Selection, staging and sequencing in the recent Chinese privatization

Selection in privatization is a decision-making process of choosing state-owned enterprises (SOEs), prioritizing and sequencing privatizing events, and determining the extent of private ownership in partial privatization. We investigate this process in an important but rarely studied case of China. Based on the SOE population over 1998-2008, we track 49,456 wholly SOEs and identify 9,359 privatization cases over time. Our econometric analysis concludes: (i) The privatization selection is a complex decision-making process in which local governments balance between various economic, financial and political objectives. (ii) In the recent Chinese privatization, firm performance relates to the selection, staging and sequencing in privatization in an inverted-U fashion. The worse and the best performing SOEs are more likely to remain state-owned, maintain higher state holding when privatized, and are less likely to be privatized later in time. These patterns suggest the privatization reform slowdown and the underlying changes in the privatization policy.

A study on the flow characteristics of an industrial radiant tube burner

The thesis presents an experimentally validated modelling study of the flow of combustion air in an industrial radiant tube burner (RTB). The RTB is used typically in industrial heat treating furnaces. The work has been initiated because of the need for improvements in burner lifetime and performance which are related to the fluid mechanics of the com busting flow, and a fundamental understanding of this is therefore necessary. To achieve this, a detailed three-dimensional Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) model has been used, validated with experimental air flow, temperature and flue gas measurements. Initially, the work programme is presented and the theory behind RTB design and operation in addition to the theory behind swirling flows and methane combustion. NOx reduction techniques are discussed and numerical modelling of combusting flows is detailed in this section. The importance of turbulence, radiation and combustion modelling is highlighted, as well as the numerical schemes that incorporate discretization, finite volume theory and convergence. The study first focuses on the combustion air flow and its delivery to the combustion zone. An isothermal computational model was developed to allow the examination of the flow characteristics as it enters the burner and progresses through the various sections prior to the discharge face in the combustion area. Important features identified include the air recuperator swirler coil, the step ring, the primary/secondary air splitting flame tube and the fuel nozzle. It was revealed that the effectiveness of the air recuperator swirler is significantly compromised by the need for a generous assembly tolerance. Also, there is a substantial circumferential flow maldistribution introduced by the swirier, but that this is effectively removed by the positioning of a ring constriction in the downstream passage. Computations using the k-ε turbulence model show good agreement with experimentally measured velocity profiles in the combustion zone and proved the use of the modelling strategy prior to the combustion study. Reasonable mesh independence was obtained with 200,000 nodes. Agreement was poorer with the RNG  k-ε and Reynolds Stress models. The study continues to address the combustion process itself and the heat transfer process internal to the RTB. A series of combustion and radiation model configurations were developed and the optimum combination of the Eddy Dissipation (ED) combustion model and the Discrete Transfer (DT) radiation model was used successfully to validate a burner experimental test. The previously cold flow validated k-ε turbulence model was used and reasonable mesh independence was obtained with 300,000 nodes. The combination showed good agreement with temperature measurements in the inner and outer walls of the burner, as well as with flue gas composition measured at the exhaust. The inner tube wall temperature predictions validated the experimental measurements in the largest portion of the thermocouple locations, highlighting a small flame bias to one side, although the model slightly over predicts the temperatures towards the downstream end of the inner tube. NOx emissions were initially over predicted, however, the use of a combustion flame temperature limiting subroutine allowed convergence to the experimental value of 451 ppmv. With the validated model, the effectiveness of certain RTB features identified previously is analysed, and an analysis of the energy transfers throughout the burner is presented, to identify the dominant mechanisms in each region. The optimum turbulence-combustion-radiation model selection was then the baseline for further model development. One of these models, an eccentrically positioned flame tube model highlights the failure mode of the RTB during long term operation. Other models were developed to address NOx reduction and improvement of the flame profile in the burner combustion zone. These included a modified fuel nozzle design, with 12 circular section fuel ports, which demonstrates a longer and more symmetric flame, although with limited success in NOx reduction. In addition, a zero bypass swirler coil model was developed that highlights the effect of the stronger swirling combustion flow. A reduced diameter and a 20 mm forward displaced flame tube model shows limited success in NOx reduction; although the latter demonstrated improvements in the discharge face heat distribution and improvements in the flame symmetry. Finally, Flue Gas Recirculation (FGR) modelling attempts indicate the difficulty of the application of this NOx reduction technique in the Wellman RTB. Recommendations for further work are made that include design mitigations for the fuel nozzle and further burner modelling is suggested to improve computational validation. The introduction of fuel staging is proposed, as well as a modification in the inner tube to enhance the effect of FGR.

Une étude générique du metteur en scène au théâtre:son émergence et son rôle moderne et contemporain

The theatre director (metteur en scene in French) is a relatively new figure in theatre practice. It was not until the I820s that the term 'mise en scene' gained currency. The term 'director' was not in general use until the I880s. The emergence and the role of the director has been considered from a variety of perspectives, either through the history of theatre (Allevy, Jomaron, Sarrazac, Viala, Biet and Triau); the history of directing (Chinoy and Cole, Boll, Veinstein, Roubine); semiotic approaches to directing (Whitmore, Miller, Pavis); the semiotics of performance (De Marinis); generic approaches to the mise en scene (Thomasseau, Banu); post-dramatic approaches to theatre (Lehmann); approaches to performance process and the specifics of rehearsal methodology (Bradby and Williams, Giannachi and Luckhurst, Picon-Vallin, Styan). What the scholarly literature has not done so far is to map the parameters necessarily involved in the directing process, and to incorporate an analysis of the emergence of the theatre director during the modem period and consider its impact on contemporary performance practice. Directing relates primarily to the making of the performance guided by a director, a single figure charged with the authority to make binding artistic decisions. Each director may have her/his own personal approaches to the process of preparation prior to a show. This is exemplified, for example, by the variety of terms now used to describe the role and function of directing, from producer, to facilitator or outside eye. However, it is essential at the outset to make two observations, each of which contributes to a justification for a generic analysis (as opposed to a genetic approach). Firstly, a director does not work alone, and cooperation with others is involved at all stages of the process. Secondly, beyond individual variation, the role of the director remains twofold. The first is to guide the actors (meneur de jeu, directeur d'acteurs, coach); the second is to make a visual representation in the performance space (set designer, stage designer, costume designer, lighting designer, scenographe). The increasing place of scenography has brought contemporary theatre directors such as Wilson, Castellucci, Fabre to produce performances where the performance space becomes a semiotic dimension that displaces the primacy of the text. The play is not, therefore, the sole artistic vehicle for directing. This definition of directing obviously calls for a definition of what the making of the performance might be. The thesis defines the making of the performance as the activity of bringing a social event, by at least one performer, providing visual and/or textual meaning in a performance space. This definition enables us to evaluate four consistent parameters throughout theatre history: first, the social aspect associated to the performance event; second, the devising process which may be based on visual and/or textual elements; third, the presence of at least one performer in the show; fourth, the performance space (which is not simply related to the theatre stage). Although the thesis focuses primarily on theatre practice, such definition blurs the boundaries between theatre and other collaborative artistic disciplines (cinema, opera, music and dance). These parameters illustrate the possibility to undertake a generic analysis of directing, and resonate with the historical, political and artistic dimensions considered. Such a generic perspective on the role of the director addresses three significant questions: an historical question: how/why has the director emerged?; a sociopolitical question: how/why was the director a catalyst for the politicisation of theatre, and subsequently contributed to the rise of State-funded theatre policy?; and an artistic one: how/why the director has changed theatre practice and theory in the twentieth-century? Directing for the theatre as an artistic activity is a historically situated phenomenon. It would seem only natural from a contemporary perspective to associate the activity of directing to the function of the director. This is relativised, however, by the question of how the performance was produced before the modern period. The thesis demonstrates that the rise of the director is a progressive and historical phenomenon (Dort) rather than a mere invention (Viala, Sarrazac). A chronological analysis of the making of the performance throughout theatre history is the most useful way to open the study. In order to understand the emergence of the director, the research methodology assesses the interconnection of the four parameters above throughout four main periods of theatre history: the beginning of the Renaissance (meneur de jeu), the classical age (actor-manager and stage designer-manager), the modern period (director) and the contemporary period (director-facilitator, performer). This allows us properly to appraise the progressive emergence of the director, as well as to make an analysis of her/his modern and contemporary role. The first chapter argues that the physical separation between the performance space and its audience, which appeared in the early fifteenth-century, has been a crucial feature in the scenographic, aesthetic, political and social organisation of the performance. At the end of the Middle Ages, French farces which raised socio-political issues (see Bakhtin) made a clear division on a single outdoor stage (treteau) between the actors and the spectators, while religious plays (drame fiturgique, mystere) were mostly performed on various outdoor and opened multispaces. As long as the performance was liturgical or religious, and therefore confined within an acceptable framework, it was allowed. At the time, the French ecclesiastical and civil authorities tried, on several occasions, to prohibit staged performances. As a result, practitioners developed non-official indoor spaces, the Theatre de fa Trinite (1398) being the first French indoor theatre recognized by scholars. This self-exclusion from the open public space involved breaking the accepted rules by practitioners (e.g. Les Confreres de fa Passion), in terms of themes but also through individual input into a secular performance rather than the repetition of commonly known religious canvases. These developments heralded the authorised theatres that began to emerge from the mid-sixteenth century, which in some cases were subsidised in their construction. The construction of authorised indoor theatres associated with the development of printing led to a considerable increase in the production of dramatic texts for the stage. Profoundly affecting the reception of the dramatic text by the audience, the distance between the stage and the auditorium accompanied the changing relationship between practitioners and spectators. This distance gave rise to a major development of the role of the actor and of the stage designer. The second chapter looks at the significance of both the actor and set designer in the devising process of the performance from the sixteenth-century to the end of the nineteenth-century. The actor underwent an important shift in function in this period from the delivery of an unwritten text that is learned in the medieval oral tradition to a structured improvisation produced by the commedia dell 'arte. In this new form of theatre, a chef de troupe or an experienced actor shaped the story, but the text existed only through the improvisation of the actors. The preparation of those performances was, moreover, centred on acting technique and the individual skills of the actor. From this point, there is clear evidence that acting began to be the subject of a number of studies in the mid-sixteenth-century, and more significantly in the seventeenth-century, in Italy and France. This is revealed through the implementation of a system of notes written by the playwright to the actors (stage directions) in a range of plays (Gerard de Vivier, Comedie de la Fidelite Nuptiale, 1577). The thesis also focuses on Leoni de' Sommi (Quatro dialoghi, 1556 or 1565) who wrote about actors' techniques and introduced the meneur de jeu in Italy. The actor-manager (meneur de jeu), a professional actor, who scholars have compared to the director (see Strihan), trained the actors. Nothing, however, indicates that the actor-manager was directing the visual representation of the text in the performance space. From the end of the sixteenth-century, the dramatic text began to dominate the process of the performance and led to an expansion of acting techniques, such as the declamation. Stage designers carne from outside the theatre tradition and played a decisive role in the staging of religious celebrations (e.g. Actes des Apotres, 1536). In the sixteenth-century, both the proscenium arch and the borders, incorporated in the architecture of the new indoor theatres (theatre a l'italienne), contributed to create all kinds of illusions on the stage, principally the revival of perspective. This chapter shows ongoing audience demands for more elaborate visual effects on the stage. This led, throughout the classical age, and even more so during the eighteenth-century, to grant the stage design practitioner a major role in the making of the performance (see Ciceri). The second chapter demonstrates that the guidance of the actors and the scenographic conception, which are the artistic components of the role of the director, appear to have developed independently from one another until the nineteenth-century. The third chapter investigates the emergence of the director per se. The causes for this have been considered by a number of scholars, who have mainly identified two: the influence of Naturalism (illustrated by the Meiningen Company, Antoine, and Stanislavski) and the invention of electric lighting. The influence of the Naturalist movement on the emergence of the modem director in the late nineteenth-century is often considered as a radical factor in the history of theatre practice. Naturalism undoubtedly contributed to changes in staging, costume and lighting design, and to a more rigorous commitment to the harmonisation and visualisation of the overall production of the play. Although the art of theatre was dependent on the dramatic text, scholars (Osborne) demonstrate that the Naturalist directors did not strictly follow the playwright's indications written in the play in the late nineteenth-century. On the other hand, the main characteristic of directing in Naturalism at that time depended on a comprehensive understanding of the scenography, which had to respond to the requirements of verisimilitude. Electric lighting contributed to this by allowing for the construction of a visual narrative on stage. However, it was a master technician, rather than an emergent director, who was responsible for key operational decisions over how to use this emerging technology in venues such as the new Bayreuth theatre in 1876. Electric lighting reflects a normal technological evolution and cannot be considered as one of the main causes of the emergence of the director. Two further causes of the emergence of the director, not considered in previous studies, are the invention of cinema and the Symbolist movement (Lugne-Poe, Meyerhold). Cinema had an important technological influence on the practitioners of the Naturalist movement. In order to achieve a photographic truth on the stage (tableau, image), Naturalist directors strove to decorate the stage with the detailed elements that would be expected to be found if the situation were happening in reality. Film production had an influence on the work of actors (Walter). The filmmaker took over a primary role in the making of the film, as the source of the script, the filming process and the editing of the film. This role influenced the conception that theatre directors had of their own work. It is this concept of the director which influenced the development of the theatre director. As for the Symbolist movement, the director's approach was to dematerialise the text of the playwright, trying to expose the spirit, movement, colour and rhythm of the text. Therefore, the Symbolists disengaged themselves from the material aspect of the production, and contributed to give greater artistic autonomy to the role of the director. Although the emergence of the director finds its roots amongst the Naturalist practitioners (through a rigorous attempt to provide a strict visual interpretation of the text on stage), the Symbolist director heralded the modem perspective of the making of performance. The emergence of the director significantly changed theatre practice and theory. For instance, the rehearsal period became a clear work in progress, a platform for both developing practitioners' techniques and staging the show. This chapter explores and contrasts several practitioners' methods based on the two aspects proposed for the definition of the director (guidance of the actors and materialisation of a visual space). The fourth chapter argues that the role of the director became stronger, more prominent, and more hierarchical, through a more political and didactic approach to theatre as exemplified by the cases of France and Germany at the end of the nineteenth-century and through the First World War. This didactic perspective to theatre defines the notion of political theatre. Political theatre is often approached by the literature (Esslin, Willett) through a Marxist interpretation of the great German directors' productions (Reinhardt, Piscator, Brecht). These directors certainly had a great influence on many directors after the Second World War, such as Jean Vilar, Judith Molina, Jean-Louis Barrault, Roger Planchon, Augusto Boal, and others. This chapter demonstrates, moreover, that the director was confirmed through both ontological and educational approaches to the process of making the performance, and consequently became a central and paternal figure in the organisational and structural processes practiced within her/his theatre company. In this way, the stance taken by the director influenced the State authorities in establishing theatrical policy. This is an entirely novel scholarly contribution to the study of the director. The German and French States were not indifferent to the development of political theatre. A network of public theatres was thus developed in the inter-war period, and more significantly after the Second World War. The fifth chapter shows how State theatre policies establish its sources in the development of political theatre, and more specifically in the German theatre trade union movement (Volksbiihne) and the great directors at the end of the nineteenth-century. French political theatre was more influenced by playwrights and actors (Romain Rolland, Louise Michel, Louis Lumet, Emile Berny). French theatre policy was based primarily on theatre directors who decentralised their activities in France during both the inter-war period and the German occupation. After the Second World War, the government established, through directors, a strong network of public theatres. Directors became both the artistic director and the executive director of those institutionalised theatres. The institution was, however, seriously shaken by the social and political upheaval of 1968. It is the link between the State and the institution in which established directors were entangled that was challenged by the young emerging directors who rejected institutionalised responsibility in favour of the autonomy of the artist in the 1960s. This process is elucidated in chapter five. The final chapter defines the contemporary role of the director in contrasting thework of a number of significant young theatre practitioners in the 1960s such as Peter Brook, Ariane Mnouchkine, The Living Theater, Jerzy Grotowski, Augusto Boal, Eugenio Barba, all of whom decided early on to detach their companies from any form of public funding. This chapter also demonstrates how they promoted new forms of performance such as the performance of the self. First, these practitioners explored new performance spaces outside the traditional theatre building. Producing performances in a non-dedicated theatre place (warehouse, street, etc.) was a more frequent practice in the 1960s than before. However, the recent development of cybertheatre questions both the separation of the audience and the practitioners and the place of the director's role since the 1990s. Secondly, the role of the director has been multifaceted since the 1960s. On the one hand, those directors, despite all their different working methods, explored western and non-western acting techniques based on both personal input and collective creation. They challenged theatrical conventions of both the character and the process of making the performance. On the other hand, recent observations and studies distinguish the two main functions of the director, the acting coach and the scenographe, both having found new developments in cinema, television, and in various others events. Thirdly, the contemporary director challenges the performance of the text. In this sense, Antonin Artaud was a visionary. His theatre illustrates the need for the consideration of the totality of the text, as well as that of theatrical production. By contrasting the theories of Artaud, based on a non-dramatic form of theatre, with one of his plays (Le Jet de Sang), this chapter demonstrates how Artaud examined the process of making the performance as a performance. Live art and autobiographical performance, both taken as directing the se(f, reinforce this suggestion. Finally, since the 1990s, autobiographical performance or the performance of the self is a growing practical and theoretical perspective in both performance studies and psychology-related studies. This relates to the premise that each individual is making a representation (through memory, interpretation, etc.) of her/his own life (performativity). This last section explores the links between the place of the director in contemporary theatre and performers in autobiographical practices. The role of the traditional actor is challenged through non-identification of the character in the play, while performers (such as Chris Burden, Ron Athey, Orlan, Franko B, Sterlac) have, likewise, explored their own story/life as a performance. The thesis demonstrates the validity of the four parameters (performer, performance space, devising process, social event) defining a generic approach to the director. A generic perspective on the role of the director would encompass: a historical dimension relative to the reasons for and stages of the 'emergence' of the director; a socio-political analysis concerning the relationship between the director, her/his institutionalisation, and the political realm; and the relationship between performance theory, practice and the contemporary role of the director. Such a generic approach is a new departure in theatre research and might resonate in the study of other collaborative artistic practices.

Spectatorship and the war on terror:creating consensus through global audiences

This paper considers the staging of violence, atrocities, and sexuality in the conduct of the war on terror. The piece discusses the manner in which the terms of the war on terror appear to shut down possible debate and examines the rhetorical and representational strategies that cause this. The paper argues that the war on terror includes a cultural project that seeks to create a consenting global audience. This cultural project appears more diffuse and less immediately instrumental than the military and diplomatic activities of this global battle. The piece argues that it is through the circulation of open secrets and accounts of torture and abuse that a global audience is constructed as both witness and participant in the practices and objectives of the war and that this positioning is designed to corral audience understanding into the suggested narratives of the proponents of the war. Este documento considera el escenario de la violencia, las atrocidades y la sexualidad en la conducta de la guerra contra el terror. El artículo plantea la manera en que los términos de la guerra contra el terror parecen suspender un posible debate y examina las estrategias retóricas y representativas que causaron esto. El documento plantea que la guerra contra el terror incluye un proyecto cultural que busca crear una audiencia global de común acuerdo. Este proyecto cultural parece más difuso y menos útil en el momento, que las actividades militares y diplomáticas de esta batalla global. El artículo sostiene que es mediante la circulación de secretos abiertos y de informes sobre la tortura y el abuso, que se forma una audiencia global tanto testigos como participantes de las prácticas y los objetivos de la guerra y que esa posición está designada a encerrar el conocimiento de la audiencia dentro de los relatos sugeridos por los proponentes de guerra.

Disciplinary talk:a systemic functional exploration of university seminar discussions

Despite the growth of spoken academic corpora in recent years, relatively little is known about the language of seminar discussions in higher education. This thesis compares seminar discussions across three disciplinary areas. The aim of this thesis is to uncover the functions and patterns of talk used in different disciplinary discussions and to highlight language on a macro and micro level that would be useful for materials design and teaching purposes. A framework for identifying and analysing genres in spoken language based on Hallidayan Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) is used. Stretches of talk sharing a similar purpose and predictable functional staging, termed Discussion Macro Genres (DMGs) are identified. Language is compared across DMGs and across disciplines through use of corpus techniques in conjunction with SFL genre theory. Data for the study comprises just over 180,000 tokens and is drawn from the British Academic Spoken English corpus (BASE), recorded at two universities in the UK. The discipline areas investigated are Arts and Humanities, Social Sciences and Physical Sciences. Findings from this study make theoretical, empirical and methodological contributions to the field of spoken EAP. The empirical findings are firstly, that the majority of the seminar discussion can be assigned to one of the three main DMG in the corpus: Responding, Debating and Problem Solving. Secondly, it characterises each discipline area according to two DMGs. Thirdly, the majority of the discussion is non-oppositional in nature, suggesting that ‘debate’ is not the only form of discussion that students need to be prepared for. Finally, while some characteristics of the discussion are tied to the DMG and common across disciplines, others are discipline specific. On a theoretical level, this study shows that an SFL genre model for investigating spoken discourse can be successfully extended to investigate longer stretches of discourse than have previously been identified. The methodological contribution is to demonstrate how corpus techniques can be combined with SFL genre theory to investigate extended stretches of spoken discussion. The thesis will be of value to those working in the field of teaching spoken EAP/ ESAP as well as to materials developers.

Sustainable development, shock and awe? London 2012 and Civil Society

There is a disconnection between the top-down, elite, nature of sports mega-events and the ostensible redistributive and participatory sustainable development agendas staked out by BINGOs (Business-based International Non-Governmental Organizations) such as the contemporary International Olympic Committee (IOC). Focusing specifically on the London 2012 Summer Olympic and Paralympic Games, we argue that, for all the environmental technology advances offered by sports mega-events, their dominant model remains one of a hollowed-out form of sustainable development. Despite significant technical and methodological innovations in environmental stewardship, the development model of the London Olympics remains predicated on the satisfaction of transnational investment flows. We discuss what this means for claims about the staging of a ‘green’ Olympic Games.

Having your day in court:judicial opportunity and tactical choice in Anti-GMO campaigns in France and the United Kingdom

Investigating the recent direct action campaigns against genetically modified crops in France and the United Kingdom, the authors set out to understand how contrasting judicial systems and cultures affect the way that activists choose to commit ostensibly illegal actions and how they negotiate the trade-offs between effectiveness and public accountability. The authors find evidence that prosecution outcomes across different judicial systems are consistent and relatively predictable and consequently argue that the concept of a “judicial opportunity structure” is useful for developing scholars’ understanding of social movement trajectories. The authors also find that these differential judicial opportunities cannot adequately account for the tactical choices made by activists with respect to the staging of covert or overt direct action; rather, explanations of tactical choice are better accounted for by movement ideas, cultures, and traditions.

Strategies to optimize the impact of nutritional surveys and epidemiological studies

The development of nutrition and health guidelines and policies requires reliable scientific information. Unfortunately, theoretical considerations and empirical evidence indicate that a large percentage of science-based claims rely on studies that fail to replicate. The session "Strategies to Optimize the Impact of Nutrition Surveys and Epidemiological Studies" focused on the elements of design, interpretation, and communication of nutritional surveys and epidemiological studies to enhance and encourage the production of reliable, objective evidence for use in developing dietary guidance for the public. The speakers called for more transparency of research, raw data, consistent data-staging techniques, and improved data analysis. New approaches to collecting data are urgently needed to increase the credibility and utility of findings from nutrition epidemiological studies. Such studies are critical for furthering our knowledge and understanding of the effects of diet on health.