Women's and men's lives and work in Sweden

Kvinnors och Mäns Liv och Arbete. J. Acker, A. Baude, U. Björnberg, E. Dahlström, G. Forsberg, L. Gonäs, H. Holter & A. Nilsson, 1992. Stockholm, SNS Förlag. ISBN 91–7150–451–6.     

Forecasting Australian elections: 1993, and all that

The link between economic conditions and election outcomes is a pillar of social science. Voters prefer ‘better times’ to worse and reward or punish incumbents accordingly. We investigate the extent to which this truism holds in the Australian context, with particular emphasis on the 1993 result. While Australian election outcomes are generally not well predicted by prevailing economic conditions, we are impressed by the extent to which the 1993 election outcome is at odds with the state of the economy. In particular, we find Labor performed up to five percentage points better than expected in 1993, making this result one of the most exceptional election results ever observed in Australia. The sizeable electoral penalty typically accompanying large increases in unemployment was effectively nullified in 1993. We accurately predict the 1993 result (ex post) only if unemployment is considered electorally irrelevant. We conclude by suggesting a research agenda for better understanding the link between economic context and election outcomes in the Australian setting.     

THE ANTHROPOCENE AND THE PLANET

Dipesh Chakrabarty's The Climate of History in a Planetary Age is, in three respects, far more than a synthesis of over a decade of pioneering conceptual work aimed at making sense of the Anthropocene/planetary predicament and its implications for historical understanding. First, the book makes visible an intellectual trajectory in which Chakrabarty's conceptual struggles with the Anthropocene gradually move from the centrality of the notion of the Anthropocene toward the centrality of the notion of the planet. Second, it highlights the relational complexities with which one needs to grapple when trying to make sense of the current predicament. Third, and finally, the book showcases a series of often overlapping conceptual distinctions that Chakrabarty has developed while navigating these complexities. Through a discussion of the above key aspects, this review essay highlights the achievements of The Climate of History in a Planetary Age and critically engages with its central themes. In dialogue with the book, it pays special attention to exploring the respective benefits and drawbacks of the notions of the Anthropocene and the planet, and to the character and role of human agency in the Anthropocene/planetary predicament. Finally, the essay concludes with a few thoughts concerning the question of what kind of a reinvention of historical understanding might be triggered, respectively, by the notions of the Anthropocene and the planet.     

The Carolingian response to the revolt of Boso, 879–887

The decade leading up to the disintegration of the Carolingian Empire in 887–8 is traditionally characterised by historians as a period when royal authority was in terminal decline, crippled by the deaths of three great rulers in the mid-870s and by the attempt of the non-Carolingian rebel Boso of Vienne to seize a throne in 879. This article challenges the conventional view, and argues that Boso's revolt actually inspired the four surviving Carolingian kings to enter into a period of successful and effective cooperation. They came to a sworn agreement which sealed a new mutually guaranteed succession plan and resolved several outstanding territorial disputes. The end of the empire was brought about neither by internal conflict nor by loss of faith in the royal house, but rather by the premature deaths of a series of heirless rulers and the failure of the last emperor Charles the Fat to organize his succession in 887.