The importance of difference in the making of transnationality: biographies and networks of the Benedictine mission in Tanganyika (1922–65)

The Missionary Benedictines of Saint Ottilien were the first Roman Catholic mission house in imperial Germany. During the heyday of European imperialisms, colonialisms and Christian missions the monastic community began its engagement in ‘German East Africa’. To enable and promote its proselytization efforts in the imperial colony until the end of the Great War, the Missionary Benedictines had to respond to shifting political conditions and to rearrange their networks as and when required. This orientation became even more pronounced during the renewal of the Benedictine Mission in the British mandated territory of Tanganyika up until the Second Vatican Council and the political independence of Tanzania. From 1922 to 1965 at least 379 members of the Congregation lived and worked in Tanganyika. Their biographies were closely linked to the complex transboundary system of their religious community. This article will portray them as a highly institutionalized group of transnational actors. It argues that to maintain its activities and organizational structures, the leaders of the Benedictine Mission established a dynamic multi-level network connecting a variety of scales, spaces and actors. To ensure its continued existence under constantly changing conditions they constituted a hierarchic system of difference and diversity.     

Locational decision-making on a Scottish estate prior to enclosure

Before the main burst of agricultural improvements, taking place in Scotland in the latter part of the eighteenth century, farming was carried out from fermtouns; these were groupings of farmsteadings and their fields. This paper seeks to determine the factors underlying the decisions that were taken in the location of the farmsteads and the different elements into which the agricultural land was divided. Isolated for examination are the distance-decay function and natural environmental factors, basically those of soil conditions. The importance of natural soil drainage conditions appears to decide the location of both intensively and extensively cultivated land while in many cases the farmsteadings also lie closest to the permanent arable land. Definite statements about the decision-making process cannot, however, be made due to our present rudimentary understanding of the stability of settlement sites and the true origins of the infield-outfield system.     

Three visions of the bomb: Australian thinking about nuclear weapons and strategy

This article argues that, over the decades, Australians have held three different, coherent, long-lived ‘visions’ of nuclear weapons and strategy. Those visions—which we have labelled Menzian, Gortonian and disarmer—compete on four grounds: the role that nuclear weapons play in international order; the doctrine of deterrence; the importance of arms control; and the relevance of nuclear weapons to Australia's specific needs. We believe this ‘textured’ framework provides a richer, more satisfying, and more accurate understanding of Australian nuclear identity, both past and present, than previous scholarship has yielded. Moreover, the competition between the three visions might not be at an end. Changes in international norms, in proliferation rates, in regional strategic dynamics, or even in the deterrence doctrines of the major powers could easily reawaken some old, enduring debates. Australian nuclear identity faces an uncertain future.     

Measuring the Effects of Consensus-building Processes with Methods of Intervention Research

In recent years, both environmental policy and research have emphasized the importance of involving the public in decision-making. This push for more participation is driven by considerable optimism about its ability to improve the quality of decisions and developments. There is, however, a lack of empirical research to support this assumption. The few studies that have attempted to measure the effect of public participation are of limited validity, as they were based on ex-post data mainly gained from expert assessments or document analysis. This paper reports on a recent study to measure and compare the effect of two consensus-building processes in a systematic and reliable way. This involved developing a new evaluation method based on the methodology of intervention research in environmental psychology. It was tested and applied in this study with two similarly designed consensus-building processes conducted in two neighbouring valleys of the Eastern Swiss Alps. These evaluation experiments showed that (a) the new evaluation method can measure and compare the effects of consensus-building processes in a differentiated and reliable way; and (b) consensus-building processes have systematic and partly statistically significant effects (at least in the short term) on several aspects of regional consensus. The initial results suggest that this new evaluation method is a promising way of obtaining reliable evidence about the societal effects of participatory processes.     

Dating the Domestic Ceramics and Pipe Smoking Related Artifacts from Casselden Place, Melbourne, Australia

This paper compares the dates of manufacture obtained for the domestic ceramic and pipe smoking related artifact assemblages from Casselden Place, Melbourne. It has previously been argued that ceramic items, because of their potentially long use-lives, may be deposited many years after their date of manufacture and purchase. This is in contrast to pipe smoking related items, which tend to have very short use-lives. However, the results presented here demonstrate that there is no significant evidence for a time lag between the date of manufacture of the ceramic items and their incorporation into the archaeological record at Casselden Place.