Judicial Changes in Qing Beijing during the Shunzhi Period (1644–61)

The judicial system in Qing Beijing integrated both Ming and Manchu institutions. In the Ming judicial system, the first level of courts in Beijing included the Ministry of Justice and the Censorate, and on the second level was the Court of Judicial Review. During the Ming, however, this system became heavily disrupted by the intelligence security apparatuses, like the Eastern Depot. In the Manchu system, on the first level of courts was the banner company captains and on the second level was the Ministry of Justice. After 1644, the Ming’s institutional legacies and lessons remained so important to Manchu rulers that they eventually created an integrated legal system that primarily drew from the Ming system. This integration reflected the Qing dynasty’s endeavor to adopt Ming institutions. Prince Regent Dorgon insisted upon judicial separation on the first level of the courts—Censors of the Five Wards could not settle cases involving banner people, nor could the banner system handle cases involving civilians—while the Shunzhi emperor and his successors wanted judicial unity in Beijing and ordinary banner people and civilians to be adjudicated by the same courts.     

An Automatic Modal Identification Procedure for the Permanent Dynamic Monitoring of the Sanctuary of Vicoforte

ABSTRACT

The interest in automatic modal parameter extraction techniques has increased significantly in recent years because of the rising demand for Continuous Structural Health Monitoring (CSHM) of civil structures and infrastructures. The wider use of CSHM is related to its capability for early damage detection and therefore to its usefulness for planning maintenance and strengthening interventions. This article presents the main steps followed in creating a robust routine to run on an online basis the first-ever Continuous Vibration-Based Structural Health Monitoring (CVB-SHM) of a large masonry oval dome, i.e., the dome of the Regina Montis Regalis Basilica, also known as Sanctuary of Vicoforte. The procedure uses an output-only stochastic subspace identification method complemented by an automatic analysis applied to identification results, which are typically provided in terms of stabilization diagrams. In this study, the fully automatic procedure also includes a hierarchical clustering algorithm to separate authentic from spurious modes.     

敦煌文献中所见唐五代时期的水利官吏

敦煌文献中保存了许多唐五代时期地方各级水利官吏的设置运作状况记录。唐代前期设都水令,为当时敦煌“统以千渠”的最高级别水利官员。中唐吐蕃统治时期设“水官”“部落水官”以及“水监”“部落水监”“地方总水监”。晚唐五代归义军时期专设水司,长官为都渠泊使,下设多名水官。敦煌绿洲四界及寿昌灌区分别设置多名有特殊责任的水官“平水”,以“平治水利”,平水“相量”为务。此外,每条灌渠、每座斗门均设渠头或斗门长,属基层一级。这套水利官吏系统层层负责,相互配合,有效保证了农田灌溉顺利进行。同时敦煌民间还自发地组织起一批“渠人社”,这对地方政府水利管理体系是有益的补充。研究历史上水利官吏系统及其运作状况,对今天河湖运行和治理管护也具有借鉴作用。     

Geographies of Swimming Pool Provision: Lessons from Glasgow 1804–2014

Swimming is a popular form of recreation and exercise in the UK and US. Swimming can take place outdoors but, particularly in the UK, largely takes place in designated indoor pools. Existing research tends to focus on ‘public’ or ‘municipal’ pools leaving broader spatial geographies of swimming pool provision under explored. In response to concern about swimming pool closures, this paper draws from extensive archival research into all swimming pools in the City of Glasgow, Scotland, since the first opened in 1804. Formal and informal programmes of pool building and closure were revealed. Rather than decreasing, public provision has remained constant for the last 100?years but become progressively more spread out in relation to the city’s changing size. Broadening exploration beyond the ‘public’ category exposed a vast drop in school pool numbers around the year 2000 due to a Private Finance Initiative project that consolidated the secondary school estate and outsourced school building management. The lessons: researching all types of swimming pool through time greatly enriches understandings of the changing meaning and extent of public service provision.     

The changing nature of GIS and the provision of formal GIS education in the UK: a case study

The arrival of the term Geographical Information System (GIS) in the 1960s soon created a demand for training and education in the use of this specialist hardware and software. Initially the main focus was on training people to use GIS, formal named degree programmes leading to postgraduate and undergraduate qualifications arrived later. This paper explores the changing landscape of U.K. degree level GIS education drawing on contemporary information from Higher Education Institution websites and a case study of the first single honours degree in GIS in Europe. The paper identifies a rise and fall in the number of named undergraduate “GIS” degrees since the late 1980s sandwiched between the continuation and development of postgraduate qualifications. In parallel with this trend the teaching and learning of GIS skills has emerged as a core component of undergraduate degree programmes with “Geography” in their title and in national school and degree level benchmarking statements for the discipline.     

Indigenous Exceptionalism under Fire: Assessing Indigenous Soldiers in Combat with the Australian,Canadian, New Zealand and American Armies during the Second World War

The literature on Indigenous participation in the Second World War from Canada, the United States, Australia and New Zealand has tended to portray Indigenous soldiers as exceptionally able and courageous in battle. While heart-warmingly laudatory and an understandable product of genuine evidentiary challenges in researching this subject, the image constructed is partial and unrealistic. At best it is misleading; at worst it conflates indigeneity and combat proficiency in ways that reinforce racial stereotypes of Indigenous people as ‘natural’ warriors prevalent during the war. This article argues that we discard the exceptionalism enshrouding Indigenous combat performance in favour of a more culturally nuanced approach.     

Governing system innovation: assisted living experiments in the UK and Norway

Debates on how to address societal challenges have moved to the forefront of academic and policy concerns. Of particular importance is the growing awareness that to deal with issues such as ageing, it will be necessary to implement concerted efforts on technological, social, institutional or political fronts. Drawing on a number of theoretical perspectives – including socio-technical transitions and embedded state theory – the aim of this paper is to identify and understand different approaches to the governance of such system innovations by comparing state responses to assisted living in two contrasting national systems of care, namely that of the UK and Norway. Its findings highlight that state-supported and funded experimentation projects have been instrumental in designing and implementing system innovation: through their emphasis on co-design and co-creation, these projects demonstrated the value of early implementation pilots to explore the ‘fit’ between novel technologies and prevailing practices and institutional structures in national systems of care. Still, competition, biases or conflicting interests should not be ignored between well-established agents and institutions and experimental solutions whose efficacy remains relatively untested and which involve a combination of new technical, social, organizational and institutional solutions.     

A critical review of entrepreneurial ecosystems research: towards a future research agenda

The entrepreneurial ecosystem (EE) literature has attracted much attention, especially in policy circles. However, the concept suffers from a number of shortcomings: (1) it lacks a clear analytical framework that makes explicit what is cause and what is effect in an EE; (2) while being a systemic concept, the EE has not yet fully exploited insights from network theory, and it is not always clear in what way the proposed elements are connected in an EE; (3) it remains a challenge what institutions (and at what spatial scale) impact on the structure and performance of EE; (4) studies have often focused on the EE in single regions or clusters, but lack a comparative and multi-scalar perspective and (5) the EE literature tends to provide a static framework taking a snapshot of EE without considering systematically their evolution over time. For each of these shortcomings, we make a number of suggestions to take up in future research on EE.     

« L’argument vassalique » au service de la prédication des croisades en Terre sainte (fin XIIe – XIIIe siècles)

In the late twelfth century we can observe important changes in the propaganda of the crusades to the Holy Land. The popes and the preachers started to stress that the Holy Land should be defended and, after the disasters of 1187, should be reconquered because of its importance personally for God. Six arguments of the crusade propaganda which were invented or became widespread at that time can be mentioned here. Among them there is one that we can call the “vassal argument”, by means of which the papacy and the preachers pointed out that God should be defended when his beloved land is attacked by heathens because he is the Lord and the listeners are his vassals. It seems that the idea was created by the crusade preachers at the end of the twelfth century and then came to be used by the papacy as well, from Innocent III onwards. In the thirteenth century it was extensively enriched by such preachers as Jacques de Vitry and Humbert of Romans who made the vassal argument more illustrative.     

ASEAN's ‘people-oriented’ aspirations: civil society influences on non-traditional security governance

Since the Asian financial crisis, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) has sought to reorient itself towards becoming a ‘people-oriented’ association. Democratic transitions in the region and increased demands from civil society to be actively involved in regional governance have prompted ASEAN to develop forms of participatory regionalism. In practice, however, the rhetorical aspirations of ASEAN have not often matched the level of participation or support expected by civil society organisations. It has often been the case that ASEAN's decisions, especially those related to sensitive issues, have been influenced by external pressure as opposed to participatory mechanisms. The aim of this article is to determine to what extent participatory mechanisms impact ASEAN's approach to non-traditional security. By doing so, the authors combine two key elements central to a ‘people-oriented’ approach to regionalism: the incorporation of deliberative and participatory processes and the acknowledgement of transboundary security issues which require cooperation to move beyond state-centric approaches. This article explains that despite the rhetorical emphasis on participatory regionalism, it continues to be the case that regional civil society organisations and non-state actors have limited capacity to influence ASEAN. By providing a critical analysis of influences on ASEAN's non-traditional security policies, the authors offer a modest yet valuable contribution to the emerging literature on ASEAN's ‘people-oriented’ regionalism and advance a nuanced understanding of ASEAN's participatory mechanisms.