China's rising Soft Power: the role of rhetoric in constructing China-Africa relations

As China turns increasingly to the cultivation of soft power in the course of developing its foreign policy, the use of political rhetoric and its explicit and implicit audiences become more and more important, both on a bilateral level and within the international arena at large. Using the case of China's relations with African countries, this article examines key themes within China's diplomatic narrative regarding its role on the African continent and contrasts with Western and African responses.

The international implications of the Chinese model of development in the Global South: Asian Consensus as a network power

This paper analyzes People's Republic of China (PRC) economic and political ascendance in the 21st century focusing on the evolution of the sui generis economic development model and its significances of the evolution of relationship between China and the developing countries in the peripheral "Global South." The objective of this article is to analyze the relationship between China and the Global South (Africa and South America) in the 21st century, characterized as a new Center-periphery global network power based on trade and investment that we call as "Asian Consensus."

Privacy and Data Protection in Elderly Healthcare: Threats and Legal Warranties

The progressive aging of the population requires new kinds of social and medical intervention and the availability of different services provided to the elder population. New applications have been developed and some services are now provided at home, allowing the older people to stay home instead of having to stay in hospitals. But an adequate response to the needs of the users will imply a high percentage of use of personal data and information, including the building up and maintenance of user profiles, feeding the systems with the data and information needed for a proactive intervention in scheduling of events in which the user may be involved. Fundamental Rights may be at stake, so a legal analysis must also be considered.

Anotação sintética, numa perspectiva de Direito Público-penal e Direito Privado-civil, ao Acórdão do Supremo Tribunal de Justiça Português, de 19 de Abril de 2012-- A poluição sonora e o direito humano ao descanso e à saúde, sem descurar a necessidade duma adequada política tributária.

Resumo: 1 – Sumário do Acórdão do Supremo Tribunal de Justiça, de 19 de Abril de 2012; 2 – Texto completo do Acórdão do Supremo Tribunal de Justiça, de 19 de Abril de 2012: cfr. http://www.dgsi.pt/jstj.nsf/954f0ce6ad9dd8b980256b5f003fa814/fc664c231f3e73cf802579ea003d91d2?OpenDocument&Highlight=0,polui%C3%A7%C3%A3o , 2 de Junho de 2012; 3 – Anotação sintética; 3.1 – Introdução à anotação sintética e suas características neste caso concreto; 4 – Algumas referências constitucionais centrais em relação a Direitos humanos e, nomeadamente, a um Direito humano a um meio-ambiente sadio, saudável em todas as suas vertentes e sentidos – o exemplo central do artigo 9.º da CRP; 4.1 – Algumas referências constitucionais centrais em relação a Direitos humanos e, nomeadamente, a um Direito humano a um meio-ambiente sadio, saudável em todas as suas vertentes e sentidos – o exemplo central do artigo 66.º da CRP e o Regime Geral do Ruído; 5 – O direito humano ao descanso e à saúde, rectius o direito ao ambiente sadio vs o direito ao lazer e/ou exploração económica de indústrias de diversão, rectius o direito à liberdade de iniciativa económica privada; 6 – A violação do direito humano, de personalidade, ao descanso e à saúde, rectius o direito a um ambiente sadio, numa perspectiva de Direito privado e Direito civil; 7 – A criminalização da poluição, designadamente a criminalização da poluição sonora – uma perspectiva de Direito público e Direito penal; 8 - A necessidade duma adequada política tributária que compatibilize desenvolvimento sustentado com a protecção dum meio ambiente sadio e com qualidade de vida; 9 – Conclusões. § Abstract: 1 - Summary of the Judgment of the Supreme Court of April 19, 2012, 2 - Complete text of the Judgment of the Supreme Court of April 19, 2012: cf. http://www.dgsi.pt/jstj.nsf/954f0ce6ad9dd8b980256b5f003fa814/fc664c231f3e73cf802579ea003d91d2?OpenDocument&Highlight=0,polui%C3%A7%C3%A3o , June 2, 2012, 3 - Synthetic Note: 3.1 - Introduction to synthetic annotation and its characteristics in this case 4 - Some references constitutional power over human rights and in particular to a human right to a healthy environment, healthy in all its forms and meanings - the central example of Article 9. of CRP; 4.1 - Some references constitutional power over human rights and in particular to a human right to a healthy environment, healthy in all its forms and meanings - the central example of Article 66. No of CRP and the General Noise; 5 - the human right to rest and health, rectius the right to healthy environment vs. the right to leisure and / or economic exploitation of industries fun, rectius the right to freedom of private economic initiative; 6 - the violation of human personality, to rest and health, rectius the right to a healthy environment, a perspective of private law and civil law; 7 - criminalization of pollution, including the criminalization of noise - a perspective of public law and criminal law; 8 - the need for appropriate tax policy that reconciles sustainable development with the protection of a healthy environment and quality of life; 9 - Conclusions.

The Metaphysics of Information The Power and the Glory of Machinehood

Não há disciplina em qualquer ramo da ciência, seja esta natural, social, humana, descritiva, experimental ou teórica, qualitativa ou quantitativa, que não tenha sido afectada a vários níveis da instrumentalidade, conceptualização, construção de modelos, escolha de metáforas heurísticas ou ontológicas, e sentidO da investigação, em alguns casos muito profunda e decisivamente, pela influência crescente da constelação informacional computacional. A investigação baseada em simulações por computador é uma “terceira espécie de ciência”, que se soma aos tipos teórico e físico-experimental de trabalho científico. A ciber-ciência é um lugar natural para simular ciência, ou meta-ciberciência, mas todo o conhecimento científico cai no domínio da meta-ciberciência ou da filosofia da ciência computacional. A meta-ciência simula a ciência(o estudo computacional da produção do conhecimento científico); a ciber-ciência é por definição simulatória; a ciber-ciência simula a Natureza; a Natureza, segundo alguns físicos, é ela mesma uma simulação. Receber a categoria da informação nas ciências da vida e nas ciências humanas e sociais, da maneira específica como tem vindo a ocorrer, traz um considerável lastro metafísico: os humanos como máquinas, ultrapassáveis por máquinas inteligentes ou “espirituais”. A informação emerge como a alavanca de Arquimedes para as nossas intervenções n o domínio da vida e do espírito, de máquinas informacionais naturais, com evidentes implicações para a ciência política.

In the Shadow of Power

Pedro Feytor Pinto headed the Department of Information Services (SEIT) in the government of Marcello Caetano who replaced Antonio Oliveira Salazar in 1968 as the head of the Portuguese government. Feytor Pinto has just released a book entitled Na Sombra do Poder (In the Shadow of Power)[Lisboa, D. Quixote, 2011, pp. 402]. Not wishing to classify it as history or memoirs, yet hoping that historians may find it useful, the author chooses to narrate events as he experienced them from his vantage point in the shadow of Power, during the years ending with the Carnation Revolt of 25 April 1974, which put an end to half a century of dictatorship, known as Estado Novo.

Metaphors of opulence and power in the life of Thomas Wolsey, the King’s Cardinal

This essay approaches the display of power and rulership both through the art of writing and the art of painting by focusing on George Cavendish's biographical account of Thomas Wolsey.

A hybrid PSO-ANFIS approach for short-term wind power prediction in Portugal

The increased integration of wind power into the electric grid, as nowadays occurs in Portugal, poses new challenges due to its intermittency and volatility. Wind power prediction plays a key role in tackling these challenges. The contribution of this paper is to propose a new hybrid approach, combining particle swarm optimization and adaptive-network-based fuzzy inference system, for short-term wind power prediction in Portugal. Significant improvements regarding forecasting accuracy are attainable using the proposed approach, in comparison with the results obtained with five other approaches.

Direct Power Control of Matrix Converter Based Unified Power Flow Controllers

This paper presents the Direct Power Control of Three-Phase Matrix Converters (DPC-MC) operating as Unified Power Flow Controllers (UPFC). Since matrix converters allow direct AC/AC power conversion without intermediate energy storage link, the resulting UPFC has reduced volume and cost, together with higher reliability. Theoretical principles of DPC-MC method are established based on an UPFC model, together with a new direct power control approach based on sliding mode control techniques. As a result, active and reactive power can be directly controlled by selection of an appropriate switching state of matrix converter. This new direct power control approach associated to matrix converters technology guarantees decoupled active and reactive power control, zero error tracking, fast response times and timely control actions. Simulation results show good performance of the proposed system.

Risk Aversion in a Mixed-Integer Nonlinear Approach to Support Decision-Making for a Hydro Power Producer

In this paper, a mixed-integer nonlinear approach is proposed to support decision-making for a hydro power producer, considering a head-dependent hydro chain. The aim is to maximize the profit of the hydro power producer from selling energy into the electric market. As a new contribution to earlier studies, a risk aversion criterion is taken into account, as well as head-dependency. The volatility of the expected profit is limited through the conditional value-at-risk (CVaR). The proposed approach has been applied successfully to solve a case study based on one of the main Portuguese cascaded hydro systems.

Stability Condition Based Sliding Mode Modulators for Multilevel Power Converters

Sliding mode controllers for power converters usually employ hysteresis comparators to directly generate the power semiconductors switching states. This paper presents a new sliding mode modulator based on the direct implementation of the sliding mode stability condition, which for multilevel power converters shows advantages, as branch equalized switching frequencies and less distortion on the ac currents when operating near the rated converter power. The new sliding mode multilevel modulator is used to control a three-phase multilevel converter, operated as a reactive power compensator (STATCOM), implementing the stability condition in a digital signal processing system. The performance of this new sliding mode modulator is compared with a multilevel modulator based on hysteresis comparators. Simulation and experimental results are presented in order to highlight the system operation and control robustness.