从环境史角度重读《英国工人阶级的状况》

从环境史角度重读《英国工人阶级的状况》,使我们认识到,恩格斯在书中充分揭示了工业革命时期英国城市的主要环境问题,即工人住所与工作场地的恶劣状况、河流污染和空气污染等,它们是伴随工业化、城市化而生的。在恩格斯看来,与此有关的灾难之所以集中在工人身上,与工厂主的唯利是图密不可分,也与爱尔兰人的生活习性有关。恩格斯的这一作提供了有关英国环境问题的珍贵史料和启发性观点,因而是英国环境史上的一部经典献。     

19世纪童工教育视域下的英国《工厂法》研究

英国是世界上第一个步入工业化的国家,肇始于十八世纪六七十年代的工业革命使英国的生产力得到了飞速发展,早期工业化历程为英国创造辉煌篇章的同时也留下了黑暗的历史,雇佣童工现象便是其中一页。工厂制的确立使工厂主发现了童工在大机器生产中的价值。随着雇佣童工现象趋于合法化、普遍化,童工在恶劣的工作环境下因缺乏教养所带来的问题引发了社会人士和政府的关注。本文以各个时期的《工厂法》针对童工教育立法过程为主线,重点描述英国从自由放任到国家干预教育特征下的贫童问题立法过程,揭示童工教育责任转移下的时代特征和意义。     

工业化时期英国地产代理制度透视——兼与中世纪庄官组织相比较

工业化时期,英国形成了以大地产为主的土地结构。由于享受城市生活、参与政治、处理地产上日益增多的事务的需要,地主因袭中世纪以来土地管理方面的庄官制度,发展出地产代理制度。一般而论,代理人负责勘查地产,管理地产经济,定期向地主汇报地产事务,参与教区社会活动。地主则选拔代理人选,干预代理人的经营策略,对地产事务发挥间接的影响。代理人、地主相互协调,使工业化时期英国农业经济的运行趋于高效。     

英国工业化时期的农业技术革新

英国的资本主义工业化开始于18世纪60年代,实现于19世纪60年代。在整个工业化时期内,英国的农业也发生了巨大而深刻的变化。这个变化,一方面表现为通过圈地运动的加速进行使农村中资本主义土地所有制得以最终确立,另一方面则表现为农业生产技术的重大改良和革新。本文打算专门来探讨一下英国工业化时期内农业生产技术方面改良和革新的情况。     

19世纪英国食品安全问题——兼谈恩格斯的《英国工人阶级状况》

食品安全关系到一个国家和民族的生存,是目前中国和世界面临的一个严重的问题。在19世纪的英国,由于工业化和城市化进程的加快,大批工人涌入城市,英国的食品安全问题日益突出。     

英国工业化时期的犯罪问题及其社会成因

工业化时期,英国的犯罪与失序问题变得日益严峻,以盗窃、抢劫为主的财物犯罪尤为猖獗。盗窃的形式多种多样,被盗物品主要为生活用品。抢劫按风格不同可分为两类:一类是专门抢劫富商大贾的拦路大盗,另一类是以平民百姓为目标的普通劫掠。暴力犯罪的危害性主要体现在其对社会秩序形成的冲击,像"戈登暴乱"等群体性暴乱甚至一度导致政府机构的瘫痪。犯罪和失序问题的加剧与底层民众的赤贫化、生存环境的恶化密切关联。在急剧城市化的背景之下,日益庞大的流动人口在脱离乡村关系的同时却并未在陌生的城市环境中谋得稳定生计,许多人的境况反而变得更加无常和艰难。     

工业化初期英国社会流动的趋势和特点——以企业家集团的来源为例

英国工业革命时期企业家集团的形成、发展和壮大,是在工业化推动下英国社会阶层结构发生的重大变化。对这一新兴社会集团的阶层出身进行研究,能够揭示工业化早期英国社会流动的趋势和特点。在充分掌握关于工业革命时期英国企业家集团来源的计量研究成果基础上,借鉴社会学中有关社会阶层结构研究的方法,考察英国企业家集团起源所揭示的代际流动和代内流动趋势、先赋性因素和后致性因素在企业家创业成长中的影响,讨论工业化冲击下英国社会流动机制的变化,可以发现,在工业化早期,英国社会流动具有社会开放度提高、水平流动占主流、垂直流动跨度小、底层中等阶级面临向上和向下两种流动压力等四大特点。     

大农业不是英国农业和经济衰落的原因——与徐正林和郭豫庆同志商榷

18世纪中期以后英国大农业的兴起和发展,从历史实际看,不仅没有导致英国农业的衰落,相反使英国农业进入了一个黄金时期;不仅没有削弱英国工业发展的基础,相反有利于工业资本的积累和农村人口向城市的流动,极大地推动了英国工业化的发展。英国丧失工业霸主地位、走向相对衰落,有着复杂的、多方面的原因,不能简单地归因于大农业。在吸收国外的研究成果时,盲目照抄,或根据某种需要而随意剪裁历史的做法,都是不可取的。     

财富与贫困的悖论--论英国工业化的失误及其原因

英国是世界上第一个工业化国家,工业化带来了生产力的巨大飞跃和财富的急剧增加。但与此同时,在社会上延续已久的贫困现象并没有因此得到多少缓解,有时甚至还加剧了,这是一种财富与贫困的悖论。工业化时期的英国,这种悖论的存在,特别是工人阶级的贫困化对社会产生了严重的消极影响。财富与贫困的悖论,究其根源来说,是由“自由放任”式工业化道路所决定的,它构成了英国工业化的一个重大失误。当２０世纪上半叶英国真正认识到这一失误并逐步去纠正时,它已在这方面付出了沉重的代价,并为后发展国家提供了“前车之鉴”     

自救与互助:托马斯·查尔莫斯的济贫思想

英国工业化时期贫困问题较为严重,苏格兰社会活动家托马斯·查尔莫斯通过考察分析英国的贫困问题,提出了自己的济贫主张。与同时代主流济贫观不同,查尔莫斯强调自立和互助在脱贫中的作用。他认为,贫困阶层应改善自身的生活习性以减少新生贫困人口,贫困者还应重视自救认知和自立能力的培养,建立自愿原则下的地方互助体系。查尔莫斯的济贫思想对英国济贫法改革和欧美慈善救助产生了深远影响。     

Telling small stories: spaces of knowledge and the practice of geography

This article examines how the practice of learning geography, and the arenas in which knowledge-making takes place, can be usefully positioned within changing histories of the discipline. It contends that networks of action – understood through the intersection of social sites, subjects and sources – present a conceptual framework and narrative focus for the re-consideration of specific episodes from geography's past. The interventions made here are informed and illustrated by a 'small story' about the doing of geography. Based on different personal accounts, the story revives a series of events, encounters, dialogues and images dating back to the winter of 1951 at Glenmore Lodge, Scotland. This educational institution in the Cairngorm mountains offered children from urban areas the opportunity to learn field studies and the skills of 'outdoor citizenship'. Initially, the focus falls on Margaret Jack, a 14-year-old field-course participant. Her learning experiences are traced through personal letters, a diary and a field journal dating from that time, and her recent recollections of this event. Margaret's account dovetails with the story of her field studies instructor, Robin Murray. Robin's role is traced through his learning experiences as a geography undergraduate at Aberdeen University, and the recent recollections of Catriona Murray, his wife.     

Das Wissen der Schulden. Recht,Kulturtechnik und Alltagserfahrung im liberalen Kapitalismus

The Knowledge of Debt: Law, Media Technique, and Everyday Experience in Liberal Capitalism. Performing an object such as ‘the economy’ hinges on practices of formatting knowledge. The article proposes to look at such instituting moments in connection with social conflicts over the legitimate rules of exchange. This is exemplified by way of recounting the story of the codification of Swiss bankruptcy law in 1889. In order to homogenize the legal procedures of debt collection and bankruptcy, two subject categories were instituted: ‘merchants’ and ‘non-merchants’. These different categories were thought to account for the diverging temporalities and spaces of credit exchange in everyday economic life. The introduction of the commercial register, a media-technical apparatus, enabled a formal distinction between ‘merchants’ and ‘non-merchants’. However, this boundary was contested and proved to be porose.     

Two radiocarbon dates for freshwater shells from hierakonpolis: Archaeological and geological interpretations

Shells of two species of freshwater bivalve (Unio willcocksi Bullen Newton and Etheria elliptica Lamarck) from the predynastic Gerzean (Nagada II) Decorated Tomb at Hierakonpolis, Egypt have given dates of 5000±90 bp for the tomb, and 12,900±120 bp for an episode of Nile terrace accumulation (correlated here with the Sahaba-Darau aggradation event). The archaeological and geological significance of these results is discussed, together with an outline of problems associated with radiocarbon dating of shell. Comparisons are made with the few other radiocarbon dates available for the Predynastic period in Egypt and possible reasons for the presence of shells in the tomb are considered.     

Some chronological implications of a fossil molluscan assemblage from a neolithic site at Brook,Kent, England

The later post-glacial history of a valley in the chalk escarpment near Brook, Kent, is described, based on molluscan stratigraphy, archaeological evidence and radio-carbon dating. Differences in size and colour banding, respectively, of fossil and living representatives of two species of land snails, Pomatias elegans (Müller) and Cepaea nemoralis (L.), are correlated with climatic change during the post-glacial period. The problems of the use of fossil shells of these species as samples for radiocarbon dating are discussed.     

China's Dynamic Industrial Sector: The Internet Industry

A Singapore-based economic geographer explores and analyzes the spatially uneven evolution of the Internet industry in China, arguing that the country's immense regional disparity in the provision of Internet services is best explained by the interplay of place- and path-dependence. The author demonstrates how the highly uneven regional endowments in relevant industrial and entrepreneurial resources have led to the substantial and persistent regional imbalance within China's emerging "new economy." His initial survey of the country's 100 leading Internet content providers (firms), identified from a listing of ca. 11,700 commercial websites, is selectively augmented to reflect an increase of over 70 million Internet users in 2007, reaching a total of 253 million in June 2008, and thus overtaking the United States as the world's largest Internet market. Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: L10, L86, O30. 6 figures, 1 table, 53 references.     

The 1911 International Exposition in Rome: architecture, archaeology, and national identity

This paper discusses the 1911 International Exposition in Rome and illustrates how this patriotic celebration of the fiftieth anniversary of the Italian Sate utilized symbolic landscapes of architecture and archaeology to promote nationalist sentiments of italianità and romanità centered on the young capital of Rome. Through modern art exhibitions at the Valle Giulia, scientific conferences at the Castel Sant’Angelo, archaeological exhibits on the Roman Empire in the Baths of Diocletian, and regional Italian pavilions in the Piazza d’Armi, exposition officials offered a complex representation of Italian national identity that was modern yet ancient, cosmopolitan yet bucolic, European yet regional, and imperial yet developing.     

The Rise and Fall of Alexander the Great – The Need for Medical Analysis: Reply to Commentaries

Alexander the Great died in 323 B.C. from an unknown cause. By elucidating the nature of his death, we can better interpret various aspects of Alexandrian history. Alexander’s death may have ensued from the sequelae of a congenital scoliotic syndrome. It would therefore be of significance to note that one of the greatest leaders in history who conquered much of the then known world may have been suffering from a physical disability.     

The Chemists' Style of Thinking

Der Denkstil der Chemiker. Der Aufsatz diskutiert die Tragfähigkeit des Begriffes “Denkstil”, wie er von Alistair Crombie eingeführt und Ian Hacking aufgegriffen wurde, für das Verständnis dessen, wie das Fach Chemie historisch seine Identität ausgeprägt hat. Obwohl weder Crombie noch Hacking den Begriff “Denkstil” in Bezug auf einzelne Disziplinen verwendet haben, erscheint im Fall der Chemie seine Anwendung besonders vielversprechend, weil er hier hilft, ein zentrales Problem zu thematisieren – nämlich die Frage, wie es Chemikern trotz wechselnder Gegenstandsbereiche und theoretischer Umbrüche gelang, eine eigenständige und stabile Identität auszubilden. Nach einer Einführung in den Begriff “Denkstil”, argumentiert der Aufsatz, dass die Beständigkeit der Chemie als eines Faches wesentlich in ihren Laborpraktiken gründet, die ihrerseits wiederum die spezifische Art der Fragen bestimmten, die Chemiker in ihren Forschungen stellten bzw. die Form der Antworten, nach denen sie suchten. Folgende Merkmale kennzeichnen diesen “chemischen Denkstil” (1) eine spezifische, im Herstellen begründete Form des Wissens, (2) die Befassung mit einzelnen Stoffen und Materialien statt mit Materie im Allgemeinen und (3) eine Beobachtung von Natur besonders im Hinblick auf Transformationsprozesse. The Chemists' Style of Thinking. This paper discusses the relevance of the notion of “styles of scientific thinking” introduced by Alistair Crombie and revisited by Ian Hacking, for understanding how chemistry shaped its identity. Although neither Crombie nor Hacking applied this notion to individual disciplines, it seems appropriate to use it in the case of chemistry because it helps to address a puzzling issue: how did chemists manage to shape an identity of their own, despite shifting territories and theoretical transformations? Following a presentation of the notion of style, I will argue that the stable identity of chemistry is rooted in laboratory practices, which determined the specific questions that chemists put to nature as well as the answers to their questions. The “chemical style of thinking” is characterized by i) a specific way of knowing through making, ii) the concern with individual materials rather than matter in general and iii) a specific commitment to nature.