THE LOGIC OF THE CONSTRUCTION OF RURAL POLITICS: POLITICAL DISCOURSES ON RURALITY IN NORWAY

Two competing discourses emerge from a careful reading of parliamentary debates in Norway on rural development. One regards rural values as intrinsic, while the other regards the rural as an actor in a play about economic growth. The 'growth' discourse has economic growth as its nodal point and fo-cuses on the freedom of an individual to establish a business wherever he or she wishes, and to migrate to any preferred destination. The 'intrinsic value' discourse places the value of rural settlements and cultures as its nodal point and focuses on allegedly forced migration, a nature-based economy, and local freedom of action. During the neoliberal period, starting about 1980 the strength of the intrinsic value discourse has been increasingly displaced by the growth discourse. The latter seems to match general social changes such as neoliberalism and globalization more than the former. However, analysing the fight between these two discourses is not exhaustive. A broader analytic perspective is needed if we want to understand the logic of how the meaning of rurality comes about. The meaning of rurality in Norwegian politics is made through the way the competing discourses link up to 'nondiscursive' topics that originate and evolve outside the discourses on Norwegian rural politics. We claim that topics which include economic safety and national identity/nation-state are more or less fundamental to understanding the logic of the production of the concrete discourses of rurality in Norwegian politics. We provide evidence that rural change is contingent not only on the meaning-making process in parliamentary debates, but on the way truth claims made by politicians are linked to general national and global issues.     

托勒密彩绘装饰与罗马彩绘装饰的比较实例：埃及图那-艾尔-葛贝尔的动物图案

2007年春天开罗大学和慕尼黑大学在Tunael—Gebel联合发掘,发现一个原始的罗马坟墓有一石顶,其形式如同金字塔,命名源于希腊某一铭文。这一小石灰石墓葬包含未发生变化的埃及埋葬风格。两个沉重的石灰和镀金木乃伊被安置于两个木棺中,其中一个有一木制锦缎屋顶。该木乃伊有五彩缤纷的玻璃镶嵌,双方的床都展示着华丽的宗教仪式场景色绘画ajoure-work（这些图像被木板分割）。部分埃及和希腊的70个护身符挂在床上,用石灰制成并刷成绿色。两个石灰雕像伊希斯（高38cm）被置于头部附近。雕像是利用周围的木桩加工成型的,然后涂上颜色。它们是一个明显的混合风格的实例。它们被加工成一个典型的希腊姿势,但仍然有一埃及背景。在传统的老埃及,光谱中的每一道颜色有特定象征意义。通过它可以读出背景的循环往复变化。例如,颜色变化从红色（祭品／敌人）-白（天狼星的位置）-黑色（看不见的东西）-绿色（再生）再次到地球上五彩缤纷的形式。这一统一已经在罗马时代瓦解。新的颜色如粉色的出现,白色王冠上画的黄色等等。埃及的象征意义似乎完全消失在罗马新的墓葬彩色装饰上。     

Creativity,Culture and Urban Strategies: A Fallacy in Cultural Urban Strategies

Two fields of knowledge have been of special importance for the emergence of culture-led urban planning in Norwegian cities: one concerns the understanding of the potential of culture as an economic driving force in urban regeneration, while the other focuses on the emergence of the concept of the “creative class” and has drawn attention to the importance of competence and creativity in urban development. Despite clear connections between the two fields, it may appear that false connections have been made in regeneration strategies in a number of cities. Based on analyses of the culture-led urban strategy of Kristiansand, a small Norwegian city, these knowledge fields are discussed and it is claimed that there seems to be a fallacy in how they are treated in the culture-led urban strategy. The fallacy concerns the way that creativity is equated with culture and further how theories about the emergence of the creative class are equated with a culture industry approach to urban planning. Questions are raised about the potential of culture industry strategies and it is argued that the potential for growth in small cities may not be as great as the public debate and research conducted in large metropolises might suggest.     

THE IMPACT OF MIXED LAND USE ON RESIDENTIAL PROPERTY VALUES*

ABSTRACT Contemporary European urban planning policies aim to mix land uses in compact neighborhoods. It is presumed that mixing land uses yields socioeconomic benefits and therefore has a positive effect on housing values. In this paper, we investigate the impact of mixed land use on housing values using semiparametric estimation techniques. We demonstrate that a diverse neighborhood is positively valued by households. There are various land use types that have a positive impact on house prices, e.g., business services and leisure. Land uses that are incompatible with residential land use are, among others, manufacturing and wholesale. It appears that households are willing to pay about 2.5 percent more for a house in a mixed neighborhood. We also show that there is substantial heterogeneity in willingness to pay for mixed land use. For example, only apartment occupiers are willing to pay for an increase in diversity, whereas households living in other house types are not willing to pay for diversity.     

Political economy and social legislation in Germany,ca 1870–1890

Summary

This article examines the nature of academic political theory in Britain in the post-war period, examining in particular the degree to which theorists were able to mount normative theoretical arguments. Traditionally, commentators such as Brian Barry and Perry Anderson have argued that political theory in this period was largely dead between 1945 and 1970 due to the impact of positivism, but I argue this is mistaken for two main reasons. First, it fails to distinguish between the different forms that positivism took in the post-war era. Thus although it is true many theorists tended to claim that moral and political values could (or should) not be discussed rationally, their reasons for doing so varied considerably. For while theorists such as A. J. Ayer and T. D. Weldon justified their positions theoretically, with arguments drawn from behaviourist social science or innovations made in linguistic philosophy, others, such as Ralf Dahrendorf and Anthony Crosland, argued that it was the perceived success of post-war welfare states or the alleged failure of political ideologies that made traditional political theory irrelevant. Second, following on from this, I argue that delineating more accurately how positivism actually operated helps to explain how political theorists were able to pursue their discipline normatively—albeit that few reacted to all aspects of positivism. Thus if some (such as Karl Popper) were more concerned to insist that political philosophy had something to say in practice, others (such as Michael Oakeshott), reacted more strongly against the proposition that human behaviour can be understood purely causally. Finally, I examine the impact of ordinary language philosophy on post-war political theory, and argue that rather than simply damaging the cause of normative political theory by encouraging a myopic concentration on the linguistic analysis of particular moral and political concepts, over the longer term its effects were much more positive, since it helped to focus attention on the irreducibly normative dimension of political concepts.     

War museums as agonistic spaces: possibilities,opportunities and constraints

ABSTRACT

Following the theorisation of museums as agonistic spaces and drawing on a comparative analysis of war museums located in various European countries, this paper argues that these institutions play complex and multi-layered roles beyond their obvious educational function. These not easily reconcilable roles act as major constraints upon the form and content of exhibitions and work against the adoption of an agonistic approach. However, the paper also argues that war museums are especially apt to become sites of political contestation able to engage with agonistic memory and unsettling counter-narratives. This is due in large part to the nature of the subject matter they deal with, as war and conflict lend themselves to being represented in ways that emphasise patriotic consensus but can also highlight dissent, contestation, multiple perspectives and alternative visions of society. Agonistic practices emerge when windows of opportunity open through a combination of top-down and bottom-up agency able to take advantage of particular socio-political circumstances or cultural developments. The paper also discusses a new exhibition on war memory planned for late 2018 in Essen, Germany and conceived as a strategic political intervention, which aims to communicate in an agonistic fashion with its audiences.