Security,secularism and gender: the Turkish military’s security discourse in relation to political Islam

This article examines the sexual and corporeal constructions of risk within the security discourses of the Turkish military in response to the rise of political Islam and Islamist identities in Turkey. I look at the Turkish military as the self-proclaimed guardian of the secular Republic, which, until recently, has actively configured political Islam as a risk to national security and ingrained such risk onto the body of the headscarved woman. My analysis covers a time frame from 1980s to late 2000s when the military issued memorandums and public statements against the rise of political Islam and pursued a belligerent campaign to erase ‘Islamist’ identities both from civilian politics and its own structure. The military implemented security regulations and dress codes to detect the ‘Islamist’ military personnel who are most conspicuously identified with the dress style of the women in their families. I explore these security regulations through women’s everyday and personal experiences in relation to their dress, headscarf style and comportment in military spaces and try to understand how ‘Islamism’ is constructed as a security threat in sexually and corporeally specific ways. I demonstrate how secularism is constructed, and needs to be protected, on the basis of a particular regime of gender and sexuality at the merger of traditional gender norms and secular Western modernity.     

Spondylolysis and lifestyle among prehistoric coastal groups from Brazil

Southern Brazilian prehistoric coastal series were examined for the presence of spondylolysis. All defects occurred at the pars interarticularis, most at L5 (51%), with the vast majority bilateral and complete (86.2%). Frequencies decreased from young adulthood (54.2%) through mid‐adulthood (33.3%) to older adulthood (12.5%), suggesting differential mortality among affected individuals. The high overall prevalence (29.6%) demonstrates that these groups experienced a strenuous lifestyle, with activities that required repetitive and vigorous movements of lumbar hyperextension and rotation. Archaeological data provide support to interpret this pattern. Throwing harpoons, rowing and wrestling fishing nets were likely the main activities associated with the defect among men. Continuous loading of weight, including plant resources, mollusks and nursing children, were probably the tasks associated with spondylolysis in women. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

我国境外无人继承文物流失的风险控制研究

我国境外无人继承文物面临流失的风险。国外法律一般规定境内无人继承的遗产归国家所有,对此,我国缺少明确的政策法规,赋予特定的主体追回境外无人继承文物的资格。此外,我国法院在受理此类案件时,会遇到管辖权、冲突规范和实体法律规定不完善等问题,难以作出有利于我国文物保护的判决。控制我国境外无人继承文物的流失风险,要求我国从原则、规则和程序等方面进行规制和完善。     

The Cutting Edge of Accumulation: Neoliberal Risk Mitigation,the Baku‐Tbilisi‐Ceyhan Pipeline and its Impact

Abstract: Adopting a historical materialist position, this article looks at new methods deployed to expand processes of accumulation and the impact that this has at different scales. Focusing upon the Baku–Tbilisi–Ceyhan (BTC) oil pipeline (traversing Azerbaijan, Georgia and Turkey), the article pays particular attention to the technocratic tools of “social neoliberalism” and corporate social responsibility, which variously incorporate environmental and social impact assessments, community investment programmes and voluntary codes of conduct. While such approaches seek to relegitimise the efforts of capital and its assistants and mitigate their risks, the assessment below details how these approaches actually assist in facilitating an increase in risk for many people. The article begins by looking at the accumulation drive pushing BTC and then provides an account of how new approaches to pipeline governance have both emerged and been incorporated into the project. The article then details what it is that these approaches have actually facilitated at four scales—the local, the national, the regional and the supra‐regional.     

FRAGILITY OF STANDARD INDUSTRIAL STRUCTURES BY A RESPONSE SURFACE BASED METHOD

National and international regulatory standards require industrial risk assessment, taking into account natural hazards including earthquakes, in the framework of Quantitative Risk Analysis (QRA). Seismic fragility analysis of industrial components may be carried out similarly as what has been done for buildings, even though some peculiar aspects require the development of specific tools. In the present paper a contribution to the definition of a rational procedure for seismic vulnerability assessment of standardised industrial constructions in a probabilistic framework is given. The method covers a range of components of the same structural type. Seismic reliability formulation for structures is used. Both seismic capacity and demand are considered probabilistic with the latter assessed by dynamic analyses. The application example refers to shell elephant foot buckling of unanchored sliding tanks. A regression-based method is applied to relate fragility curves to parameters varying in the domain of variables for structural design.     

The Early Bronze Age funerary archaeological landscape of western Ja'alan: results of three seasons of investigation

This paper presents the results of three seasons of investigations in the western part of Ja'alan in the southern al‐Sharqyiah Governorate in the Sultanate of Oman. The results highlight the importance of this part of Ja'alan during the Early Bronze Age (EBA), particularly the Hafit period and provide us with important information about the funerary archaeological landscape during this period. The results also reveal important aspects of landscape utilisation and occupation during this time and add to our knowledge of the cultural and economic facets of the earliest Bronze Age societies. The distribution of tombs in the landscape suggests that they were constructed by nomadic or semi‐nomadic pastoral groups that shifted from one location to another in search of grazing for their livestock. The availability and seasonality of natural resources such as water, pasture and game made it necessary for them to mark their tribal territory with their funerary structures.     

Large-scale Debris Flow Disasters: Hazard-Risk-Vulnerability Analysis Approach in Taiwan

Catastrophic disasters may cause irreversible damage to cultural heritage. This study identified the risk to cultural heritage sites in Taiwan posed by large-scale debris flow disasters. The cultural heritage sites that may be affected by debris flows were identified through risk identification and by using GIS. Subsequently, an on-site field survey was conducted to confirm the cultural heritage sites that are potentially vulnerable to debris flow disasters. The research findings are as follows: (a) the top three cultural heritage sites that are most affected by debris flows are municipal, county, and city monuments, historical buildings, and historical sites; (b) the number of cultural heritage sites affected is related to environmental exploitation; (c) the cultural heritage sites at high risk of being affected by disasters were primarily located in Taitung and Chiayi Counties.     

Re-thinking threats to architectural heritage

This paper proposes the need for heritage strategies and policies to engage with the psychological literature on risk perception because current heritage processes exclude many groups of people due to the psychological processes that are favoured in current procedures. Risk perception research has affected mitigation strategies in the realms of natural disaster planning (for example, earthquake preparedness) and, more recently, climate change mitigation. The paper outlines relevant psychological research and highlights areas that have the potential to inform heritage loss mitigation.     

Trust,business groups and social capital: building a Protestant entrepreneurial network in nineteenth-century Naples

Abstract

This article explores the behaviour of a group of foreign entrepreneurs (mainly Swiss and Germans) who settled in southern Italy during the nineteenth century, establishing cotton manufacturing, creating a religious community, importing technologies, machines and patterns of management. These entrepreneurs shared a high level of training and culture and they all belonged to Protestant denominations. In the context of this foreign entrepreneurial community, the article examines the role played by friendship, kinship, origins, education and religion in shaping the network that linked groups of Protestant businessmen across Europe, emphasizing how these manufacturing firms relied on forms of cooperation, solidarity and physical proximity that were consolidated and perpetuated across more than three generations.     

Developments in flood maps for flood risk management in Scotland

ABSTRACT

Sustainable flood risk management in Scotland is underpinned by the Flood Risk Management (Scotland) Act 2009. Effective delivery of actions to reduce the adverse impact of flooding are dependent on a collaborative approach by Responsible Authorities and a common understanding of flood hazard and risk. Over the last few decades, flood hazard maps have established a prominent role as essential tools in supporting effective flood risk management. They have developed as a result of improved national datasets and advances in computer processing. Improvements in modelling confidence and in the spatial representation of hazard and risk-inform confident actions set out in Flood Risk Management Strategies that coordinate actions supporting adaptation to future hazard conditions. The continued development of the accurate spatial representation of flood hazard and risk is an essential component of enhancing resilience in the face of future climate change.