High modernism in the Arctic: planning Frobisher Bay and Inuvik

This paper considers Frobisher Bay and Inuvik, two Canadian Arctic towns, as examples of the high-modernist planning that swept the globe during the middle decades of the twentieth century, but also Cold War projects reflecting a sudden interest in the Arctic as a region of military significance. Building on the framework provided by James Scott in Seeing like a State (1998), the paper details the connections between modernization theory and Cold War militarism before turning to the strikingly parallel case studies. In each instance, federal officials proposed ambitious urban models designed to simultaneously overcome the hostility of a northern environment and catapult native northerners into conditions of modern living. While the limits and failings of such schemes varied by location, both sites were also laboratories for social scientists employed by the federal government to document and analyze the modernization of the Arctic. The work of these scholars represents a particularly rich and complex record of governmental interventions, tied variously to Cold War imperatives, in northern lives and landscapes at a time of great faith in the transformative power of modern engineering.     

初到新疆的历程

新中国成立前夕,刘少奇率中共代表团秘密访问苏联,为适应国内斗争形势的变化,中央决定将解放新疆的时间从原计划的1950年提前到1949年,为争取时间,选派我为中共中央联络员,从莫斯科直接赴新疆开展工作。为了建立党中央与新疆三区的联系,"力群电台"于8月15日开通,11月底中共新疆分局成立后电台撤销,发给中央的电报有150多份。我在伊犁接触了新疆三区的领导和骨干,在迪化接触了新疆的高层领导陶峙岳、鲍尔汉等人,通过各种途径对新疆地区敌、我、友三方面的情况有了比较切实的了解,并及时向中央进行了汇报,为中央解决新疆问题提供了较为可靠的根据。     

Developments in Rural Life on the Eastern African Coast,a.d. 700–1500

The eastern African coast is known for its Swahili “stonetowns.” Archaeological study of stonetowns has overshadowed that of Swahili rural life, and how it reformulated in the context of urban transformations after a.d. 1000. To help redress that imbalance, we focus here on village research carried out in a Swahili heartland—Pemba Island, Tanzania—in the context of two archaeological projects. We feature four settlements: later 1st millennium Kimimba village and its large, trading village neighbor, Tumbe; and 2nd millennium Kaliwa village, neighbor to Chwaka stonetown. Their archaeology, contextualized within a regional landscape, allows us to say new things about the changing nature of rural life on Pemba, and to make a case for the potential of village complexity elsewhere on the Swahili coast.     

Improvised Hybridity in the “Fixing” of Chinese Infrastructure Capital: The Case of Kenya's Standard Gauge Railway

The article explores the role of state-owned enterprises (SOEs) in the globalisation of China's infrastructure capital. Examining how accumulation strategies of Chinese SOEs are driven by a complex set of political and economic, state and private, interests, it foregrounds the inherently hybrid nature of China's state capitalism. We use Kenya's Standard Gauge Railway (SGR) as a case study to analyse how state infrastructure capital traverses borders, and the specific ways that contradictions of accumulation in China are relocated through the improvised hybridity of SOEs. In Kenya, China Road and Bridge Corporation, the main SGR contractor, shifted and adapted its strategies as the pursuit of economic productivity gave way to political priorities in China, simultaneously responding to changing socio-political circumstances in Kenya and across East Africa. Analysing these dynamics, we highlight the contingencies of, and limitations to, structural reorganisation of actually existing forms of state capitalism in China and beyond.     

Coping with parallel authorities: the early diplomatic negotiations of Soviet Russia and China on the Chinese Eastern Railway, 1917–1925

This article explores the evolution of Soviet diplomatic policies with respect to the disputed ownership of the Chinese Eastern Railway and the responses of the three Chinese political authorities in Beijing, Guangzhou, and Fengtian from 1917 to 1925. It unveils a “parallel diplomacy” on the Soviet side and the roles the three Chinese authorities played in this grand diplomatic game. From the October Revolution in 1917 until the death of Sun Yat-sen in 1925, Moscow’s contacts with Beijing, Guangzhou, and Fengtian were initiated almost simultaneously with a different purpose in each case, namely political legitimacy, justification of ideology, and practical leverage, respectively. In response, the Beijing Government took a relatively active approach toward reclaiming the ownership of the railway, whereas Sun in Guangzhou was somewhat passive in dealing with Soviet claims. Fengtian warlord Zhang Zuolin’s responses were quite ambiguous, as he was suspicious of Moscow yet willing to cooperate with it. In general, this study reveals a balance between propaganda and national interests in Soviet diplomatic policy making, and it evaluates the effectiveness of Chinese politicians’ responses to Soviet Russia.     

城乡边缘带研究的回顾与展望

本文综述了国内外对城乡边缘带的概念、地域结构、土地利用形态、社会经济特征、形成演变机制等方面的研究,并对城乡边缘带研究的最新进展及今后的研究方向作了评述。     

近代以来新疆艺术述论(1840-1999)

本文把近代以来新疆艺术发展划分成三个阶段,对各艺术种类在不同时期的演变进行了概括性的研究,认为新疆艺术和中国政治社会变化密切相关,各阶段的新疆艺术既有其鲜明的时代烙印,也深刻地体现着其独具的传统特点;虽然新疆艺术受东、西方文化和艺术潮流的影响,但是此期中国内地艺术的影响深刻而全面。     

1932年《铁道法》形成的历史路径及其实施阻力

1932年中国历史上第一部铁路基本法——《铁道法》正式颁布。《铁道法》的诞生,既迎合了近代国人对铁路国有化的产业发展路径,也符合了铁路法制由简至繁、由缺至全的演进路径。《铁道法》是国民政府推行铁路产业政策的根本性立法,但在实施过程中受到了阻力,在不断的外耗与内耗中效力有限。