丝路开通之初帕提亚帝国境内的东西交通路线

丝绸之路的具体路径是学界在中外交流领域长期关注的焦点.张骞凿空之时,正是帕提亚帝国疆域大扩张时期,从两河流域到中亚的道路基本在其控制之下.从西到东,帕提亚帝国的领土可分为三大区域:亚述一巴比伦尼亚地区、伊朗高原上的波斯腹地以及赫卡尼亚以东的不稳定控制地域.自亚历山大东征至四大帝国并立时的1-2世纪,帕提亚帝国境内的东西...     

唐宋時期邕州入交三道

《宋史》记载,中国在唐代以后,曾发展出十六道通往交趾的水陆交通路线,可惜史书并无具体行经路线的说明。本文透过文献记载,考证出当时邕州进入交趾的三条主要交通路线。受到桂西山脉的环境限制,这三条道路大致沿着明江、水口河及平而河三个河谷平原前进,作者因此分别称之为:明江道、水口道与平而道。文中除对三条路线具体描述以外,也对中国与安南重要边境城市"永平砦"的形成背景、功能、存续时间及确切位置,详加考证与说明。     

今日大海道——大海道考古探险纪实

大海道是古代丝绸之路上连接吐鲁番和敦煌的最近一条路。因道路险阻 ,近现代各种探险活动很难走完全程。新世纪之初 ,我国大海道考古探险队克服重重困难险阻 ,历时11天 ,成功穿越了大海道。文章较为详细地记述了此次探险考察活动的全过程     

China and the “culture and trade” debate: a holistic approach

ABSTRACT

Over the past century, the ‘culture and trade’ debate has constantly evolved, particularly in the wake of rapid and still accelerating technological and scientific advances. These changes, manifest in an increasing convergence of many new technologies and industries, meant that the strict separation of culture from trade by means, for instance, of general or special exceptions in international trade agreements, such as the 1947 General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) or the 1988 Canada–United States Free Trade Agreement (CUSFTA), can no longer be sustained. It means that in light of the emergence of oxymoronic concepts like ‘the cultural and creative industries’, the debate can no longer be framed along binary modes of thinking that oppose the liberalization of international trade and the protection and promotion of the diversity of cultures. Instead a more holistic approach seems to be needed, which appears to coincide with the approach taken by the People’s Republic of China (PRC), which joined the WTO in 2001. The present paper examines the holistic approach by the PRC, which seeks to combine rather than separate culture and trade in its domestic, regional and global law and policymaking.     

Improvised Hybridity in the “Fixing” of Chinese Infrastructure Capital: The Case of Kenya's Standard Gauge Railway

The article explores the role of state-owned enterprises (SOEs) in the globalisation of China's infrastructure capital. Examining how accumulation strategies of Chinese SOEs are driven by a complex set of political and economic, state and private, interests, it foregrounds the inherently hybrid nature of China's state capitalism. We use Kenya's Standard Gauge Railway (SGR) as a case study to analyse how state infrastructure capital traverses borders, and the specific ways that contradictions of accumulation in China are relocated through the improvised hybridity of SOEs. In Kenya, China Road and Bridge Corporation, the main SGR contractor, shifted and adapted its strategies as the pursuit of economic productivity gave way to political priorities in China, simultaneously responding to changing socio-political circumstances in Kenya and across East Africa. Analysing these dynamics, we highlight the contingencies of, and limitations to, structural reorganisation of actually existing forms of state capitalism in China and beyond.