Animal Electricity at the End of the Eighteenth Century: The Many Facets of a Great Scientific Controversy

In the 1790s, Luigi Galvani and Alessandro Volta were the main protagonists of a lively debate on the role of electricity in animal organisms. Significant developments originated from this debate, leading to the foundation of two new disciplines, electrodynamics and electrophysiology, that were to play a crucial role in the scientific and technological progress of the last two centuries. The Galvani-Volta controversy has been repeatedly reconstructed, sometimes in an attempt to identify the merits and the errors of one or the other of the two protagonists, sometimes with the aim of demonstrating that the theories elaborated by the two Italian scholars were irreconcilable, reflecting completely different ways of looking at phenomena and conceiving of scientific research. In this article a different interpretation is offered, based on a discussion of the scientific issues that were central to Galvani's and Volta's research, and with reference to the context of science and society of the eighteenth century.     

经济伦理学及其在我国之研究

经济伦理学作为本世纪下半叶在西文工业发达国家迅速兴起的一个学术研究领域,由于其特殊的应用价值,逐渐成为近十年来我国学术界广泛关注的一个理论热点。本文着重阐述经济伦理学产生的社会背景、研究的基本问题及春在我国的研究、发展状况。     

Ethics and the Party Brand: The Case of the Office of Congressional Ethics

Dating back to its creation in 2008, the independent Office of Congressional Ethics (OCE) has faced criticism from the very members of Congress it is tasked with investigating. Despite this criticism, a majority of House members both voted to create OCE in 2008 and have ultimately backed away from any efforts to rein in the office. Why? Through an examination of both the passage of OCE in 2008 and subsequent efforts to rein in its power, this article argues that partisan considerations and pressure from party leaders played a critical role in OCE's creation and survival. The creation of the independent commission in the House thus demonstrates the power of the party valence brand in the contemporary Congress.     

孟德斯鸠对“礼仪之争”的解读

礼仪之争传入欧洲后,引起法国知识菁英的广泛关注。孟德斯鸠至迟自1713年起就关注礼仪之争,但他并不介入其中,而是冷眼旁观。他阅读了当时有关中国的绝大多数主要著作,还曾与来自中国的黄嘉略和自中国返回欧洲的傅圣泽进行长谈,从阅读和谈话中汲取了大量的信息,作出了对礼仪之争的解读。他认为,礼仪之争是一场无谓的争论,基督教在中国受挫是必然的结果,他独具特色的中国观在此基础上形成。他对中国持冷峻的态度,褒贬兼具,既肯定中国的某些优点,更严厉斥责中国的种种弊端,并断然将中国定性为专制主义。     

The Silent Missiles of Guadalcanal: Magic as Rhetoric in the Sandline Controversy

In February of 1997, Sir Julius Chan, then Prime Minister of Papua New Guinea, hired mercenaries from the Sandline Corporation to help fight the Bougainville Revolutionary Army. This act would create a distinct controversy in PNG, with the firing of the head of the PNGDF, General Singirok, a threatened coup d'etat, followed by public protests in Port Moresby and the eventual resignation of Chan. While these events were taking place, I was conducting field work in neighbouring Solomon Islands, specifically in Guadalcanal. The Vaturanga, among whom I lived during this period, took an especial interest in this controversy. They even believed that they themselves were playing a part in it, through forms of magic or sorcery, known locally as riana pupuku and poke sosolo. Guadalcanal has been renowned for its sorcery for many decades. But with modernization and its attendant institutions and patterns, these and other forms of magic have been reinterpreted by the Vaturanga and used as a sort of commentary about the economic, social and political changes they have experienced. This work explores the transnational aspects of the Sandline Controversy from the perspective of Guadalcanal Islanders and probes how this consciousness would play a role in the emergence of conflict in Guadalacanal eighteen months later.     

Exploring the Frontier of Livelihoods Research

This article discusses the value of livelihoods studies and examines the obstacles which have prevented it from making a greater contribution to understanding the lives of poor people over the past decade. After examining the roots of the livelihoods approach, two major challenges are explored: the conceptualization of the problem of access, and how to achieve a better understanding of the mutual link between livelihood opportunities and decision‐making. The article concludes that access to livelihood opportunities is governed by social relations, institutions and organizations, and that power is an important (and sometimes overlooked) explanatory variable. In discussing the issue of access to livelihood opportunities, the authors note the occurrence of both strategic and unintentional behaviour and the importance of structural factors; they discuss concepts of styles and pathways, which try to cater for structural components and regularities; and they propose livelihood trajectories as an appropriate methodology for examining these issues. In this way, the article also sets the agenda for future livelihoods research.     

美国史学界有关奴隶制起源的争论

美国的历史学在有关美国奴隶制的起源问题上的争论断断续续地已经进行了一个多世纪。争论的主要问题包括英属北美殖民地黑人奴隶制确立的时间、黑人奴隶制确立的原因以及奴隶制与种族主义的关系。鉴于这个问题涉及问题的广泛性,澄清美国奴隶制的起源,对于理解美国殖民地初期的种族关系乃至当代美国的种族问题具有重要的学术价值和现实意义。本的主要目的在于,对争论各方的主要观点进行梳理和比较,将百年来美国学围绕这一问题的争论概况介绍给国内的学界,以期促进中国学对这一问题更为深入的研究。