Land use change in Northeast China in the twentieth century: a note on sources,methods and patterns

Studies of historical change in cultivated land use in Northeast China have become important in the discussion of food supply safety and the reconstruction of land use/cover changes in China. This paper subjects a number of sources relating to land use change in the three provinces of Northeast China to comparative analysis. The data examined include Russian survey data (1914), data from local and regional Chinese governments during the Republic of China (1931), data from the Japanese Society of Manchuria Railway (SMR) for 1940 and various sets of contemporary Chinese data for the second half of the 20th century. A unified method of reconstructing the data and estimating the rate of cultivated land use change in Northeast China during the 20th century is developed here. A relational model is proposed for this purpose. It establishes a general framework for relating the various sets of data generated in different time periods and indicates ways in which the data have to be calibrated to ensure their comparability. The calibration of the data involves correlation and regression analysis. The results of the comparative analysis show that the area of and rate of change in cultivated land use in Northeast China increased until the last decade of the twentieth century. Increase rates were particularly high between 1914–1931 and 1950–1960.     

Regeneration and mobility: the spatial dynamics of industries in wartime Shanghai

During the three-month long Sino-Japanese hostilities in the summer of 1937, Shanghai industries suffered the heaviest loss ever sustained during any previous military conflict in the city. Yet as has been shown in a previous study, local industries seem to have recovered fairly quickly. All statistics point to a return to pre-war levels of production in most sectors by the end of 1938 in some cases and during 1939 for most industrial branches. The purpose of this paper is to try to highlight the spatial dynamics at work in this recovery process. It relies not just on original sources, but on the unique capabilities GIS offers in processing large amounts of historical data and exploring connected issues in land use, demography, and urban life. The paper argues that Shanghai industries went through a thorough phase of relocation and migration within the city, but also of inbound migration from the surrounding regions. This study is based on a particular set of documents produced by the Shanghai Municipal Council, the largely independent body that administered the International Settlement. In this study, therefore, I shall argue that what happened in the territory of the International Settlement mirrored what happened next door and possibly in other parts of the Chinese-administered/Japanese-occupied areas. Beyond the issue of industrial movement, this paper also examines connected issues in land use, demography, and urban life.     

承续与建构：近年来国内马克思主义政治哲学研究综述

近年来,马克思主义政治哲学研究的广度与深度都有了较大的发展,为这一分支学科的建立和发展提     

Spatial processes and politics of renewable energy transition: Land,zones and frictions in South Africa

This paper seeks to make a contribution to on-going debates about how to conceptualise the spatial processes of renewable energy transition. It makes a case for understanding renewable energy transitions as simultaneously spatial and political processes, constitutive of new territories and configuring development pathways. Drawing on a case study of South Africa's Renewable Energy Independent Power Procurement Programme (REI4P), the paper explores the ways in which energy transitions are intrinsically bound up with both the materiality and the historical and contemporary politics of land. It then examines the relationship between energy transitions and territory to conceptualise the ways in which transitions take on an experimental shape in the form of 'zones'. The paper argues that these zones are new territories deploying forms of spatial and political-administrative exceptionality, which allow political and economic actors to exercise authority and commercial power. Two types of zone emerging from South Africa's energy transition exemplify these processes: legally-defined zones for the development of solar and wind energy and zones of socioeconomic development required by REI4P. The paper explores the spatial and political consequences of these strategies and suggests that these may not necessarily translate into conflict and confrontation, but instead produce uneasy co-existences of different political, social and spatial projects and interests, with potential to create new polities.     

Indigenous politics in the Australian Journal of Political Science: A review

This article reviews the slow emergence of writing on Indigenous issues and power in the journal over its first fifty years. It notes that most of this writing is by non Indigenous authors about issues that are thought to effect Indigenous lives. More contributions by Indigenous authors would be useful and will hopefully occur with growing numbers of Indigenous post-graduate students.     

Using toponymy to reconstruct past land use: a case study of ‘brüsáda’ (burn) in southern Switzerland

Toponyms are frequently the outcome of a creative process, a subjective interpretation by the local inhabitants at the time of naming. They often survive changes in the local landscape, thus becoming historical documents of landscape dynamics or changes in land use. In this contribution we provide a systematic synchronic analysis of the toponym brüsáda (burn) in Canton Ticino. In total, 182 instances of place names containing brüsáda were recorded, of which 102 cases (56.0%) were localised. Based on oral information provided by the local people or on archival documents, it was possible to group the selected toponyms into different meaning classes such as burnt building, exposed sites, pasture-land and others without any indication (classified here as generic). On the basis of etymological, topographic, documentary, bibliographic, and historic evidence, as well as proxy-archives (such as charcoal in lake sediments), we hypothesise that most of the toponyms associated with pasture-land – and probably also a large portion of the generic toponyms – are directly or indirectly related to the habit of using fire to clear brushwood to improve pasture-land or to eliminate trees. In the study area, the practice of pasture-fires appears to have been a very well controlled and targeted activity in medieval times. In contrast, pasture-fires became very frequent and uncontrolled in the second half of the nineteenth century up until the Second World War. Our study confirms the usefulness and suitability of toponymy, in combination with other disciplines, for ecohistorical reconstructions of past environmental and land-use changes.     

从《吏民田家莂》看汉代田税的征收方式

简牍表明,孙吴把国有土地按质量分为“熟田”、“旱田”两类租给农民,征收不同标准的田租,其“熟田”、“旱田”的数额是人为地“定”出来的而非依据土地质量的自然状况而统计出来的数量;东汉自章帝以后把土地“差为三品”而税之,吴简的问世,间接地证明了东汉土地分为三等之后是分别征以不同数额的田税;孙吴的“熟田”、“旱田”之分是东汉田分三等的发展,尽管租、税性质不同,但方式一致。     

《泰山雅泳》：——《永乐大典》中的泰山佚书

新近发现：在现存《永乐大典》残卷中,收录一种泰山佚书——《泰山雅泳》。《大典》共录存其书之诗十首。本对以上十诗逐一作了考察,并在此基础上,对《雅袜》的成书时代、编撰人员以及其书所具认识价值,提出了自己的见解。     

Archaeology in the Context of War: Legal Frameworks for Protecting Cultural Heritage during Armed Conflict

International law provides for a framework for protecting cultural heritage during armed conflict and for punishing those who transgress these principles. If understood within its limitations of dependence on state ratification and enforcement, international law protects cultural heritage by providing guidelines to those who wish to conform and by punishing after the fact those who deliberately destroy cultural heritage. Recent movement toward ratification of the 1954 Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict and its protocols by the major military powers should afford greater protection to cultural heritage in future conflicts.     

晚清政府的非洲华侨政策：评价与反思

针对晚清非洲华侨政策的研究中几个争议较大或有所不足的问题,提炼出三个总体观点：客观成效不能完全否定主观努力;个体不能代替整体;招工费的具体分析。认为在对非洲华侨政策上,晚清政府已经表现出了一定的主动性和进步性,如对主权的意识,对国际法的重视,对华民称呼的改变,部分出于对民生的关注而主动输出劳务,在外交上的主动争取等等。但限于国力和关注重点以及外交技巧上的多重束缚,晚清政府的非洲华侨政策其客观效果并不能令人满意。     

乾隆初年政府职能扩展的几个例证

世界历史在18世纪出现了罕见的“共时现象”,其中最明显的就是政府职能的扩展。但在中国,相比之下这段历史却不太为人注意。本文力图展示乾隆初年清代政府在劝农、兴修水利和开矿几个方面的所作所为。如果说,在18 世纪的西欧,政府职能扩展已属于一种“现代现象”,那么我们又应如何看待中国的这段历史?     

Population Distribution and Spatial Structure in Transitional Chinese Cities: A Study of Nanjing

Two geographers use population surface model techniques to analyze the distribution of population in Chinese cities. Focusing on Nanjing, they utilize detailed urban land use and building distribution data to develop a productive alternative method to reveal spatial variations in the distribution of inhabitants. The findings indicate that despite suburbanization, Nanjing remains a compact city with a population density that declines rapidly as distance from its central business district increases. Also, suburbanization has been limited to an inner area where population is densely distributed while commercial and office development is less prominent. Lastly, commercial activities influence the distribution of urban inhabitants and suburbanization more significantly than industrial development in suburbia. Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: O15, O18, R12, R14. 9 figures, 3 tables, 37 references.     

‘We Live Like This’: Local Inequalities and Disproportionate Risk in the Context of Extractive Development and Climate Change on New Hanover Island,Papua New Guinea

This study examines the local processes, effects, and responses to large‐scale logging and agricultural development efforts in subsistence communities on New Hanover Island, Papua New Guinea (PNG). Recently, New Hanover became the site of three special agricultural and business leases (SABLs) that combined to cover approximately 79% of the island. The proliferation of SABLs within PNG is an outcome of recent national development initiatives promoting a significant increase in the production of commercial agricultural crops such as oil palm and biofuel. Accordingly, SABLs are designed to facilitate the development of long‐term commercial agricultural industries in rural locations across the country through the conversion of forested lands and the simplification of communal land tenure, for the purposes of private lease. However, SABLs have simultaneously provided a convenient loophole around more restrictive national forestry policies and thereby become attractive to traditional logging interests in the Asian/Pacific region. Consequently, many SABLs across PNG have failed to produce viable agricultural development or broad local benefit. It is within this context, that this study pays particular attention to the experiences of women and lower‐status landowners living through the processes of SABL conversion, during the El Nino drought of 2015. The study details the statuses and roles of these groups within the overall development process, the ways in which their social relationships changed in the context of development, why these groups were particularly vulnerable to the broad livelihood effects of forest conversion and drought, how they adapted to these effects, and what their hopes were regarding the future of the development project and life on the island. This study adds to current theoretical interests on emerging neoliberal frontiers of land and resource control by examining these SABL landscapes on New Hanover as contemporary examples of land grabs and documenting the very real local level consequences of this phenomenon. The study is also particularly significant in light of the growing threats to forests and forest‐dependent livelihoods and the recognition of the importance of local forest practices to global sustainability.     

From ethnographic knowledge to anthropological intelligence: An anthropologist in the office of strategic services in Second World War Africa

This article explores the overlapping modalities and practical purposes of anthropological ethnographic knowledge and political–military intelligence gathering – the commonalities as well as the boundaries between them – through an analysis of the career of the anthropologist Jack Sargent Harris (1912–2008), a secret operative for the United States’ Office of Strategic Services during the Second World War in Nigeria and South Africa. Calling upon archival and oral historical sources, the article relates Harris’s training in Boasian cultural anthropology and as a professional ethnographer of African societies and cultures to the ways he recruited informants, conducted surveillance, related to foreign Allied officials, utilized documentary evidence, and worked to establish authority and credibility in his wartime intelligence reporting. The article argues that political purpose is a central artefact of anthropological ethnography as it is in other ethnographic modalities even if the justifications for these endeavours remain distinct.     

建国初期国家农贷的历史考察——以中南区为中心

国家银行业务在农村的延伸是新中国乡村借贷关系转型和现代化的标志之一。建国初期,为了活跃农村金融,促进农村经济的恢复与发展,国家大力举办了农贷。这一时期,国家农贷在规模上是逐年增加的,在发放对象上倾向照顾农村合作经济组织和广大贫困农民,在贷款利率上有逐年下降的趋势,在贷款用途上绝大部分是为了解决农民的生产困难。总体上看,国家农贷作为建国初期人民政府扶持和发展农村经济的重要措施之一,对当时农民的生产经营和农村经济的发展发挥了重要作用,但也存在一定的缺陷和不足。     

Practical Knowledge in the Viking Age: the use of mental templates in clinker shipbuilding

It has long been recognized that ships built according to the Nordic clinker tradition during the Viking Age were conceived and constructed simultaneously by eye, in a shell‐first manner, and using rules‐of‐thumb to control both the longitudinal and transversal shape of the hull. While a lot of attention has been paid to the conceptual definition of the keel and stems, far less research has explored how such rules would have worked while planking the hull. Two cargo‐ships, Skuldelev 3 and Skuldelev 1, are used to argue for pre‐design and the use of mental templates. This highlights a cognitive dimension of practical knowledge, in particular how it was accumulated, stored and transmitted.     

Mining Archaeology and Micro‐Raman Analysis Associated with ESEM‐EDX: Toward a Chrono‐Spatial Definition of Ore Consumption in a Pyrenean Medieval Workshop, 14th–16th Centuries

The rapid expansion of non‐ferrous metallurgy in the late Middle Ages (14th–15th centuries) enhanced ore demand, which was supported by mining intensification. Metallurgical workshops developed various supply strategies based on geological, political and economic constraints. This is particularly true for the Pyrenean multi‐metals workshop of Castel‐Minier (Ariège, France), where recent excavations unearthed an exceptional corpus of non‐ferrous ores. A specific analytical methodology combining micro‐Raman spectroscopy and environmental scanning electron microscopy with energy dispersive X‐ray (ESEM‐EDX) was set up to study these artefacts. This composite methodology permitted the fast characterization of both mineral and gangue as well as a discussion of their economic potential. Ores identified were compared with ancient mines in neighbouring mining districts in order to sketch a geography of the mineral resources available to medieval metallurgists. Moreover, a chrono‐stratigraphic study of ore distribution in Castel‐Minier revealed the supply strategies, technological choices as well as spatializing of copper and lead metallurgies.     

The origins of agriculture in North-West Africa: macro-botanical remains from Epipalaeolithic and Early Neolithic levels of Ifri Oudadane (Morocco)

This research aims to shed light on the early stages of agricultural development in Northern Africa through the analysis of the rich macro-botanical assemblages obtained from Ifri Oudadane, an Epipalaeolithic–Early Neolithic site from North-East Morocco. Results indicate the presence of domesticated plants, cereals (Hordeum vulgare, Triticum monococcum/dicoccum, Triticum durum and Triticum aestivum/durum) and pulses (Lens culinaris and Pisum sativum) in the Early Neolithic. One lentil has been dated to 7611 ± 37 cal BP representing the oldest direct date of a domesticated plant seed in Morocco and, by extension, in North Africa. Similarities in both radiocarbon dates and crop assemblages from Early Neolithic sites in Northern Morocco and the Iberian Peninsula suggest a simultaneous East to West maritime spread of agriculture along the shores of the Western Mediterranean. Wild plants were abundantly collected in both the Epipalaeolithic and the Early Neolithic periods pointing to the important role of these resources during the two periods. In addition to fruits and seeds that could have been consumed by both humans and domesticated animals, fragments of esparto grass (Stipa tenacissima) rhizomes have been identified. This is a western Mediterranean native plant that may have been used as a source of fibres for basketry.     

The ‘Society’ at Bora Ceremonies: A Manifestation of a Body of Traditional Law and Custom in Aboriginal Australia relevant to Native Title Case Law

Anthropologists working on native title cases in Australia are commonly asked to identify the Aboriginal ‘society’ that holds the body of laws and customs that confer land ownership rights on certain groups of people. In this paper I investigate how the early documentation of bora initiation ceremonies is relevant to understanding contemporary Aboriginal societies and the normative laws and customs that give rise to rights and interests in land. The vast ethnographic oeuvre of R.H. Mathews (1841–1918) includes detailed documentation of bora gatherings, which allows the reconstruction of the wider social reaches of people's networks in the lower Darling Downs of eastern Australia, and can in turn be understood as the ‘society’ so often sought in current native title case law.