创先争优活动是新形势下加强党的先进性建设的重大举措

创先争优活动,是中国共产党将自己的执政理念化为行动的重要载体,是党将自己的根本宗旨融入时代的生动实践。本文从开展创先争优活动的时代意义、指导思想和目标任务、本质要求、实践主体、载体和方式方法等方面,论述了开展创先争优活动是新形势下加强党的先进性建设的重大举措,切实为深入开展创先争优活动,增强活动的针对性和时效性提供理论指导。     

SEISMIC RESPONSE CONTROL OF A CABLE-STAYED BRIDGE BY VARIABLE DAMPERS

Cable-stayed bridges exhibit unique responses under a strong motion. It is partly due to the complexity in their damping mechanism. Recently, the benchmark problem of a cable-stayed bridge was developed to clarify the effectiveness of various seismic control strategies. Due to the new development of magnetorheological dampers, the application of variable dampers in bridges becomes possible. In this study, the effectiveness of the nonlinear viscous damping force scheme and the two-step friction damping force scheme are investigated. It is found that the nonlinear viscous damping force scheme is effective to control the response of the cable-stayed bridge with less demand for the damping force capacity of a damper. In addition, the two-step friction damping force scheme shows the improvement over conventional friction damping because the energy dissipation of a damper can be increased.     

DAMAGE AND DUCTILITY DEMAND SPECTRA ASSESSMENT OF HYSTERETIC DEGRADING SYSTEMS SUBJECT TO STOCHASTIC SEISMIC LOADS

Damage phenomena observed in structures subject to intense seismic events are the result of stiffness and strength degradation. This paper studies the damage assessment of hysteretic degrading structures described by means of the Bouc-Wen model, modified to represent the mechanical degradation induced by severe earthquakes. In order to consider randomness of seismic action, the analysis is performed by adopting a stochastic approach and the Park and Ang damage functional is also evaluated in stochastic way. A parametric analysis is carried out with the aim to analyse the effect of mechanical characteristics and measure parameters of earthquake intensity on seismic response and damage level. Damage spectra are finally obtained and they are used to develop, on the basis of the Performance Based Seismic Design, ductility demand spectra.     

ENERGY-BASED TECHNIQUE FOR SEISMIC PERFORMANCE ASSESSMENT OF INTERIOR BEAM-COLUMN JOINTS

For investigating the seismic behaviour of monolithic beam-column joints, a new technique of assessment of joint performance, termed the Shear Deformation Energy Index, is presented in this paper. Previous research efforts in this field were evaluated and the relative merits and drawbacks of each approach were highlighted. Primary variables influencing the seismic behaviour of joints were studied in the experimental phase of the current study. This included pseudo-static testing of nine interior beam-column sub-assemblages with different joint configurations. The parametric investigation of primary variables was complemented by studying the behaviour of specimens of eight different experimental programmes. For easy application of the technique in design practice, the Index is graphically represented versus its main variables in a design chart, referred to as the Performance Chart.     

Following the plot of Bengt Pohjanen's Meänmaa: narrativization as a process of creating regional identity

This paper discusses the artistic and cultural work of one minority author and regional activist, Bengt Pohjanen, and how it constitutes a means for mediating regional identity narratives, constructing Meänmaa, the region straddling the border between Sweden and Finland in the Tornio River Valley. We will approach narrativization as a creative social action, focusing on the performative, social and political aspects of regional stories, and by this means impugning the division between territorial, bounded, and networked, unbounded, conceptualizations of regions. We will follow the narrative plot of Bengt Pohjanen's Meänmaa, pointing out how an artistic and cultural region becomes part of our social reality and how regional consciousness and identity become established and constantly renegotiated within and across national borders.     

The Genesis of Economic Cooperation in the Stories of Joseph: A Constitutional and Institutional Economic Reconstruction

Abstract

The paper analyzes in constitutional and institutional economic terms Joseph’s economic policies, such as changes to property rights arrangements for farming, the introduction of a barter tax on crop production, and the multi-layered bureaucratic hierarchies of Egypt. Utilizing Buchanan’s approach to constitutional economics, I argue that these policies lowered attack/defense costs as they arise, when a group attempts to escape from the natural distribution state (the “war of all”, as Hobbes called it). A key thesis is that this encouraged interacting parties, already on the grounds of selfinterested choice, to engage in societal contracting out of the “war of all,” thereby reaping mutual gains.

Complementary to this strand of analysis, I have drawn on other institutional economic concepts, particularly those that were introduced by Williamson, and by North and Weingast. The paper argues in this respect that Joseph’s policies credibly and more reliably guaranteed property rights, which in turn lowered transaction costs of the interacting parties, i.e. Egypt and Israel. This ultimately yielded mutual gains and high economic performance for the society depicted in Genesis. In this way, cooperation was generated in economic terms.     

Explaining the monopoly in shell-bead production on the Channel Islands: drilling experiments with four lithic raw materials

Significant political and economic developments among the Chumash of southern California were catalyzed in part by the emergence of an intensive, specialist-driven shell-bead industry during the second millennium CE on the Santa Barbara Channel Islands. The production of millions of beads depended in turn on the availability of lithic microdrills of standardized form and materials. Channel Islanders quarried a particular stone type, a blocky Monterey Formation chert, from multiple outcrops situated close to the eastern shores of Santa Cruz Island. Rich archaeological assemblages document the lithic and shell byproducts of these intertwined production systems, each of which endured for several centuries (CE 1150–1819). Islanders invariably chose Island chert for making microdrills: hundreds of thousands of specimens recorded to date are of this material. Furthermore, nearly every microlith in all of Chumash territory (post CE 1150) was produced on the islands; the large populations on the mainland did not participate in microlith making or bead making after CE 1150–1200. We argue that this pattern had its roots not only in the patchiness of key resources and shifting regional social relationships, but also in the physical properties of available raw materials. Here we experimentally assess the properties of Santa Cruz Island chert alongside three important mainland raw materials—Grimes Canyon fused shale, Coso obsidian, and Vandenberg chert—that potentially could have been tapped to make microliths. We test the proposition that Island chert outperforms other lithic materials in drilling efficiency and drill use life. Our experimental results from 108 drilling trials reveal sharp distinctions in performance characteristics across the four materials. We infer that the process by which Islanders became the more-or-less exclusive manufacturers of shell-bead currency in southern California was facilitated by both the efficacy and physical properties of the Island cherts and the propitious locations of the outcrops.     

Guerilla art,social value and absent heritage fabric

There is extensive commentary on the role of unauthorised art, but little on the coincidence of heritage value and guerilla art. This paper analyses the relationship of the two in a 2007 statue which is a monument to a lost place for which there is no surviving historic fabric. The statue functions not just as a place of memory, but of guerilla art; a complex interplay has emerged between an official piece of government art and unsanctioned community performance. Growing heritage emphasis on social value over the previous dominance of original fabric suggests that the delight with which the statue has been greeted illuminates evolving heritage philosophy, monument language and the emergence of the importance of the heritage community especially for its potential performance value at a site. The dramatic contribution that the statue has made to the city has an impact on the fields of landscaping, planning, history and heritage.     

Problematizing silences in intangible heritage: unsettling historical records of women in protests

Abstract

This paper addresses questions of women’s visibility in constructed histories, as well as levels of recognition concerning their participation in politics through historical narratives. In particular, historical narratives representing women in protest in the context of waterfront heritage zones associated with the shipbuilding industry are examined, based on examples of two public art projects: Strong Women of the Clydeside: Protests and Suffragettes from Govan’s Hidden Histories led by the artist t s Beall in the Govan area of Glasgow, Scotland and Shipyard is a Woman by Arteria Association and Metropolitanka in Gdansk, Poland.