nyerere's national and international legitimacy and reinforced the Tanganyika African National Union's hegemony over the national political space. Relations between Tanzania and the UK were finally restored in July 1968, after the other African governments had re-established them. Nyerere felt sure that this policy reversal would not put at risk his government's political legitimacy.     

Building the nation of the future,one waiting room at a time: hospital murals in the making of modern Mexico

Abstract

Mid-twentieth century Mexican hospitals – the buildings themselves and their interior and exterior walls – became stages that depicted national hopes and aspirations. Hospitals and clinics became ideal spaces that married science and medicine with the state’s version of a triumphant social revolution. Visitors and patients to hospital waiting rooms, lobbies and auditoriums would see, indeed be surrounded by, depictions of the complicated hopes placed on science and medicine as interpreted by politicians, architects, and artists. Hospital walls became contested spaces where art depicted Mexico’s embrace of modern technology and medical practices while also showcasing, in vivid color, citizens challenging the government’s broken revolutionary promises, especially the right of all to health and social security.     

Municipal Contact Centres: A Slower Approach Towards Sustainable Local Development by E-government

Abstract

It is Swedish government policy to use information and communication technologies to increase sustainability. This has implications for planning and local organization of communities. In the municipalities where most public services are provided, there are growing numbers of local contact centres (CCs) aiming to meet citizens' needs for information and coordination of public services. The CCs localize public services and combine different services into a one-stop practice focusing on needs and demands of individual citizens and their unique situations. The municipalities hereby have to plan for service provision in new ways to meet more individualized needs that are also in line with improved sustainability. CCs are both local offices and advanced services on-line, as e-governmental services. E-government could be considered fast government, but this article aims to turn that obvious first impression upside down and discuss how e-government can slow down and make services more local, personalized and sustainable. Theoretically we take off from a time-geographical modelling of slow processes that has implication for slower, more sustainable development. Based on in-depth case studies of municipal CCs we argue that they are tools towards improved sustainability and localism, and that they are “slowing up” administrative processes. In particular, we point out that e-government has a potential to plan for, and promote, sustainability and slow local development.     

'Euroscepticism', Political Agendas and Spatial Planning: British National and Regional Planning Policy in Uncertain Times

Over the last 10 years, European Union interest in planning has increased significantly. Although land use planning remains a function of each member state, the legal obligations imposed by the EU in the fields of environmental law, structural funds, the Common Agricultural Policy, and Trans-European Transport Networks, have all impacted upon the context of the operation of the British planning process. Many of the EU initiatives have had to be transposed into domestic legislation, while others form an important-if oft-times uncertain-framework for British policy-makers. This paper examines the relationship between the European Union's policies and initiatives as they have potentially impacted upon the British planning system and the contents of Britain's national and regional planning policy guidance to local planning authorities in the assessment period 1988-1997. But the Conservative governments adopted a 'Eurosceptic' approach to their relations with Europe and, as demonstrated within this paper, also towards spatial planning issues that caused uncertainty in practice. The research indicates that although the EU has impacted upon British planning, particularly at the local level of government, this has not been reflected at the national and regional levels in planning policy documentation, mainly because of the 'Eurosceptic' attitude of the government. Policy-makers at both the national and regional levels in England, Scotland and Wales are now recognizing the need, however, to keep apace with changes occurring simultaneously with regard to enhanced European integration, and the approach of the Blair government since 1997 has re-focused the relationship between the EU and UK over spatial planning.     

Accelerators and national security the evolution of science policy for high‐energy physics, 1947–1967

Historical analysis of the evolution of science policy for high‐energy physics from 1947–1967 shows how national security concerns played a role in this branch of fundamental science. The Manhattan Engineer District (MED) of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers supported particle accelerators after World War II demonstrated the military utility of particle accelerator technology for isotope separation, the transferability of technological skills from accelerator building to other technologies such as radar development, and the usefulness of particle accelerators in making the physical measurements required in the early stages of the design of nuclear weapons.

Although the Atomic Energy Commission initially was disinclined to support further particle accelerator development, it was persuaded to support accelerator projects to advance understanding of the nuclear forces that underlay fission and other nuclear processes, to promote the health of the AEC Laboratories, and to ensure a supply of trained scientific personnel.

The bond between accelerator development and national security tightened during the Korean War an AEC‐Department of Defense (DoD) program studied uses of accelerators for defense and to produce nuclear materials.

Accelerators contributed to another form of national security: national prestige in the international technological competition with the Soviet Union under the Atoms for Peace program and after the President's Scientific Advisory Committee (PSAC) was created in 1958 to respond to Sputnik. Particle accelerators also continued to develop in the AEC weapons laboratories up to the new emphasis placed on them by the Strategic Defense Initiative Organization (SDIO). Links to national security concerns helped programs traditionally thought to be “pure” science efforts win support, and applications from such programs found their way into applied programs.     

Experimental governance: the role of municipalities in urban living labs

Innovations in urban governance such as Urban Living Labs (ULL) are expected to accelerate the transition towards more sustainable and climate-resilient cities. This article reviews different ULL across Europe and explores the role and potential capacity of municipalities in the development of and/or facilitation of ULL as a form of experimental governance. It focuses on the role of the public sector in the multi-actor collaborations that often characterize experimental governance. The article draws on literature on cities in sustainability, climate and environmental governance, and bridges this with political science literature on governance. Based on institutional theory that emphasizes roles, identities, and perceived and actual acting space, three functional roles for the municipality are singled out – promoter, enabler and partner – in a framework with a set of indicators that are used to analyse 50 case studies of ULL (http://www.urbanlivinglabs.net). The aim is to advance knowledge on how municipalities can facilitate urban sustainability through experimental governance.     

London: Structural Continuities and Institutional Change in Water Management

This article provides a synthetic account of the historical development of London's water supply system within its wider national context, and addresses the current organizational setting of the water sector. Particular attention is paid to the post-Second World War period, which marked a transition towards integrated water management in England and Wales, a trend that has been consolidated since the 1970s. The article emphasizes the continuities and contradictions arising from the different combinations of public and private management strategies characterizing the UK water sector, and their implications for the sustainable management of water resources. It argues that there exists an in-built contradiction in the current institutional framework between the profit-oriented rationale of the private operators and the goals of efficiency, equity, and environmental sustainability pursued by the water regulators. Within this framework, it highlights the key policy issues facing the metropolitan water systems, and suggests what their most likely trajectories might be in the foreseeable future.     

Student Evaluation and Assessment of Group Projects

University teachers in the UK are increasingly being asked to develop skills, such as the ability to work effectively in groups, both by government and by employers. This paper outlines and evaluates, from a student perspective, the use of fieldwork projects to develop group-working skills. It also considers the use of self-assessment for summative purposes and the development of reflective practice or 'learning to learn' skills in students.     

The Element of Sustainability in the Greek Statutory Spatial Planning System: A Real Operational Concept or a Political Declaration?

This paper focuses on the response of the Greek statutory spatial planning system to the concept and principles of sustainability. The query to be answered is the following: Have the structure, institutions, processes and instruments of the planning system been affected by sustainability principles and in what way? Furthermore, are there any public policy results contributing to sustainable development and attributable to spatial planning? Methodological approach is based on cross-examination of a group of assumed sustainability criteria on the one side and recent changes/transformations in the key-factors of the spatial planning system (institutions, processes, instruments) on the otherside. The approach is complemented by reverse direction considerations: in cases of operational processes leading evidently up to sustainability the responsible policy sector is acknowledged and any factual connection to spatial planning is addressed. The main conclusion is that for the time being sustainability objectives in strategic and top-down spatial planning in Greece rather perform the function of a political manifesto and 'legalize' traditional weaknesses than drive real development towards a sustainable course. The chances for operational success are expected slim in the near future and originate mostly from the European Union (EU) political and economic pressures, producing however fragmented, single-dimension (mainly environment conservation) results for which commitment of the involved societies has never been accomplished and confirmed.     

Canadian geopolitical culture: Climate change and sustainability

Considering recent formulations of geopolitical culture in combination with concerns that environmental change be included in contemporary geopolitical analysis, this paper examines the implicit geopolitical formulations in recent Canadian federal political discourse both in Stephen Harper's Conservative government and the subsequent Liberal administration. Contrasting earth system science ideas about global transformations with Canadian nationalist rhetoric concerning petroleum production and notions of unlimited resource extraction as parts of national identity sharply highlights the contours of Canadian identity. If sustainability is to be taken seriously, the official nationalist formulation will have to be drastically changed, but as the widespread rejection of the LEAP manifesto suggests, such ideas of a sustainable mode of globalization have yet to substantially influence Canadian political discourse, despite the rhetorical support offered to the Paris Agreement on Climate Change by the Liberal government of Justin Trudeau.     

Scientists and the media: the struggle for legitimacy in climate change and conservation science

Abstract

Despite the uncertainties associated with forecasts of the possible negative effects of climate change on natural environments, such research is often widely reported in the news media. Here we review the presentation in the UK news media and on the internet of an academic study published in Nature, forecasting future global extinctions as a result of climate change. The results and conclusions of the study were widely misrepresented, especially in the news media, to make the consequences seem more catastrophic and the timescale shorter. Representations of the original article on the internet were more variable, with several sites ranked highly on popular search engines being overtly critical of the underlying science. We suggest that such polarised representations of environmental science are indicative of a 'struggle for legitimacy' between environmentalist and anti-environmentalist groups, with potential negative consequences for public trust in science.     

The United States Monopolization of Bank Note Production: Politics,Government, and the Greenback, 1862–1878

Abstract

Between 1862 and 1878, the view of the United States government towards the nation's money was transformed. Early in the Civil War, the government got into the bank note printing business out of necessity, printing and issuing the first-ever federal currency. Over the following years, debates raged whether the national currency should be printed privately or by the government's bank note printer, the United States Bureau of Engraving and Printing (BEP). Matters came to a head in 1878 when Congress debated the future of the BEP. That year, in a radical departure from the past, Congress gave the Bureau of Engraving and Printing a monopoly on the production of currency, forever changing the role of the government in the nation's economy. Money, be it in the form of coin or currency, was now the exclusive province of the government – not private banks or bank note companies. This change was the result of a rare consensus between Democrats and Republicans and between the forces of the antimonopoly tradition, Greenbackism, and hard money. For various reasons, they were unanimous in believing that the government, especially Congress, should be in control of those matters affecting the monetary affairs of the country.     

Sustaining the Forests: The Community-based Approach in South and South-East Asia

The concept of sustainability emphasizes four basic principles when applied to rural communities: that basic needs must be met; that resources should be subject to local control; that local communities must have a decisive voice in planning; and that they should represent themselves through their own institutions. These principles have been notionally accepted by development planners and conservationists at all levels. Yet, throughout the tropical forest belt, they are being systematically overridden by international and national policies and development programmes, leading to increasing poverty, social conflict and rapid deforestation. Traditional knowledge and systems of land use have proved far more environmentally appropriate, resilient and complex than initially supposed by outsiders. Forest peoples have successfully opposed many socially and environmentally destructive development schemes proposed for their lands. However, these societies are not resisting all change: population increase and the internal dynamic for development have also created social and environmental problems. A review of community-based initiatives in South and South-East Asia shows that in some countries, positive initiatives have been taken by local and national governments to promote a community-based approach. Notable successes have been achieved but many other initiatives have failed. The examples show that, besides the four principles noted above, environmentally successful management also depends on innovative political organization at the community level.     

Administration for Scientific Research

Abstract

Stability and change are the poles of the field in which scientific research exists: Ideally stable – better: growing-resources for ever-changing scientific aims? The author deals first with the 'why' of science management and introduces some basic aspects from the point of view of the German lawyer as science administrator. Dealing next with the 'how' of science management, he gives examples of lines of action in personnel, finance, and procurement using the Deutsches Krebsforschungszentrum as a model. Finally, he sketches some character traits of a science administrator and a scientist: ideally not opponents, sitting on the poles of stability and change respectively, but partners working together for the enhancement of scientific research in their field.     

'Nothing Can Ever Be the Case of 'Us' and 'Them' Again': Exploring the politics of difference through border pedagogy and student journal writing

Linda McDowell (1994) has called for styles of teaching which put into practice arguments about the 'politics of difference', which has become an increasingly central part of human geographical research. This paper draws on a number of years' experience of teaching an undergraduate course on multicultural historical geography, in which this was attempted. Here students were encouraged to get more involved in these debates, to take them more personally, and to develop 'situated knowledges' about the UK as a multicultural society. The approach to teaching, learning and assessment which made this possible was based on the principles of 'border pedagogy' and on students writing journals throughout the course which charted the development of their understandings of the materials they encountered.     

Understanding socio-economic sustainability drivers of sustainable regeneration: an empirical study of regeneration practitioners in UK

The construction industry has been recognized as a major driver towards the delivery of UK sustainable regeneration objectives. Several construction organizations have played various roles in their quest to deliver sustainable regeneration projects in line with sustainable development objectives. Yet, to-date the delivery of such sustainable development objectives has continued to be an on-going challenge for these organizations involved in the delivery of regeneration projects. The study adopted an exploratory research approach, using a questionnaire survey to collect data from 193 construction organizations/practitioners involved in the delivery of sustainable regeneration projects in the UK. The findings revealed that the majority of construction organizations were promoting socio-economic sustainability principles to meet their own corporate business objectives. The findings further revealed that the majority of practitioners’ organizations were integrating socio-economic sustainability principles into their business practices because they believed doing so was the best way to gain advantage over their competitors and remain relevant in their market place.     

The New Nature of Things? Canada's Conservative Government and the Design of the New Environmental Subject

Since coming to power in 2006, Canada's government under Stephen Harper has worked to recalibrate federal regulatory, legislative and economic development frameworks as they overlap in the littoral zone of the environment. We argue that Harper's Conservative government is pursuing a totalizing strategy in reconfiguring the desired Canadian environmental subject. This strategy approaches an integrated design that eclipses the incremental strategic options most Canadian federal governments have understood themselves to be constrained by. This design's basic features include the discursive strategies employed to collapse “the environment” into a singular resource extraction paradigm, a programmatic concentration of power to the executive branch of the Canadian government, and a classical conservative ideology that associates environmental regulation and management with dominion over and improvement of national territory, to the exclusion of other frames and relations. We query the articulation of consent and certainty in relation to the environment and extractive economies in Canada.     

Green,red, yellow and purple: gendering the Kurdish Question in south-east Turkey

This article discusses the role of women in the contemporary ethno-territorial struggle of Kurdish Question in Turkey. I argue that gendered development has become the primary terrain where Turkish and pro-Kurdish political groups articulate their nationalist interests. The Kürt Sorunu (Kurdish Question) – the enduring debate over the political status and rights of Turkey's Kurdish population – is Turkey's largest geopolitical challenge to date. In the last decade, Turkish government policy towards the predominantly Kurdish south-east region has shifted from military intervention to gendered and socio-economic development. Simultaneously, the popularity and growth of a formal pro-Kurdish political movement has given the campaign for Kurdish rights an institutionalized voice and stronger role in regional affairs. The primary work of both the Turkish national government and local pro-Kurdish municipality of late has focused on women. Drawing on historical analysis and participant observation of development activities, I describe the symbolic and physical role women play in the contemporary Kurdish Question. Geographically, this pointed focus on women marks a territorialization of political power upon gendered spaces of the home and neighbourhood. I describe this process of territorialization through an examination of education curriculum, neighbourhood mapping and nationalist landscapes.     

Letter to the Editor

Abstract

The last decade has seen an increasing awareness of the global impacts on our environment of modern technological civilization. To understand and deal with these impacts, we need to develop a science of the biosphere – a science that views life on the Earth from a planetary perspective. Recent scientific and technical advances make this science possible now. These advances include the development and testing of satellite remote sensing of Earth resources; advances in computer-based data acquisition, storage, analysis and dissemination; development of interdisciplinary efforts among scientists who recognize the need for this science; and the development of mathematical theory and computer simulation methods appropriate for the study of the biosphere. This review describes the basic needs for this new science and the advances which make the science possible.