Land Tenures as Policy Instruments: Transitions on Cape York Peninsula

Over the last four decades, Australia's most remote marginal lands have provided an expansive space towards realisation of emergent national goals, involving recognition of Aboriginal land rights together with protection of ‘wilderness’ and semi‐natural ecosystems. This has been achieved by the revival of land tenures as instruments for the delivery of public policy, requiring innovative federal and state legislation, often driven by judicial determinations. More so than any other bioregion, Cape York Peninsula has experienced radical shifts in landownership, land titles, and property rights, reflecting its pivotal role as an arena in which emerging national goals are contested. The most immediately visible evidence of these changes is depicted in the tenure maps for 1970, 1990, and 2010. However, these maps provide an incomplete account of tenure changes, including new titles such as non‐transferable communal freehold and common‐law recognition of traditional native title, requiring belated responses by state and federal governments. The three benchmark maps provide a starting point for an examination of the currently resurrected role of land titles and land rights as policy instruments. The time‐specific attributes of each tenure category are discussed and linked to the policies underpinning each tenure and to the communities, political constituencies, resources, enterprises, and national values engaged with each tenure. Land titles and land rights are pivotal in political contests about regional futures, with the peninsula acting as a crucible in shaping wider national directions.     

Easter and the Battle of Pollentia

Interest in the battle of Pollentia in recent years has been confined to the issue of dating the year in which it occurred, the extent to which either Claudian or Prudentius, the two late Roman poets who mention it, depended on the other's work, and the significance of the battle in the political and military careers of its two chief protagonists, Stilicho, the Vandal regent of the emperor Honorius, and Alaric, the Visigothic leader and rebellious Roman agent. In this paper, I consider religion as a tactic in the conduct of the battle. We know from Orosius that it was fought at Easter, something for which he chastised Stilicho. While scholars refer to its Easter date and Vanderspoel has found Easter allusions in another of Claudian's poem written in the light of the battle, none has investigated the significance of the battle taking place at Easter. It is argued here that religious considerations were crucial in determining the moment of engagement and not just coincidental and that, by attacking Alaric at Easter, we have another indication of just how precarious Stilicho's position was.     

THE HISTORY OF THE BROOKHAVEN NATIONAL LABORATORY PROJECT IN ARCHAEOLOGICAL CHEMISTRY,AND APPLYING NUCLEAR METHODS TO THE FINE ARTS

This paper traces the events leading up to the formation of a project in 1954, in the Chemistry Department at Brookhaven National Laboratory, dedicated to the application of those new developments that were rapidly transforming postwar nuclear science to the parallel humanistic disciplines of archaeology and the fine arts. The further evolution of this effort involved the enlightened support of the Department of Energy (then AEC and ERDA) coupled with the lively interests of the archaeological, fine‐arts and art‐historical communities, their professional academics and the many graduate and undergraduate students who participated in the Brookhaven project. But more than new scientific methodologies, concepts and instrumentation were deployed. What developed was a large‐scale, truly interdisciplinary effort, where scholars of the humanities and sciences worked side by side in a remarkable way, each led by the other, to the mutual benefit and increase of their knowledge and understanding. A paradigm of co‐operation between arts and sciences was initiated: this paper presents a record of the process and its outcome, a novel blending of science and humanism that is very much taken for granted by research workers today.     

The strategic culture of the European Union: a progress report

This article re‐examines the EU's character and potential as a strategic actor, setting that analysis in the context of the debate on strategic culture. The definition of strategic culture as the political and institutional confidence and processes to manage and deploy military force, coupled with external recognition of the EU as a legitimate actor in the military sphere, lends itself to a reappraisal around four core questions. First, military capabilities: establishing a European strategic culture is vital in order to rationalize the acquisition of capabilities necessary for the range of humanitarian and peacekeeping tasks envisaged. Equally, without military capabilities, all talk of a strategic culture would ring hollow. This article discusses how much closer the EU has come to acquiring those essential capabilities. Second, while the EU has gained significant experience of, albeit limited, military/policing experiences and established a growing reputation and some credibility for ad hoc action, to what extent and in what quarters have these experiences engendered a sense of reliability and legitimacy for autonomous EU action? Third, given that so far operations in the Democratic Republic of Congo and the Balkans have depended on an integrated civil–military effort, do the policy‐making processes of the EU now ensure the appropriate level and depth of civil–military integration? Finally, considering that EU operations have been limited in time and scope, and that much of the EU's work in the Balkans has depended upon cooperation with NATO, what can be said of the evolving relationship between the EU and NATO?     

The United States and the Cyprus crisis of 1974

Based upon two recently published volumes of the Foreign Relations of the United States series of declassified diplomatic documents for the period of the Nixon and Ford presidencies, this article focuses upon the crisis which erupted in Cyprus in the summer of 1974 at the time of the transition between the two administrations. A Greek-sponsored coup on the island led to a Turkish invasion and the threat of war between two of America's NATO allies and culminated in the collapse of the Greek military junta and the de facto partition of Cyprus. Emphasis is placed upon the role of Henry Kissinger and his advisers in their efforts to defuse the crisis, efforts which were only partially successful. The conspiracy theories which surround the episode are found wanting and the limitations of the Anglo–American 'special relationship' highlighted.