Public Policy and the Idea of the Vietnamese State: The Cultural Political Economy of Domestic Water Supply

Using Rural Water Supply (RWS) policy practices as a case study, this article shows that the disjunction between implementation as formally conceived and informally practised is not a question of ineffective policy cycle dynamics, but rather an inherent feature of Vietnam’s Cultural Political Economy. Drawing on critical realist approaches to social and state theory, we argue that formal and informal RWS policy practices, as a set of two interconnected spheres, serve as key, separate but connected, mechanisms for reproducing the distribution of material resources (primarily through the informal sphere) and the hegemony of ideas (primarily through the formal sphere) in Vietnamese society. We conclude that the formal, administrative practices of RWS policy are primarily to be understood in their function of reproducing the idea of the state and state legitimacy. RWS administrative practices function to sustain the core social and political order in Vietnam as institutionalised in “the state”, rather than being primarily oriented to improving rural water supply. The findings raise questions for donor-supported programs that focus on formal administrative institutions and practices for improving the performance of the water sector.     

Supply routes and the consumption of glass in first millennium CE Butrint (Albania)

Archaeological, historical and analytical evidence can identify trade patterns and the movement of people and products and thus reveal the cultural and economic connections that existed at a given time. In the case of first millennium CE glass, the manufacture of raw glass in a limited number of glass making installations with unique compositional characteristics makes it possible to trace the likely origin of the raw materials at consumption sites. In this way the analytical characterisation of a large corpus of glass finds can identify changes in the supply routes of high-end industrial products from the Roman to the middle Byzantine period.     

Image et Sciences Sociales

Contrary to oral interviews, statistics or primary sources in print, the use of film does not occupy an important place in the training of social scientists. Yet, as this article argues, before film and video can become standard data gathering tools, social scientists need to reflect on the ways filming techniques are taught. To do so, this article offers an account of a filming course taught for several years to third year students at the university of Tours.     

Fatherless children and Accouchement sous X,from marriage to demarriage: a paradigmatic approach

The author proposes a paradigmatic approach to the construction of fatherless, abandoned, and/or motherless children as social issues needing some policy responses: within the different historical Western configurations of the repertoire of potential responses, major organizing paradigms draw the line between those responses that are rejected as belonging to the supreme evil sphere and others that can be considered as lesser evils. Within the framework of a paradigm, dilemmas exist and debates go on as to which lesser evils should be preferred and how the policies should be implemented. Policies deriving from different paradigms give rise to intractable controversies since the disagreements concern not only the means but also the ends. Four paradigms can be extracted from the historical data with regard to illegitimacy and single motherhood: Christian angelism, Malthusian angelism, healthy citizenship, and proper citizenship.     

COMMERCIAL AND SOCIAL SIGNIFICANCE OF GLASS BEADS IN MIGRATION-PERIOD ITALY: THE CEMETERY OF CAMPO MARCHIONE

Migration-period glass beads from Italy are an overlooked source of evidence. This investigation discusses the provenance, economic value and social significance of glass beads from the cemetery of Campo Marchione, northern Italy (c.570 to the end of the seventh century AD). The different chemical compositions and specific forming technologies have identified European, Egyptian, Mesopotamian and Asian specimens. The wider contextualization of the beads in association with other grave goods and the sex and age of the deceased has yielded important insights into the economic, social and cultural significance beads held in Italy, acting as markers of long-distance exchange.     

Chemical characterisation of glass mosaic tesserae from sixth-century Sagalassos (south-west Turkey): chronology and production techniques

Little is known about the origin, supply pattern and production technology of Byzantine glass mosaic tesserae. In this study, we have analysed forty-eight glass tesserae from Sagalassos (Asia Minor) of different colours and from two archaeological contexts that were stratigraphically dated to the sixth century CE. The main aim was to identify the raw materials, colourants and opacifiers as well as secondary working practices that are reflected in the composition (EPMA, LA-ICP-MS analyses) and the microstructure (XRD, SEM-BSE) of the tesserae. The set of samples retrieved from the Roman Baths complex at Sagalassos is compositionally very homogeneous, representing possibly a single commission, and can be tentatively dated to the late Roman period. In contrast, the assemblage associated with the construction of a Byzantine church around the turn of the sixth century CE is more diverse, suggesting that these tesserae were produced from more than one silica source. This highlights a diversification in the supply and manufacture of glass tesserae during the Byzantine period.