Promoting multiculturalism and tolerance: Expanding the meaning of “unity through diversity” in the United Arab Emirates

The United Arab Emirates (UAE) has sought to establish a national identity among its nationals since its inception in 1971. Contrary to the pessimism in its first few years, the UAE was able to create a national identity among its nationals despite their initially differing loyalties. The UAE has now embarked on a phase of creating a new national identity that includes non-nationals, encompassing migrants and expats. This study argues that this new identity aims to include, at least discursively, non-nationals, presenting them as an integral part of society. It should be noted that this new identity does not seek to standardize or assimilate the whole population, in contrast to the first identity, which aimed to standardize the nationals. Its primary aim is rather to express its appreciation of the migrant population through the notions of tolerance, diversity, and multiculturalism, while also preventing complaints from the nationals. This study analyses the ways of including non-nationals in a new national identity through national gatherings (national days), institutional activities (heritage festivals, cultural gatherings, cultural center visits and activities), media analyses (state-sponsored media), and foreign policy initiatives that emerged (or presented) due to domestic diversity, such as Pope's visit.     

Ambitious deep energy retrofits of buildings to accelerate the 1.5°C energy transition in Canada

Scientists advise limiting global warming to 1.5°C with substantial actions by 2030. Our viewpoint argues that climate response strategies in Canada have underemphasized and underestimated the potential contribution deep energy retrofits can make to greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions reductions, leading to inadequate responses in the building sector, and that Canada can (and should) be ambitious with building retrofits over the next decade. GHG savings from building retrofits can be realized more quickly than GHG reductions from other sectors, and either deliver net cost savings or are cost‐effective when compared to other mitigation measures. Retrofits can also provide social and economic benefits, such as improved health and comfort, and lower energy costs. This paper reviews energy use and building retrofits in Canada and argues the following should be implemented: (1) focus innovation on deep energy retrofit processes, not singular retrofit actions; (2) maximize both social and environmental benefits; (3) improve data gathering and availability for analysis and delivery; (4) innovate for a process of decisions and to avoid “dropouts” during the retrofit process; and (5) focus innovation on business models that maximize benefits.     

Analyzing the association of policy narratives with problem tractability in the implementation of EU decisions: Evidence from the phytosanitary policy area

The Narrative Policy Framework (NPF) suggests that narratives can be employed to define and contest policy problems. Yet, few NPF studies have explicitly addressed the narrative portrayal of problem intractability. What role do narratives play in a situation of uncertainty about the causes and solutions of the problem, when strong divergences regarding the values and interests of the policy actors exist? The article anchors the NPF to the literatures on problem definition and implementation to advance two propositions about (a) how differences in the use of narrative elements can be suggestive of the degree of problem (in-)tractability; and (b) whether other elements of tractability, namely the presence of a valid causal theory, are associated with the usage of narrative strategies. I test the propositions by analyzing media commentaries surrounding the implementation of European decisions to tackle a tree-killing epidemic in Italy. The findings suggest that narratives can helpfully illustrate the intractability inherent in the policy debate. However, narratives can also develop independently of factors that the implementation literature understands as conducive to lowering intractability, namely knowledge accumulation. The NPF may represent a promising alternative to understand policy implementation processes.     

Mixed messages & bounded rationality: The perverse consequences of real ID for immigration policy

Policies concerning undocumented immigrants are inevitably ambivalent, creating uncertainty and confusion in the implementation process. We identify a clear example of this ambivalence —U.S. law setting standards for determining the credibility of asylum seekers—that resulted in an increase in asylum grants despite policymakers' intention to make it harder for individuals to obtain the status. We argue that this law, The REAL ID Act of 2005, sent mixed messages to immigration judges (IJs), street-level bureaucrats who implement immigration policy. It increased IJ discretion, but set vague limits. We theorize that IJs, behaving in a bounded rationality framework, use their professional legal training as a short-cut and look primarily to the courts for guidance. Our evidence supports our argument. After the passage of the REAL ID Act, IJ decision-making is more closely aligned with the preferences of their political and legal principals, and, in the final score, the federal circuit courts are the winners.     

En tiempos del condestable Dávalos: Enrique de Aragón,poeta quejoso en Crónica. Año de 1420, de Jerónimo de la Escosura

Infants of Aragon are very important figures in the history and literature of the nineteenth century, but it is rare that one of them, Don Enrique, is the protagonist. This work analyzes the romantic story Cronica. Año de 1420, published by Jerónimo de la Escosura in 1839. In it, Enrique de Aragón is a cunning courtier and a poet in love, and he manages to change history because he changes the story with his verses.     

Beauty,Bath and Beyond: Framing Bathsheba as a Royal Fantasy in 2 Sam 11,1-5

This paper investigates the function of beauty in David and Bathsheba’s encounter in 2 Sam 11,1-5. It argues that the female bather’s pleasant appearance, rather than simply kindling king David’s desire, focalizes the woman as sexually available (and vulnerable) and wraps the whole episode in a royal fantasy of shared intimacy. The focus on Bathsheba’s beautiful body—her wash, her motion towards the king, her self-sanctification and her pregnancy—frames the episode in a very erotic way, suggesting adultery. It conceals the sexual violence committed by the king who sends, takes and sleeps with the woman. David’s violent entitlement to Bathsheba reveals the beauty politics at play in his royal House.     

The hinc et nunc of moral theology: Francisco de Vitoria’s lesson and the missionary experience*

In the sixteenth century, as moral theology was being consolidated as an autonomous academic discipline, theologians at the University of Salamanca, including the Dominican Francisco de Vitoria, began to incorporate current moral and political issues into their teaching agendas. Prominent among these issues were those arising out of the conquest of the Americas. Their students, a generation of university-trained missionaries, then went to work in Spanish possessions in the Americas and the Philippines. These missionaries and men of learning included the Augustinians Alonso de la Veracruz (in Mexico) and Martín de Rada (in the Philippines and China). As their world expanded, Vitoria's teachings were rendered fully intelligible in the confusing reality of the colonial enterprise, and these missionaries struggled to apply his lessons to the questions of conscience they encountered. The result can be considered a new chapter in the relationship between theological knowledge, the production of facts, and moral certainty, all against the backdrop of the territorial and economic expansion of Spain.     

Experimental investigation of carbon dioxide trapping due to capillary retention in saline aquifers

Capillary trapping is a physical mechanism by which carbon dioxide (CO₂) is naturally immobilized in the pore spaces of aquifer rocks during geologic carbon sequestration operations, and thus a key aspect of estimating geologic storage potential. Here, we studied capillary trapping of supercritical carbon dioxide (scCO₂), and the effect of initial scCO₂ saturation and flow rate on the storage/trapping potential of Berea sandstone. We performed two‐phase, scCO₂‐brine displacements in two samples, each subject to four sequential drainage–imbibition core‐flooding cycles to quantify end‐point saturations of scCO₂ with the aid of micro‐ and macro‐computed tomography imaging. From these experiments, we found that between 51% and 75% of the initial CO₂ injected can be left behind after the brine injection. We also observed that the initial scCO₂ saturation influenced the residual scCO₂ saturation to a greater extent than the rate of brine injection under the experimental conditions examined. In spite of differences in the experimental conditions tested, as well as those reported in the literature, initial and residual saturations were found to follow a consistent relationship.     

Low‐temperature catalytic CO2 hydrogenation with geological quantities of ruthenium: a possible abiotic CH4 source in chromitite‐rich serpentinized rocks

Metal‐catalysed CO₂ hydrogenation is considered a source of methane in serpentinized (hydrated) igneous rocks and a fundamental abiotic process germane to the origin of life. Iron, nickel, chromium and cobalt are the catalysts typically employed in hydrothermal simulation experiments to obtain methane at temperatures >200°C. However, land‐based present‐day serpentinization and abiotic gas apparently develop below 100°C, down to approximately 40–50°C. Here, we document considerable methane production in thirteen CO₂ hydrogenation experiments performed in a closed dry system, from 20 to 90°C and atmospheric pressure, over 0.9–122 days, using concentrations of non‐pretreated ruthenium equivalent to those occurring in chromitites in ophiolites or igneous complexes (from 0.4 to 76 mg of Ru, equivalent to the amount occurring approximately in 0.4–760 kg of chromitite). Methane production increased with time and temperature, reaching approximately 87 mg CH₄ per gram of Ru after 30 days (2.9 mgCH₄/g_ru/day) at 90°C. At room temperature, CH₄ production rate was approximately three orders of magnitude lower (0.003 mgCH₄/g_ru/day). We report the first stable carbon and hydrogen isotope ratios of abiotic CH₄ generated below 100°C. Using initial δ¹³C_CO2 of ‐40‰, we obtained room temperature δ¹³C_CH4 values as ¹³C depleted as ?142‰. With time and temperature, the C‐isotope separation between CO₂ and CH₄ decreased significantly and the final δ¹³C_CH4 values approached that of initial δ¹³C_CO2. The presence of minor amounts of C₂‐C₆ hydrocarbons is consistent with observations in natural settings. Comparative experiments at the same temperatures with iron and nichel catalysts did not generate CH₄. Ru‐enriched chromitites could potentially generate methane at low temperatures on Earth and on other planets.     

Salafī‐Ashʻarī Polemics of the 3rd & 4th Islamic Centuries

While Sunnism is the largest sect of Islam, Sunnism itself is divided into many strands. The two main strands of Sunnism for the last few centuries are the Atharī (or Salafī) strand, and the Ash?arī strand. This papers seeks to examine the earliest recorded controversies that signal this intra‐Sunnī divide. While each of these two groups has historically attempted to claim true Sunnī ‘orthodoxy’ by denying the legitimacy, and at times even the early existence, of the other, it will be shown that the genesis of this intra‐Sunnī divide dates back to the first century of Sunnism itself, viz., the 3^rd AH/8^th CE centuries, and that there are specific historic incidents that indicate theological tensions within the nascent Sunnī movement that would later be manifested in the two streams of Ash?arism and Salafism. Hence, it can be argued that Sunnism was never truly unified to begin with, and that these incidents demonstrate theological tensions that existed from its very origins.