Cooperative and market-based solutions to pollution abatement problems

This work concerns itself with the possibility of solutions, both cooperative and market based, to pollution abatement problems. In particular, we are interested in pollutant emissions in Southern California and possible solutions to the abatement problems enumerated in the 1990 Clean Air Act. A tradable pollution permit program has been implemented to reduce emissions, creating property rights associated with various pollutants.

Before we discuss the performance of market-based solutions to LA's pollution woes, we consider the existence of cooperative solutions. In Chapter 2, we examine pollutant emissions as a trans boundary public bad. We show that for a class of environments in which pollution moves in a bi-directional, acyclic manner, there exists a sustainable coalition structure and associated levels of emissions. We do so via a new core concept, one more appropriate to modeling cooperative emissions agreements (and potential defection from them) than the standard definitions.

However, this leaves the question of implementing pollution abatement programs unanswered. While the existence of a cost-effective permit market equilibrium has long been understood, the implementation of such programs has been difficult. The design of Los Angeles' REgional CLean Air Incentives Market (RECLAIM) alleviated some of the implementation problems, and in part exacerbated them. For example, it created two overlapping cycles of permits and two zones of permits for different geographic regions. While these design features create a market that allows some measure of regulatory control, they establish a very difficult trading environment with the potential for inefficiency arising from the transactions costs enumerated above and the illiquidity induced by the myriad assets and relatively few participants in this market.

It was with these concerns in mind that the ACE market (Automated Credit Exchange) was designed. The ACE market utilizes an iterated combined-value call market (CV Market). Before discussing the performance of the RECLAIM program in general and the ACE mechanism in particular, we test experimentally whether a portfolio trading mechanism can overcome market illiquidity. Chapter 3 experimentally demonstrates the ability of a portfolio trading mechanism to overcome portfolio rebalancing problems, thereby inducing sufficient liquidity for markets to fully equilibrate.

With experimental evidence in hand, we consider the CV Market's performance in the real world. We find that as the allocation of permits reduces to the level of historical emissions, prices are increasing. As of April of this year, prices are roughly equal to the cost of the Best Available Control Technology (BACT). This took longer than expected, due both to tendencies to mis-report emissions under the old regime, and abatement technology advances encouraged by the program. Vve also find that the ACE market provides liquidity where needed to encourage long-term planning on behalf of polluting facilities.

泥河湾盆地大长梁剖面岩石磁学和环境磁学研究

The fluvio-lacustrine sequence in the Nihewan Basin is an important archive of late Pliocene-Pleistocene climate and environment changes in temperate northern China, which provides excellent sources of early human settlements in high latitude East Asia. The recent years have witnessed a considerable progress in the paleomagnetic dating of its stratigraphy, which has notably increased our understanding of a series of important issues such as the early human occupation in the Old World, the infilling history of the Nihewan Basin, and the chronological sequence of the Nihewan faunas. Up to now, the long-term paleoenvironmental changes directly retrieved from this basin, which might influence the evolution and expansion of early humans in the Nihewan Basin, are still poorly constrained, although several paleoclimatic records have been retrieved from this area. In this study, a combined mineral-magnetic and geochemical investigation was carried out on the fluvio-lacustrine sequence from the Dachangliang section at the eastern margin of the basin in order to reveal its rock magnetic and environmental magnetic characteristics and its implications for early human evolution in East Asia. The major findings and conclusions are listed as the following: First, there is an increased cooling coupled with an intensified aridification recorded in the fluvio-lacustrine sequence of the Dachangliang section. The cooling is related to an up-section decrease in propensity to chemical weathering as inferred from an increase in low-field susceptibility after cycling to 700 °C. Close to 700 °C, reacting chlorite is providing the iron source for newly formed very fine-grained ferrimagnetic minerals which enhances the susceptibility signal. The reactivity of chlorite after annealing at temperatures above 600 °C is documented with X-ray diffraction. Second, degrees of chemical weathering in the Nihewan Basin are further estimated by clay mineralogy (i.e. chlorite and illite contents and chlorite/illite ratio) and a series of major element proxies (i.e. Na2O/Al2O3 versus K2O/Al2O3 diagram, Al2O3-(CaO + Na2O)-K2O ternary diagram (A-CN-K), chemical index of alteration (CIA), (CaO + Na2O + MgO)/TiO2, (CaO + Na2O + MgO + K2O)/(TiO2 + Al2O3), CaO/Al2O3 and CaO/TiO2). The up-section decrease in propensity to chemical weathering suggested by the aforementioned rock mangetic measurement is further confirmed by these geochemical analyses. Combining the chemical weathering records from the Nihewan Basin, Chinese Loess Plateau, South China Sea and eastern China, we find that the consecutive decreasing trend in chemical weathering intensity during the late Cenozoic is ubiquitous across China. This pattern may result from a long-term decreasing East Asian summer monsoon and increasing East Asian winter monsoon, and thus a consecutive increasing of aridification and cooling in Asia during the Quaternary. Furthermore, the chemical weathering intensity increased from South China to North China during the Quaternary, in line with the decreasing East Asian summer monsoon and increasing East Asian winter monsoon and thus the gradually intensified aridification and cooling from South China to North China. Third, a combined mineral-magnetic and geochemical investigation provides evidences that the large-amplitude alterations of concentration of magnetic minerals mainly result from preservation/dissolution cycles of detrital magnetic minerals in alternately oxic and anoxic depositional environments. The preservation/dissolution model implies that the high-magnetic and low-magnetic cycles of this sedimentary sequence represent glacial and interglacial climate cycles, respectively. This contribute significnatly to our understanding of the link between climate and magnetic properties. Finally, the paleoclimatic implications of these rock magnetic and geochemical characteristics significantly increase our understanding of the general setting of early humans in high northern latitude in East Asia. We propose that the cold and dry climate may have contributed significantly to the expansion and adaptation of early humans, rather than bringing hardship, as is often thought. The relationship between magnetic properties and climate possibly provides valuable information on the climatic context of the Paleolithic sites in the basin, especially whether the occupation occurred during an interglacial or glacial period.

The local and global dimensions of metalliferous pollution derived from a reconstruction of an eight thousand year record of copper smelting and mining at a desert-mountain frontier in southern Jordan

Grattan, J.P., Gilbertson, D.D., Hunt, C.O. (2007). The local and global dimensions of metaliferrous air pollution derived from a reconstruction of an 8 thousand year record of copper smelting and mining at a desert-mountain frontier in southern Jordan. Journal of Archaeological Science 34, 83-110

Asian Christology and the Mahayana : a reprint of the century-old "Indian Church History", by Thomas Yeates ; and the further investigation of the religion of the Orient as influenced by the Apostle of the Hindus and Chinese

http://www.archive.org/details/asianchristology00gorduoft

“Something isn’t right here”: American exceptionalism and the creative nonfiction of the Vietnam War

In this thesis, I argue that few attempts were as effective in correcting the exceptionalist ethos of the United States than the creative nonfiction written by the veterans and journalists of the Vietnam War. Using critical works on creative nonfiction, I identify the characteristics of the genre that allowed Paul John Eakin to call it ‘a special kind of fiction.’ I summarise a brief history of creative nonfiction to demonstrate how it became a distinctly American form despite its Old World origins. I then claim that it was the genre most suited to the kind of ideological transformation that many hoped to instigate in U.S. society in the aftermath of Vietnam. Following this, the study explores how this “new” myth-making process occurred. I use Tim O’Brien’s If I Die in a Combat Zone and Philip Caputo’s A Rumor of War to illustrate how autobiography/memoir was able to demonstrate the detrimental effect that America’s exceptionalist ideology was having on its population. Utilising narrative and autobiographical theory, I contend that these accounts represented a collective voice which spoke for all Americans in the years after Vietnam. Using Neil Sheehan’s A Bright Shining Lie and C.D.B. Bryan’s Friendly Fire, I illustrate how literary journalism highlighted the hubris of the American government. I contend that while poiesis is an integral attribute of creative nonfiction, by the inclusion of extraneous bibliographic material, authors of the genre could also be seen as creating a literary context predisposing the reader towards an empirical interpretation of the events documented within. Finally, I claim that oral histories were in their essence a synthesis of “everyman” experiences very much in keeping with the American zeitgeist of the early Eighties. Focussing solely on Al Santoli’s Everything We Had, I demonstrate how such polyphonic narratives personalised the history of the Vietnam War.

Cross-cultural dimensions of meaning in the evaluation of events in world history? Perceptions of historical calamities and progress in cross-cultural data from 30 societies

The universality versus culture specificity of quantitative evaluations (negative-positive) of 40 events in world history was addressed using World History Survey data collected from 5,800 university students in 30 countries/societies. Multidimensional scaling using generalized procrustean analysis indicated poor fit of data from the 30 countries to an overall mean configuration, indicating lack of universal agreement as to the associational meaning of events in world history. Hierarchical cluster analysis identified one Western and two non-Western country clusters for which adequate multidimensional fit was obtained after item deletions. A two-dimensional solution for the three country clusters was identified, where the primary dimension was historical calamities versus progress and a weak second dimension was modernity versus resistance to modernity. Factor analysis further reduced the item inventory to identify a single concept with structural equivalence across cultures, Historical Calamities, which included man-made and natural, intentional and unintentional, predominantly violent but also nonviolent calamities. Less robust factors were tentatively named as Historical Progress and Historical Resistance to Oppression. Historical Calamities and Historical Progress were at the individual level both significant and independent predictors of willingness to fight for one’s country in a hierarchical linear model that also identified significant country-level variation in these relationships. Consensus around calamity but disagreement as to what constitutes historical progress is discussed in relation to the political culture of nations and lay perceptions of history as catastrophe.

Emerging Infectious Disease: Host and Parasite Perspectives

Avian malaria and related haematozoa are nearly ubiquitous parasites that can impose fitness costs of variable severity and may, in some cases, cause substantial mortality in their host populations. One example of the latter, the emergence of avian malaria in the endemic avifauna of Hawaii, has become a model for understanding the consequences of human-mediated disease introduction. The drastic declines of native Hawaiian birds due to avian malaria provided the impetus for examining more closely several aspects of host-parasite interactions in this system. Host-specificity is an important character determining the extent to which a parasite may emerge. Traditional parasite classification, however, has used host information as a character in taxonomical identification, potentially obscuring the true host range of many parasites. To improve upon previous methods, I first developed molecular tools to identify parasites infecting a particular host. I then used these molecular techniques to characterize host-specificity of parasites in the genera Plasmodium and Haemoproteus. I show that parasites in the genus Plasmodium exhibit low specificity and are therefore most likely to emerge in new hosts in the future. Subsequently, I characterized the global distribution of the single lineage of P. relictum that has emerged in Hawaii. I demonstrate that this parasite has a broad host distribution worldwide, that it is likely of Old World origin and that it has been introduced to numerous islands around the world, where it may have been overlooked as a cause of decline in native birds. I also demonstrate that morphological classification of P. relictum does not capture differences among groups of parasites that appear to be reproductively isolated based on molecular evidence. Finally, I examined whether reduced immunological capacity, which has been proposed to explain the susceptibility of Hawaiian endemics, is a general feature of an "island syndrome" in isolated avifauna of the remote Pacific. I show that, over multiple time scales, changes in immune response are not uniform and that observed changes probably reflect differences in genetic diversity, parasite exposure and life history that are unique to each species.

Shifting Loyalties: World War I and the Conflicted Politics of Patriotism in the British Caribbean

This dissertation examines how the crisis of World War I impacted imperial policy and popular claims-making in the British Caribbean. Between 1915 and 1918, tens of thousands of men from the British Caribbean volunteered to fight in World War I and nearly 16,000 men, hailing from every British colony in the region, served in the newly formed British West Indies Regiment (BWIR). Rousing appeals to imperial patriotism and manly duty during the wartime recruitment campaigns and postwar commemoration movement linked the British Empire, civilization, and Christianity while simultaneously promoting new roles for women vis-à-vis the colonial state. In Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago, the two colonies that contributed over seventy-five percent of the British Caribbean troops, discussions about the meaning of the war for black, coloured, white, East Indian, and Chinese residents sparked heated debates about the relationship among race, gender, and imperial loyalty.

To explore these debates, this dissertation foregrounds the social, cultural, and political practices of BWIR soldiers, tracing their engagements with colonial authorities, military officials, and West Indian civilians throughout the war years. It begins by reassessing the origins of the BWIR, and then analyzes the regional campaign to recruit West Indian men for military service. Travelling with newly enlisted volunteers across the Atlantic, this study then chronicles soldiers' multi-sited campaign for equal status, pay, and standing in the British imperial armed forces. It closes by offering new perspectives on the dramatic postwar protests by BWIR soldiers in Italy in 1918 and British Honduras and Trinidad in 1919, and reflects on the trajectory of veterans' activism in the postwar era.

This study argues that the racism and discrimination soldiers experienced overseas fueled heightened claims-making in the postwar era. In the aftermath of the war, veterans mobilized collectively to garner financial support and social recognition from colonial officials. Rather than withdrawing their allegiance from the empire, ex-servicemen and civilians invoked notions of mutual obligation to argue that British officials owed a debt to West Indians for their wartime sacrifices. This study reveals the continued salience of imperial patriotism, even as veterans and their civilian allies invoked nested local, regional, and diasporic loyalties as well. In doing so, it contributes to the literature on the origins of patriotism in the colonial Caribbean, while providing a historical case study for contemporary debates about "hegemonic dissolution" and popular mobilization in the region.

This dissertation draws upon a wide range of written and visual sources, including archival materials, war recruitment posters, newspapers, oral histories, photographs, and memoirs. In addition to Colonial Office records and military files, it incorporates previously untapped letters and petitions from the Jamaica Archives, National Archives of Trinidad and Tobago, Barbados Department of Archives, and US National Archives.

Short reflections on the history of African communication

This article aims to propose a chronological subdivision in the history of African communication. African communication today is one of the most important axes for implementing development strategies, sustaining education, health, and schooling programmes, and so on. However, many of these programmes fail due to a lack of or ineffective communication between international organisations, local elite and lay people. The reasons for this situation must be found in Africa’s history of communication, which has undergone radical transformations in its different phases. Using the functionalist analysis drawn up by Jakobson, this article proposes a new chronological subdivision of Africa’s history of communication, reflecting on the current contradictions in contemporary communication in Africa.

Troubled Geographies: A Spatial History of Religion and Society in Ireland

Ireland’s landscape is marked by fault lines of religious, ethnic, and political identity that have shaped its troubled history. Troubled Geographies maps this history by detailing the patterns of change in Ireland from 16th century attempts to “plant” areas of Ireland with loyal English Protestants to defend against threats posed by indigenous Catholics, through the violence of the latter part of the 20th century and the rise of the “Celtic Tiger.” The book is concerned with how a geography laid down in the 16th and 17th centuries led to an amalgam based on religious belief, ethnic/national identity, and political conviction that continues to shape the geographies of modern Ireland. Troubled Geographies shows how changes in religious affiliation, identity, and territoriality have impacted Irish society during this period. It explores the response of society in general and religion in particular to major cultural shocks such as the Famine and to long term processes such as urbanization.

Investigating Behaviour and Face Encoding in a Hypothetical Real-World Social Contract: Handwashing in Hazardous Health Settings

Investigations into the evolutionary origins of human cognition has shown that individuals’ memory for others is influenced by the latter’s behaviour in social contracts. Such research is primarily based on hypothetical or more abstract forms of social contracts, whereas an application of this knowledge to everyday health behaviours can be of great value. To address this, the current study investigated whether participants who were asked to imagine themselves in a hypothetical hazardous health scenario showed differential response sensitivity (d’) and latency (RT) to faces of hospital staff tagged with contrasting hand hygiene before touching patients: clean hands, dirty hands, or unknown hand-washing behaviour (control). The test used a two alternative forced-choice (2AFC: “old/new”) face recognition paradigm. The findings showed that d’ to dirty and clean hands was similar, but higher than for controls. Moreover, d’ was not affected by the occupation of hospital staff (nurses vs porters). The absence of memory gains towards clean or dirty hands points to the need for new strategies to remind patients to observe (and remember) the hand hygiene of others when exposed to hazardous health environments.

Daniel D. Tompkins letter to General Dearborn, June 28, 1812.

Transcript [original spelling and grammar retained]: Albany June 28 1812 Sir Your letter of the 23d has been received. I had anticipated your request by ordering the detachment from Washington, Essex, Clinton and Franklin Counties into service and have fixed the days and places of their Rendezvous. Upon application to the quarter master General I find there are but 139 tents & 60 camp kettles at this place & even those I take by a kind of stealth. The Deputy Quarter Master General declines giving an order for their delivery until he shall have a written order from the Quarter Master General, and the latter is willing I Shall take them but will not give the Deputy a written order for that purpose. Under Such circumstances I shall avail myself of the rule of Possession and by virtue of the Eleven Points of Law Send them tomorrow morning without a written order from anyone. You may remember that when you were Secretary of the war department I invited you to forward and deposit in our Frontier Arsenals, arms ammunition and camp equipage free of expense to be ready in case of war and the same invitation to the war department has been repeated some time, Since The United States have now from 5 to 600 regular troops at Plattsburgh, Rome, Canandaigua & c, where those arsenals are, and yet those recruits are now and must be for weeks to come unarmed and unequipped in every respect although within musket Shot of arsenals. The recruits at Plattsburgh are within 50 miles of two tribes of Canadian Indians. In case of an attack upon the Frontiers that portion of the United States army would be as inefficient and unable to defend the inhabitants or themselves even. The Militia Detachments on the Western Frontiers received the news of war with [cherafulness] and determined courage, and I am happy to find they are united late brothers, highly improved in Discipline & ready to devote themselves to any Service or danger which the good of the Country may require. But they are in barracks from which they cannot move a days march for the want of tents and other equipage, and they are in Separate and Independent Detachments without a General Officer to command them or combine their exertions for the accomplishment of any desirable and important object. The only officer of the United States here who can do anything is the Quarter Master General and he has not a tent Camp Kettle or Knapsack in this arsenal except what I have concluded to send off tomorrow morning as above mentioned to furnish men As to Cannon Muskets and Ammunition. I can find now one here who will exercise any authority over them or deliver a Single article upon my requisition. Neither can I find any Officer of the army who feel himself authorized to exercise any authority or do any act which will aid me in the all important object of protecting the Inhabitants of an extended Frontier exposed to the Cruelties of Savages and the depredations of the enemy. If I must rely upon the Militia Solely for Such protection I entreat you to give orders to your Officers to furnish upon my orders, for the use of the Militia Detachments , all needful weapons and articles with which the United States are Supplied and of which we are destitute . You may rely upon all the assistance which my talents, influence or authority can furnish in the active prosecution of the first & necessary way which has been declared by the Constituted Authorities of our beloved Country. I am, Sir, respectfully Your ob. Servt. Daniel D. Tompkins

Shari'a Commercial Law : "old wine in new bottles?"

Suite à la crise financière globale de 2008, ainsi qu’aux différents facteurs qui y ont mené, il est étonnant qu’une alternative éthique et juste pour une finance lucrative et stable n’existe toujours pas (ou du moins, demeure oubliée). Ayant décidé de contribuer au domaine pluri-centenaire du Droit Commercial de la Chari’a, nous avons été surpris par la découverte d’une problématique à l’origine de cette thèse. En France, nous avons suivi des débats doctrinaux intéressants dont les conclusions se rapprochent de la perception générale Occidentale quand à la nature de la finance Islamique, que ce soit au niveau de la finance basée sur le Droit de la Chari’a ou encore les exigences de sa pleine introduction dans le système juridique français de l’époque. Cet intérêt initial dans la finance islamique a ensuite mené à un intérêt dans la question des avantages d’éthique et de justice du Droit Commercial de la Chari’a dans son ensemble, qui est au coeur de cette thèse. Dans le monde moderne du commerce et de la finance d’aujourd’hui, les transactions sont marquées par une prise de risque excessive et un esprit de spéculation qui s’apparente aux jeux de hasard, et menant à des pertes colossales. Pire encore, ces pertes sont ensuite transférées à la collectivité. Par conséquent, y at-il des préceptes, des principes ou des règles éthiques et juridiques qui peuvent fournir une certaine forme de sécurité et de protection dans les marchés financiers d'aujourd'hui? Est-ce réalisable? Cette thèse soutient que la richesse de la jurisprudence islamique ainsi que ses règles dont les avantages n’ont pas encore été pleinement saisis et régénérés en réponse aux nouveaux défis d’aujourd'hui, peuvent encore fournir continuellement des solutions, et réformer des produits financiers de façon à refléter des principes de justice et d'équité. Dans ce processus, un éclairage nouveau sera apporté à certains sujets déjà connus dans le cadre de la contribution prévue de cette thèse, mais ne sera pas le principal objectif de la thèse.

Histoire d'une profession disparue: les puéricultrices du Québec, 1925-1985

Ce mémoire porte sur l’évolution de la profession de puéricultrice au Québec entre 1925 et 1985. Il cherche plus spécifiquement à éclairer les raisons de la disparition de cette profession. Celle-ci prend racine dans le contexte de la lutte contre la mortalité infantile et de la médicalisation croissante de la maternité, ce dernier phénomène connaissant de profondes modifications au cours du XXe siècle. En parallèle, les systèmes de santé et d’éducation québécois connaissent d’importants bouleversements. Comment la profession de puéricultrice évolue-t-elle devant ces changements ? Comment tentera-t-elle de faire sa place dans le monde des spécialistes des soins et de l’enfance ? Par ailleurs, quelle place la société, plus spécifiquement le monde médical et l’État, lui réservera-t-elle au fil du temps et pour quelles raisons ? Qu’est-ce qui explique sa disparition ? Voilà les questions auxquelles ce mémoire cherche à répondre. Afin de bien ancrer les origines de la profession, notre analyse s’est d’abord penchée sur les raisons de la création des premières formations en puériculture et des stratégies de professionnalisation des puéricultrices. Notre recherche s’est ensuite intéressée aux discours des acteurs s’étant prononcés sur le sort des puéricultrices à la suite des grandes réformes des années 1960-1970 ainsi qu’au discours des puéricultrices qui cherchent à s’inscrire dans ce nouveau système de santé étatisé. Nous émettons l’hypothèse que la profession de puéricultrice a été victime de plusieurs facteurs dont les multiples réorganisations du système de santé ainsi que de la compétition entre les professions de la santé, mais plus profondément d’une conception de la maternité qui se modifie considérablement au cours de la période étudiée.