The compendium of European spatial planning systems

This paper sets out the context for the production of a European planning systems compendium, which will provide an authoritative and accessible source of information about systems and policies across the European Union.     

Book reviews

COMPARING FOREIGN POLICIES: Theories, Findings, and Methods. JAMES N. ROSENAU (ed.) Beverley Hills, Sage Publications distributed by John Wiley & Sons, New York, 442 pp., ISBN 0–470–73613–5, $A23.

NATIONS IN CONFLICT: National Growth and International Violence. NAZLI CHOUCRI and ROBERT C. NORTH, W.H. Freeman and Company, San Francisco, 356 pp., ISBN 0–7167–0773‐X, $US12.95.

CHINA'S FOREIGN RELATIONS SINCE 1949. ALAN LAWRANCE (ed.) Routledge & Kegan Paul, London and Boston, 1975. xii + 261pp. 0–7100–8092–1. $20.80 hardcover.

THE FATE OF THE ATLANTIC COMMUNITY. ELLIOT R. GOODMAN. Praeger, for the Atlantic Council of the United States, New York, 1975. pp.xx, 583. $27.50.

AFTER HITLER: REPORT FROM A WEST GERMAN CITY. JÜRGEN NEVEN‐DU MONT. Translated by Ralph Manheim. Penguin, Harmondsworth, 1974. 319 pp. $2.20     

CONSUMERS AS COPRODUCERS OF PUBLIC SERVICES: SOME ECONOMIC AND INSTITUTIONAL CONSIDERATIONS

The concept of coproduction of public services has captured increased attention as a potential means of increasing the effectiveness and efficiency of local government. In this article we explore the concept of coproduction in an effort to sharpen the definition of that concept and add rigor to our understanding of the effects of coproduction in local service delivery and the processes by which coproductive activity occurs.     

Le temporel des archevêques de Rouen aux derniers siècles du moyen-âge

Doubtless put together in Merovingian times, the temporal possessions of the archbishops of Rouen were enlarged in the twelfth century, thanks to restitutions and, above all, to royal donations. A rapid transformation took place in the thirteenth century: substantial growth and diversification — due to exchanges with the king, purchases of lordships, of houses, or of rents in direct ownership, and reclamations and other improvements — of a patrimony which had become an instrument of spiritual administration. Reaching their maximum revenue around 1330, these temporalities were scarcely modified thereafter as regards their composition, but difficulties in the first half of the fifteenth century, which halved the revenue, affected above all the rural elements, so that the proportion of urban revenues — especially dues on commerce — increased. At once vast and varied, these temporalities take on a somewhat original aspect by comparison with many other ecclesiastical temporalities based on the ownership of rural domains or urban properties.     

Carnelian,agate, and other types of chalcedony: the prehistory of Jebel al‐Ma'taradh and its semi‐precious stones,Emirate of Ra's al‐Khaimah

The Jebel al‐Ma'taradh and its surroundings contain exceptional deposits of lithic raw materials, including flint and chert, but especially chalcedony, agate, carnelian, and chrysoprase. These deposits were intensively exploited during the Neolithic, and some of the artefacts produced entered the trade network that included settlements on the coast and inland, sometimes as far as 300 km. During earlier periods, probably as early as the Pleistocene, only flint was used. Between the sixth and the fourth millennia, carnelian and agate were exploited to make beads, which are found in the necropolises and settlements of the UAE.     

Talking about bodies online: Viagra,YouTube, and the politics of public(ized) sexualities

The development of Viagra in the late 1990s ushered in a new age of conversation about sex and sexuality, as men's bodily abilities were put on display for all to discuss. In 2005, the video-sharing technology YouTube was launched. Taken together, these technological innovations – both biomedical and representational – have produced debate around sex, sexualized and gendered bodies, and sexual health. This article interrogates Viagra-related representations posted on YouTube and analyzes sexuopharmaceuticals as a set of intertextualities that create space for both normative discourses and social critiques. Three analytic themes illustrate how Viagra-related YouTube videos (1) reinforce a regime of self-care within a wider context of individualized responsibility for one's sexual health, (2) highlight the values attached to the pharmasexed gendered body for men and women in the age of Viagra, and (3) provide disruptions, in the form of criticism, to the assumption that healthy bodies and relationships need pharmasexual enhancement. The article concludes by suggesting that social networking sites such as YouTube are managed public spaces through which one can interrogate the intertextualities that link discourses related to bodies and sexual health to the virtual and material spaces of everyday life.