The Disappearing State and the Quasi‐Event of Immigration Control

Immigration enforcement by sheriffs and police can be characterized as a proliferation of quasi‐events which never quite rise to the status of an event. This poses distinct challenges for feminist‐inspired scholarship on the state which seeks to document, ethnographically, how the state goes about its business on the ground. In this article we draw on our fieldwork experience in North Carolina and Georgia on sheriffs’ and police departments’ use of traffic enforcement and policing roadblocks to scrutinize drivers for their legal status, and ask how our ethnographic approach to the problem of state power inevitably stumbles in relation to the ordinariness of these practices. We conclude that feminist scholarship committed to an ethnography of the state could do much more to think through the potentially aporetic quality of that which is our common object of research—the state in practice.     

'Not Enough Food and Too Many Military Police’: Discipline,Food, and the 23rd Reserve Battalion July – September 1917

This paper seeks to explain the underlying causes of a mutiny that the Canadian artist A.Y. Jackson took part in while stationed in the English village of Shoreham-by-Sea and serving with the 23rd Reserve Battalion. The battalion was filled with convalescents who, having been wounded at the front, were on their way back to France after a stay in ‘blighty.’ The men of the battalion lived in a world of harsh discipline, rigorous physical training and poor-quality rations. Moreover, those who commanded them tended to be ‘shirkers’ –– at least in the eyes of the men of the battalion –– who had avoided going to France, choosing instead to remain in England. A sense of the unfairness of it all pervades the reminiscences of Jackson and other members of the battalion. Officially, the ‘mutiny’ never took place, and the whole incident was swept under the rug after a few high ranking Generals and dignitaries were called in to tour the mess facilities.     

Archaeological Quantification of Pottery: The Rims Count Adjusted using the Modulus of Rupture (MR)

Archaeological quantification is a recurrent issue in research about pottery, its typologies and its distribution. We accept the validity of other methods of quantification—sherd count, minimum number of individuals (MNI) or sherd weight—but the methodology that we have proposed for quantification of assemblages of archaeological contexts is the rims count, which has to be transformed into coefficients of reference through a correction using the modulus of rupture (MR). Such correctors are obtained through measuring the percentage of preserved rim of a significant number of sherds of each type and establishing the average of that percentage. This quantification method is easily applicable to all pottery types and it is also statistically reliable. Besides, it can be used in any study in which the gross number of rims is published. Finally, in the case of ceramic transport containers, a second correction can be applied by multiplying the corrected coefficient (number of rims × MR) by its average capacity (AC), another corrector that will allow us to gather statistics according to the litres of transported product. We believe that the rims count (the easiest part to classify) is a fast, relatively easy and very reliable method that needs to be corrected using the MR.     

“Mehr Licht,mehr Luft” — wissenschaftliche Hygiene und Stadtentwicklung in Deutschland im 19. Jahrhundert

Since 1870 a group of planners tried to ground urban planning scientifically in economy, engineering and hygiene. It is argued that hygiene as a newly developed natural science provided planners with a lot of good arguments to legitimize a change in the traditional urban planning regulations. These had not been able to prevent the chaotic growth of big cities that resulted in a housing misery, in large block of flats, and in noisy and smelling factories neighboring better class housing. Hygienic reasoning concerned with sunlight (because of its germ killing capacity), air, and ventilation (to drive away miasma) was transformed into urban planning and, than, stood for lesser hight of buildings, more space between large blocks of flats, and different parts of town for industry and housing. Planning regulations with these ends were often opposed by owners who did not accept the devaluation of their property. Therefore it was not before 1918 that these hygienically motivated planning regulations could be set into practice by a new ruling class.     

EURATOM,ENEA und die nationale Kernenergiepolitik in Deutschland

EURATOM was created by politicians who put the advancement of European integration above all other goals. However, the science and energy policies of the individual member states were still largely conceived within a national framework. After its official establishment, EURATOM began to develop a life of its own. Significant conflicts arose between national and EURATOM interests as the records of the German Foreign Office and the German Ministry of Atomic Energy demonstrate. German scientists, engineers and business leaders preferred the more liberal approach to the development of nuclear energy taken by OEEC and its affiliate, the European Nuclear Energy Agency ENEA. In conjunction with the IAEA in Vienna, however, EURATOM performed a particularly useful service in helping to control the proliferation of fissionable material.     

Kleinstadt und Bibliothek in der Frühmoderne. Zu Genese und Struktur der Ratsbibliothek der fränkischen Reichsstadt Weißenburg

Small town and library in early modern times: Even small German imperial towns in particular were unable to conduct their daily business without maintaining a library with a wide range of excellent and usefull books suitable for employment by the judiciary, the administration, the health-care services, the church and school system as well as for supporting the interests of the town effectively. It is clear that the municipial council placed high value on the acquisition of the most important works in the field of law, theology and literature treated in school considering the relatively rational manner in which the “Ratsbibliothek” (library of the council) of the imperial town of Weißenburg (Bavaria) took stock of its books in the early modern times (16th to 18th century): this can be seen in the contemporary cataloguing (1600/1745/1829) of the library. Since the library orientated itself pragmatically towards the administrative interests of the town, there was hardly any inclination towards the acquisition of works in the fields of philosophy or poetry. — This study is based on the first edition of the “Beringer-catalogue” included (1600).     

博物馆内主要污染气体的检测及其分布状况的研究

采用常用的基准方法对文物具有普遍危害性的 S0_2,NO_2、O_2 进行了测定.研究了适宜检测博物馆内大气污染状况的 TEA 纸片法.运用了 TEA 纸片法对上海博物馆内二氧化硫和二氧化氮的分布状况进行了测定研究.     

(Education for) Sustainable Development in Geography Education: review and outlook from a perspective of Germany

Nearly 15 years after the Rio Conference and 10 years after the Lucerne Declaration on Geographical Education for Sustainable Development we are interested to what extent the goals of this declaration have been implemented? What role does Geography play in Education for Sustainable Development in higher education? We analyzed the modules of 107 degree programs with Geography as a degree major or as a teacher training subject at 55 German universities, technical colleges and universities of education. We conducted a quantitative text analysis in which we searched the key words “Sustainability”, “Sustainable Development”, “Education for Sustainable Development” and “Nature-Society Studies” in the Module Regulations. Our data indicate great heterogeneity between the degree programs. The key words were predominantly found in majors in “Human Geography”, “Geography” and teacher training programs for “academic high schools”. Aspects of the results considered in the paper include: (a) differences in the orientation of degree programs, (b) varying degree of implementation in the modules, (c) different conceptual understanding of the principles of sustainability, (d) the extent to which concepts of Environmental Education and Education for Sustainable Development are mixed, (e) heterogeneity between mandatory courses and electives.     

The April 1977 Persepolis Conference on the Transfer of Nuclear Technology: A Third World Revolt Against US Non-Proliferation Policy?

ABSTRACT

Iran under Mohammad Reza Pahlavi embarked on one of the most ambitious nuclear programmes of any state in the 1970s. This decision was in part motivated by the zeitgeist surrounding nuclear energy in the 1970s that envisioned the transition from a petroleum- to plutonium-based economy. This decision, however, was soon followed by the Indian ‘Smiling Buddha’ peaceful nuclear explosion. This led the United States and other nuclear suppliers to strengthen restraints on nuclear exports. Many nuclear recipients, particularly in the Third World, objected to US-led changes to the nuclear non-proliferation regime, including the creation of the London Club (later renamed the Nuclear Suppliers Group). To address perceived shortcomings of nuclear suppliers in cooperation on the peaceful uses of nuclear technology, the Iranian nuclear leadership organized the Iran Conference on the Transfer of Nuclear Technology in April 1977. The Persepolis conference, as it came to be known, saw many nuclear suppliers, recipients and industry rally in opposition to US non-proliferation policy under President Jimmy Carter. However, following the Iranian Revolution of 1979, Iran ceased to function as the lynchpin of this opposition to US policy, with the result that the coalition created at the Persepolis conference dissipated.     

An East–West confrontation in the North-China Herald during the Nationalist Revolution: a case study of Shao Futang’s letters to the editor

ABSTRACT

In the Republican period, Shao Futang, secretary to the general manager of the International Dispensary of Shanghai (Wuzhou yaofang), wrote numerous letters to the editor that were published under the initials F. D. Z. in the English-language newspapers of Shanghai, such as the North-China Herald and the China Press. He wrote frequently to these newspapers out of dissatisfaction with the total indifference shown by Chinese residents of the Shanghai International Settlement to what foreigners said about China in these newspapers. The North-China Herald and other newspapers also had Chinese readers and thus needed to hear from those like Shao who could represent the voice of the Chinese people. When anti-imperialism and abrogation of unequal treaties were first proposed in 1924, Shao for the first time voiced his opinion in these newspapers. He defended Chinese patriotism by pointing out that it was not “anti-foreignism.” When the Nationalist Revolution broke out in 1926, an increasingly strong sense of nationalism emerged in the published letters he wrote. He denounced Western readers’ disparagement of the Nationalist Revolution, expressed the desire of the Chinese people for the abrogation of the unequal treaties, and appealed to the Municipal Council of the Shanghai International Settlement to make necessary changes and give political rights to the Chinese people.