From the Grassroots: Bernard Narokobi and the Making of Papua New Guinea's Constitution

ABSTRACT

Bernard Narokobi's concept of the Melanesian Way was influenced by a variety of factors, including his own childhood in the village, his religion, and the understandings of the people around him. He also drew inspiration from his exposure to the views and opinions of the many Papua New Guineans who contributed to the work of the Constitutional Planning Committee (CPC) between 1972 and 1975 when he served as a consultant to the committee. He shared the belief in a specifically ‘Melanesian’ way of social organization and cosmological understanding with the others who took part in the CPC's work, most prominently its de facto chairman, Father John Momis. With Momis he drew on the people's contributions to formulate PNG's National Goals and Directive Principles, which, at least in part, embody Narokobi's understanding of what it is to be Melanesian.     

甲骨学发展的新总结——评《中国甲骨学》

一在甲骨文发现110周年之际,王宇信先生的新著——《中国甲骨学》问世了。该书是阐述110年来甲骨学发展历程与成就的煌煌巨著,全书分上、中、下三篇,共28章,总计90余万字。王宇信先生长期关注甲骨学的历史发展状况。他曾先后出版过两本专著———《建     

On fitting certain closed convex curves to archaeological point data using an interactive graphics terminal

A graphics terminal displays the archaeological point data superimposed on the closed curve together with numerical information relating to the accuracy of fit. Human logic then shortcuts the otherwise extensive computer capacity necessary for initial refinement. The Powell minimization technique is then used to obtain the “best” fit.The underlying mathematics, an outline of the implementation and several examples are presented.     

The Southern Conservative Thought of John C. Calhoun and the Cultural Foundations of the Canadian Identity

Besides the largely ignored fact of general Canadian support for the Southern Confederacy during the American Civil War, the consociational dimensions of Canadian Confederation, as something opposed to American unionism in cultural terms, finds its historical roots legitimized in the Southern conservative writings of John C. Calhoun. It is the tension between an institutionally entrenched foundation of consociational pluralism and growing urban cosmopolitanism within Canadian history that has defined the debates and divides over the meaning of the Canadian identity, just as it is. Alternatively it is the tension between enforced constitutionalist unionism and consociational cultural tradition within the American South that has largely defined their historical experience. Both Canada and the American South find the tensions of their cultural identities rooted in the consociational values originally laid out by nineteenth century Southern conservative political thought.     

Asserting Europe's technological sovereignty amid American platform finance: Countering financial sector dependence on Big Tech?

Spearheaded by major technology companies (Big Tech), digital platforms have rapidly become key infrastructures for accumulation under global financialized capitalism, with consumer convenience and underlying practices of data collection, control and analysis giving rise to platform finance. While financial institutions are partnering with financial technology (FinTech) start-ups to digitally enclose customers, American and Chinese Big Techs increasingly mobilize their platforms to offer payment services, next to expanding their platformed services to financial incumbents. Observing the growing dependence of finance on American Big Tech platforms, this paper investigates how the shift toward platform finance in the European Union (EU) unfolds as a state-mediated and power-laden process between mostly ‘domestic’ (EU) financial incumbents and ‘foreign’ (non-EU) Big Tech firms. The starting point of the analysis is the European Strategy for Data launched by the European Commission in 2020. Through document analysis, we reconstruct the circulation of code words within ‘the Brussels Bubble’ in anticipation of- and in direct response to the proposal. We find that, despite its implication in the global financial crisis, incumbent EU finance presents itself as a fix for non-EU platform domination by Big Tech. The ‘technological sovereignty’ of the EU is marshalled by incumbent finance to defend market share as would-be pan-European digital financial champions. The Big Tech ‘threat’ is thereby transformed into an argument for strategic deregulation and forced data sharing by Big Tech for the sake of maintaining a ‘level playing field’. The outcome of these processes of strategic coupling is an alignment between the interests of EU data protection and the commercial interests of platformizing European banks.     

问鼎上层文化:胡适的哲学史研究

胡适是中国哲学史研究的开山者。他的《中国哲学史大纲》(卷上)作为中国第一部真正的哲学史著作,建立了哲学史学科的新体系,开创了现代学术史的新纪元。(1)它以科学的方法和可信的史料,创造了全新古典哲学史体系、构想与规范,使哲学史作为一门科学戛然独立,并迈向了中国古代哲学史研究的近代化进程;(2)它用疑古与实证的方法实践,完成了新学科的创立及从“形”到“质”的转变,开启了崭新的治学门径,对具体的学术研究起到了示范作用。(3)它从形式到内容整体手段的全方位更新,不仅具有冲击传统惯性的强劲的反封建之风,又有开拓学术研究新风尚之意义。胡适的哲学史研究,新见迭出,影响深远,具有划时代的意义。