A Strategic Framework for Monitoring Coastal Change in Australia's Wet-dry Tropics – Concepts and Progress

A strategic framework for monitoring natural and human-induced change in the coastal plains of the Alligator Rivers Region in the wet-dry tropics of northern Australia is presented. The framework also supports refinement of methods used to monitor the vulnerability of coastal areas to change, including human-induced climate change and sea-level rise. The information derived through the framework can be used to assess scenarios, highlight the potential significance and implications of changes, and assist land managers formulate management responses. The framework incorporates several large-scale studies for monitoring atmospheric and hydrodynamic processes as well as mapping and monitoring projects specific to environmental change in the freshwater wetlands and the floodplains of the Region. Monitoring is proposed to address processes influencing the stability and rate of change of the floodplain environments. These include large-scale processes, such as inter-annual variability in weather conditions affecting the morphology of the coastal plains, shoreline and riverbank stabilisation, headward expansion of tidal creeks, and salinisation of freshwater basins. Information management is also addressed, and a Geographic Information System structure proposed for effective data collation, analysis and management. The information management system will facilitate data sharing and participation of multiple agencies and organisations interested in coastal change, especially where a landscape perspective or whole ecosystem approach is advocated.     

World government and empire: the international historian as theorist

International history and International Relations have long been held separate, partly by misunderstanding and partly by mistrust. Three recent books, Marc Trachtenberg's Craft of international history , Paul Kennedy's The parliament of man and Niall Ferguson's The war of the world , suggest that the divide between history and theory is not as severe as it sometimes appears. This review article examines, through the histories of Kennedy and Ferguson, Trachtenberg's insistence that historians should be more attentive to the 'conceptual cores' of their work and that theorists should become better historians than they have been hitherto. It concludes by arguing that, in methodological terms at least, history and theory are not the distinct enterprises they are commonly taken to be.     

'Advice is judged by results, not by intentions': why Gordon Brown is wrong about Africa

Chancellor Gordon Brown has declared that 2005 will be a milestone in the United Kingdom's campaign to meet the UN Millennium Goals. Owing to Britain's chairmanship of both the G8 and the European Union in 2005, Brown believes that an opportunity to raise the continent's star in global politics presents itself. This comes after the launch in 2004 of the Blair Commission for Africa and a recent spate of high profile interventions by assorted politicians and famous musicians. It also follows a trend begun at the G8 meetings where Africa is placed on the G8 agenda. Such an interest in the continent is to be welcomed. Yet this article contends that Gordon Brown's assumptions regarding Africa's troubles, and the ingredients found within his proposals, are mistaken and need rethinking. The article argues that Brown's approach to Africa's problems is based on incomplete information or a misreading of the situation, and by default may serve to prolong Africa's crises rather than alleviate them.     

China and the United States: a succession of hegemonies?

This article critically reviews the suggestion that we are experiencing a ‘succession of hegemonies’ from the United States to China. It develops Martin Wight's writings on hegemony, and introduces a fundamental distinction (not made by Wight) between a power transition and a hegemonic succession. Wight held complex views about the nature of power and at times seemed to subscribe to a purely materialist account. Elsewhere he was more nuanced and appealed to the purpose of dominant states as part of his argument that influence does not correlate exactly with mass and weight. This suggestion is developed in the author's view of hegemony—as distinct from primacy—as denoting a legitimate practice within international society. These ideas are then superimposed upon current debates about a power transition, or a succession of hegemonies, as between the United States and China. The existing debate conflates those two issues. Accordingly, while it can readily be acknowledged that there are important indicators of a shift in the material distribution of power, this in no way amounts, as yet, to any kind of hegemonic succession. For the latter to occur, there would need to be clear evidence of an effective socialization of the aspirant hegemon's purpose and support for its preferred order. On the contrary, to date China has been largely content to operate within existing frameworks, rather than instigate a revision of them, and does not yet present a model for emulation elsewhere. It is possible that a power transition, without any hegemonic succession, could be corrosive of global governance.