Ward-Perkins, B., The fall of Rome and the end of civilization, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2005, 239 páginas

Fil: Sarachu, Pablo. Universidad Nacional de La Plata. Facultad de Humanidades y Ciencias de la Educación; Argentina.

The misconception of political lessons : how UMNO perceives the fall of LDP in Japan

2012 marks the thirtieth anniversary of Malaysia’s Look East Policy (LEP). This article argues that the strong relationship between Malaysia and Japan is stimulated by symbiotic ties binding together both countries’ respective major political parties, viz. the United Malays National Organisation (UMNO) and the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP). UMNO, especially under the leadership of Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad (1981-2003), derived political lessons from developments affecting LDP in Japan. Two forms of lessons may be discerned. First, emulation of Japan’s success in economic development, which become the basis of LEP launched in 1981. Second, on which our article focuses, lessons from the failure of LDP to retain power twice in 1993 and 2009. Since 1993, DP’s defeat has been a poignant reminder for UMNO to be in alert mode in facing any electoral possibility. When LDP was again ousted from power in 2009, UMNO was a most psychologically affected party owing to the unprecedented setback it suffered at Malaysia’s Twelfth General Elections (GE) of 2008. Yet, although LDP’s reversal of fortunes served as a landmark for UMNO in situating changes to its trajectory since 1999, the analogical reasoning and political lessons applied by UMNO leaders were, to a large extent, flawed. Arguably, politicians frequently do misjudge in analogising between different situations which at a glance seem to be comparable.

The evolution of man: a popular exposition of the principal points of human ontogney phylogeny / From the German of Ernst Haeckel.

2

The evolution of man: a popular exposition of the principal points of human ontogeny and phylogeny. From the German of Ernst Haeckel.

2

The evolution of man: a popular exposition of the principal points of human ontogeny and phylogeny. From the German of Ernst Haeckel.

1

The rise and fall of the medical mediated searcher

The relationship between the development of mediated online literature searching and the recruitment of medical librarians to fill positions as online searchers was investigated. The history of database searching by medical librarians was outlined and a content analysis of thirty-five years of job advertisements in MLA News from 1961 through 1996 was summarized. Advertisements for online searchers were examined to test the hypothesis that the growth of mediated online searching was reflected in the recruitment of librarians to fill positions as mediated online searchers in medical libraries. The advent of end-user searching was also traced to determine how this trend affected the demand for mediated online searching and job availability of online searchers. Job advertisements were analyzed to determine what skills were in demand as end-user searching replaced mediated online searching as the norm in medical libraries. Finally, the trend away from mediated online searching to support of other library services was placed in the context of new roles for medical librarians.

Sovereignty and Intervention in the Middle East: From the Fall of the Ottoman Empire to the Arab Spring

This research provides an institutional explanation of the practices of external intervention in the Arab state system from the fall of the Ottoman Empire in 1922 to the Arab Spring. My explanation consists of two institutional variables: sovereignty and inter-state borders. I examine the changes in regional and international norms of sovereignty and their impact on the practices of external intervention in the Arab state system. I also examine the impact of the level of institutionalization of inter-state borders in the Arab World on the practices of external intervention. I argue that changes in regional and international norms of sovereignty and changes in the level of institutionalization of inter-state borders have constituted the significant variation over time in both the frequency and type of external intervention in the Arab state system from 1922 to the present. My institutional explanation and findings seriously challenge the traditional accounts of sovereignty and intervention in the Arab World, including the cultural perspectives that emphasize the conflict between sovereignty, Arabism, and Islam, the constructivist accounts that emphasize the regional norm of pan-Arabism, the comparative politics explanations that focus on the domestic material power of the Arab state, the post-colonial perspectives that emphasize the artificiality of the Arab state, and the realist accounts that focus on great powers and the regional distribution of power in the Middle East. This research also contributes to International Relations Theory. I construct a new analytical framework to study the relations between sovereignty, borders, and intervention, combining theoretical elements from the fields of Role Theory, Social Constructivism, and Institutionalization. Methodologically, this research includes both quantitative and qualitative analysis. I conduct content analysis of official documents of Arab states and the Arab League, Arabic press documents, and Arab political thought. I also utilize quantitative data sets on international intervention.

Report of the treasurer of the Committee of Relief for the Sufferers by the Fall of the Pemberton Mill, in Lawrence, Mass, on the 10th of January, 1860

Signed, p. 19: Charles S. Storrow.

The early history of man : with special reference to the Cap-Blanc skeleton / by Henry Field, Assistant Curator of Physical Anthropology.

no.26(1927)

The Fall of the East German Birth Rate After Unification: Crisis or Means of Adaptation? CES Germany & Europe Working Papers, No. 05.6, 26 June 1995

Since the fall of the Wall, Eastern Germans have drastically changed their demographic behavior. Marriages and births have dropped to an unprecedented low level. Our paper tracks birth rates of the East German population, past, present, and future. We propose a simulation model of future cohort fertility. The hypotheses we develop build on the historical record of reproductive behavior in the German Democratic Republic (GDR) since 1960 and on an analysis of the pattern of change between 1990 and 1994. The particular emphasis lies in the assumption that East German couples will rapidly westernize their family size by trying to reach completed fertility levels of the corresponding West German cohort. This implies that the resulting adaptation process includes the postunification crisis as a logical first step.

A Pan-European District for the European Elections? The Rise and Fall of the Duff Proposal for the Electoral Reform of the European Parliament. Bruges Political Research Papers 44/2015.

The aim of the present article is to understand the dynamics underlying the birth, the development and the eventual failure of the Duff proposal of 2009-2012, an ambitious attempt to change the provisions governing the elections for the European Parliament. In particular, the way agenda-setting on electoral reform is shaped in the European Union will be analysed, trying to understand if the current stalemate on the issue can be explained in light of factors specific to the EU. The report presented by liberal MEP Andrew Duff at the beginning of the seventh legislature called on Member States to gather a Convention, in order to introduce fundamental improvements in the way Members of the European Parliament are elected. Among the envisaged changes, the creation of a pan-European constituency to elect twenty-five Members on transnational lists represented the most controversial issue. After having analysed its main elements, the path of the Duff report from the committee of Constitutional Affairs (AFCO) to the plenary will be analysed. It will be concluded that a sharp contrast exists between the way electoral issues are raised in the AFCO committee and the way the Parliament as a whole deals with them. Moreover, diverging interests between national delegations inside groups seem to play a decisive role in hampering electoral reform. While further research is needed to corroborate the present findings, the analysis of the Duff proposal appears to shed light on the different barriers that ensure electoral reform is taken off the agenda of the Union, and on the relative weight each of them carries.