Romania's Roma Population: From Marginality to Social Integration

Abstract

Among several groups vulnerable to discrimination in 21st century Europe, Roma loom large because the poorer, traditionally-minded elements continue to resist integration and remain on the margins of society. Most of the people involved have become EU citizens as a result of recent accession by East Central European countries where marginalisation has been tolerated, with varying degrees of discrimination, ever since the 19th century abolition of feudalism. In the interest of a more inclusive society, Roma are now being encouraged to strive for living standards comparable with those enjoyed by the mainstream population. This paper concentrates on Romania, which has one of the largest Roma communities in Europe. We profile the situation with some reference to regional geographies and previous policy history. We examine the key concepts relevant to marginality, arguing for an element of self-exclusion, because while many Roma elements have been successfully assimilated over the years, a large residual element insists on preserving elements of ‘identity’, implying separation from the mainstream in terms of the modernising ethos and the rule of law. The main thrust of the paper rests with a comprehensive programme to improve the condition of the Roma community as a major element among a number of other factors which are working towards the same objective. We give particular attention to the education programme that is now making significant progress.     

Not Only Helpless but also Hopeless: Changing Dynamics of Urban Poverty in Turkey,the Case of Sultanbeyli,Istanbul

This paper is an attempt to understand the changing characteristics of urban poverty in Turkey since 1980. First, it analyses how the urban poor in Turkey had adopted aggressive survival strategies by strengthening their solidarity networks on religious, ethnic and cultural bases until the 2000s. Then it sheds light on how those networks have dissolved later on thanks to a set of internal and external factors and concludes that Turkey now faces deepening poverty levels and engendering new forms and dynamics of poverty. This paper is based on the Sultanbeyli district of Istanbul, a district almost entirely composed of unauthorized houses whose population grew at an unprecedented rate after 1980; and it is a perfect case for the study of issues relating to migration, urbanization and poverty in Turkish cities.     

江苏淮安财富广场南北朝墓群发掘报告

江苏淮安财富广场南北朝家族墓是一处典型的家族墓地,墓葬排列有序,随葬器物较为丰富精美,时代特征明显,文化因素较为复杂,对研究南北朝时期丧葬礼俗及淮安地方历史文化具有重要的价值。     

Increasing Role of Services in Competitive Power and Innovativeness of Firms and Industrial Clusters

The aim of this paper is to discuss the importance of different types of global services for industrial firms and clusters in terms of their economic competitiveness and innovative performance. The theoretical debates argue that globalization, deregulation and the new production organization make it necessary to use global services that are supplied easily with the help of new telecommunication technologies. The existing empirical studies provide some supporting evidence. However, they also indicate that global service firms can be attained by only smaller numbers of industrial firms and clusters. Still, in-house services besides temporal and informal mechanisms are important to meet the needs of the specialized services, even for the firms that try to become a part of the global production system. The paper focuses on three main questions: “What types of global services are becoming crucial for manufacturing firms and what type of services are still local and national? Is there a significant difference between the characteristics of firms that use the same type of services? To what extent is having access to global services important for the innovativeness of industrial firms and clusters? This paper looks for the answers to these questions based on existing case studies as well as this study of three industrial clusters in Turkey. The findings indicate that there is not a perfect match between theory and empirical evidence and there is a need for more refined theoretical discourses on industry–service relations.     

沧州铁狮子健康监测数据采集系统的研究与应用

沧州铁狮子是世界上现存的最大铸铁狮子,其重要地位和所处的环境要求必须对其健康状况进行实时地监测和预警。针对其基础组成部分一沧州铁狮子健康监测数据采集系统进行了研究开发,首先分析了铁狮子传感器选型的影响因素并结合传感器自身的适用标准进行了具体的选型,然后进行了基于所选定传感器的硬件系统设计,运用Labview平台结合沧州铁狮子自身特点开发了一套采集软件系统,形成了一套完整的基于虚拟仪器技术的沧州铁狮子健康监测数据采集系统,最后成功将该系统应用于沧州铁狮子结构健康监测系统测试试验,证明了本套系统可为将来沧州铁狮子健康监测系统的实现提供重要支持。