Metelkova as Autonomous Heterotopia

This article examines conflicts concerning urban space, focusing on relationships between autonomous space and neoliberal urbanism through the empirical example of the cultural centre AKC Metelkova Mesto in Ljubljana, Slovenia. Through a thematic discourse analysis of activist interviews and collective statements by activist groups connected to Metelkova, research questions concern how urban conflict is constructed from the vantage point of autonomous space; what role autonomous space is assigned in relation to such conflict; and how tensions and antagonisms within the autonomous space can be understood. Theoretically we engage in a reinterpretation of the notion of heterotopia in conjunction with critical urban theory, analysing Metelkova as an autonomous heterotopia. Further, we argue that theoretisations of autonomous spaces need to consider experiences from Central and Eastern Europe, in which the conditions are shaped and constructed in conjunction with particular configurations of abruptly implemented neoliberal governance and the rise of the authoritarianism.     

Command Centre Bjorn: the conflict heritage of a Swedish Cold War military installation

This text presents the results of a contemporary archaeological investigation of an important Swedish Cold War installation, Command Centre Bjorn. This centre was connected to the Air Force Attack Squadron and together with the coastal artillery and the navy it constituted a crucial part of the Swedish defence efforts during the Cold War period. The text also discusses questions concerning heritage processes, and it stresses that a contemporary archaeology approach can contribute with new insights into the Cold War and its heritage in Sweden, as well as canalize and offer guidance to the huge public interest in the material remains from this period in Sweden.     

Editorial

In this article it is argued that men and women have been considered as "too old" in the labour market at an earlier age than people in general have been considered old, irrespectively of the actual biological life expectancy. The article discusses, first, farm servants in the old peasant society on the basis of the Swedish Hired Labour Acts, and, second, the migration restrictions imposed on elderly servants. The third point of discussion concerns age composition and wage by age of industrial workers in Finland at the turn of the 20th century, while the fourth point covers long-term unemployment in the 1930s and the introduction of old-age pension schemes. Some tentative explanations for the variation in the incidence of age discrimination over the past two centuries are suggested.     

Debating the moral and economic foundations of a democratic polity

From around the middle of the 18th century, agrarian reforms came on the agenda in most countries of western Europe. Although Norway’s economy was not manorial like that of Denmark and much of the rest of the continent, a debate emerged on how to improve Norwegian agriculture as well. Contrary to what the idealized picture of the typical Norwegian peasant might make us believe, the Norwegian right of redemption, odelsretten, was at the heart of these discussions. This article explores the differing opinions voiced over the ancient familial right from the viewpoint of intellectual history, drawing on the European historiography on political languages and the rise of commercial society and arguing that they should be interpreted as different responses to the societal changes caused by the economic growth in Norway from the middle of the 18th century.     

Kirkenes: An Industrial Site Reinvented as a Border Town

Abstract

1 1. This is a significantly revised version of an article published in Nyseth and Granås 2007 “Place-reinvention – Dynamics and Governance Perspectives”, Stockholm: Nordregio. This article analyses the transformation of Kirkenes, a small town on the Russian–Norwegian border, from an industrial town to a border town. Kirkenes was established as a harbour for an iron-ore mining venture in what today is the municipality of Sør-Varanger. This industry closed down during the 1990s. The article describes how Kirkenes has been transformed within “bordered” relationships of civic society, business and a combination of high-level and local political activities. Being a border town and a centre in the Barents Region is the hegemonic narrative of today. The manifold transformations have led to a situation where Kirkenes has become “Russianized”, though local actors struggle with how to handle this aspect of local development and the meaning of the place. The article also investigates to what degree the transformations have changed local identity. The focus is on how identities are dealt with, whether they are seen as immanent and essential cultural traits, or as something that tends to be changed and adapted to the situation. Based on the concept of narrative identities, there are reasons to believe that there are strong identities based on both public narratives relating to local history and nature and metanarratives about globalization and cross-border communities.     

Archaeological classification and ethnic groups: A case study from Sudanese Nubia

This is an attempt to discuss the central problem in archaeology, to understand the relationship between the artifacts and the cultural processes which produced them. Classification is our main methodology for the interpretation of this relationship: The problem is, however, to find the significant criteria. The focus of this paper is to show how archaeologists on the basis of classification of artifacts have tried to reconstruct culture history in terms of migration, diffusion or invention. The main example is from Sudanese Nubia. A criticism of the criteria here selected as significant for the identification of people and their movement, is based on a general theoretical discussion of ethnic groups.     

Man's role in the changing habitat of Mema during the old Kingdom of Ghana

The Mema area, Mali, situated climatologically within the Sahel zone, carries extensive traces of ancient settlements. Material from the author's 1978 excavation indicates environmental conditions similar to the present day inland Niger delta during the old Kingdom of Ghana (A.D. 800–1150). This centralized political power controlled gold trade from the south and salt from the north. The iron smelting in Mema was too extensive to be explained as local supply alone. It probably constituted an important basis for political centralization. The iron production seems to have caused deforestation, and the Kingdom may therefor have been weakened by ecological detonation connected with iron production.     

Contract for delivery of jars

The papyrus edited here is an example of a so‐called “delivery purchase” contract. The objects of the purchase are jars for the bottling of wine. The vendor is a deacon, who is said to be illiterate but signs in his own hand. The document is dated to AD 494 by reference to the Oxyrhynchite era and gives us the name of a hitherto unknown notary.